Discussion and fellowship group for Civil War topics in the Philadelphia and southern New Jersey area
Welcome to the website of the Old Baldy Civil War Round Table, serving the greater Philadelphia area with a discussion forum for Civil War-era topics. See the MEETING INFO tab above for meeting times and directions.
We invite you to join us for in-person meetings at Camden County College’s William G. Rohrer Center, 1889 Marlton Pike East, Cherry Hill, NJ 08003, at 7:15 PM. The program will also be simulcast on Zoom for the benefit of those members and friends who are unable to attend. Please email oldbaldycwrt [at] verizon [dot] net at least 24 hours prior to request Zoom access.
June 12 7:00 PM EARLY MEETING— “From Frederick to Sharpsburg: People, Places, and Events of the Maryland Campaign Before Antietam”
Meet in the Classroom or on ZOOM this week. Don’t forget to join us at the special time of 7:00 PM on Thursday 12 June to participate in the recognition of the Michael A Cavanaugh Book Award author. To join the Zoom Meeting click or paste this link:
Old Baldy sells branded products: T-shirts, caps, etc.! Click here or the STORE menu item in the header above.
A pamphlet describing the history of Old Baldy (Maj. Gen. George Meade’s warhorse), written by Anthony Waskie, is available for download in the MEMBERSHIP tab.
Members may be interested in accessing the website of the CWRT Congress. It is here.
Steven R Stotelmyer on “From Frederick to Sharpsburg: People, Places, and Events of the Maryland Campaign Before Antietam”
The Battle of Antietam stands out as the single bloodiest day’s combat in American history. More people were killed or injured on September 17, 1862, than any other day in our nation’s entire history. With 23,000 casualties it is understandable that this single event tends to take the spotlight in the Maryland Campaign of 1862. However, Robert E. Lee did not begin crossing the Potomac on September 4. 1862, just so he could fight at Sharpsburg 13 days later with his back to that same river. From Frederick to Sharpsburg sheds light on some of the other participants and events long obscured in the shadow cast by America’s bloodiest day.
Steven R. Stotelmyer is a native of Hagerstown, Maryland. After serving in the U.S. Navy, he earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Frostburg State College and a Master of Arts from Hood College in Frederick. He is a founding member of the Central Maryland Heritage League, a non-profit land trust which helped preserve some of the South Mountain Battlefield. This led to the publication of The Bivouacs of the Dead: The Story of Those Who Died at Antietam and South Mountain (Toomey Press, 1992). In 2019 Stotelmyer authored Too Useful To Sacrifice, Reconsidering George B. McClellan’s Generalship in the Maryland Campaign from South Mountain to Antietam (Savas Beatie, 2019). Currently, Steve is a National Park Service Volunteer as well as a NPS Certified Antietam and South Mountain Battlefield Tour Guide.
Walt Lafty on “A Near Death Experience: The Battle of Stones River, a Turning Point in the War”
The Battle of Stones River in Tennessee was the last battle of 1862 and the first of 1863. It was one of the best defensive battles fought during the civil war, and saw many heroics, on both sides, ending in a Union strategic win. The battle is number one in percentage of casualties to troops engaged, slightly higher than the battle of Gettysburg. Months after the battle, President Lincoln said that “…had there been a defeat instead, the nation could scarcely have lived over”. It can be considered one of the most important political turning points of the war.
Walt Lafty has been active in various Civil War groups for almost twenty years. Currently those include the Delaware Valley CWRT where he is a board member as well as a member of the preservation committee; and he is also an active member of the Old Baldy CWRT. In addition, Walt is a volunteer and research administrator at the G.A.R. Museum in Philadelphia. He is also a member of Baker-Fisher Camp 101 Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War in Hatboro PA, where he serves as the camp secretary, and he is also a member of the General Meade Society.
Ron Kirkwood on “Tell Mother Not to Worry”: Soldier Stories From Gettysburg’s George Spangler Farm”
The George Spangler Farm in Gettysburg is a place of reverence. Nurses held the hands of dying soldiers and prayed and spoke last words with them amid the blood, stench, and agony of two hospitals. Heroic surgeons resolutely worked around the clock to save lives. Author Ronald D. Kirkwood’s best-selling “Too Much for Human Endurance”: The George Spangler Farm Hospitals and the Battle of Gettysburg established the military and medical importance of the Spangler farm and hospitals. “Tell Mother Not to Worry”: Soldier Stories From Gettysburg’s George Spangler Farm is Ron’s eagerly awaited sequel. Kirkwood researched thousands of pensions and military records, hospital files, letters, newspapers, and diaries of those present at the hospitals on Spangler land during and after the battle. The result is a deeper and richer understanding of what these men and women endured—suffering that often lingered for the rest of their lives. Their injuries and deaths, Yankee and Rebel alike, carried with it not only tragedy and sadness for parents, spouses, and children, but often financial devastation as well.
Ronald D. Kirkwood is retired after a 40-year career as an editor and writer in newspapers and magazines, including USA TODAY, the Baltimore Sun, Harrisburg (PA) Patriot-News, York (PA) Daily Record, and Midland (MI) Daily News. Ron edited national magazines for USA TODAY Sports and was NFL editor for USA TODAY Sports Weekly. He won state, regional, and national awards and managed the copy desk in Harrisburg when the newspaper won a Pulitzer Prize in 2012. Ron has been a Gettysburg Foundation docent at the George Spangler Farm Civil War Field Hospital Site since it opened in 2013. He is a native of Dowagiac/Sister Lakes, MI, and a graduate of Central Michigan University, where he has returned as guest speaker for journalism classes as part of the school’s Hearst Visiting Professionals series. Ron and his wife of almost 50 years, Barbara, live in the deer-filled countryside near Murrysville, PA, just outside of Pittsburgh.
Phil Roycraft on “The Plot to Perpetuate Slavery: How George McClellan, Southern Spies and a Confidence Man Nearly Derailed Emancipation”.
In the aftermath of the September 1862 Battle of Antietam, President Abraham Lincoln issued the most significant presidential decree in American history, the Emancipation Proclamation, which would forever free all slaves in territory not under Union control. Nevertheless, his chief military commander in the field, Major General George B. McClellan, was outraged. Within days, two former Union officers nefariously crossed the lines into rebeldom, an initiative resulting in an elaborate subterfuge to scam Lincoln into withdrawing the Proclamation in return for nebulous promises of peace.
This book tells the story, obscured in a veil of secrecy for 150 years, of the cloak and dagger chess match between Union detectives and Southern operatives in the months before emancipation become effective. Despite an ominous warning by author Herman Melville five years before, the scheme to perpetuate slavery almost succeeded, for it was engineered by a man the National Police Gazette once declared the “King of the Confidence Men.”
Phil Roycraft is an environmental engineer, historian and author specializing in the Civil War era. He has written articles for a variety of historical journals including the Michigan History Magazine, Leviathan: A Journal of Melville Studies, Journal of Illinois History and the Maryland Historical Magazine. He lives in Cadillac, Michigan.
Kelly Hancock on “The Art of Surviving: Belle Island and Beyond”.
Using Belle Isle as a starting point, delve into the horror of life in Civil War prison camps, both North and South, and discover the many ways prisoners sought to maintain sanity in the midst of squalor, disease, and malnutrition. Numerous pieces of the Museum’s POW art collection are displayed through PowerPoint.
Kelly Hancock is Director of Programs at the American Civil War Museum in Richmond, Va. Kelly oversees programs and education at the Museum for the general public, students, teachers, and senior adults, initiating the research, development, and implementation of programs for audiences both on- and off-site. A museum professional for over twenty years, she has a passion for uncovering history and bringing to light lesser-known stories from the past. Kelly is a graduate of Eastern New Mexico University.
Marty Wilensky was born in Philadelphia and grew up in the northeast section of the city, attending Northeast High School. At 16 he took a job at Burger Chef, working there the next 5½ years. After graduating high school, he attended Temple University, commuting from home. Marty paid for his tuition and expenses from the money he made at Burger Chef. Besides paying for college, his time at Burger Chef led to another life-changing event – it’s where Marty met his wife, Janice (she worked the counter while he had risen from burger flipper to assistant manager). They dated for several years and got married in 1973. They will celebrate their 50th anniversary next year.
Marty was a history major in college, where he focused on European history. However, senior year, he decided to take some accounting and business classes. After graduation, he continued taking accounting and business classes at Temple, earning enough business credits to take and pass the CPA (Certified Public Accountant) test in 1974.
After college, Marty held a couple of accounting jobs until September 1975, when he answered an ad for a local accounting firm, Blumberg, Seligman, Cupersmith & Company, LLP. The firm hired Marty as a CPA. He did well and was made partner in 1979. Many years later, in 2006, the firm split up, with Marty and Mr. Cupersmith forming Cupersmith, Wilensky, Stempler & Company, LLP. Marty is still a partner there, marking 47 years at the same firm and its successor.
Marty and Janice have three daughters and a son and four grandchildren. Their eldest daughter attended Gettysburg College, which resulted in many family outings to the battlefield at different times of the year while on college visits. She received her Master’s Degree in Micro-Biology from Johns Hopkins and lives with her husband and two children in California.
A second daughter is an engineer currently living in Ohio with her husband and twin boys. A third daughter is an attorney in Chicago, while their son is an attorney with the DC Capital Police. On January 6, 2021, he was monitoring the actions of the police officers during that day’s election protests. At some point, things escalated and he had a difficult time making it back safely to the police station when some protestors became more confrontational.
Marty taught his children the importance of history. In 1998, when the family took a vacation to Hawaii, he took them to Pearl Harbor so they would know what happened there and the sacrifices made by our military. Their visit to the Arizona Memorial was an emotional experience.
Marty enjoys reading about the Civil War. One of the first Civil War books he liked was Bruce Catton’s Grant TakesCommand. He also enjoyed Michael Shaara’s The Killer Angels, as well as the various historical novels by Shaara’s son, Jeff.
In addition to history, Marty’s interests include Lionel trains. As a kid growing up, Marty remembers his dad setting up Lionel trains in the basement at Christmas and the fun he and his brothers had playing with them. So, when he and Janice moved into their home, Marty began collecting Lionel trains as well. He, too, set up his trains in the basement where his children could play with them. He still has his train collection, though they don’t see as much action now that his children have grown and moved on.
So how did Marty team up with Old Baldy? Well, a few years ago, one of our members, Harry Jenkins, happened to be driving by Marty’s office in Cherry Hill, NJ. Harry and Marty had been friends in Junior High School but had not seen each other in years. Harry saw Marty’s name on the firm’s sign and wondered whether this was the same Martin Wilensky he knew back in school. And in fact, it was. Marty ended up doing Harry’s taxes and Harry encouraged Marty to join the Old Baldy Civil War Round Table.
We are happy to have Marty as a member of Old Baldy. And all thanks to a fortuitous outing by his old Junior High School friend, Harry Jenkins.
When you first meet William (Bill) Sia, you quickly notice his sense of humor. Chat with him for a good while and you come away knowing more than you ever thought possible about American history and the workings of his country’s government. “I’m the only guy I know who walks around with a copy of the Constitution in his back pocket.”
Born in 1945 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania Bill, one of six children, had an idyllic childhood. He idolized his Dad, a veteran of the second World War, who labored in a coal mine (the only job available) for five years before moving his family 120 miles down the road to Levittown to work in a steel mill. Ten-year-old Bill thought he had moved to suburban heaven. “We bought a house, schools went up, I could ride my bike anywhere, my Mom and Dad filled the house with books – it was great growing up there.”
After graduating in 1963 from Woodrow Wilson High School, Bill set out to become a teacher. In 1967 he earned a B.A. at King’s College and then went on to teach American Government and History to seniors at Pennsauken High School (NJ) for 35 years. He earned a M.A. at Trenton State College in 1982. Bill, a member of the New Jersey Education Association, credits his parents and teachers with his career success. “They steered me to entrench myself in the activities of reading and studying. Even my professors. They all set a good example.”
While working at Pennsauken H.S. Bill met Ed Komczyk, then a math teacher and friend of Old Baldy Civil War Round Table. Ed would mention a group meeting to Bill, Bill would say yeah, let’s go, and together they would take a train to the Civil War Museum on Pine Street in Philly. They enjoyed those early days of discussions and camaraderie, through the group’s move to the Union League and now – with the help of Bill Hughes and others – at Camden County College. “This is where I met a very bright and talented group.”
Fast forward 25 years and Bill and Ed remain great friends and loyal Round Table members. Although Bill continues to harbor an interest in the Civil War, he is drawn primarily to the areas of pre-war influences and Reconstruction, a topic he has presented at the Round Table. Bill is extremely proud of the Old Baldy crew. “I can’t get over how smart people are in the group. They are so knowledgeable.”
Fellow Old Baldy members may be surprised at how knowledgeable Bill is at something totally unrelated to the U.S. Civil War and that is building race cars. With the help of their tech- savvy Dad, Bill and his brother built a 1963 Triumph that they took to the car hill climb competitions in Wilkes-Barre in the 70s. They painted the car red, white, and blue – with stars. The car is long gone (two rich guys bought it; Bill has regrets) but Bill’s brother has the frame of a MGB sitting in his garage waiting for a body. Constructing another racer is certainly on Bill’s bucket list. Right now, though, he is having too much fun traveling to NASCAR races with his brother.
Bill lives in Marlton, NJ with his wife and college sweetheart, Anna. She is a retired nurse. They have been married for 50 years and have one son, Brian, a computer engineer working at McGuire AFB in NJ.
An eighth grade Catholic nun in South Philly walked into a classroom wearing a full Union uniform when she introduced the Civil War to her students. A history-loving father handed his 16-year-old hospitalized son Bruce Catton’s Gettysburg: The Final Fury and a second book on the history of the Confederacy. These two impactful experiences true to then teenager Bob Russo were the beginning of his lifelong appreciation of the Civil War. “Those books, on top of my eighth grade experience and a visit to Gettysburg a couple years later, left me hooked for a lifetime.”
Bob was first interested in battles and troop movements, even visiting battlefields (Antietam is a favorite) to better understand the carnage, and in the process recognized that every person on or near the battles, both military and citizen, had an experience. “The strength, courage, and perseverance exhibited by people is truly impossible to imagine.” Later, he became interested in Civil War medicine and was surprised to learn — despite Hollywood’s depictions to the contrary — that anesthesia was used in operations and that medical care was state of the art for the times. As a trusted historian, Bob needs to know all sides of the past — the good, the bad, the sad, the ugly.
Dedicated to pursuing his passions, Bob shares his knowledge of the nation’s history with Saturday morning visitors to Independence National Historical Park. Since 2015, he has been conducting tours of Independence Hall, Congress Hall, and giving talks at the Liberty Bell and other sites within the Park. “The most special thing for me is to stand on the delegates’ side of the railing in the Assembly Room of Independence Hall to talk about those momentous events.” Bob would like to have a sit down with John Dickinson, the man he believes to be the most misunderstood Founding Father because he did not vote for independence. “That is true but extremely misleading.”
Bob is a member of numerous historical organizations including the Gettysburg Foundation, Surratt Society, the National Constitution Center and others. He also received the Certificate of Completion from the Civil War Institute at Manor College, where he once attended an Antietam class run by the Delaware Valley CWRT and Jerry Carrier. Impressed by the class, Bob went to the group’s meeting in Trevose, Pennsylvania and ”Rich Jankowski, the eternal recruiter for Old Baldy CWRT, was in the audience. Rich didn’t even wait for the end of the meeting; he turned from a few rows in front of me and shouted, “I have a group that meets much closer to you! We will talk! That’s the thing about OB, DV, and every historical organization I belong to. Great people, great camaraderie, and great experiences.” He is a nine-year member of Old Baldy and past vice president.
Born in 1958, Bob is a true believer in the old adage, “those who forget their history are bound to repeat it.” With that in mind he has written and presented “The Wounded Knee Massacre” and “Arlington National Cemetery ‒ Garden of Stone.” After two years studying the December 29, 1890 Native American tragedy (hundreds of Lakota dead at the hands of the U.S. Army), Bob and his wife, Carol, visited the site on the Lakota Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. “During that entire study, I found myself often deeply saddened by what was done to all native American tribes, which in my opinion is the attempted annihilation of a people and a culture by the United States government. The entire story is incredibly sad.”
After 20 or so visits to the military cemetery that contains the remains of approximately 400,000 people, “ I still feel humbled just thinking about it. The biggest thing that people do not realize about Arlington is, beyond the immense service of those in eternal rest below those headstones, and the dignity and importance of the Tomb of the Unknowns, Arlington through a couple hundred memorials and monuments offers a history of the United States.”
A graduate of the Pennsylvania Institute of Technology, Bob is the senior vice president of Central Metals, Inc., and Roma Steel Erection, Inc. He and Carol live in Cherry Hill and have been married 35 years. Between them they have three children and four grandchildren. Bob recently introduced his grandsons to model railroading. “They are mesmerized and seeing them that way is a great joy for me. I look forward to introducing them to fishing in a nearby lake in a couple years.”
Ellen Preston grew up in Bellmawr, NJ, attending Highland High School. If you went to a Highland HS sporting event back in the 1970s, you may have seen Ellen as she was the Highland Tartans’ school mascot. Her outfit included a kilt, sash, gaiters, hat and bagpipes. How did she come to play the bagpipes? Ellen played clarinet in the school band and her teacher encouraged her to try bagpipes. While not easy to learn, she did it and still plays to this day, including at her son’s wedding. And yes, she did get to bonnie Scotland – three times.
In high school, Ellen read Stephen Crane’s Red Badge of Courage, sparking a lifetime interest in the Civil War (another favorite Civil War book is Tony Horowitz’s Confederates in the Attic). Her Civil War focus was further nurtured by a trip to Gettysburg with her Girl Scout troop when she and her Scout-mates reenacted the fighting at Devil’s Den and Pickett’s Charge.
After high school, Ellen attended Sterling College in Vermont before joining the Air Force as a life support specialist. She later took night school courses at Camden County College and got a Master of Science degree on-line from Swinburne University in Australia. Since getting her degree, Ellen has held many diverse jobs, including an anti-terrorist food expert, working for Amtrak on its $100 million labor schedule system, and her current position for the Delaware River Port Authority running its SAP Systems Upgrade project.
Ellen’s husband, Dietrich, is another Old Baldy member and Civil War enthusiast. They’ve been married 8 years though have known each other long before that, having met on South Street in Philly 26 years ago. Ellen saw him and a voice in her head said, “He’s the one.” So she went over and struck up a conversation. It turned out they both had mutual friends and they kept in touch over the years. And eventually they got married. Between them, they have three children from a prior marriage: Rowen Gunn (39) lives in Colorado while Remy (16) and Liam (18) reside in Pennsylvania.
Ellen has been with Old Baldy for 6 years and has served on its Board of Directors. But her most famous Old Baldy contribution has been her New Jersey Civil War map. The map started as a lark – she’s always had an interest in local history – and began researching places in New Jersey with Civil War connections. She then placed them on a map which eventually became the New Jersey Civil War map featured at our Old Baldy meetings. “It’s been a fun project,” Ellen noted, “which has really taken off.”
While Ellen does not have a favorite battlefield, she has visited many Civil War sites. Rich Jankowski likes to kid her as being the only other person he knows who has visited the Prairie Grove battlefield in Arkansas (Ellen was out there on a business trip). But her most memorable trip to a Civil War site was in 2017 when she was on a Fort Sumter tour during the total solar eclipse. Her group was at the fort when the eclipse began before moving onto a boat and seeing the climax on the water. “It was probably the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen,” recalled Ellen. “As it got closer to totality, a really creepy feeling came over us. The shadows were all wrong. While not totally black, it was dark enough.”
Her many other interests include life in the 1800s, nature photography (she has 30,000 photos, including eagles, ospreys and herons, her current favorite focus), kayaking and horses. Ellen has also served as the chairperson of the U.S.- Icelandic Horse Congress. This group helps with the importation of horses from Iceland. Because the breed is raised in this far north island nation, the isolation results in a unique small and sturdy steed. Ellen once wrote an article for an equine publication on riding Icelandic horses in the Pine Barrens which still generates comments from those fond of this unusual breed. As can be seen, Ellen is a person of many interests and we are fortunate that her interests include the Civil War and the Old Baldy Civil War Round Table.
