President Lincoln signed the Homestead Act on May 20, 1862. It was “an act to secure homesteads to actual settlers on the public domain,” and increased westward expansion through settlement of surveyed government lands in thirty states. The law allowed a homesteader to receive up to 160 acres by applying for a claim, improving the…
When the boiler exploded aboard the steamer Sultana on April 27, 1865, more than 1,700 people lost their lives. Most of those aboard were recently released Union prisoners from Confederate prisons in Cahaba, Alabama, and Andersonville, Georgia. They were en route from Camp Fiske in Mississippi to Camp Chase, Ohio, but the explosion occurred only…
When the RMS Titanic sank on April 15, 1912, the disaster altered the world on many levels. Even now, 100 years later, the legacy of the Titanic still fascinates. The stories of those who survived and those who perished continue to be revealed. At least four male survivors of a certain age (15-35 years old…
It reads like a story taken from a best-selling crime novel, yet it is a true criminal case of a jewel heist staged in a castle in the 1940s, starring U.S. military officers, German royalty, and $2.5 million in treasure. The tale is rife with deception, conspiracy, and international intrigue. The records are on Fold3….
As Fold3 continues to add valuable content to the Civil War Collection, we have started placing online the alphabetical card index to compiled service records of Union troops. The first four states to go live are Massachusetts, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. Each index card gives the name of a soldier, his rank, and the…
The title, Numbered Record Books, doesn’t reveal much about this significant new collection of Revolutionary War documents on Fold3. Yet, anyone familiar with these military records—oaths of allegiance, supply records, orderly books, letters, account ledgers—knows they contain revealing and rather extraordinary documents from the early days of our nation’s military history.Whether you have Revolutionary War…
Nine months before the victory at Yorktown successfully ended what we now call the Revolutionary War, a critical turning point in the southern campaign occurred at the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina. On January 17, 1781, General Daniel Morgan and his Continental forces met the British forces of Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton. Strategic advantages…
