Civil War Bandolier
To learn more about this resource, view the item in the U. S. Civil War Resources for East Central Indiana collection in the Digital Media Repository.
Introduction
The U.S. Civil War was the conflict between the Northern states (the Union) and the eleven Southern states that seceded from the Union and were organized as the Confederate States of America. It is also known as the War between the States, the War of Secession, and the War of the Rebellion. Dissension had been brewing between the North and South long before the first shots were fired on Fort Sumter, a Union military post in Charleston, South Carolina, on April 12, 1861. Causes of the Civil War include sectionalism, extension of slavery into the territories, and states' rights. After a nine-month siege of Petersburg led to the Union's taking the town, Confederate General Robert E. Lee evacuated Richmond and surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia. Terms of the surrender were made on April 9, 1865. Less than a week later, Lincoln was dead, shot by assassin John Wilkes Booth, a Southern sympathizer.
The costs of the Civil War were immense in both lives and dollars. Nearly as many Americans died in the Civil War as have died in all wars the United States has fought — approximately 620,000. The North lost about 360,000 troops. Although figures for the Confederacy are uncertain, an estimated one-fourth of its soldiers were killed. Many of the deaths were caused by disease, which was rampant among the troops and in the prison camps.
Source: The Great American History Fact-Finder. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2004. s.v. "Civil War."
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Collection Guides
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These collections appear in the U.S. Civil War Resources for East Central Indiana.
DMR Collections
The Ball State University Libraries Digital Media Repository contains the collections listed below pertaining to the U.S. Civil War, 1861-1865. To browse all U.S. Civil War materials available in the DMR click here.
- U. S. Civil War Resources for East Central IndianaThe U. S. Civil War Resources for East Central Indiana digital collection includes letters, diaries, photographs, and physical objects from four repositories.
- Otto Sellers PhotographsThe Ball State University Libraries Digital Media Repository features the Otto Sellers Photographs collection, whose holdings include over 900 images primarily ranging from 1908 to 1926.
- Ronald V. Morris American and Indiana History ImagesThe Ronald V. Morris American and Indiana History Images digital collection includes slides of historical sites and living history productions taken by Ball State University professor of history Ron Morris in the 1980s and 1990s.
- Spurgeon-Greene PhotographsThe Spurgeon-Greene Photographs digital collection, created by Richard (Dick) A. Greene and donated by Wiley Spurgeon, almost 3,000 photographs that provide invaluable historical documentation of Muncie, Indiana, from the 1930s through the 1970s.
- W. A. Swift PhotographsThe Ball State University Libraries Digital Media Repository features the W.A. Swift Photographs collection provided by the Archives and Special Collections. There are over 1,000 images in this collection, depicting life in Muncie from the 1910s to the 1940s.