Our Mission

Fort Fisher Visitors Center / Photo courtesy of Chuck Lee

The Blue and Gray Education Society is dedicated to the preservation of the heritage of the American Civil War by the study and understanding of its battlefields and other historic sites through the conduct of field study tours and seminars, open discussion of issues relating to the case for preserving sites and artifacts, interpretative projects, and collaborative evaluation and publication of scholarly research and writings.


Monthly Newsletter

Holding the Line edited by Barbara Noe Kennedy is published several months to our entire subscription list. If you haven’t already signed up as a subscriber, you can do so here: Sign up for our email list. Download prior issues in pdf format here.

Holding the Line, April, 2019
Holding the Line, May, 2019
Holding the Line, July, 2019
Holding the Line, August, 2019
Holding the Line, September, 2019
Holding the Line, October, 2019
Holding the Line, November, 2019
Holding the Line, December, 2019
Holding the Line, January, 2020
Holding the Line, February, 2020
Holding the Line, March, 2020
Holding the Line, April, 2020
Holding the Line, May, 2020
Holding the Line, June, 2020
Holding the Line, July, 2020
Holding the Line, August, 2020
Holding the Line, October, 2020
Holding the Line, November, 2020
Holding the Line, December, 2020
Holding the Line, January, 2021
Holding the Line, February, 2021
Holding the Line, March, 2021
Holding the Line, April, 2021
Holding the Line, May, 2021
Holding the Line, June, 2021

Member’s Newsletter

In Camp Along The Monocacy edited by Len is published Bi-monthly and is electronically distributed to all members. It contains detailed stories and information. Information on joining BGES is here: BGES Membership. Download prior issues, in PDF format here.

Volume 1, Issue 2, July 2017
Volume 1, Issue 3, October 2017
Volume 2, Issue 1, January 2018
Volume 2, Issue 2, April 2018
Volume 2, Issue 3, July 2018
Volume 3, Issue 1, March 2019
Volume 3, Issue 2, May/June 2019
Volume 3, Issue 3, July/August 2019
Volume 3, Issue 4, September/October 2019
Volume 3, Issue 5, November/December 2019
Volume 3, Issue 6, June 2020
Volume 4, Issue 1, February/March 2020
Volume 4, Issue 3, April 2020
Volume 4, Issue 4, August/September 2020
Volume 4, Issue 5, October/November 2020


Blue and Gray Dispatch

October, 2019

October 15, 2019 – Fitzgerald, Georgia: The Soldier’s Colony of Unity
October 18, 2019 – My Enemy, My Friend: A Civil War Friendship
October 22, 2019 – Civil War Photoshop
October 25, 2019 – CSS Shenandoah: Last Flag Down
October 29, 2019 – Raymond’s Obelisk

November, 2019

November 1, 2019 – Wilson’s Raid
November 5, 2019 – “More of the Story” on Monuments
November 8, 2019 – Our Greatest Trial: The American Civil Wa

December, 2019

December 3, 2019 – Fitzgerald, Georgia: The Soldier’s Colony of
Unity

December 6, 2019 – My Enemy, My Friend: A Civil War Friendship
December 10, 2019 – CSS Shenandoah: Last Flag Down
December 13, 2019 – Raymond’s Obelisk
December 17, 2019 – Wilson’s Raid
December 20, 2019 – Our Greatest Trial: The American Civil War
December 24, 2019 – Santa Claus – Our Nation’s Jolly Old Elf
December 28, 2019 – A Quiet Corner of the War
December 31, 2019 – General Sherman’s Famous March to the Sea
Began In Alabama – Not Georgia!

January, 2020

January 3, 2020 – Glory: History or Just a Good Story?
January 7, 2020 – Surprises Don’t Last
January 10, 2020 – John W. Inzer: Gallant Confederate Veteran and County Leader
January 14, 2020 – Charlotte Branch: “The Mother of The Oglethorpe Light Infantry”
January 17, 2020 – A Witness to the 1856 John Brown Patawattomie Creek Massacre in Kansas
January 21, 2020 – Mahala Doyle: Witness to the 1856 Pottawatomie Creek Massacre in Kansas And her Letter to John Brown in 1859
January 24, 2020 – Dr. Mary Edwards Walker and the Medal of Honor
January 28, 2020 – Modern Drugstores: Created by Civil War Soldier Eli Lilly
January 31, 2020 – Revolution in Richmond: Part I

February, 2020

February 4, 2020 – Revolution in Richmond: Part II
February 7, 2020 – Revolution in Richmond: Part III
February 11, 2020 – Florida Civil War Escape Story – Judah Benjamin, Confederate States of America
February 14, 2020 – Abraham Lincoln’s Love for Gingerbread Cookies
February 18, 2020 – Aviator Howard Hughes Could Have Been a Member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV)
February 21, 2020 – Those Damned Black Hats! The Uniform of the Iron Brigade
February 25, 2020 – Power Grab: “Sunset” Cox and the Etheridge Conspiracy of 186
February 28, 2020 – A Civil War Father – Son Tragedy: General William J Hardee

March, 2020

March 3, 2020 – Governor Wise at Harper’s Ferry
March 6, 2020 – General Sherman’s Confederate Girlfriend
March 10, 2020 – Our Greatest Trial: The American Civil War
March 13, 2020 – The Yorktown Monument: A Victim of Another War
March 17, 2020 – Contemporary Accounts on the Death of General Robert E Lee both North and South
March 20, 2020 – Fort Harrison: What can a little known fort teach us?
March 24, 2020 – Civil War In The West – The Battle of Mesilla
March 27, 2020 – Fitzgerald, Georgia: The Soldier’s Colony of Unity
March 31, 2020 – Generals of the Georgia Sea Islands

April, 2020

April 3, 2020 – The Cost of War: All Tragedy is Local
April 7, 2020 – The Tejano Tiger: Col. Santos Benavides, Confederate States of Army
April 10, 2020 – The Paul Revere of the South — John Wisdom — and the Forrest Streight Raid
April 13, 2020 – The Lady Slocomb: How Mobile, Alabama, Lost its Most famous Civil War Cannon to New Orleans
April 17, 2020 – Last Grand Charge of the Civil War: The Battle of Fort Blakeley, Alabama
April 20, 2020 – Siege of Suffolk
April 24, 2020 – Ben Wade at Bull Run
April 27, 2020 – A Soldier’s Story: Truth or Fiction?

May, 2020

May 1, 2020 – For a Want of a Virus: Pensacola in 1861
May 4, 2020 – Family of Actress Kathy Bates has a Rich and Unusual Civil War History
May 8, 2020 – The Revolutionary War Battle for Mobile
May 11, 2020 – The Revolutionary War Battle at “The Village”
May 15, 2020 – Emma Sansom: A Very Brave 15-Year-Old
May 18, 2020 – The Gray Ghost of the Confederacy
May 22, 2020 – Funeral of the “Gallant” Pelham, Boy Hero of the Confederacy
May 25, 2020 – The Tragic Story of the Bridgens Brothers
May 29, 2020 – Mosby: A Master at the Use of Fear and Deception

June, 2020

June 1, 2020 – The Bellicose and Artistic Life of Conrad Wise Chapman
June 5, 2020 – Living in Atlanta with the Legacy of Sherman
June 8, 2020 – The Confederate Submarine Hunley, the Blue Light, and Its Most Likely Source
June 12, 2020 – The Archer from the Cherokee Hills
June 15, 2020 – A Quiet Corner of the War
June 19, 2020 – A Different Conclusion to the CSS Hunley and the Blue Light Debate
June 22, 2020 – Ten Feet Tall and Big in Proportion
June 26, 2020 – The 1969 Moon Landing Started with the Astronomical Curiosity of a Union General
June 29, 2020 – The Small, Big Millen, Georgia

July, 2020

July 3, 2020 – Origins of a Secessionist County
July 7, 2020 – The War Officially Begins
July 10, 2020 – The United States Colored Troops (USCT) at the Battle of Fort Blakeley
July 17, 2020 – Confederate Attempts to Capture Fort Pickens, Pensacola, Florida in 1864
July 21, 2020 – He (She) was a Combat Solider in the American Revolution
July 24, 2020 – The Death of a Senator’s Son
July 28, 2020 – The Importance of Georgia’s Western & Atlantic Railroad
July 31, 2020 – How the Civil War Created Coca-Cola

August, 2020

August 4, 2020 – An Excellent Primary Source
August 7, 2020 – Gen. Braxton Bragg and Two Texas Ghost Stories
August 11, 2020 – The Waltons Connection to the Civil War
August 14, 2020 – Col. William Washington’s Dragoons at the Battle of Cowpens
August 18, 2020 – Spring Hill in the National Tribune
August 21, 2020 – The Quartermaster’s Son
August 25, 2020 – Cleburne’s Proposal to Arm the African Americans during the Civil War
August 28, 2020 – Forrest’s Family

September, 2020

September 1, 2020 – Where Flowers Healed a Nation: The Origins of Memorial Day
September 4, 2020 – The Man Who Might Have Been President
September 8, 2020 – The Angel of Marye’s Heights
September 11, 2020 – The Last Civil War Volunteers
September 14, 2020 – Intersection of History at Turner’s Gap
September 15, 2020 – The Legacy of Commodore David Porter, USN: Midshipman David Glasgow Farragut
September 18, 2020 – Forrest Captures All of the Yankees
September 21, 2020 – A Rich Man’s War and a Poor Man’s Fight
September 25, 2020 – Myths of Cold Harbor
September 28, 2020 – The Dalton Revival of 1864

October, 2020

October 2, 2020 – Hubbard Pryor, Defender of Fort Hill
October 5, 2020 – The Sharpshooters of Raccoon Mountain: An Incident of the 1863 Chattanooga Campaign
October 9, 2020 – Willing’s Raid: The Only Significant Revolutionary War Altercation in West Florida
October 12, 2020 – Dual Destiny
October 16, 2020 – Augusta’s Civil War Legacy in Bronze
October 19, 2020 – The Legacy of Commodore David Porter: David Farragut—The Civil War Years
October 23, 2020 – Northern Birth, Southern Sacrifice
October 26, 2020 – The Local Home Guards
October 30, 2020 – Dalton’s Southern Belle with a Cause

November, 2020

November 2, 2020 – The Elections of 1860 and 2020
November 6, 2020 – The Legacy of Commodore David Porter: David Dixon Porter
November 9, 2020 – Henry “Dad” Brown
November 13, 2020 – The Texas Lone Star Flag was Actually Created for Georgians
November 16, 2020 – All in a (Pen) Name
November 20, 2020 – The Good Doctor
November 23, 2020 – Love Letters from Dalton
November 27, 2020 – Croxton’s Raid
November 30, 2020 – “Defending the Flag”

December, 2020

December 4, 2020 – The Brown’s Island Explosion Victims
December 7, 2020 – Honoring Hans Christian Heg
December 11, 2020 – Touched by the Better Angels: Freedom
December 18, 2020 – Who Writes History? Part One of a two-part series
December 21, 2020 – Who Writes History? Part Two of a two-part series
December 25, 2020 – Across the Delaware
December 28, 2020 – Civil War Monument (Denver)

January, 2021

January 1, 2021 – South Carolina Monument (Chickamauga Battlefield)
January 4, 2021 – Touched by the Better Angels: Truth
January 8, 2021 – Charles Stone’s Redemption
January 11, 2021 – These Men Held that the States Made the Union
January 15, 2021 – Touched by the Better Angels: Inspiration
January 18, 2021 – Colored Soldiers Monument
January 30, 2021 – Touched by the Better Angels: Compassion

February, 2021

February 1, 2021 – The New Yorker Who Was a Confederate Naval Commodore
February 8, 2021 – Touched by the Better Angels: Reconciliation
February 12, 2021 – The Army of Tennessee in Dalton, Georgia: Where Did They All Fit?
February 15, 2021 – The Battles for Dalton
February 19, 2021 – The First Chapter of the Atlanta Campaign
February 22, 2021 – A Historical Account of the Battle of South Anna Bridge
February 26, 2021 – The Battle of Mill Creek Gap and How to Visit Today

March, 2021

March 1, 2021 – Fitzgerald, Georgia: The Soldiers’ Colony
March 8, 2021 – Civil War Photoshop
March 12, 2021 – CSS Shenandoah: Last Flag Down
March 15, 2021 – Wilson’s Raid
March 19, 2021 – Beyond the Irish Brigade in the Army of the Potomac
March 23, 2021 – A Quiet Corner of the War
March 26, 2021 – General Sherman’s Famous March to the Sea Began In Alabama – Not Georgia!
March 29, 2021 – Glory: History or Just a Good Story?

April, 2021

April 2, 2021 – The First into Richmond?
April 5, 2021 – Chinese Confederates
April 9, 2021 – Two Far-Removed Eras of American History Forever Linked
April 12, 2021 – Go Gators: The Confederate General Who Helped Establish the University of Florida
April 16, 2021 – The First Communist to Serve in the U.S.Government?
April 19, 2021 – Eve of War: Williamsburg
April 23, 2021 – Cook Brothers’ Armory in Athens, Georgia: These Brits made Superior Confederate Rifles
April 26, 2021 – The Lineage of an American Icon
April 30, 2021 – Forrest–Streight Raid: Skirmish at Black Creek

May, 2021

May 3, 2021 – The Art at Shiloh: “Defeated Victory”
May 7, 2021 – Eve of War: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
May 10, 2021 – The Long Legacy of Oakley Plantation
May 14, 2021 – The Barber of Natchez—and the Future Confederate General Who Tried to Bring His Family Justice
May 17, 2021 – Point Blank Business: the Battle of Wauhatchie
May 21, 2021 – Did the Wright Brothers Really Fly the First Airplane? One Civil War Doctor Would Beg to Differ
May 24, 2021 – The Art at Chickamauga: 125th Ohio Infantry
Monument

May 31, 2021 – The Historic Connections of the Church of the Holy Cross in Stateburg, South Carolina

June, 2021

June 4, 2021 – Harlan Page Paige’s War Part 1: Early Days and High Hopes
June 7, 2021 – Croxton’s Raid and the Last CSA Casualty
June 11, 2021 – The Wife of the Wizard of the Saddle


Medford Dispatch

Medford Photo #50
Medford Photo #51
Medford Photo #52
Medford Photo #53
Medford Photo #54
Medford Photo #55
Medford Photo #56
Medford Photo #57
Medford Photo #58
Medford Photo #59
Medford Photo #60
Medford Photo #61
Medford Photo #62
Medford Photo #63
Medford Photo #64
Medford Photo #65


The following documents are available as pdf downloads: BGES BylawsMost recent Form 990IRS Determination letter.

Investors Reports

Our yearly reports prepared for the donors of the Blue and Gray Education Society are available for download here.

BGES Investor’s Report, 2014
BGES Investor’s Report, 2015
BGES Investor’s Report, 2016
BGES Investor’s Report, 2017
BGES Investor’s Report, 2019

The Staff

Len Riedel, Executive Director, Blue and Gray Educational Society
Len Riedel, Membership Coordinator
Barbara Noe Kennedy, Communications Coordinator (Monthly newsletter: “Holding the Line”)
Jane Martin, Website Photo Editor

Mike Kennedy, Feature writer

Burford Smith, Tour Manager
Dan Galfano, Technical Support Coordinator

Board of Directors

Bill McKinnon, President, Term Expires 2023
Gary Wilson, Vice President, Term Expires 2022

Mary Adams, Secretary, Term Expires 2022
Laurence Schiller, Treasurer, Term Expires 2021
Steve Jaren, Term Expires 2022
Fowler West, Term Expires 2021
Bill Terpeluk, Term Expires 2023
Joe Trahan, Term Expires 2023

Jo Roberts, Past President, Term expires 2021