The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter

The first shots of the American Civil War (wiki) were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter: 

Bombardment of Fort Sumter by Currier & Ives

South Carolina had seceded from the Union on December 20, 1860 - at that time, United States Major Robert Anderson and his force of 85 soldiers were positioned at Fort Moultrie near the mouth of Charleston Harbor. On December 26, fearing for the safety of his men, Anderson moved his command to Fort Sumter (wiki) in the middle of the harbor. 

On Thursday, April 11, 1861, Confederate Brig. Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard dispatched aides to Maj. Anderson to demand the fort’s surrender. Anderson refused. The next morning, at 4:30 a.m., Confederate batteries opened fire on Fort Sumter and continued for 34 hours. 

The firing continued all day, although much less rapidly since the Union aimed to conserve ammunition. "The crashing of the shot, the bursting of the shells, the falling of the walls, and the roar of the flames, made a pandemonium of the fort," wrote Union Capt. Abner Doubleday, the fort's second in command. 

On Saturday, April 13, Anderson surrendered the fort. The generous terms of surrender allowed Anderson to perform a 100-gun salute before he and his men evacuated the fort the next day; although no soldiers had been killed in the battle, an accidental explosion during the salute killed one of the gunners and mortally wounded another. 

Carrying their tattered banner, the men marched out of the fort and boarded a boat that ferried them to the Union ships outside the harbor. They were greeted as heroes on their return to the North.

Two days later, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln (wiki) issued a proclamation calling for 75,000 volunteer soldiers to quell the Southern “insurrection.”

Here's an animated map showing the daily changes to the front over the course of the war:

Legend:

Maroon = Confederate States of America and territories

Red = Areas occupied by Confederate forces

Pink = Gains for that Day

Dark Blue = United States of America and territories

Blue = Areas occupied by Union forces.

Light blue = Gains for that day

Yellow = Border states / disputed areas.

Related posts:

Santa Claus enters the fray on the side of the Union.

It's Stonewall Jackson's birthday - here's the story of his left arm's separate grave.

The Gettysburg Address was seven score and eleven years ago.

Abraham Lincoln was assassinated 150 years ago today.

Gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain

There's lots more on Fort Sumter at CivilWar.org and the Smithsonian.

Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865

From Harper's Weekly of April 29, 1965. this illustration is by Thomas Nast, and represents Nast's Tribute to the fallen president. The illustration shows Columbia, or Lady Liberty, kneeling and weeping over Abraham Lincoln's Coffin. The picture also shows a grieving Union Soldier, contemplating the loss of his commander and chief. Also pictured is a Union Navy man, likewise mourning Abraham Lincoln's death.

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,

The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won. 

The port is near, the bells I hear, the people are exulting,

While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;

But O heart! heart! heart!

O the bleeding drops of red,

Where on the deck my Captain lies,

Fallen cold and dead. 

~ Walt Whitman (1819-1892) (wiki) ("O Captain! My Captain!," 1st stanza)*

Last known photograph of Abraham Lincoln,
taken by Henry F. Warren on 6 March 1865

Our children will behold his fame,

The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man,

Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,

New birth of our new soil, the first American. 

~James Russell Lowell (1819-1891) (of President Lincoln, Commemoration Ode, 21 July 1865)

Assassination has never changed the history of the world.**

~Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) (in the House of Commons, 1 May 1865, on Lincoln's assassination) 

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have born the battle and for his widow and for his orphan, to do all that may achieve a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. 

~President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) (wiki) (Second inaugural address, 4 March 1865)

Lincoln Assassination - Harper's Weekly Illustration

Although he actually died at 7:30 the following morning, today is the anniversary of the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) on 14 April 1865, only five days after Lee's surrender at Appomattox. Lincoln was very fond of the theater, and that evening, he and Mrs. Lincoln - likely in a celebratory mood because of the end of the Civil War - attended a performance of the comedy, Our American Cousin, by English playwright Tom Taylor at Ford's Theater on 10th Street NW in Washington. There, following the intermission, actor and Southern sympathizer John Wilkes Booth managed to gain access to the Presidential box through a series of security lapses, and shot Lincoln in the back of head with a small pistol. He then jumped down onto the stage, shouted "Sic semper tynannis!" ("Thus always to tyrants!"), and although breaking his leg in the process, made his escape. Booth was ultimately tracked down and killed on 26 April, and four other conspirators were hanged on 7 July 1865.*** 

.

The Assassination of President Lincoln at Ford's Theatre
 After the Act, wood engraving from Harper's Weekly,
 April 29, 1865 (colorized)

At least in the North, the President's death unleashed a paroxysm of grief. Before funeral services in Washington, he lay in state in both the White House and the Capitol, and the train that slowly bore his body to Illinois for burial stopped in 11 cities for additional viewings by the public. He was laid to rest in Springfield, Illinois on 4 May 1865. Perhaps my favorite Lincoln quotation:

"As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy."

* N.B. Written by Whitman in 1871 in memory of the assassination of President Lincoln.

** Except that this one probably did, at least in the United States... It led to the many excesses of Reconstruction and lasting bitterness between the North and South.

*** Lincoln's assassination was only part of a larger conspiracy which also targeted Vice President Andrew Johnson and Secretary of State William Seward. Johnson's intended attacker lost his nerve, but Seward was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack that same night. 

Here's a brief (5 minute) video on the assassination:

Funeral March for Abraham Lincoln written by Major General John Gross Barnard was performed by the United States Marine Band during the funeral procession from the Executive Mansion to the Capitol on April 19, 1865. This youtube version is played with with period illustrations of the obsequies: 

In 1956, an eyewitness (Samuel Seymour) to the Lincoln assassination appeared on "I've Got a Secret": 

Here's the 1954 interview with Mr. Seymour referred to by the host.

Related posts/links:

Here' a  photo of Lincoln's first inauguration.

The Gettysburg Address was delivered on November 19, 1863: history, photos, videos and more.

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter.

Santa Claus enters the fray on the side of the Union.

Lincoln's 1858 speech on the meaning of Independence Day: "Let us stick to it then. Let us stand firmly by it then."

Gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain

Much more at History.com. The rest of the illustrations from the Harper's Weekly issue referenced above are available here.

It's Stonewall Jackson's birthday - here's the story of his left arm's separate grave (bonus: Lord Uxbridge's leg)

From the always interesting Atlas Obscura:

Most of Civil War superstar Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall*" Jackson (wiki) was buried in a Lexington, Virginia, cemetery that now bears his name, but he was so famous at the time of his death that his amputated left arm was spirited away to its own separate grave.

It was just after dark on May 2, 1863. Jackson had just launched a devastating attack against Union forces at Chancellorsville. Returning to his own lines with several staff officers, Jackson, ever the aggressive soldier, decided to conduct reconnaissance in the area. As he and his staff rode through the woods near Confederate lines, a North Carolina regiment, unable to see who was riding up on them, opened fire. Jackson was struck by three bullets, two of them shattering his left arm.** The general was evacuated from the area and given medical treatment, but the arm couldn't be saved and was amputated. Pneumonia set in, and on May 10, 1863, the South lost its most effective tactician. While Jackson's body would travel to Lexington, where he had taught before the war, his severed arm would receive its own burial.

Two-armed Thomas 'Stonewall' Jackson
during the Mexican-American War, 1847

Thinking that the limb of so great a solider was too precious to simply throw on the regular body part trash pile, Jackson's unofficial company chaplain, Reverend Tucker Lacy wrapped the arm in a blanket and took it his family cemetery. The reverend gave the limb a standard Christian burial and placed a marker above the site.

Supposedly Stonewall Jackson's arm was dug up and reburied numerous times in the ensuing years and there is no concrete evidence that it still resides in its original burial space, but the simple gravestone remains to remember one of the oddest instances of hero worship in the history of battle.

* Jackson rose to prominence and earned his most famous nickname at the First Battle of Bull Run (aka First Manassas) on July 21, 1861. As the Confederate lines began to crumble under heavy Union assault, Jackson's brigade provided crucial reinforcements on Henry House Hill, demonstrating the discipline he instilled in his men. Brig. Gen. Barnard Elliott Bee, Jr., exhorted his own troops to re-form by shouting, "There is Jackson standing like a stone wall. Let us determine to die here, and we will conquer!"

The Death of “Stonewall” Jackson
Currier & Ives (1872)

When Jackson died on May 10, 1863, his attending physicians attributed the death to a pneumonia Jackson had developed four days after amputation of his arm. The infection was believed to be secondary to a pulmonary contusion, or bruised lung, that Jackson may have suffered after falling from a stretcher during his removal from the field. For nearly 150 years, that diagnosis was largely unchallenged. 

More recently, however, modern physicians have begun offering alternate possibilities for his cause of death.The most commonly suggested alternative is pyemia, or blood poisoning. Known today as sepsis, pyemia was a well-recognized and deadly condition during the pre-antibiotic days of the Civil War.

** The story of Stonewall Jackson's injury always reminds me of this, from later in the War of Northern Aggression (wiki):

"They couldn't hit an elephant at this distance."

~ Union general John Sedgwick (died 1864) (just before being killed by Confederate fire at the battle of Spotsylvania)

Uxbridge's false leg

Related, via Andrew Stuttaford - read the whole Wikipedia entry: Lord Uxbridge's leg was shattered by a cannon shot at the Battle of Waterloo and removed by a surgeon. The amputated limb went on to lead a somewhat macabre after-life as a tourist attraction in the village of Waterloo in Belgium, where it had been removed and interred.

Per Wikipedia:

Just after the Surgeon had taken off the Marquis of Anglesey's leg, Sir Hussey Vivian came into the cottage where the operation was performed. "Ah, Vivian!" said the wounded noble, "I want you to do me a favour. Some of my friends here seem to think I might have kept that leg on. Just go and cast your eye upon it, and tell me what you think." "I went, accordingly", said Sir Hussey, "and, taking up the lacerated limb, carefully examined it, and so far as I could tell, it was completely spoiled for work. A rusty grape-shot had gone through and shattered the bones all to pieces. I therefore returned to the Marquis and told him he could set his mind quite at rest, as his leg, in my opinion, was better off than on."

I love this bit: 

According to anecdote, he was close to the Duke of Wellington (at Waterloo) when his leg was hit, and exclaimed, "By God, sir, I've lost my leg!", to which Wellington replied "By God, sir, so you have!"

Further reading: Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson

Abraham Lincoln was born on February 12, 1809

This Feb. 5, 1865 photo of Lincoln
in Washington is the last one taken of him

The dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present.  The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion.  As our case is new, so we must think anew and and act anew.  We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country. 

Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history.  We of this Congress and this generation will be remembered in spite of ourselves.  No personal significance or insignificance can spare one or another of us.  The fiery trial through which we pass will light us down to honor or dishonor to the last generation...

~ Abraham Lincoln (Second Annual Message to Congress, 1 December 1862) 

It has long been a grave question whether any government, not too strong for the liberties of the people, can be strong enough to maintain its existence in great emergencies. 

~ Lincoln (Response to a serenade, 10 November 1864) 

Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away.  Yet, if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled up by the bond-man's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

~ Lincoln (Second Inaugural Address, 4 March 1865*)

Colorized photo by Matthew Brady was taken in 1861

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have born the battle and for his widow and for his orphan, to do all that may achieve a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations. 

~ ibid

This dust was once the man,

Gentle, plain, just and resolute, under whose cautious hand, 

Against the foulest crime in history known in any land or age,

Was saved the Union of these States. 

~ Walt Whitman (1819-1892) (of Lincoln, "This Dust Was Once the Man")   

February 12 is the anniversary of the birth of the 16th president of these United States, Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865). Born in Kentucky and raised in Illinois, Lincoln was largely self-educated and became a country lawyer in 1836, having been elected to the state legislature two years earlier.  He had one term in the U.S. Congress (1847-1849) but failed (against Stephen A. Douglas) to gain election to the Senate in 1856. Nominated by the Republican party for the presidency in 1860, he prevailed against the divided Democrats, triggering the secession of the southern states and the beginning of the Civil War. As the course of the war turned more favorably for the preservation of the Union, Lincoln was elected to a second term in 1864, but was assassinated in April 1865, only a week after the final victory.  

* N.B.  Highly recommended is Lincoln's Greatest Speech, by Ronald C. White, Jr., who analyzes the Second Inaugural Address in the same way that Gary Wills dissected the Gettysburg Address in Lincoln at Gettysburg. This post on the speech contains some analysis, as well.

A brief National Geographic documentary on Lincoln:

Related posts and links:

This Feb. 5, 1865 photo of Lincoln in Washington is the last one taken of him.

Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865 (this post has a different photo that claims to be Lincoln's last - I don't know which is accurate). 

In 1956, an eyewitness (Samuel Seymour) to the Lincoln assassination appeared on TV.

Here's a  photo of Lincoln's first inauguration.

The Gettysburg Address was delivered on November 19, 1863: history, photos, videos and more.

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter.

Santa Claus enters the fray on the side of the Union.

Lincoln's 1858 speech on the meaning of Independence Day: "Let us stick to it then. Let us stand firmly by it then."

Gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain.

Part of the text above is adapted from Ed's Quotation of the Day, only available via email - leave your email address in the comments if you'd like to be added to his list. Ed is the author of Hunters and Killers: Volume 1: Anti-Submarine Warfare from 1776 to 1943 and Hunters and Killers: Volume 2: Anti-Submarine Warfare from 1943.

The Gettysburg Address was delivered on November 19, 1863: history, photos, videos and more

Today is the anniversary of President Lincoln's delivery of his few "brief remarks" at the dedication of the new national cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (wiki), only four or so months after the great Civil War battle there that emerged as "the high-water mark of the Confederacy." 

One of the only two confirmed photos of Abraham
 Lincoln (sepia highlight) at Gettysburg, taken
about noon, just after Lincoln arrived and
some three hours before the speech.
To Lincoln's right is his bodyguard, Ward Hill Lamon

At the time, the final issue of the war was still in some doubt, and Lincoln received second billing to a lengthy speech by Dr. Edward Everett, then president of Harvard University and reputedly America's greatest orator. 

Everyone's familiar with the Gettysburg Address - didn't we all have to memorize it in grammar school? But in these troubled times, its mere 272 words remain well worth reading again. The full text is below.

By the way, Garry Wills' brilliant study Lincoln at Gettysburg analyzes the Gettysburg Address in terms of its role in defining the ethos of the United States for subsequent generations, while also tracing the antecedents of Lincoln's argument and the structure of his peerless prose back to Thucydides' account of Pericles' 430 B.C funeral oration at the end of the first year of the Peloponnesian War. (Wills notes that despite the popular view that Lincoln generally preferred short, pithy utterances, the final sentence of the Gettysburg Address is 84 words long - almost a third of the whole.)

Here's Wikipedia on the similarities:

Lincoln's speech, like Pericles', begins with an acknowledgment of revered predecessors: "Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent..."; Lincoln, like Pericles, then praises the uniqueness of the State's commitment to democracy: "..a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal...government of the people, by the people, and for the people..."; Lincoln, like Pericles, addresses the difficulties faced by a speaker on such an occasion, "...we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground"; Lincoln, like Pericles, exhorts the survivors to emulate the deeds of the dead, "It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the great task remaining before us"; and finally, Lincoln, like Pericles, contrasts the efficacy of words and deeds, "The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract...The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here." It is uncertain to what degree Lincoln was directly influenced by Pericles' Funeral Oration.

Wills never claims that Lincoln drew on it as a source, though Edward Everett, who delivered a lengthy oration at the same ceremony at Gettysburg, began by describing the "Athenian example".

This 2014 article on Obama's recitation of the speech (the 150th anniversary) in which he left out the words "under God" is from WMAL. Excerpts:

WASHINGTON -- One nation under God? Under President Obama, maybe not so much.

Union soldiers dead at Gettysburg, July 1963

In advance of the 150th anniversary of the Gettysburg Address (full text below), which President Abraham Lincoln delivered on November 19, 1863, filmmaker Ken Burns gathered every living President, along with several prominent members of Congress, celebrities and news media stars to deliver the address themselves. Burns edited the individual speeches into one final mashup that is available on the site, but he also provided the complete speech as delivered by each individual dignitary. 

Curiously enough, in his version of the speech, President Barack Obama's delivery contained an omission - in a line that every other celebrity delivered as "that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom" (click here for proof of that), the President left out the words "under God." 

You can watch all of the speeches at learntheaddress.org.

Gettysburg Address full text:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any other nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. 

We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here died that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we do this. But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. 

The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us - that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion - that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. 

~ Abraham Lincoln ("The Gettysburg Address," 19 November 1863)

Here's a brief documentary which includes most of the available photographs of Lincoln, some photos of battlefields, and several (non-photographic) illustrations from contemporaneous newspaper accounts. It also describes the historical context of the speech and Lincoln's feeling that it had been a failure:

An animated version of the speech:

Gettysburg Address from Adam Gault Studio on Vimeo.

This video is a series of photos from the morning after the battle, set to music:

At the Smithsonian, a Battle of Gettysburg Interactive Map.

Related: Paper prints retraction for 1863 article calling Gettysburg address "silly remarks"; retraction written in the style of Gettysburg Address (read the whole thing!):

Seven score and ten years ago, the forefathers of this media institution brought forth to its audience a judgment so flawed, so tainted by hubris, so lacking in the perspective history would bring, that it cannot remain unaddressed in our archives.

Mental Floss has an excellent post - Gettysburg: The Great Reunion of 1913.

Monday links

November 5 is Guy Fawkes Day: God preserved us from the "secret contrivance and hellish malice of Popish Conspirators".

Man uses teeth to pull 677-ton cargo ship.

Telegraph operators were the first to know news of the Civil War, which arrived in code. Related: how the breaking news spread in 1776.

Political maps of the United States from 1850 and 1880.

The Nazi Werewolves Who Terrorized Allied Soldiers at the End of WWII. 

Lab-Made Whiskey and Wine.

ICYMI, Friday's links are here, and include Daylight Saving Time history (including Ben Franklin's satirical proposal), the science of chocolate, personal eating knives if Medieval Europe, 16th century eyebrow interpretation, and that time Supreme Court Justice Rehnquist proposed to Supreme Court Justice O'Connor.

This Feb. 5, 1865 photo of President Abraham Lincoln in Washington is the last one taken of him.

This Sunday, Feb. 5, 1865, photo made available by the Library of Congress shows President Abraham Lincoln in Washington. This image is the last photo in the president's last photo session during his life. 

(AP Photo/Library of Congress, Alexander Gardner)

h/t Hot Mic

This 1861 photo by Matthew Brady was taken in 1861 - it's from this set of gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain (this related book gets excellent reviews: The Civil War in Color: A Photographic Reenactment of the War Between the States.):

Related posts and links:

Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865 (this post has a different photo that claims to be Lincoln's last - I don't know which is accurate). Related: In 1956, an eyewitness (Samuel Seymour) to the Lincoln assassination appeared on TV.

Here' a  photo of Lincoln's first inauguration.

The Gettysburg Address was delivered on November 19, 1863: history, photos, videos and more.

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter.

Santa Claus enters the fray on the side of the Union.

Lincoln's 1858 speech on the meaning of Independence Day: Let us stick to it then. Let us stand firmly by it then.

Friday links

Excellent site for DIY intelligent women's costumes.

This 1935 Car of the Future Had Huge Spheres Instead of Wheels.

The Strange Real-Life Origins of the Fiendish Werewolf.

We've come a long way... from 2013: Obama Mask for Halloween? That'll get you and your 750 fellow employees sent to re-education camp.

Scientists Are Just Starting to Understand Earth's Eighth Continent, Zealandia.

The Bloodiest Day in American History: 31 Rare and Haunting Photos From the 1862 Battle of Antietam.

ICYMI, Thursday's links are here, and include Napoleon-era travel tips, the anniversary of the day the earth was created (October 26 in 4004 B.C. at 9AM), instructions for dog costumes, 1930s giant frog farms, and a gallery of Art Nouveau architecture. 

Monday links

In honor of Columbus Day, here’s a list of the top 10 accidental discoveries. Related: Columbus cleared of importing syphilis from the Americas to Europe. Plus, that time Columbus tricked Jamaicans out of supplies using knowledge of an upcoming eclipse.

Nose hair extensions are the next hot beauty trend everyone needs to try. Well, maybe not everybody.

Seven Body Organs You Can Live Without.

Gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain.

Related to the above link: By the end of the Civil War, 4.5 million pieces of undelivered mail, which contained thousands of photos, had piled up in the Washington, D.C. Dead Letter Office. More on the DLO here.

Inflatable dummy tanks were a critical tactic in battlefield deception.

ICYMI, Friday's links are here, and include a UFO detector, a collection of vintage ads you would never see today, Hitler's boxers bought at auction, and how nutmeg, cinnamon, and black pepper set off bloody conflicts and the discovery of the New World.

Gorgeous remastered and colorized images from the Civil War era, including Lincoln and Mark Twain

This Mark Twain is extraordinary - it looks as if were taken yesterday:

Abraham Lincoln, taken by Civil War-era photographer Mathew Brady in 1861, at the beginning of Lincoln's first presidential term:

A colorized image of three Confederate prisoners and its original black and white stenograph, taken by Mathew Brady in 1863 on top of Seminary Ridge in Gettysburg:

And here's Custer:

More at Daily Mail and at the artists' Facebook page Colorized History. This related book gets excellent reviews: The Civil War in Color: A Photographic Reenactment of the War Between the States.

Wednesday links

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter.

There's A Secret Hideaway In The Heart Of Disney World Just For The Military.

We may have missed Dog Farting Awareness Day (it was April 8th), but Scientific American's article on the science of dog farts is still worthwhile.

Why does the date of Easter move around?

The science behind why your shoelace knot is doomed to fail.

It Was Once Someone’s Job to Chat With the King While He Used the Toilet.

ICYMI, Friday's links are here, and include FDR's bomb shelter, a mine-sweeping drone, nuclear and chemical testing in the U.S., and an 1860s series of Australian photos illustrating the '5 stages of inebriation'.

Wednesday links

A day that will live in infamy: It's the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor.

How Civil War Soldiers Gave Themselves Syphilis While Trying to Avoid Smallpox.

Microwave Memories - cooking with early microwave ovens. 

December 6 was the feast day of St. Nicholas of Myra, aka Santa Claus.

What Happened To The Only Person Ever Hit By A Meteorite.

10 Of The Biggest Natural Disasters In Earth's History.

ICYMI, Monday's links are here, and include the end of prohibition, why, when facing predators, male monkeys do whatever the females tell them to do, who poisoned the Goebbels children in Hitler's bunker, and lots of awkward Christmas photos.

Thursday links

Digital hell: this Kansas farm is the default location for 600 million IP addresses.

The science behind why you shouldn’t pop your pimples.

Elderly men in South Korea have allegedly been given erectile dysfunction drugs to buy their votes in legislative elections.

Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on this date in 1865.

The Titanic sunk on this day in 1912 - here's an eyewitness account.

The Story Behind Those Smithsonian Collection Photos.

ICYMI, Tuesday's links are here, and include the anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War, people whose names that break computers, how to  judge an animal from its snout, McDonalds Monopoly fraud (from 1995 to 2001, there was only one real winner - Uncle Jerry), and fixing clogged arteries with powdered booze.

Tuesday links

The first shots of the Civil War were fired on April 12, 1861 at Fort Sumter

These unlucky people have names that break computers

I keep hearing ads on the radio for this: The McDonalds Monopoly Fraud: from 1995 to 2001, there was only one real winner - Uncle Jerry.

Get the Nobel Prize ready: Powdered Booze Could Fix Your Clogged Arteries.

You can judge a lot about an animal from its snout.

Man hacked random-number generator to rig state lotteries.

ICYMI, Monday's links are here, and include wasps building rainbow colored nests, the peculiar history of life insurance, a Women are teachable 1940's booklet to “assist male bosses in supervising their new female employees" and a 1967 booklet on how to get a man, and advice from 1658 on giving up wine (spoiler - there are decomposing eels involved). 

Santa Claus enters the fray on the side of the Union

The History Blog:

The great 29th century political cartoonist Thomas Nast (wiki) is widely credited with having created the look of Santa Claus as we know him today. Inspired by Clement Moore’s* description of the “jolly old elf” in his 1823 poem A Visit from St. Nicholas, aka The Night Before Christmas, Nast first depicted Santa in the January 3, 1863, issue of Harper’s Weekly. 

Zoomable image here

On the cover was a scene captioned “Santa Claus in Camp” in which Saint Nick brings toys and good cheer to Union soldiers. It seems that Santa, much like Nast himself who was a staunch Republican and abolitionist, had picked a side in the Civil War, and he wasn’t at all subtle about it.

Santa’s blue (of course) coat has white stars on it and his pants have red and white stripes, similar to garb donned by other patriotic icons drawn by Nast like Columbia and Uncle Sam. He has delivered parcels to the soldiers. One finds a sock inside, doubtless a welcome gift in the bleak midwinter after the devastating loss at Fredericksburg which saw more than 12,000 of his comrades killed, wounded or taken captive. A drummer boy in the foreground stares with wide-eyed surprise at the jack-in-the-box that leapt out of his present.

But it’s the toy Santa is holding that is most remarkable. Here’s Harper’s explanation of it:

Santa Claus is entertaining the soldiers by showing them Jeff Davis’ future. He is tying a cord pretty tightly round his neck, and Jeff seems to be kicking very much at such a fate.

Read the whole rather fascinating post at The History Blog, including this:

After the war, Nast continued to draw Santa Claus for seasonal issues of the magazine. It was Thomas Nast who introduced the idea that Santa Claus has a toy workshop in the North Pole, although in his vision Santa did all his own labour.

From 1865, a less bloodthirsty version of Santa appeared:

Zoomable image here

By Christmas of 1865, Santa’s wartime support of the Union had softened from stringing up effigy Jefferson Davis with his own hands to presiding over a Christmas pageant starring Ulysses S. Grant as the giant killer from Jack and the Beanstalk. Sure, the decapitated heads of Confederate generals Robert E. Lee, John Bell Hood and Richard Ewell are at Grant’s feet, but it’s just metaphoric playacting and anyway Santa’s involvement is restricted to a wink and an avuncular smile, possibly a touch on the gloating side.

* There have been some questions raised about Clement Moore's authorship of this poem - this article sums up the controversy.