Download Call to Arms Nov 2012 - Brunswick Civil War Round Table

Call
to
arms
November 2012
Volume III, Issue 9
The Newsletter of the Brunswick Civil War Round Table
The President’s
Corner
Wally Rueckel
Our
October meeting
was
well
attended. Charen Fink,
one of our Director’s
and Newsletter CoEditor, spoke about
“Civil War Women at
War.” She presented a
different focus on the
Civil war. You can read
a synopsis of her talk in
this newsletter.
At our November
meeting Horace Mewborn will talk about
what President Lincoln
called the “slickest
piece of cattle-stealing”
he ever heard of where
Confederate
cavalry
General, Wade Hampton, captured 2,500
hundred head of cattle
from behind Union
lines, to feed starving
Confederate troops dur-
ing the siege of Petersburg. Horace is a Vietnam veteran, retired
FBI agent and a renowned historian on
Confederate
cavalry.
You
should
enjoy
Horace who lives in
New Bern, NC and was
our battle field guide
during our recent tour
of Civil War sites in
New Bern and Kinston.
At the November
meeting we will officially announce the proposed slate of officers
for 2013 as required by
our By-Laws. Norm
Praet was appointed the
Nominating Committee
Chairman. Several people offered to run for
the open positions.
Norm talked to all of
them and proposed the
Inside this
Issue
President’s
Message
1-2
Next Program 2
slate of 5 candidates to
run for office for next
year and the Directors
have approved his recommendations.
The
slate will consist of myself as President, Marv
Hamer and Rob Clarke
as Vice Presidents,
Norm Praet as Secretary and Tom Kehoe as
Treasurer. The recommended slate includes
three returning Officers
and two new Officers. Mike Powell will
be retiring as one of our
Vice Presidents after
serving two years and
doing a wonderful job
but has agreed to continue handle planning
and organizing our various Civil War trips.
This gives Mike more
Continued next page
Last Meeting
Synopsis
3
Ladies’ Dept
4
Book Revolution
5
Open For
Discussion
5
Special Notice 6
Member7
ship/
Renewal
Form
150 Years Ago 7
Co-Editors
Charen Fink
Jim McKee
Mike Powell
N OVEMBER 2012
Next Speaker
P AGE 2
HORACE MEWBORN DISCUSSES WADE
HAMPTON’S 1864 BEEFSTEAK RAID
one of the strangest actions
of the Civil War took place during September, 1864 as part of
the Siege of Petersburg. This
daring event will be presented
by popular historian and author,
Horace Mewborn at the Round
Table meeting on Tuesday, November 6th. The title of his presentation is, “Hampton’s Cattle
Raid.”
Short on food supplies, Confederate Maj. Gen. Wade
Hampton led a force of 3,000
troops, including “several certified Texas cattle thieves,” to
acquire cattle that were intended for the consumption of
the Union Army which was laying siege to Richmond and Petersburg, Va. With only light
opposition, the raid captured
almost 2,500 cattle. It was one
of the largest cattle rustling operations in American history.
President Lincoln called the
raid “the slickest piece of cattlestealing” he ever heard of. And,
soon thereafter, when Gen.
Ulysses S. Grant was asked by a
reporter when he thought he
would take Petersburg, “never,”
said the Union Commander, “if
our armies continue to supply
Lee’s troops with beef cattle.”
Horace Mewborn is a prolific writer and author whose
specialty is the Confederate
cavalry in northern Virginia. He
will provide details and interesting observations about this unusual raid, which while a blow
to the Union Army, the Confederates lacked the grain to feed
the cattle, so they soon had to
revert to their previous dismal
food situation.
The meeting will be held at
Trinity
United
Methodist
Church, 209 E. Nash St., Southport. Registration begins at
6:30. Everyone is welcome. The
fee for guests is $5 which can
be applied toward the $25 annual membership dues. There is
no fee for students.
President… cont.
ministrative matters. We are
fortunate in having Tom
Kehoe agree to run for the
open Treasurer’s position.
We have also been successful recruiting new volunteers
to take over some of the other
important jobs of our Round
Table including meeting room
set-up and clean-up, managing
the sutler’s table, official meeting greeter and membership
administration. We are thankful for all of your support but
we can always use more help.
We are currently looking for
someone to assist Norm Praet
with his Secretary duties and
someone to assist with the A/V
operation at our meetings. If
you are interested please contact Norm Praet 253-8303 or
myself 253-7382.
time to devote to the things he
enjoys best. Rob Clarke, one
of our advisors, has agreed to
run for the open position of
Vice President. He will make
another great addition to our
Board. Bob Benedict is stepping down as Treasurer after
three years in this position and
is one of the original founding
committee members that Tom
O’Donnell and I brought together to study and launch this
Round Table. Bob’s strong
counsel will be missed on the
Board but he will remain active helping with various ad-
N OVEMBER 2012
Speaker Synopsis
P AGE 3
EXPLOITS OF FEMALE SOLDIERS, SPIES AND FEMME
FATALES (HEROES OR HARLOTS????)
By Dan Fink
Charen Fink and her husband (me) have been living for
months with these “ladies –
er—gentlemen.” Charen will
tell you they have been clamoring to get their truths out.
Perhaps 100 hours of research
was spent getting their stories
straight but once they started
pediculatin’(sporting strange
differences) there was no stopping and sometimes it became
downright scintilatin’. Did you
have any idea that so many
served (400-2000) and for so
long (almost half the War)?
Oh, how they broke the mold.
Victorian ideas were out.
They could spit, cuss and shoot
with the best. Being mostly
agrarian in background, a soldier’s rugged life wasn’t much
of a stretch. They joined for
many good reasons. First –
women had no legal or voting
privilege – men did. Second –
they could patriotically respond to the call for service.
Third—Lots of adventure and
freedom. Escaping detection
wasn’t hard. A Civil War
physical checked mainly for a
trigger finger, four front teeth
and two feet . They looked
like most of the young recruits
and covered their femininity
easily. An injury, death, captivity and recognition were
some causes of discovery.
The world’s second oldest profession – spying—fit well. (It
was a sneaky business).
Women spies were resourceful
and knowledgeable.
They
needed to be brave, willing and
intelligent to avoid capture.
This was an invaluable tool for
both sides (The South was better at it but thru Pinkerton, the
North slowly gained).
Ah Femme Fatales. These
women hung out on the fringe
of respectability. They were
dangerous, mysterious and
often seductive. Most had a
hidden agenda and used feminine wiles (beauty, charm and
sexual allure) to gain their purpose. Being in all the wrong
places was no problem – if it
gained their purpose. If you
were there, you know which
one shot her jailer with his
own gun and who danced the
notorious “Spider Dance.”
Wasn’t the balance in that seductress Lotta Crabtree’s bank
account amazing?
Charen leaves us with a mountain of information all designed to help us answer for
ourselves that question she
posed at the beginning –
WERE THEY HEROES OR
HARLOT’S??? You must decide for yourselves.
N OVEMBER 2012
Ladies’ Department By Charen Fink
Women Hairdressers
Hairwork (continued from last
month)
IHairdressers earned $4-$5 a
week.
IWeaving hairpieces brought
$1.75 -$2 per day.
IWorking 10 hours/day
brought $3-$8 a week for making
wigs, toupees and scalps.
IHuman hair was used.
IBetween 1859 and 1860
150,000-200,000 pounds of hair
was used for false hairpieces.
IPeasant girls flocked to markets to have their hair shorn.
I Most hairwork was done in
the North; Southern women went
North to work.
IEarrings cost $4.50-$10,
rings $1.50-$3, necklaces $6-$15
and fob chains $6-$12.
Terminology
IGod’s country—term used by
Union troops to refer to the North
ICafeteria—since about 1830,
a coffee house; usage as a selfservice restaurant did not arise
until the 1890’s
Trivia Quiz
Some of the questions relate to
last month’s lecture about spies
and soldiers. Do you remember?
IThis spy provided valuable
intelligence to Gen. Rosecrans
prior to the Tullahoma Campaign
in 1863. She was captured and
sentenced to death; happily she
was rescued by Federal Troops.
IShe was a 19-year old daring
spy for Stonewall Jackson; she
received credit for the Federal
defeat at Front Royal and was
twice captured and briefly held in
the Old Capitol Prison, in Washington, D.C.
IAs color bearer of the 1st
Rhode Island Regiment, she ad-
vanced with the men against the
Confederate position at the 1st
Battle of Bull Run. Holding high
the colors, her position was in the
center, front line. She advanced
within a few hundred yards of
rebel lines until a retreat was
called. Was also a vivandiere.
Your choices:
Belle Boyd,
Brownell, Pauline Cushman,
Kady Brownell
The Sensitive Topic of Toilets
and Bathing
IPotty—small chamber pot for
a child
IWater closet—a chair with a
hole in the seat and a chamber pot
beneath it, often put into a small
room
ICommode—piece of furniture made to look like something
other than the hidden pot
IOuthouses—crescent moon
over the door for women and the
sun for men
IIn polite society an outhouse
was called: house of office or necessary house.
IRural or lower-class people
called it: outhouse, privy, jake ,
joe or john.
IActual toilets—quinces—
came into use by 1820’s
IToilet covers—by late 1830’s
IUrinals—1850’s
IToilet
paper—1880’s—
leaves, corn shuckings, and old
newspapers had been used
• Bathing: Americans were
bathing on a weekly basis by
the 1830’s. A generation
before thought that bathing
was considered immodest,
uncomfortable and unnecessary and many went an entire
lifetime without ever bathing.
• Zinc coffin—zinc lined bathtub—used in the kitchen or in
front of a fireplace.
•
•
•
•
P AGE 4
Bathroom—a room used only
for bathing without the presence of a toilet
In 1855 George Vanderbilt
was one of the first to have a
bathroom with a tub and toilet.
In 1865, Vassar College
made it mandatory for girls to
bathe twice a week.
By the 1880’s, approximately
15% of all city people had
some sort of indoor bathrooms.
References
Topping, Elizabeth. “Hairwork:
On the Head and Off” The Citizens’ Companion,
August/
September 2012, Vol. XVIII-No.
7, pgs. 18-20.
Varhola, Michael J. Everyday Life
During the Civil War. Cincinnati,
OH: Writer’s Digest Books, 1999,
pgs. 72-73.
Open For Discussion
N OVEMBER 2012
P AGE 5
The revolution in
by Mike Powell
books
I have been a book buyer for 50
years, not a collector of rare volumes, but historical, non-fiction
books for the information in them.
I had one source, the small, independent, neighborhood book
stores which offered limited selections and when you found
something you were actually
looking for, it was a good day. I
think this was the way it had been
done for centuries.
With the growth of the mall
came the book giants, Borders,
Walden, Books-A-Million and
they provided more selection, all
the new titles and discounts.
They even had catalogues that
you could search and order a book
you may be looking for, still limiting, but in a couple of weeks
you could pick it up.
The introduction of the computer changed it all. It gave the
chain book stores, who were all
on the same system, greater
search capabilities. And, as long
as the book you were searching
for was still in print, you could
get that book. There was still a
need for the small independent
book stores who provided a place
for the collector to find rare gems
and the big chains offered everything else.
The internet took book buying
to a new level. A buyer could not
only search the big chains for a
topic, but, they could now search
books stores all over the world
(amazon.com;
abebooks.com)
Shipping costs still limited the
harvesting of the books you
wanted, from a store in Charring
Cross, London, but at least you
knew where it was if you wanted
it bad enough.
I am not sure exactly when it
was that the National Archives
(archive.org) and other great repositories of libraries came on
line, maybe 10 years ago, but they
scanned out of print, out of copyright books, and put them on the
internet. You could download the
book and read it off your computer screen.
Has there ever
been a greater advancement for
historians? Those doing research
could now stay at home, save the
travel money and research books
on line that they only dreamt of
before. But even this process has
its limitations. It is hard to read
off the computer screen. Young
eyes are needed for that. Also,
because the book was scanned
and not typed, it could not be
searched for a particular word of
phrase.
Now, the latest in book buying is
the “print on demand” feature.
Say that you want a book printed
in 1800, and had not been printed
since. You may be able to find a
copy, on the internet for sale, but
the cost would be prohibitive.
Now, for between $20-25.00, they
can print it on demand just for
your order, and you may have
received it in the mail in days.
Archives and university libraries,
that have the original book in
their possession, are now the book
printers and sellers. For the collector of rare books, it does not
matter much, they still have to
search for their treasures, but for
the researchers, readers, historians, etc., that just want the book
for what is in it, it has never been
better.
Open For Discussion...
North Carolina reluctantly left the Union on May 20, 1861. The debates and the decision to
leave the Union were painful for the Tar Heel State. It would be President Lincoln’s call for
75,000 troops to put down the rebellion on April 15 that pushed North Carolina out of the Union. Many felt that North Carolina and the south were committing suicide, yet still seceded.
When all was said and done, the reluctant Old North State would supply the material and incur
the most casualties of any other southern state. How long would the south have survived if
North Carolina had not seceded and how would the Confederacy have dealt with North
Carolina as a neutral or belligerent?
We hope you will submit your opinions to Mike Powell
([email protected])
N OVEMBER 2012
Open For Discussion
P AGE 6
HUZZAHS!
The BCWRT extends many thanks
and appreciation for all the hard
work and dedication given by the
following volunteers as they move
on to other ventures. You will be
missed but know we’ll still see you
at the meetings. Mike Powell
leaves as a V.P; Bob Benedict as
treasurer and keeper of our name
badges; Anne Benedict for her
contributions as membership coordinator ; John & Barbara Lawter
for maintaining the sutler’s table
and selling books; Joe Butchko for
setting up the meeting room and
putting it back in order at the end
of each meeting; and Musette
Steck for her welcoming smiles as
she greeted everyone coming in the
door.
IMPORTANT NOTICE TO THE MEMBERSHIP
After two years in establishing the Brunswick Civil War Round Table, the officers and Board (9 members), and the
advisors (3 members) have recently evaluated this organization. The membership should be made aware that certain changes have been decided on as follows:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Basic membership fees for individuals and couples will remain at $25.00 and will not change prior to January
1, 2013, if then;
Students will be welcomed free of charge effective immediately;
A $5.00 admission fee will be charged all guests, effective September 4, 2012.
Subsequently it may be necessary to charge guests a higher fee when there is an especially renowned speaker
or when travel arrangements become more expensive.
The RT has the following stated objectives:
1. To promote knowledge and understanding of the complex Civil War Era through programs, travel, and the
Newsletter;
2. To support the development and preservation of Civil War sites. (This group has adopted Fort Anderson as it
primary site.)
Pursued in various ways, some obvious and some less so, these efforts vary as to the monthly cost of speakers,
venues, programs, and publicity. With this in mind, we propose to establish two categories of elective, tax-free
giving which would secure our finances in light of unknown future changes. The proposed categories reflect our
purposes. One category will be for programs and the other for Historic Site preservation.
The membership may be assured that due diligence is given to all RT finances and other affairs.
N OVEMBER 2012
MEMBERSHIP IN FO
P AGE 7
BRUNSWICK CIVIL
WAR ROUND TABLE
Membership Application and Renewal
The Brunswick Civil War
Round Table usually meets on the first Tuesday of each month, except during July and
August. Most meetings will be held in the Southport area. Specific locations will be
announced in advance, either at meetings, in the newsletter, via email, or on our web
site. (brunswickcivilwarroundtable.com)
Annual dues are $25.00 for individuals and couples, students are free of charge. Nonmembers pay $5.00 per visit, which can be applied to membership. Please make checks
payable to: B. C. W. R. T. Payments for renewal memberships should be made on the
anniversary of your initial membership. Forms and checks for membership or renewal can be given to those at the registration desk, at the meetings, or send to:
BCWRT, P. O. Box 10161, Southport, NC. 28461
NAME(S):________________________________________________________________
ADDRESS:_______________________________________________________________
CITY/STATE/ZIP:________________________________________________________
PHONE:_______________________CELL:____________________________________
EMAIL:__________________________________________________________________
If you would like to make a donation to help BCWRT in its historical preservation
work or to assure that we continue to get the best speakers possible please complete
boxes below.
Speakers and programs:
Amount $________
Battlefield preservation:
Amount $________
Recognition may be acknowledged in our communications should you wish.
150 YEARS AG O november 1862
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
November 2– Grant’s first Vicksburg Campaign begins
November 5– McClellan relieved of command on the Army of the Potomac, again.
November 6– Jefferson Davis officially elected President of the Confederacy.
November 6– James Longstreet and “Stonewall” Jackson promoted to Lt. General.
November 7– Ambrose Burnside promoted to command of the Army of the Potomac
November 8– Benjamin Butler relieved of command in New Orleans due to disregard of civilian population
November 17– First troops of the Army of the Potomac arrive north of the Rappahannock River at
Fredericksburg, VA
November 21– James Seddon becomes Confederate Secretary of War
November 24– Joseph E. Johnston assumes command of the Dept. of the West, including two armies: Army
of Tennessee (Bragg) and Army of Mississippi (Pemberton)
November 29– John Magruder assumes command of CS forces in Texas
N OVEMBER 2012
Call To Arms
P AGE 8
THE NEXT MEETING IS TUESDAY,
November 6, 2012
Remember to VOTE!
The Brunswick Civil War Round Table is a 501 (c) (3) tax exempt organization that
meets on the first Tuesday of each month, except July and August. Unless otherwise noted, meetings will be held at:
Trinity United Methodist Church
209 E. Nash St.
Southport, NC 28461
Registration is open at 6:30 pm and the program starts at 7:00pm.
2012 BCWRT Officers, Directors, Advisors
Wally Rueckel: President & Director
Mike Powell: Vice President & Director
Marv Hamer: Vice President & Director
Bob Benedict: Treasurer & Director
Norm Praet: Secretary & Director
Tom O’Donnell: Director & Advisor
Charen Fink: Director
Chuck Roedema: Director
Max Williams: Director
Jim McKee: Advisor
Jack Carpenter: Advisor
Robert Clarke: Advisor
Check Us Out on the
Web
The Brunswick Civil War Round Table's website is now up and running. The BCWRT
website can be found under brunswickcivilwarroundtable.com or brunswickcivilwarroundtable.org. All of the information on the website is available to everyone except for the
newsletter - Call to Arms. which is available to members. Your username and password is
required to view the newsletter. Be sure to check out the list of presenters already lined up
for our 2012/2013 year. There is also information on current Round Table sponsored trips
and write-ups on trips already taken. Be sure to check out the Links page for other organizations involved in the Civil War.
Members should have received an email with their login information including username
and password. Everyone's default password is their email address. Junk mail filters will
likely impede the delivery of many of those emails. If you did not receive this e-mail please
check your spam folder first. For the people who did not received the e-mail due to incorrect or no e-mail address provided to the club, please contact Kathy O'Donnell at [email protected].
The website is updated frequently so please keep checking in on us.