On June 25, 26 and 27 the Charles Town Library, Jefferson County Historical Society and the Historic Shepherdstown Commission will offer a workshop entitled “Jefferson County and the Civil War, 1862.” The workshop will explore what happened in Jefferson County during the second year of the American Civil War. Topics and locations will be different each day.

The workshop is open to the public, but all participants must register for one, two or all three days. Each session (8:30 a.m. to 3 p.m) will be free with the exception of a modest entrance fee to Harpers Ferry National Park on June 27.

To register, contact Donna Northouse at dnorthouse@gmail.com or 304-876-8177. Please provide name, contact information, days of attendance, and, if attendee is a teacher. If so, include school and subject/grade taught. Attendance is limited and will be on a first-come, first-served basis.

Teachers in the Jefferson County Schools will earn staff development credit for attending any or all of the sessions. Teaching materials will be provided.

The focus of the June 25 session at Charles Town Library and the Jefferson County Museum will be on 1862 in Charles Town. The day will include talks on Civil War relics and researching local ancestors. On June 26, at the Entler Hotel and Museum, Shepherdstown, speakers will discuss the Battle of Antietam and its aftermath in Shepherdstown and the surrounding counties. The June 27 session will focus on Harpers Ferry during 1862. Participants will meet at the Charles Town Library at 8:30 and carpool to Harpers Ferry for a tour and discussion led by the Chief Historian of Harpers Ferry National Park.

Partial funding for the workshop is being provided by the Arts and Humanities Alliance of Jefferson County.

Speakers at the Charles Town Library session will be Jefferson County historian Doug Perks, Civil War historian Jim Glymph, genealogy expert Don Watts, and historian and author Steve French, who will be signing his book Imboden’s Brigade in the Gettysburg Campaign.

The speakers at Shepherdstown will be Ted Alexander, chief historian of Antietam Battlefield and author of The Battle of Antietam: The Bloodiest Day; Terry Reimer, director of research at the National Museum of Civil War Medicine and author of One Vast Hospital; author/historian James Tent, and Shepherdstown historian and artist/craftsman Dan Tokar. Terry Reimer and Ted Alexander will be signing their books.

At Harpers Ferry National Park, Chief Historian Dennis Frye will give the talk and tour. His new book Harpers Ferry Under Fire: A Border Town in the American Civil War is available in the park’s bookstore.