Blog
Humility and Hope: How Lincoln Framed a Nation at War
September 26, 1861, holds a unique place in the moral and spiritual landscape of the early Civil War, not because of a battlefield triumph or a strategic maneuver, but as a day formally designated for “humiliation, prayer, and fasting.” …
High Stakes in the Heartland: The Civil War’s Hemp Bale Battle
The fighting around Lexington, Missouri, in September 1861—often called the Battle of Lexington or the “Battle of the Hemp Bales”—was one of the most notable early engagements of the Civil War in the Trans-Mississippi Theater…
A General, a Proclamation, and a Cabinet in Crisis
In September 1861, the question of whether to remove General John C. Frémont from command of the Union’s Western Department revealed not just concerns about military strategy, but also deep tensions within President Lincoln’s Cabi…
Cheat Mountain’s Hidden Drama: Lee, Rain, and Retreat
In the fall of 1861, the Cheat Mountain Campaign marked one of the first significant military operations in western Virginia, a rugged region where both Union and Confederate forces sought to secure not just territory, but also vital transportation …
Johnston Takes Command: Can One Man Defend Half a Continent?
On September 10, 1861, Confederate president Jefferson Davis appointed General Albert Sidney Johnston to command the sprawling Western Department, a vast military theater that stretched from the Appalachians to the Mississippi River. The decision ca…
A Historian POV – An Interview with Dr. Robert Tracy McKenzie
In this thought-provoking episode, we sit down with Dr. Robert Tracy McKenzie (Arthur F. Holmes Chair of Faith and Learning and Professor of History at Wheaton College), a renowned historian of the American Civil War and American democracy, to exp…