TOCWOC – A Civil War Blog

Once secession of the Lower South was a fact, the seceded states immediately began attempting to expel Federal garrisons and claim United States installations. This was successful except for a few points, most notably Ft. Pickens at Pensacola and Ft. Sumter at Charleston. Alabama and Mississippi both sent troops to assist the taking of Ft. […]

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In this letter home to his father, Blackford seems to understand better than the politicians what is coming. Although opposing secession, he also opposes coercion by the Federal government. Ere this I suppose you have received the intelligence that Alabama has seceded, and that I am for the first time in my life without the […]

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David P. Goldman is something of a polymath – scholar, investment banker, musicologist, and pundit. In the latter capacity, under the handle Spengler, he has written on a variety of subjects, including the Civil War. There, unfortunately, he comes off as being rather uninformed. Indeed one is tempted to use the characterization of Noam Chomsky […]

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The newest secession news is from Arizona, where a group of liberals in Tucson (apparently a protected area) want to form Baja Arizona. This is ironic since Tucson was a stronghold of the Confederate State of Arizona (not the same as the US state) and if you check the Wikipedia article there is a photo […]

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Any Lincoln experts out there? I am looking to verify a quote attributed to him that’s been floating around the internet lately. The government, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary […]

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At the Precipice: Americans North and South during the Secession Crisis (Littlefield History of the Civil War Era) by Shearer Davis Bowman Product Details Hardcover: 480 pages Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press (September 30, 2010) Language: English ISBN-10: 0807833924 ISBN-13: 978-0807833926 Difficult but Rewarding The author, who died in December 2009, spent his […]

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In spite of having a lot of Civil War related material I have been missing in action for the last few weeks or so writing an article on the battle of Fort Mahone and updating a rescue book. However, I hope to have a bit more time to blog. Some time ago I posted on […]

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