Interview with Erica Uszak: Scholarship Recipient for 2018 CWI Summer Conference

Recently, the CWI reached out to Erica Uszak ’22 to reflect on her experience at the 2018 CWI Summer Conference. Uszak, currently a freshman at Gettysburg College studying History and the Civil War, was one of ten high school students to receive a scholarship to attend the conference. Any high school student with an interest in history is eligible to apply for the High School Scholarship. [excerpt

Violence and Restraint: An Interview with Aaron Sheehan-Dean

Today we are speaking with Aaron Sheehan-Dean, Fred C. Frey Professor of Southern Studies at Louisiana State University and the Chair of LSU’s History Department. He teaches courses on nineteenth-century U.S. history, the Civil War and Reconstruction, and southern History. He is the author of Why Confederates Fought: Family and Nation in Civil War Virginia (UNC Press, 2007), Concise Historical Atlas of the U.S. Civil War (Oxford University Press, 2008), and is the editor of several other volumes. His most recent book, The Calculus of Violence: How Americans Fought the Civil War, was released by Harvard University Press in Fall, 2018. [excerpt

William Stokes Papers - Accession 882

The William Stokes Papers mainly consist of personal correspondence from William Stokes (1833-1905) to his wife, Eliza Jane Boulware Stokes (1837-1916), during the American Civil War. William Stokes served in the Confederate Army during the American Civil War with the 4th Regiment South Carolina Calvary as Lieutenant Colonel. After the conclusion of the war he would be given the rank of Brigadier General by then Governor Wade Hampton. He was born on October 20, 1833, and died on June 30, 1905. The collection includes pre-Civil War, Civil War, and post-Civil War letters and military orders. Also includes writings by historians detailing William Stokes’ involvement, and actions by his regiment and other regiments, particularly those from South Carolina, during the Civil War. Most of the letters and orders are dated and identified.https://digitalcommons.winthrop.edu/manuscriptcollection_findingaids/2256/thumbnail.jp

Confederate Journal and Magazine Collection - Accession 1705

This collection consists of the first four editions of the Confederate War Journal Illustrated and an incomplete run of the Confederate Veteran Magazine from 1893, 1898 through 1930. The Confederate Veteran was originally started in 1893 by Sumner A. Cunningham (1843-1913) as an effort raise funds for the construction of a monument to honor Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederate States of America, in Richmond, VA. The magazine became very popular and was one of the most influential monthly magazines in the South. The magazine would eventually become the official voice of the United Confederate Veterans and later of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, and the Sons of Confederate Veterans. The magazine stayed in print through 1932. These magazines provide a valuable insight into the southern mindset following the American civil War and Reconstruction while offering personal accounts of the war. Historiography students would find these magazines helpful in analyzing the histories of the American Civil War from the losing side’s perspective.https://digitalcommons.winthrop.edu/manuscriptcollection_findingaids/2672/thumbnail.jp

Reproduction of Gardiner Explosive Bullet

A reproduction of the Gardiner Explosive Bullet. The reproduction bullet appears to be made of lead.https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/fvw-artifacts/4547/thumbnail.jp

Description of Civil War Bullets

A document which provides descriptive information for the Civil War replica bullet set. The document is printed on orange paper. It includes several helpful paragraphs and illustrations of assorted bullets from the set.https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/fvw-artifacts/4486/thumbnail.jp

“Give them liberty or give me death”: The Unionist Espionage of Elizabeth Van Lew: An Interview with Elizabeth Varon

Over the course of this year, we’ll be interviewing some of the speakers from the upcoming 2018 CWI conference about their talks. Today we are speaking with Elizabeth Varon, Associate Director of the John L. Nau III Center for Civil War History and Langbourne M. Williams Professor of American History at the University of Virginia. A specialist in the Civil War era and 19th-century South, Varon is the author of We Mean to be Counted: White Women and Politics in Antebellum Virginia (UNC Press, 1998); Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: The True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, A Union Agent in the Heart of the Confederacy (Oxford University Press, 2003); Disunion!: The Coming of the American Civil War, 1789-1859 (UNC Press, 2008); and Appomattox: Victory, Defeat and Freedom at the End of the Civil War (Oxford University Press, 2013). Southern Lady, Yankee Spy won three book awards and was named one of the “Five Best” books on the “Civil War away from the battlefield” in the Wall Street Journal. Appomattox won the 2014 Library of Virginia Literary Award for Nonfiction, the 2014 Dan and Marilyn Laney Prize for Civil War History from the Austin Civil War Roundtable, and the 2014 Eugene Feit Award in Civil War Studies from the New York Military Affairs Symposium. Appomattox was also named one of Civil War Monitor’s “Best Books of 2014” and one of National Public Radio’s “Six Civil War Books to Read Now.” Varon’s public presentations include book talks at the Lincoln Bicentennial in Springfield, at Gettysburg’s Civil War Institute, and on C-Span’s Book TV. Her next book, Armies of Deliverance: A New History of the Civil War, is forthcoming with Oxford University Press in 2018. [excerpt

Reproduction of the Pritchett Bullet

A reproduction of the Pritchett Bullet. The reproduction bullet appears to be made of lead.https://scholarsjunction.msstate.edu/fvw-artifacts/4566/thumbnail.jp

Ida Jane Dacus Collection - Accession 1658

This collection consists of letters and autographs Miss Ida Jane Dacus collected from famous authors and politicians. There are also photographs, deeds and land records, financial records, poems and sonnets, notices, memorabilia mostly from the 19th century. Most of these documents are related to South Carolina during the American Civil War and in particular to the Confederate States of America, however some are pre-Civil War. The deeds and land records all relate to property in Wake County, NC. Some of this material may have been on display in the museum that was in the Tillman Science Building which was razed in 1962, at which point hey may have been brought to the library and mixed with Ida Jane Dacus’ collection of Autographs and letters.https://digitalcommons.winthrop.edu/manuscriptcollection_findingaids/2651/thumbnail.jp