Battles Of The American Civil War

Before his cavalry raids made headlines, John Hunt Morgan was a Lexington businessman, husband, and militia captain. We follow his life from his Kentucky upbringing and Mexican War service through slavery, family tragedy, Confederate command, prison escape, and his death in Greeneville, Tennessee.

The 33rd Virginia began as companies of neighbors from the Shenandoah Valley. At Manassas, they charged Union guns. Then came Kernstown, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, and Spotsylvania. Every fight changed who was still standing in the ranks. This is the story of the regiment that made it all the way to Appomattox.

Bragg’s Confederates won the field at Perryville, then withdrew that night. We break down how divided command, bad intelligence, and missed opportunities left a bloody victory unable to save the invasion of Kentucky.

The Cornfield at Antietam changed hands again and again as Union and Confederate troops tore each other apart over a few acres of Maryland farmland.

In the weeks after Fort Sumter, the Union Navy moved to close the Chesapeake Bay and cut Virginia off from the sea. At Gloucester Point and Sewell’s Point, unfinished Confederate batteries faced Union gunboats in two of the war’s earliest armed clashes. These small engagements caused few casualties, but they marked the beginning of the naval blockade in Virginia and showed both sides what controlling Hampton Roads would require.

Benjamin Butler was one of the Civil War’s most controversial figures. A failed battlefield commander who became “Beast Butler” in the South, helped turn escaped slaves into free people, ruled New Orleans with an iron hand, and later fought for Black civil rights in Congress.

The 20th Maine is remembered for its desperate stand and bayonet charge at Little Round Top, but its story stretched far beyond Gettysburg. Follow the regiment from its formation in 1862 through Fredericksburg, the Overland Campaign, Petersburg, Five Forks, and the final surrender at Appomattox.

The Red River Campaign was supposed to crush Confederate resistance in Louisiana and capture Shreveport. Instead, poor planning, divided command, and one devastating defeat turned it into a complete disaster for the Union.

Fort Sumter was more than the first battle of the American Civil War. It was the breaking point that turned months of secession, threats, and failed negotiations into open war. Follow Major Robert Anderson’s secret occupation of the unfinished fort, the failed relief missions, the Confederate bombardment, and the surrender that changed the nation forever.

Shot 5 times at Antietam, John Brown Gordon rose from an untrained captain to one of Robert E. Lee’s last corps commanders. But his controversial postwar life left behind a legacy far darker than his battlefield legend.