Graham T. Dozier on a Civil War Soldier Who Became a Civil War Tourist

Civil War buffs and historians are not the only people interested in visiting historical battlefields. On our Civil War blog, Graham T. Dozier, editor of A Gunner in Lee’s Army: The Civil War Letters of Thomas Henry Carter observes how Civil War battle sites have long fascinated visitors of all kinds. Dozier writes:

Of all the ways that Americans demonstrate ongoing interest 150 years after the Civil War, visiting battlefields is perhaps the most popular expression of that attraction. People travel to preserved sites across the country to try not only to learn what happened there but also to imagine what it was like for the men who fought on those fields so long ago. That desire to make sense of those dramatic events is nothing new. In fact, it began for one man only two months after the first major battle of the war had taken place.

Capt. Thomas Henry Carter, the 30-year-old commander of the recently formed King William Artillery, came to the war in 1861 with a genuine curiosity about people and events. He arrived in northern Virginia that September, and one of the first things he wrote to his wife Susan about was the Battle of Bull Run (or Manassas), which had taken place on 21 July. Specifically, Carter told her what soldiers in the Confederate army thought about the way the battle had ended. “The opinion of the army,” he reported, “is that a tremendous mistake was made in not advancing on to Alexandria immediately after the Bull Run fight.” Clearly this notion troubled Tom Carter deeply. When he considered who was responsible, Carter pointed his finger in one direction. He explained to Susan that “[a]ll admit it now & the blame is put on Davis’ shoulders here. Politicians will ruin us forever.”

Check out Dozier’s full post, “A Civil War Tourist in 1861,” at UNCPressCivilWar150.com.