From the moment Abraham Lincoln announced its preliminary version in late September 1862, the Emancipation Proclamation has been seen as a document of great import. At the time, soldiers and citizens on both sides understood that the proclamation had initiated a new kind of war. Not only did it clarify the North’s war aim so […]

The American Civil War’s Centennial vs. the Sesquicentennial

The First Battle of Bull Run
“All of this McDowell knew, but the impassioned patriots who from a safe distance were providing the pressure for the great march on Richmond neither knew nor cared about any of it.  They wanted action; action was ordered, and on the afternoon of July 16 McDowell hauled his regiments out […]