Gen James J. Byrne Camp 1, Dept of TX & LA, SUVCW

10/21/2026

Balls Bluff
21 Oct 1861

in 1861 Union troops scouting the area around Leesburg, Virginia, mistook a line of trees for a Confederate encampment, unintentionally starting the Battle of Ball’s Bluff. Federal commander General Charles Stone, seeing an opportunity for a surprise attack, sent several companies across the Potomac. The soldiers soon realized they had mistaken trees for tents, but by that time, the Confederates were aware of their presence and attacked. General Stone, who stayed on the opposite side of the river, ordered Col. Edward Baker (a U.S. Senator) across the river to take charge. By the time Baker arrived, Union troops were fully engaged in a disorganized fight with the rebels. Baker was soon mortally wounded, and the federals fled down the bluff to try to re-cross the river. Confederates firing down on them sunk all of their boats, and the Union soldiers attempting to swim were either shot or drowned. Others stranded on the shore were forced to surrender. Baker is to date the only sitting U.S. Congressman killed in combat.

Image: Death of Colonel Edward D. Baker At The Battle of Balls Bluff, Virginia 1861 (Artist F. O. C. Darley)

10/20/2026

THIRTY-FOUR STAR FLAG
Megan Kemble acquired this fantastic tinted tintype of a delightfully smirking child wearing a shako topped by a feather, along with a backpack and bedroll, and holding a kid-sized r***e. The child appears to be wearing a kilt. A hand-colored U.S. flag with 34 stars appears at the child's feet, apparently stuck in a shoelace. Alan Beckett believes that the photographers then "put the flag through the sling mount on the r***e. The shoulder strap isn't attached but the sling mount bracket is there. If you zoom in, you can barely make out the bracket."

The 34-Star Flag became the official United States Flag on July 4th, 1861 and was used until the 35-Star Flag was adopted on July 4th, 1863 as a result of the admission of West Virginia into statehood on June 20, 1863.

Tintype image courtesy of Megan Kemble.

By Craig Heberton IV

10/19/2026

Cedar Creek
19 Oct 1864

Maps, animated maps, history articles, photos, recommended books, web links, and more on this 1864 Civil War battle.

10/18/2026

167 Years Ago Today… John Brown’s Raid Ends

On October 18, 1859, U.S. Marines stormed the engine house at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia), bringing John Brown’s raid to an end. Two days earlier, Brown and a small band of followers had seized the federal arsenal, hoping to spark a widespread uprising of enslaved people and strike a decisive blow against slavery.

On October 16, Brown’s men captured the arsenal and took hostages, but the alarm was soon raised. The following day, local militia and armed citizens surrounded the raiders, trapping them inside the engine house as fighting left several people dead. On the morning of October 18, Marines under the command of Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee stormed the building, capturing Brown and the surviving raiders.

The impact of the raid reached far beyond Harpers Ferry. It intensified the national debate over slavery, deepened divisions between North and South, and became one of the events that helped push the nation toward the Civil War.

10/14/2026

https://youtu.be/8l_FsYLLFgY?is=HE0a4HT7kF1W34A_

The 3rd IN Cav took the highest percentage of casualties when fight...

10/14/2026

Bristoe Station
14 Oct 1863

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/civil-war/battles/bristoe-station?fbclid=IwdGRjcAU8ZQVjbGNrBTxk-GV4dG4DYWVtAjExAHBkb2YBc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQMMzUwNjg1NTMxNzI4AAEeN9dBm84IOZ03AvD2HF5HV60vdne54_U_qxIpNgaMlTxPHAFhDow5mfDk0r0_aem_tRwzzKAJcqXrRMFi7vInuA

The Battle of Bristoe Station page includes battle maps, history articles, historical facts, recommended, web links, and more on this 1863 Civil War battle.

10/13/2026

In 1865 Union General Uysses S. Grant’s Military Secretary, Lt. Col. Ely Parker, pictured here, helped draft documents for Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s surrender at Appomattox. Parker, born with the Native American name Hasanoanda and later known as Donehogawa, was a Seneca Indian leader who had joined the Union Army in 1863 as an engineer. General Grant, an acquaintance of Parker, appointed him to his staff in 1864. When Lee arrived to sign the documents, he reportedly said to Parker, “I’m glad to see one real American here,” to which Parker responded, “We are all Americans, sir.” In 1871, President Grant appointed Parker as the first Native American Commissioner of Indian Affairs.

Photo Credit: National Archives

10/09/2026

162 Years Ago Today... The Battle of Tom's Brook

After three days of Confederate cavalry snapping at his rear, Gen. Philip Sheridan turned his horsemen around. The night before, he had told Gen. Alfred Torbert to whip the enemy or get whipped. At dawn, Torbert sent two divisions south from the hamlet of Tom’s Brook. Gen. George Custer took the Back Road. Gen. Wesley Merritt took the Valley Pike. The fights ran about two miles apart.

On the Back Road, Gen. Thomas Rosser held the northern face of Spiker’s Hill with fewer than 2,000 men. He and Custer had been classmates at West Point, and Rosser had boasted that he would give Custer “the best whipping today that he ever got.” For an hour the lines charged and countercharged in the creek bottom. Frontal attacks failed.

Custer then extended west and sent two regiments around Rosser’s left, while Col. James Kidd’s Michigan brigade, from Merritt’s division, came in on the Confederate right. Custer led the 5th New York and 18th Pennsylvania up the hill. Rosser’s line broke. A Virginia captain looked back and saw “the whole country to my left rear covered with the flying regiments.”

On the pike, Merritt struck Gen. Lunsford Lomax south of Jordan Run. Col. Thomas Devin gained the ridge on Lomax’s left, and that smaller division gave way after a short fight.

Outnumbered about two to one, both Confederate commands ran. The pursuit carried through Woodstock and on toward Edinburg and Mount Jackson,. Valley people and Union troopers called it the Woodstock Races. The Federals took about 300 prisoners, eleven guns, and the wagons of Rosser’s and Munford’s headquarters, at a cost of fewer than 60 men. Early’s cavalry did not recover.

10/08/2026

Perryville
8 Oct 1862

The largest and last major battle in the Kentucky Campaign, the Bat...