At 6:00 A.M. on the 4th of July in 1863, it rained in Gettysburg -- it rained on many of the 27,000 wounded and dying Confederate and Union soldiers. It rained on the thousands of dead yet to be buried. As the day wore on, Lee's shattered army left Gettysburg and Major George Rogers Clark Todd, 10th Georgia Infantry (surgeon in Semmes' Brigade) headed south, leaving behind the battlefield his brother-in-law, Abraham Lincoln, would come to consecrate just 4-1/2 months later. Vicksburg fell to the Union this day. General George Gordon Meade must have in some way felt this to be a bittersweet victory as his sister, Charlotte, was a resident of Vicksburg, and married to a Southerner, Alfred Ingraham. The Ingrahams, having sided with the Confederacy, lost one son in an early engagement of the war, a soldier son-in-law to disease, and another son at Chancellorsville. General Robert E. Lee's sister, Anne, along with her husband, William Marshall, sided with the Union, and their son, Louis, served on the staff of Union General John Pope. This truly was a war of family against family, brother against brother.

While the Civil War is a remarkable piece of history to study, it brings us all close to the pain and heartache of what war is truly about. Many lives were lost at Gettysburg. Many lives were lost in the war. I would like to list every single one, as each was our brother. To them all, both Confederate and Union, I give my utmost respect for defending with their lives what they believed in. Each and every one deserves to be remembered for sacrifice and devotion to a cause thought just. May their souls be blessed and may they rest in peace. Source.

John Fee was a Methodist minister from Kentucky. His father was a prosperous slave-holding farmer. In Fee's diary, he chronicles the conflicts he had with his father over slavery. This entry describes how he tried to free a slave named Julett to save her from being sold and separated from her family:

Intelligence came to me that my brother had advised my father to sell the woman referred to, for the reason that there were more women in the family than were needed. I said to my wife: "I cannot redeem all slaves, nor even all in my father's family, but the labors of Julett and her husband contributed in part to the purchase of the land I yet own in Indiana, and to sell those lands and redeem her will be in some measure returning to her and her husband what they have toiled for." My wife said: "Do what you think is right." I took my horse, rode twenty-five miles to my father's house and spent the night. In the morning of the next day I sought an opportunity when my father was alone, and having learned that he would sell, asked what he would take for Julett. He fixed his price. I said: "Will you sell her to me if I bring to you the money?" He said yes. I immediately rode to Germantown and borrowed the requisite amount of money by mortgaging my remaining tract of land for the payment. Whilst there I executed a bill of sale, so that without delay my father could sign it, before he even returned from the field at noon. I tendered to him the money and the bill of sale. He signed the bill of sale, and took the money. I immediately went to "Add," the husband of Julett, and told him I had bought Julett and should immediately secure by law her freedom. I said to him: "I would gladly redeem you but I have not the means." He replied: "I am glad you can free her; I can take care of myself better than she can.” See entire entry here.

When nineteen-year-old Henry Lane Stone joined the Confederate army,he did not just turn against the Union, or what he called the "cursed dominionof Yankeedom," he also defied his family, especially his father. Stone's parents were natives of Kentucky, but by 1861 they were living in southern Indiana with Henry and his four brothers. They were staunch Unionists, and at least one of Henry's brothers volunteered for the Union army. But in August 1862 Henry, a middle child, felt drawn to fight for the Confederacy. Knowing that his family would try to stop him, he kept his decision secret and departed without even leaving a note. To make his way past Union pickets, he disguised himself as a poor farmer and headed for Kentucky to join the cavalry of John Hunt Morgan. A month later he revealed his whereabouts to his father: "Pap, I do not regret one practical my leaving home and every day convinces me I did right," he explained, yet he realized the personal cost of his actions. ”I can imagine how your feelings are, one son in the Northern and another in the Southern Army," he acknowledged. "But so it is.... Good times will come again." He signed the letter, "Your rebelling son, Henry.” Source for previous three slides: Amy Murrell Taylor, Divided Family in Civil War America (Chapell Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005).

Ezekial Clay

One morning in 1861, Ann Clay, wife of pro-Union Kentucky legislator Brutus Junius Clay, found her stepson's bed empty but for this note stating that he had gone to join the Confederate army:

September 24, 1861

B.J. Clay and family,

I leave for the army tonight. I do it for I believe I am doing right. I go of my own free will. If it turns out I do wrong I beg forgiveness.

Goodbye to you all. You will hear from me soon.

E.F. Clay (Zeke)

After reading the note above, Ann Clay wrote the following letter to her husband.

My Dear Husband:

I feel that the only relief to my sad feeling tonight will be to write you. I suppose you have received Mr. Scott's letter saying Zeke had gone off last night to join the secession army. On Monday Aunt Holloway, Cyrus Miller, and Jimmy Miller came here, the two former on their way to Illinois. Yesterday Dudley, Zeke and Jimmy went to town and to see Judge Bedford, came back, sat through supper and then went to the office. At bedtime Jimmy came in the house. I asked him where Zeke was. Said he would be in in a few moments, and as it was bed time they were soon asked to their beds upstairs, and Zeke did not make his appearance. The morning Isham went around for him to come to his breakfast. Said he was not there, he had slept in his bed and he expected he had gone coon hunting this morning. Jimmy said yes that Judge had asked him to go hunting with him this morning but that Zeke remarked he could not leave him, so we ate our breakfast and concluded he had gone hunting, and directly after breakfast we went to town as Aunt Holloway wanted to see the Hickmans and some friends before she left today for Illinois, and I thought no more of Zeke till I went to the depot and Scott told me he had gone last night. I remarked that I did not believe it, but if he had, he had disgraced himself. He told me Judge Bedford and Wash Clay had gone with Zeke and that Volney Bedford knew all about it. I felt so provoked I determined to come by there and give him a piece of my mind.

Zeke rode his brown mare, took a comfort and blankets off his bed, your Sharp's rifle and a few shirts. Ever since you wrote to me about his having his guns ready, he has been busy making cartridges and I gave him the credit of making them for you, but Cash tells me he did not leave a load of powder on the place. He will go to town in the morning to get some, do not be uneasy about us at home. I do not feel afraid and do not suppose I will be troubled. Sidney and Mr. Hawkins both have offered to stay or attend to anything that is necessary.... I have been very particular about the doors and have always had the windows down as I did not consider the shutters secure. James Miller lied to us and knew all about it, and Mr. Bedford thought he was going with them. Aunt Holloway was hurried off by the troubles in Ky. Mrs. Deingham went to Frankfort today so I suppose Mrs. Tubman came. Do try and get to see them.... Cash is about well. My love to you, Ma and Sally

Yrs. devotedly

Ann M. Clay (See entire letter here)

1. Two Brothers, born in Scotland and building new lives in America found themselves fighting each other for their adoptive countries at Secessionville in 1862.

2. They immigrated to America in the 1850's. Confederate James Campbell settled in Charleston where he worked as a drayman and clerk, joining a militia company known as the Union Light Infantry, sometimes called 42nd. Highlanders (probably after the 42nd. British Black Watch Regiment because of its predominately Scottish ethnicity). His brother Alexander settled in New York, but spent time in Charleston working as a stone mason on the new U.S. Customs House being built at the end of Market Street shortly before the war. While in Charleston he also enlisted in a militia company later identified in letters from his brother as "the H.G.s" which was probably the Home Guards, composed of foreign born residents of Charleston. In March 1862, James and the Union Infantry were consolidated into the Charleston Battalion. In New York, Alexander joined the 79th. Highlander regiment.

3. After the war James managed a Plantation and eventually bought land on the Ashepoo River South of Charleston. he was active in Charleston's St. Andrews Society and the United Confederate Veterans. Alexander moved to Connecticut and established a business manufacturing "artistic monuments." They corresponded with each other and were on good terms after the war. James died in 1907 and Alexander died in 1909. Source.

West Point Brothers:

Civil War Enemies

Union Soldier Marries Confederate Spy

Mary Todd LincolnThe Civil War ripped Mary Todd Lincoln apart as it did the nation. She had been raised in a slave-owning family, but came to abhor slavery. Her best friend was her seamstress, the freed slave Elizabeth Keckley. As a well-bred woman of Kentucky, she was reviled by Southerners as a turncoat, while Northerners doubted her loyalty. Six of her close relatives fought in the war -- all for the Confederacy -- and two of her stepbrothers and a brother-in-law were killed in battle. Of one of her dead stepbrothers, she said, "He made his choice long ago. He decided against my husband, through him against me. He has been fighting against us and since he chose to be our deadly enemy, I see no special reason why I should bitterly mourn his death." Yet when her brother-in-law Ben Hardin Helm was killed fighting for the Confederates, the Lincolns took in his widow, her stepsister Emilie, to live with them in the White House. Source. Pic Source.

Sources

Letters: http://www.ket.org/civilwar/families.htmlhttp://www.ket.org/civilwar/aamerican.html