History never remains silent or still. At times it speaks in soft whispers, and others it shouts with deafening resonation. Living as we do in an era preoccupied with the present, we often cannot or will not hear our old companion talking to us. But it will always be there, in lockstep, attempting to teach.
History echoes still with the cataclysm of the American Civil War, despite its last battles having ended nearly 150 years ago. In 2004, some 40,000 people were in attendance to see Charleston’s Magnolia Cemetery became the final resting place for the crew of the recently discovered CSS Hunley. In 2008, the body of a Union soldier was discovered at Antietam. The following year, his remains were laid to rest in his regimental home of New York State. In 2009, on what used to be the open fields of the old battleground at Franklin, a construction crew building a fast food restaurant unearthed the bones of an unknown soldier. I recently had the honor and privilege of helping organize the funeral and re-internment of that young man.
Among these newly found fallen rises a willingness among the living to hear the words of history. And in terms of the Civil War, our future certainly seems promising.
In just the last few years, there have been new centers and museums built at Corinth, Kennesaw Mountain, Nashville, and elsewhere, with more on the way. The modern Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum at Springfield has turned a commendable site of historic interest into a world class hub of tourism and research. The ever-accelerating digital age has made countless pages of antebellum and wartime documentation, once confined to dusty archives and private collections, available to the world at the click of a button. From the privately owned Lotz House Museum in Franklin, to the new $100 million Visitors Center at Gettysburg, the past is resounding at every octave.
It is through this great expansion of interest and information that it has come time to offer a new edition to a book written years ago. Through my good fortune, The History Buff’s Guide to the Civil War has done well. Having spawned a series with a growing number of volumes, it has enabled me to continue writing, sharing, and learning. And through this process, there are updates to be made, subjects to be added (most notably, Songs of the War and the Largest Cemeteries), and conclusions to be revisited—because history refuses to remain silent or still.
Thomas R. Flagel
Franklin, Tennessee
February 1, 2010