Over the next 2 weeks I will be busy focusing on my lecture “The Great Revival: The Rise of Religion During the Civil War” which will be given as part of the Lunchtime Learning Series at Manassas Museum on August 25th. There is a lot of press for this particular event and I have been told that a bus tour and senior church group will also be in attendance. I have already procured some great references and a list of source materials from the NPS archives (courtesy of our friend John Hennessy). I'll most likely be up at Chatham next week going through the bound volumes and along with the material I used for “The Southern Cross,” I should be able to finish a nice 40 min. piece w/ PowerPoint-driven photos. A Q&A and book signing will follow. I have been looking forward to this talk since it was booked back in the spring as the Manassas Museum is a top-notch facility with a great staff. I cannot tell you how much I enjoy doing these speaking engagements and the people I get to meet are always a blessing to me. This is a topic near and dear to my heart and I hope this leads to a longer piece for the magazine or newspaper.

As the Civil War progressed, a movement referred to as "The Great Revival" took place in the South. Beginning in the fall of 1863, this event was in full progress throughout the Army of Northern Virginia. Before the revival was interrupted by Grant's attack in May 1864, approximately seven thousand soldiers-10 percent of Lee's force-were reportedly converted. Dr. Gardiner H. Shattuck, Jr., author of "A Shield and Hiding Place: The Religious Life of the Civil War Armies," reports that "The best estimates of conversions in the Union forces place the figure between 100,000 and 200,000 men-about 5-10 percent of all individuals engaged in the conflict. In the smaller Confederate armies, at least 100,000 were converted. Since these numbers include only "conversions" and do not represent the number of soldiers actually swept up in the revivals-a yet more substantial figure-the impact of revivals during the Civil War surely was tremendous." My talk will speak to this event on a regional level and how it affected both the military and civilian populations.

FYI: My blog posts may be less frequent over the next few weeks. I also have a family vacation coming up, a combined book review, and a book release party to plan for.