American Battlefield Trust

09/04/2026

What do Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Roosevelt Jr., Arthur MacArthur Jr., and Douglas MacArthur have in common? They were all part of father-son pairs that both received the Medal of Honor! Dive into the history of the fighting MacArthurs below ⬇️

A father and son separated by generations of war, Arthur and Douglas MacArthur became the first family duo to both receive the Medal of Honor

09/03/2026

Do you know the name of the only Revolutionary War battle fought in the state of Delaware? If you guessed the Battle of Cooch’s Bridge, also known as the Battle of Iron Hill, then you would be correct!

September 3, 1777, a company of the American light infantry met a group of dragoons led by Captain Johann Ewald, who quickly summoned reinforcements, in present-day Newark, Delaware. The Americans then proceeded to conduct a fighting retreat against German jaegers onto Iron Hill, where they were attacked by German and British troops. The fighting lasted for several hours, but eventually the Americans, running low on am******on, were forced to retreat over Cooch’s Bridge across the creek and fall back towards the main body of the Continental Army. This battle was a precursor to the Battle of Brandywine, fought only eight days later.

The Battle of Cooch’s Bridge, also known as the Battle of Iron Hill, was the only major battle on Delaware soil. Fought on September 3, 1777, it was the...

09/03/2026

September 3, 1783, the Treaty of Paris was signed, officially bringing the American Revolution to a close. In commemoration, Benjamin West began a painting depicting the American and British delegations. However, while he was able to capture the likenesses of the American delegation, which included John Jay, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Henry Laurens, and William Temple Franklin, he was unable to do the same for the British. Richard Oswald and his secretary Caleb Whitefoord declined to pose. Today, the unfinished painting is displayed at the Winterthur Museum, Garden, and Library in Winterthur, Delaware.

Learn more about the Treaty of Paris: https://bit.ly/3HQXifk

09/02/2026

Catharine “Caty” Littlefield married Rhode Island merchant Nathanael Greene just a year before the first shots of war were fired at Lexington and Concord. When her husband was made a general in the Continental Army, Caty followed him to Patriot camps throughout the Thirteen Colonies, becoming a popular and comforting presence to troops during the eight-year struggle for independence. She passed away September 2, 1814.

Catharine “Caty” Littlefield married Rhode Island merchant Nathanael Greene just a year before the first shots of war were fired at Lexington and...

09/02/2026

According to a monument added at Moores Creek Bridge Battlefield in 1907, Mary (Polly) Slocumb is the “most honored of the names.” The monument text explains that she was the “wife of Lieutenant Slocumb” and rode alone at night “65 miles to succor [aid] the wounded on this battlefield.” But did she really? The myths and stories around Mary Slocumb make it difficult to untangle the realities of her life from legend. Dive into her story below ⬇️

The myths and stories around Mary Slocumb make it difficult to untangle the realities of her life from legend.

09/01/2026

In 1883, Hazard Stevens, Major General Isaac I. Stevens’s son, and Charles Walcott of the 21st Massachusetts returned to the site of the Battle of Chantilly, where they identified the locations where Stevens and Major General Philip Kearny were killed during the fighting September 1, 1862. By the time of their return, the area was farmland owned by Confederate veteran John Ballard and his wife, Mary Reid Ballard. With respect to the fallen generals, the spots where they fell were marked; in Stevens’s case, the spot was marked with a mound of boulders and later a white quartz stone, which can still be seen to this day.

In 1915, Ballard’s son, James W. Ballard, said of his father and this stone, “…an ex-Confederate maimed in that great struggle, with weak hands but with a heart strong in its respect for a brave fallen foeman, planted that stone to mark that spot…with no services other than the reverence one brave man has for another.”

Learn more about the Battle of Chantilly: https://bit.ly/4lNJSOU

09/01/2026

During the Second Manassas Campaign, the Reid farmhouse was a prominent landmark in the Battle of Chantilly, fought September 1, 1862. From the vicinity of this house, Federal infantry led by Generals Isaac Stevens and Phillip Kearny advanced to engage the Confederate infantry from A.P. Hill’s and Ewell’s divisions of General Stonewall Jackson’s Left Wing. From positions near the building, federal artillery supported the attack, shelling the Confederates in the woods at the north end of the Reid farm fields. During the battle, the home sheltered wounded Federal soldiers, who were later carried to the Millan place, known as Oakley, where a field hospital had been established.

The original log home was built by Joseph Reid before the American Revolution, and the home subsequently passed through succeeding generations of Reids. In 1860, Col. John Reid had willed the house to his granddaughter Mary Lillie Reid Thrift. Fourteen years later, in 1874, Mary Thrift married former Confederate Lt. John N. Ballard, a veteran of Mosby’s 43rd Battalion Virginia Cavalry. Together, the pair raised seven children in the home. When John and Mary Ballard died in the 1920s, the farm was divided, and the house passed from the family in 1964. In 1965, after nearly two centuries, the Reid-Ballard house was demolished for the construction of homes in Cedar Lakes Estates.

Learn more about Chantilly Battlefield here: https://bit.ly/4xybej1

08/31/2026

Whether you’ve heard them singing at night or found their shells outside, the cicadas have arrived to announce the end of summer. But to Union prisoners during the Civil War, the sound of the cicadas meant more than the end of summer – it often meant freedom! The Confederate prison camp at Andersonville was notorious for its unsanitary and miserable conditions, which motivated numerous Union prisoners to attempt prison breaks, often in late summer when they could use the din of cicadas to mask the sound of their attempted escape.

The “dog days” of summer have arrived, along with all the exciting and unique creatures that historically make their presence known with the elevated...

08/31/2026

By late August 1864, the city of Atlanta was not yet subdued by Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman's armies. The Macon & Western and Atlanta & West Point Railroads were still open and supporting the army of Confederate Lt. Gen. John B. Hood, encircled there. Hoping to destroy these supply routes and force an evacuation of the city, Sherman began moving infantry towards the railroad lines near Jonesborough. In response, Hood sent Confederate Lt. Gen. William J. Hardee to halt their movement.

August 31, 1864, Hardee attacked west of Jonesborough, but Sherman’s troops easily repulsed him. That same evening, Hood withdrew one corps of Hardee’s force, fearing an attack on Atlanta. But the next day, September 1, a Union attack broke through Hardee’s troops and forced them to retreat south. That evening, Hood evacuated Atlanta, and by the next day, September 2, the city surrendered to Federal troops.

Our Battle of Jonesborough page contains historical maps, history articles, commander bios, recommended reading, web links and more on this 1864 Civil War battle in the Atlanta campaign.

08/30/2026

Season 4 of Historically Correct is here from the Empire State! Join Nicholas Ferroni in New York, NY, at Fraunces Tavern, which played an important role before, during, and after the American Revolution. Now a museum, bar, and restaurant located at the corner of Pearl and Broad Streets in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan, the Tavern served as a meeting place for the Sons of Liberty before the war. As the British Army prepared to evacuate New York City, it was the site of proceedings known as "The Birch Trials." Once the British left in 1783, it was the site where General George Washington was honored at a banquet celebrating the British Army evacuation and where Washington bid farewell to his officers. Later, when the United States capital was located in New York City, Fraunces Tavern was rented in 1785-1788 by the Congress of the Confederation to house the departments of Foreign Affairs and War, and offices of the Board of Treasury.

This season of Historically Correct has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities.