The return of the Witnesses to History series sees long-time friend of the site Gary Chiaramonte share news of a new acquisition by the The American Military Heritage Museum of North Carolina. Gary has spent many years researching and collecting material relating to the Irish experience of the American Civil War, and has identified a......
Back on 25th January last Catherine gave an online presentation to the Morris Center for Lowcountry Heritage in South Carolina on the topic of Civil War Irish Songs. The talk was recorded and is available via Facebook Live- although we are biased, we think it’s well worth checking out! It will be of particular interest......
In the second of his two-part guest post about the Welsh-born Irish 69th Pennsylvania General Joshua T. Owen, Aled Jones (Swansea University) explores more about Owen’s troubled Civil War career and image. In this second post, Owen defends his conduct in the wake of doubts over his leadership abilities. You can catch-up on Part 1......
When I got the opportunity to undertake some research at Andersonville towards the end of last year I also met up with historian Sheritta Bitikofer of Emerging Civil War. We chatted about a range of Irish-related topics, from my own story, to the Irish in America generally, to Irish service and of course on the......
The Andersonville Irish Project has now reached the milestone of 600 identified men and families. To mark it, a new project infographic has been produced, the third in the series. You can explore the infographic in detail by clicking on the image below to enlarge it. In addition, the interactive project map and full database have been......
We are very pleased to publish our first guest post following our call for blog submissions on aspects of Irish American Civil War history. This fascinating analysis about the career, character, and cultural views of Welsh-born Irish 69th Pennsylvania commander Joshua T. Owen has been written by doctoral student Aled Jones, and is the first......
As some of you may be aware, I was away conducting some research at Andersonville National Historic Site as part of the Andersonville Irish Project. It was a really productive trip, and I’m looking forward to sharing some of the results with readers of the site over the coming months. While I was there I......
The U.S. Bureau of Pensions was in a bind. They were unable to verify–or even approximate–the age of one Richard Ewing, a 21-year veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps who previously served two years in the 25th New York Volunteer Infantry and one year in the Navy during the Civil War. Every one of the......
Back in 2019 I published a feature in History Ireland magazine exploring the importance of the American Civil War in the context of Irish history, and the reasons behind a need to improve on the relative neglect it has suffered in Irish historical circles. The article has now been made freely available to read on......
To the police of Albany, New York, the Small brothers were well-known troublemakers. The two boys, Henry and Stephen, were born in Albany to Irish immigrant parents in the 1840s. Their mother Hannah died when they were little, leaving them in the care of their father Hugh, who kept a grocery business, selling liquor and......