Two minor battles take place today, one in which the Union emerges victorious, while the Confederacy triumphs in the other. Like many other clashes this year of no direct significance to the outcome of the war, the impact of these two battles is localized, albeit reflecting important dynamics of the war. The Battle of Droop…
West Virginia is officially admitted into the Union as the 35th state of the United States. This land that formally constituted the western portion of Virginia has never been a stronghold for slavery. Residents, opposing secession in 1861, had on June 11 of that year nullified Virginia’s ordinance of secession and proclaimed their region as…
During this second day of the Battle of Chancellorsville, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee‘s Army of Northern Virginia again outflanks and outfights Union Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker‘s Army of the Potomac, a force twice the size of Lee’s. Yet this otherwise victorious day for the South ends badly when Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, daring military…