Veterans John J. Long, Walter H. French, E. P Robinson, and an
unidentified companion, 1860s Courtesy Library of Congress More
than three million soldiers fought in the war from 1861-1865.
More than half a million died, and almost as many were wounded
but survived. Hundreds of thousands were permanently disabled by
battlefield injuries or surgery, which saved lives by
sacrificing limbs. These men served as a symbol of the fractured
nation and remained a stark reminder of the costs of the
conflict for long after the war. Look for this symbol throughout
the exhibition to take a closer look at Civil War-era texts, or
view them all in the library of Digital Documents.