“[I am] still alive and hearty although the mosquitoes have half eaten me. Charleston is not yet taken!!!”

“this place is to be evacuated all the troops and the gunboats leave with us there is a general move of the darkeys they all want to go with us they do not dare to stay here after we leave for fear of the guerrillas I believe we are to take every thing with us that can be of use to the rebs”

“a scout came in and told us that old Wheeler had crossed the river above with three thousand and was comming down to burn the Bridge and we went to work and built some works to protect us and keep the devils at bay and hold them untill we got reinforced and then we put out pickets and I went out about one mile and was out all night and looked for the Johneys but we looked in vain”

“I think Charleston must fall this time but we need something beside men and heavy ordinance. we need the help of God if we go forth in his name and strength, he will lead us to victory.”

“Some one has got to do this Work I might as Well do it as any one els but just as they think not as I care I Stood it two years in the feld most I gess I can Stand Nine months more…”

“…the woods was ful of ded rebs”

“we had quite an excitement in Newbern about a week ago the rebels made three or four attacks on the City and were finally repulsed we lost one man on board of one of the Gunboats that is all”

“Those four legged Grey backs have about played out but there is a plenty of two legged ones here yet....We are going to try & Cleanse out these Johneys this summer & come home next winter”

Printed by Ringwalt & Brown in Philadelphia, this recruitment poster sought men between ages 18 and 35 to enlist in twelve mounted batteries of light artillery. Touted as the “only Regiment of its kind in the service, and the last chance for those who wish to join the flying artillery,” the field officers “are men of experience in the Regular Army,” so enlistees could be certain of “doing the duty of Soldiers, under the command of Soldiers.”

“marched to Gettisburg 10 miles...about 1 ’clock in afternoon went in to the fight. It was a hard one & was taken Prisoner as was 40% of my reg and the rest was either killed or wounded.”

Shoemaker Calvin Conant was a private in Company G of the 13^th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry when he was taken prisoner at the Second Battle of Bull Run on August 30, 1862. For the next three months, he was at home in Massachusetts waiting to be “exchanged” for Confederate a prisoner. He rejoined his regiment in December, after missing the Battles of Antietam and Fredericksburg. He participated in the Mud March and the Battle of Chancellorsville but was taken prisoner on the first day of the Battle of Gettysburg, soon after joining the battle. He spent the next six weeks in a parole camp outside of Philadelphia before rejoining his regiment in mid-August 1863.

This hand-sewn booklet contains eight songs popular during the Civil War era, with music and lyrics in calligraphy. Songs include “On a Green Grassy Noll” by J. D. Canning, with music by Ira Odell; “The Old Mountain Tree” by James G. Clark; “Harmonian Waltz”; “Year of Jubilee, or Kingdom has Come!”; “Squire Jones’s Daughter”; “The Sweet Birds Are Singing”; “Lament of the Irish Emigrant”; and “Soon and For Ever,” by J. B. Monsell. The last page of the booklet is dated February 21, 1864.

Shortly after Abraham Lincoln’s election as president in November 1860, secessionists in South Carolina demanded a convention to remove the state from the United States. South Carolina’s secession convention assembled in Columbia on December 17, 1860, but fearing an outbreak of smallpox there, they reassembled in Charleston from December 18 to January 5, 1861. On December 20, they passed a secession ordinance.

Shortly after Abraham Lincoln’s election as president in November 1860, secessionists in South Carolina demanded a convention to remove the state from the United States. South Carolina’s secession convention assembled in Columbia on December 17, 1860, but fearing an outbreak of smallpox there, they reassembled in Charleston from December 18 to January 5, 1861. On December 20, they passed a secession ordinance.

“Whereas the convention on the 8^th Jany 1862 expressed “as the sense of the people of South Carolina … that Charleston should be defended at any cost of life or property … I, Milledge L. Bonham Commander-in-chief in & over the State of South Carolina do recommend to, and enjoin upon, all good citizens the removal from Charleston, as early as practicable, of all non-combatants....”