Civil War Pittsburgh

Local news channel WTAE-TV Pittsburgh showing love for our friends at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall & Museum!

Visitors pour into Soldiers and Sailors to honor fallen veterans for Memorial Day Visitors at Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum were surrounded by stories and artifacts from every major war.

On Memorial Day we honor those who have fallen in the service of our country.

In 1868 General John A. Logan, Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, issued General Orders No. 11, which directed that the 30th day of May be “designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet churchyard in the land.”

The subsequent observations of what came to be known as Decoration Day set the tone for how we remember those who gave “the last full measure of devotion.”

Image 1: Unknown dead at Gettysburg National Cemetery

Image 2: Veterans of Alexander Hays G.A.R. Post No. 3 at Allegheny Cemetery, Memorial Day 1918 (Pittsburgh Gazette Times, May 31, 1918)

Join our friends at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall & Museum for tomorrow’s Memorial Day observance!

Join us TOMORROW for our Annual Memorial Day Ceremony & Celebration! 🇺🇸

From 11 AM to 4 PM, enjoy family-friendly activities, contests, live musical performances, an all day tribute to fallen post-9/11 veterans from Pennsylvania, and free admission to our museum including special exhibits just for Memorial Day! We are also observing a national moment of silence at 3 PM.

Hosted by Pittsburgh Radio Personality, Mike Frazier, the celebration also includes food and drink available for purchase on site! This event is free to attend (rain or shine!), and there is free street-level parking available directly across the street from the Museum on Bigelow Boulevard!

Help us celebrate and "Honor them with your presence" this Memorial Day! 🫡

On May 22, 1863 the United States War Department issued General Orders No. 143, which established the Bureau of Colored Troops. With these orders in effect, approximately 180,000 African American men served in the U.S. Army and nearly 20,000 in the U.S. Navy.

While Black volunteers, such as Allegheny County’s Hannibal Guards, offered their services in April 1861, the War Department did not yet recognize their enlistment. That status changed nearly two years later with the issuance of President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation.

Many of the Black troops recruited in Pennsylvania trained at Philadelphia’s Camp William Penn, where approximately 11,000 African American men prepared for armed service.

Great news for our friends at Greene County Historical Society Museum!

Pittsburgh’s influence is found on battlefields both near and far!

These two 10-inch Rodman guns and 13-inch mortar were manufactured at Fort Pitt Foundry in the Strip District, and now reside at Fort Moultrie near Charleston, South Carolina; the cradle of the Confederacy, and site of the opening shots of the Civil War.

From our friends at Little Beaver Historical Society!

The 139th Pennsylvania Infantry was comprised of soldiers largely from Allegheny, Armstrong, Beaver, and Mercer Counties who received training at Camp Howe in Oakland. Their service spanned from September 1862 to June 1865, taking the men of the regiment from the Maryland Campaign to the fields of Gettysburg, and to the Shenandoah Valley.

Former soldiers from the 139th PA volunteers formed in Beaver County to fight in the Civil war. this photo was taken in 1910 at the dedication of the PA memorial at Gettysburg .

From the book Historical Voyage

Thanks to Civil Warscapes for highlighting one of our favorite, and treasured, sites in the Pittsburgh area - Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall & Museum!

Have you ever noticed some of our local Civil War connections on the streets of Pittsburgh’s North Side?

Along Western Avenue, for example, the former meeting place of VFW Post 623 is named for Fort McKeever - one of the city’s 37 wartime defenses constructed by local residents in June 1863.

While Fort McKeever itself no longer exists, some remnants of this earthen structure can be seen along Marshall Avenue at the site of Pressley Ridge School.