On April 21, 1865, the funeral train bearing the body of assassinated President Abraham Lincoln passed through York County, PA, enroute to Harrisburg.
Lincoln Archives
Here are ten misconceptions about York County, PA, during the Civil War. Author and lecturer Scott Mingus answers readers’ questions.
York newspaperman David Small, an ardent Democrat, questioned why President Lincoln did not send his own son off to war while ordering others to do so.
Abraham Lincoln’s funeral train passed through York County on April 21, 1863, as a cold drizzle set the tone as somber crowds lined the tracks.
York’s chief burgess, Democrat David Small, endorsed famed Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin as a possible candidate for PA governor in 1863. It was not to be.
Only a handful of outdoor photographs taken during the Civil War in York County, PA, still exist. Many more may have been taken. Here are a few examples.
The Hanover Branch Railroad provided freight and passenger service connecting Gettysburg and Littlestown to the Northern Central Railway at Hanover Junction.
Convalescing soldiers in York’s army hospitals marched through the streets to the train station to martial music carrying an anti-copperhead banner.
David Small, the Democratic chief burgess of York PA, had to call for the local constables to protect him from angry Union soldiers.
Pro-Lincoln newspapers across the North pilloried York’s “copperhead” citizens and their chief burgess, David Small, for surrendering York to the Rebels in 1863. It remains a controversial decision to this day.