behind AotW

Your assignment: catch up with some new and fascinating online work about the Maryland Campaign of 1862.

Recent and ongoing now is an excellent discussion about who did what at Sharpsburg on TalkAntietam*. Beginning with fine-grain research Dean Essig is doing for his new wargame–with other genuine experts weighing in–the group is exploring the reality of the “numbers” of the battle. The unintentional but inescapable conclusion here may be that it’s impossible to acurately quantify the battle. See what you find …

from Harper’s Weekly, 24 October 1863 (Son of the South).

Be sure also to catch the two latest feature articles Larry Freiheit has contributed to AotW. At the top is his view of Military Intelligence in Maryland from both General’s perspectives. You’ll find a number of ‘hmmm’ moments in that piece. Larry’s also the author of an analysis of JEB Stuart’s cavalry at and before Sharpsburg, which was posted just before the anniversary last year. Mighty fine.

Also fresh is John David Hoptak’s masterful biographical sketch of Brigadier James Nagle. Ranger Hoptak is highly fluent on Nagle and the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry, as you probably know from his blog. Thanks to the Save Historic Antietam Foundation for sharing that work online. When you see (or visit) next, ask John how you can help restore the General’s sword, too.

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* Anyone can read the messages on TalkAntietam, but you’ll have to join the group and be approved to contribute. But that’s easy, trust me. I know the group moderator really well; I can get you in :)

I’ve just stumbled over a fascinating project of Christoper Busta-Peck’s covering the Old National Road/National Pike. You probably know that part of that historic thoroughfare was on the path of the Armies during the Maryland Campaign of 1862.

National Pike milestone, recreated (C. Busta-Peck)

Christoper is a librarian at the Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, and is using the blogging medium to perfection, as I see it, to illuminate history right under our noses. History, I dare say, most of us have missed. Do go see his excellent use of GoogleMaps to cover the milemarkers and other sights along the Road, in addition to the range of other fine posts on the subject.

When he started in September 2007, Christopher explained:

This blog is my attempt to describe and share my journeys on the National Pike, as it winds its way from Baltimore to Cumberland, Maryland, as well as the National Road, from Cumberland, Maryland, to Vandalia, Illinois. I plan to include plenty of photographs, maps to describe the journey.

The blog post that finally caught my attention today is about the series of 19th Century stone bridges over the Antietam and the 1910 book on the subject by Helen Ashe Hays. He’s scanned and posted the superb photos from that volume. Both of my readers will immediately recognize the spans in his post as brothers and sisters of what’s now known as Burnside Bridge.

Bravo. Brilliant!

Just a quick post this week - I’ve too many irons in the fire. Blog neglect aside, though, January has been a good month for incoming treasures and catching up with biographies on AotW.

Corporal James A Barber (M. Frazel)

One in particular came out of a post I found on Granite in my Blood just before Christmas in which Midge Frazel transcribed a relative’s narrative about the Barber Family. Included was her great-grandfather James Albert Barber, who was in Battery G, First Rhode Island Light Artillery…

While chasing one of my boys, Lieutenant Colonel Samuel W. Owen, 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry, I came on a photograph of him in an unusual setting. It made me think about how few casual or frivolous pictures–snapshots–I’ve can remember seeing among (probably) thousands of American Civil War-era images.

On reflection, this isn’t surprising. Due to the technical demands of wet-plate photography during the War, I’d expect most photographs to have a serious purpose. The long exposures and difficulty in preparing and developing photographs in the field probably made it less likely that photographers would risk wasting film on a moving subject or mundane scene.

Perhaps as a result, most surviving photographs are stiffly posed, and live subjects seem terribly aware of the camera. For fun, today, I’ve found a few with quite a different feel …

Lieut.-Col. A.V. Colburn, Warrenton, Va, November 1862 (studio of M. Brady, Library of Congress)

A brand new Lieutenant at First Bull Run in July 1861, George A Custer later recalled with envy a gallant charge by a squadron of the 1st US Cavalry under Capt Colburn early in the battle. The charge may not have actually happened, which is sad for the romantics like Custer, particularly as the first major battle of the War was Colburn’s last in hands-on field command.

Albert V. Colburn is best known now as Assistant Adjutant General (AAG) to George McClellan during the General’s terms in command of the Army of the Potomac. Students of that army will come upon Colburn’s name frequently–on orders, reports and letters–as he so often served as the voice of the General Commanding.

Let me offer just a little more about the man behind the signature …