History Commons^™

"Beyond Being A War For The Union, This Is A Ware For Civilization": Nelson Dingley Jr.'S Emancipation War On Slavery 1861-1863, Eben Miller

Maine History

When the Civil War began in April 1861, the Union entered the conflict committed to suppressing secession and securing the republic. On the Maine home front, Nelson Dingley Jr., editor of the Lewiston Daily Evening Journal and Republican member of the state legislature, contended that this would require the adoption of measures to weaken slavery, from protecting and even arming

runaway slaves to the emancipation of enslaved peoples. This article examines how Dingley championed emancipationist measures in the Journal during the early stages of the Civil War, situating his voice among fellow Mainers—clergy members, soldiers, elected officials—who likewise espoused the …

Gettysburg: The Topography That Saved The United States, Benjamin Wyman

Maine History

Many scholars have analyzed the Battle of Gettysburg and the factors that determined its outcome. This work argues that the topographical features on the extreme

left flank of the Union army, which the Union troops held on July 2, were the primary factors in a Federal victory at Gettysburg. Focusing on the second day of the battle and the terrain the two armies fought over on the left flank of the Union army, this article combines an analysis

of topography and leadership in what would prove to be a pivotal Confederate defeat at the high tide of the Civil War. …

Color Sergeant Andrew J. Tozier, 20 Maine Medal Of Honor Winner, James A. Christian

Maine History

Sergeant Andrew Jackson Tozier’s seizing of an abandoned rifle to defend the 20th Maine’s national flag at his lone, advanced position would earn him a Medal of Honor. As Tozier left no personal diary, or personal letters written during the war, scholars must instead turn to archival military records, published regimental histories, contemporary newspaper accounts, and the diaries and letters of Tozier’s regimental comrades. Using these sources, the article herein sketches a portrait of the man General Joshua Chamberlain lauded as “an example of all that was excellent as a soldier.” More broadly, perhaps, it depicts the experiences of a …

Yankees On The Western Front: New England In France During World War I, Steven Alboum

Maine History

On April 6, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson declared that the United States would enter World War 1 on the side of the Allies, a move that would mobilize the American army and propel the 26th National Guard Division onto the world stage. Originally comprised only of boys from the New England states, most of whom had barely left home and had never fired a rifle in combat, this brave unit was put to the test on the Western Front against the Kaiser’s army, an enemy who had been at war for three years. The 26th was the first American military …

Maine’S Marines: The Search For Remembrance Of The Great War, J. Michael Miller

Maine History

Of the 32,083 Maine men who served in World War I, approximately twenty-four did so as enlistees in the United States Marine Corps. While Maine marines at that time represented only a small percentage of servicemen, they participated in some of the most significant battles in the war, battles that boosted the morale of the Allied forces in Europe, bolstered military recruitment efforts in the United States, and, by many estimates, helped turn the tide of the war. In the following article, author J. Michael Miller offers a remembrance of some of these marines by naming them and providing an …

How Maine Viewed The War, 1914–1917 (1940 Reprint), Edwin Costrell

Maine History

Originally published in 1940, as the United States once more evaluated possible involvement in global conflict, How Maine Viewed the War, 1914– 1917 looks backward to Maine on the eve of World War I. Author Edwin Stanley Costrell (1913–2010), through a study of newspaper coverage of the years 1914 to 1917, provides a thought-provoking account of a Maine people wrestling with ambivalence over US involvement in the Great War; of a citizenry seeking to reconcile ethnic diversity with national unity; and of a nation divided over pacifism, militarism, isolationism, and internationalism and increasingly moving toward war with Germany. Costrell was …

Captain Jeremiah O’Brien: Maine Mariner, Sheldon S. Cohen

Maine History

In contrast to most of the major army campaigns, clashes, leadership personalities, effectiveness levels, and strategies of the major land combatants during the American Revolution, Patriot naval activities have not received the overall attention they deserve. William J. Morgan, a former editor of the monumental series, Naval Documents of the American Revolution, has noted, “all too frequently historians of the American Revolution have ignored the maritime aspects of the conflict, or, at best have reflected slight understanding of that decisive element.” Morgan's observations, made several decades ago, can be verified by surveying the contents then found in prominent writings of …

Sheridan In The Shenandoah: The Civil War Memoir Of Levi H. Winslow, Twelfth Maine Infantry Regiment Of Volunteers, David Mitros

Maine History

David Mitros is archivist emeritus, Morris County Heritage Commission, Morristown, New Jersey. Currently living in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, he continues his writing and research as a part-time local history project consultant. He received a bachelor’s degree from Montclair State University and a master’s degree from California State University, Dominguez Hills. He received the Roger McDonough Librarianship Award from New Jersey Studies Academic Alliance in 2009. He is the author of four books, including one on the Civil War, Gone to Wear the Victor’s Crown: Morris County, New Jersey and the Civil War, A Documentary Account (1998).

Benevolent Chaos: Nurse Harriet Eaton’S Relief War For Maine, Jane E. Schultz

Maine History

Harriet Eaton, Portland citizen and Civil War nurse, kept a daily journal of two tours of duty with Maine regiments in the Army of the Potomac. The journal reveals the mistrust that local aid organization workers had regarding the sweeping benevolent objectives of the U.S. Sanitary Commission. The Maine Camp Hospital Association, a local aid society established in Portland in 1862, resisted absorption by the Maine State Relief Agency early in the war, but, in time, the two groups came to cooperate effectively with one another, despite Eaton’s continuing critique of the efficacy of federal benevolence. Jane E. Schultz is …

Contested Memory: John Badger Bachelder, The Maine Gettysburg Commission, And Hallowed Ground, Crompton Burton

Maine History

In the grim aftermath of the Battle of Gettysburg, John Badger Bachelder, a young artist from New Hampshire, arrived on the field with a master plan to become the preeminent historian of the battle. However, Bachelder quickly learned he could not monopolize the memorializing of those who gave all for the Union. For the next thirty-one years, his vision for remembrance would, by necessity, become a shared one with veterans who were emotionally invested in the preservation of the hallowed ground. The consequence of this collaboration was a uniquely American approach to commemoration in which individual states formed commissions to …

Dependent Parents’ Pension Claim For A Killed Maine Soldier: The Case Of Emeline And William Merrill, 1880-1887, James A. Christian M.D.

Maine History

Dr. James A. Christian is a practicing internal medicine physician. He holds an undergraduate degree from Harvard College and a M.D. degree from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. For the past fifteen years, Dr. Christian has served as a lead physician in a medical group that provides staffing for Federal Occupational Health Clinics in the metropolitan Washington, D.C., area. He resides in Silver Spring, Maryland. Dr. Christian has a particular interest in how new historical scholarship can help in more accurately understanding and appreciating the pervasive suffering that accompanied the Civil War.

“We Respect The Flag But….”: Opposition To The Civil War In Down East Maine, Timothy F. Garrity

Maine History

Although Maine is commonly remembered as one of the states most supportive of the Union during the Civil War, many of its citizens were implacably opposed to the conflict, and they voiced their opposition loudly and persistently from the war’s beginning until its end. Others weighed in on the topic more quietly but just as forcefully when they refused to enlist and evaded conscription by any effective means. While many studies have explored the history of Copperheadism and associated the political movement with populations that were urban, immigrant, and Catholic, there has been almost no prior investigation of Down East …

Charles Minor’S Cashbook And The Diary Of E.P. Harmon, A Maine Soldier In The Overland Campaign, Spring 1864, Aaron D. Purcell

Maine History

On May 25, 1864, the soldiers of Company E, Fifth Maine Volunteers, destroyed the railroad tracks and property of the Virginia Central Railroad near the small depot in Hewlett’s Station, Virginia, just north of Richmond. Union soldiers procured a travel trunk that belonged to Confederate Captain Charles L.C. Minor. It contained items such as clothes, personal belongings, and a cashbook of financial records. The cashbook (a pocket-sized ledger book measuring 5.5 x 7.5 inches) included details of Minor’s financial transactions from 1860 to 1863.

“News Of Provisions Ahead”: Accommodation In A Wilderness Borderland During The American Invasion Of Quebec, 1775, Daniel S. Soucier

Maine History

Soon after the American Revolutionary War began, Colonel Benedict Arnold led an American invasion force from Maine into Quebec in an effort to capture the British province. The trek through the wilderness of western Maine did not go smoothly. This territory was a unique borderland area that was not inhabited by colonists as a frontier society, but instead remained a largely unsettled region still under the control of the Wabanakis. On the northern periphery of this borderland the Quebecois and Wabanakis supplied Arnold and his men with provisions, aid, and intelligence. It was the assistance of French habitants and Wabanakis …

Creating An Indian Enemy In The Borderlands: King Philip’S War In Maine, 1675-1678, Christopher J. Bilodeau

Maine History

In the borderlands space between New England and Québec, the Wabanaki Indians had their own reasons for getting embroiled in a conflict that started in southern New England, King Philip’s War (1675-1678). This essay argues that, ironically, the English vision of a monolithic Indian enemy was the key to Wabanaki success in this war. The Wabanakis were a heterogeneous group when it came to the issue of fighting the English, with many eager to join the fight, others ambivalent, and still others against. The English of Massachusetts Bay and Maine, however, treated the entire Wabanaki population as united under a …

Maine's Embargo Forts, Joshua M. Smith

Maine History

The Embargo acts, passed in 1806-1808 during the Jefferson administration, were originally designed to punish Great Britain for violating American neutrality on the high seas during the Napoleonic wars. Increasingly, however, the acts were enforced against Americans seeking to defy the embargo and trade with England. Since Maine was heavily committed to trading with Great Britain — and with its colonies immediately to the north of Maine — the War Department ordered several forts built along the District’s coast, ostensibly to protect American citizens from British reprisal or war, but in fact, to enforce the embargoes. The forts brought sharply …

Henry Mowat: Miscreant Of The Maine Coast, Louis Arthur Norton

Maine History

This article follows the career of Captain Henry Mowat as he took charge of operations for the British Navy off the Maine Coast during the Revolutionary War. Mowat was involved in three decisive actions during this time: the dismantling of Fort Pownall at the mouth of the Penobscot River; the burning of Falmouth, or present-day Portland; and the defeat of the Massachusetts naval expedition to the British-occupied Bagaduce Peninsula on the eastern side of Penobscot Bay. The author asks the question: did this British officer deserve his reputation among Mainers as an “execrable monster?” Louis Arthur Norton is a professor …

Settling Oxford County: Maine’S Revolutionary War Bounty Myth, Jean F. Hankins

Maine History

It is a common assumption that many New England frontier towns were founded by veterans of the Revolutionary War who had been given land for their service to the country. Author Jean Hankins's careful research in deeds, records, and legislative acts shows that this was not the case in representative Oxford County towns. Although there were a variety of bounties given for land in these towns, few had anything to do with the Revolutionary War. The Revolutionary War bounty myth persists, the author specidates, because it is an appealing way to begin the history of these towns, and because, since …

“The American Committee For The Defense Of British Homes”, Stephanie Philbrick

Maine History

No abstract provided.

The Wounded, The Sick, And The Scared: An Examination Of Disabled Maine Veterans From The Civil War, John D. Blaisdell

Maine History

Students of Civil War history often harbor a sterilized impression that veterans included only the living, who returned home to pick up the threads of their previous existence, and the dead, who were laid to rest with honors in local or national cemeteries. In truth, there were many who fell in between: neither dead nor physically intact, they suffered debilitating injury or disease for their remaining lives. Records of some 260 such individuals in the Bangor Historical Society provide insight into the medical and surgical problems suffered by Civil War veterans. Their conditions fall into four categories: those who suffered …

The Indelible Scars Of Private Hutchinson, Maine 15th Infantry Regiment, Frederick G. Hoyt

Maine History

Private Albert E. Hutchinson of the 15th Maine Regiment survived thirteen long and dreary months of imprisonment in a Confederate prisoner-of-war camp, an experience so horrific he made two unsuccessful attempts at escape. It was over thirty years before he could tell his story of abandonment by his own regiment in Louisiana and incarceration in Texas. Surprisingly, his greatest trauma came after the war, when the released POW arrived home as a ‘straggler' neglected and disregarded by officials and citizens in his home state. The glorious welcome other veterans received contrasted starkly with his shoddy treatment. Private Hutchinson’s confrontation with …

From Bangor To Elmira And Back Again: The Civil War Career Of Dr. Eugene Francis Sanger, Andrew Macissac

Maine History

Bangor's Dr. Eugene Francis Sanger holds a dubious claim to fame in the annals of Civil War history. Having joined the Union medical corps largely to advance his own career; the abrasive surgeon moved from post to post, frustrated by lack of discipline among field staff and by lack of recognition from his superiors. In 1864 Sanger became the chief medical officer at the Elmira Prison Camp in New York, a northern counterpart to the infamous Andersonville Prison. Was Sanger responsible for Elmira 's unconscionable mortality rate? The historical record is ambiguous. Andrew Maclsaac grew up in Mexico, Maine, and …

Blending Loyalties: Maine Soldiers Respond To The Civil War, Andy Deroche

Maine History

Scholars agree that during the Civil War most Federal soldiers saw their primary purpose as saving the Union, but their loyalty to the Union was expressed in complex ways. Using a sample of thirty-seven collections of Civil War correspondence and diaries, Andy DeRoche assesses the soldiers ’ view of the war, the Union, the Conscription Act, and the elections of 1864. Above all, loyalty to family structured their thinking about these momentous national questions.

Franklin Simmons And His Civil War Monuments, Martha R. Severens

Maine History

Franklin Simmons was a Maine sculptor who achieved national prominence for his Civil War monuments. Simmons' work in Maine earned him the opportunity to create numerous monuments in Washington, D. C. In this article Martha R. Severens reviews the sculptor's life and work and provides insight into a unique style that inspired other sculptors across the Northeast. Ms. Severens, curator at the Greenville (SC) County Museum of Art, has published volumes on the Museum's Southern Collection and on Andrew Wyeth. Previously, she held similar positions at the Portland Museum of Art and the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston, SC.

Bath Iron Works, By Carroll Thayer Berry, William David Barry

Maine History

No abstract provided.

The Third Maine’S Angel Of Mercy: Sarah Smith Sampson, Edward Foley

Maine History

Sarah Smith Sampson's exciting career as a Civil War nurse illustrates the important role women played in giving aid and comfort to soldiers near the field of battle. Traveling with the troops or laboring in nearby Army hospitals, Sampson participated in the great events of 1861-1865 as a representative of the Maine Soldiers' Relief Association, assigned to accompany the 3rd Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment. Author Edward Foley, a resident of Brewer, attended Bangor schools, Fryeburg Academy, and Husson College. He served with the 1101st Combat Engineer Group during WWII. Recalled to active duty with the Air Force during the Korean …

“A Few Days Later In Coming:” Major General Winfield Scott’S Role In The Aroostook War, Michael D. Wagner

Maine History

This article is a summary of the military and diplomatic actions taken in 1839 to avert the Aroostock War between the State of Maine and the Province of New Brunswick. Particular emphasis is placed on the actions of Major General Winfield Scott.

German Prisoners Of War In Maine, 1944-1946, Jules J. Arel

Maine History

Like many states during World War II, Maine faced a severe labor shortage at a time when wartime needs boosted production demands. Northern Maine farmers and paper makers used German prisoners of war to help meet these extraordinary demands. Despite early apprehensions among local people, the POW's, stationed in Houlton, remained unobtrusive. They responded well to the rigors of climate and work, and some of them formed lasting friendships with local residents.

A Wac From Maine In The South: The World War Ii Correspondence Of Katherine Trickey, Judy Barrett Litoff, David C. Smith

Maine History

The World War II Correspondence of Katherine Trickey

The Union Soldier Meets The Freedman, John R. Sellers

Maine History

This article documents the treatment of Freedman by the Union Army.