AUGUSTA – In 1862, Joshua Chamberlain, a 34-year-old language professor at Bowdoin College, wrote to Maine’s governor saying he wanted to serve in the Civil War, which he believed would not end unless men were willing to step forth and “defend the national existence.”

Israel Washburn asked confidants what they knew about Chamberlain. Attorney General Josiah Drummond replied that Chamberlain is “nothing at all.”

Nevertheless, Chamberlain joined the Army as a lieutenant colonel in the 20th Maine, and went on to become a hero of the battle at Gettysburg. And now his letter seeking a military commission, as well as the attorney general’s letter casually dismissing him, are available for the public to view online on the Maine State Archive website.

Beginning Nov. 5, the archive had posted 160 documents that give glimpses of how the hostilities affected people’s lives.

The website showcases some of what state archivist David Cheever calls the most comprehensive collection of Civil War material in any state. The archive has 180,000 letters from the Civil War period, more than 14,500 pages of muster rolls and more than 2,000 soldier photos.

Maine has what Cheever believes is the most extraordinary variety of material, including photos, letters, lithographs, muster rolls, battlefield reports and telegram transcripts.

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Tracey Berezansky, past president of the National Association of Government Archives and Records Administrators, said while there is no universal listing of all states’ Civil War material, Maine could well have the most extensive collection among Northern states.

But Berezansky, an assistant archivist in Alabama, said some Southern states have very extensive collections. Her state, for example, has 220,000 cards summarizing the service of every Alabamian who served in the war, she said.

Cheever said interns from the University of Maine at Farmington and volunteers are helping archive staff, and he’d like to expand the website to as many as 400 entries.

“The crown jewel of the Maine State Archive collection is the Civil War material,” he said.

Letters available on the website were penned not just by politicians and military officers, but also by soldiers, their wives and widows, volunteers who made shirts, socks and mittens for the soldiers, and those who were otherwise involved, including a woman who voiced her disappointment at how some soldiers’ funerals were conducted.

Cheever sees the letters as important because they show the effect the war had on the state in myriad ways, from health care and race relations to intergovernmental relations, tax policy, business and banking practices.

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Perhaps the most captivating part about the letters is how they reflect the war’s impact on people’s everyday lives.

For example, Charles Doak, 19, of Bucksport, who enlisted in the 6th Maine Infantry Regiment, wrote Dec. 30, 1861, about how he’d spent Christmas while serving in Virginia. Some punctuation has been added and grammar modified in the following to make it clearer to readers.

“The day before Christmas we had to clean up our things, then we spent the evening in merriment. At nine o’clock we went to bed and had a pleasant nap ’til morning then it was turn out to roll call, then it was a wish you merry Christmas all over the Regiment, then after that came breakfast,” Doak wrote.

Doak’s letter listed the menu: “Baked beans and hot biscuits and coffee, then we had turkey for dinner baked beef and potatoes, then for supper we had fried donuts and hot tea.”

Charles Tilden of the 16th Maine Infantry Regiment had a much more bleak message after the battle at Fredericksburg in 1862. His regiment had 450 soldiers when the fighting started. the end of the first day, more than half were dead, wounded or missing. The men, Tilden wrote, had represented “the Old Pine Tree State well, altho’ at a great Sacrifice.”

 


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