Tragedy at city's arsenal

In the blistering June sun, the superintendent of the Washington Arsenal, Thomas B. Brown, thoughtlessly set out to dry three pans of his special "Red Star" signal flare pellets in a little-used space behind a former storage building. These fireworks and his carelessness would kill 21 young women.

Battle that inspired a song

At the 1863 Northwestern Sanitary Fair in Chicago, the public saw a few fragments of the battle flag of the 19th Illinois Volunteer Infantry. On these fragments, the words "Who'll Save the Left" were still legible.