Boys to Men

Editor’s Note: Please welcome Matt Hollis, one of a number of new amateur Civil War bloggers here at TOCWOC.  Matt and the rest of the group are here to bring some fresh new perspectives to TOCWOC, a blog I founded back in late 2006.  My goal is to bring you the reader fresh content from a variety of perspectives five days a week.  I look forward to what Matt and the others will bring to the table.

I love Civil War history!

There, I said it.  Often times the first step to recovery is admission of the condition. I’m quite certain that this is an addiction that I can live with; some would say that I can’t live without.

My addiction began when I was a 10 year old boy, some 32 years ago.  It started innocently enough with a Saturday bike ride on the Chickamauga battlefield with my family.  Most people in the Chattanooga area appreciate the Battlefield for its recreational benefits rather than its historical significance.  On this trip, the realization of what happened here took hold of me and never let go. One thing led to another and at the age of 16, I began participating in Civil War reenacting which still could not extinguish the fire.

After graduating college with a B.A. in History, I moved to Gettysburg, the Mecca of everything Civil War – or at least I thought so.  I suddenly realized the lack of knowledge in the Western Theater of the war and it really angered me. The people there had an assumption that nothing happened outside Gettysburg and Northern Virginia.  Luckily, a coworker of mine at The Horse Soldier felt the same way so at every opportunity we praised the exploits of men like Gen. George H. Thomas and Voltaire P. Twombly. We suddenly found ourselves being known as “Hawkeye John” and “The Chickamauga Kid” respectively.

I’ve now moved back to the Chattanooga area and look forward to discussing Western Theater events with this audience and enhancing the mutual exchange of knowledge. So my journey has taken me in a full circle. My knowledge has grown from a boy, to now a man.