Visit the Donovan Reading Room in Cudahy Library to see the Civil War exhibit from the University Archives & Special Collections. The exhibit commemorating the 150th Anniversary of the Civil War, 1861-1865, will close by the end of April.
Just a few of the items on display include a letter from Ulysses S. Grant, an Army Captain’s diary, and a photograph from President Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Also on display is a map of Civil War memorials you can visit in the Chicago area.
Before you see the exhibit, check out this interesting background about the Civil War and Illinois…
The state of Illinois provided the Union Army with over 256,000 troops, with almost 22,000 of them coming from Cook County alone. There were a total of 150 infantry regiments from Illinois, including the famed 23rd Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment, also referred to as the “Irish Brigade”. While some families and institutions, such as The Chicago Times, sympathized with the Confederacy, the majority of the state supported the Union Army.
Cook County also housed a prisoner of war camp for captured Confederate soldiers. Camp Douglas, located on Chicago’s South Side, was named for the property owner Stephen A. Douglas, who was well known for the debates he participated in against Lincoln in the 1858 Senate race for the Illinois seat. The camp held 10,000 prisoners at its height. Over 6,000 prisoners died at Camp Douglas largely due to poor sanitation and inadequate medical facilities. Camp Douglas incarcerated over 18,000 Confederate troops from 1862 to 1865.
Approximately 4,000 soldiers from Chicago died in the Civil War. Many of the city’s first monuments were built to honor these fallen soldiers. Monuments honoring Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant were erected in two of Chicago’s lakefront parks, which were also named after them, although Lincoln’s statue is in Grant Park while the statue of Grant is in Lincoln Park.
