Civil War and Trains

I had never been interested in the history of trains until I discovered that my great grandfather, Andrew J Healan, probably escaped heavy fighting in a Civil War Battle because the train was late.

I had documented that he was in the Ninth Georgia Regiment that served in the early part of the war with General Joseph E. Johnston and the Army of the Shenandoah. In reading Johnston's Narrative of Military Operations During the Civil War, I learned that this army had fought in the 1st Battle of Bull Run, also called 1st Manasses.

"Ah ha," I thought, "A J Healan must have fought in that battle. " However, in further reading the General's Narrative, I discovered that not all his men actually made it to the battle. Then I stumbled upon a wonderful resource on the Internet that painted a picture of the situation. Charles T. Harrell wrote an article about the train problem and posted it on his web site, http://nps-vip.net/history/too_few_trains1.htm

In further research I found that the Ninth Georgia Regiment was one of units that waited at the train station for transportation. The train did not come until the fighting at Manasses was over.

Thanks to Harrell's article and Johnston's narrative, I learned a little of the history about trains. Harrell mentioned that this is the first time a General had used the railroad to move a large army to a major battle. Check out Harrell's article for a riveting picture of how some of our railroads began and how a little piece of history was made.

A Wealth of Information

The beginning of stories are almost everywhere. For the genealogist storyteller, old newspapers can be a neat source of more than information. They hint of stories that can tease my imagination.

I found my great-grandfather's name in shipping lists in newspapers from 1848 and 1850. I had no idea he had traveled by ship and that he had chosen a sailing vessel for one trip and a steamship for another.

It appeared he went to New Orleans each time, once from a port in New York City and once from Charleston, SC. He live in neighboring Georgia for about 25 years so using a SC port made sense to me. I have no idea why he traveled, but I could fantasize about what type of job he may have had.

Although there are free newspaper archives on the Internet, I used a paid service, www.genealogybank.com

For a list of both free and paid newspaper archives, check out
http://genealogy.about.com/od/newspapers/tp/newspapers_online.01.htm

Also check with local libraries to see if they subscribe to any online newspaper databases.