On Saturday, October 22, The Kentucky Historical Society dedicated a historical marker to commemorate the service of the 8th U.S. Colored Heavy Artillery, a Civil War regiment of black soldiers.  The marker dedication was held at the Paducah-McCracken County Convention and Expo Center in Paducah, KY.

8th U.S. Colored Heavy Artillery

The city of Paducah was an important site during the Civil War, as it was the first city in Kentucky to develop a black regiment.   Other recruitments for black soldiers also took place there, and any slave who enlisted was granted emancipation. Paducah also harbored Fort Anderson, a fort of the Union.  On March 25, 1864, Confederate troops attacked Fort Anderson under the command of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest, and the 8th U.S. Colored Heavy Artillery played an integral role in fending off the attack.

Are there any black Civil War soldier marker dedications or commemorative events happening in your area?  If so, please contact us at civilwar150@ohiohistory.org and we’ll post it on the website!

Original news article provided by the Kentucky Historical Society: http://history.ky.gov/news.php?articleID=599

The Ohio Historical Society is seeking an AmeriCorps service member to join the Ohio History Service Corps at Dennison Railroad Depot Museum in Dennison, Ohio. The Ohio History Service Corps is an AmeriCorps State program created by the Ohio Historical Society and statewide partners to promote local history, historic preservation and tourism. We welcome applicants looking for experience in community outreach, event planning, public history, K-12 history education, public relations, and tourism.

Position Description: Ten Civil War 150 (CW150) Leadership Corps members will be hosted at partner sites throughout Ohio. Corps members will serve as the coordinator and information clearinghouse for the Civil War commemoration initiatives in their region and will focus on volunteer recruitment and heritage tourism. Service members assist their host organization and other regional organizations with collaborating and building capacity for educational and public programming; special events, and regional initiatives. Members will provide ideas for, plan and lead three of the following five activities, depending on needs of the region and host site as well as the member’s skills and interest, during their service time: a) A regional volunteer fair, b) Heritage tourism efforts, such as walking or bus tours or packaging with a convention and visitor bureau (CVB) regional organization, c) Application submissions to the Park Service’s Network to Freedom, d) K-12 education outreach, (ex. assisting with History Day; creating teacher resource packages, and/or e) Regional commemoration events. This position is located at the Dennison Railroad Depot Museum.

Program Description: The Ohio Historical Society and its statewide partners developed the Ohio History Service Corps to promote sustainable community development and heritage tourism in Ohio. The Corps consists of three components: Civil War 150 Leadership Corps, to initiate educational programming and regional special events; Ohio History Tech Corps, to provide digitization of historic resources and develop an oral history program; and Historic Preservation Corps, to inventory historic buildings, support community revitalization, and assist local preservation

Program Benefits: AmeriCorps members pledge to “get things done” in local communities. In exchange for their service, the members earn a living stipend, are eligible for health insurance, and may receive an Education Award of $5500 to further their education or pay off existing school loans. Members receive top-notch training in volunteer management, meeting facilitation, leadership, communication, community development and more.

Terms: Car recommended, Permits attendance at school during off hours, Permits working at another job during off hours.
Skills: Communications, Community Organization, Public Speaking, Writing/Editing.
Start Date: 11/1/11
End Date: 9/30/12
Requirements: All applicants must register and apply on http://www.americorps.gov/. To find the listing detailed above, follow this link.
Application Deadline: October 25, 2011
Contact: Mary Cannon
Ohio Historical Society
mcannon@ohiohistory.org
P: 614-297-2392 or 614-297-2342

Columbus, OH-The Ohio Historical Society held a reception on Sunday, September 25 to honor organizations and individuals who donated to the Save the Flag Campaign. Devoted to conserving and displaying Ohio’s Civil War battle flags, the Save the Flag Campaign has raised more than $165,000 since 1998, which, along with state funding, has allowed the Society to conserve a total of 19 flags.

An important feature of the event was the presence and words of Ohio’s Adjutant General, Major General Deborah A. Ashenhurst who assumed the duties as the Adjutant General, Ohio National Guard, on January 10, 2011. While the Society is honored to be the custodian of the flags, these artifacts are actually part of the collection of the Ohio Adjutant General. This collection includes 553 flags, three quarters of which are from the Civil War.

In attendance were donors who contributed to the Battle Flag General Conservation Fund and those who adopted an individual flag. During the program, the Society recognized the donors of $1,000 and greater who were present:

• The Army of the Ohio
• 4th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry Descendants Association
• 14th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Reenacting Unit
• Ohio Society Children of the American Revolution
• Mark Holbrook, The Ohio Historical Society

Maj. Gen. Deborah A. Ashenhurst (left), Ohio adjutant general, and Sharon Dean (right) Ohio Historical Society director of museum and library services, presents Tom Jahns (second from left) and Bob Minton, representing the 14th Ohio Volunteer Infantry (OVI) reenactors, with photos of the conserved flags of the 14th OVI and the 100th OVI on Sep. 25, 2011 at the Ohio History Center in Columbus.

Additionally, the Society expressed gratitude to the numerous honorees who supported the preservation of 19 flags, which have been treated and housed in frames for display purposes. In the process of learning about the intricate preservation process, event attendees learned about the most recent developments in the Save the Flag Campaign, including:

• Two flags have recently returned from the conservator: the 5th United States Colored Troops Flank Marker and the 4th Ohio Volunteer Cavalry (OVC) Regimental Colors. The Gordon Chandler Memorial Fund of the Columbus Foundation (for the 5th USCT Flank Marker) and the Ohio Society Children of the American Revolution & 4th OVC Descendants Association (for the 4th OVC Regimental Colors) donated funds for these flags’ preservation.
• A flag, the 2nd Ohio Veterans Volunteer Cavalry Regimental Colors, has recently gone to the conservator and will return to the Society in June 2012. The conservation of this flag is supported by the Sidney Frohman Foundation of Suffolk, VA and an anonymous donor.
• A flag from the 23rd Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regimental Colors has been adopted by the Army of the Ohio, the Army Historical Foundation, and by an individual donor, Jeane H. Candido, of Dublin.
• A flag of the 121st Ohio Volunteer Infantry was adopted by The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company. The 121st OVI was the regiment of Scotts’ founder, O.M. Scott.

This campaign and the attendees’ donations take on greater significance as Ohioans commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Civil War. Ohio’s battle flags are a physical representation of Ohioans’ participation in the Civil War and a reminder of the state’s important role in it. Visitors to the Ohio History Center can view 10 of the conserved flags on display in the Follow the Flag exhibit.

The Ohio Battle Flag Collection
The Ohio Battle Flag collection is one of the largest in the country. The Ohio Battle Flag Collection was photographed before preservation in the 1960s. These prints, plus slides showing an artist’s rendition of each flag as it appeared originally, are available for viewing online. Fight for the Colors provides access to images of and information about Ohio battle flags. You also may order copies of photographs or slides by calling the Society’s Photo Duplication Office at (614) 297-2543.

The flags were gathered in the late nineteenth century at the Ohio Statehouse and exhibited there, first in the Flag Room, then in the Rotunda. In the mid-1960s, most of the flags were conserved under the direction of a Flag Preservation Committee and the National Guard. The technique involved adhering a flag to fine nylon fabric with a plastic-like substance (polyvinyl alcohol or PVA) in order to provide stability and support for the flag. About half of the flags were mounted for hanging, while the rest either were not treated or were treated and furled around flag poles.

The Society exhibited the hanging and furled flags for public viewing until 1988. Over time, however, the PVA became brittle and the nylon fabric supports began to curl and fray. Due to concern about their condition, the flags were removed to the Society’s storage facility, where they are protected from dust, light and handling while they await new conservation treatment.

Save the Flags Campaign
Funds raised by the Save the Flags Campaign will conserve the Ohio Battle Flag Collection. The goals of the campaign are to: 1) use new conservation techniques to save the flags from further deterioration; 2) make them available again for research examination; and 3) provide for possible exhibit, under suitable conditions for conservation. Treatment will involve removing the earlier PVA treatment and mounting the fragile flags in new supports. A conservator’s examination revealed that a Civil War silk battle flag is estimated to cost between $5,000 and $30,000; the cost varies based on the condition and size of the flag. To donate to the Save the Flag Campaign, please contact the Ohio Historical Society’s Office of Institutional Advancement at (614) 297-2320 or (800) 647-6921.

About the Ohio Historical Society
The Ohio Historical Society is a nonprofit organization that serves as the state’s partner in preserving and interpreting Ohio’s history, archaeology, natural history and historic places. The Society oversees a network of 58 historic sites across Ohio. For more information on the sites, visit: www.ohiohistory.org/places/name.html. The Ohio History Center in Columbus houses the Ohio Historical Society, the State Museum, the Archives/Library, the Ohio Historic Preservation Office, the headquarters for the sites and the headquarters of the Ohio Village. Membership in the Society provides free admission to all 58 sites in the statewide network of historic sites. : www.OhioHistory.org/membership.

An upcoming concert of Civil War music at Cincinnati’s National Underground Railroad Freedom Center will benefit new educational programming at the Harriet Beecher Stowe House.

This year marks the 200th anniversary of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s birth and the sesquicentennial of the start of the Civil War. The Ohio Historical Society and the Friends of Harriet Beecher Stowe House, who manage the site for the society, have embarked on a series of improvements to the Stowe House to underscore its significance as a Cincinnati cultural and historic landmark and expand its offerings to the public. To underscore these activities, the Ohio Historical Society and the Friends will sponsor a concert of Civil War music Saturday, Oct. 1, at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati, featuring the Jay Ungar and Molly Mason Family Band, pianist Jacqueline Schwab, the Northern Kentucky Brotherhood Singers and a special appearance by Cincinnati journalist and human rights activist Nick Clooney.

Harriet Beecher Stowe House in Cincinnati

Concert Artists
The Civil War, Ken Burns’s famous PBS documentary, featured a Grammy-winning musical score performed in large part by Ungar and Mason and Schwab. Ungar composed the haunting melody Ashokan Farewell, the musical hallmark of the series. Ungar and Mason are one of the most celebrated duos in American acoustic music, well known for their appearances on A Prairie Home Companion, their own live radio program Dancing on the Air on WAMC in Albany, film soundtracks such as Legends of the Fall and Brother’s Keeper and the fiddle and dance camps they conduct in the Catskills. They will be joined by their daughter Ruthy and her husband Michael Merenda for this performance.

The emotional and expressive piano of Jacqueline Schwab is featured in many of Burns’s productions. She performs solo piano concerts of vintage American and traditional English, Irish and Scottish music, creating the intimate feeling of an old-fashioned parlor setting. Schwab has toured the United States and England as a solo pianist and with Bare Necessities, a quartet known nationwide for its unique presentation of English country dance music. She performed at the White House for President Clinton in 1997 to celebrate Burns’s Lewis and Clark series and at the Smithsonian in 2000 to celebrate its exhibition on the presidency. In May 2009, she accompanied Scottish singer Jean Redpath on the Late Show with David Letterman.

The Northern Kentucky Brotherhood Singers, from Covington, Ky., will lend their distinctive a capella jubilee-style harmony to the performance. The group, well known to Cincinnati audiences, began singing at the Ninth Street Baptist Church in Covington 24 years ago and specializes in gospel, patriotic and R&B music. They have performed in churches, secular music venues and on television throughout the United States, Canada and Spain and have appeared at the Library of Congress, the Lowell Folk Festival and on the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage.

Nick Clooney is well known as a print and broadcast journalist, author and activist. Following a distinguished career in radio and television in Kentucky, Ohio and California, he became a columnist for the Cincinnati Enquirer and host of cable television’s American Movie Classics. He later joined the faculty of American University’s School of Communication and was Distinguished Journalist in Residence at the Newseum in Washington, D.C. More recently he has achieved prominence as a human rights activist and advocate for the people of Darfur.

Location and Tickets
The concert takes place Saturday, Oct. 1, at 7:30 p.m. in the Harriet Tubman Theatre at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center at 50 E. Freedom Way in downtown Cincinnati, and will be followed by a reception with the performers for all ticketholders. Tickets are $50. Proceeds benefit new educational programming at the Harriet Beecher Stowe House.

Click here to purchase tickets online. For more information, call 800.647.6921 or 614.297.2308 or e-mail kwyatt@ohiohistory.org.

The Concert is sponsored in part by the Ohio Historical Society, the Friends of Harriet Beecher Stowe House, CET Public Television, Cincinnati Public Radio, ArtsWave, National Underground Railroad Freedom Center and generous individual donors.

Our latest featured photograph of an unidentified Civil War soldier was recently found and cataloged in the Ohio Historical Society’s collections.

Photograph of an Unidentified Union Officer

This photograph features an officer with a rather impressive beard. Based on the gentleman’s jacket and shoulder marks, we are fairly certain that he was an officer in the Union Army during the Civil War. However, we can not see the shoulder marks clearly enough to determine his rank. Based on what is visible, we think it is quite possible that he was a colonel or general. Assuming that he was from Ohio, that does not help us to narrow his possible identity by much as there were hundreds of Union Army generals and colonels from Ohio.

We have compared this photograph to those of a some high ranking Ohio officers who became prominent in Ohio and national politics after the Civil War, but so far this  exercise  has only produced a list of people whom we believe the photograph is not.

We welcome your comments and questions below.

Do you have a photograph of an unidentified soldier or civilian from the war? Are you unsure if your photo dates back to the Civil War? Send it in to civilwar150@ohiohistory.org and we’ll post it on the website!

This post was originally written   by  L. Wood, Curator for Visual Resources at the Ohio Historical Society, for the Ohio Historical Society’s Collections Blog.