Available Lectures and Programming

19^th Century history scholar specializing in military, medical and humanitarian history.

Clara Barton scholar offering presentations, programs and recreated lectures* by Barton during the Civil War and Reconstruction eras to the early 20^th Century.

Topics include:

American Military Medicine: Setting the Stage in the Civil War

Women in the Civil War

19^th Century Kitchen and Medicinal Gardens

Women Spies in the Civil War

The Buck Stops Here: Presidents Lincoln and Davis Compared

The Essence of Clara Barton   

The Development of American Humanitarian Organizations   

Clara Barton’s Civil War   

Clara Barton: Educator   

Clara Barton’s American Red Cross  

Lt. Gen.  James Longstreet, Lee’s War Horse

Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart, Lee’s Young Major General

First Corps Army of Northern Virginia topics including
Brig. Gen.s Micah Jenkins and Evander Law: Longstreet’s Impossible Hand
Washington Artillery of New Orleans: The USNG/Lousiana’s 114^th Artillery Battalion
Lee’s Special Project Man: BGen Edward Porter Alexander
Original Rebels: South Carolina and the American Civil War.

Campaigns of the Army of Northern Virginia and the Southern Historical Society from a non-Lost Cause perspective.

Descriptions:

Clara Barton: No Ordinary Courage

Public Service hallmarked Clara Barton’s life from her initial career as a school teacher to her medical support and nursing during the Civil War, establishment of the American Red Cross and First Aid Association in 1905.  A favorite civilian volunteer of Generals Ambrose Burnside, Benjamin Butler and Ulysses S. Grant, she received a rare compliment from President Abraham Lincoln via his published request to the public supporting her missing soldier’s identification work.  This presentation explores the talents and events that guided Barton throughout her life and her legacy to the American people through the American Red Cross. PowerPoint presentation.

Clara Barton’s Civil War

Clara Barton resided in Washington D.C. and worked as a copyist at the U. S. Patent Office when the Civil War broke out in 1860.  At that time she had not entertained the idea of becoming an icon in humanitarianism both at home and abroad. Ms. Rosenvold explores the little known facets of Barton’s life and philosophies developed during her role in the war that marked the rest of her life. PowerPoint presentation.

Clara Barton’s Washington

Join Speaker Susan Rosenvold and discover Washington D.C. through the eyes of one of its residents – Clara Barton.  Barton lived in Washington several times, first, to become an independent woman, second, as a humanitarian and later as s lobbyist attempting to found the American Red Cross.  Discover what Washington was like, who Clara rubbed elbows with, and her success as a humanitarian. PowerPoint presentation, and/or Tour.

Clara Barton Takes the Field

After collecting two warehouses full of supplies, Clara Barton needed to deliver them to Union soldiers in need.  It wasn’t until 1862 and Robert E. Lee’s first invasion of the North that Barton would get an opportunity.  Barton scholar Susan Rosenvold outlines the great event from the military’s discovery of Barton and her goods to her return to Washington on death’s door after the Battle of Antietam. Powerpoint presentation, and/or Tour.

Clara Barton Post Civil War Lectures

After the Civil War, Clara Barton began lecturing to earn money for maintaining her Missing Soldiers Office.  Susan Rosenvold re-creates these passionate, moving memories of war Miss Barton shared with audiences all over the Northern U. S. from 1867-1868.

The Longstreet Perspective

Lets face it, the Civil War was written by a group of masterful deceivers, cloaked in the false pretense of being eyewitnesses, and brandishing weapons of hate and self aggrandizement.  Led by one of the few Generals ever relieved by Robert E. Lee, Jubal Early pre-meditated a campaign to cement the South’s version of the history of the Civil War. With a collection of lies through the Southern Historical Society (SHS) (with the assistance of a band of members) the group successfully fought to relieve the South of its guilt in losing the war.  The Society’s cover up and skewing of the events and results of the war is still difficult for Southerners to reject.  Unfortunately, the emotional subjectivity of the history fuels its persistent legacy that proves difficult to revise.  The Society built its case on the back of James Longstreet military career which robbed the U.S. military of important lessons that led to the reinvention of his innovative methods of battlefield tactics in later wars.   Serious consequences of the acceptance of this false history delayed the acceptance of African Americans as equal citizens for more than another hundred years.  Northerners who accepted this false history in order to make amends with Southerners are as culpable of this crime against humanity as much as the SHS. PowerPoint presentation/lecture. 

Jubal Early’s Raid: The Threat That Never Was

Although Gen. Lew Wallace is hailed as the man who saved Washington, we Jubal Early really a serious threat?  Join Susan Rosenvold to discuss Early’s Raid from a different perspective.  Discover Washington’s fortifications and how the Federal Government protected itself from Confederate invasion.  Explore the Confederate’s purpose in threatening the Nation’s Capital and it’s ability to do so. PowerPoint presentation.