About the Center
Civil War history lives at Virginia Tech.
Part of Virginia Tech’s History Department, the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies promotes greater understanding of the Civil War era among academics and the public. Whether you’re a student or a professional historian, a serious history buff or someone who just likes to learn, we have something to offer you.
First announced in March of 1999, the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies is a legacy of Virginia Tech’s Dr. James I. “Bud” Robertson. Prior to arriving at Virginia Tech, Dr. Robertson was already widely recognized, as he had worked with Presidents Kennedy and Johnson as the Executive Director of the Civil War Centennial Commission. He arrived at Virginia Tech in 1967, where his Civil War history class attracted students from a variety of fields. Inspired by Dr. Robertson’s success, Virginia Tech decided to establish a Civil War Center dedicated to education and book and document preservation. The Center also continued programs which Dr. Robertson had established long before, including the annual “Civil War Weekend” conference.
The Center is part of Virginia Tech’s history department. While originally housed in Major Williams Hall, The Center moved to Lane Hall in 2024.
In 2000, William C. “Jack” Davis came to Virginia Tech to serve as the Center’s Director of Programs. Together, they expanded the Center’s offerings to include a great range of programs, including lectures, digital learning projects, book series, documentaries, and graduate scholarships. After Dr. Robertson retired in 2011, Davis led the center until his own retirement in 2013. Today, the Center is run by Dr. Paul Quigley. Under his direction, it continues to provide scholarships and fellowships and sponsors a variety of public and academic programs throughout the year.
Our scholarship and fellowship programs are shaping the future of Civil War history, attracting talented MA students, postdoctoral fellows, and researchers to Virginia Tech. The center also sponsors international conferences on cutting-edge themes such as citizenship and postwar reconciliation.
We bring the best of Civil War history to public audiences in Blacksburg and beyond. The popular Civil War Film Series screens movies old and new, providing opportunities to discuss their historical contexts with expert speakers. Our annual Civil War Weekend attracts alumni and other history lovers to Blacksburg to hear from some of the best Civil War speakers around. And lectures throughout the year explore Civil War history in its many dimensions, from military history to the war’s international impact, from women’s experiences during the war to the lasting legacies of Reconstruction. Please visit our Events page to learn more about events like these or subscribe to our mailing list (see drop down below) to receive updates on upcoming events straight to your email.
We are also proud to bring history into classrooms throughout Montgomery, Giles, and Roanoke Counties with our Traveling Trunk of Civil War History. The Trunk contains historic artifacts and objects of the Civil War, including clothing, tools, images, and other objects that bring Civil War history to life for young audiences. We also offer the Civil War Driving Tour of Southwest Virginia for people of all ages, allowing both residents and visitors a means of discovering our area’s history.
The center is also bringing Civil War history into the digital age. Online projects include the Essential Civil War Curriculum, a free encyclopedia of all things Civil War; a crowdsourced digital archive revealing the many ways nineteenth-century Americans celebrated the Fourth of July; and Civil War Sources, a guide to the many collections of digitized primary sources available online. Please visit our Programs and Projects page to learn more about all of these projects, as well as many more!
At the interface of academic and public history, the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies is dedicated to fostering creative new conversations about America’s defining conflict.
Paul Quigley is Director of the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies and the James I. Robertson, Jr. Associate Professor of Civil War History in the History Department at Virginia Tech. He also serves as the Director of Virginia Tech’s Center for Humanities. Originally from Manchester, England, he holds degrees from Lancaster University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Quigley is the author of Shifting Grounds: Nationalism and the American South, 1848-65, which won awards from the British Association for American Studies, the American Civil War Museum, and Phi Beta Kappa. His work has appeared in journals such as the Journal of Southern History and Journal of the Civil War Era, as well as the Roanoke Times, the Richmond Times-Dispatch, the Washington Post, and the New York Times Disunion section. He edited a volume of essays entitled The Civil War and the Transformation of American Citizenship, and coedited another essay collection, Reconciliation after Civil Wars: Global Perspectives. His study of Preston Brooks, the South Carolina Congressman who achieved notoriety by caning Senator Charles Sumner on the floor of the Senate in 1856, is under contract with Oxford University Press. Quigley also leads the NEH-funded project “Experiencing Civil War History Through Augmented Reality: Soldiers, Civilians, and the Environment at Pamplin Historical Park.”
Quigley serves on the editorial board of the journal Civil War History, and has previously served on the advisory boards of the American Civil War Museum in Richmond and the Society of Civil War Historians.
You may reach Quigley at pquigley@vt.edu.
Rachel Stanley is the Program Coordinator for the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies. Rachel is from Mechanicsville, VA and earned her B.A. in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. As Program Coordinator, Rachel maintains the center website and social media, organizes the Traveling Trunk elementary school outreach program and works on event planning for the center. Contact Rachel at rcstanley@vt.edu
Miles Abernethy is an outreach assistant with the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies and a graduate student in the Virginia Tech History M.A. program. He earned his B.A. in History and Political Science from Virginia Tech in 2023, and worked for the VCCWS as an undergraduate. As a graduate assistant, he continues his work at the VCCWS as well as at Virginia Tech’s Special Collections and University Archives. Miles’ research centers on how white Southerners wrote and discussed “marginal” peoples within the Confederate military: Indigenous troops and soldiers with foreign origins. Miles interned at Fredericksburg & Spotsylvania NMP and Appomattox Court House NHP, and interned with Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation in Summer 2024. He is planning for a career in Civil War era public history.
Madison Smith is a Graduate Research Assistant with the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies and a graduate student in the Virginia Tech History M.A. program. She earned her B.A. in History with a Classics Concentration from Roanoke College in 2024. As a graduate assistant for the VCCWS, she is primarily involved with the Pamplin AR project; integrating Augmented Reality at various spots within the Pamplin Historical Park in Petersburg, VA to enhance visitor’s understanding of Civil War era history. For the M.A. program, Madison’s overall research focuses on East Asian perspectives of race and racism in the Jim Crow South through sources such as diaries and personal writings. She is planning to pursue a PhD in either History or International Relations.
Previous Directors
William C. “Jack” Davis is the author or editor of more than 50 books in Civil War and Southern history. He retired in 2013 as Executive Director of the Virginia Center for Civil War Studies. His latest book, coedited with Sue Heth Bell, is The Whartons’ War: The Civil War Correspondence of General Gabriel C. Wharton & Anne Radford Wharton, 1863-1865. Among his awards are a record fourth Jefferson Davis Award from the American Civil War Museum and the Richard Nelson Current Award from the Lincoln Forum.
James I. “Bud” Robertson, Jr., 1930-2019, was Alumni Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Founding Director of the Center. The Danville, Va., native served as executive director of the U.S. Civil War Centennial Commission and played a leading role in Virginia’s Sesquicentennial of the American Civil War Commission.
Robertson was the author or editor of more than 40 books. His biography of Gen. Thomas Jonathan Jackson, Stonewall Jackson: The Man, The Soldier, The Legend, won eight national awards and was used as the foundation for the portrayal of Jackson in the Ted Turner/Warner Bros. film, Gods and Generals, released in 2003. He regularly appeared in Civil War programs on the Arts & Entertainment Network, the History Channel, C-Span, and public television, and he recorded a weekly Civil War program that aired on 11 public radio stations. He was also a lecturer of national acclaim and one of the most popular teachers in the history of Virginia Tech, attracting some 300 students each semester to his Civil War course.