TOCWOC – A Civil War Blog

Month: August 2012

  • Crowdsourcing a Phrase

    I’ve been transcribing a number of letters from Maj. Eugene Blackford CSA (which is why I haven’t posted much). He has excellent penmanship but occasionally I run into parts of his letters I have trouble with. One of those cases is presented below, which may involve a foreign phrase. Blackford often salts his letters with […]

  • Wilmington Part 9

    Fort Fisher Falls With key leaders down on both sides the fight for the fort continued on with “desperate valor.” The Confederate charge had failed but the remaining traverses on the land face remained to be taken. The Federal advance was stalled by the thick carpet of dead and wounded that lay on their narrow […]

  • DE ARAGON, The Chronicle of a Confederate Surgeon – Epilogue

    Author’s note: This is the last installment of the story of Major Ramon T. de Aragon. It deals with events after the war ended and he returned to his home in Moscow, Tennessee. Epilogue   By May 13, the men of Taylor’s army had completed the task of turning in their arms and the last […]

  • Wilmington Part 8

    The Army Attack Begins Inside the fort Whiting* and Lamb were jubilant at the repulse of the naval assault but were well aware that the job of defending the fort was not finished. Their attention was called to the western end of the fort where the next Federal assault was already gaining steam. Whiting had […]

  • Short Video Takes

    Some videos that might interest TOCWOC readers: Watch an Australian re-enactor of the Napoleonic-era 95th Rifles fire a Baker rifle in sustained fire. He manages quite a respectable rate of fire, especially for a flintlock. It’s easy to see how the 95th established the superiority of the rifle on the skirmish line. The same lads […]

  • Was Justice Scalia wrong About Citizen Militias Having “Cannon” Under the Second Amendment?

    In a recent interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News, Justice Antonin Scalia, one of the Court’s conservative justices (and one known for his support of citizen gun rights), said: Wallace: You wrote in 2008, the opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller, the majority opinion that said the Second Amendment means what it says, […]

  • 150 years ago, August 1862

    150 years ago, August 1862 This is one of the busiest months of the war. In Tennessee and Kentucky, Braxton Bragg and Kirby-Smith start north.  Bragg marches from Chattanooga toward Nashville and Kentucky.  Kirby-Smith departs Knoxville, marching through the Cumberland Gap into Kentucky.  Richmond is in the grip of “Kentucky Fever”.  They are obsessed with […]