Tag Archives: Edwin M. Stanton

“a sad peace-offering for us all”

From Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant (in chapters 66 and 67): The head of Lee’s column came marching up there [near Appomattox Station] on the morning of the 9th, not dreaming, I suppose, that there were any Union soldiers near. … Continue reading

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October surprise?

As the 1864 presidential election neared, a Democrat paper claimed that a Union assault on the Petersburg-Richmond front was politically motivated to create good war news for President Lincoln; the administration then covered up the failed attack. From a Seneca … Continue reading

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EXECUTIVE Mansion

“The buck stops here,” but President Lincoln did not seem to have any role in the following account – except that a Democrat paper put his name in the headline. Still, it was probably a tasty story for the newspaper’s … Continue reading

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when?

In the same issue that featured articles on Cold Harbor and the Georgia campaign and startling images of starved Union prisoners, the June 18, 1864 Harper’s Weekly (at Son of the South) published a poem by a member of President … Continue reading

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“the suppressic veri and the suggestio falsi”

going to hurt me more than you? From the June 11, 1864 edition of Harper’s Weekly at Son of the South: Also 150 years ago this week, a Richmond paper noticed that Union Secretary of War Stanton’s telegrams to General … Continue reading

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“false and spurious”

President Lincoln wasn’t going to shut down a paper for printing exaggerated stories about the in-laws, but he acted promptly when a couple journals published a fabricated presidential call for 400,000 more soldiers and a Day of Thanksgiving. The date … Continue reading

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U.S.C.T.

150 years ago today a Bureau of Colored Troops was ordered by the federal War Department: GENERAL ORDERS, No. 143 WAR DEPARTMENT, ADJUTANT GENERAL’S OFFICE, Washington, May 22, 1863. I — A Bureau is established in the Adjutant General’s Office … Continue reading

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“needlessly, wickedly sacrificed”

From a Seneca County, New York newspaper in December 1862: Again Defeated. What is to be said in this week of the nation’s agony? What word is sufficient in these days red with battle and hot with the flush of … Continue reading

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How suspenders worked

In August 1862 Secretary of War Stanton ordered arrests for disloyal practices and the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus in those cases. Here’s how that worked out in practice at least in this case (and to the extent … Continue reading

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Enforcing the Monster’s Orders

Southern Pennsylvania and Dubuque, Iowa The first part of the following article is mostly an editorial in a southern Pennsylvania Democrat newspaper. Its opposition to the Lincoln administration’s orders against the discouragement of enlistment are very similar to an editorial … Continue reading

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