the office of historic alexandra in partnership hosted a recent symposium in the revolutionary war. in two hours, presenters participate in a final discussion and answer audience questions about his conceptions about the american revolution. howard: today's speaker is gary ecelbarger. his topic is general john logan, a life to memorialize. introducing gary will be illinois state society board member rod ross. this past year, rod rejoined the board after a couple of years' absence. back in the day -- well, 20 years ago, rod served as the

historian for the illinois state society, having put on programs in the capitol building, arlington cemetery, hillwood, union station, the national cathedral, and the lithuanian embassy. this past year, rod has been a mainstay for the society's webinars. he facilitated a program on julius rosenwald, and efforts to establish a national park complex focusing on the establishment of the rosenwald schools in the american south. then, he turned his attention to addressing concerns of a commission established by chicago's mayor lightfoot on statues deemed "problematic." these included statues honoring abraham lincoln, john logan, and ulysses s. grant.

the initial webinar in the series was entitled "why we , honor lincoln." for his talk today, gary ecelbarger will take a different approach. rather than attempting to address the concerns of the chicago monuments commission, he well let his presentation speak for itself. with that, here is rod. rod: thank you, howard. i am privileged today to introduce gary ecelbarger. i first met gary a number of years ago when he was featured speaker for a memorial day program organized by the logan circle civic association in washington. born in western new york state, and educated in buffalo, and then at the university of wisconsin madison, gary's masters degree is in science, rather than history. his day job with the washington

hospital center is as a nutritionist, concentrating on those with feeding tubes or iv solutions. it is as a historian that gary appears today, a historian with countless historical articles, and nine books to his credit. gary's talk today uses material from his 2005 work, "black jack logan: an extraordinary life in peace and war." most, but not all, of his books and battlefield tours, concentrate on civil war battles in the shenandoah, and the battle of atlanta. for well over 20 years, he and his wife and their three children have lived in northern

virginia. gary is a former president of the bull run civil war roundtable, and a charter member of the kearnstown battlefield association. if time permits during the q&a session, i have a battery of backup questions related not only to blackjack logan, but also to gary's research interests. gary: thank you for the introduction. thank you for taking time out of your busy days to listen to the life of an extraordinary person. i don't have an elaborate slideshow. i will just have the information speak for itself. there is some quite dazzling information. i will take us back 135 years ago.

we will go back to friday night, june 12, 1885. within d.c. today you have 36 roundabouts. we call them circles. most have statues in the middle. back in the 1880's they did not. the only one today that has -- is an all residential circle in the downtown area, is called logan circle. we will go to that circle. back then in 1885, it was called iowa circle. it was an all residential neighborhood back then as it was today. one of the residents in that circle was john a. logan, who was by this time a very famous person. probably one of the most famous in the country. he is a former five term congressman and about to start his third term in the u.s. senate. a failed presidential candidate and a civil war hero among other things, and the author of three books.

he resides in the house that, if you are facing the circle from the south to the north, he would be sitting at 10:00. the house he rented still stands today. he is in that house, having just returned from a trip to new york city, where he visited his dying friend, ulysses s grant, dying of throat cancer, the former president and war hero in new york. he will be serenaded this night. it's about 10:00 at night. a huge crowd is gathering within the circle. remember, no statue in the center. it is iowa circle. they are chanting his name and giving speeches. there is a military company and a military band. by the estimate of a washington post reporter who is recording this event on pen and paper, he estimates the crowd size at about 5000. one unique thing, a commonality in the crowd except for the post reporter.

they are all african-americans. this is a serenade to general logan from crowd of african-americans who have considered him their hero for championing their rights. they are rewarding him with that third senate win. they know that will continue to serve them well because he will continue to fight for their causes. they are trying to bring him out. after this, maybe a 30- to 45-minute demonstration, the general finally appears on the second floor piazza and addresses the crowd. typical of any of logan speeches, there is someone who talked about logan speeches, not this particular night, but described them like this. all his words or ideas.

they come forth flash, flash, flash, until you are dazzled at the quick succession and almost puzzled at your comprehension. in common phrase, he thinks lightning. a steam gun dicharging 100 shots in sudden and continuous succession is not more sudden, sustained or certain. keep up the discharges for three-quarters of an hour intermittently and you have something type of the physical effect of just one of logan's speeches. that description is very apt. usually he short changes logan. at the time those kind of speeches did not go on for three quarters of an hour. they usually went on for two to three, sometimes longer than three hours. on the night of june 12, that description was very apt. logan perhaps did not speak much more than a half-hour, 45 minutes, primarily due to the lateness of the night. he went out and thanked the crowd for coming to serenade him.

he told them he would continue to fight for their causes because there is still so much to fight for. he talked about his visit to u.s. grant up in new york and talked about how, together, they will continue to champion the rights of african-americans. at the close of this fairly short address he said, again, thanking you for this demonstration and this evidence of esteem, i now invite as many of you as will, to pass through this house so i may be gratified in shaking your hand. over 1000 people took him up on that offer. they lined up in front of that house beginning at around midnight and single file they went through the front parlor, shook hands, shook right hands with logan, and then out the back door. it was a very poignant event. one of the most incredible

things about it is, they knew who logan was. they knew what his past was. this was a man who had a saul to paul conversion. regarding the rights of african americans. he was a former persecutor of african-americans and their rights in the 1850's. he had completely transformed and turned into their champion. they had forgiven him for it and have completed this serenade. he completed that conversion with the demonstration that you have just noticed at the end with him shaking hands with them. now i would like to go back to his earlier life and talk about this life we need to memorialize. and i will discuss more in terms of his social philosophy. i will do a little bit of a cradle-to-grave version in a short time. let's go back to the 1820's. logan was born in february of

1826, in southern illinois. illinois, a free state, part of the old northwest territory converted to a series of free states, is a very long state from north to south, almost 400 miles. the northern part of the illinois is on the same horizontal as the massachusetts-new hampshire border. and the southern end of illinois is online with north carolina-virginia border. that gives you an idea about how its domestic and political philosophy might vary from one end to the other. the southern part was probably the first part that had the highest concentration in early settlement. most of the settlers of southern illinois were former southerners. logan's mother hailed from north carolina. she probably was a descendant of a slaveholding family. his father, even though he was raised in ohio, practiced medicine in mississippi and missouri.

and he had purchased and owned slaves before transferring into illinois himself. logan is the son of a slave -- a former slave holder. he grew up in southern illinois. by our standards he had a very primitive education. it was probably above the norm for his peers in that area at the time in jackson county, illinois. one of his early jobs was he was a jockey for his father. he raced horses. he was a very wiry teenager. very dark complected. that is why he earned the name of black jack. he had long hair as well. he could race horses at breakneck speed. as a young adult, he first got some notoriety because he was always known as a good talker and a natural leader. when the mexican war broke out, he entered the war with a

lieutenantcy representing his area. even though he did not see action, he and the company he was involved with never got past santa fe, new mexico, the experience taught him about how to lead a company of men even though they were never involved in battle. when he came back, he practiced the study of law. he did that from his uncle, from which his middle name is derived. he became a lawyer. he ran for prosecuting attorney in the early 1850's and won. he was a prosecuting attorney in the third judicial circuit. if you remember from abraham lincoln, he practiced on the eighth judicial circuit. logan was a prosecutor. he eventually opened up his own law practice is where he was mainly defending clients. in this case he was prosecuting them.

this leads me to a quick story. you can't do this anymore but back then you could. at the very end of his term he had a case of a horse thief with very flimsy evidence. it was in one of these southern counties he represented in his prosecuting term. despite the flimsy evidence, his people would say logan was great at convincing everybody and a good talker. he was able to convict a man with a jury of his peers and find him guilty. well the judge knew better. , through whatever channels he could use, the judge decided this trial needed to reconvene in a different county any throughout the case. logan's term just ended. the man who was just convicted was wise enough to hire logan as his defense attorney. the trial convened in a different county a few much later. logan defended the man and guess what?

he got him an acquittal. a reporter said, which verdict was correct? logan smiled and said both, of course. convicted and acquitted the man on the same charge a few months apart. that has to be a record. but it just shows how convincing he can be, the gift of his gab and persuasion and his leadership. that natural gift ran in the family. his uncle was a u.s. congressman. his father was an illinois state legislator, a democrat. in fact, if you are familiar with illinois and you think of springfield, illinois, it is the county just north of it with the only -- the first city named after lincoln. it is in logan logan county was named after logan's father, dr. john logan, the former slave

owner who moved to illinois. so, lincoln and logan, the elder logan, even though they were across the aisle, they were friends. the younger logan followed in his father's footsteps. he wins his first of two seats in the illinois state legislature in 1853. back then, the revised state constitution had passed five years earlier, in 1848. there was a provision in that constitution that had a very draconian measure against freed african-americans. it prohibited them from settling into illinois. the legislatures between 1848 and 1853 decided not to take up that provision. but the young logan was trying to make his mark with his very southern oriented district he is representing. that district is what became the

lower 18 counties of illinois. it was called egypt, illinois. one of the reasons or associations with that is the most southern point, cairo. it is pronounced cay-ro. that is logan's territory. he will see that provision carried through. he will bring it to the floor. he will debate for its passage against some opposition. it eventually passes. it will be coined as, logan's black code, or logan's black law. and imposed heavy fines on any freed african-americans that tried to settle in the state. people, freed blacks living there were exempt, but it imposed heavy fines.

logan will become infamous or famous for it. remember, think of how i opened this talk. he becomes a champion of african-americans. this should be kind of astounding. we are talking about 32 years apart. that is how he initially makes his mark in illinois politics. eventually, he will carry his political powers into the u.s. house of representatives. he will be elected two terms as a democrat. a southern oriented democrat, they called them jacksonian democrats after andrew jackson at the time. logan will win his first one in 1858 and his reelection in 1860. in 1860, there is a presidential if you rememberin 1860, there is a presidential election. , two of the four candidates running are from illinois,

stephen douglas, with who logan is aligned, and abraham lincoln is the whig who converted to a republican. the republican party started in illinois roughly around 1856. lincoln is the first republican -- second republican candidate for president in 1860. the first very popular and prominent republican in illinois. logan campaigns hard for his reelection in southern illinois, in egypt, for douglas and against abraham lincoln. when the dust settled at the end of that election, logan wins easily. lincoln wins illinois and the presidency, but he does it with only 39% of the popular vote because there are four people running. he wins illinois by almost embarrassingly low-margin. that was because of logan's campaign against him in egypt. of the 28,000 votes cast in 1860

in southern illinois, lincoln only got 5200. 17%, that's it. lincoln won't forgive logan for that and will really drag his feet when it comes to efforts to get logan a command in the civil war. we know that right after lincoln's election, secession and civil war initiates within that next year, by 1861. logan, even though he seemingly seemed aligned with southern proclivities, he was a prounion person. but he almost always denounced abolitionists. this is what rankled newspaper editors like those of the chicago tribune had nicknamed logan dirty work logan.

sometimes they would shorten it to d.w., for dirty work. because logan is on the house floor, the house of representatives floor. he once said he is in support of the fugitive slave law as constitutionally protected. he said he was willing to do the dirty work. he was called dirty work logan. so, he is denied any chance to raise a regiment, which he really wanted to do. he was convinced by the lincoln because administration there was no need to do that. this is going to be a short war. so, he and not of congressman -- pn a knot of congressmen go up to witness the first great land battle of the work in manassas, virginia. in a prelude in a place called blackburn's ford, logan becomes

a fighting politician when he sees a shirking soldier from new york state running from the bull run river. logan says, give me your gun. the gun is handed to him. in his congressional clothes, he goes down to the stream, crouches in position, and fires a few shots at the confederates on the others. -- on the others. he comes back to washington and really pushes to be given a regiment. they realize after the battle of bull run three days later it is not going to be a short war. lincoln finally awards logan a colonel's commission. and logan is allowed to raise a regiment. the regiment he raises is mostly within his congressional district, the 9th congressional district of illinois, the lower 18 counties which were primarily anti-lincoln counties. it became known as the 31st illinois volunteers, nicknamed the dirty first because of dirty work logan. logan became a natural warrior.

through the course of the civil war he became a star. , he rose from colonel to brigadier general to major general, commanding a regiment, to a brigade, to a division, to a corp. by the time that union army is conducting its victory parade in 1865, logan is leading the army may, of the tennessee, the most successful army on the face of the earth at that time. not the biggest but most successful, down pennsylvania avenue. of the major armies that are officially disbanded after the civil war, logan is only one of four corps commanders who was not west point trained. this was a natural warrior, a natural star. so much so, that when civil war commissioned generals go back to the regular armies after the war, they returned with lower

ranks. let me give you an example of a name i'm sure you are familiar with. george armstrong custer, who was a general in the civil war, goes back into the regular army as a captain. general logan -- by the way, custer was a west point grad. general logan, who had no west point education, no military experience, except sitting in santa fe for a few months, during the mexican war, because of his prowess within the civil war is offered a brigadier generalship in the regular army. i wanted to bring that out. i will not talk about the civil war today but i wanted to show you how much of a prominent general he really was. we say he was the best political general in the civil war but that's a disservice. most political generals had quite a bit lacking. logan is one of the best generals, period, fighting for

the north or the south, in the eastern or western theater. he is one of the best generals period. he particularly shined in the vicksburg campaign in 1863, and atlanta in 1864. he ended up being grant's that said political general more , than lincoln's. well lincoln kept dragging his feet giving him promotions, grant always intervened and saw that lincoln was a little biased against logan fort representing egypt, the lower 18 counties and pushed through from logan's promotion. logan and grant were very tight from the beginning. i bring this up because what i want to talk about during the civil war, not only did the war make him a star. it completely changed his social and political philosophy. the man that enters the work d and railing against abolitionists in the same breath as senescent -- secessionism.

the same dirty work logan who talked about willing to do the dirty work the son of a former , slave owner, the man linked with the black codes, entered the war that way but did not leave it that way. and when i investigated that, i can't to this day pinpoint exactly when that happened. yes, i lie awake until 2:00 or 3:00 a.m. thinking about that, at least i used to. i cannot pinpoint when it happened. it looked like it happened in stages. as a brigadier we know in 1862, general we know in 1862,, he is stationed in jackson, tennessee. all the evils of slavery are borne out in that place. there is an incident with a runaway slave woman named zela who escapes an abusive slave master and gets within union lines in logan's territory.

and and up in logan's camp. they protect her from the owner who is trying to intervene and get her back. they keep her protected. but this very nefarious slaveowner sends a message to her that he is dying. this is a month later. she buys into this and slips through the union lines to go visit him for a last time, which was his last request before he died. he had faked the whole thing, he recaptured her and sold her to another slaveowner in georgia. she will spend the rest of her life probably in slavery, at least for the next four years , until the civil war ends. so i think logan was certainly , changed by that. he probably was also affected when there was an accidental shooting of one of his men, of a young black boy.

through a interchange of letters that i read i could see that logan was personally embarrassed when asked the name of the boy and he has to admit he does not know the name. one must wonder if he thought, what he had the same problem if the kid was white. all these things are starting to you see it in his speeches. play havoc with him and you see it in his speeches. what speeches is logan giving? he must be giving addresses to his men. newspapers that used to support logan were in the north, the southern-aligned newspapers in southern illinois and southern ohio and southern indiana, and they start passing on little articles that logan is giving pro abolition speeches. logan would write a rejoinder that is published in the give paper saying, i do not political speeches. note that he did not rail against abolitionists. he just says i don't give political speeches. you can see that stepwise change.

he gets a little leave of absence and gives a speech in carbondale, his hometown in southern illinois in 1862. it gets a lot of play and press at that time in 1862. by 1863, after he has heroically as a division commander, finish the vicksburg campaign, logan is given the post of honor by u.s. grant. he is allowed to lead his troops into the city that has just been captured, vicksburg on the , fourth of july, 1863. by the way vicksburg won't , celebrate the fourth of july for the next 80 years after that. they were still peeved about that one. so, logan leads his troops in there and when were setting free

confederate officers to return home to lay down their arms. they were trying to get all enslaved people that had been around the streets of vicksburg, trying to scoop them up and take them south. the one that railed against this, we know in some writings and by people's testimony is none other than black jack logan. he's called blackjack because of his swarthy complexion. he's certainly starting to demonstrate his antipathy against slaveowners and is trying to work to keep slaves that have been recaptured by union and freed because of that, he does not want to see them end up back in slavery again. general grant will send logan back to illinois for 30 days in the summer of 1863 to recover , your health. logan was not sick. grant knew he was not sick. again logan is grant's political , general and grant sends him to

illinois to give a series of pro-union speeches to disaffected areas of southern illinois because the war is growing old. there are hundreds of thousands of people dying. you have pockets within illinois showing the strains of this . and the anti-work fervor is really ramping up. logan, as this new war hero, is sent to southern illinois to give these speeches. he goes back to carbondale, his hometown where he just spoke the previous summer. he is back with a crowd of 5000 and he says, that he knows he has this reputation of being called an abolitionist. and this is a crowd of his former congressional district. and he says if being against rebels and traitors is an abolitionist, i guess i need to be counted within that. in other words, he was not

railing against abolitionists, wasn't calling himself an abolitionist because he would be overthrowing the constitution if you were an abolitionist. but he said abolitionists had the same ideals about prosecuting the war against the confederacy and seeing it as a prounion win. so that was quite astounding. this was dirty work logan. he's giving the speeches and then goes up to chicago and gives quite frankly about the same speech. to show you the power of his oratory, chicago is the seventh or eighth largest city in the country at the time and logan is giving this speech to the equivalent of one out of 10 people who live in the city. 12,000 people gather in the courthouse square in a time when there's no amplification of the voice with microphones and he can address that kind of crowd . he is certainly making grant's

leave of absence well worthwhile. two rows up union feeling -- worthwhile two rows union feeling -- worthwhile to rouse up union feeling. those speeches are reproduced in pamphlet form and he's becoming more famous on the homefront as well as what he's accomplishing in the war. you are seeing that stepwise movement from abolitionist to not railing against that to siding with them. by the spring of 1864, it's early logan is embarking on the june, atlanta campaign and he's , a corps commander in that campaign. that painting behind me is logan at kennesaw mountain. is part of that campaign. that so it is about three weeks before that battle. logan gets a message and this is quite astounding. it is a newspaper clipping. there are political parties forming because the election of

1864 is coming up and there are these tickets. a political ticket is your presidential candidate and his vice presidential running mate for different tickets. well logan found out he was , being talked up as a vice presidential candidate on the abolition ticket. on the abolition ticket. in june of 1864. this was a brush that off and said, that is quite the joke. you could see how everyone was considering him at the time because of the speeches he was making. in fact he was very pro-lincoln , at that time. after the atlanta campaign ended with the surrender of savannah, -- of atlanta on september 2, lincoln will send prominent political generals, including john logan, back to illinois after he saw what logan did for grant in 1863, he sent them back in 1864.

lincoln is a republican on that union party ticket. logan is sent back to illinois, to campaign primarily for the , republican party. logan is a democrat, technically. he's no longer the congressman, because when he was commissioned brigadier general he had to give up his congressional seat. so he's campaigning for the republican running for that congressional seat. remember in the district that , voted against lincoln 23,000 to 5000 just three years -- four years earlier. so this is logan going back planning 16 speeches throughout , southern illinois, which is 16 counties instead of the previous 18. so there are 22,000 voters instead of 28,000 the first time. it's a perilous situation for logan. southern illinois hates him. he has to bring a gun to his speeches and lay it on the dais and show he's not going to tolerate anyone who tries to rush him or shout him down and they tend to shout him down,

including his sister, who supports southern causes. his own mother won't speak to him for several years after the war. his position, prounion generally, but now supporting the abolition of slavery is rankly all his former friends in southern illinois and is tearing apart his family as well. but he gives a series of speeches for all the republicans in southern illinois and the same district that voted so heavily against lincoln voted for lincoln in 1864 by 1000 votes. logan turned that district around. all the republicans logan campaigned for one by fairly narrow margins, but it was logan who was responsible. there has been no accomplishment

by a true political general in six months both at war and on the home front compared to what you sell but logan did from may in 1864 in georgia through september, and in september and october campaigning for lincoln in southern illinois in 1864, a dramatic change. that is what logan becomes a hero. so when he gives up the brigadier generalship after the war ends, he is already promoting the 13th amendment, which gets ratified in december, 1865. remember logan does not have a political position. at that put an end to slavery and makes slavery illegal throughout the land. now he starts promoting what will eventually become the 14th, which is citizenship for african-americans and all born in the u.s. and for the 15th amendment, that was his baby, the once logan

really pushed for, then called negro suffrage, but was for the rights of african-americans to vote. he is pushing for this in the 1860's and runs for congress again on an at-large seat for that position. all of the former papers that hated logan in the 1850's love him now because he's fighting for the causes of african-americans. all the papers that supported him in the southern part of the states in the old northwest hated him. the perfect example is a southern illinois paper writing , we are tired of the vulgar and vile logan. maggots would sicken on him. it did not matter, logan wins that seat as a republican. he has switched parties. his social and political philosophy is completely changed. now he is supporting causes and rights of african-americans at a time when it was not, not, not politically expedient to do so.

perfect example -- logan enters ohio in the fall of 1867, campaigning in a special election that will be held in october, for a series of republican candidates, but also to have an amendment for the rights of african-americans to vote in the state. it is not the law of the land yet as an amendment to the u.s. constitution. but there's a handful states that have allowed it and are trying to push for it. it is so unpopular that i gets cremated and that election by 40,000 votes, which is a huge margin in ohio. but logan speeches had quite the effect of showing what his true colors were. no pun intended. one of the former supporting papers that turned on logan calling him a defiance democrat is saying something to the effect they called logan's , speech his abolition harangue. quite a change.

he said general logan is a humbug. his negroes, ditto. so they are linking logan with african-americans, are those that are completely against voting rights for african-americans showing their true colors as well. so logan is now becoming their worst enemy. as we know, logan wins the seat, he is becoming a very powerful head of the ways and means can. i will end by showing how that we'll have an effect on what we will celebrate at the end of but may. i should let you know the 15th amendment does get ratified in 1870. so logan's efforts have worked well and he is well-regarded in the african-american community. obviously, by this time, for that. by 1880, frederick douglass, the world famous frederick douglass is campaigning with logan, sharing the stump when they are giving political speeches together.

and in 1884, douglas is supporting logan for the presidency of the united states . and he says the republican party is generally supportive of african-american rights, but he said, in a party of candidates for the republican ticket, most of them are invertebrate animals but general logan has a spine like the brooklyn bridge. so frederick douglass is a huge , fan of general logan and the new york times had several articles in 1884 with the title s, "negroes support general logan." then they have, general logan and then you grow vote: -- general logan and the negro vot e: early war hero and hero of the antislavery movement. even though it's not really true

that he was the early mover of the antislavery movement, he is being linked with it. you can see where this complete so conversion has taken place , leading to that june 12 event i just talked about. when logan was still in -- before he even became a senator, finishing one of his terms in congress in he used his war hero 1868, status, his congressional power, and his work as a second president of the grand army of the republic. he turned that fraternity organization of civil war vets into a very powerful, political lobbyist association which would fight for pensions for civil war soldiers. but he used it for a special purpose in 1868. he saw over the years and took part in one in southern illinois, a series of regional grave decorating ceremonies. and he decided to nationalize that with the dar documents general orders 11 which set aside may 30 as a day to

commemorate soldiers graves, primarily union soldiers, by string them with flowers -- strewing them with flowers because they bloom at that time of the error and to celebrate , that every may 30. decoration day, logan was in arlington cemetery celebrating , with ulysses s grant and other civil war heroes. the very next year, he's celebrating in different areas of the country. but beginning in the second year, in 1869, he calls it what it is today -- memorial day. the only thing that has changed is it changed from may 30 to the last monday in may. logan will call that, in his later years, the proudest act of his life. the celebration of the , nationalization of memorial day. the last days of his life turned but out to be dramatically short.

logan's war service will eventually kill him. he developed rheumatism from cold days around fort donaldson in february and he dies from one of these attacks, internal attacks, shortly after christmas in 1886, and he is dead the day after at the age of 60 years of age. logan becomes the seventh person in our history to lie in state in the u.s. capitol. and he's buried near the old soldiers home today in a mausoleum not far from rock creek park. he was honored throughout the country. if you read most black newspapers, they were highly commemorating him and how his los they believe has affected their cause for the future as well. that is how logan was looked at and how we should view that

complete saul to paul conversion. indeed, it has been a life to memorialize. today we can think about logan, he is commemorated in various areas. iowa circle is now logan circle with a statue erected there in the 1920's. there is a famous statue in grant park put up in the 1890's. in southern illinois, i'm wearing a shirt for john logan community college in southern carterville -- and carterville, in southern illinois, not far from the home he grew up in which is now and archaeology , excavated cabin, near general john a logan museum, just off route 13 which since 2005, and there's a sign for it behind my left shoulder, john a logan memorial highway is route 13 between murfreesboro, his hometown, and the state of

kentucky. in an era today in which there is discussion and events to actually remove statues because , people depicted in the statues are not living by today's moral standards, general logan is a guy who we need more statues for without a doubt. , as i have depicted, this is a man we need more statues to -- we need more statues to memorialize him for his accomplishments as one of the greatest political generals in world history. as a fighter for the preservation of the union. for the early champion of the rights of african-americans and, of course, memorial day. we need more statues for him because it's commemorating this country. it is what we stand for. this is a country that not only celebrates the best and brightest where they succeed, but for people like logan, the opportunist, the overachieving b

students of life. only in this country can they succeed as the best and brightest and best educated. that is what we celebrate with logan. the other thing we celebrate with logan is we are a country of second chances, where we give people the opportunity to overcome past decisions and make amends of that. and there than general logan is no better example for that himself. i would like to end with one thing we know about general logan and we commemorate him in the illinois state song. don't worry, i'm not going to sing. the song is adopted from a poem from the 1890's and it became in the state song of illinois in 1925. so it's about 100 years old. there are only three surnames mentioned in the stands of the song.

of the three surnames, only logan is native to the state of illinois. the only one who was actually born there, and his is one of the two names repeated and this is how the final stanza goes. on the record of thy years, abraham lincoln's name appears. grant and logan and our tears, illinois, illinois. grant and logan and our tears. illinois. i thank you. rod: that was wonderful, gary. before we moved to your career and away from logan, talk about the logan statue and the two bas in washington, d.c. reliefs in logan circle in washington, d.c. , gary: you will probably have to speak on the bas reliefs. the statue was put up in the early 1920's. remember, that used to be iowa

circle. one of the bas reliefs -- rod: it's almost a take off on your book title. logan and his corps commanders. gary: was it one of them. the other is the political was , that the impeachment one for andrew johnson? rod: i think it has to do with logan and the luminaries. so, even though he is being sworn in and was already a senator by then, mary logan said art should be inspirational and not a static representation. gary: like i said i do not member the bas reliefs. rod: let's move on to your career as a writer. how did you get interested in logan in the first place? gary: most of my early books on the civil war were battles and

campaigns. i remember getting one of those gray covered time life books in the 1980's about the atlanta campaign which i end up spending , the last 12 years working on. i was really taken because the center images were from the atlanta cyclarama, which is currently in the place it needs to be, the atlanta historical center. a beautiful painting i believe , it is the second largest oil painting in the world. there are lots of cuts of that painting in this version of the time life books. of course, it features logan and the battle used to be called general logan's battle because of his efforts in that battle. when i decided to do a little so, back on work on him, i had

just finished biography of a very obscure union general. i found logan's life was very fascinating. the other benefit living close to washington, dc, he had sets of papers in various areas of the country but the largest collection by far was the library of congress. that allowed me several times to go visit the manuscript division and go through research on his papers. i must say, of all my books, it was my favorite one to write and i don't think i could do another cradle to grave biography again because of that book. he can't be topped. rod: all of your books are military related, except the one on lincoln and the one you are working on for washington. gary: the washington one is military as well.

the lincoln one was about his nomination for the presidency. it was lincoln before the beard. the washington one i'm working on now, is george washington, looking at him in one year , during the revolution, between the fourth of july, 1777, and the fourth of july, 1778. that's more of a military book. rod: speaking of logan and the military, logan succeeded general mcpherson after his unfortunate demise. why was it logan did not get permanent command of the army? gary: the battle i just talked

about at the cyclarama, was july 22nd, 1864. mcpherson was killed during that battle. he was the only major in charge of an army -- he's the only major on the union side, the only major general in charge of a major army to be killed in the civil war and this happened in the last 10 months of the war. immediately, logan succeeded him because he was the supporting officer and coordinator and ranked the other two commanders there. he was responsible turning this chaotic moment of losing the commander and helped by his presence to win that battle. but logan was not west point trained and the overall commander of all the armies in that theater was william tecumseh sherman. he had a proclivity to hire in top department commands because -- only west point educated and trained personnel because he , looked at these departments as not just field armies which logan excelled at. sherman acknowledged that, he

said was perfect in combat, but , logan was perfect in combat, but he looked at it as a department as much as an army. meaning there's a lot of papers , to push and to take care of logistical and strategic things. he felt a west pointer would have been more beneficial. for that reason, he chose oliver otis howard, for which howard university is named. and the man who started the freedmen's bureau. just a few days after the battle of atlanta, howard was put in charge of the army. four logan's part, he sulked about it for a day but he went back to cork matter and served in that role. it was all for the wrong reasons sherman did this. but, in the long run, logan is better suited as an inspirational commander at the court -level level- corps rather than leading a full army where his full commanding presence would not be in front of the troops and could be in a smaller role. but, as it turned out, about eight months later, before the

very end of the war, howard left the army to take charge of the freedmen's bureau and logan got command of the army in tennessee back.

he was able to lead it down pennsylvania avenue and discharged it as the only commander of the union army that was not west point trained. a scientist, have made such a contribution in the field of history. gary: i always like history as a kid. my father was a big washington man, for example. i took it as all my electives in college, so i always like history. the only crossover i could say with my science degree is i learned at least in graduate school how to really dissect research articles and i had a knack for that with historical works, where i could take primary sources from the general author and look at it and study it and come up with a different version that other people who had written about it. at tends to be a crossover. i'm just as interested in history as i am science. i just chose one is my

profession and the other is my primary academic passion and the other is my secondary. my books on lincoln and the -- lincoln and logan. and then lander. the others are about battles. my first book was about a shenandoah battle. i did another bell campaign called three days in shenandoah about the battle of winchester. my last two battle books were on the battle of atlanta, the july 22 contest we talked about. in a battle six days later, the battle of church. i had partly written another logan was involved with in the atlanta campaign that i will get to. it is about the battle of dallas, town and george's. -- georgette.

-- in georgia. i was hired by time life to write a shenandoah valley book and research articles on that and it is primarily. my work i did. a lot of work -- that is primarily my work. i did a lot of work on the battle of fredericksburg. rod: before i let you go talk about how you got into giving battle tours? gary: when i moved to northern virginia from wisconsin after i got my masters degree. i joined a roundtable, civil war roundtable called thebull -- called the bull run civil war roundtable. we started tours were members

would get together on weekends. in a caravan of cars we would go to battlefields because a huge advantage we had was most of the battles of virginia and maryland and gettysburg were not far away from where we were located, within an hour or hour and a half drive. we would designate different stops on the battlefield where each of us would prepare presentations to give. that is how i got my start. cutting my teeth by giving those kind of tours, over a couple of years. that i lucked into a national tour, done by a civil war society that was in charge of a magazine. then i got hired by a couple of different history groups and local groups and it took off from there. i have been tours -- i have been doing tours now come for over a quarter of a century. this is my 2060 are doing tours. -- might -- my 26th year doing

tours. rod: where does the other fit into? gary: one of the members was a marine corps historian. we got together at a local manassas pub after meeting one night. he knew my special interest was the shenandoah valley. he invited me to give a co-tour with him come up with the quantico greens and we did that a few times in the 1990's as well. i benefited from having a lot of the right connections and i very lucky in the people i knew. rod: and your special interest in atlanta, when will be at the next time you give atlanta-based tours? gary: i just did a five year series of that, and it ended pre-covid in 2019.

i think, maybe fort not for another two years -- i think maybe not for another two years. i am doing revolutionary war tours, and back to the shenandoah valley, beginning in the fall as well. for a year, no one has been giving tours, obviously [laughter] and it just started back up again. a lot of tours i had planned for last year had been postponed instead of canceled. so everything is pushed back into a fall schedule and i will have a huge run of them beginning in september. rod: if you were going to have last words for this program, do you have final thought, any last words you would like to share with the audience? gary: i had so many words before. [laughter] hopefully, everyone appreciates, i have a feeling most people have never heard of logan or did not know anything about him my

job today was to introduce you to who he was and what he did. i consider logan the most noteworthy 19th-century american , who has almost completely escaped notice of the 20th and 21st century. my job was to bring him back so you understand why he was noteworthy in the 19th century. because he kind of dropped off the face of the earth after the state song was adopted, we have not heard about him since that. so that was my job tonight or this afternoon and hopefully that was accomplished. rod: thank you very much. gary: howard, do you have any fun words? -- any final words? rod: thank you very much, gary. you are wonderful. gary: thank you very much.

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3 as a public service each week american history tvs american artifacts takes you to museums and historic places next we travel to yorktown, virginia to witness the arrival from france of the tall sailing ship airmeon. the ship is a replica of a military frigate that carried general marquis de lafayette in 1780 with a message from king louie the 16th promising thousands of french soldiers and a large naval force to help in the revolutionary war the original air may own participated in the decisive of yorktown in 1781 the journey from rocha fort to yorktown was the beginning of a trip up the east coast of thes