Deserters Deserters The popular literature of the Civil War is filled with inspiring accounts of courage and sacrifice. Countless such acts, even if exaggerated, took place. Every great event, however, contains many stories that create bumps in the overall smooth narrative. One is the story of desertion during the American Civil War. Military officials estimated that about 200,000 men deserted the U. S. Army during the conflict. Illinois contributed to this number, though not in…
The 92nd Illinois riles Kentuckians The 92nd Illinois riles Kentuckians In November 1862 the 92nd Illinois Infantry, which had become known as a “slave-stealing” regiment for its refusal to return fleeing slaves to their owners, marched through Kentucky towns with weapons loaded to overawe threatening pro-slavery mobs. The controversy mirrored the evolving struggle in the North over how the war should affect African American slavery. Time and change President Abraham Lincoln declared with the…
“You are sure to be happy again”: President Lincoln consoles Fanny McCullough Executive Mansion, Washington, December 23, 1862. Dear Fanny, It is with deep grief that I learn of the death of your kind and brave Father; and, especially, that it is affecting your young heart beyond what is common in such cases. In this sad world of ours, sorrow comes to all; and, to the young, it comes with bitterest agony, because it takes…
Emancipation! On January 1, 1863, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring free Africans Americans held as slaves in areas under Confederate control. This followed his September 22, 1862, preliminary proclamation, which warned those in rebellious states that they could save their “peculiar institution” by laying down their arms and renewing their allegiance to the Unites States within one hundred days. Reaction to the proclamation in Illinois—like that in the Union as a whole-varied from…
Fireworks in Springfield The competing public meetings to discuss emancipation held by the political parties at the state capitol building in Springfield in early January 1863 (see the January 2013 monthly feature) foreshadowed a complete breakdown of relations between the Republican governor and the Democratic majority in the legislature. The 1863 session of the Illinois General Assembly was filled with fireworks and ended with an action never seen before—or since. Here are a few high…
Illinois schools during the war While the nation was preoccupied with events on the battlefront, important things were happening on the home front. In Illinois hundreds of thousands of youngsters continued to attend classes in the state’s relatively new system of public schools. The system in 1861 Laws enacted in the 1850s Illinois created a mandatory system of public schools financed through taxation. The system was overseen by a state superintendent of public instruction.…
Who in the world was Lewis B. Parsons? In December 1861 Lewis Baldwin Parsons was placed in charge of all military rail and river transportation within the Department of the Mississippi, which extended from Pittsburg to west of the Mississippi and south to New Orleans. In a war that made huge use of steam to move troops and supplies, Parsons was a crucial player. Prewar career Lewis Parsons was born in New York State in 1818, the…
FIRST BLACK TROOPS Some early black troops from Illinois On May 25, 1863, a group of fifteen to twenty African American men gathered at a railroad platform in Springfield to begin a journey east to Massachusetts. There they would be mustered into the Fifty-Fifth Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, one of the Union’s earliest black military units. The men were some of the first of many black troops from Illinois that would fight in our Civil War. Why…
Dealing with “disloyal” newspapers in Illinois Some early black troops from Illinois On June 1, 1863, Major General Ambrose E. Burnside, commanding the Department of the Ohio which included Illinois, ordered the Chicago Times to be “suppressed” for the “repeated expression of disloyal and incendiary sentiments.” In part because of the personal intervention of President Lincoln in revoking the suspension, the Times incident is perhaps the most famous of many actions taken by the…
Illinois at the ‘burgs In early July 1863 Illinoisans joined others in the loyal North in celebrating major military victories at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania and Vicksburg, Mississippi. A small number of Illinois units saw important service at Gettysburg, while troops from the Sucker State made up as much as one-third of the army with which Ulysses S. Grant captured the crucial Confederate bastion on the Mississippi River. Hot work in Pennsylvania Three Illinois regiments took…