These words were written to describe Gen. JEB Stuart not by a high-ranking officer, but by a sergeant in the 4th Texas Infantry, Valerius Cincinnatus “Val” Giles (life dates 1842-1915) who served in Gen. John B. Hood's Texas Brigade. Here is Giles's recollection.

Nurse Katherine Wormeley witnessed the horrors of war firsthand during the Peninsula Campaign, tending to soldiers wounded after the Battle of Seven Pines. She reflected on suffering, duty, and resilience in vivid letters that reveal the human cost of the Civil War. Here's her story.

Valerius Cincinnatus “Val” Giles (1842–1915), of the 4th Texas Infantry, recalled the hard fighting he and his regiment endured during the assault on Little Round Top during the second day of the Battle of Gettysburg. Here is his recollection.

A journey down the research rabbit hole to learn more about Joseph Brunson’s service with then 14th South Carolina Infantry and the Army of Northern Virginia reveals a memorable encounter with Gen. Robert E. Lee. Here's the story.

Valerius Cincinnatus “Val” Giles (1842–1915), of the 4th Texas Infantry, recalled the hard fighting he and his regiment endured at the Battle of Chickamauga, which he observed "was the West against the South, about equally divided on both sides, and they fought it out right there." Here's his rem...

Private Columbus R. Warfield’s firsthand account of the Union charge at the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain captures the chaos, fear, and confusion of the fighting, offering a ground-level view less commonly found in official reports from generals and senior officers. Here's Warfield's recollection.

In a letter written a month after the momentous victory at Vicksburg, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman reflected on law, democracy, and rebellion, arguing that national authority must prevail over local opinion. His words reveal a turning point in Union strategy and a growing belief in uncompromising...

In this 1864 letter from Vicksburg to Maj. Roswell M. Sawyer, a fellow officer and friend, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman outlines his views on warfare against civilians and reveals his views on the hardening Union policy toward the South as the conflict evolved into a harsher, total war.

An 1864 editorial in the Chicago Tribune argued that slavery contradicted the Founders’ vision of a republic and must be eradicated. It reflected wartime, and, later, Reconstruction thinking that connected the nation's survival to emancipation, warning that compromise with slavery risked a second...

The cavalry volume of Francis Trevelyan Miller's 1911 Photographic History of the Civil War included Capt. George "Van" Vanderbilt’s vivid account of green cavalrymen struggling with horses and gear near Fredericksburg, capturing the chaos, humor, and hard lessons of soldiers learning war in real...

Three weeks after Antietam, the massive numbers of wounded soldiers still blanketed the battlefield, tucked away in crude field hospitals scattered across the land. The lack of proper food, medical supplies and shelter amounted to a humanitarian crisis. The sheer volume of casualties overwhelmed ...

During the final, bitter weeks of the war, as large portions of Confederate territory had descended into economic ruin and social disorder, anger and frustration reached the boiling point. In South Carolina, Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman reacted with a strongly worded letter to Lt. Gen. Wade Hampt...

The death of Colonel John Singleton Mosby at age 83 in 1916 made headlines in newspapers across the United States. The Baltimore Sun published a biographical sketch of the late colonel written by James W. Foster, who had served as captain of Company A in Mosby's 43rd Battalion Virginia Cavalry.

Sarah Elizabeth Simcox’s Civil War story reveals love, loss, and resilience—leaving home to find her wounded husband to a hospital, nursing soldiers, and enduring widowhood after his death in Confederate prison. Here's her story.

A family-held portrait of 1st Lt. Waldo C. VanValin of the 45th Pennsylvania Infantry opens the door to his vivid first-person account of Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant’s Overland Campaign and the brutal fighting at the Battle of the Wilderness. Here's VanValin's recollection.

Major Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman responded to Southern accusations of brutality during the March to the Sea by describing how Union forces governed Savannah and protected civilians after capturing the city in 1864.

Union engineer Andrew Hickenlooper received an order from Maj. Gen. James B. McPherson that seemed impossible. But, a stroke of genius led to an out of the box solution that saved the day and raised Hickenlooper even higher in the esteem of McPherson and other superiors. Here's what happened.

William S. Sturgis Jr. served just four months in the Civil War, yet his two emergency militia activations came at critical moments. A sergeant in New York’s 22nd State Militia, he guarded Baltimore and Harper's Ferry in 1862 and rushed to Pennsylvania during Lee’s 1863 invasion, standing ready f...

A grave marker in Loudoun County, Va., bearing the word “assassinated” leads to the story of a trooper in Confederate Lt. Col. Elijah Viers “Lige” White’s 35th Battalion Virginia Cavalry. Known for bold raids and relentless attacks, Mobberly terrorized the region until Union soldiers ambushed and...

After hours of brutal combat at the Battle of Shiloh, only about 80 men remained of the 11th Illinois Infantry. They included Ira Beddo, who continued fighting despite a mangled hand. Their stubborn stand helped hold the line during one of the Civil War’s bloodiest engagements.

William Baldwin Fletcher held high hopes of serving as a Union army surgeon. When that prospect failed to materialize, he instead became a scout for Brig. Gen. Joseph J. Reynolds. Thus began his adventures in western Virginia during the earliest months of the war. Here is what happened.

After witnessing the aftermath of Col. Elmer E. Ellsworth’s shooting in May 1861, Edward B. Knox carried his friend’s legacy from Alexandria to Gettysburg, earning honors for bravery and lifelong devotion to the Union cause. Here's his story.

On April 18, 1861, in Baltimore, the Washington Artillery of Pottsville, Pa., disembarked from a train and marched through the city to the jeers and taunts of Southern sympathetic mobs. One of the Pennsylvanians, Nick Biddle, was one of the targets for their anger. Here's what happened.

Captain Dennis Barnes of the 93rd New York Infantry found himself deep in The Wilderness on the night of May 5, 1864, searching for men wounded and left behind in the thick underbrush after a brutal, bloody, and relentless day of combat. Here's what happened next.