Search Documents

129 Documents foundEdit Search

Sort by: Title, Date, Type

  • | Illustration

    Rebels Destroying the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad

    This image from the October 8, 1862 issue of Harper's Weekly depicts three men at Fair View, Maryland observing Confederate forces in the distance working to destroy the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.

  • | Photograph

    Rails for military railroad, Alexandria, Virginia.

  • | Map

    Railroads and war zone counties, 1861?1865

    If the presence of the Union army and/or a battle constituted a war zone, then only in Virginia did the Civil War?s destruction touch the majority of counties. Vast sections of the South remained out of the war zone, but over the course of the war destruction tended to follow closely along the pathways of the major lines of communication and transportation. From Paul F. Paskoff, ?Measures of War: A Quantitative Examination of the Civil War?s Destructiveness in the Confederacy,? Civil War History, Vol. 54, No. 1 (March 2008). (Reproduced with permission of Paul F. Paskoff)

  • | Photograph

    Railroad mortar "The Dictator" at Petersburg, Virginia, July 25, 1864

  • | Illustration

    Railroad Junction near Corinth

    Corinth was at the junction of two railroad lines, the Mobile & Ohio and the Memphis & Charleston, and so was strategically important to both sides. This image was published shortly after the Seige of Corinth, in which the city was taken by Union forces.

  • | Illustration

    Railroad Depot at Resaca, Georgia

    This image from the July 2, 1864 issue of Harper's Weekly depicts Union soldiers under the command of General William T. Sherman near a railroad depot at Resaca, Georgia during the American Civil War.

  • | Photograph

    Railroad construction workers hammer track as a third watches

    African American laborers, free and contraband, worked for the Union Army to build and repair rail lines across the South. Note the bent and broken rails scattered in the background, signs of earlier destruction.

  • | Illustration

    Pickets of the 1st Louisiana ?Native Guard? Guarding the New Orleans, Opelousas and Great Western Railroad

    United States Colored Troops (U.S.C.T.) recruiters in 1863 fanned out along the railroads, especially in Tennessee, stopping at depots along the route to sign up soldiers. Over 180,000 black men volunteered and enlisted for service in the U.S.C.T. Both white regiments and U.S.C.T. units found themselves guarding railroads and watching for guerrillas.

  • | Time Table

    Orange and Alexandria Line "Irregular" Timetable

    This "irregular" timetable, published by the United States Military Railroads department, shows arrival and departure times on the Orange and Alexandria Line for "The Government of Operatives Only."

  • | Map

    Norfolk and Vicinity

    In the wake of the Battle of Hampton Roads, the New York Daily Tribune prints a map of the waterways and fortifications near Norfolk, Virginia.

  • | Photograph

    No. 1. Steam engines "Telegraph" and "O. A. Bull," Atlanta, Ga., 1864

    No. 1. Steam engines ?Telegraph? and ?O. A. Bull? remained in position amid the ruins of a Confederate roundhouse in Atlanta in 1864. The South possessed some of the most beautiful depots and railroad facilities in the nation in 1861. Sherman?s campaigns sought to dismantle the Confederate railroad system and in so doing deny any claim to modernity and progress. African American workers stand atop the old Georgia Railroad flatcar.

  • | Illustration

    New York Militia En Route to Washington, D.C.

    This image from the March 3, 1860 issue of Harper's Weekly depicts soldiers from the New York state militia on their way to Washington, D.C. to attend the inauguration of a statue of George Washingon.

  • | Map

    New York Daily Tribune, May 12, 1862

    This front page image illustrates the importance of maps of space and resources (including railroads) to readers of Civil War-era newspapers. Note the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad running up the center of the larger map; a number of other rail lines criss-cross the map.

  • | Map

    Movements near Corinth, Mississippi

    Although small, this map illustrates the interconnection of railroads and battle lines in the South.

  • | Illustration

    Military Telegraph to Ackworth, Georgia

    This image from the July 9, 1863 issue of Harper's Weekly depicts Union soldiers under the command of General William T. Sherman constructing a telegraph line along railroad tracks in Georgia.

  • | Photograph

    Military Railroad Bridge over Potomac Creek, 1864

    This bridge was destroyed and rebuilt several times. In May 1862 General Irwin McDowell employed hundreds of contraband laborers, who replaced the bridge in nine days. Here, in May 1864, the U.S. Military Railroads, again with large numbers of black freedmen, constructed the bridge in forty hours. Photographs such as this one indicated the complexity, cost, and scale of the bridges across many of the South?s rivers and also conveyed the precarious, and sublime, ways the railroad was thought to defy nature.

  • | Photograph

    Military railroad bridge over Potomac Creek on the Richmond, Frederickburg & Potomac Railroad

    A trestle railroad bridge built by the United States Military Railroad Construction Corps.

  • | Letter

    Letter from W. W. McCafferty to J. H. Devereaux, January 29, 1864

    An inquiry about re-hiring a blacksmith for the military railroad.

  • | Letter

    Letter from W. W. McCafferty to F. P. Lord, November 19, 1863

    McCafferty notes damage done to Engine Rapidan by contrabands.

  • | Letter

    Letter from station/road masters to Adna Anderson, October 16, 1864

    Labor bosses ask Adna Anderson to pressure the Quarter Master to approve the sale of winter clothing to contrabands.