TOCWOC – A Civil War Blog

Month: March 2017

  • A Confederate Whitworth

    Auctioneer James D. Julia has a rare Confederate Whitworth up on the block. This one even has the four power Davidson telescope. The brass tube Davidson scope was adjusted for elevation by turning the knurled knob on the right side of the forearm. This loosened the clamp on the left side so the 1-1/2″ bar […]

  • Ft. Stedman Anniversary

    Today, March 25th, is the anniversary of the battle of Ft. Stedman, the last offensive of Lee’s Army. Civil War Trust is featuring an article I wrote a while back for America’s Civil War on the battle. By this time, of course, the battle—one of the shortest of the war—was long since over. Near Petersburg, […]

  • Wheellocks, Fergusons, and Sharps

    As part of our continuing look at old weapons, we go back some 500 years to the beginning of the modern era and the first really practical firearms. Ian McCollum of Forgotten Weapons does the honors, and first up is the wheellock, which dates back at least to the early 1500s and probably before then. […]

  • New 109th New York Book from the Author of Dear Friend Amelia

    I was pleasantly surprised to receive a short note from Mary Jordan, editor of Dear Friend Amelia: The Civil War Letters of Private John Tidd. Since editing that collection of letters, she has been busy in a collaboration with Joyce Hatch working on a larger effort transcribing and preserving the writings of other soldiers from […]

  • A Whitworth of One’s Own

    Couple of very nice period Whitworths have come up for sale recently, and the outfit selling them has been kind enough to allow me to post the photos of them. First up is target model. Whitworths were the rifle to beat in 1860s long-range matches and were competitive well into the 1880s in Britain, and […]