Blogging

I was sad to see that Brian Dirck has decided to pull the plug on his excellent Abraham Lincoln blog, but I understand the reasons. Blogging can be a time-consuming thing, and Brian felt that it was taking away from other things he has to do. I completely understand, and there are times when I feel the same way.

I will miss Brian’s blog. Always insightful, I looked forward to reading it every day. Good luck to you, Brian. You will be missed.

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Chris Swift has deleted the content from his blog, and it’s gone. Consequently, I have deleted the link from my blogroll. And another one bites the dust…..

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Susan found a REALLY cool template for this blog that we installed last night. I really liked it, as it was quite unique. However, it had a black background, with white letters, and within minutes of it going up, I had a complaint about it being hard to read. When I got a second one today, I figured it had better go. So, I’m going with this newspaper theme instead. I hope y’all like this one better.

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Chris Army, whom I’ve known for years as a Gettysburgaholic, has started a new blog. Chris only has two posts so far, so it’s hard to predict what the future holds, but knowing Chris, I believe it will be a good addition to the blogosphere. I’ve added a link.

Welcome to the blogosphere, Chris.

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After more than six months without a single post–I had written it off as a dead blog–Touch the Elbow, the excellent blog by the authors of the regimental history of the 18th Massachusetts Infantry, is back! I always really enjoyed the insights of Tom and the others, and was very sorry to see the blog die. I’m even more pleased to see it back. I’ve added it back into the blogroll. Welcome back, guys.

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William Henry Bonser (“Harry”) Lamin was a British enlisted man who served in the trenches of the Western Front during World War I. His grandson, Bill Lamin, an information technology teacher in England, found his grandfather’s letters home while a boy, and has decided to present them in a blog format. The letters are run, verbatim, on Bill’s blog on the 70th anniversary of the date on which they were written. The first letter appeared in 2005, and 57 of them ran in 2006. Bill refuses to give any clue’s to Harry’s fate, and his readers wait to find out what will happen to Harry in real time. The letters contain a fair amount of mundane discussion of family matters, such as how much Harry misses his boys, but they also provide some tantalizing glimpses at the horror of the life in the trenches during The War to End All Wars.

Bill’s blog has recently gotten a tremendous amount of attention in the media, both here and in England, which it richly deserves.

I think it’s an absolutely brilliant use of the blogging format and is a very welcome addition to the body of knowledge. I like the idea well enough to consider doing the same thing if I can locate the right set of letters or a soldier’s diary with which to do it.

Anyway, kudos to Bill for a magnificent idea. Harry’s saga can be found here.

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David Woodbury has an absolutely hysterical take on neo-Confederate nonsense on his blog today. Be sure to click on the picture to get the enlarged image, or else it won’t make sense.

Enjoy.

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Old friend Ted Savas has a fun little poll on the first page of his blog. Some may recall Ted’s prior publishing venture, Savas-Woodbury, which he co-owned with fellow blogger David Woodbury. The quiz takes a walk down memory lane and asks readers to vote for their favorite Savas-Woodbury title.

Through Savas-Woodbury, Ted and David published two of my very favorite Civil War books. One was Mark L. Bradley’s excellent Last Stand in the Carolinas: The Battle of Bentonville, which is one of the best campaign studies I’ve ever read. It’s included in Ted’s poll, and was the book I voted for. The other is Chris E. Fonvielle, Jr.’s outstanding book The Wilmington Campaign: Last Rays of Departing Hope, which was not included in the poll.

Ted and David (and later, just Ted) did some terrific work with Savas-Woodbury, just as Ted continues to do terrific work with Savas-Beatie. Keep up the good work, T.

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Daniel Mallock maintains a blog called Books, Film & Music, which includes a nice hodgepodge of information on a variety of subjects. Dan, a transplanted Northerner, has made his first foray into posting on the Civil War with a really outstanding summary of the Battle of Franklin, which I commend to you. It’s probably the best concise summary of this fascinating battle I’ve seen yet.

If Dan continues to post this level of quality material on the Civil War, I will have to find a place for him in the blogroll. 🙂

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Just a note to point out that this is the 600th post on this blog since it began in September 2005. I never figured I’d still be here so many months and so many posts later, but here I am, still standing.

Thanks to all who indulge my rantings. Without you, there would be no point in doing this.

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