Over the past few semesters, I've really enjoyed chatting with students about my book. If you're assigning it this fall, first, thank you! And second, schedule permitting, I'd be delighted to Zoom into your class and discuss it.
Robert Colby
@rkdcolby86.bsky.social
Historian at the University of Mississippi. Author of An Unholy Traffic: Slave Trading in the Civil War South (OUP, 2024).
Less than 3 weeks remain to submit or nominate a book for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! First books on Civil War history are welcome! Deadline is Friday, 2/20. @scwhistorians.bsky.social @shearites.bsky.social @joursouhist.bsky.social @shgape.bsky.social
Robert Colby@rkdcolby86.bsky.social · 8mo agoCivil War historians! If you published your first book in 2025 on a topic related to the Civil War (broadly construed), please consider submitting it for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! The deadline is Friday, February 20. olemiss.edu/civil-war-re...
Less than 3 weeks remain to submit or nominate a book for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! First books on Civil War history are welcome! Deadline is Friday, 2/20. @scwhistorians.bsky.social @shearites.bsky.social @joursouhist.bsky.social @shgape.bsky.social
Robert Colby@rkdcolby86.bsky.social · 8mo agoCivil War historians! If you published your first book in 2025 on a topic related to the Civil War (broadly construed), please consider submitting it for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! The deadline is Friday, February 20. olemiss.edu/civil-war-re...
Civil War historians! If you published your first book in 2025 on a topic related to the Civil War (broadly construed), please consider submitting it for the Center for Civil War Research's Wiley-Silver Prize! The deadline is Friday, February 20. olemiss.edu/civil-war-re...
Wiley-Silver Prize | Ole Miss
olemiss.edu
Excited to be back at the Boston Athenaeum for more research on book #2. Thankful for the support of a Loring Fellowship in conducting this work.
Many thanks to Carrie Janney, Brian Neumann, and the @naucivilwar.bsky.social for hosting me this weekend to accept the 2025 Nau Book Prize. I was especially honored as an alum of the UVA History Department have my work recognized where it all began.
Very pleased to have my @oxfordacademic.bsky.social book, An Unholy Traffic, reviewed in the latest issue of the New York Review of Books. Thanks to James Oakes for taking the time to engage with it!
The New York Review of Books@nybooks.com · 10mo agoJames Oakes on the South’s attempts to maintain the domestic slave trade during the Civil War
Very pleased to have my book, An Unholy Traffic, reviewed in the latest issue of the New York Review of Books. Thanks to James Oakes for taking the time to engage with it! www.nybooks.com/articles/202...
Speculation in Human Property | James Oakes
The survival of slave trading during the Civil War suggests that enslaved people remained valuable commodities in a time of economic upheaval.
nybooks.com
Thanks to friends and colleagues who helped promote my first book, Counting the Cost of Freedom! (Especially those here, where I don't post much.) @kringelberg.bsky.social @archiecrowley.bsky.social @gauthamrao.bsky.social @rkdcolby86.bsky.social
Getting ready for my Readings in the Civil War Era class. Excited to dive into some great books this semester with my grad students.
Fantastic resource for historians: a spreadsheet of NARA's digitized microfilm, with links to the files in the Archives catalog. May it help you as much as it has helped me. www.archives.gov/files/colleg...
archives.gov
NERFC roadtrip stop #4: the New Hampshire Historical Society.
NERFC Fellowship stop #3: the Maine Historical Society.
Day 2 of my NERFC roadtrip: looking for breadcrumbs in Dartmouth College's stunning Rauner Library.
Check out the call for papers for the 2026 Society of Civil War Historians Conference (Richmond, June 18-20)! If you're not sure where to start, you can find the panel builder tool and connect with others looking to submit. Deadline is 9/15! scwh.memberclicks.net/biennial-con...
Conference
Conferences
scwh.memberclicks.net
Stop one on my New England Regional Fellowship Consortium road trip: Williams College's Chapin Library. Gorgeous day to be in Western Massachusetts!
First time at the Boston Athenaeum, and it's hard to imagine a more beautiful place in which to do research. Grateful for the support of a Loring Fellowship allowing me to do so.
Thrilled to be kicking off my time this morning as the Suzanne and Caleb Loring Research Fellow @mhs1791.bsky.social!
NARA informing historians they can't park directly at Archives II anymore:
Had a wonderful weekend in Columbus, MS at the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters banquet. Honored to have received the 2025 prize for nonfiction! @oxfordacademic.bsky.social
Had a wonderful weekend in Columbus, MS at the Mississippi Institute of Arts and Letters banquet. Honored to have received the 2025 prize for nonfiction! @oxfordacademic.bsky.social
The front cover is complete -- with a fantastic blurb from @rkdcolby86.bsky.social! "Deeply moving, sometimes shocking, and sure to provoke deep reflection..."
Deadline approaching this Friday, June 6! Please consider submitting!
Robert Colby@rkdcolby86.bsky.social · last yr.Our deadline is coming up this Friday (6/6)! It's going to be a great conference, featuring a keynote from @arielagross.bsky.social and conversation with @gauthamrao.bsky.social, Anne Twitty, and Cynthia Nicoletti. Please apply, and please share! @jcwe.bsky.social @joursouhist.bsky.social
Our deadline is coming up this Friday (6/6)! It's going to be a great conference, featuring a keynote from @arielagross.bsky.social and conversation with @gauthamrao.bsky.social, Anne Twitty, and Cynthia Nicoletti. Please apply, and please share! @jcwe.bsky.social @joursouhist.bsky.social
Robert Colby@rkdcolby86.bsky.social · last yr.One week remains to submit for the Center for Civil War Research's 2025 conference, "New Directions in the Legal History of the Civil War Era," happening in Oxford, MS Oct. 16-18. Details below; please share! @jcwe.bsky.social @joursouhist.bsky.social @historians.org olemiss.edu/civil-war-re...