Over the weekend of June 25 to 27, 2021, I had the opportunity to join Dr. Brian Steel Wills and Norman Dasinger, Jr. for Blue & Gray Education Society’s tour of Streight’s Raid, from Eastport, Mississippi to Cedar Bluff, Alabama. It was my first time to join a BGES tour and it was an amazing … Read more
The Ohio River served as the dividing line between the North and South in middle America, with Ohio offering freedom and opportunity to refugee enslaved individuals. Ohio also served as an important political calculation for President Abraham Lincoln, who understood the importance of Ohio (and neighboring Indiana) as the South closed off economic traffic downriver. … Read more
Darryl Smith may be new to BGES, but he’s a grizzled veteran when it comes to Civil War history in Ohio and Kentucky. The owner of Walking With History, Smith will host his first BGES tour later this summer, focusing on the often-overlooked battles waged along the Ohio River. “Civil War on the Ohio” runs … Read more
“Oh, the sun shines bright on my old Kentucky home.” That enduring lyric holds particular meaning for BGES member Dan Rush. His family roots reach deep into the fertile soil of the Bluegrass State, quite literally. His ancestors settled in Kentucky in the 1700s and farmed the land from the time they arrived. As an … Read more
by Doug Smock On Wednesday, May 12, I escaped my 15-month pandemic-imposed confinement in Weymouth, Massachusetts, and arrived in Tennessee for an introductory evening talk by Greg Mertz, a recently retired National Park Service historian. He distributed three-ring binders full of battle information, including maps, mostly made by Civil War cartographer Hal Jespersen, who … Read more
In the game of baseball, an error by the first baseman is scored an E-3. In the world of BGES, a tour hosted by Dennis Frye is identified in the opposite way, 3-E, as in educational, entertaining, and energizing. This summer, Frye will be back at it with “A Weekend with Historian Dennis Frye, John … Read more
Travels to Hallowed Ground: A Historian’s Journey to the American Civil War By Emory M. Thomas (University of South Carolina Press, 1987) Emory Thomas is one of the most revered of academic Civil War historians, and so it is with regret that I rate his musings so low. In fairness, as with all such books … Read more
Snuggled between the steep crags of the Blue Ridge, at the point where the Shenandoah River meets the Potomac, Harpers Ferry is a quiet mountain village of stone-and-brick buildings and narrow, hilly streets. Its history, though, is anything but quiet, for it was here in 1859 that fiery abolitionist John Brown launched his ill-fated raid … Read more
In August 2021, Darryl Smith will host his first tour for BGES, “Civil War on the Ohio.” Relatively new to the group, Smith is decidedly excited for the opportunity. “We will cover a few different topics, such as Cincinnati’s Civil War importance, along with some fights involving John H. Morgan’s men in northern Kentucky,” he … Read more
It was eerie: Fist bumps and face masks, people brandishing their Covid vaccination records, a nervous chatter in the meeting room muted by masks and uncertainty that all was normal again. Two BGES board members who were physicians were in attendance; the BGES lawyer was there as well. I went to ensure that there would be … Read more
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