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Radio War Nerd EP #618 — US Civil War, Pt. 21: Early's Raid On Washington DC (Patreon)

Published:
2026-07-04 17:23:55
Imported:
2026-07
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Content

Recorded: July 2, 2026

The War Nerd resumes his US Civil War series to recount perhaps the Union's most embarrassing episode of the war, when, in summer 1864, Confederate crank Jubal Early almost took Washington DC.

Check out the RWN US Civil War collection

Maps & Images*Early's roundabout raid route on DC

*Battle of Monocasy

*Union Gen. David "This Combover Runs" Hunter

Total time: 1:01:46Direct link to this episode's mp3 here

*

Buy & review John Dolan's new book, They Should Have Been Hanged: War Nerd Essays on the U.S. Civil War

Subscribe to Radio War Nerd at patreon.com/radiowarnerd

Sound production by Telescope Audio

Files

Comments

William

Bring. Back. Ocean. Liners. For John’s sake!

Kamran Husain

a lot of the democrats today seem to admire the bipartisan generals who didn’t care who won the war

Isaac Suárez

Great episode! I will say this much about Sigel, he could, at least, load a cannon (and he could sometimes be inspiring to his men.) Aside from that, he was not much of an officer.

drizzly_november

Please no, John would find a way to get shipwrecked and wind up recording the show from a barren rock in the sea.

Cameron Young

Best July 4th content one could ask for

drizzly_november

It’d be cool to have William Hogeland back on to talk the 250th fizzling out like this. He was the best part of the honestly quite good Ken Burns’ Revolution series.

Miko

I flew to Hawaii from the US west coast and I think it took close to 8 hours. By hour 6 over open sea you appreciate how far Hawaii is from the mainland. I cannot imagine the slog to New Zealand. Hawaii would probably seem like a fun day trip excursion than an international flight going BEYOND Australia.

Michael Ehrenreich

IF YOU DONT DO AN EPISODE ON GRANT’S OVERLAND CAMPAIGN I WILL DIE

Maggie+Al

On the question of moving the, if your Lincoln and your eastern armies command is lousy with copperheads defeatists and cowards do you want to give them the increased autonomy that would flows from withdrawal to Philadelphia. By staying close he could keep political control without needing to resort to more overt systems of supervision (representatives on mission commissars and the like)

Ian H

@31 mins that gambler's all-in tendency of Grant's is the subject of one of the best Sherman quotes "I am a damned sight smarter man than Grant. I know more about military history, strategy, and grand tactics than he does. I know more about supply, administration, and everything else than he does. I'll tell you where he beats me though and where he beats the world. He doesn't give a damn about what the enemy does out of his sight, but it scares me like hell"

etienne

few episodes late on that but I was so enamored with the Motorbike Guys from earlier, it's kind of obnoxious but it's so much more honorable and chivalric than the American equivalent which is to get a lifted truck that makes smoke on purpose

Terry Dunk

Re why a shitty commander would want the job anyway, I think it's very difficult to overstate or, from our postmodern vantage point, appreciate the degree to which notions of honor, masculinity, duty, ego, etc structured a person's entire world view at the time. I mean, a century later, men were still falling over themselves to get into positions of responsibility in WWII, devil may cry.

etienne

it's like if the 200th had been organized by Richard M. Nixon personally

Martin

I have ~16 hours in the car lined up for the weekend so I’m looking forward to mainlining the RWN civil war series. Ty RWN crew

Andrew S

Thank you for this episode. Monocacy looms large in my imagination. In retreat Maj. Harry Gilmor raided my specific Baltimore suburb. (Where he is also from) basically just causing chaos up and down the rail line/arterial road for a day. He stopped in and saw his parents in the process and fought with his pro union neighbors, one of which shot a confederate soldier in the face and managed to run away. After the war.. baltimore made Gilmor police commissioner (of course) but he died young of his war wounds. His families house is now under a reservoir. I think about all of this way too much. I really love to think about how unpleasant the political division of Maryland must have been in open civil war. There was a definite phenomenon of just trying to lay low and stay out of it, but the families that did actively take sides… I’m sure they would choose the same sides today.

Jerry McKenzie

I remember the Bicentennial. Graduated high school in ‘76 and everyone got a medallion with a red, white, & blue ribbon to hang around our necks during the graduation ceremonies.