The morning of 3rd October 1862 had not gone well for Major-General William Starke Rosecran’s Union forces. Holding the northern Mississippi town of Corinth, they had been attacked around 10am by Confederate forces of Major-General Earl Van Dorn’s Army of...

On 8th September 1864, First Lieutenant Patrick McCarthy of Company C, 182nd New York Infantry (69th New York National Guard), sat down to write a letter to the father of one of his comrades. The young man found himself with...

Private Michael Dougherty of Falcarragh, Co. Donegal, served in the ranks of the 13th Pennsylvania Cavalry during the American Civil War. His bravery in combat would be recognised in 1897, when he was awarded the Medal of Honor. However, as...

On 24th April 1861, 17 year-old James Allen enlisted in the army at Potsdam, New York. Joining Company F of the 16th New York Infantry, he would see action in all the major battles of the Army of the Potomac...

The Battle of Perryville, Kentucky was the ‘high water mark’ of the Confederacy in the Western Theater. On 8th October 1862 Braxton Bragg’s Confederate Army of the Mississippi smashed into elements of Don Carlos Buell’s Union Army of the Ohio...

The Confederate uniforms produced in Limerick and shipped through the Union blockade have been the subject of a previous post on Irish in the American Civil War. The remains of the factory are still visible in Limerick today, and its...

The October 1909 issue of the Confederate Veteran tells the story of Tommy Campbell, and Irishman who had been discharged from the largely Irish 5th Confederate Infantry Regiment in 1862 as overage. This proved to be a very poor decision,...

The remarkable story of the Confederate uniforms made in Limerick and shipped to the South through the Federal Blockade. Sir Peter Tait was born in Scotland in 1828, but moved to Limerick at a young age. In 1844 he obtained...