The Journal of the Civil War Era

Henry 'Box Brown: Tobacco Worker, Stage Magician, Tourist Attraction - The Journal of the Civil War Era Henry ‘Box’ Brown had a variety of identities in his life-tobacco factory worker, escaped slave, abolitionist, lecturer, and touring panoramist and entertainer on the English stage. In recent years, a...

In today's Muster, ongoing contributor Elliott Martin writes about Henry 'Box' Brown and Richmond's public history landscape www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2026/01/henr...

We are excited to welcome these new members to the board! And deeply thankful for the service of our past board members 🙏

Muster Call for Graduate Student Submissions - The Journal of the Civil War Era The Society of Civil War Historians’ Graduate Student Connection Committee, together with Muster, the blog of The Journal of the Civil War Era, is calling for submissions from graduate students. Muste...

In today's Muster, we are announcing a call for gradate student submissions www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2026/01/must...

Civil War historians! If you published your first book in 2025 on a topic related to the Civil War (broadly construed), please consider submitting it for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! The deadline is Friday, February 20.
olemiss.edu/civil-war-re...

Jan. 6 and the Long Shadow of Civil War- and Reconstruction-Era Political Violence Two days after the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, we...

ICYMI @jcwe.bsky.social editors @katemasur.bsky.social and Gregory Downs discuss January 6 and the legacy of Civil War-era violence with @talkingpointsmemo.com talkingpointsmemo.com/cafe/jan-6-a...

Remembering Reconstruction’s Lost Generation - The Journal of the Civil War Era Benjamin Franklin Randolph was part of a generation that changed the nation’s political history. Born free and raised in Ohio, he attended Oberlin College and after graduating he served as a principal...

In today's Muster @robertdbland.bsky.social examines the legacy of the Reconstruction generation www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2026/01/reme...

Death by Lightning - An Ode to Service - The Journal of the Civil War Era In his inaugural speech on March 4, 1881, newly elected President James Garfield emphasized the importance of ongoing Reconstruction, asserting that the “elevation of the negro race from slavery to th...

In today's Muster, @richcondon.bsky.social explores the recent Netflix series Death by Lightning and its portrait of James Garfield as the last "Lincoln Republican" www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/12/deat...

Dylan Penningroth, Joshua Strayhorn, Tera Hunter

Congrats to postdoc scholar Dr. Joshua Strayhorn on a great manuscript workshop on “Freedom’s Promise: Black Mobility, Migration, and Freedom Dreams in Eastern North Carolina, 1862-1898!” And many thanks to the invited scholars, Dr. Tera Hunter & Dr. Dylan Penningroth, for their valuable feedback.

Canada Caught in the Cross Fire: How U.S. Major General John Adams Dix Confronted Confederate Violence on the International Border - The Journal of the Civil War Era Hundreds of miles from the cacophony of hissing Minié balls, rumbling artillery fire, and thumping drums that defined the acoustic environment of battlefields in established theaters of war, Major Gen...

In today's Muster, Cassandra Jane Werking explores irregular warfare along the Canadian border and how this conflict challenges our current hemispheric story of the American Civil War www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/12/cana...

Congratulations to former Muster editor @hngreen.bsky.social for being included on this illustrious list!

For more on this historical context, see this amicus brief from @marthasjones.bsky.social and @katemasur.bsky.social

www.brennancenter.org/media/14006/...

Previewing the December 2025 JCWE - The Journal of the Civil War Era With this issue of the journal, we complete six years as coeditors and feel inspired by the work of so many of our professional colleagues who keep scholarly journals functioning and humbled by Bill B...

In today's Muster, Kate Masur and Gregory Downs preview the December issue of the journal www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/12/prev...

Richards Center CFA for the Mark & Ann Persun Visiting Scholars Program for tenured faculty in history at the rank of Associate Professor. For the 2026-27 academic year, the fellowship is open to scholars of the Civil War Era, broadly conceived, who study military or political history.

Compensated Emancipation in Maryland during the Civil War - The Journal of the Civil War Era Historians have long marked President Abraham Lincoln’s January 1, 1863, Emancipation Proclamation as the harbinger of immediate, uncompensated emancipation in both the Confederacy and the Border Stat...

In today's Muster, Amanda Laury Kleintop explores the hidden history of compensated emancipation in Maryland www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/12/comp...

In today's Muster, JCWE Book Review Editor Megan Bever chats with J Matt Ward about his book Garden of Ruins (LSU Press, 2024) www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/11/jcwe...

Stephen Douglas’ Fictitious Case: Immigrant Voting in Antebellum Illinois - The Journal of the Civil War Era Both sides agreed on the facts. Both sides, the Whigs and the Democrats,  agreed that on August 6, 1838, Jeremiah Kyle went to the window of a polling booth in Galena, Illinois. Both sides agreed that...

In today's Muster, Clark North examines Stephen Douglas' role in shaping debates over citizenship and voting rights in antebellum Illinois www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/11/step...

Alternative Fictions: The New Lost Cause in the Post-Civil Rights Era - The Journal of the Civil War Era “What if the South Won the Civil War?” Answers to this question reflect shifts in collective memory as authors use artistic license to reframe the real-world past.[1] Mackinlay Kantor’s answer in 1960...

In today's Muster, contributor Kris Plunkett examines the rise of the New Lost Cause in Post-Civil Rights era alternative history stories www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/10/alte...

Introducing New Muster Contributors - The Journal of the Civil War Era In today’s Muster, we are excited to introduce four new contributors to our site. We are excited to welcome Cassy Werking, Will Horne, Elliott Martin, and Kris Plunkett to our team. They will contribu...

In today's Muster, we introduce four new contributors to the site. Welcome Cassy Werking, Will Horne, Elliott, and Kris Plunkett to the Muster team! www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/10/intr...

The history of the Civil War era is inextricably linked to indigenous history and Muster will always strive to be an outlet to highlight the ongoing conversations and important debates that reveal a deeper understanding of this nation's indigenous past

Lindsey Peterson Interview on "'Home Builders': Free Labor Households and Settler Colonialism in Western Union Civil War Commemorations" - The Journal of the Civil War Era In today’s Muster, associate editor Robert D. Bland speaks with Lindsey R. Peterson about her March 2025 JCWE article “‘Home-Builders’: Free Labor Households and Settler Colonialism in Western Union C...

Finally, Lindsey R. Peterson discussed her 2025 JCWE article on settler colonialism, western Unionism, and Indian boarding schools with Muster this past summer. Her groundbreaking article won the 2023 Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay award. www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/04/lind...

In 2024, Paul Barba offered an deeply insightful investigation of the Office of Indian Affairs in Kansas during the height of the sectional crisis
www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2024/07/acts...

Insurrections, Indigenous Power, & The Empire for Slavery in the Southwest - The Journal of the Civil War Era The realities of Indigenous power, marronage, and Mexico’s emancipation policies haunted Anglo-American visions of a white supremacist imperial order in the trans-Mississippi West. On May 25, 1836 Con...

Next is Max Flormen's 2021 post on Indigenous Power and Slavery in the American Southwest www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2021/03/insu...

Honoring and Remembering Indigenous Civil War Veterans in Public Spaces - The Journal of the Civil War Era A groundbreaking ceremony for the National Native American Veterans Memorial was held on September 21, 2019—the fifteen-year anniversary of the opening of the National Museum of the American Indian (N...

In honor of Indigenous People's Day, we would like to highlight some Muster posts that have examined Native American history during the Civil War era.

First, Michelle Anderson's 2019 essay on the honoring Indigenous Civil War veterans www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2019/11/hono...

Announcing the 2025 Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award - The Journal of the Civil War Era The Journal of the Civil War Era is pleased to announce that Dr. J. Jacob Calhoun has been selected as the recipient of the Anthony E. Kaye Memorial Essay Award for 2025. His winning essay is titled, ...

In today's Muster, we announce that Dr. J. Jacob Calhoun has been selected as the recipient of the Anthony E. Kaye Essay Award for 2025. Congratulations Dr. Calhoun! www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/09/anno...

Conversation with Caleb Gayle - The Journal of the Civil War Era In today’s Muster, JCWE Associate Editor Robert Bland has a conversation with Caleb Gayle, Associate Professor of Journalism and Africana Studies at Northeastern University. Gayle is the author of Bla...

In today's Muster, JCWE Associate Editor Robert Bland has a conversation with Caleb Gayle, author of Black Moses: A Sage of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State (Penguin, 2025). www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/09/conv...

A reminder that the JCWE is seeking new contributors to Muster. The deadline for applications is October 1. If you are or anyone you know is interested in contributing to our ongoing online conversation on Civil War history, please apply!

Congratulations to Dr. Mount!

Previewing the September 2025 JCWE - The Journal of the Civil War Era This issue exemplifies the wide sweep of the Civil War Era as scholars understand it, and the success of the journal’s now fifteen-year-long effort to promote broadminded interrogation of the many for...

In today's Muster, Gregory Downs and Kate Masur preview the September 2025 JCWE www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/09/prev...

Muster is looking for new contributors! We want to include a wide range of voices from many different of perspectives. Please share the following call widely. www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/08/call...

In today's Muster, JCWE Book Review Editor Megan Bever has a conversation with Shae Smith Cox about her book, The Fabric of the Civil War Society www.journalofthecivilwarera.org/2025/08/conv...