Month: May 2020

  • Free Access to Fold3 Military Records for Memorial Day

    Fold3 is offering free access to its records for the Memorial Day weekend. Especially if you’re still in lockdown this is an excellent chance to access Civil War records, including an extensive collection of service records.

  • Musketoons and Rifle-Muskets: What’s In A Name?

    Names and nomenclature do make a difference in military topics. You’d like to be as accurate as possible, and I think it’s important to use the terminology current at the time unless you specify you’re using something contemporary. I’ll use two examples that have caused a lot of confusion—musketoon and the rifle-musket. The difference between […]

  • Who Shot General Hancock?

    It has become somewhat of a cottage industry to try to identify who shot various prominent figures like generals Sedgwick and Reynolds. The other say I ran across this postwar newspaper article dealing with the shooting of General Winfield Hancock at Gettysburg. The article credits Sergeant William Wood of Company H, 56th Virginia (Kemper’s brigade, […]