In May of 1845, a committee of ordained leaders from the German Baptist Brethren (Church of the Brethren) convened in Roanoke County, Virginia to discuss the most pressing questions facing their denomination. Much of their discussion, according to the minutes of the meeting, focused on the nuances of traditional Brethren theology in terms of worldliness, alcohol use, nonresistance, feet washing, service...
Maria Chapman and Melanie Ammidon from the Boston Anti-Slavery Female Society wrote an address about their abolitionist society outlining why their support for abolition and how they planned to petition. They believed that all people are immortal souls created by God, and that no one, therefore, should live under the cruel system of slavery. The address argued that women are very influential in society...
On February 12, 1833, Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky asked the Senate to modify the Tariff of 1832 in order to make it more agreeable towards both northern and southern interests. He began his speech by explaining that he refused to get rid of the tariff simply because one side did not agree with it, nor would he keep it exactly as it because one side was happy with it. He believed that it was...
Franklin Pierce rode the Boston and Maine Railroad with his wife, Jane, and only son, Bennie, on their return trip from Jane’s uncle’s funeral in January of 1853. Pierce won the presidential election against Winfield Scott the previous year and was preparing for his inauguration in two months. Approximately five minutes into the trip, the train entered the first bend in the line near Andover. Suddenly,...
The completion of the Blue Ridge Tunnel was the pinnacle of American railroad engineering in the late 1850s. At 4,273 feet long, the tunnel was the longest ever constructed in the United States in 1858. Using funds from the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Central Virginia Railroad hired famous engineer Claudius Crozet for the project. He then found several contractors to do the work. The laborers consisted...
On February 22, 1832, toward the end of Andrew Jackson’s presidency a large celebration in his honor took place. The festivities of music and a parade drew in a crowd of 10,000 people; but the highlight of the ceremony was the four-foot-tall, two-foot thick, fourteen-hundred-pound wheel of cheddar cheese, with a belt around it bearing the inscription: “Our Union, It Must be Preserved.” Ben Perley...
On November 30, 1864 Colonel W.D. Gale participated in the Battle of Franklin and burying the large number of Confederate dead that filled the battlefield. He wrote a letter home to his wife, describing the battle and the Confederate hospital where he visited his wounded comrades. In the Battle of Franklin, the Confederate Army of Tennessee went on the offensive striking the Union army entrenched there....
On the night of August 15, 1864, a woman sought lodging at a station house in Fort Wayne, Indiana. This was no ordinary woman. Frances Clayton told her story to Officer Rand, who then recounted it to the Fort Wayne Daily Gazette the next day. In 1861, Clayton enlisted in the Union Army of Missouri under the alias Jack Williams, with her husband. She fought in eighteen battles, serving in both the cavalry...
In June 1866, John and Carrie McGavock donated two acres of their land to serve as a Confederate cemetery to rebury the Confederate soldiers that lost their lives at the Battle of Franklin. After the battle in 1864, burial details started to inter the dead, choosing to place them in the area where they had fallen in battle. They recorded the name, rank, regiment, and company of the individuals upon...
After the Civil War, the United States’ relationship with Brazil became an important one because of the thousands of Confederates who had relocated to South America. Henry W. Hillard served as the U.S. Ambassador to Brazil from 1877 to 1881 and became a vocal member of the Brazilian Anti-Slavery Society. Joaquim Nabuco, a Brazilian abolitionist, served as the legal attaché...