The fallout over Governor McDonnell’s apology will no doubt continue throughout the day today. I will probably not follow much of it as I can anticipate the fault lines that will frame the vast majority of responses. Yesterday I offered a brief commentary as to what I think this turn of events signifies. It comes [...]
Southern History
Update: I think it is important to point out that the governor’s proclamation is easily eclipsed by the work of the Virginia Sesquicentennial Committee, which has aggressively pushed for an inclusive and education-driven approach to commemorating the Civil War. I am proud to serve as an advisor to this state-sponsored committee. Click here for more [...]
Update: Thanks to TF Smith for the following comment, which I decided to add to the post. He offers some very interesting observations about this image that are worth serious consideration. Your thoughts are much appreciated. Actually, this was obviously a posed studio portrait, and there’s probably a case to be made the weapons – [...]
Update: “The board of the Patriots Point Development Authority on Tuesday split 3-3 on whether to allow the Sons of Confederate Veterans to place an 11 1/2-foot granite monument to the ordinance signers at the Patriots Point Naval and Maritime Museum. The tie vote meant the idea failed.” The Sons of Confederate Veterans is hoping [...]
Debby Applegate The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher (Three Leaves, 2007). Anne J. Bailey, Invisible Southerners: Ethnicity in the Civil War (University of Georgia Press, 2006). George C. Bradley and Richard L. Dahlen, From Conquest to Conciliation: The Sack of Athens and the Court-Martial of Colonel John B. Turchin [...]
You can imagine my surprise when I returned from my trip to Shepherd University to find an email from Prof. Gregory Pfitzer of Skidmore College. Prof. Pfitzer is currently teaching an American Studies course that focuses on Civil War Memory and has been using this blog as a resource. Students are focusing specifically on a [...]
The story of Silas Chandler is one of the most popular black Confederate stories out there on the Web. You can find it featured on the website of the 37th Texas, the Petersburg Express, on blogs, and you can even purchase a t-shirt of Silas and Andrew at Dixie Outfitters. A few weeks ago the [...]
I know many of you out there are looking forward to a day/week without a blog post about Earl Ijames. Many of you are perhaps disappointed with the way I’ve gone about all of this. There is plenty of room to disagree. I want to state up front that my goal has never been to [...]
Update: I now have the audio of this talk. Unfortunately, the files are very large and as it stands I am unable to upload them for your listening pleasure. I will continue to work on this. The talk is literally just a string of individual stories strung together. There is almost no analysis of the [...]