;

Civil War Blog

A project of PA Historian

Civil War Christmas with the 96th Pennsylvania Volunteers

| December 20, 2013

The men of the 96th Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry struggled to keep warm on the evening of December 24, 1861. A frigid wind howled across the ridges and farms of Northern Virginia that Christmas Eve. Within their newly completed winter quarters, the hearty men of central and eastern Pennsylvania huddled next to blazing campfires, in a vain […]

The Hegins Draft Riot

| July 5, 2013

Nestled in the upper end of the Lykens Valley, Hegins was a sleepy, little farming community in the spring of 1863. The war had taken many of its men off to war, leaving behind families struggling to support their farms. Then there was those men who stayed behind, for one reason or another. Among these […]

“Danger is Imminent:” The Beginning of the Gettysburg Campaign

| June 15, 2013

As General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia began its trek up the Shenandoah Valley in early June 1863, the objective mystified many in the North. Some thought he had aims on Washington or Baltimore, while others thought he was taking his army further north, into the Union’s second most populous state. Pennsylvania looked […]