Latest news with #Pickett'sCharge
Yahoo
05-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Rare Civil War flag sold at Columbus auction for $468,000
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — A long-lost Confederate flag, captured at the Battle of Gettysburg and among the rarest Civil War artifacts, sold for $468,000 at an Ohio auction house last month. Carried by the 11th Virginia Infantry during Pickett's Charge, a failed Confederate assault in 1863 on the Gettysburg battle's third day, the flag was acquired after heated bidding between four phone bidders on April 26 at Fleischer's Auctions in Columbus. The charge, named after Gen. George Pickett, who led more than 12,500 soldiers that day, resulted in mass casualties and ultimately led to the Confederacy's defeat. Columbus dispensary issued product alert for 'edible glitter' in cannabis gummies The auction house, one of the nation's leading purveyors of early American antiques and artifacts, previously estimated the flag could sell for $150,000 to $300,000. 'It's recognition as one of the most valuable Civil War artifacts sold in recent years rightfully reflects its importance,' auction president Adam Fleischer said. 'We were honored to facilitate the sale and ensure it was preserved so that future generations can appreciate and learn from it.' The flag was one of 564 lots in Fleischer's premier spring auction, yielding a combined price realized of $2,326,440. Other items included a portrait of Revolutionary War artillerist Alexander Ramsey Thompson I, accompanied by his commission signed by President George Washington, which sold for $50,400. A high-grade sword presented by the 3rd Mississippi Infantry to Colonel Richard H. Ballinger sold for $90,000, and a cast of Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman's bust portrait by Augustus Saint-Gaudens was acquired for $120,000. While all Confederate battle flags are rare, the one sold by Fleischer is significant because it's the only unaccounted-for flag that was captured from a regiment in Pickett's division, Fleischer said. Other such flags are accounted for and reside in museums or institutions, which means this flag is the only one left that's privately owned. Several Virginia color bearers who carried the flag were wounded or killed before it was captured by Cyren B. Lawton, a Union lieutenant from the 16th Vermont Infantry who died shortly after in hand-to-hand combat. The flag was preserved by fellow Vermont officer Henry F. Dix, who quietly passed down the artifact through generations of his family. Central Ohio advocate says RFK Jr.'s autism comments concerns families Still, the flag's whereabouts were generally unknown for more than 150 years, Fleischer said. Dix's family held onto the artifact until about the 1940s or '50s, when it was given to a family friend who also passed it down. The flag didn't resurface until the owner brought it to a Georgia collector show in 2021, and the discovery was announced to the collecting community. The artifact's current owner turned to Fleischer's, which also sold the sword of Civil War Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman last May, to list the flag for bidding. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Intercept
20-04-2025
- Politics
- The Intercept
Trump's Power Feeds on White Demographic Fears
Donald Trump answers questions from reporters after signing an executive order in the Oval Office on April 17, 2025, in Washington, D.C. Photo:GETTYSBURG — This is the most American of towns. It is where Robert E. Lee tried to destroy the nation, where Abraham Lincoln tried to heal it, and where William Faulkner revealed a century later that the country was still irretrievably racist and broken. Even though much of its bloody Civil War past is hidden behind McDonald's and Burger King and Dairy Queen and Walmart, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, today is still the symbolic capital of the endless American fight over the nation's history. Inevitably, that fight always comes down to race. And so that means that this is the town that best explains Donald Trump. Once you understand that Trump's rise is all about white fears and white power — the same motivations that triggered the Civil War — the Trump agenda begins to make sense. Gettysburg is where the Confederates invaded the North to make their ultimate bid to protect slavery and white supremacy. Pickett's Charge, on July 3, 1863, the final day of the Battle of Gettysburg, lives on in Southern mythology as the so-called 'high tide of the Confederacy,' the closest that Southerners believe they came to winning the Civil War. But it really wasn't that close. Pickett's Charge was a disaster for the Confederates, a bloody massacre of thousands of rebel troops. After Gettysburg, it was just a matter of time before the Confederacy's ultimate defeat. Lincoln recognized Gettysburg's real significance as the beginning of the end and so came here to give his most iconic speech to explain what the war was about. When he said in his Gettysburg Address that 'this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth,' Americans at the time understood what he meant: an oligarchic slavocracy could not be allowed to run the nation. But after Lee surrendered at Appomattox and the war ended in 1865, there were still millions of white people in the South who refused to accept the death of the slavocracy, while many more of their descendants have never accepted that white people and Black people can truly live as equals. In his Yoknapatawpha County masterpiece, 'Intruder in the Dust,' Faulkner revealed in 1948 what Southern white people really thought about race and American history. If only they could try Pickett's Charge again: 'For every Southern boy fourteen years old … there is the instant when it's still not yet two o'clock on that July afternoon in 1863, the brigades are in position behind the rail fence, the guns are laid and ready in the woods … it's all in the balance … we have come too far with too much at stake and that moment doesn't need even a fourteen-year-old boy to think this time. Maybe this time with all this much to lose and all this much to gain: Pennsylvania, Maryland, the world, the golden dome of Washington itself to crown with desperate and unbelievable victory.' What even Faulkner couldn't imagine was that white people all across the nation would eventually come to sympathize with and perhaps even share that Confederate fantasy. It is white hysteria, the same phenomenon that gripped the antebellum South and led to the Civil War, that has fueled the rise of Donald Trump. The Trump phenomenon and the surge of right-wing extremism in America has never really been about economic anxiety, as so many pundits have claimed. True, many swing voters, including some minorities, have supported Trump by wrongly thinking that he would be good for the economy. But for Trump's MAGA base, it has always been about race and racism. The fact that MAGA voters aren't motivated by the economy has become clear as Trump has tanked the stock market and threatened a global financial crisis with his crippling tariffs. Trump's voters, who loudly complained about inflation under the Biden administration, now say they don't care about the higher prices and financial panic generated by Trump's tariffs. Instead of economic angst, MAGA is gripped by a demographic paranoia of the same kind that surged throughout the South in the years just before the Civil War. The antebellum South feared what was to come in 20 years: America's western expansion would lead to the creation of so many free states that the South would eventually be outnumbered in Congress and lose its power to defend slavery. The Civil War was about the future. Today, MAGA also fears the future: It fears that America will soon become so diverse that white people will lose their power over politics and society. Here is the figure that freaks out MAGA the most: In 2025, only about 47 percent of American children under five years old are white. That one statistic explains MAGA hysteria — and explains much of Trump's agenda. It explains his draconian anti-immigration and deportation policies and his attempts to end birthright citizenship. It also explains the anti-abortion movement and the right-wing pro-natal movement, both of which represent flailing attempts to increase the white percentage of the population. The racist truth about the right-wing pro-natal movement becomes clear by examining its contradictory positions; many of its leaders are virulently anti-immigration at the same time they say they fear population decline. They only fear white population decline. As long as Trump demagogues about race and identity and takes actions that his base thinks are designed to curb minority population growth and enhance white power, MAGA will go along with anything else that he wants to do. Right now, that racial bond between Trump and his base manifests itself through Trump's draconian anti-immigration policies. Trump and his MAGA base are obsessed with immigrants. Trump has pushed out a frenzied series of anti-immigration orders, including, among many others, the freezing of funding for refugee resettlement and the scrapping of temporary protected status for refugees from Venezuela, the banning of migrant legal aid, detaining and deporting students simply because they were involved in pro-Palestinian protests, and the withdrawal of hundreds of other international student visas with no explanation. Many of his orders, including his attempt to end birthright citizenship, are facing ongoing legal challenges. The only point of Trump's crude anti-immigration orders is to try to reduce the number of nonwhite people entering the country. That became clear when Trump extended refugee status to white South Africans, who he falsely claimed were being persecuted by the majority-Black South African government. Read Our Complete Coverage The consequences of MAGA's demographic hysteria are similar to what happened in the antebellum South, when Southerners gave up on the idea of being part of the United States. A sense of existential dread has led to the rise of radical right-wing politics in MAGA, combined with a surge in conspiracy theories that revolve around race and identity. Conspiracy theories once confined to the margins of the internet now flourish, most infamously one that claims that a leftist deep state secretly unleashed a surge in immigration in order to replace America's white population. There is a parallel with the antebellum South, which was also immersed in conspiracy theories about race and identity: then, conspiracy theories were stoked by Southern fears of slave revolts, of the abolitionist movement, and of Abraham Lincoln. Today, MAGA's beliefs have spread so far that even more traditional Republicans have embraced the notion that liberals are seeking to sabotage traditional America. William Barr, who turned against Trump after serving as his attorney general in his first term, still insisted in 2024 that he couldn't support a Democratic presidential candidate because he believed that a 'continuation of the Biden administration is national suicide.' Trump's rise has been stoked by his unrelenting use of racist conspiracy theories, beginning with his false claims that Barack Obama was not born in the United States and highlighted during the 2024 campaign by his lie that Haitian immigrants in Ohio were eating people's pets. His one great political skill has been his shameless willingness to lie to appeal to white people fearful of a diverse future and convert them into his MAGA disciples. While Trump's MAGA base is not a majority of the country, it is large enough to dominate the Republican Party's base, which explains why Republican politicians have been so reluctant to speak up against any of Trump's chaotic actions. What is most ominous today is that MAGA is now so immersed in conspiracy theories that it has developed a deep hatred of the federal government, much as the South did in the 1850s. Trump's followers not only believe that the federal government has been instrumental in their demographic decline, but they also seem convinced that Western-style liberal democracy is no longer the right political system for them. They appear willing to give up on democracy in exchange for a white nationalist autocrat — someone like Donald Trump.
Yahoo
10-04-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Rare Civil War flag to be sold at Columbus auction
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — A long-lost Confederate flag, captured at the Battle of Gettysburg and among the rarest Civil War artifacts, will be a top lot for bidders at an Ohio auction house this month. Carried by the 11th Virginia Infantry during Pickett's Charge, a failed Confederacy assault in 1863 on the Gettysburg battle's third day, the flag is one in a series of items open to bidders on April 26 at Fleischer's Auctions in Columbus. The charge, named after Gen. George Pickett, who steered more than 12,500 soldiers that day, resulted in mass casualties and ultimately led to the Confederacy's defeat. All about six new Ohio laws that went into effect this week 'The Battle of Gettysburg was what most historians consider to be the turning point of the Civil War,' auction president Adam Fleischer said. 'After the battle was lost by the Confederate Army, it really represented a decline in their momentum. It was the Confederacy's last attempt to invade the North. Pickett's Charge was the focal point of the battle.' While all Confederate battle flags are rare, this one is significant because it's the only unaccounted-for flag that was captured from a regiment in Pickett's division, Fleischer said. Other such flags are accounted for and reside in museums or institutions, which means this flag is the only one left that's privately owned. Several Virginia color bearers who carried the flag were wounded or killed before it was captured by Cyren B. Lawton, a Union lieutenant from the 16th Vermont Infantry who died shortly after in hand-to-hand combat. The flag was preserved by fellow Vermont officer Henry F. Dix, who quietly passed down the artifact through generations of his family. Still, the flag's whereabouts were generally unknown for more than 150 years, Fleischer said. Dix's family held onto the artifact until about the 1940s or '50s, when it was given to a family friend who also passed it down. The flag didn't resurface until the owner brought it to a Georgia collector show in 2021, and the discovery was announced to the collecting community. OSU President seeks legislative clarity after student visas revoked without notice The artifact's current owner turned to Fleischer's, which also sold the sword of Civil War Union Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman last May, to list the flag for bidding. The auction house, one of the nation's leading purveyors of early American antiques and artifacts, estimates the flag could sell for $150,000 to $300,000, or more. Fleischer recognizes the flag's contentious symbolism, as a long-standing reminder of the nation's racist history that also now holds dueling associations with white supremacy and southern heritage. However, the auction president noted that the item remains as a historical artifact, not a monument. 'I know that as a symbol, it can be divisive but I would remind people, who I think are upset by its mere existence, that a Union officer lost his life to capture it,' Fleischer said. 'When learning about the history of the flag, I think it's important to meditate, not just on what it represents as a symbol, but also the actual history of the artifact.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
17-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump's cuts to federal workers have taken their toll on Pa. More are coming
A statue at the Gettysburg National Military Park along the Union lines where Pickett's Charge was turned away on July 3, 1863. (Tim Lambert) While he was preparing for work at the National Energy Technology Laboratory on Feb. 14, Kyle Buchheit opened an email he'd received around midnight. 'Per OPM instructions, DOE [the Department of Energy] finds that your further employment would not be in the public interest. For this reason, you are being removed from your position.' It was a total surprise. The Pittsburgh-area research engineer knew President Donald Trump campaigned on cutting the federal workforce, but saw his work, conducting research that helps inform how grants are awarded in promising areas of fossil fuel development, as aligned with the administration's energy goals. And he didn't recognize himself or his colleagues in Trump's description of wasteful bureaucrats. 'I'm one of the quote unquote 'good federal employees.' I went to work every day in the office,' Buchheit said. 'I'm not a bureaucrat. I don't handle money. Our lab doesn't pass any kind of rules, regulations, none of that. We do research. We try to [help the development of] energy technology so electricity is cheap and affordable.' Buchheit was one of hundreds of federal workers in Pennsylvania, and tens of thousands across the country, who have lost their jobs as a result of cost-cutting measures implemented by Trump and overseen by billionaire mega-donor Elon Musk. Mostly, they were probationary workers — meaning they were in their first year or so of employment, and didn't have the job protections of their more senior colleagues. Before the layoffs, the commonwealth was home to around 75,000 federal workers, not including post office workers or military members, according to data provided by the state Department of Labor and Industry. An analysis by the Capital-Star shows they come from all over. But the landscape is changing rapidly. In the last week, two federal judges have ruled many of the firings were illegal, and ordered probationary employees to be allowed to return to work. But those rulings left room for future job cuts, and the Trump administration has signaled their intention for even larger action. Since Valentine's Day, the administration has told federal agencies to prepare for even more staff cuts, and a deadline has come and gone for agencies to submit plans for 'large-scale reductions in force,' though none have been made public yet. That puts thousands of federal workers living across the state at risk of losing their jobs, and those plans have not been made public. For many of those federal employees, like Buchheit, the blow could be massive. 'I'm one of the quote unquote 'good federal employees.' I went to work every day in the office. I'm not a bureaucrat. I don't handle money. Our lab doesn't pass any kind of rules, regulations, none of that. We do research. – Kyle Buchheit For nine years, his life revolved around the NETL lab, the only one of its kind fully owned and operated by the U.S. government. After graduating in 2015, he took a postdoctoral fellowship at the branch in West Virginia. Four years later, he moved to Pennsylvania to work as a private contractor at the Pittsburgh-area location, where he bought a house and started his family. When he got a full-time federal job last year, it was exactly where he wanted to be. 'There's a running joke that everyone could make more money if they worked in the private sector,' Buccheit said. 'But if I worked in the private sector, my benefit goes to the company. If I work in the government, my benefit goes to the people.' Buchheit comes from a long line of public servants. His grandfather on his mother's side served in the Pacific in World War II. And his paternal grandfather was the postmaster and mayor of a small Missouri town. In his own way, he felt he was continuing that service to his country. It's a sentiment shared by other federal workers, who are stung by questions and accusations by Musk and Republican lawmakers over their work ethic. 'A lot of people have bought into the concept of the D.C. bureaucrat, and I think that's a real problem,' said Philip Glover, the vice president of the American Federation of Government Employees third district. It covers Pennsylvania and Delaware. He estimates his union, the largest for federal employees in the commonwealth, represents about 30,000 Pennsylvanians. Philip Glover, national vice president of AFGE District 3, addresses protesters outside of Rep. Scott Perry's office in Harrisburg on Feb. 20 (Capital-Star photo by Ian Karbal) Glover said people should realize that federal workers do not conform to a stereotype. They work white collar and blue collar jobs, and have a variety of political views. Nationwide, roughly 85% of the federal workforce lives outside of the nation's capital. And about one third are veterans. 'They'd come out and recruit us for these jobs,' said Glover, an Army veteran. 'They came to Fort Bragg to recruit me into the Federal Bureau of Prisons. I was an MP. Now, [they say] 'You're not really worth anything.'' On Feb. 20, Glover joined dozens of people in a field outside Rep. Scott Perry's office in Harrisburg, despite the sub-freezing temperature. They were protesting the termination of federal workers and proposed cuts by Congressional Republicans to federal funding and social safety nets like Medicaid. 'It's crazy what's going on here,' Glover said in a speech. 'This is not running (the) government, and [Perry] is not saying a word about any of it.' Perry's 10th District in southcentral Pennsylvania has the highest proportion of federal workers of any congressional district in the state. Around 3.22% of the workforce is employed by federal agencies — or roughly 13,000 people, according to data compiled by the Congressional Research Office last year, not including post office employees and active duty military members, The lawmaker, who was involved in efforts to keep Trump in office following his loss in the 2020 election, wasn't at his office during the protest, and did not respond to questions from the Capital-Star. But he has praised Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency. Glover was joined by Mark Cochran, the president of the local AFGE union that represents National Park Service workers at the Gettysburg National Military Park and Eisenhower National Historic Site. He is also president of AFGE Council 270, which represents National Park Service employees in the northeast part of the country. The staff at the two sites has been hit hard by Musk's team and an executive order freezing new hires. First, they learned seasonal workers, who make up about 75 percent of the Gettysburg workforce during the busy tourist months, couldn't be hired back in the spring, according to Cochran. Five probationary workers were also cut. That means some parts of the Civil War battlefield, one of the most popular tourist sites in the state, and Eisenhower farm will be left to go to nature, which can create hazards for visitors and, ultimately, will take much more time and money to restore than if they'd kept up with the work at their previous pace. 'We're working these typically lower-paying jobs, because we're passionate about the work that we're doing,' Cochran said. 'Working here at Gettysburg, we're preserving one of the turning points of our country's history for future generations. You can't ask for a better job than that, and these folks, they just want to work.' Republicans like Perry represent the three Pennsylvania congressional districts with the highest proportion of federal workers. That's according to data collected by the Congressional Research Office. They include Reps. Rob Bresnahan (R-8th District) and John Joyce (R-13th District). Federal workers make up 2.9% and 2.8% of the total workforce in their districts, respectively. Neither congressman responded to questions from the Capital-Star about their views on the workforce cuts. Are you a federal employee in Pennsylvania, or have you been impacted by federal workforce cuts? You can reach out to Ian Karbal by email at ikarbal@ or by call/text/Signal at 847-946-9191 to share your stories or help inform our future reporting on the subject According to data provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry, many of the parts of the state most dependent on federal labor supported Trump in the 2024 election. Federal workers made up 6.8% of the workforce in Union County as of last September, more than any other in the commonwealth. Sixty one percent of voters there cast ballots for Trump in 2024. In Lebanon County, where 64% of voters supported Trump in November, 6.2% of the workforce is employed by the federal government. The federal workforce there is largely employed by the Department of Veterans Affairs, which runs the Lebanon VA Medical Center, where an undisclosed number of probationary federal workers have already been laid off. Douglas Etter, a spokesperson for the VA Medical Center said the cuts 'will have no negative effect on veteran health care, benefits or other services and will allow VA to focus more effectively on its core mission of serving veterans, families, caregivers and survivors.' Monroe County, which had the third highest rate of federal employment at 4.7% of the workforce, went for Trump by less than a single percent in November. The Dept. of Defense is the largest civilian federal employer, and Secretary Pete Hegseth has said he'd like to cut the Pentagon's budget for nonlethal programs by 8% over each of the next five years, while reprioritizing spending on border security, drones, missile defense and more. 'A lot of my co-workers, they voted for Trump, and very proudly voted for Trump,' Cochran said. 'Now they're seeing their people they've worked side by side with for years — suddenly they're not here. And they're like, 'What's going on?'' While many of the areas in the state with the highest proportion of federal employees in their workforce are more rural and suburban, cities like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh have tens of thousands of federal workers between them, Roughly one-third of federal workers in the commonwealth, or over 25,000, lived in Philadelphia County as of September 2024. That's 3.6% of the county's workforce. Alex Berman, vice president of a Philadelphia branch of the National Treasury Employees Union, represents thousands of workers on the Philadelphia campus for the Internal Revenue Service. He says that roughly 400 IRS employees in the city have been laid off since Trump took office. 'They're in shock. They're hurting,' Berman said. 'They're understandably feeling betrayed. It's hard to sit here and be part of the union and say, 'We're working on it.'' Berman is also an IRS employee, and said the layoffs could result in more people paying more fees and taxes than they should. He estimates 90% of the workers that were cut were responsible for helping people who feel they were taxed more than they owed, or need to set up a payment plan, or other issues after they receive their tax bills. And, according to Berman, those agents are often recruited as volunteers by the Federal Emergency Management Agency to take calls from people impacted by natural disasters. 'What happens if there is a terrible hurricane coming this season, or another round of wildfires in another area of California or Texas, and those people need to get their claims heard, filed or claimed quickly? There's not gonna be many of us,' Berman said. For Kyle Buchheit, the Department of Energy researcher, there's hope though. While it hasn't happened yet, he's been told to expect a formal letter reinstating him. This past Thursday, a federal judge ruled the termination of probationary federal employees, including his, were illegal. Still, the ruling left room for future workforce cuts, and there's the 'massive' reduction plans that Trump has ordered but not yet announced. 'I'm gonna get my job back, but it's not guaranteed I'm gonna stay there' Buccheit said. 'RIFs [reductions in force] are next and I'm going to keep preparing.' While he's excited to return to work, he plans to keep sending out resumes. It's a big mindset shift from mere weeks ago, when he had hoped to retire from the lab. 'A lot of people have bought into the concept of the D.C. bureaucrat, and I think that's a real problem. – Philip Glover, the vice president of the American Federation of Government Employee's third district. And his wife plans to keep the third job she got at their child's daycare so they can save as much as they can – just in case. Going back to work will also mean returning to a changed workplace. Federal workers still on the job in Pennsylvania have struggled with felt the impact of the layoffs too. Beyond having to make up for a reduced staff, some feel their workplace has become hostile and unpredictable. 'Every day I go to work, I feel like I could be fired,' said a Department of Energy employee who works at the same lab Buchheit did. She was granted anonymity because of fears of retaliation. Buchheit's colleague was also a probationary employee, and can't see any reason why he was laid off and she wasn't. Both had excellent performance reviews. 'Everybody was coming up with these theories,' she said. 'It was brilliantly executed, if the goal was to cause people a lot of stress.' She said the communications her colleagues have received from Musk's team — from the early 'fork in the road' buyout offer that called them less productive than private sector workers, to requests they justify their positions by describing what they did that week — are demoralizing and antagonistic. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE And there's the sword of Damocles. So far, her supervisors haven't told her anything about what the reduction in force plans might mean for the lab. It's been particularly unnerving because they've otherwise been quick to respond to new developments as they appear in the news or in their inboxes. It's unclear to her if that's because her bosses don't know or don't want to say. 'I took a pay cut to get this job,' she said. 'At a fossil energy lab, you have a lot of people who you might imagine could be making a lot more money working in the oil and gas industry … They actively made a choice not to go cash in because they believed in the mission.'
