Several weeks ago, the monument to the 6th New York Cavalry on McPherson’s Ridge at Gettysburg took a direct hit by a bolt of lighting, which nearly blew the monument apart. I took this photo on October 21. Here’s a press release from the National Park Service relating to the damage to the monument:

Gettysburg National Military Park News Release

For Release: October 30, 2007
Contact: Katie Lawhon
Phone: 717/ 334-1124 x452

Gettysburg’s 6th New York Cavalry Monument Damaged by Lightning

Officials at Gettysburg National Military Park are still assessing the damage done by a lightning strike on October 9 th that seriously damaged the monument to the 6th New York Cavalry.

The monument dates to 1889 and is composed …

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The November issue of Civil War News contains a really outstanding review of my Rush’s Lancers: The Sixth Pennsylvania Cavalry in the Civil War. I’m not normally one to blow my own horn–I actually find it unseemly–but this review is so good that I wanted to share it. As book reviews go, it doesn’t get much better than this.

Rush’s Lancers: The Sixth Pennsylvania Cavalry in the Civil War
By Eric J. Wittenberg
Illustrated, notes, index, appendix, 304 pp, 2007. Westholme Publishing LLC, 8 Harvey Ave., Yardley, PA, 19067, $29.95 plus shipping.

Reviewer: Chuck Romig
Chuck Romig graduated from Penn State University with a B.S. in secondary education and teaches history at Penns Valley High School in Spring Mills, …

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Here’s an article from the Fredericksburg Free-Lance Star newspaper that provides another excellent example of how developers and preservationists can work together to achieve the right result. The Central Virginia Battlefield Trust has long been one of the most successful and most effective battlefield preservation groups working out there, and this article provides another lesson in how to do it right:

Civil War site saved in Orange
Silver Cos. donates more land at Wilderness battlefield site
Date published: 10/6/2007
By RUSTY DENNEN

Help in preserving important Civil War sites in the Fredericksburg area has come from many quarters, including developers.

The Silver Cos. recently completed its second donation of land at Grant’s Knoll, across from Ellwood in Orange County, according …

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Late last week–before I went to Pittsburgh for the weekend–my publisher, Savas-Beatie, LLC, announced a new preservation initiative:

Book Publisher Savas Beatie and The Civil War Preservation Trust Team up to Raise Funds for Endangered Land
by Sarah Keeney, Marketing Director, Savas Beatie LLC
Thursday, October 10, 2007

El Dorado Hills, CA October 10, 2007 — Historical book publisher Savas Beatie LLC and The Civil War Preservation Trust have teamed up to raise money for endangered Civil War battlefields.

Savas Beatie is a leading independent publisher of military and general history books. Many of its titles focus on specific battles and campaigns, and so have been used by various groups and individuals to raise funds for various preservation causes. …

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I wanted to give a quick thumbs up to a group doing some underappreciated but much needed preservation work, the Hunterstown Preservation Society. The good folks from the HPS face a severe challenge: they are fighting a developer that does not care about the fact that he intends to eradicate a nearly pristine battlefield in the process. Please give these folks your support, both financially and morally, as they need all of the help that they can get to save their beautiful little battlefield.

J. D. had a good post about the efforts of the HPS on his blog today, which I commend to you.

Keep up the good work, folks.

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My old friend and mentor Clark B. “Bud” Hall, one of the founders of the Civil War preservation movement, was one of the speakers at the dedication of the faithful cavalry horse in Middleburg, Virginia. Bud has a home in Middleburg, and he is one of the leading authorities on Civil War cavalry operations, so it was entirely appropriate for him to speak at the dedication of the monument ten years ago. Bud was kind enough to share with me his comments that day, and I find them so moving that I want to share them with you.

Here they are: an appropriate tribute to the cavalry horses who sacrificed so much during the Civil War.

The Horses

“Here lies …

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Centex Homes of Texas gets kudos for its willingness to work with local preservation groups so as to save a battlefield but still get to develop the land surrounding the battlefield. In an unprecedented partnership that should serve as the template for all such efforts, Centex agreed to carve out the Bristoe Station battlefield site in Virginia, and the preservationists agreed not to dispute Centex’s development of the neighboring parcels. It was, as the movie Casablanca ended, the making of a beautiful friendship. I wish that the idiot trying to develop the Hunterstown battlefield would learn something from this example.

The battlefield park is now open. Here’s the newspaper article about it:

Bristoe Station Park Opens
By Jaclyn Pitts, Staff …

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In August, I posted about the better features of Google’s book search feature. J. D. and I both made very extensive use of Google’s site, as well as the Microsoft live book search site (a note about the Microsoft site–it will not work on the Mac. That, in and of itself, is reason enough for me not to want to use it at all).

There is a third organization digitizing books. The Internet Archive is also digitizing public domain books and making them available. The following article appeared in today’s issue of The New York Times, and explains why I prefer the Internet Archive project:

Libraries Shun Deals to Place Books on Web
By KATIE HAFNER
Published: October 22, …

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Here is the cover art for our book on the retreat from Gettysburg. The scene portrayed in the vintage woodcut is the July 8, 1863 Battle of Boonsboro. The cover art was done by the same graphic designer that did the cover art for the Stuart’s Ride book. The idea was to make the dust jacket for the retreat book be consistent with the Stuart’s Ride book, a la Gordon Rhea’s books on the Overland Campaign. It only makes me more eager to see the final product when the book is published.

There will be 16 maps, and something like 50 illustrations. Given the word count, Ted Savas tells me that we’re looking at a book in the range of …

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Time for another in my infrequent series of forgotten cavalrymen.

Born to an ancient, ennobled Italian family in 1833, Luigi Palma di Cesnola had a glittering military reputation at the beginning of the Civil War. His father had fought for Napoleon. di Cesnola was educated at the Royal Military Academy at Turin, and entered the mounted arm of the Sardinian army. At age seventeen, the young count fought against powerful Austrian armies in Italy’s war for independence. He also fought in the Crimea in the late 1850’s. Finally, in 1860, di Cesnola immigrated to the United States, settling in New York. He married the daughter of an American naval officer and served as the director of a 700-student military school …

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