Wednesday, September 11 (7:30pm)-Saturday, September 14 (5pm)
Led by Douglas Cubbison
Tour Registration: $495.00

The astute observer of 18th century events and British Whig politician, Horace Walpole observed, “The volley fired by a young Virginian in the backwoods of America set the world on fire.” Walpole’s words ring true. The Virginian he was referring to was, of course, a 22-year old militia major named George Washington. Washington’s actions in western Pennsylvania are credited with starting the French and Indian War in America. Besides George Washington, Braddock’s Campaign of 1755 will introduce many personalities who became famous during the American Revolution: Daniel Morgan, Daniel Boone, Thomas Gage, Charles Lee, Adam Stephen and Horatio Gates.

On Thursday morning our tour will start at Jumonville Glen, a seldom visited site where Washington’s militia and his “ally,” a Seneca chief named “Half King” ambushed a sleepy French force under Ensign Joseph Coulon de Jumonville. This site is truly pristine and the story of Washington’s first military action will unfold at this off-the-beaten track locale. Our next stop will be the reconstructed palisades of Fort Necessity which Washington built after defeating the French. It was in the “Great Meadows” that the young Virginian met his first defeat as a military commander. Fort Necessity has a very fine museum and book store. In the afternoon we will visit the ruins of Fort Cumberland located at the Emmanuel Episcopal Church where the fort’s walls are visible within the church’s basement. After leaving Cumberland, Maryland we’ll drive along Braddock’s route and see some of his army’s campsites. Our last stop of the day will be the Great Crossings of the Youghiogheny River.

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Friday, September 20  (8am-5pm)
Led by Douglas R. Cubbison
In conjunction with the 10th Annual American Revolution Seminar meeting at Fort Ticonderoga
Tour Registration: $125

America’s History is proud to announce a new partnership with the Fort Ticonderoga Association whereby we’ll offer a one-day tour of the early stages of British Lt. Gen. John Burgoyne’s campaign of 1777. Led by noted author and historian, Doug Cubbison, we will visit many sites important to this campaign including Mount Defiance, Mount Hope, Burgoyne’s lines around Fort Ticonderoga, Crown Point, Hubbardton battlefield and Skenesborough Harbor (present-day Whitehall.)

During the summer and fall of 1777, one of the great military campaigns of world history was fought in the dense forests and rolling fields of upstate New York and Vermont. John “Gentleman Johnny” Burgoyne led a combined force of some 9,000 British Redcoats, German hirelings, vengeful Tories and blood-thirsty Indians. This army descended from Canada, aiming to cut off the American middle colonies from their New England neighbors.

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Thursday, October 31 (7:30pm)-Saturday, November 2 (5pm)
Winston-Salem, NC
Led by Chris Hartley
Tour Registration: $295

In March 1865, in a driving rainstorm, Federal Maj. Gen. George Stoneman led a column of some four thousand blue cavalrymen out of Knoxville, Tennessee. They rode eastward, launching a cavalry raid that would take them deep into the heart of the Confederacy. Over the next two months, Stoneman’s cavalry galloped across six Southern states, fighting fierce skirmishes with Confederate forces and destroying enemy supplies and facilities. When the raid finally ended, Stoneman’s troopers had brought the war home to dozens of communities that had not seen it up close before. In the process, the cavalrymen pulled off one of the longest cavalry raids in U.S. military history, and left behind an impact that still echoes in The Band’s 1969 hit recording, “The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.”

Stoneman’s 1865 raid was so vast it would difficult to cover the entire span in two days. But it is possible to understand the raid by focusing on one area. Yankee troopers rode through the Piedmont of North Carolina in early April. In this tour, we will visit sites in the Piedmont area that figured prominently in Stoneman’s operation.

On Friday morning we’ll visit Moody’s Tavern, Moratock Iron Furnace and Old Salem, a historical community which looks much like it did in 1865 when a brigade of Stoneman’s raiders briefly made its headquarters there. In Salem the town square, Home Moravian Church, Blum Printers, the Single Sisters House and the Boner House, sites of both drama and levity, will be interpreted. We’ll also visit the Moravian Cemetery. We’ll have lunch at the historic Salem Tavern. After lunch, we’ll visit Mendenhall Plantation and Store to understand the action at Jamestown. You’ll also see the Jamestown Mill, Jamestown Depot site and the gun factory sites.

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Thursday, May 31 (5:30PM) to Sunday, June 3, 2012  (4:00pm)
Led by Horace Mewborn, Scott Mauger, Rick Britton and Bruce Venter
Based in Richmond, VA
Tour Registration Fee: $475.00

In the Eastern theatre, the names Jeb Stuart and Wade Hampton evoke images of fabled Confederate cavalry successes against their Union opponents. Our tour will highlight some of these classic operations with the chance to walk a number of private property sites, not accessible to the general public.

In Stuart’s Ride around McClellan’s Army of the Potomac in 1862 we will visit Hickory Hill, the Wickham family home (private property) where Stuart stopped the night of June 12 to visit Williams Wickham who was recuperating from a battlefield wound. Then it’s on to historic Hanover Court House where the Gray Cavalier ran into a detachment of Federal cavalry. As we follow Stuart’s plume, we’ll have a chance to stop at the site of the 1864 cavalry battle of Haws Shop. Returning to Stuart’s ride we will see many sites associated with it like Linney’s Corner, Old Church, Tunstall’s Station, Garlick’s Landing, Talleysville, Forge Bridge, Charles City Court House and Rowland’s Mill where Stuart stopped for a cup of coffee. As we return to the hotel we’ll come past Yellow Tavern, the battle site where Stuart was mortally wounded in 1864.

We’ll begin Hampton’s 1864 Beefsteak Raid at Violet Bank, Robert E. Lee’s headquarters during the Petersburg siege where he and the South Carolinian discussed the raid. From there, we’ll see Wilkinson’s Bridge where Hampton crossed Rowanty Creek, then stop at Belsches’ Mill where he picked up his guide for the raid. We’ll also see Cook’s Bridge, Laurel Springs, Sycamore Church where Tom Rosser attacked the 1st D. C. Cavalry and the Harrison Farm site where the cattle were corralled. We will stop at Edmund Ruffin’s Farm (private property) where his old house still stands. We’ll see Cocke’s Mill, the site of James Dearing’s defensive position against a Federal effort to retrieve the herd and the Donnan House site where Hampton’s aide gave a captured cow to 12 year old Margaret Donnan. We’ll go to Hawkinsville where cattle crossed the Jerusalem Plank Road while Tom Rosser blocked the road at Ebenezer Church, Freeman’s Ford where the cattle crossed the Nottoway River and the intersection of the Boydton Plank and White Oak roads where the herd was penned after reaching Confederate lines.

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Wednesday, June 27 (7:30PM) to Saturday, June 30, 2012  (5:00pm)
Led by Dan Tortora
Based in Cherokee, NC
Tour Registration Fee: $425.00

The French and Indian War in the South had taken a back seat to more well-known events that occurred in New York and Pennsylvania. Our Defending the Southern Frontier: The Cherokee War of 1759-61 will remedy that shortcoming.

By 1760 the fate of the British colonies in North America was determined by the capture of Quebec. But in the South, the Cherokee Indians continued a war against South Carolina and British troops. The war was the result of a corrupt deerskin trade and other longstanding Cherokee grievances, a collapse in the Cherokee-British military alliance, and bungled diplomacy by South Carolina’s colonial governor. The “peace,” if you could call it that, left festering tensions on all sides which would influence the coming American Revolution. Focusing on the Middle and Overhill Cherokee villages, we will discuss the scope of the southern theater in the French and Indian War by visiting a number famous and some lesser known sites.

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Wednesday, August 1 (7:30PM) to Saturday, August 4, 2012  (5:00pm)
Led by Ed Bearss, Horace Mewborn and Bob O’Neill
Based in Leesburg, VA
Tour Registration Fee: $495.00

Ever since the Gettysburg campaign ended, participants, historians and Civil War enthusiasts have debated the results of Jeb Stuart’s ride to Gettysburg, placing blame, on one hand, or exonerating the “Bold Dragoon” on the other hand, for his decisions. Some have said Stuart’s delay in reaching the Confederate army in Pennsylvania may have cost General Robert E. Lee the battle. Others contend Stuart’s absence made little difference in the military scheme of things. Our “Jeb Stuart in the Gettysburg Campaign” tour will try to sort out these issues by retracing the steps the Gray Cavalier took once he left his commander on June 24, 1863. We will cover Stuart’s ride, his contribution to the battle itself, his part in Lee’s retreat and the ongoing controversy surrounding his performance. Our analysis will include the facts, the geography, the myths and the unanswered questions about Stuart’s decisions.

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