Tag Archives: 1860’s

Family Connections

With a collection as regional as the one at the W. S. Hoole Special Collections Library, it’s not surprising to find some occasional overlap. The Wynne Family Papers and the Meriwether Family Papers come together with the Coleman family, as you can see … Continue reading

The Day the Campus Burned

Five days later, and it might not have happened at all. Five days later, Robert E. Lee was surrendering at Appomattox Courthouse, and the Civil War was irreversibly moving toward its end. Five days later, Brigadier General John T. Croxton … Continue reading

Newly online: materials about slave labor at UA, 1820s-1860s

We know them by first name only, and there’s a good chance those are not the names they were born with. Men called William, Moses, Edwards, Patrick, Sam, Major, Quillen, Arthur, Speers, Robert, Andrew, Swindle, Peter, Erasmus, Anderson, Jack, Isaac, … Continue reading

Papers of H. D. Clayton Sr., General, statesman, and UA President

Over the last few months, we’ve been digitizing the papers of Henry De Lamar Clayton, Sr. As our student worker Ellyn and I see the final box of materials in sight, it seems like a good time to give an … Continue reading

Augusta Evans Wilson, novelist and Confederate patriot

In the 19th century, more and more women became not just occasional novel writers but full time authors. Hoole Special Collections Library houses the papers of Georgia native Augusta Jane Evans Wilson, who published nine sentimental novels, including Beulah, the … Continue reading

Hugh Davis farm journals, 1848-1880

Hugh Davis (1811-1862) was an Alabama lawyer turned plantation owner. Being a learned man, his record books from the Beaver Bend farm are thorough and articulate, describing both day-to-day activities and overall running of farming operations, including the relationship between … Continue reading

Newly Online: James A. Goble Civil War diary

Sometimes our records of historical events come to us from ordinary and relatively unknown sources. All we know about James A. Goble is that he was a soldier in the First Alabama Infantry, and that while he was born in … Continue reading

Battle of Chickamauga

“…I see a hog and black sheep dead. poor things they ought to keep away from where man meets in fearful combat. it is strange that the most intelligent beings on earth endowed with reason and sense cannot settle disputes … Continue reading

The Siege of Vicksburg

150 years ago today, Vicksburg, Mississippi. was in between two major assaults that began a more than month-long siege of the city. What began as a conflict between Gen. Grant’s Army of Tennessee and the Confederate forces of Lt. Gen. … Continue reading

Life Studies of the Great Army

One of our great small digital collections is Life Studies of the Great Army, a book of etchings depicting scenes from the Civil War. Published in 1876, it features the work of Edwin Forbes, a relatively well known landscape artist. … Continue reading