The First Baptist Church West Main Street, Charlottesville, Virginia, an African American congregation, traces its beginnings to March 16, 1863. That was the day that some 800 black members of the Charlottesville Baptist Church petitioned the church’s white leaders to allow them to form their own congregation. Today their request is finally granted, and the…
While the Overland and Atlanta campaigns dominate the battlefield news this month, Union forces periodically collide with Confederates in skirmishes in Louisiana and Arkansas as the Federal troops slowly but systematically extend their presence in the western theater of the war. One such small clash occurs today in the Battle of Old River Lake (also…
Today near Poison Spring, Arkansas, near Camden, Confederate troops ambush a federal force which was returning from foraging for corn and other food crops on nearby plantations. The Union forces are led by Colonel James M. Williams, while Brigadier General John S. Marmaduke and Brigadier General Samuel Bell Maxey command the rebel forces. Surprise is…