Monthly Archives: March 2011

Yesterday in his blog, Crossroads, Brooks Simpson discusses how the National Park Service has too often neglected slavery and emancipation in interpreting Civil War battlefields. Simpson writes: NPS sites don’t always tell us much about the story of slavery and emancipation.  For … Continue reading →

In March 1861, Arizona Territory seceded from the Union. However, the Arizona that announced it was leaving the United States bore only a passing resemblance to the present-day state of Arizona. What is today Arizona and New Mexico at the … Continue reading →

Wednesday’s Disunion in the New York Times has an interesting piece by Daniel W. Crofts on Charles Francis Adams, son of John Quincy Adams, grandson of John Adams, and during the Civil War period, U.S. ambassador to Great Britain. The piece is … Continue reading →

Spring 1861 was a horrible time for the Upper South, as the slave states there had to decide whether to cast their lot with the Lower South in the new Confederacy or with the Union many there still held dear. … Continue reading →

On March 22, 1861, the New York Times reprinted for its readers a story from Virginia that had appeared three days before in the Petersburgh Express. The story related an account of a slave in Dinwiddie County, Virginia, who had … Continue reading →

When historians want to cite evidence of the Civil War being about slavery, they often make use of Alexander H. Stephens’ Cornerstone Speech. As Civil War Emancipation has demonstrated ad nauseum there is plenty of other evidence on this point. So … Continue reading →

Arkansas, like the entire Upper South, was torn on the issue of secession during Spring 1861. The state’s secession convention assembled on March 4, 1861, to consider the state’s future vis-à-vis the Union. It is clear that conditional unionists in Arkansas quickly took control of the … Continue reading →

From the perspective of 150 years later it is possible to apply penetrating hindsight to Spring 1861. For example, the March 10 edition of Civil War Emancipation was able to look at a few instances of slaves seeking sanctuary at … Continue reading →

Disunion in the New York Times recently described Abraham Lincoln early in his presidency as a “Rookie Executive” and it was true. Lincoln had no real executive experience before becoming president, and even in his law partnership he tended to concentrate on litigation … Continue reading →

Yesterday’s Disunion in the New York Times has a fascinating piece by Ben Tarnoff discussing the frustrating problems of the Confederate government in financing its war effort. Failed efforts at taxation and limited capital for borrowing in the South meant the Confederacy largely financed its … Continue reading →