Tag Archives: Potomac River

Heat and rain plagued the 5th Maine Infantry’s march to Gettysburg

At Chancellorsville the 5th Maine Infantry Regiment had fought with the 2nd Brigade (Brig. Gen. Joseph J. Bartlett), 1st Division (Brig. Gen. William T. H. Brooks), VI Corps (Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick). Led by Col. Clark S. Edwards, the 5th Maine had taken and administered drubbings at Salem Church and had escaped along with VI […]

Nurse Abba Goddard meets hard-bitten Confederates at Harpers Ferry, part 3

Maine at War celebrates Women’s History Month with a four-part tale about nurse Abba Goddard and her adventures at Harpers Ferry during the Antietam Campaign. You can read part 1 here, part 2 here, and part 4 here. Named matron of the Clayton General Hospital in Harpers Ferry in summer 1862, Maine nurse Abba Goddard […]

Nurse Abba Goddard withstands Jackson’s bombardment at Harpers Ferry, part 1

Maine at War celebrates Women’s History Month with a four-part tale about nurse Abba Goddard and her adventures at Harpers Ferry during the Antietam Campaign. You can read part 2 here, part 3 here, and part 4 here. Maine nurse Abba Goddard went livid when Col. Dixon Stansbury Miles surrendered the Harpers Ferry garrison to […]

They Are Our Glory — the 7th Maine at Antietam, Part I

Wind-stirred flags attracted Confederate attention at Antietam, as Thomas Worcester Hyde realized by mid-afternoon on Wednesday, Sept. 17, 1862. A Bowdoin College graduate and the only son of a Yankee trader from Bath, Hyde had commanded the 7th Maine Infantry Regiment during the Sept. 14 attack on Confederate-held Crampton’s Gap on South Mountain in Maryland. […]

Blanket Brigade: the perfect gift for Thanksgiving

  Note: This is the conclusion of the three-part series about the “Blanket Brigade.” Rising from their rude shelters in Ridgeville, Md. on Sunday, Sept. 14, the 16th Maine Infantry boys listened to “the terrific cannonading” erupting from the Battle of South Mountain, fought miles to the west, Adjutant Abner Small recalled the distant thunder. […]

Lack of combat skills costs 1st Maine Heavies dearly at Harris Farm

  A few hours spent learning rudimentary combat skills could have saved many Maine lives near Spotsylvania Court House, Va. on Thursday, May 19, 1864. The modern Army’s concept of “Advanced Infantry Training” did not exist during the Civil War. The small pre-war Army primarily fought Indians in the far West, where parade-ground maneuvers drawn […]

Isabella Fogg investigated reports of Army mistreatment of wounded Union soldiers

    Isabella Fogg had already encountered the horrors of war when the slaughter known as Antietam took place on Sept. 17, 1862. Then Fogg discovered the hell that is war. Surnamed Morrison, her parents had emigrated to New Brunswick from Scotland before Isabella’s birth in 1823. Practically a child bride when she married William […]