Rouviere Media

President Barack Obama has signed a proclamation designating Fort Monroe, Virginia, a national monument. The recently decommissioned Army fort in Virginia is replete with history, not just of the Civil War. Strategically located at Hampton Roads, Fort Monroe has long guarded the channel between the Chesapeake Bay and Hampton Roads at the confluence of the Elizabeth, Nansemond and James Rivers.  It was the last remaining U.S. fort until its decommissioning this year. 

Fortifications were first built on the location in 1609, although the stone fort known as Fort Monroe was not built until 1834.

In August 1619, the Dutch trading ship White Lion arrived at the fort carrying more than 30 Affricans captured from the slave ship Sao Joao Bautista. They were the first Africans to come ashore in the British colonies of America. They were considered indentured servants, not slaves, but their arrival is considered to mark the beginning of slavery in America. One of them gave birth to the first African American child.

The stone fortifications were built after the War of 1812. Robert E. Lee, as a young first lieutenant and engineer in the U.S. Army, was stationed at the fort from 1831-1834 and was involved in the final construction of it. Fort Monroe was called the Gibralter of Chesapeake Bay.

When the Civil War began, President Abraham Lincoln immediately had the fort reenforced, and it was held by Union forced throughout the war. Both sea and land expeditions were launched from the fort. Troops from Fort Monroe launched the extension of the Union blockade to the coasts of North and South Carolina.

On May 27, 1861, Major General Benjamin Butler decided that escaping slaves who reached Union lines would be considered contraband and would not be returned to bondage. As a result, thousands of slaves fled to Union lines around Fort Monroe, Butler's headquarters in Virginia. The fort was called Freedom's Fortress, as any slave who reached it was free. A camp was organized to house the freed families and the freedmen were taught to read and write near the fort.  

After the war, Confederate President Jefferson Davis was held captive at the fort for two years. 

During World War II, Fort Monroe was headquarters for coast artillery and also controlled submarine barriers and underwater mine fields on the coast.  After World War II, it served as the major headquarters for training soldiers. The  fort has 565 acres, with 170 historic buildings and nearly 200 acres of natural resources.  Visitors to the fort can see a museum that depicts the fort's history. 

California is commemorating the 150th anniversary of  the involvement of Californians in the war. More than 17,000 Californians volunteered, but most of them were kept in western states and territories building forts and patrolling the Oregon Overland and Santa Fe Trails that were used to transport millions of dollars woth of California gold used to shore up Union bonds.

A group of 500 California volunteers, known as Company A of the 2nd Massachusetts Cavalry,  was recruited in Calfornia and fought in a number of battles in the eastern United States. They were present at the surrender  at Appomattox. On Saturday, November 12, the San Leandro Main Library in San Leandro, California, will commemorate the California involvement with a presentation, exhibits and re-enactors.

The commemoration has highlighted a revival of Civil War music. Wisconsin’s 1st Bridge Band, consisting of about 50 members from a five-state area, performs dance music from the mid-19th century.  The band originated in 1864 with 18 Wisconsin men. It eventually died out, but was started up again when music and history buffs began to find and restore dented and broken instruments and reconstruct torn music sheets. The band performs in concerts, parades, and at reenactment ceremonies. On November  5, the band will plan for a Civil War Ball, admission $35, in Racine, Wisconsin.

Meanwhile, the 5th Michigan Regiment Band is playing original sheet music obtained from the National Archives. All of the music is performed on Civil War-era instruments. The band can play more thant 150 marches, polkas, schottishes and waltzes that were popular for parades, military balls and musters on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line during the war. The 5th Michigan Regiment was disbanded after the war until 1973, when it was reborn as a bicentennial project. Now it has 30 musicians, color guards and support persons. They perform at Civil War festivals, reenactments, historical events and musters in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky and have recorded five CDs. 

A violin inscribed with its owner's Civil War travels is on display at the Smithsonian Museum. The violin was purchased by Solomon Conn in Nashvilel, Tennesee. He carried and wrote on it his travels for the next two years in battle.  His family donated it to the Smithsonian Insitution in 1988.

Thanks to eBay, the University of South Carolina has acquired nearly 200 Civil War-erra photos and three albums belonging to diarist Mary Boykin Chesnut. After her death, some of Chesnut’s photographs were sent to her niece, but the picture collection never made it to its final destination. Years later, Chesnut’s descendants found them on Ebay. The family notified other museum officials who were thinking about purchasing the photo collection and let them know her family wanted to donate the pictures to USC. They will be on display at the Univeristy’s SouthCarolinianan Library until January 31.

American Eagle Tankers has agreed to pay  for improvements to the Sabine Pass Battleground and  Walter Umphrey Park to compensate for spilling crude oil in a collision of the Eagle Otome with a barge and a 400,000-gallon oil spill into the Sabine Neches Waterway.  The projects were part of a $400,000 settlement agreement with the Texas General Land Office. The company will spend more than $313,000 on the improvements in addition paying a fine of $86,600.  The battleground is  the site of an 1863 Civil War Battle.

The Jersey City Free Public Library has returned a 220-year-old book of court records to the Library of Virginia, nearly 150 years after a Union Army captain took it from the Stafford County courthouse in Virginia during the Civil War.The record includes summarized court records from 1749 to 1755. An assistant manager at the Jersey City Free Public Library found the book in a box while gathering materials to commemorate the Civil War. The book fills in part of the holes from the catastrophic loss of Stafford County records as a result of the war.