Hello Everyone,
Another week has come and gone here in Washington D.C. Time has taken on a different quality for me here. I’m very used variety in my life, so when I get a chance to stop and catch my breath, it’s actually kind of nice. Now I’m through the “catching my breath” phase and into a routine phase which I know is how most people’s lives simply are. It has its ups and downs, but more than anything the time just seems to slip away. I hope every week to at least have something to show for that week, but even if there isn’t anything tangible it’s another week of keeping myself safe and sane and another week of helping who I can do the same. Sometimes it’s the little things that can make a difference too. This week I saw my first lightning bugs of the summer and it reminded me of how magical these little critters are. How cool is it that they can just glow like that in the dark? When I used to guide night snorkel tours in the islands, I used to try and show people some phosphorescence in the water, but lightning bugs are way cooler than that. They fly and they glow. In my next life, it wouldn’t be a bad choice. On a completely unrelated note, my mother set a new personal record for rabbits seen on her morning walk this week with 16. Like I said, sometimes it’s the little things.
My week started with a relaxing Thursday. I’m sure I did things, but I can’t remember what they were. There are more of those kinds of days recently too. I did have a nice Zoom chat with some of my friends from college and it felt really good to laugh for a while. Friday was exciting because we tapped our recently brewed homebrew and I have to say it was pretty tasty. We sampled it alongside other beers of the same kind (Kolsch), and ours held up okay. We also brewed a fresh batch on Friday as well, an American Cream Ale this time, so we’ll see how that works out in a couple of weeks. It’s been bubbling away in the fermenter, so that’s a good sign. After all of the beer excitement, we enjoyed some nice weather outside on the patio with some snacks and an exciting game of Skip-Bo, one of our go-to pandemic card games. It wasn’t a bad Friday at all.
Saturday I met up with a friend for a nice walk down in Rock Creek Park, a wonderful National Park unit which splits the city down the middle along the natural valley formed by the creek. It was a beautiful day for a walk, and hence was a little more crowded than I would have liked, but we did okay. My friend brought her dog along and he seemed to enjoy the exercise as well. We sat for a while by the water and chatted away the morning and for a minute, it almost felt like normalcy.
The Battle of Gettysburg which took place from July 1st-3rd, 1863 would be the bloodiest battle of the Civil War. 170,000 men would clash over those three hot days in July and over 50,000 would end up dead, captured, wounded or missing. While both armies were looking for a fight, neither expected it to be in this tiny Pennsylvania town.
After his dramatic victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, General Lee decided to once again push north into Union territory. He wanted a decisive victory on Northern soil to try and force President Lincoln to the negotiating table. Lee marched his Army of Northern Virginia north, crossed the Potomac River and moved through Maryland and into Pennsylvania. The Union’s Army of the Potomac, still under the command of General Hooker, pursued. By the end of June, General George Meade had replaced Hooker at the helm…
The photos below come from a recent visit to Gettysburg National Battlefield, the site of the bloodiest and most well known battles of the war. Civil War Chronicles will trace the major battles of the Eastern Theater through photos and brief histories
It’s been a warm week here in D.C. – summer has definitely arrived. I’ve had some nice days to get out and explore the city this week, but also some hot and humid ones and a few epic thunderstorms as well. It’s been a long time since I’ve experienced summer in our nation’s capital, and there are definitely pluses and minuses. I will say that the lack of traffic anywhere at any time makes the heat of summer a little more tolerable. As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, that lack of traffic definitely makes for cleaner air and clearer skies – something my camera sees even more than I do. That is one of the plusses of the situation. We’ve been enjoying some summer fruit too, which is one of the best things about summer anywhere. We’ve had beautiful cherries, watermelon, strawberries and others and I’m looking forward to peaches very soon.
Last Friday my stepfather made some wonderful homemade pizzas and we sat in the basement and played some games and listened to some music while we chowed down on a couple of pies. It was another great Forget-About-It Friday, which we are grateful for. This coming week we will tap our homebrew and see how it turned out, and begin our next batch as well – an American Cream Ale. I’m looking forward to having a taste and to keeping the brewing going while I’m home. It’s fun and there’s a (hopefully) fine finished product at the end. After the cream ale, I want to try something a little more complicated now that I’m getting my brewing confidence back up.
The rest of the weekend was pretty quiet. My mom spent Saturday cooking up a storm and we had a wonderful dinner on Saturday night as well. Sunday I spent some time reading my new (to me) book about the Gettysburg Address which I’m really enjoying. I also got some photos edited and published from our trip to Antietam last week, and got some writing done as well. It was a pretty relaxing weekend all around, but it felt good to accomplish a few things along the way.
After being turned back south after the Battle of Antietam, Confederate General Robert E. Lee marched his army back to Virginia. Union General George McClellan was replaced by General Ambrose Burnside to command the Army of the Potomac, and President Lincoln urged Burnside to pursue the Army of Northern Virginia deep into the state and attack the Confederate Capital at Richmond. The major obstacle lying in their way was the Rappahannock River.
Burnside arrived at Stafford Heights overlooking the river and the small town of Fredericksburg in mid-November, 1862. He had sent orders to have pontoons at the ready to provide a means of bringing his army rapidly across the river. Tragically for Burnside and his men, the pontoons didn’t arrive for several weeks. Instead of crossing the river in boats or rafts, he chose to wait for the pontoons. By the time they got there, Confederate troops had dug in on the high ground south of the city called Marye’s Heights and behind a stone wall along a sunken road to the front of this position.
Union engineers worked through the night of December 10th to assemble the pontoon bridge, but their progress was slowed by Mississippi sharpshooters in town. A small group of Union soldiers crossed the river in boats and fought a battle to secure the streets of the town. They finally secured the town in late afternoon on the 11th, but it was winter and the daylight soon gave out. The bridge would be completed and most of the army would cross it on December 12th.
Antietam National Battlefield was the sight of the bloodiest day in American History and one of the best known battle of the American Civil War. Along Antietam Creek just north of the tiny town of Sharpsburg, Maryland, 100,000 soldiers marched into battle on September 17th, 1862. By the end of that day almost 23,000 were dead, wounded or missing.
After a Confederate victory at the 2nd Manassas/Bull Run, General Robert E. Lee pushed into the North for the first time. The Virginia countryside had been ravaged during the first year of the war, and Lee wanted to give it time to heal, plus a decisive victory in the North might bring President Lincoln to the negotiating table.
On September 15th, 1862, Lee crossed the Potomac River into Maryland and dug in along the high ground west of Antietam Creek. Union forces under Commanding General George McClellan moved in from the east. At dawn on September 17th, the battle began…
The photos below come from a cloudy visit to Antietam National Battlefield, the site of the bloodiest day in the American Civil War. Civil War Chronicles will trace the major battles of the Eastern Theater through photos and brief histories.
Hello everyone! 10 weeks later and I’m still here in Washington and with no end in sight I’m trying to make the most of it. It’s been another tough week across the country, and here in our Nation’s Capital, and I don’t want to downplay the significance of what’s going on so that’s where I’ll start this week. The murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis saddens me greatly. If you are a regular listener of my podcast, you know that I don’t shy away from talking about racism in America and some of the horrible incidents which have occurred in our country’s history. Racism and violence towards minorities is not something which ended with the Civil War or the Civil Rights Act and it’s something which is an everyday reality for many of our fellow Americans. I try and keep politics and controversy to a minimum in this space, but there should be no controversy in this. A man was killed for no good reason and when that happens the person who did the killing needs to face the harshest of consequences. In this case, all the good cops should be leading the charge as what happened was a disgrace to the badges they wear.
Beyond that, I don’t know the answers. I wish I did. It’s been hard to watch the vandalism going on in my city and in my neighborhood. I wish that it hadn’t come to that, but I’ve been watching backlash for years over peaceful protests and sadly this seems to be what it takes to peoples’ attention. I’m trying to keep my ears open right now and really listen to what my black friends are saying. Their reality is different from mine and I acknowledge that and I am listening. I think the thing which affected me most was a tweet by Seth Green which said “Black people are literally saying ‘stop killing us’ and there are people saying ‘but…”. A change has got to come. What’s past is past, but there is still hope for the future.
With all of this weighing heavily on my mind, I’ve been trying to stay productive this week. I’ve been getting some photos edited and published and some writing done as well. I’m also making some headway on one of the books I’m writing, although it will undoubtedly take longer than I anticipated.
On July 21st, 1861 the first major battle of the American Civil War took place near the town of Manassas, Virginia and just west of a meandering creek called Bull Run. The battle was supposed to be a quick and decisive one, and many congressmen and socialites rode out from Washington with picnic baskets to watch it unfold. 10 hours after the battle began, 900 young men lay dead on the battlefield and the bloodiest war in American history began in earnest. This first Battle of Bull Run at Manassas was also where General Thomas J. Jackson earned his nickname as General Barnard Bee commented to his men “There stands Jackson like a stone wall! Rally behind the Virginians”. By the end of the day, the Southerners had sent the Federals running back to Washington and won a major victory for the Confederacy.
Just over a year later, the two armies clashed once again near this critical rail junction just 25 miles from Washington D.C. For three days in August, the Battle of Second Bull Run at Manassas raged violently across the landscape. When the smoke cleared, 3,300 soldiers lay dead and the South once again claimed victory. General Robert E. Lee, now in charge of the South’s Army of the Potomac, knew that their breadbasket in Northern Virginia was running low, so he pushed the war across the Potomac River and into the North for the first time. The tides would turn at the battle of Antietam at Sharpsburg, Maryland. To learn about this next chapter in the war, check back for my next installment of the Civil War Chronicles, coming soon.
The photos below come from a cloudy visit to the Manassas National Battlefield, the site of two important battles from the American Civil War. Civil War
Hello everyone, well we’ve made it through another week. I hope it’s been a good one wherever you’re reading this from today. Mine has been really good – probably the best I’ve had since returning home to D.C. now 2 months ago. After a positive start to being sheltered in place and having some free time to catch up on some work and try some fun stay-at-home hobbies, I really hit a downward spiral there for a while as claustrophobia and cabin fever kicked in. With the extended and indefinite closure of my industry (travel and tourism), I found myself staring out at an uncertain and challenging future. I usually keep my anxiety levels in check by being in control of certain aspects of the situation and then allowing the rest to unfold as it will. Under these circumstances, my environment is more controlled than usual, but there are thousands of moving pieces around the world that I have no control over, but which will help shape my near and distant future. I find that to be incredibly frustrating, and with limitations on how I normally deal with my frustration as the gym is closed, travel is limited and my camera is gathering dust.
I’m the kind of person who usually turns inward to sort things out, dealing with them in my own head with little or no outside influence. This week though, I’ve had a lot of outside influences help pull me up out of the mud. First I got some nice messages from some of y’all which is always appreciated. Believe me, I love to hear from you so don’t hesitate to comment or message me. Second, I met with a couple of different friend groups over Zoom which is always good. Third, I went to see some of my friends in person – masked and 10 feet apart, but it was still great to actually see people in the flesh. I hate the fact that I’m home and can’t see my friends or their kids, and this was a chance to at least pop around and say hello. And lastly, my mom came up with a plan to get us out of the house and provide some outlet for being stuck at home indefinitely.
Last Thursday, we went for a walk in Rock Creek Park, the large green space which surrounds its namesake creek through the middle of the city. We took a look at the earthworks that were once Fort DeRussy…
Hello everyone, another week has come and gone and it’s certainly had its ups and downs. More ups than last week, so that is at least something. The weather got warm here in D.C. for the weekend, and we enjoyed sitting outside in the sun. It’s turned significantly colder again as the new week began, which I’m okay with because I know the oppressive heat of D.C. in the summertime is not far away. It’s normally about this time of year that I’m making plans to head north and away from the heat. North to the Rockies, north to Alaska, north to the Great Lakes - somewhere where summer is a little bit easier to cope with and it’s actually a wonderful thing to be outside. I think it’s the knowledge that I’m likely to be here in D.C. for most of the summer which made my cabin fever boil over a bit this week. I miss the road. I miss my friends. I miss the opportunity to pick up and go when and where I want to. I miss new adventures and experiences.
We had a nice weekend here in the old homestead. My mother took charge of the social calendar for a night on Thursday and we enjoyed an evening in a colonial tavern. We had a wonderful meal and listened to some lovely fife and drum music from Colonial Williamsburg. It was a lot of fun and definitely different.
Friday, we had a nice barbecue outside, minus the barbecue. My old gas grill wasn’t working right, so we cooked inside instead, but at least we sat outside and enjoyed the nice weather and some good music…
Founded by French colonists in 1729, Port Gibson is one of the oldest towns in what’s now the state of Mississippi. Today, it serves as the county seat of Claiborne County and it is home to the beautiful county courthouse pictured below. Port Gibson was the site of several skirmishes during the Civil War, but most of its antebellum buildings survived because General Ulysses S. Grant called the town “too beautiful to burn”. The town’s population today is probably only around 1500 which explains why it’s so quiet. There are several beautiful old churches along the appropriately named Church Street and some great old buildings around the downtown area. I really enjoyed the wonderful, sunny afternoon I spent taking these photos in the charming town of Port Gibson.
It’s always interesting to me to find how interconnected history can be. I never thought in a million years when I pulled into tiny Iuka, Mississippi that I would end up stumbling into the summer home of Colonel Robert C. Brinkley, the builder of the famed Peabody Hotel in Memphis. I found it even more interesting that it was this house which served as the headquarters of Ulysses S. Grant during the Civil War. This story sent me down a lot of rabbit holes, but I found the whole thing really fascinating.
Robert C. Brinkley, or “R.C.” as he was known, was born in Chatham County, North Carolina in 1816. He studied law at the Bingham School in North Carolina and moved to Tennessee when he was 20 and went to work as an attorney. Two years later, he married Ann Overton and they would have two children together. When Ann passed away in 1845, R.C. left his law practice and started focusing on real estate. He went on to become the president of the Memphis branch of Planters Bank, and began selling stock in the Memphis to Charleston Railroad.
It was during this time that R.C. traveled to London to try and raise money to purchase the rails necessary to complete this line. There, he met and befriended banker and financier George Peabody (whose finance business would be renamed J.P. Morgan after his death…
The tiny town of Iuka, Mississippi (population 3,000) was founded by David Hubbard in 1857 along the route of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad. Built on the sight of an old Chickasaw Indian village, the town takes its name from one of the chiefs of that village, Chief Ish-ta-ki-yu-ka-tubbe . Iuka (pronounced “aye-you-ka”) was the site of the Battle of Iuka during the Civil War, an engagement between Union General Rosecrans’ Army of the Mississippi and Confederate General Sterling Price’s Confederate Army of the West. The battle resulted in over 2300 casualties before Price withdrew his troops and marched on to join General Van Dorn in the 2nd Battle of Corinth. The Brinkley House, also called Dunrobin, was used as General Grant’s Headquarters during the battle, and is a really cool antebellum home.
Today, Iuka is a charming little town with a cute downtown area and a wonderful park. The park’s centerpiece is the Iuka Mineral Springs, where natural spring water flows for all to enjoy. I really liked this park for some reason and enjoyed taking photos of the old playground equipment which reminded me of the things I played on when I was a kid. Iuka has a beautiful War Memorial and a history museum in their old courthouse which was sadly closed during my visit. There were also several beautiful churches and some neat looking shops. Much like my visit to Corinth, short days and cold weather kept me from exploring too far afield, but I thought Iuka was an adorable little town and that these photos would give you a feel for my visit.
