Confederate Courage on Other Fields: Four Lesser Known Accounts of the War Between the States

While many soldiers in the army of the Confederate States of America fought on famous fields like Gettysburg and Antietam, others demonstrated equal valor in lesser known places. Here are collected, for the first time, the accounts of four little known pieces of Confederate history. These four pieces are important components in understanding Confederate life in both small and large scale.

The first section concerns the battle of Dinwiddie Court House on March 31, 1865, the last significant Confederate victory and the prelude to the battle of Five Forks the next day. The second section chronicles the experiences of Col. Charles C. Blacknall of the 23rd North Carolina Infantry, whose letters offer insight into the life of an officer and his personal struggles before his death from wounds received at the battle of Winchester. The third section examines a tragic and bloody series of conflicts and retaliations in southeast Missouri that demonstrated the revenge and violence against civilians that often erupted during the war. Finally, the history of General Hospital Number One, at Kittrell Springs, is analyzed, including accounts from the hospital's chaplain and its chief surgeon, and many of the last words they recorded in the performance of their duties.

These four accounts illustrate very personal experiences of war by Confederate soldiers, in their own words from letters and diaries, period and contemporary photographs, and maps.

Scholarly author, novelist and songwriter Mark J. Crawford lives in Madison, Wisconsin. After a career as an exploration geologist, his writings have specialized in Civil War history, the environment, and science.