Southern Indiana Civil War Roundtable

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In Memoriam: William Powell “Bill” Hale (1944–2025)

The Southern Indiana Civil War Roundtable mourns the passing of our long-time member and past president, William Powell “Bill” Hale. Bill died on September 4, 2025, at the age of 81, following a brief illness.

Bill was born on July 22, 1944, in Olney, Maryland, the son of the late William P. Jr. and Alice Rebecca (Fletcher) Hale. After graduating from Oak Ridge High School in Tennessee, he pursued higher education at Transylvania University, East Tennessee State University, and later earned a master’s degree from Ball State University. He dedicated more than three decades to education with the Franklin County Community School Corporation, where he taught science, history, and geography, shaping the lives of countless students.

Bill joined the Roundtable many years ago, and his knowledge, energy, and leadership enriched our community. As past president, he worked tirelessly to promote historical understanding and foster fellowship among members. Beyond scholarship, Bill was an active Civil War reenactor, bringing history to life for new generations.

Together with his late wife, Gretchen, Bill traveled widely—47 states and six continents—embracing a spirit of curiosity and adventure that also animated his love of history. He was deeply rooted in Franklin County, where he lived for more than 50 years, and he remained active in his church, professional associations, and community life.

Bill is survived by his children, Stephen Hale of Norfolk, Virginia, and LeAnna Matsey of Lawrenceburg, Indiana; his siblings, Bruce Hale of Clinton, Tennessee, and Barbara Hale Brooks of Atlanta, Georgia; as well as many friends, colleagues, and fellow history enthusiasts.

We will remember Bill for his dedication to learning, his generosity of spirit, and his passion for preserving the lessons of the past. The Roundtable extends its deepest condolences to his family. His absence will be keenly felt, but his legacy endures in the lives he touched and the history he so loved.

A celebration of life will be held on Saturday, October 11, 2025, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. at Boundless Ways of Grace Church in Metamora, Indiana.

January 2023 Program

Joshua Claybourn

Our meeting on January 19, 2023, at 7:00 p.m. will feature Joshua Claybourn on “Abe’s Youth.” Abraham Lincoln spent a quarter of his life—from 1816 to 1830, ages 7 to 21—learning and growing in southwestern Indiana. Despite the importance of these formative years, Lincoln rarely discussed this period, and with his sudden, untimely death in 1865, mysterious gaps appear in recorded history. In a new book titled Abraham Lincoln’s Wilderness Years, Claybourn collects and annotates the most significant scholarship from J. Edward Murr, one of the few writers to cover this lost period of Lincoln’s life. A Hoosier minister who grew up with the 16th president’s cousins, Murr interviewed locals who knew Lincoln and his environment. Of all Lincoln’s biographers, few knew his boyhood associates and Indiana environment as well as Murr, whose complete Lincoln research and scholarship have never been published—until now.

Joshua Claybourn is an attorney and author or editor of several books, including Abe’s Youth and Our American Story. He serves on the board of directors of both the Abraham Lincoln Association and Abraham Lincoln Institute and is host of the Lincoln Log podcast. Claybourn frequently serves as a featured speaker on Abraham Lincoln and the American Civil War. He lives in Evansville, Indiana.

Spring 2022 Programs

Our program on April 21, 2022, will feature a video from the Gary Gallagher series. The first is The Background to Emancipation and the second is Emancipation Completed.

Our next program on May 19, 2022, will be provided by SICWRT member Greg Briggs and is titled “The Cumberland River: Avenue for Middle Tennessee and the Civil War.” The river system of mid-America carried people and commerce across the nation. Flatboats and later steamboats greatly expanded America. The coming of the railroads added to this expansion as well as big increases in commerce. The Cumberland River in Tennessee was not only an avenue of commerce but also one of invasion. In 1862, the Federals would advance up this river taking forts and cities, including Nashville. Later, the river would be a vital part of the Union supply line for the fighting not only in Tennessee but also Alabama and Georgia. This program teaches the history of water commerce as well as the expansion of railroads and how both played into the Civil War in Tennessee for both sides.

Our meeting scheduled for June 16, 2022, will provided by SICWRT member Carol Hancock and will cover the book Lincoln’s Team of Rivals.

January 2020 Program

The Southern Indiana Civil War Roundtable’s upcoming program on January 16th will begin at 7:00 p.m. at the Evansville Fraternal Order of Police (801 Court St, Evansville, IN 47708). It will feature author Eric Sprouls presenting on “Civil War Battlefield Preservation — History, Failures and Successes.”

The presentation will address development of the American Battlefield Trust and the preservation movement with pictures of successes and failures. Mr. Sprouls is an associate professor of engineering at the University of Southern Indiana and a member of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, Foster Camp.

July Program

The Southern Indiana Civil War Roundtable’s upcoming program on July 18th will begin at 7:00 p.m. at the Evansville Fraternal Order of Police (801 Court St, Evansville, IN 47708). It will feature John Cashon presenting on “Paducah, Kentucky, and Jackson Purchase During the Civil War.”

John Cashon is an author, historian, and photographer from Paducah, Kentucky. He authored the book Paducah and the Civil War, released on 10 October 2016. Cashon serves as a docent for the Lloyd Tilghman House and Civil War Museum in Paducah and is the historian of the Sons of Confederate Veterans Paducah Camp 1495. He received his bachelor’s degree in history at Murray State University. His work appears in the Jackson Purchase Historical Society Journal and on his website, Reflecting on History.

Morgan’s Great Raid

October 16th’s meeting will feature David Mowery’s presentation titled “Morgan’s Great Raid: Taking the War to the North.” David, a native resident of Cincinnati, has penned a book on this topic. He takes a new look at this unprecedented event in American history, one historians rank among the world’s greatest land-based raids since Elizabethan times. Click here for more details.