Civil War Photo Friday: Lincoln's reelection poster

Considering recent events, I thought it would be nice to put up Lincoln's campaign poster from the 1864 presidential election. Here he is, trying to become a two-term president in the face of harsh criticism from the Democrats and rising popular complaints about the war.

Interestingly, this Republican president decided to run with Andrew Johnson, a Democrat. Johnson was a slave owner but when the war started, he supported the fight to preserve the Union with all his energy. The support of the War Democrats, as people like Johnson were called, were vital if the Republicans wanted to stay in power. In an attempt to get them on board, the Republicans temporarily changed their name to the National Union Party to emphasize that they were all about preserving the Union.

Photo courtesy Wikipedia.

Voting follows old patterns in Missouri

In the weeks running up to the election I became obsessed with CNN's Election Center. With all the results in, I took a look at voting in Missouri. CNN posted an interesting map showing how Missouri voted county by county.

As you can see, Obama only carried three counties. They were St. Louis, Jackson, and Boone. He also carried St. Louis city. St. Louis County is part of the metro area, Jackson is home to Kansas City, and Boone is home to Columbia, where I live part-time and which serves as the setting for my Civil War novel.

Knowing Missouri, I never expected Obama to win there. He did pretty well, though. St. Louis and Jackson are, of course, the most populous counties, and Boone is number 7, so while Obama only managed to carry three counties and St. Louis city, he did get 44% of the popular vote.

What's interesting is that St. Louis, Kansas City, and Columbia were the three main strongholds for Union sentiment during the Civil War. More rural areas (called "Outstate" by Missourans) tended to be for the South. They supported the Democrats, who back then were a conservative party that wanted to preserve the status quo. If you wanted to find supporters of the liberal alternative to the Democrats, the Republicans Party, you had to look in St. Louis, Kansas City, and Columbia.

A sweeping generalization, I know, but one that still has a ring of truth 150 years later. The three cities are still liberal and the rest of the state is still conservative, all they've done is switch parties!

A faked Civil War photo

Yesterday I posted a cropped version of the above photograph. It was titled "Confederate and Union dead side by side" and was taken on April 3, 1865 at Fort Mahone, during the waning days of the siege of Petersburg.

The body in the foreground is a real corpse of a fallen soldier. While the ammo pouch he's carrying says US, he could be a Confederate since many rebels, short on gear, used whatever Union gear they could get their hands on. It's hard to tell from this photo, but the uniform could either be gray or a faded blue.

The fellow in the background is supposed to be the "Confederate" but has two things wrong with him. 1) He's black, an unlikely skin tone for a Confederate soldier, 2) He's not wearing a uniform, and 3) He's alive.

The guy was the photographer's teamster. There's another photo showing him alive if you follow this link. The Civil War Times published an article on this photo in their December 2010 issue titled "Substitute for a Corpse."

Yep, a little Election Day chicanery for you!

Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Why you need to vote

This is a photo of a dead Union soldier at Fort Mahone, taken on April 3, 1865. More than 350,000 soldiers in blue died to preserve the Union. If they had not fought for their country, the United States would have become two nations, and in all likelihood neither would have been strong enough to become a global superpower. The effects that this would have had on later events (WWII, the Cold War, the global economy, culture, etc.) are mind boggling.

Have you done as much for your country as this guy? No you haven't, because you're alive and reading this.

Go vote. Now.

This image is from the Library of Congress. There's an interesting story about this photograph that I'll tell you about tomorrow.

Iraq Victory Lap: my fiction is on sale!

For the month of November I've reduced the prices on my ebooks. My Civil War novel A Fine Likeness is reduced to $2.99 and my short story collection The Night the Nazis Came to Dinner and other dark tales is reduced to only 99 cents!

Why? Several reasons.

1. I'm grateful that I returned safe and sound from traveling in Iraq. Despite all the street food I ate I didn't even get a case of Saddam's Revenge! Here is yours truly with the print edition of my novel at Babylon's Ishtar Gate.

2. My Iraq series for Gadling and my blog tour about my trip will both start this week.

3. I'm psyched that my Jesse James book has been released by Osprey Publishing.

4. I love hearing from new readers and I want more of them!

So if you haven't sampled my fiction, now is the time. The links above are for Amazon, but my Civil War novel is also available on many other online venues such as Barnes and Noble and Smashwords. If the recession is hitting you hard, check out my free historical fantasy novella The Quintessence of Absence over at Black Gate magazine.

If you have read my fiction already, please help out a struggling writer by reviewing it. Feedback is always welcome!

My latest Wild West book out now!

While I was traveling in Iraq my latest book was published by Osprey Publishing. The Last Ride of the James-Younger Gang: Jesse James and the Northfield Raid 1876 came out on October 20, while I was somewhere in the Sunni Triangle. This book detailed the ill-fated raid that destroyed the James-Younger gang. It's is my fifth book for Osprey and twelfth book in total. To see my other Osprey titles, click on my Osprey author's page. You can see some interior images here.

Civil War Photo Friday: Confederate General John S. Marmaduke

I'm back safely from Iraq and while I've been blogging about my trip, it's time to get back to some Civil War and Wild West stuff! My Iraq series for Gadling will be starting shortly and I'll announce it here.

This week's Civil War photo is of John Sappington Marmaduke, a Confederate commander from Missouri. Born to a wealthy plantation family in Arrow Rock, he went with the South when his uncle, Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson, planned the state's secession from the Union. Marmaduke commanded the rebel troops and tasted defeat at the Battle of Boonville, one of the first battles of the Civil War.

Marmaduke rose in the ranks and was appointed a Brigadier General 150 years ago this month. He's most famous for two raids he conducted into Union-dominated Missouri in 1863 in an effort to reduce pressure on Confederate-held Arkansas. The first raid saw him in a bitter fight in Springfield. The second saw him causing havoc in southeast Missouri. Neither raid was particularly successful. His career was further tarnished when he challenged a fellow officer to a duel and shot him dead.

Marmaduke's career ended at the Battle of Mine Creek on October 25, 1864. This was near the end of General Price's disastrous invasion of Missouri, the background for my Civil War novel A Fine Likeness. Marmaduke positioned his artillery and men poorly and the Union army cut him off from the rest of the rebel army and captured him and some 800 of his men. I'll cover all of these events in more detail as their 150th anniversaries come up.

Despite his failings as a commander, Marmaduke remained a popular figure and served as governor of Missouri from 1885 to his death in office in 1887.

Photo courtesy Wikipedia.