Commercial Tours Being Lined Up to Mark Civil War Anniversary

Alexander Gardner took 70 photographs of the Antietam battlefield within two days of the historic battle. This one depicts a soldier looking upon a Union soldier's grave with the body of a Confederate soldier seemingly tossed aside.

With the 150th anniversary of the launch of the Civil War in the offing, tour operators are lining up to explain the conflict to visitors of such parks as Antietam National Battlefield and Gettysburg National Military Park.

A glimpse of some of the offerings by The Associated Press shows pricing ranges from $50 for a two-hour tour of Antietam, where 23,000 soldiers either died, were wounded, or went missing after 12 hours of battle on September 17, 1862, to $950 (not including lodging or meals) for a multi-day bus tour of Civil War sites with insights provided by scholars such as James McPherson, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his 1988 book, "Battle Cry of Freedom."

To learn about some of the other offerings, check out this story.