Union Army

As the sun rose on the morning of July 3, 1863, the Confederates at the Battle of Gettysburg were completing a plan of attack on the Union army. Gen. Robert E. Lee intended that the Confederate attack would strike at the center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge, followed with reinforcements to break through and work their way in, with hopes of reducing Union batteries. The goal of the extensive artillery barrage before the assault was to cause heavy damage to the surrounding infantry and to reach the rear of the Union defense.

At the height of the Civil War, a Union soldier climbed into the dome of the State House in Annapolis and described the scene around it, a sea of white tents spreading in every direction. The tents were home to thousands of soldiers captured by the Confederates and returned to the Union army. They would wait in Camp Parole until recalled to service or sent home. In a letter home, another infantryman described the dire conditions in the crowded camp and called the state capital "a low, dirty place.

When the re-enactment of the Union army's Grand Review takes place in Harrisburg, Pa., next weekend, African-American regiments will march under arms alongside Union and Confederate re-enactors, all commemorating the 135th anniversary of the end of the Civil War and the ceremony held in the national capital at the close of the war. However, when the two-day Grand Review of the Union army began May 23, 1865, no African-American regiment could parade under...

Although the battle of Little Round Top is one of the most famous events at the battle of Gettysburg, it was in many ways an accident. The commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, Gen. Robert E. Lee, ordered Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, commander of the army's 1st Corps, to attack the exposed southern flank of the 3rd Corps of the Union Army, which had advanced beyond the Union line on Cemetery Ridge to a position in the Peach Orchard along the Emmitsburg...

Although the Union army had fought well during the morning of the First Battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861, ended in a Confederate victory and a rout of the federal forces. This outcome was mostly a matter of generalship. After drawing up a plan that resulted in the Union army's driving back the Confederates' left flank, the federal commander, Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell, "became ever more engrossed in personally leading brigades and regiments," according to Col. Vincent J. Esposito in West Point Atlas of American Wars, published in 1959.

A Confederate plan to take the high ground behind Union lines was thwarted at Cress' Ridge on July 3, 1863, and raised the reputation of the "boy general," George Armstrong Custer, by his Charge of the Wolverines, so named because Custer commanded Michigan cavalry regiments, and residents of that state, nicknamed the Wolverine State, found themselves known as "Wolverines." Clever Union anticipation of the maneuver and key mistakes by Confederate commanders, resulted in a defeat of Maj. Gen. J.E.B.

In the spring of 1862 General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson wrote, "If this Valley falls, Virginia falls." The valley he wrote of was the Shenandoah Valley, a lush stretch of farmland and small towns, landscaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains, which served as the battleground for hundreds of armed clashes during the Civil War. The Confederate army relied on the valley -the "breadbasket of the Confederacy" - for food and used it as a transportation corridor...

Although the battle of Little Round Top is one of the most famous events at the battle of Gettysburg, it was in many ways an accident. The commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, Gen. Robert E. Lee, ordered Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, commander of the army's 1st Corps, to attack the exposed southern flank of the 3rd Corps of the Union Army, which had advanced beyond the Union line on Cemetery Ridge to a position in the Peach Orchard along the Emmitsburg...

When the graves have been decorated and the volleys fired in the cemeteries and the speeches made and the veterans have marched by this Thursday, it will be the 123rd year that official Memorial Day tributes have been made to fallen U.S. soldiery.Though Confederate grave decorating and memorial services began soon after the Civil War, the national Memorial Day celebration has Northern roots.As the story goes, three years after Appomattox settled the Civil War, a Union Army veteran, Gen. N. P. Chipman, then adjutant general of the Ohio Union veteran's group (the Grand Army of the Republic)

Brig. Gen. Irvin McDowell's Union army left its encampments in the vicinity of Alexandria, Va., the afternoon of July 16, 1861. McDowell moved south cautiously, taking 2 1/2 days to reach Centreville, opposite Confederate Brig. Gen. Pierre Gustave Toutant Beauregard's positions at Manassas Junction. The Union army marched in four columns: Brig. Gen. Daniel Tyler's 1st Division numbered about 13,000 men in four brigades; Brig. Gen. David Hunter's 2nd Division numbered about 2,500 men in two brigades; Brig.

Ranked as one of the two largest battles fought in the Shenandoah Valley, the Battle of Cedar Creek was the last major battle of Union Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan's 1864 Valley Campaign. The fighting began at dawn on Oct. 19, 1864, when the Confederate Army, under the command of Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early, carried out one of the most daring and successful surprise attacks of the war. According to Dan Reigle and the Cincinnati Civil War Round Table, Early had two concerns when he entered into battle: to hold Sheridan's forces in the Shenandoah Valley and to strike a blow where possible.

In the early morning of Oct. 19, 1864, the Confederate Army of the Valley led by Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early attacked the Union Army of the Shenandoah under Maj. Gen. Philip H. Sheridan by surprise at Cedar Creek. The first unit of the Union Army to feel the wrath of that Confederate attack was the little "Army of West Virginia" (AWV) or 8th Corps led by Brig. Gen. George Crook, now much reduced in numbers after hard campaigning and fighting since May. It was hardly an army and not much of a corps because of these reduced numbers.

The flag rests, tattered edges, deep stains and all, beneath a protective mesh cover and curious eyes. It's a peaceful change of pace for an artifact that, nearly 140 years ago, helped lead hundreds of pioneering Baltimore troops into battle in America's bloodiest war. Recently acquired by the Maryland Historical Society, the 5-by-5 1/2 -foot, handmade silk flag belonged to Baltimore's 4th Regiment, U.S. Colored Troops, one of the Union Army's first units...

As the sun rose on the morning of July 3, 1863, the Confederates at the Battle of Gettysburg were completing a plan of attack on the Union army. Gen. Robert E. Lee intended that the Confederate attack would strike at the center of the Union line on Cemetery Ridge, followed with reinforcements to break through and work their way in, with hopes of reducing Union batteries. The goal of the extensive artillery barrage before the assault was to cause heavy damage to the surrounding infantry and to reach the rear of the Union defense.

In the spring of 1862 General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson wrote, "If this Valley falls, Virginia falls." The valley he wrote of was the Shenandoah Valley, a lush stretch of farmland and small towns, landscaped by the Blue Ridge Mountains, which served as the battleground for hundreds of armed clashes during the Civil War. The Confederate army relied on the valley -the "breadbasket of the Confederacy" - for food and used it as a transportation corridor...

Occupied by the summer heat and a siege at Petersburg, Va., Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant underestimated the importance of the Shenandoah Valley Campaign's role as part of his grand military offensive in 1864. According to Jeffry D. Wert in his 1987 book From Winchester to Cedar Creek: The Shenandoah Campaign of 1864, it was not until late summer that Grant understood "if the summer stalemate in Virginia were to be broken, it would be beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains in the Shenandoah Valley."

Warren D. Wenger loves history. He also likes to write. So, he put the two together, and the result was several books.Most of the books aren't in bookstores because they deal with such esoteric subjects as his work in Nicaragua as a missionary and Moravian Church history.But his latest work, "Western Maryland: Springboard of the Union Army to Gettysburg," is available at Locust Books at 15 E. Main St., Westminster, where the retired Moravian minister will autograph copies from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday.

To understand how a quiet, obscure Pennsylvania town with no industry, no military significance at all in July of 1863, became the fiercely contested ground in the bloodiest three days of fighting in the Civil War -- now the subject of the new Turner Pictures epic "Gettysburg" -- one has only to consult a map of the countryside.Ten different roads led into Gettysburg in those days from the surrounding Pennsylvania and Maryland countryside, making it the natural rallying point for a scattered army trying to quickly piece itself together.

Southern hopes for victory at Gettysburg were dashed when Pickett's Charge on July 3, 1863, failed to break the Union army's hold on Cemetery Ridge. Maj. Gen. George E. Pickett's division consisted of brigades commanded by Brig. Gen. Richard B. Garnett, Brig. Gen. James Lawson Kemper and Brig. Gen. Lewis A. Armistead. These three men would lead this charge into well-defended Union territory and into American history. In the morning, Pickett's division marched across Spangler's Woods and formed a battle line east of the woods in the open space behind Seminary Ridge.

Maj. Gen. Joseph B. Kershaw's part in the surprise attack on Union forces at Cedar Creek was to cross the creek and drive back the Union center. The planning for Kershaw's advance occurred the night before. Confederate Maj. Gen. John B. Gordon and mapmaker Jedediah Hotchkiss had climbed to the top of Massanutten Mountain to Signal Knob on Oct. 17, surveying the position of the Union army at Cedar Creek. This climb took several hours and, once at the top of the signal station, Gordon and Hotchkiss devised a plan of attack.