Everyone is welcome at our monthly meetings

September 11th Regular Meeting
James Marten on "The Sixth Wisconsin and the Long Civil War"

As one of the original regiments in the Iron Brigade, the Sixth Wisconsin fought in virtually all of the major campaigns of the Army of the Potomac from Second Bull Run through Appomattox, from the Cornfield at Antietam and the Unfinished Railroad Cut at Gettysburg through the confusing bloodbath of the Wilderness and the frustrating siege at Petersburg. After the war veterans struggled with the aftermaths of wounds and disease, commemorated their contributions, and remembered their fallen comrades. Prof. Marten's talk will sample the war-time and post-war experiences of volunteers like Rufus Dawes, Captain of Company K and future commander of the Sixth, as well as draftees like Gottlieb Torke, one of hundreds of mostly German-immigrants who finished the war.
James Marten is professor of history emeritus at Marquette University, where he taught for thirty-six years. He is author, editor, or co-editor, of two dozen books, including The Children's Civil War, Sing Not War: The Lives of Union and Confederate Veterans in Gilded Age America, and his latest, The Sixth Wisconsin and the Long Civil War: The Biography of a Regiment. He was president of the Society of Civil War Historians from 2013 to 2015.

For our 2026-2027 program year, we proudly welcome these outstanding speakers:

Sept. 11th: James Marten on "The Sixth Wisconsin and the Long War"
Oct. 9th: Joshua Lindamood on "Black Thursday: the Battle of Sailor's Creek"
Nov. 13th: Bob Miller on "Angels of the Battlefield: Catholic Nuns in the Civil War"
Dec. 11th: Stuart Dempsey on "'So outrageously and so persistently misrepresented': The 11th Corps at Chancellorsville and Gettysburg"
Jan. 8th, 2027: Dan Masters on "Hell By the Half Acre: The Stones River Campaign"
Feb. 12th: Rob Girardi on "Gouverneur K. Warren in the Gettysburg Campaign"
March 12th: Doug Dammann, Nevins-Freeman Address: Tar-Heel and The Yankee: Civil War Veterans Who Played in the First Intercollegiate Football Game on November 6, 1869
April 9th: Dave Powell on "Who Won the Battle of Chickamauga?"
May 14th: Lucas Wilder on "Longstreet's East Tennessee Campaign"
June 11th: Kevin Donovan, topic TBA

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