Battle Hymn of the Republic appears on the cover of The Atlantic Monthly.

The poem was written in the Willard Hotel in Washington, D.C. by Julia Ward Howe the day after she visited an Army encampment with a party led by Massachusetts Gov. John A. Andrew on November 18, 1861. After hearing the men sing “John Brown’s Body,” Rev. James Freeman Clarke suggested, “Mrs. Howe, why do you not write some good words for that stirring tune?” Atlantic editor James Fields suggested the title for the song, which is first performed in public soon after at the Plymouth Church in Framingham. The song becomes a favorite of President Abraham Lincoln and is subsequently described as the Union Anthem of the Civil War.