Telegram from Major Robert Anderson announcing his withdrawal from Fort Sumter, April 18, 1861 This month marks the 150th anniversary of the attack on Fort Sumter, South Carolina, the first battle of the American Civil War. The War Between the States as it is sometimes called, lasted almost 4 years and cost more American lives…
A little while back we started adding images from the World War II War Diaries to Footnote. These diaries provide a day-to-day record of operational activities from the Navy and Marine Corps, and offer an interesting look into some of the major events of World War II. We’ve already added over 250,000 images of the…
Operation Valkyrie was a Hitler approved emergency scenario that set up the continuity of government and plan for the military if a general breakdown of civil order should occur, such as the Führer’s death. On July 20, 1944, in an attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg detonated a briefcase bomb at Hitler’s…
Errol Morris has posted the fourth of five installments of “Whose Father Was He?” — a riveting investigation into a photograph of three children found in the hands of the dead body of Amos Humiston, a fallen Union soldier, at Gettysburg in 1863. You can see him and his family in the 1860 US Census…
Today, in conjunction with the National Archives and Records Administration, we announced the launch of the internet’s largest interactive World War II collection. Some of the information in the collection has been on the site for a while, but this week we released two important additions, an interactive USS Arizona Memorial Wall and over 8…
Footnote’s Virtual Vietnam Veterans Memorial – a near, full-size, digital reproduction – is a finalist for the We Media Game Changers Award. The project was first covered by CNN when it launched last spring. Since then it has been visited by thousands, many of whom have added hundreds of photos and stories directly to the inscribed names. Please vote…
It’s amazing what a plane can go through and still keep flying. This morning I was looking through some photos on the site and came into a section of photos taken in England of planes that had been damaged on missions, but still returned to base. Here are a couple of examples: Then I came…
