Regular reader and fellow lawyer Randy Sauls, who lives in Goldsboro, NC, is the founder of the Goldsborough Bridge Battlefield Association. Randy has every reason in the world to be extremely proud of himself and of his organization.

In December 1862, Union General John G. Foster led 12,000 Union soldiers on a foray out of New Bern intended to destroy a vital railroad bridge over the Neuse River. 2,000 Confederate defenders awaited them. On December 17, 1862, the action occurred. Although Clingman’s Confederates fought valiantly and delayed Foster’s advance, the vastly larger Union force evetually overpowered the Southern defenders and the bridge was burned. Foster then returned to New Bern on December 20. The bridge was rebuilt within a matter …

Continue reading

The wonderful news contained in this press release came to me via e-mail:

GAMING CONTROL BOARD REJECTS SLOTS PARLOR NEAR HISTORIC GETTYSBURG BATTLEFIELD

After 20 months of debate, the Control Board concludes that Gettysburg and gambling don’t mix.

(Harrisburg, Pa., 12/20/2006) – During a public hearing today, the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board rejected a proposal to build a 3,000-machine slots parlor one mile from the Gettysburg Battlefield.  James Lighthizer, president of the Civil War Preservation Trust (CWPT), issued the following statement in the wake of the vote:

“This is a great day for Gettysburg and for preservationists throughout the nation.  By not allowing gambling to encroach on this famous town and battlefield, Pennsylvania has sent a clear message that it …

Continue reading

So, here’s the bottom line…I am presently suffering from a horrific case of severe motivational deficit. Since Susan blew out her knee on October 19, I just don’t have any motivation to get anything productive done. Blogging has been about the most productive thing I’ve been able to force myself to do. Beyond that, with having to watch the dogs, handling much of the household stuff, my workload at the office, and everything else that’s been going on in my life, I just don’t much feel like doing anything productive in the Civil War arena.

I SHOULD be working on my article on William H. Boyd in the Gettysburg Campaign, but there’s no motivation to be productive. I continue to …

Continue reading

My friend Mark Peters, a certified public accountant who lives on the west coast of England, has long been a member of the CWDG and who is serving as a moderator for my new Revolutionary War forum boards, is someone whose knowledge I respect a great deal. Mark regularly comments here.

A couple of months ago, Mark decided to dip his toe into the blogging waters. His original concept was for a lighthearted blog focused on wistful stuff. While his blog always made for pleasant reading, it’s not been up to the standards I expect of him. Without any prompting from me, Mark has decided to change the focus of his blog and is now discussing British history, which …

Continue reading

Over the course of the last couple of years, I’ve been focusing my pleasure reading (what little of it there is, that is) on the colonial period and on the Revolutionary War. Having grown up in the shadow of Independence Hall, and as a political science major, I find the events leading to the founding of this Republic of ours to be irresistable. As a lawyer, the debate over the best constitutional form of government for this country intrigues me. Consequently, I made a conscious decision to learn more about the details of these events.

For months now, I’ve been working my way through Ron Chernow’s monumental and magnificent 700 page biography of Alexander Hamilton. It’s a very well written …

Continue reading

As critical as I have been of Google’s scheme to disregard the copyright rights of authors, I have a very difficult time finding any fault at all with this extremely useful web site. The link is to Microsoft’s Books Live site. Bear in mind that the depth of how much I despise Microsoft–also known as the Evil Empire–and that saying anything at nice about Microsoft is extremely difficult indeed for me. Hat tip to Teej Smith and J. D. Petruzzi for bringing this site to my attention.

However, the Evil Empire’s Books Live project has digitized thousands of PUBLIC DOMAIN works in order to make them available to the consuming public. These works are no longer eligible for copyright …

Continue reading

After two VERY long (seemingly endless, in fact) days, I now have completed 25.5 hours of continuing legal education, meaning that, not only have I met the requirement of 24 hours every two years, I get to carry 1.5 hours forward toward the 2008 reporting period.

Every reporting period, we’re required to waste half an hour of our lives on substance abuse and how to recognize impaired lawyers. If you’ve heard this worthless, waste of time program once, you’ve heard it as many times as you ever need to hear it. There is absolutely no reason why this has to be repeated every other year. I’ve now heard it 9 times during the course of my career and it’s just …

Continue reading

In 1994, I decided to gather material on the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry, also known as Rush’s Lancers. I wasn’t sure that I was going to do a regimental history, but I was intrigued by this regiment, which was armed with a strange and cumbersome weapon. As I started learning more about the unit, I realized that it really deserved a modern regimental history. The original regimental history, based on the war-time diary of the regimental chaplain, was published in 1868. I decided to gather material and see if I could come up with enough to write a regimental history about a year later.

I spent more than twelve years researching and writing about this regiment. Along the way, one volume …

Continue reading

Like most states, Ohio has continuing education requirements as a condition of maintaining one’s license to practice law. We are required to complete 24 hours of continuing education every two years. The first half of the alphabet reports in odd-numbered years, and the second half of the alphabet reports in even-numbered years. As a “W”, this is my year to report. I have to satisfy the obligation by December 31. For the most part, we get to pick our own programs. The only absolute requirement is 1 hour of legal ethics, 1 hour of professionalism, and a completely and totally wasted half hour of how to recognize substance abusers every two years. Beyond that, we are free to select what …

Continue reading

J. D. Petruzzi has been working his way through the draft of the Dahlgren manuscript for me. I got another three chapters from him the other day, which means that he’s gotten through 9 of the 13 chapters for me. Scott Patchan’s also returning the favor (I read and edited his Shenandoah Valley in 1864 manuscript for him earlier this year) by reading it for me. When they’re done, it will then go out to four folks to read and review: Horace Mewborn, Bob O’Neill, Ken Noe, and Ethan Rafuse. Teej Smith, who read the very rough first drafts of each chapter as they were completed, also wants to take another run at it now that it’s been polished a …

Continue reading