Edited by author 03-05-2002 01:15 PM
Hi All.

Welcome to the online discussion forum for the American Civil War. You should consider this space a debate forum, a useful corrective for the instructor, a chance to follow up on classroom conversations, and an ongoing review session. I will read your postings each day but will not intervene in the conversation. See the syllabus for specific posting requirements.


**My Short Bio**
I was born in Ithaca, New York, in the Finger Lakes region of the rural upstate. My
mother is from Raleigh, North Carolina and my late father was from Olney,
Maryland. They came north to attend Cornell University and never left. I did my
graduate work at the University of Virginia. While there I met my wife, Vicki, who is
from Waynesboro, Virginia. We have a son, Josh, who is a senior in high school. We
have a mutt named Lincoln and a golden retriever named Grant, along with a cat
named "Zeke Benson." I am currently finishing a collection of documents on the
 caning of Sumner incident. My musical tastes lean towards the acoustic, including reggae, country, blues, and bluegrass, with a seasoning of classical. Dr. Rasmussen in Psychology and I have started running regularly, with the plan of completing a marathon in late 2002 or early 2003. I like to crack jokes but if I don't get enough sleep I can be blunt and sarcastic. I really like my job, my colleagues, Furman students, and the weekend. I have been to Gettysburg at least two dozen times and have visited most of the important battlefields on the east coast.

My name is Rusty Lee. I was born and have always lived in Hartsville, South Carolina. My mom is a legal secretary, and my dad is retired on disability. Ever since AP US History in high school, I have been interested in both the American Revolution and the Civil War. I intend to double major in history and either political science or philosophy. I believe that this class will help shed light on what my 8th grade teacher called "The War Between the States". These 12 weeks should definitely take us deeper into the conflict, making us able to see it as more than the typical "Southerners fighting for slavery" cliche-esque notion. I am looking forward to the challenge.

hi - My name is Ali. I'm a junior history major. I have 2 brothers named Max and Ben who are 13 and 15, so for spring break I went home to see them cause I miss them bunches! I also have a twin sister named jenny who also goes to Furman, so don't be embarassed if you get us mixed up - it happens 20 times everyday! After taking 2 European history classes last term, I realized how much I enjoyed American history, so i'm excited about the class. I also love music and theatre, especially musical theatre, and I'm a long distance runner - I haven't run any marathons yet, but my sister and I run half-marathons together! I have two jobs on campus too that keep me busy, but I'm still thinking about auditioning for a play this month, so cross your fingers for me!

My name is Matthew Heathman. I was born in Albany, GA, lived in Texas for 16 years and now reside in Augusta, GA. I have a younger brother who is a sophomore in high school. As for pets we have 3 cats. For spring break I went to Atlanta to see family the first weekend and then went home and had a week of relaxation. I'm a sophomore history major and considering doubling in philosophy. Some time early on I became a fan of the Civil War and on our travels from Texas to GA in the summer we'd stop by as many Civil War sites as possible. I've always wanted to visit Gettysburg, but I've been unable to make it up there. I am really looking forward to this class to learn more about the Civil War, it is one of my favorite periods of history.

My name is Kelly Morrow. I'm a sophomore and I'm from Conway, South Carolina(it's near Myrtle Beach!). I enjoy music(I play the violin. Orchestra concert Thursday night!), tennis, antique shopping, and crafty Martha Stewarty stuff. I've always enjoyed history and I need to declare it as my major sometime soon! I'm particularly interested in American history, especially the civil war. Gone with the Wind is by far my favorite movie even though it is kind of long! I read the civil war book Cold Mountain by Charles Fraser recently and really enjoyed it because it takes place in western North Carolina where most of my family is from. I'm excited about this class and hope to learn much more about the civil war time period.

Hi, my name is Shannon Roe and I am a sophomore from Ashland, KY (it's pretty small, and WAY up in the northeastern corner, where KY, OH, and WV come together). I am planning on double-majoring in PoliSci and History, though I haven't declared either one just yet. Being from Kentucky, regional differences have always interested me; no one knows what do with you when you're from Kentucky--the northern people think you're southern, the southern people think you're northern, or, as one South Carolina native explained it to me, "Kentucky is the most confused state I've ever seen--the people speak with southern accents, but drink UNsweetened tea." As for the Civil War, it is really interesting to me that my AP US History teacher in high school (in NORTHeastern Kentucky, mind you)felt the need to stress to us that the war wasn't JUST about slavery, but since coming to Furman, I have been told by more than one person, "No matter what anyone tries to tell you about the motivations of the confederacy, slavery WAS involved." At any rate, I am really looking forward to this class because I know there is so much I don't know about the conflict, and I can't wait to find out about it.

Hi, my name is Neal Collins. I am a sophomore majoring in political science and french. I am from nearby Easley, South Carolina. Despite my accent, I spent four to five years of my life in Massachusetts and can relate to the plural thoughts on the Civil War. However, if I could name my own dog, it would be Longstreet. I am more excited about this class than any other at Furman.

Hi,I'm Stephanie Gunter. I was born in Pusan, South Korea, but I was adopted at four and a half months old and have lived in Gainesville, GA ever since. I'm a sophomore and I'm double majoring in history and communications. I started dancing when I was 3 and I'm currently taking dance classes and helping teach at the dance studio by Publix. I'm also on FUSAB and I'm in rehearsal for A Midsummer Night's Dream so I'm pretty busy right now! I'm very excited about this class because the Civil War has always interested me. I think that the sectional differences that led to the war are interesting because there are so many factors that contributed to this war. I also agree that the Civil War is one of the few wars that people still feel strongly about which makes it unique in that aspect. I'm looking forward to learning more about this time period.

Hello, I'm Sara LaBerge. I was born in Kansas City, MO, but have resided in Eden Prairie, MN (suburb of Minneapolis) for 11 years. Yes, I have been to the Mall of America. I am a sophomore, history major; I transferred here at the beginning of the school year from a small liberal arts college in eastern Wisconsin. Ever since my father moved down south 10 years ago, he has taken me to a lot of places like Fort Sumter, Monticello, Ash-Lawn Highland, Montpelier, Appomattox, Bull Run, Gettysburg, etc. My mother has taken me to lots of historical places in the Midwest, like Wounded Knee, Deadwood, Little Big Horn, etc. Visiting these places and getting to know my family's genealogy has helped fire my interest in our Nation's history. I'm interested in learning about the Civil War in another geographically (and culturally) different part of our country, and getting to know how other's think about the war. I have heard it called "The War of Northern Agression." Ha ha. I guess in this class we'll see about that.

Hey Im Jonathan Poehlman. This is my second class with Dr. Benson and I am looking forward to the issues and complexities that we will be dealing with. Growing up in the mountains of North Georgia, you can believe that I dealt with all sorts of sterotypes dealing with the Civil War. I hope that this class will be effective in debunking some of the myths that have always been part of Southern folklore.
I am currently reading the Killer Angels Trilogy by Jeff and Micheal Shaara. I am almost done with Gods and Generals and I am anticipating reading The Killer Angels. The third book is The Last Full Measure if anyone is interested. Looking forward to a good spring.
                                          Jonathan

Hey y'all! My name is Janna DeLoach and I am a sophomore history (and english??) major. Like Poehlman, this is my second class with Dr. Benson, and I am so excited about it! The US history classes I have taken so far have contained minimal discussion about the Civil War and I think it will be interesting to discuss this relatively small era for the entire term. Having grown up in south Georgia (Statesboro, to be exact...), I feel like I have been exposed to the "aftermath" of the Civil War a great deal ("The South Will Rise Again" bumperstickers and t-shirts, Confederate flags, etc.). I look forward to discussing why the Civil War has made such an impact on so many individuals when events (like World War I?) do not seem to affect anyone's life on a daily basis...

My name is Matt Lynn and I was born and raised in South Carolina. I live in Columbia, presently, but have spent a great deal of my childhood in rural South Carolina. I have heard stories and read letters from relatives who fought in the war since before I can remember. I hope this class will shed light on differing perspectives, that one can imagine my sometimes conservative, pro- south grandparents left out when teaching me about it. I am a history major and am highly interested in studying the Civil War era, because as many have said previously it affects our daily lives in many profound ways.

Yo, yo, yo my name is Thomas Jordan, and I'm from Birmingjam, AL. Right now I'm a sophomore religion major. The civil war fascinates me and I can't wait to take this course. It's gonna be off the hook ya'll. I've had some exposure to the hard core neo-confederate culture that some of you mentioned, mostly through my relatives, so I'm really looking forward to Confederates in the Attic, which figures to be an interesting look at this phenomenon. I'm also very interested in the methods and motivations of different Civil War officers; there were some intriguing characters on both sides to be sure. Anyway, here's looking forward to a closer look at the War between the States this term.

P.S. Is this message thing rad or what ???

Hello my name is Eric Gray and I am a sophmore. I live in in Portland, Maine where I enjoy playing golf and hockey. I am involved in WFTV and I am the social chair in my fraternity. I came down here to the south so that I could escape the cold and nasty weather that Maine has in the winter. I am a political science major but enjoy the history of the United States as well. I have a special interest in the Civil War and that time period before and after the war. I am looking forward to the class and hearing the many different opinions and views from other classmates that live in various parts of the United States.

Hi. My name is Mike Davis. I have lived in Alpharetta, Georgia all my life. My family has deep roots in the south. I am a sophomore History and Art double major. I am primarily interested in European history. I choose to take Civil War history because I feel that it is a very interesting time in American History, and it is something that I know very little about. The majority of what I hear about the Civil war is that it was over Slavery, while my relatives say that it is over states rights and that slavery plays a minor role. I am interested in seeing what were the motivations for this war. I am also looking forward to the reconstruction era. I know that Georgians hated this time in history. In fact, since the end of reconstruction there has never been a Republican governor of Georgia nor have Republicans controlled either of the state houses.

Hi, my name is Michael Barry and i'm a sophmore. I live in Hendersonville, North Carolina. I'm not entirely sure how i became accepted at this institute of higher learner, and will probably never figure that question out. But, until someone calls my bluff i'll continue the fake parade i put on. I was originally born in connetticut and moved down to hendersonville when i was five. i became interested in the civil war through my grandfather who was what one would call a "buff" of the subject. i enjoy the war aspect of history more than any other part. The concepts of war are much more entertaining. the blood and guts just make for better stories.

Whats up everyone. I'm Alex Willard a sophmore from the small town of Mableton, Georgia (if you're ever been to Six Flags that's our claim to fame). I'm involved in FUSAB and Greek life enjoy event planning, like concerts. I've grown up and gone to school in Atlanta for most of my life so I've seen both the backwoods, gone toting, confederate flag flying rednecks and I've also seen alot of transplanted Yankees. So for me it will be interesting to study about how the Civil War was and is still such a big deal in American History. I'm a history major and for me one of the best parts of history is seeing how it all fits together.

My name is David Vendt. I am a junior religion and probably history major. I am from Rockville Md. which is a suberb of Washington DC. I play lacrosse and play the guitar when I can. I am really interested in the civil war. I guess it was taught to me a lot as I was younger and I grew up visiting Gettysburg. Other history majors tell me that it is so unimportant but I still have such an interest in it. I am really excited for this class and I hope that the next time I go to Gettysburg or any other battlefield, it will be a more meaningful experience.

My name is James Cash and I am a sophomore. I live in Wilson, North Carolina, confused many times with the center of the universe. Both my mother's and fathers's ancestors were involved in the Civil War, but especially my mother's side. One of her ancestors was a high ranking officer in the Confederate Army of Tennessee, however he was killed in the Battle of Missionary Ridge. I am looking forward to hearing various perspectives on the Civil War, since I my entire life I have only been exposed to Confederate propaganda from my biased southern relatives.

I'm Sean McCann from Durham, NC. I'm a soph, probably majoring in history and poly sci, but it depends on how this term goes. I don't know much about the war, but I think the class will be great. I live near Bennet Place, but never really cared until this year, so I hope this class will peak some interest. Thats about it.

Hey! My name is Elizabeth Griffin and I'm from a little area in the "sticks" known as Landrum, SC... otherwise referred to as Blue Ridge. I grew up on a small farm and enjoy the outdoors, especially horseback riding. I am a sophomore and a history major. American history has always fascinated me, especially the late 19th century. I know that I have various ancestors who fought in the Civil War, but I would have to due further family research to know the details of their involvement. I am interested in gaining a deeper understanding of Civil War society and the forces that drove the thoughts and decisions of major figures of this time. My knowledge base of the Civil War era is based on limited study and general impressions I have gained throughout my life. I am excited to take a more intricate look at what this time period was really like, and glean a better understanding of how this era fits in with the broader scheme of American history.

my name is nicholas iglowski and i'm from columbia,sc. i'm a sophomore and a recently declared asian studies and history major. i was born and raised in the north but i have lived in sc for quite some time now. i consider it my home. i know very little about the civil war (other than the fact that a lot of people around here seem to refer to it as the war of nothern aggression) but i recognize the importance of it in our society. it is seeminly still an important issue with many people and i'm interested in learning more about the subject. causes, results, and all the deeper implications this war had to offer should not be forgotten.

Hi everyone, my name's Chris Brantingham and I'm from Thousand Oaks, California. I grew up most of my life there until middle school when I moved to South Africa. I came back to California in my senior year and then the next year started going to Furman. I plan to major in political science and history, but haven't declared yet. The Civil War hasn't really had the same place in the psyche of California that it has in South Carolina, so I've not really grown up hearing strong opinions on it. I've not read much on it outside of my school text books, but I do find it a very interesting topic and one that I can't wait to learn more about.

My name is Andy Atkins, and I'm a senior history major from Columbia, SC. As I was reading some of the comments made so far about past experiences with Civil War history, I was struck by an odd memory of my own. Once, when I was young, my family and I visited a small church and cemetery in Hopkins, SC. Relatives of mine are buried there, and I'd been there a time or two before I'm sure. This time, however, I noticed that a few of the graves had small Confederate flags placed in front of them. My little brain was puzzled: why would anyone care to put tiny flags by the graves, especially when these people have been pushing up daisies for a long time? Or, why do people dress up in uncomfortable uniforms and stage battles? Or, why do staunch Confederate flag supporters support the Confederate flag so staunchly? I find it interesting that the Civil War is both a complex scholarly topic and, for some people, a part of everyday life. I suspect this course will show us why.

Hello, I'm Austin Chapman, a history major from Saluda, SC, so far taking my second history class (not counting Western civ). The one I took before this one was History 21 last term with Dr. Benson. I don't really have much experience with things pertaining to the Civil War, but my family does have a couple of artifacts (a canteen with my great great uncle's name on it, and a rusty sword from another Confederate officer in the family). As for the course itself, I think it will be very interesting, because I've never really thought about the Civil War, its causes, and its effects and significance in any real depth before. I hope to end the term with a better knowledge of the Civil War.

Hello all. My name is Megan Ayers and I am from Essex, Vermont. I was born in Charleston, SC and lived in two differnt towns in Florida too before we moved to Vermont right before 8th grade. I've definitely had my fair share of being called both a Yankee and a Southerner. As one of my friends put it, I'm just confused. I am a history major and really looking forward to this class. I know a little about the Civil War, but not a whole lot. I guess that's about it.

My name is Matt Reagan and I'm a senior history/Spanish major. I'm from the Isle of Palms/Sullivan's Island, SC, and I currently reside in Mount Pleasant(all in the Charleston area). I have grown up around southern pride and often proclaimed regrets about the results of the Civil War, but I have never understood how people can take such pride in what appears to be, in many ways, a shameful past. I also see that many of the men in my life whom I consider role models, or even heroes, have a deep admiration for the great southern generals of the War, especially Robert E. Lee. I am eager to learn of their character,racial stance, and how the issue of race impacted teir lives.

Hello. My name is Kenneth Hamner, and I'm a junior history/political science major. I spent 18 years of my life just south of Atlanta, Georgia, in a town called Peachtree City. Everybody there drives golf carts. For example, if you want to go to the supermarket, you take the golf cart. They even have parking spaces for them. Peachtree City is right by Jonesboro, Georgia, and according to the book Gone With The Wind, that's where Tara was suppose to be. I've always been interested in Southern history, so taking a Civil War class seemed to be a pretty logical choice. I'm excited about what we're going to read and learn, and I look forward to everything this class has to offer. That's it. The end.

What's up all? You can see my name on the sidehatch. I was born in Winston Salem, North Carolina and I moved to Nantucket Island, Massachusetts when I was a wee lad still bouncing on my pop's knee. My middle name is Herndon, which was passed down to me through many southern generations. My Great-Great-Grandfather James Matthew Herndon fought right next to ol' General Lee himself. As you can tell by my middle name, I have been instilled with Southern values, even living as far North as I do. All my family lives below the Mason-Dixon line and I pretty much spent half my life there, so I don't consider myself a yank or a reb. All I know is that where my Grandparents used to live before they passed away, the townfolk do not concede defeat. They don't believe the South lost the war and they have their muskets loaded for round two. Either way, I can see why both sides would want to protect what they believed was right. I look forward to learning about the war so I can shoot down the arguments for both sides. Peace

Hello. My name is Ryan Potter. I have lived in Greenville all my life. I came to Furman to play golf, so the location was pretty convenient. I am involved with golf and a fraternity. I am majoring in history. I've been very interested in the Civil War ever since I visited Gettsyburg about seven years ago. I got to take a Civil War course in high school. I'm interested in learning more about the time period.

Edited by author 03-06-2002 10:30 PM
I guess I'll start things off for the circle group. . .
I guess the primary focus of what we've covered in the readings so far is the very complex question of what could cause a group of people who, objectively, shared so much in common (religion, language, belief in republican government, etc.), and who less than a century earlier had been, in at least a general term, united on the same side of another tremendous conflict, to develop into what both sides ultimately recognized as two fundamentally different camps. In the absence of a common enemy, since their break from the British crown, all sections of the new nation had been allowed to develop basically as they wished, brought about in no small part by the liberal ideas inherent in the national founding. I would say, then, that economic development (based in geography, climate, etc.), had at base created two different ways of life, and with that, ultimately different wants and needs. When Southerners argued, as we saw in the documents, for their superior way of life, compared with the demoralizing industrialization of the northern idea of "free society," it is not easy for anyone to deny that they were right in thinking they had developed a pretty nice way of life for themselves (especially factoring in the horrible tales mucrakers would show us regarding factory life). But the northerners (or abolitionists) were not wholly incorrect (though I'm sure this opinion was based in their "money-grubbing" ways) to insist that, from an economic standpoint, slavery didn't necessarily make sense, and that the arguments for its continuation were often based heavily in mere tradition (though one could note that this is often a justification used to support all sorts of issues). Maybe the important thing to consider, though, was that there were basically no simple answers, in a conflict where many things classically thought of as unifiers were just as easily turned around and used to create division.

A technical note. By default, you can only get to the Randall article on JSTOR from the Furman campus network. There is a section on the library pages (library.furman.edu) that tells you how to enable a "proxy server" to get to JSTOR from off-campus. Let me know if you have problems. The library also has the original journal on microfilm, if that suits you better.

Salutations! I need to introduce myself before I add to the "circle" commentary on the readings, hence:
I'm a senior history major from Bristol, Tennessee -- in Sullivan County, the only pro-Confederate county in eastern Tennessee. Civil War ancestor: my great-great-great-grandfather, a Confederate "missionary" (i.e., a Presbyterian chaplain) who escaped to Bristol after his unit was broken up -- as the war in Tennessee didn't go so well for the CSA -- and was eventually pardoned by President Andrew Johnson. In my "youth" before college, I was a serious Civil War history buff, but since then I've drifted into older stuff (the later Roman empire). I still enjoy the "hobby" aspect of the war, however, and I'd be happy to discuss the nuances of the terrain at Antietam or the trajectory of a 20-pounder Parrott rifled cannon ... In all seriousness, though, I look forward to hearing different opinions and learning from our varied knowledge of the Civil War.

Edited by author 03-07-2002 12:28 AM
First of all, I want to start off by saying that I thought it was interesting to hear the perspectives about the Civil War in class today. I think many ideas about the Civil War are influenced by a person's background and where he or she grew up. The readings for today provided a nice mix of opinions about sectional differences. I was especially impressed by James McPherson's article on the differences between the North and South. I agree with McPherson when he says "the South has possessed a separate and unique identity...which appeared to be out of the mainstream of American experience". I think that almost everyone has an image or idea that pops into their heads when they think about southern states during the antebellum period. I know I always thought about hoop skirts and plantation houses with wide porches. I think that these ideas have been influenced by popular cultural representations(for example, the Fourth of July laser show at Stone Mtn., GA). The antebellum North really does not have a strong cultural identity like southern states and I think that is the reason people always consider the latter to be the exception. McPherson does a good job of detailing the differences. Furthermore, he raises an interesting point at the end of his essay that points to the northern states as the exception. I had never really thought of things this way, but I can see how the progression of the northern region contributed to the conflicts. It is also notable that most European countries closely mirrored the southern region during that time. Up until this point, I had always thought of the southern states as being the exceptional region, but I think McPherson's argument has validity.

The first passage on how slavery harms the South was very interesting in the way it contrasted the differences between slavery and free labor. The passage pointed out how in almost every category, free labor is much cheaper and more efficient for the plantation owners. It seems pure stubbornness and fear of change that prevents the owners from switching to this type of labor. The articles on Southern Lassitude and the South’s Lack of Material Progress show some of the many differences between the individuals and societies of the north and south. I found it ironic that southerners were described as “content with being”, yet they obviously were not content when they seceded.
Another passage that I found very interesting was the explanation for why Nonslaveholders Should Support Slavery. This article first off assumed that all the non-slaveholders in the south wanted to be slaveholder, so that assumption in itself fueled half of the argument. It further claimed that slavery supported the non-slaveholder and provided them better jobs and economy. What it failed to mention was the exploitation and abuse of over half the state in order to achieve this betterment of life.

I would like to start this first day of postings by disscussing the Randall article. I have always known about the horrible things that took place in this war of a split nation. But I have never truely grasped the how bad things really were. When one thinks of a war, they think of death and gore. We always picture these deaths coming by way of bullets and cannons, when in fact, poor medical and sanitized living conditions undoubtably can be attributed to hundreds of thousands of deaths. This aspect of the civil war, is truely one of the greatest tragedies of the war. I have always imagined that the confederate army was far less superior to the union army. Randall makes reference to the fact that in actuallity, the union army was poorly assembled, and badly administrated by its inexperienced leaders. Shannon is right by saying that much of the policies and rhetoric used in the hopes of unifying, were just as easily turned into points of division. This war was inevidable. There were just to many fronts of causation, and too much crookedness on both sides.

Dave's points on the Randall article are well-taken; the realities of warfare were far from gallant and picturesque. Randall also reminds us that the "robber barons" of the Gilded Age got their start in the Civil War (selling U.S. war bonds, among other things); the "Union" seems "united" only in its self-interest. Yet I think Randall overplays the disorganization and poor leadership of the Federal armies; I cite the Union Army of the Tennessee's campaign to seize the Mississippi River as an example of a well-conducted, long-term operation that consistently defeated its Confederate opponents. I think Randall is too focused on the "Eastern Theater" and the Army of the Potomac.
Going further, Randall ventures into weighing causation of the war, and he states that just as in the American Revolution, "minorities" of the population brought the Civil War about. He then discredits single-event causes such as Lincoln's election. He has already discounted culture as a determining factor in the decision to take sides. I appreciate his sophistication in ruling out "simple causes," but might culture and politics be the underpinnings of his "real causes": "emotional unreason and overbold leadership"? I would contend that Randall neglects the "links" in causation by which the sequence/combination of cultural bias, economic self-interest, and a flashpoint (e.g., Sumter) might ALL cause a Southern individual/state to go to war.
In closing, I was struck by Randall's use of language from other historical periods to describe events and motivations in the Civil War period; most striking to me was his footnote about the U.S. search for "Lebenraum." I must admit that I had not compared the sectional hunger for Western land to Hitler's ideological desire to expand the Third Reich, though the juxtaposition is valuable in some ways: there is a common displacement/elimination of "subhuman" native peoples, establishment of new cultures in conquered territory, and the vision of manifest destiny. Randall makes some fascinatingly broad assertions about the Civil War that beg for discussion or critique when one looks at the specifics.

Randall is a popular fellow. Three posts in a row about him. What a guy.

I think this article is a fine way to start the course, in part because it discusses some of what we are already starting to see, that the Civil War is far more complex than many people realize. As others have mentioned, he criticizes the myth that the Civil War was a romantic and noble period. He goes further to describe the prevalence of dual-natured propaganda, and how people in the various sections viewed major events, often quite differently than what one might assume. For these and other of Randall's explanations, I think this article fits nicely with where this course is going, as a way to debunk some of our commonly held views about the Civil War.

As Craig has already said, Randall delves into the causes of the Civil War. I too appreciate the fact that Randall rules out the simple explanations for the war. He demphasizes broad generalizations concerning political and economic causes of the war, such as nationalism or the desire for economic advantage. However, I do not think he ignores the "links" between causes at all.

Randall places a great deal of emphasis on the Civil War generation itself: the morals, values and mindset of the people of the "sixties". This, I think, is the glue that holds his argument about causation together, the "link" between a variety of broad and specific explanations for the Civil War. Boiling causation down to simple explanations or events, such as economics, the election of Lincoln, or Sumter, are, at best, incomplete causes in Randall's view. However, Randall argues that the "emotional unresaon and overbold leadership" of the Civil War generation could be that which allows a combination of these factors to serve as an explanation for the war.

In chemistry, is water not the universal solvent, or universal something (I haven't taken a chemistry course since high school)? One might say that the mindset, fanaticism, and politics of the Civil War generation is Randall's solvent, into which a variety of broad and specific factors dissolve to explain the Civil War. Or maybe I'm just mixing metaphors.

FYI -- Group Assignments:

Circle
Atkins, Caldwell, Deloach, Gunter, Jordan, McCann, Roe, Mathews

Shamrock
Ayers, Chapman, Gray, Hamner, LaBerge, Michelsen, Soder, Potter

Diamond
Barry, Collins, Griffin, Heathman, Lee, Morrow, Vendt, Poehlman

Triangle
Brantingham, Davis, Gunn, Iglowski, Lynn, Reagan, Willard, Cash

(I may have inadvertently missed someone. Check the roster sheet if you are unsure.)

Edited by author 03-07-2002 11:44 AM
Tomorrow in class we will see a table of leading sectionalists and the per household value of manufacturing in their communities. If you would like to get a preview of the information it is available at http://history.furman.edu/~benson/civwar/manudwelling1850.htm.

I apologize for the lateness of this first posting...it's been quite a day...
So first off I'd like to comment on what Sean said about the Southern population's "fear of change." Fall term I wrote a pretty in-depth research paper about women in the Confederacy during the Civil War and throughout my research I kept coming back to this hypothesis about the "fear of change" in the southern states. It is interesting to think that perhaps southerners were not as "for" slavery as they were "against" change and challenges to tradition and the lives that they were used to...
The first chapter of the MAJOR PROBLEMS book addresses southern ideology--or what was thought to be southern ideology--several times. Olmstead and Helper criticize southerners for their contentment despite lack of progress, while Hammond and Fitzhugh praise southerners for nearly the same thing (according to Hammond and Fitzhugh, "progress" causes mobs, trade unions, strikes, and a greater gap between rich and poor). It wasn't necessarily that southerners were unaware of their lagging progress; perhaps they were aware, and quite comfortable, with where they were.
Also, as I mentioned before, the southerners (Fitzhugh)criticized the great gap existing between rich and poor in the northern states. Interestingly, chapter one of THE CRISIS OF THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC theorizes that the smaller "gap" that existed in the Confederacy was the result of racism. In order to ensure the support of poor citizens for institutions (like slavery) which offered them no personal benefits, "aristocratic" southerners had to create a common bond with them. This common bond became one of white superiority; both aristocratic and poor southerners were united simply because of their race. Issues of wealth were kept secondary so that aristocrats could maintain their traditional lifestyle.

Hi all. The posts on the Randall article are pretty interesting. It really does show the war’s horror, and I agree with Atkins in saying that it’s a good article to kick the course off. With that being said, I’d like to change the topic a little bit and discuss the website for the Valley of the Shadow Project.

Upon first glance, the website for the Valley of the Shadow Project looks pretty impressive. It’s comprehensive in the way it presents its Civil War-era primary documents (diaries, newspapers, various records, etc.). Looking at the newspaper section, it’s good to see that the website provides a number of different newspapers within the Virginia valley (Valley Spirit, Staunton Spectator, Franklin Repository and Transcript, and Stanton Vindicator) as they all exemplify a number of issues we’ve discussed in class. For example, it shows the fear of rebellion attitudes people in the Repository and Transcript on February 1,1860 in the picture at the bottom of the webpage (http://jefferson.village.Virginia.EDU/vsha.../repository1-2.html). When the paper asks who unsettled Virginia, it lists the answer as John Brown, a white male infamous for organizing a slave rebellion.

While the website recognizes how Virginian newspapers exemplified and perpetuated themes we’ve discussed in class, I’m glad to see that the website included articles from several major national and regional newspapers. Articles from the New York Tribune and the Baltimore American show the attitudes of businessmen, abolitionists, and political scientists, but in my opinion this section of the website doesn’t compliment the themes and views brought up by the Virginia valley newspapers. Perhaps it’s just a lack of research or a lack of material (my guess is a lack of material), but it’s difficult to compare articles to each other on certain issues (fear of rebellion for example). However, I’m still glad to see the website incorporated these articles as the primary sources still serve a purpose to us understanding the attitudes going into the war.

The public records section shows how methodical yet untrustful valley residents were towards free blacks. The register for free blacks shows that not all blacks were slaves, but they still kept an eye on them. Perhaps it was to just document which blacks were free or which blacks weren’t, but I have a feeling there was another purpose to these records considering the views whites had of blacks. It’s just an idea, but I’d be interested to hear what other people have to say about this issue.

I think it’s a good thing we’re reading primary documents from the Valley of the Shadow Project. It not only helps us understand the materials we’ve read in class, but it affords us the opportunity to analyze class themes from primary documents. Yeah to that.

In investigating the Valley of the Shadow project, I paid special attention to the slavery/racial-related articles in the newspapers and the statistics on the slaveowners in Augusta County, VA, from the Census of 1860. Like Kenneth, I was impressed with the extent of the information included in the project. After looking through several of the newspaper articles, I discovered that the attitudes toward slavery were similar to the various ideas we discussed in class. In most of the articles I looked at, the misdeeds of blacks were reported to a larger extent than those of whites. There was one exception I found, though. That's the article "The Late Slave Murder Case" in the October 16, 1860, issue of The Spectator; it relays the story of a white slaveowner convicted of brutally whipping one of his female slaves to death while she was tied firmly to a tree. The man was sentenced to 18 years in prison, and the judge said that he would consider freeing the man if he were to sincerely repent after serving his term. But despite the judge's appropriate sentence, he does not fail to emphasize the purpose of the trail, that purpose being to show the North that the South was not as barbaric as most Northerners thought.

It should not be surprising that the general attitude of the time and place was one that advocated the superiority of the white race over the black race. In addition to this, many whites believed that slavery was something that should not be taken away from them. One article in The Spectator ("A Sensible Negro") even praises a slave woman who voluntarily returned to a condition of slavery after she had been freed by her master.

Overall, I think the Valley of the Shadow project gives us a good supply of mid nineteenth century Virginian viewpoints about slavery, politics, and economy, and the project can be used to better understand the ideas of that time and place and the context in which they occurred.

In looking through the website, Valley of the Shadow project established by the University of Virginia, I have found many interesting points and pieces of information that have helped me learn and understand the happenings of the Civil War. The Valley of the Shadow project explains the story of the Civil War through the eyes of two different communties. The communities are Franklin County of Pennsylvania and Augusta County of Virginia. They are seperated by the Mason-Dixon line which gives the reader two different perspectives of the war. Throughout the website, internet users are able to check public records, which provides imoportant information on population, taxes, and you are also able to chech records on free blacks and slaveowners for Augusta County. The website also explains events leading up to the Civil War and gives accounts of soldiers feelings and emotions told through their diaries. The Newspaper section allows the internet user to read actuall articles written at that time, which were very explicit to say the least. Finally, internet users are able to read about the churches druing the civil war, read files on each soldier who fought in the civil war that lived in either Franklin of Augusta County, and observe maps and pictures of that era. In response to Austin Chapman's view on the slavery/racial-related articles found in the newspaper section in the website, I agree that black problems and "misdeeds" were elaborated and discussed more. Through explicit language written in the newspapers, internet users are able to feel the intense and dramatic feeloings and emotion felt by the people towards the black community. One piece of information that I found very interesting was the explaining of events on that dreadful day when the Civil War started. In the Valley of the Shadow project website, they illustrate that the firing at Fort Sumter was beacuse the confederates felt threatened as Lincoln sent a ship to resupply the territory. Licoln told the confederates that the ship was for humanitarian reasons and that it was unarmed but the Conderates took the "bait" and fired at 4:30 a.m. by Edmund Ruffin. I thought this was interesting because I was taught, just last term in military science class, that the start of the Civil War was an accidental shot fired and things snowballed from that. Consequently, I have learned important information from this website and I believe that the Valley of the Shadow Project will help the class and myslef out by supplying important details and perspectives that will enrich are learning experience.

The Valley of the Shadow project gives very in depth and detailed information about the Civil War, focusing on Augusta and Franklin counties. Augusta county is in Virginia, while Franklin is in Pennsylvania. Since they are on opposite sides of the Mason-Dixon Line, the reader gets two different perspectives. I liked the maps and atlas that showed the area of the valley. When looking at the website, I concentrated most on the newspapers. It concentrated on the newspapers from Augusta and Franklin, but also included regional and national papers to provide a context for the local news, The site only indexed national events that touched directly on Augusta and Franklin counties. Along with articles from different regions, articles about different political parties(Democratic, Republican, and Whig) were included. I think that Austin brought up a good point in his message. While looking over the articles, I found it was true that blacks crimes were treated more severely and reported more often. Another sectionin the website showed letters with issues that concerned everyone. These gave different perspectives from both whites and blacks. The public records section were made up of federal, county, and city governments records. They give a census(taken in 1860 and 1870) of the population, manufacturing, and agriculture. It also gave records of slaves and freed blacks. The most interesting part of the site for me was the military records. This section comprised a file for each solider from Augusta and Franklin counties. In this section the reader could search for a specific person, or search for who was wounded at the Battle of Gettysburg. I was very suprised at the amount of information that this website offered. I think it will help us relate to the in class discussions.

I found The Valley of the Shadow very interesting, and it held for me just as much insight, if not more than, as an American History text book... probably because we are viewing and reading historical documents themselves. The information and media from two counties on different sides of the Mason-Dixon provides a distinct portrayal of the two counties' citizens, from all classes and walks of life, and their lives during the oncoming war.
Although the newspapers and records were fascinating to read (especially in comparison to today's crises in the headlines), I must admit I spent most of my time reading the letters from citizens of Augusta and Franklin counties. For me they give a more personal side to the eve of the war that I understand better than just plain, cut and paste numbers and facts. Reading a letter from a slave woman to her husband begging him to talk to his master about buying her before her own master sells her causes one to feel the shackles of slavery, and what it did to families. The papers of Alexander H. H. Stuart and Edward McPherson discuss personal political views as well as direct news from Washington (two letters from even President Millard Fillmore discussing the south and "her" future). One letter in particular in Edward McPherson's papers struck me as being key to the question of compromise before the war (To Edward McPherson from A. K. McClure, Chambersburg December 14, 1860).
Other letters were just as fascinating, such as a young man writing to his father about trying to avoid joining the Confederate Army, and a preacher's account of the Battle of Gettysburg. I suppose I appreciate the voices and personal encounteres of the war than printed text, although text is no less important, because it provides "a different kind of pair of shoes to walk in," and experience.
Praise to the Valley of the Shadow project for giving access to varities of media to offer many perspectives on a confusing, yet extremely important and interesting topic in our nation's history.

Personally, when I first logged onto the Valley of The ShadowProject wensite, I was overwhelmed with the amount of information, and did not know where to start, so I gook the guided tour. First I went into the tax records where I learned about each county and their tax differences. Both states had a real estate tax with assigned balues to lots, but the Pennsylvania collectors distinghished between lots with buildings and open lots. It was interesting to see the amount of tax paid by each county and the tax rates between the two places.
     Looking at old copies of newspapers was pretty cool and thdterminint the party affiliation of each newspaper gave insight into the angle of the stories and the biases involved. The Valley Spirit from Pennsylvania was democratic. The founders of the Staunton Spectator followed the whig party and therefore related to whig issues. The articles were hard to decipher, but the summaries shed light on a background of each newspaper. Newspapers outside of each place also shed light on outside opinions concerning the war and the experiences and opinions of each place. The reference section detailed the events taking place in the few years preceeding the Civil War including John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry and the thoughts of the counties involved in the website. Other topics discussed were party conventions, Lincoln's election, the secession and finally, the beginning of the war. Like Eric, I think the start of the war was an interesting section to concentrate on. Citizens from Augusta County were pro Union but joined the Confederate side after deciding that Lincoln's reasons for war were unreasonable. Their counterparts, Franklin County expressed a die hard commitment to the Union.
    To truly get a good feel for the sight, I think days would need to be spent going over the myriad of facts and maps which are included. The sight does a good job encompassing many aspects of the war and the events which eventually led to it's beginning.

I am a person who really enjoys learing in other ways besides just reading in a text book, so the The Valley of the Shadow project website is right up my alley. I really enjoyed reading some of the letters and diaries from both Augusta and Franklin Counties. I think it is often forgotten that all of these events that we talk and learn about happened with real people, very much like you and I today. The people that played out this important time in our history really do just be come characters in a story. The website with the writings from these real players, some pictures, different newspaper articles, etc helps to put back into perspective the fact that we are dealing with people who eat, drink, and sleep much like we do today.

One interesting note. Under the military listings I put both my last name and my mother's maiden name to see if anything came up. And sure enough I got a total of 4 people from those two searches. That is really interesting to me because I enjoy having some personal connection to history and at least now I can pretend I have one.

I am really looking forward to the different things we are doing in class. I love that it feels like it's going to be a hand's on approach. I just wish we could take some time to go around and look at different civil war sites.

As the sole blemish on the otherwise spotless and shining archetype of responsible, enthusiastic, timely, and otherwise exemplary academic discourse provided by the circle group last week, I humbly beg all of you to return briefly to last thursday's discussion as Dr. Benson has graciously allowed me to post my two cents retroactively. Specifically, I would like to comment on Randall's "blundering generation" article.

At a loss to find any other relevance to his argument, I assume that the opening commentary on the atrocity of war and its contrast to any romantic recount of war's events was intended as a analogical segue to his categorical rejection of economic, cultural, and political issues traditionally held to be the underlying causes of the war in favor of a more realistic, more historically responsible (to Randall) view of causation. The suggestion seems to be that discussion of causation in terms of "broad national urges" should be left to novelists, while a more sophisticated historical in*uiry which cuts through the faulty economics and rampant political and moral generalization commonly used to characterize "northern" and "southern" motivations and positions is the proper domain of the scholar.

Randall's most precise statement of his own argument is probably, "If one word or phrase were selected to account for the war, that word would not be slavery, or state-rights, or diverse civilizations. It would have to be such a word as fanatacism (on both sides), or misunderstanding, or perhaps politics." This argument has merit, but at first reading, Randall seems to err in his substitution of fanatacism etc. for his rejected causes. In hindsight, it could certainly be said of any conflict that these things were its ultimate causes, but fanaticism must have an object, a misunderstanding cannot occur over nothing, and even the most politically obscured issues are still issues. However inflated by propaganda, however twisted for political purposes, however historically over-generalized, the economic and political grievances between the North and South were not entirely fictional and they had a great deal to do with the coming of the civil war. To say that fanaticism rather than slavery or state-rights was the cause of the war is to ignore the fact that it is over such issues which the fanaticism leading to war arises. It would be more accurate to cite the cultural differences between the North and South as a source of Randall's "misunderstanding" than to reject or downplay these differences as causes of the war.

It might be said that Randall's argument is not that such differences did not exist, but that they did not necessitate conflict and therefore were not the causes of the war. What conflict in history was truly necessary in the sense that it could not have been avoided by some degree of compromise? Maybe slavery, state-rights, and unionism should not have lead to war, but the point is it that they were chief among the issues that stirred (or were used to stir) men's hearts and minds to a fanaticism and resolution of war caliber. As Craig pointed out earlier, these issues were the "underpinnings" of Randall's "emotional unreason and overbold leadership". Why these issues, in this place and time, when at other places and times, more legitimate grievances have not lead to armed conflict? Now this is a uestion for historical investigation. The socio-political mechanisms that manufacture wars are mysterious indeed. Randall makes a good argument, but it would be better if it more accurately reflected the relationship between the over-emphasized, over-generalized traditionally recognized causes of the war and the fanatical attitudes and irreconcilable sectional hatred and misunderstanding they produced.

*My ole keyboard no longer produces the letter between p and r, so please imagine it where necessary.

     The four sources to read continue to represent a multitude of views on specific issues. CAR in pages 38-56 continue the history of the prelude to the war from 1820-1854. These dates, bookended by the Missouri Compromise and the Kansas-Nebraska bill, show the escalation of threats. CAR mentions the Missouri Compromise, Texan independence, the Mexican War, Compromise of 1850, and the Kansas-Nebraska bill. CAR also outlines the four political solutions for the Mexican cession.
     CAR pointed out something I never thought about as to the Missouri Compromise. Why would the slaveholding South agree to the terms of it? The Louisiana Territory was an upside down triangle which means the North would have more opportunities to create Free States. Unless, however, expansion could logically occur. This is why Southerners agreed.
     The Preston Brooks reading related Brooks' concern and issues over the Kansas-Nebraska situation. I thought Brooks delivered some valuable issues and insight into slaveholders' thinking. However, there were some poor evaluations on his part. His belief that foreigners are now (1854) a great danger to America's liberties and institutions is not convincing especially with his other belief that former foreigners made America. Brooks also mentioned the "imaginary sufferings of slavery" (ha) and the "inferiority and dependence" by slaves to a "superior race". Brooks continued with his most persuasive argument to keep true to the principles of the Constitution.
     The Boston Riot article gave a different perspective to CAR concerning the Fugitive Slave Law. The article mentions mobs, the disregard of Constitution and law, and the hypocrisy of Charles Sumner by describing the inteference of the Boston public contrasted with the Burns affair (p53) in CAR. CAR describes the inteference more objectively by not mentioning principles, laws, or emotion but the historical importance and impact of the event.
     Finally, in the Major Problems reading, Independent Democrats write a persuasive response to the Kansas-Nebraska bill. Justice, the Constitution, and liberty were brought up on the side of non-slaveholders this time. The Missouri Compromise, argued the Independent Democrats, should be the ruling law on the matter of Kansas territory. The second reading by Sen. Stephen Douglas is an explanation of his Kansas-Nebraska bill. Douglas, like the Independent Democrats, uses the Constitution as proof on his side. Douglas believed in the fundamental principle of self-government and Congress has no authority to do any other than what his bill tries to construct.

     The seeds of Antebellum discontent are steadily growing--before our eyes--into a flower of threats, paranoia, and unwavering fervor. One could argue it ironic that the expansion of this great nation, the attempt to broaden its boundaries and magnify its fruitfulness, is the very process that led to internal combustion. The acquisitions from both the Lousiana Purchase and Mexican War carried with them an unseen stigma--the status of slavery within their future statehooded borders. Henry Clay's Missouri Compromise presented itself as a monumental step towards future reconciliations regarding the "peculiar institution". However, the Mexican War, and more notbaly the political ascention of Stephen Douglas, would later challenege Clay's revered legislation. Stephen Douglas, as far as I can understand him, reminds me of several Southern Conservatives that live on my hall. He was interwoven with fabrics of personal choice and immersed in waters of state's rights. He unequivocable believed that settlers in new states had the right to decide slavery's future there. I agree with Guelzo on the point that Douglas was severely naive in his view of future settlers. He incorrectly envisioned perfect compromise and failed to consider "...other ways of achieveing majorities than gradual and painless ones." One could possibly deem this a misjudgment of human tendencies on the part of Douglas. He simply failed to realize that the presence of inherent choice lends itself to selfishness and greed on the part of opposing sides. Pro-slavery types and abolitionist/anti-slavery types cannot reasonably be expected to enter a new tract of land in an orderly manner and set up bona fide legislatures (made up of equal representation) in the hope of solving the slavery problem. Conversely, each side is naturally going to crowd the land and "set up shop" before their opponents can blink. Bravo to Guelzo on his analysis of this matter.
     On another note, I would also like to commend Guelzos commentary on the word "threat". This opinion parallels my own views concerning the various Antebellum crises. To borrow classmate Matt Reagan's phrase, the entire ordeal seemed to consist of "bark and no bite". Rather, it was the fear, maybe even the perception of impending (or unavoidable) bite, that led to the ardent stands taken by both Whigs and Southern Democrats. Anyhow, a great number of people felt very strongly about their particular opinions, and they were unwilling to budge on crux issues. In a sense, the existence of opposing views was as detrimental as would have been the presence of material conflict and concrete cases of violence, etc. More accurately stated, the bark was effective enough so as not to need a bite.
     In closing, I would like to agree with Thomas with regard to his comments concerning slavery and political issues. Though I have been exposed to many theories on the coming of Civil War, one fact stands cemented in my mind: the chief cause of the Civil War was, unarguably, SLAVERY. Sure, other conditions of conflict existed. Nonetheless, slavery--its nature, the very justification for its existence, and its future or lack thereof--led to Union v. Confederacy in the feature bout of the 19th century.

 All our readings for today dealt with slavery, if one had not had any prior reading or knowledge of the Civil War and read what we did, they would believe the Civil War was just about slavery. I have never thought slavery to be the biggest reason behind the Civil War, at least in the opinion of the sucessionist states. I did not think states would dissolve the Union over slavery, but the more I think about it, the more I consider slavery to be a bigger issue. I do not think that slavery in itself is the problem, neither whites in the North or the South cared that much for the black man. There were a very small number of people spread out in all regions of the United States that believed all people are equal, black and white, and those as Dr. Benson said were mainly women. Why do the women support this? It is because with equal rights they believe they will also gain equal rights. The women are pushing for a voice in the government and through that power to make decisions for our country. I see Antebellum America as a place where everyone is looking to get ahead of everyone else, they use whatever issue they can to get themselves more power. It is not slavery itself that is under fire before the war, but the power a region of the country can get from it. With the exceptions of the abolitionists, we do not hear a cry for freeing the slaves, there are no bills brought up on the floor of Congress to get rid of slavery or attempt to modify the Constitution’s stance on slaves. It is the expansion of slavery that is the issue.
 Guelzo quotes David Wilmot of saying “I am jealous of the power of the South.” If a slave state is added to the Union without the addition of a free state the power pendulum would swing to the way of the South and they would be able to implement the policies they see fit. They used the threat of suceesion as a way to get by in Congress, as a way to get compromises, but I do not believe that they really wanted to suceed. The only way to get anything through the House where the Southern states were outnumbered was to threaten the North. Whether slavery was right or wrong was not the issue, it was who would have the power in Congress. Except perhaps the Independent Democrats, they appeal to Christians and Christian ministers whose religion calls for equality to intervene in politics. The Independent Democrats write that the “fundamental maxim of Democracy [is]-EQUAL RIGHTS AND EXACT JUSTICE FOR ALL MEN.” I do believe these men could really care about the slaves, but being politicans they probably look at the whole picture. If slavery is stopped from spreading westward, or ultimately abolished political power would swing to the North. By adding free states the South would become even more outnumbered in the House and also outnumbered in the Senate, the North could easily pass any laws they felt like.
 Through the Missouri Compromise, The Great Compromise of 1850 and the Kansas-Nebraska Act, the North and the South were putting off what was inevitable, a power struggle to see who would control the Union. What we all do get caught up in is the North vs. the South, with the inaction of popular sovereignty for the territories, if the Civil War had been put for a little longer, the sides might not have been as clear as they were. Perhaps slave and free states would have been scattered all through the new territories. So as Dr. Benson said, perhaps calling it the North and the South is not the best idea, because both sides had support in the opposite region.
 I believe that when we stop and say that slavery is the cause of the Civil War we stop too early. In this issue I disagree with Rusty, I would say that the real heart of the matter is not slavery, but what is behind it, the issue of power. In all of history one faction strives to gain power over the another, just in this case the vehicle used to gain that power is slavery.

In our readings for today, I found the speech to Congress by Preston Brooks concerning the Kansas-Nebraska Act to be the most interesting. He obviously discusses the institution of slavery from the slaveholder's standpoint, attempting to justify it in light of the way slavery "benefited" the union. I cannot agree with his sentiments here. However, I think he raises a noteworthy and interesting argument concerning the struggle over this issue which is considered the central and primary cause of the Civil War. He would argue that the two opposing platforms are not in disagreement because slavery is morally wrong-- rather, he would contest that slavery is strictly a politically charged issue that is merely elaborated and publicized using value statements and morality. This is a very important distinction, because it strips away anything that might dilute the truth of this subject's essential nature and forces this matter to be addressed for what it is-- a political struggle between a party favoring egrarian and commercial growth/expansion and one which favors an industrial expansion.
 I feel like I have been taught my entire life to believe that the issue of slavery in the Civil War hinged on a matter of moral consciousness and stubborness. Only recently has it been brought to my attention that the issue of slavery (certainly a key issue for this era), is central because of the political and economic ramifications that slavery might pose to the future of the union. I never realized that slavery was dangerous (beyond it's immediate effect on the slaves themselves), because it would criple the nation in a world that was growing and expanding technologically and industrially.
I also agree from the other readings with Matthew Heathman, when he stated that he thought that all the measures presented by Congress before the war (The Missouri Compromise, The Great Compromise of 1850, and this Kansas-Nebraska Act) only served to postpone or "put off" what was "inevitable" in this power struggle between the Free-Soilers and abolitionist campaigns and those of the slaveholders.

It is surprising to now read about the comming of the Civil War in such a political sense. While the issues that are being debated have to do with slavery, it seems they have nothing to do with the slaves. The Northern states seem not to be the kind of abolitionist heroes that I've always seen them as. The debate seems to be, and this was really brought out in the annexations of Missouri and Maine, that there was already a battle going on. The metaphor of the balance that Guelzo uses was aptly chosen. The North and the South seem to be in a kind of Cold War with each other in the sense that they are trying to stay on top of each other or at least neck and neck.
Perhaps my idea of the Northern states as a slave-liberating army and the war as a war to end slavery was the fact that I was taught the Civil War in Maryland which isn't the epitome of the North but was still different from the South. How was the Civil War taught/viewed in the South?

  I found the CAR's discussion of Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin to be especially interesting. I've never read the book and I found it very helpful that the CAR included a brief synopsis. I agree with the CAR in that it was very important and rather insightful on Stowe's behalf to write the book from the slave's perspective and attack slavery that way rather than directly attack slaveholders as many writers did. This fresh approach gave the reader a first-hand look at just how much slaves really suffered both physically and mentally and most importantly made the reader aware of the realities of slavery.
  I think another reason why the book did so well is that Stowe could relate to slavery and that aided in her writing. The CAR said that Stowe and her sister did not accept the role of "Republican Motherhood" which kept women from freedom much like slaves were kept from freedom. Women were bound to their husbands, they were not able to vote, they could not own land, and the list goes on. Stowe, like the slaves, felt stifled and that is probably why the story "poured out of her pen" into the one outlet that was available to her, writing. The fact that women could relate to slavery is probably why many women were involved in the abolition movement.
  I also found Preston Brooks' speech to be interesting and I had to laugh when he tells the Free-Soilers to come South and observe the "glorious" union between slave and master. He portrays the slave as willing to do anything to uphold his master's family and the master as willing to "peril his life" for his slaves and protect them from "cruelty and injustice." When I read this, I remembered our discussion of this in class and how if slavery is so great and wonderful, why was no one willing to sign up to be Dr. Benson's slave. I find Brooks' arguement to be far fetched and that it could be true only in a slaveholder's dreams. Even then, I can't see a slaveholder willing to "peril his life" for what he saw as a mere posession.

It is apparent that by 1856, after the two violent acts of John Brown and Preston Brooks, that Douglas's motives with the popular sovreignty doctrine embedded in the Compromise of 1850 were not producing the peace they promised. No matter how harsh Senator Sumner's language was in his condemnation of the "Crime against Kansas," the bullying of Mr. Brooks was an uneccessary form of angry fanaticism. It seems that this resulted from a Southern desperation that was setting in by the late 1850's, which Fehrenbacher illustrates very well. He proposes that the sectional crises of 1820, 1833, 1850, and 1856 had all apparently turned out Southern victories, but in actuality culminated to leave the South defeated and ready for secession on the eve of Lincoln's election. The author of this essay proposes that Southern motives to keep the Democrats in power in all branches of government overrode any consessions the South recieved from various compromises. The rejection of the Lecompten Constitution and its political aftermath resulted in the split of the Democratic party, which forshadowed disaster for the Southern states. Southerners labeled Douglas as a traitor and said he was "stained with the dishonor of treachery without a parallel in the political history of the country." The debate over the Lecompten constitution was essentially the final breaking point before the inevitable election of Lincoln in November of 1860. The South was left to grapple directly with Northern views that Southerners were morally inferior, feelings which they had been attempting to abate since the first stirrings of sectional crisis in the early 19th century. Their direct action due to these problems resulted in the decision to secede and form the Confederate States of America in the early spring of 1861. The inevitability of war was weeks away.

I think that the most interesting thing from the reading last night was the idea that has been present in almost all of our reading about the secession movement. That idea is not pro-slavery vs. anti-slavery, or industrial vs. agrarian, but it is mainly the symbolic struggle over what is perceived as the south and the north, and what is perceived as right and wrong. From the reading last night we are confronted with the two big examples of this, “Bleeding Kansas,” and “The Caning.”

The Bleeding Kansas episode shows us just how far the “idea” of the south and north so effected the south that they aggressively pursued something that would in almost no way benefit them. I think that Fehrenbacher makes it seem like a huge and obvious mistake, but I don’t think we can say this without hindsight. I’m sure at the time it seemed like a perfect opportunity to gain new territory for the south so they could hold on to their political stronghold. Kansas did lead to the Republicans gaining power, but I don’t think that the Southerners where thinking this way. Sure they should have realized that their northern democratic friends could have helped out, but what if the political party alignments shifted anyway (without Kansas). Wouldn’t that leave the south at a huge disadvantage if all the remaining territories became free? Even so, I do believe that Kansas caused a huge gap between the North and South. There had been such violence caused by Abolitionists and Slavery supporters that there was huge tension. And what resulted was a growing disassociation of the North and South, with many Northerners switching to the Republican Party.

The Caning was another such incident of perception. It further enraged abolitionists and further solidified slavery supporters. Following all this the Republican Party began to grow in the North on the coattails of Kansas, the Democratic Party split and the propaganda of the caning. These ideological differences were the biggest reason for secession. While I agree with Matt Heathman that this is a power struggle over slavery, I think the most appropriate way to state it is the perceived power struggle over slavery. If you lived in the South your enemy was the North and vice versa, even if in many cases this was not at all the truth.

In the reading, the major events that affected the sectional conflict in the United States were the caning of Senator Sumner by Congressman Brooks, and the heated argument over the Kansas/Nebraska Act. Both of these events had an effect on the regional tension by accomplishing one thing: convincing the moderates in the North to side with the abolitionists and free soilers instead of the Southern Democrats.

The reason the Kansas/Nebraska act drove a wedge between Northern rail-sitters and Democrats in the Southern States was due its unpopular nature. The fact that the act repealed the Missouri Compromise alienated many Northerns, and not just the ones who were leaning toward Republican views, but many Democrats became disillusioned as well, especially when the Stephen Douglas and the Southerns backed the Lecompton Constitution. The elections of 1858 illustrate the Northern backlash against the Democrats, and at the same time show how discontent with the territorial conflict in Kansas drew new members to the fledgling Republican Party.

The reason the Preston/Brooks fight had so much of an effect upon the nation was again because it gave the image of a more radical South, and this in turn made Northern moderates more likely to join up with the abolitionists and Republicans. The editorial from the Louisville Journal in May of 1856 paints the image of a Northern population that is fed up with the Democrats, and especially the Southern Democrats rallied behind Douglas. While these two events are completely separate, and seem minor in their application, their effects not only put strain on the United States, but also added so much sectional tension that they seem to be the final proverbial nails in the coffin.

Wow, only one week since class started an already a huge amount has been said on the Civil War. It makes you wonder how big this thing will be by the time this course is over. Anyway, on to the task at hand.

From the readings and the issues that I've come across so far, I tend to agree with those who have said that struggle was really over power. When you look at "Bleeding Kansas," or any of the territorial disputes it's all about the power. Some might say that the power was needed for the South to defend slavery. But I don't think there was really any danger of slavery being ended where it was already established in the South any time soon.

Slavery was a catalyst issue. Slavery bound the southern states together in an alliance that brought great power for the South in the rest of the Union. Expansion of slavery brought more states into that alliance, but expansion withouth slavery did not necessarily bring states that would fight slavery. Most in the North didn't really want to end it in the South because of that "unholy union between the lords of the loom and the lords of the lash." The South had been the dominant partner in the Union (along with the democratic party), and were worried that they would lose that position. The expansion of slavery was used as a tool to bind new territories into an alliance with the South, and also as a kind of meter by which to judge how much power they had.

There was a kind paranoia on the part of the South when they sensed themselves losing power. Political mis-steps calculated for the purpose of regaining that power merely angered northerners, causing leave their national party, the Democrat party, and join a northern party, the Republican party. Southern and democratic mis-steps were made worse by the opportunity to make martyrs out of people like Charles Sumner. In many of the Republican papers it seems that they talk far more about the inexcusable nature of that act of southern barbarity than about the reasons behind it.

I think that in a very important way, the Civil War's causes were not led up to by South vs. North conflicts, but by South vs. non-South.

I agree with matthew heathman that salvery by itself is not the main cause of slavery, but at the same time i'm not sure power is the sole cause either. I think you have to look further than the politicians and their debates and remember all the citizens in each region and the varying motives they had. I don't think power would have been high on the average person's list of reasons when choosing sides. Politicians have to have support, and the reasons for the varying support of the common citizen is what I find the most interesting. I liked, therefore, Fehrenbacher's essay, b/c it focused not only on what happened but what what happened revealed about the different areas, such as with the struggle over the Kansas Nebraska Bill. i think that this struggle is so crucial in part b/c the poltical psychology does symbolize the psychology of the general population. The Southern victories were symbolic and represented triumph over "moral reproach" - principles and "points of honor" and values as major motivations seem to be a large message of the essay. He points out that crisis's arising in congress could usually be controlled by congress, meaning deeper conflicts were just as crucial to the ensuing conflict. I liked F's idea of the theme of betrayal as an essential to southern feelings of aliention - not to say that i agree wholly with The Blundering Generation, but I do wonder how much propaganda, etc.... influenced or escalated sectional feelings.

very interesting stuff. how the kansas-nebraska act was simply blown out of proportion is interesting in and of itself. the fact that it turned out to be more of an issue of "honor" than anything else leads me to believe Randall's statement that the war was in fact caused by fanaticism and could have been prevented. another interesting fact in the readings was that the south was the majority in the government for quite some time, until they were put backs against the wall. leads me to believe the war was caused by fact that the south wanted to keep their honor intact. when they finally lost douglas, i agree that they were able to be finally united under this one spark and pulled into civil war. something that of course never should have happened.

Maybe it's just me but whenever I think of someone beating up or caning someone whose political views are different from their own I think of countries like Bosnia or Croatia, not the United States. It's crazy to me that Brooks' attacked Sumner at all, much less on the floor of Congress. I've always taken for granted the freedom of free speech as a given that everyone accepts, however I now see that it was not always the case. I can understand, even though I don't condone, Brooks' action in the heat of the moment, but the most unnerving actions were those taken by Brooks' constituents. When Brooks returned to the South he was greeted with a hero's welcome by widespread approval of his action, and even given a few souvenir canes. Yet, the thing which dismayed me the most was that other congressmen condoned his actions.
  One of the interesting things about this event is that had Southern congressmen quickly denounced Brooks' actions, or at least not praised them, Northern people would not have been as outraged as they were. However, when Southerners condoned Brooks', many people in the North had "their eyes opened to the evils of slavery, some even said it was the first step to enslaving the North".The rise of the Republican party can be attributed not soley to this event but it had alot to do with it.
   However, Southern states were determined to get what they wanted from Northern states and would continue to issue ultimatiums to get their way or they would leave the Union. These could be overlooked for a little bit, but after a short while they would cause a great war.

I am a little confused about the more fanatic end of the South and its push for slavery, not popular sovereignty, with the state of Kansas. It is the height of hypocrisy to claim your own desire for nothing more than the supreme right of the state and then call for federal intervention to impose slavery upon another. It shows me that federal vs. state was clearly not the core issue. Then comes the eloquent but pointed speech of Sumner(and in no way deserving of such a harsh beating. Reminds me of Reginald Denny). I'm sure that southern speakers had choice words for their enemies in Congress as well, but such a clear and singled out attack on slavery brought a physical rebuttal and an entire region's support behind it. I don't care how you slice it, whether you call it greed or desire for power or racism, the core of the conflict was slavery. One could make the plug for a common identity as the cause, but even that revolved around the issue of slavery. Even if a person claims that only Congress debated this issue, I can't escape that it was the way of life for southern voters and not for northern voters. There couldn't have been that much disparity between the men on the floor and the men on the plantations.
     Fehrenbacher's article is very thorough and points out some strong causes of conflict,that seem to often go unmentioned, namely the death of the Whigs and the proposition of the Lecompton Bill(which led to an ultimatum).

Douglas' speech impressively beat around the bush by my making no real sense and no real statements but keeping from bashing either side. What a politician.

I agree with Matt (and probably everyone in the class) that Sumner definitely did not deserve the treatment he got, but obviously Brooks felt justified in his actions. I think this whole incident shows the extent to which the nation had split. The Dred Scott case simply expanded the divide. I think everyone knew that by this point there was no possible way to ease the conflict among states. In my opinion, Justice Taney made a serious mistake by trying to settle the slavery question with his decision. I really can't figure out how he thought this would solve things because the abolitionists and northerners would not be expected to back down from the issue especially after witnessing the violent returns of runaway slaves. By attacking the Compromises Taney attempted to make a proslavery statement that only succeeded in stirring up sectional conflict.

Edited by author 03-13-2002 12:41 AM
I tend to agree with Alex's comment regarding our predisposition towards expecting that events like the caning of Sumner are problems only faced by faraway places, not something we expect in our own nation. I think in such cases, though, what we often fail to recognize is the important factor in evaluating such events is not necessarily the country or locale in which it happens, but perhaps the circumstances under which it occurs, and it is obvious that the United States during the 1850's was an extremely different situation than anything we have encountered within our own lifetimes, thus a different point of reference. The decision in Scott v. Sanford, then, was just another of the unnatural events which occured in the mid-1850's. The editorials on this subject once again run the gambit of opinion, illustrating very nicely the issues of regional identity which we have been touching on over the past few days. I personally was pretty appalled by the decision, especially the fact that instead of just addressing Scott's lack of standing as a citizen before the court, Chief Justice Taney felt it necessary to continue onward and blow holes through every decision and compromise that had been made along the way, even back to the Northwest Ordinance--I agree with Stephanie that he made a big mistake in trying to solve the slavery issue this way. I also appreciated Guelzo's discussion of the court's makeup and possible motivations of Taney in rendering his verdict, as opposed to the treatment offered by many of the pro-slavery editorials, which held up the court's conduct as little more than the good work of justices beyond the realm of partisanship (what an angle!).

Perhaps what I found most interesting in chapter 2 of Guelzo was the explanation of party dissolution and formation during the 1850s. The Whig and Democratic parties cracked "under the strain of sectional controversy" (60), leaving an extremely diverse conglomoration of citizens with nothing to bind them. Before the party splits, the nation was joined (loosely) by common party identification of northerners and southerners. Despite the widely differing economic and social structures in the northern and southern states, people felt (at least somewhat) bound to one another because of their shared party identification. A nation cannot survive without some common thread linking its many citizens. And so, the splits in the two predominant political parties AND the divisions within the Protestant churches (perhaps the only institution besides politics capable of uniting a diverse group of people)inevitably came a split in the nation.
It seems to me that all the political party dissolution, division, and creation would only further complicate already-complex issues (like slavery, for example). Can you imagine what would happen if Republican George W. Bush decided that he was going to become a member of the Whig party and Democrat Al Gore decided to become a "Know-Nothing"? The average citizen, it seems, would have trouble deciding whether to "follow the leader" to his new party or remain loyal to his old party identification. I think the "blundering generation" (Randall) was an appropriate description of these people who, I think, were just grasping for some sense of continuity in their daily lives. If the political parties that you had held so dearly were crumbling, wouldn't you seek continuity elsewhere? Perhaps in the traditional institution of slavery??

    The core issue behind the Sumner caneing was slavery, no doubt about it. Yes, Brooks did probably feel a personal obligation to go after the man making personal attacks on his uncle. But more importantly, the rhetoric used by Sumner in his address was an attack on the South. It was an attack that was aimed at southern principles, southern lifestyle, and southern institutions. Most importantly, an attack on the institution of slavery. It is my opinion that if Brooks did not take it upon himself to savagely beat Sumner, someone else most definitely would have. From the Sumner caneing, we can begin to see the regional conflict in America start to boil. The Dred Scott ruling only hightened the tension.
   The Scott editorials show to us a great division amonst the nation. In the Pittsburg Gazzete, there was a statement made that the ruling of the court should be considered a nullity, a ruling that should not be followed or enforced by those with northern Republican beliefs. The ruling was seen as "opinion", not law. I would tend to disagree with Matt on the assumption that a regional conflict was not at the core. The ruling in the Scott case caused northerners to question the authority of the court. The court was seen as pro south, slavery expansionist. The south couldn't be happier to see a federal court make a ruling that protected their institutions. It is my opinion that the court negated the principles of the constitution and the federal government in favor of southern states rights.

The caning is certainly quite shocking, even unfathomable, especially when you consider that, where it not for the vicious attack, this would have been a fairly mundane event. How could one speech, filled with asides that were little worse than what others had said before, warrant a beating? I think this a fine example of Randall's fanaticism at work, not only in Brooks's behavior, but in the popular response as well. As the reactions to the Sumner editorials indicate, people in all sections of the country had rather extreme responses to the incident. The pieces are falling into place: we have hot political disputes, and now, increasing fanaticism.

Like others have said, Taney's decisions in the Dred Scott were seriously flawed. One has to wonder what this man was thinking in trying to solve the slavery issue by attacking the Compromises that had barely prevented crises in the past. I agree with Guelzo and some of the editorialists who argue that, beyond ruling that Scott was not a citizen, the Court had no grounds to judge the case. Even if Taney had left it at that, its a safe bet that the war would have occurred anyway. Still, perhaps some fanaticism could have been avoided. Shock and outrage that Scott must remain a slave with no legal rights, but at least the Compromises would remain. To expand a bit on what Janna says, perhaps, had Taney dropped the case on the citizenship issue, some "common thread" would have remained. At least the Compromises would stand, at a time when compromise was lacking. The Taney Court would not appear to be as biased and corrupt as some editorialists made it out to be, having judged the case on citizenship alone. Alas, Taney definitely "blundered" the Dred Scott decision.

I must admit that it’d been a while since I’d studied the Dred Scott case prior to the assigned readings. After rereading the facts and opinions surrounding this case, I can truly say it was one of the worst decisions ever rendered by a court. Yes, Andy Atkins is correct in saying Taney’s decision was wrong. Yes, Dave Mathews is correct in saying that the nation was dividing, and the newspapers and reports concerning this case show how much the south was winning in this “Cold War.” When a paper such as The Enquirer from Richmond, Virginia, says that the “nation has achieved a triumph, sectionalism has been rebuked, and abolitionism has been staggered and stunned,” they weren’t lying. The Dred Scott case continued the winning streak for the slave supporting southerners, the same individual’s who’d won the Missouri Compromise and kept such an immoral but profitable practice alive. However, while I agree with Atkin’s point that southern state’s rights triumphed, the ideology and definition of state’s rights as a whole lost. As Emerson was stationed in the Louisiana Purchase with Dred Scott, he was technically in free soil territory. When the court ruled that Dred Scott was still not free and had no right to petition the court as a non-citizen, state’s rights went out the window with the Missouri Compromise.

With that being said, I’d like to address the 1859 newspaper editorials concerning John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry. While I was reading the articles, it’s very obvious to see the difference in regional reporting. The southern papers are initially very biased and harsh towards Brown, and they read like propaganda as it spread false information, sensationalized facts, and talked about how Brown deserves “just deserts” (Mercury 18 October 1859). These southern reports not only make current American newspapers look tame in the way they reported 9/11, but they also show how much they truly despised and feared Haitian-style blood baths. The north didn’t fear such violence, and perhaps that’s why their editorials are initially much more rational and less propaganda like. For example, The Evening Journal from New York on Oct. 19 reports the facts and condemns the raids in a fairly sympathetic manner (the attackers “were committing a crime against Innocent men, women and children…”). Perhaps if the north lived in fear of rebellions, it’s reporting might have sounded a little different.

While reading the articles on the John Brown incident, one thing really caught my attention. The Northern papers seemed more concerned about the incident than the Southern papers did. The Northerners were giving reasons why the insurrection happened, while the Southerners were wondering how it would effect them. The main arguement made in the North was that abolitionist thoughts, such as those taught by Seward and Lincoln, caused the insurrection, since it was led by abolitionists. For example, The Patriot from Concord, New Hampshire blamed the black republicans. It said that the revolt was the effect of their principle and doctrine of arms and violence used in Kansas. The Southern papers were much different. The Mercury, out of Charleston, South Carolina, thinks that the situation is being exaggerated and that there is no cause for alarm. It does recognize that it is something to think about because it most likely will happen again. The paper thinks that this situation will help slavery as an institution. The article that intreged me the most was from Richmond,Va. This article pretty much makes fun of the whole incident. It says that probably half of the "soliders" will make it back home alive. It also states that the situation was blown out of proportion. Very interesting that the paper written in the same state is the least concerned about the situation.

In reading the articles about John Brown's revolt at Harper's Ferry, I have found a common difference between the articles from the south and the ones from the north. The southern articles believe that the revolt was not as big a deal as everyone made it out to be. In the Whig, a Richmond, Virginia newspaper, they said that the revolt was "greatly exaggerated" and also that "the affair is pretty much of a humbug." The southern states take view that I did not expect. Due to past history and current debates over slavery, I would have thought that the actions in Harper's Ferry would have caused an uproar throughout the south, possibly more attacks taken on slaves. In the Mercury, a Charleston, South Carolina newspaper, also wrote that the revolt was small in that they were forced to cooperate and "perfect quiet has been again established." The southern newspapers realize that the attcaks were wrong but know that they were fighting for what they believe in and they accpet that will for freedom. On the other hand the north viewed the attack by John Brown as a vicious move towards freedom and equality. In the Evening Journal published in Albany, New York they wrote that the attack was planned by 15 to 20 misguided and desperate men who plunged a vicious revolt in a peaceful community. Lead by John Brown, a victim of the Border Ruffin Invasion Of Missouri and stripped of his property, house, and the murdering of his 3 sons, engaged the plan to revolt by means of the slaves. Like Ryan said, the northerners seemed more concerned and worried over the attack than the southerners, eventhough it was on their southern land. The north is supposed to back their citizens and believe in the fight for equality and freedom of all citizens.

Quick side story: When I was little, living in Overland Park, KS, my big sister took me to the State Capitol in Topeka. In the rotunda are murals depicting Kansas state history. There is a picture of John Brown, the background is full of pure chaos. The tour guide was telling us to notice the length of his arms that were outstretched, one was longer than the other. I then remembered one of my grandpa's phrases, something like, "possessed by the wrath of god." That's exactly what John Brown looked like in this picture. I'm not sure why I remembered that. Doesn't seem like the kind of day to stick out in a six year old's mind. Here's a link to the picture: http://www.trosch.org/bra/johnbrwn.gif

I found it interesting how different regional papers reacted to the Harper's Ferry riot. The Evening Journal of Albany, NY (10/19/1859) tried, in a sense, to justify Brown's actions. They saw him as a "victim" after experiencing the harshness of the Missouri Bushwhackers. They explain that he had gone mad after the Bushwhackers killed his sons and burned his house, and then that madness turned into revenge of the most terrible sort. The Evening Journal basically pleads insanity for Brown, but does condemn his actions.
The Charleston Mercury, however, takes on a totally different view, looking at Brown as a blood thirsty man out to destroy southern people (perhaps he was... in a way). The article makes northern abolitionists out to ruin the lives of Southerners, but does give a very ominous prediction that this riot has set the tone between those with sectionalist differences.

I think a big distinction that needs to be recognized is the importance of the papers being "Republican" or "Democratic" vs. "Northern and Southern". For instance, the State Register which came out of Springfield, IL was a democratic paper and had very interesting things to say about the raid on Harper's Ferry. Perhaps, this is a wrong assumption of mine, but I would've previously considered Illinois a "Northern" state thus siding with the papers from Albany, NY and Chicago, IL.

One thing I found really interesting was what exactly the editorials said. With the vast improvement in technology we don't hear about things "coming off the wire", but the first reports coming in about John Brown and Harper's Ferry talk about the reports coming in off the wire and how it's sad that the person on the other end stopped writing so early. Oh how the times have changed!

*laughing at Sara's picture of John Brown* I think it's perfect. While I can't totally disagree with Brown's actions against proslavery (I admire his determination against the evil of slavery), I also maintain that he was indeed too extreme. His raids certainly did not help the cause of abolitionism for fairly obvious reasons (Brown became a great stereotype for proslavery people to take advantage of; now all abolitionists seemed to be murderous zealots bent on the destruction of the Union).

On another note, I found the mini-biography of Lincoln in Guelzo's book quite interesting. I had always viewed Lincoln as someone who had questioned slavery on moral grounds, but Guelzo says no. Of course, Lincoln's problem with the economics of slavery is almost the same as a problem with morality of slavery because slavery violates his belief in equality of opportunity. We can see this in his speech at Peoria even though he admits that he is not quite certain if blacks should stand on equal social footing with whites.

Like Sara and Megan, the first interesting aspect of the editorials that I found was the different viewpoints and biases contained in each. Almost all editorials called the actions disgraceful and unneeded, but the way many went about explaining the events and the man involved were different. Newspapers like the Richmond Whig and the Mercury from Charleston dummed the event down so as not to add any mystique or unneeded fuel to the fire burning hot under the issue of abolition. If the event was publicized greatly and glorified in any way, there could be more trouble for slaveholders; possibly another raid or riot. For example, the Illinois State Register called Harper's actions "bold," which could lead others to believe his actions were honorable, if not warranted. I was also interested to see the background behind Brown, which is usually left out of the history books. The Albany Evening Journal reported that Brown had been robbed by ruffians, his house was burned and his three sons were killed. Whether or not this was a major reason attached to the raid cannot be answered, but it did shed some light on his emotional state at the time. Overall, the event was looked down upon, mainly by Southern newspapers as a senseless act carried out by misguided, crazy men.

Edited by author 03-14-2002 03:46 PM
The Disruption of Democracy chapter by Nichols explains the dynamics to the Democratic convention held in Charleston, SC in April of 1860. The delegates had a weight to bear in that they sensed a Republican movement at the expense of the Democratic political stronghold. Nichols notes many factors attribute to the dynamics of the convention. The factors include the factionalism within the Democratic Party: the Douglas band and the Senatorial Three; the setting: Charleston with its proslavery crowds, the carnival-like atmosphere and the intense heat; the expensive hotels; and the resentment between delegates. All of these factors were not compromised resulting in splitting of the party. The loss of the executive branch was the price for honor and pride on both sides of the split. Nichols offers an interesting point in this chapter - the setting of Charleston was key and was the pivotal point in the split of the Dem. Party. I think Nichols agrees it would have eventually occur but the setting of Charleston was too much for the Party to handle in April of 1860.

Edited by author 03-14-2002 07:05 PM
     The most helpful result of reading the Nichols chapter was the sense of person--the realization that the complex political occurences of the 1850's were not simply slef-sufficient forces derived of their own power. On the contrary...real people, actual living and breathing human beings were involved in making the decisions that would shape America for future generations and produce the nation's most romanticized and talked about conflict. We often read history as such: "The North felt...." or "The Convention decided...". Nichols places keen emphasis on particular names (i.e. his focus on the Senatorial Three). Personally, I was more able to imagine the struggles and sacrifices experienced by delegates of the Democratic party--each man having his won agenda, his own concerns, his own idea of what was "right" or "necessary".
     I agree with Neal that Nichols placed considerable emphasis on the location of the Convention. I would hold, however, that the setting was not directly or direly important. It is my view that Stephen Douglas' pervasive faith in "popular sovereignty", which later branded him a traitor in the eyes of Southern Democrats, set the stage for disagreement in Charleston; I would even assert that Stephen Douglas could be argued as the most inflential individual in relation to the coming of War. I do agree that Charleston--a Southern stronghold, the prototypical, cliche of Southernism--provided an ironic, even influential setting. However, the fire of Democratic unity had already been set; Charleston served merely as oxygen...spreading the already unstoppable forces that would bring Honest Abe to the White House.

 After reading the beginning of Men of Secession and the chapter from Nichols’s book, I think that the Southern Democrats came into the Charleston Convention with a couple different plans. Above all they did not want Douglas to become President. The Southern Democrats had more than one option to work through this, get their own candidate to be the Democratic nominee for President and split the Democratic party so that Douglas would not have enough support to win the Presidency. The Southern Democrats realized if they split the party they would not be able to gain enough support to win the Presidency either, but at least Douglas would not be President. They realized that with a party split the Republicans would have an easy victory, therefore this was not their main purpose. It is in my opinion that this was on the back burner of the minds of many Southern Democrats, especially the Senatorial Three. I think they realized that if a member of their own party were elected to the Presidency, they would not be able to secede, their main bargaining chip would be taken away, but if a President of a party whose views are ‘unconstitutional’ was elected President, it would be justifiable to leave the Union. Southern Democrats saw both these options as logical, they realized there were two ways to gain political power, through a Southern Democrat victory or a split in the party. If the South ended up seceding then the Southern Democrats would easily be the most powerful party. If Douglas won the Presidency the Southern Democrats would suffer, Douglas would use all his powers, especially patronage, to keep the Southern Democrats out of power. Once the Southern Democrats left the convention, it is in my opinion that some of them wanted Lincoln to win the election of 1860. They realized that their candidate would not have a real chance with the Democratic party split, therefore the only way to gain power is to create a new government, which means they must secede. To gain support for the secession the Southern Democrats must have a reasonable excuse which would stem from the election of Lincoln as President. Therefore, it is my belief that many of the Southern Democrats wanted Lincoln to win the election of 1860.
 I agree with Rusty in the fact that it was individuals who made the difference, the secession movement was not done by a mob but rather a small group of individuals. Nichols spends a lot of time naming the different individuals who were involved in the convention and what their implications were. The Senatorial Three were the big dogs running the Southern Democrats. They saw the politicians of the South very enthusiastic, but noticed they had no leadership. Once the Senatorial Three stepped in, the Southern Democrats would support them no matter what. So instead of some 150 odd people having input it was just three who were making the decisions. On one hand was Douglas and the other was the Senatorial Three, of course there were others helping form platforms and taking care of other business, but for the most part it was these 4 individuals who influenced everything that happened in Charleston.

It is amazing to me the division present within the Democratic party itself. It seems that the eventual split was very apparent and that this last effort was somewhat of a charade so that the southern democrats could resist the bigger enemy of the Republicans. The differences, however were growing too large. I agree with matthew's idea that the southern Democrats actually began to embrace the idea of a total opposite candidate because that gave them a more legit reason to break away. This, however, makes the SOuthern democrats seem like spoiled babies who cry until they get their way and refuse to play if they can't win. Nichols talks a good deal about the setting of this debate and that seems to be an extra character in the situation. Though Nichols doesn't clearly emphasize this, we have come across the idea of Southern nobility and pride already. The presence of the debate in Charleston is no small detail. The southern democrats were unwilling to recieve defeat on their home field with their fans watching. Nichols also includes the weather as a key component which causes fuses to be shorter and tensions to grow tighter.

Like some of you others, I am stunned at the depth of the factions within the Democratic party. The only thing the members of this convention seemed to have in common was the title of "democrat." The southern democrats and the north western democrats were so vehemently opposed, while the eastern democrats seemed to sway between the two platforms, seeking a candidate that would meet their specific needs. Not only were these significant schisms within the convention, but I was surprised to see the factions within each of these subgroups. How on earth could the democratic party conceive of defeating the strength of their Republican opponents with such disunion, bitterness, tension among themselves?!

I have to agree with David in saying that the location of the convention- Charleston- was "no small detail." The details of this southern city that epitamized southern culture are important because it reveals the attitude of the southern democrats towards the other members of their party. They were certainly stubborn and hell-bent on getting their way... and they seem to have felt superior to their fellow democrats. For example, typical southern pride was reflected in the attitudes of the locals who were hosting the convention- " few plates were laid for [northern democrats], few charming ladies paid them compliments or even noticed them save with a faintly suppressed disdain."

one final note... i'm not totally sure what i think about this overall, but I think an interesting point is made in the last sentence of this chapter- "Southern states were defying their northern neighbors..." Although the opposing sides of the Civil War are too complex to be described as "the North" and "the South," it does seem that this convention lent to the tensions we commonly think of between these territories.

     I found the Nichols chapter to be a very thorough and interesting account of the Democratic Convention of 1860. I agree with the other members of the group that Nichols' focus on the individuals involved and the location of the Convention helps bring the reader to a better understanding of the situation. Nichols focuses on the delegates by giving their names, relaying what they are thinking, and giving the reasons behind their actions. This focus works to give the reader a better understanding of the situation by delving into the mechanics rather than just relaying the cut and dry outcomes. Nichols fills the account with background information that allows the reader to know just where the "clan Douglas" and the Senatorial Three are coming from and the forces that are pushing them to emerge as the two main factions. When this information is combined, the outcome is a well-rounded understanding of the split and one might even suggest a feeling of attachment to the situation.
   Moving to the subject of location, I believe that Nichols' emphasis on Charleston is important in that it relays to the reader, once again, what the delegates where experiencing and quite possibly why they did what they did. For the delegates who found Charleston to be the "great cultural center of southernism," Charleston was their home-field advantage and a sense of empowerment engulfed them that I believe had an effect on their decisions and actions. For the delegates from the North, Charleston was an interesting place that started out as a novelty and moved to outright annoyance and a feeling of alienation. I can see how this would have the possibility of effecting a person's morale and, ultimately aggrivating them enough to effect their decisions. If only the Democratic leaders could have forseen Charleston's effect!

Edited by author 03-15-2002 02:06 AM
slef*** = "self" won**** = "own" my apologies for the typographical errors

These are passages you have read before, but you might find it helpful to study them in comparison.

Guelzo, Crisis of the American Republic, p. 69
Until the firing of the very first gun, Northerners and Southerners were driven, not by irrationality, but by the clearest political logic on offer. "As long as slavery is looked upon by the North with abhorrence; as long as the South is regarded as a mere slave-breeding and slave-driving community; as long as false and pernicious theories are cherished respecting the inherent equality and rights of every human being, there can be no satisfactory political union between the two sections," declared the New Orleans Bee in December of 1860. And while the premises of that proposition may be questionable, the logic that flowed from them was not. "If one-half the people believe the other half to be deeply dyed in inquiry; to be daily and hourly in the perpetration of the most atrocious moral offense," continued the editor of the Bee, "how can two such antagonistic nationalities dwell together in fraternal concord under the same government?" On those terms, secession and disunion were-dismayingly coherent and logical political choices within a political system that had all along confirmed that secession and disunion were viable op-,tions. The political system did not break down—as James McPherson has written, the southern states simply decided that it had fallen into the wrong hands, and that 'they would no longer choose to use it. And so far from losing confidence in that system, Northerners and Southerners struggled for workable compromises right down to last minutes, even while the room for creating those compromises narrowed beyond all hope of maneuver, and they continued to agitate for them almost all the way through the war in the form of northern and southern peace movements. If there is anything genuinely appalling in the political context of the Civil War, it is the dominance of the most glittering and hard-edged political rationality, and it was the hard edge of that rationality which, in the end, made a final compromise impossible.

Nichols, Disruption of the American Democracy, 295.
Both sides indeed were careless of consequences. In reality neither of them actually dreaded a split. The Douglas men felt that a secession of several delegations—such as Alabama, South Carolina, and perhaps Mississippi—might aid Douglas, rouse sympathy for him, and cause his easier nomination. The Senatorial Three had even a greater hope. If there were a schism, and two candidates, this result would throw the election into Congress because no candidate would have an electoral majority. The House was so divided that no party was in control, and certainly no Republican could be elected. Probably therefore it would be for the Senate to choose a Vice President, who through lack of a presidential choice would then become Chief Magistrate. The Senate was safely Democratic, safely southern. Added to this carelessness over consequences, the environment made both sides reckless and uncooperative.

This weekend I was finally able to read “Men of Secession.” There were many great facts brought out in this book. To me the most interesting thing was toward the end when it talks about the road to secession and the great power of its leaders. These ideas were brought up in the “Blundering Generation” article, but here they were greatly expounded upon. I think it becomes very clear that these men held such great power as to sway many to false ideas and command great political power. By 1860, the “fire-eaters” did not control many people, but they had conditioned many to fear the north, love slavery, and contemplate secession. This conditioning “paid off” when events started to happen that “proved” their northern fear correct (such as John Brown, and the rise of the Republican party). Many people had a false view of what was truly going on, and this false view is so strong as to survive quite well today.

Through most of my life I have heard that the true question of the Civil War was states rights. Slavery was only a small part of this. What I have found intriguing is that even the Republicans wanted states rights. The fourth point of their Platform called for this. The only true disagreement in the platform is their ideas about the territories and the Supreme Court decisions. It was not the preservation of slavery that was of utmost importance; it was slavery’s growth they thought wrong. Many southerners wanted slavery in the territories, because they would lose the ability to have a strong voice in the government. So I think it is less about states rights and more about the question of slavery. Would it grow or stay as it is. The south had many friends and interests in the north. These would all fade because of the slavery question.

The reading for this weekend was light, but interesting. Out of the split of the Democratic party rose two new candadites in addition to Douglas. This split was monumental in history and basically threw the election to the Republicans. The Republicans made a clutch move in nominating Abe Lincoln and thus making the Republican platform extremely moderate and appealing to a wide range of voters in the North and Northwest. These two areas overwhelmingly elected Lincoln in the 1860 election, while the South was split over Brekenridge and Bell. It seems in the election of 1860, the Southern powers contending for the sustaining of slavery did everything wrong, and the moderating abolitionist Republicans of the northern contigent did everything right. It is interesting to think if things had happened differently what the outcome could or might have been. However by 1860 it was apparent that more sectional differences were inevitable, no matter what party won the presidency.

Tonight’s reading demonstrate perfectly the long held notion that the Democratic party shot themselves in the foot with the election of 1860. CAR states plainly that in many of the states that Lincoln won, Democratic candidates actually received more votes total. Important Midwestern states like Illinois and Ohio, both Lincoln states, were taken by only a few thousand votes. The reading also illustrated how the Republicans made a outstanding political maneuver by nominating Lincoln instead of Seward, a more radical abolitionist.

Yet one thing stood out more than anything else, and that was the Democratic platform. The language in it took a very strong stance against the slavery and its practice. While not as radical as the language of The Liberator, it is still understandable why the Southern Democrats perceived Lincoln and his associates as a threat. Therefore, secession was a legitimate choice for Southerners, and one I can understand.

    After reading this it is interesting to think what would have happened if the Democratic party would not have split before the 1860 Presidential election. The Crisis of the American Republic states that all the Democratic candidates combined would have defeated the Republicans by more than one million votes. This is also easy to see by looking at the voter map of America. But as I was saying, imagine if the Democratic convention had not been in Charleston and had been in Baltimore of some other Northern city. The Democratic party might never have split and would have more than likely won the Presidential election. Not to say that a civil war would have been avoided altogether, maybe it would have been worse than before.
    Either way, the Republicans were smart in nominating a moderate candidate like Lincoln rather than a more well known candidate like Seward who was father towards the parties extremes. Lincoln was elected President and the wheels of secession were put into motion for many Southern states. Shortly after the election, South Carolina approved legislation which called for a state assembly that would seceed from the Union.

Reading the Republican platform is frustrating to me as I try to find loopholes that would have allowed for reconciliation or at least common ground between the parties. They were operating from two completely separate moral and political views. I feel that I can healthily assume that reconciliation in any great measure was out of reach, but I cannot say that secession was inevitable. I think everyone has hit the nail on the head by laying blame on the Democratic split of 1860. The close races of 1856 became landslides for the Republicans in 1860 in most every northern state. I wonder if the split had major effects on Democratic voter turnout as well since they lost the hope of victory. The scary thing, though, is that a united Democratic Party with a moderate presidential candidate could have easily won a few of the swing states and brought the victory to the Democrats. Slavery would have remained intact and maybe even spreading, which begs the questions: Was the abolition of slavery worth 600,000 American deaths? How long would slavery have survived if there had been no secession? Should we lament the split of the Democratic Party after all?

i agree that the split of the democratic party was an incredibly important event in all of the events leading up to secession and civil war. i believe that the democrats certainly shot themselves in the foot by allowing themselves to divide but it almost seems like they could not have helped it. it is interesting to see how so many events in history should be looked at as reasons for the split. so many means to one end. the dividing of the democratic party and eventually the union were the results of so many factors. of all the factors we have encountered, slavery seems to be the reoccuring issue and the real cause of war. if only the issue was approached in a different way... i suppose history is studied so we can learn from mistakes that were made. the civil war is a perfect example of a mistake made by factors that could have been prevented. the victory of the republicans in the year of 1860 was just the culmination or climax of factors. it is always interesting to think that if it had never happened, would a civil war be avoided, but it is impossible to answer.

The web page for the 1860 election is located at(http://history.furman.edu/~benson/civwar/cw1860.htm)

In class today, Dr. Benson said something about liberal arts education and how its purpose is to make students question the things they have always accepted as true. I certainly agree; if nothing else, Furman has encouraged my belief that there is always more to discover, more to know, more to understand. Take the Civil War, for example. In your early history classes, wasn't it merely the study of a war over slavery? And now, in just a few weeks, we've explored not only slavery as a cause, but all the many, many other complex issues that led up to the War.
In some of the most recent readings (Abrahamson, Nichols, Wyatt-Brown), the significance of individuals (as opposed to sections or groups) has become increasingly clear. Abrahamson's claim that "we cannot fully understand the origins of the Civil War if we look only to events and to the influence of allegedly irresistible but impersonal forces" (xv) is apparent in both Nichols's depiction of the Democratic Convention in Charleston and Wyatt-Brown's hypothesis that Southern honor was at the root of the Civil War.
In class we've discussed whether or not the Southern Democrats would have left the Democratic Convention, whether the Southern states would have seceded, etc. if they had known that 600,000 lives would be lost. A "personal" explanation of the War suggests that southerners would have risked many more than 600,000 lives in order to uphold their reputations and defend their honor. Had the conflict been merely a debate over slavery or states' rights, I think the southern states would have been more willing to compromise. The vehemence with which southerners approached the Civil War can only be explained in personal terms. Without some individual interest (something to be personally lost or gained), I do not think that the support for the War would have been so intense. A crisis between sections does not exist without the individuals that compose them--individuals that wanted, perhaps more than anything, not to defend the institution of slavery, etc. but to defend themselves (their honor, etc.)...

I completely agree with Janna that this Civil War class has opened my eyes to many different views of the war. I also agree that the importance of individuals has been emphasized recently in the readings. I find it surprising that Alexander Stephens was against secession because he was the vice-president of the Confederate States. I think an important to note that many leaders in the Southern states were opposed to secession. Perhaps Wyatt-Brown's article provides an explanation of the mindset that prevailed in the South during th antebellum period. I think the southern code of honor defined many factors throughout the South, politics being one of them. Dr. Benson's point about southern reputations also goes along with this theme. I think much of the sense of honor that Janna talks about in her posting comes from the sense of honor and devotion to one's home state. The southern secessionists felt that by backing down and compromising on the slavery issue that they would be allowing their state's honor to be violated.

Edited by author 03-19-2002 12:11 AM
I begin by throwing my support behind Janna and Stephanie's assertions as to the degree in which this class has provided a much larger picture of the complex issues involved in the Civil War. Over the past couple of weeks, we have examined a variety of factors which each in their own way account for the coming of the war. In the particular reading for today, I think it is especially important that Wyatt-Brown uses the phrasing "the southerners sense of themselves as a people" in describing the regional factors at work. As we examined earlier, with the comparison of average industrial outputs in different states, economic motivations far from account for the reasons why southerners took the particular world-view that they did. More, perhaps, than an actual reality was their pursuit of an ideal, the way of life which they like to see themselves as upholding. Central to this way of life was the southern idea of honor, what Wyatt-Brown notes as "white-skinned honor," something that fits nicely with the idea of the superior slave society which only secession could uphold. In discussing this sense of honor, I found especially interesting the sense that this world was "manichean" or divided between absolutes--viewing things with right or wrong as definite terms is something I feel has carried through much of the reading, describing the psychology behind secession motivations--"either the other side is for us, or they're against us."

Tied to this idea of honor, I also found very interesting our discussion in class about whether the particular behaviors leading up to the election of 1860 were rational and calculating or simply a careless of consequences. Whether the behavior of the democratic party, in their eventual split, and that of the advocates of secession was (to them) rational or planned, it seems obvious that there was worry that the people in their states would not be so easily convinced, something seem in Barnwell Rhett's assertion in the Abrahamson book that "they (the people) must not be given time to think" (87). Obviously, secessional feelings were relying on momentum, and their proponents recognized that they must simply convince all other parties the moves were rational, not giving them time to think them through on their own. There is a reason that both Wyatt-Brown and Abrahamson use similar terminology in describing the political atmosphere at the time (W-B calling it a "highly charged political setting" [82] and Abr. the "superheated political atmosphere" [97]). The stakes in the game were high, and, with the honor view in mind, the secessionists had much to lose, if they let any valuable time slip away.

IN response to Matt's ending questions, I agree with Janna and think that Brown would argue that yes the war was worth 600,000 deaths. What if slavery had been allowed to naturally die out? Would that have been better? I don;t think so - maaaaybe for the average white male perhaps since most of those lost lives were whites, but what about the slaves? And that would have set back the progress of equality back even further. The Civil Rights Movement didn't take place that long ago. Another decade or more of slavery would have made a significant difference in U.S. history. Janna said that had the conflict merely been over slavery, compromise might have been accomplished and that they crisis was over defense of honor rather than slavery. I think the argument Wyatt-Brown is makingm however, is that questions of honor and slavery can't be separated. Included in the different definitions of honor, Wyatt-Brown emphasises the "brotherhood of white-skinned honor" the essence of which is 'personal autonomy or freedom to do what one wishes, and its absence indicates powerlessness' -To criticize slavery was to criticize a way of life and everyone in it, so they weren;t defending themselves INSTEAD of slavery. Their defense of themselves and of slavery was really the same thing if we're talking strictly about honor. I don;t see how you can talk about one without the other. It seems to me that unlike Randalls' interpretation, culture had much to do with the conflict.

Sorry for the great lateness of this post. I was mixed up on when to post. Going back to the issue of the Republican party and its victories, I feel like I'm left with little left to say. The Democrats brought it on themselves through their political blunders which lost them their friends and empowered their enemies, who happened to be better at playing the political game in the north. The Democrats were their own worst enemies.

Stephens’s viewpoint in his short address to congress appeared at first to be strongly against war and disunion. He claims that patriotism within itself demands that the Southern States make one last attempt to avoid secession and eventual war. But as his speech moves on, it seems very much that his main objective is to simply join the Southern States in anticipation of the inevitable battle to come. He claims his main objective is to maintain the rights, honor, and glory his state within the union, but if that doesn’t work out, instead of fixing his state for the union, he suggest to simply break apart from it. He greatly enforces these ideas of patriotism, and I will give him the benefit of the doubt that he knew nothing of how the war would play out, but he seems to have no grasp of the significance of his decision. To lose 600,000 fathers, brothers, husbands, and sons, and then to merely claim to “have the satisfaction of knowing that we have down our duty and all the patriotism could require”, is such a ludicrous statement. They should have continued to push this fatal decision back further and further, in an attempt to reconcile the differences. This is the point argued by the Raleigh North Carolina Standard. This article pushes for a later and nationally unified decision to fight the war. This method might have caused a prevention of war, and a slow, natural death for slavery. But as Ali pointed out, this natural death would probably have only benefited the white men. Of course on the other hand, it probably would have led to a much less drastic reconstruction period.

My predecessors on the board have discussed Wyatt-Brown's points about Southern honor quite well; I will add only a few words to theirs, and then move on.
As an aspiring ancient historian, I love Wyatt-Brown's construction of a South based on honor, his "timocracy." (If anyone cares, "timao" (o=omega) in ancient Greek is "to honor or revere.") The reference to Athens is intriguing because Athens was a state that professed to be a democracy, yet because of restrictions in society (e.g. slavery), it was at best an oligarchy -- like the antebellum South? Yet just as most of y'all didn't need to know the Greek or understand Wyatt-Brown's other classical allusions (Periclean Athens, Nestor in the Trojan War), I note that the average Southerner did not see his state of affairs as classical in origin. My Civil War ancestor could make his way through the (King James) Bible, but Virgil was probably not on his reading list!
Reading Sean's thoughts on the N.C. Standard, I can only wonder if the "delay" for which the Standard pushes is hardly long enough for slavery to die or compromise to be reached; perhaps the North Carolinians, as wise strategists, do not want to be crushed piecemeal. The Confederacy needed ALL the Upper South (and the border states, too!) to create a viable entity; can you imagine what might have occurred if Virginia had seceded and Tennessee and North Carolina did NOT?
But if strategy played no role, I would end with the N.C. Standard's image of Samson. Is he not heroic? Is his demolition of the unholy temple of the Philistines, while tragic, not a supreme assertion of his manliness, his (Israelite) "patriotism" [as Sean quotes Stephens]? Faced with icons like this, with the rhetoric from the Deep South, with Lincoln's hard line on slavery in the territories (and fear of what else he might do), and the innate Southern sense of honor insulted, I can see why the war came.

Honor seems to be the theme of the day, and, like others, I've found this to be a very interesting topic. So far, we've examined important events leading up to secession and Civil War. However, I've felt that something of the personal side of these events was missing. With Wyatt-Brown, it’s nice to see some insight into the Southern mindset.

What struck me the most about this and the other selections from Major Problems is how utterly flawed and hypocritical the notion of Southern honor seems to be. That's not to say I think Wyatt-Brown is completely wrong. On the contrary, I think his discussion of honor provides a convenient undercurrent to the events we've discussed, in much the same way that Randall's fanaticism fits in as well.

To cite one example of inconsistency, from a secessionist point of view, defending the rights of your state, slavery, manhood, et. al. is the honorable thing to do. However, is it not dishonorable to break an oath? If your state pledged to uphold the Constitution and be a part of the Union, I should think it would be dishonorable to break that promise. If public image is the important thing, then breaking that oath implies that your character possesses any number of negative qualities. It would seem that the truly honorable thing to do would be to find a peaceful, quiet solution, and save face without publicly denouncing the Constitution and its ideals, which were once held dear.

The submissionists are another example of inconsistency in Southern honor. Ostensibly, the submissionists are willing to "submit" to their Northern masters at the expense of the South. Judging from Wyatt-Brown, Stephens, and the N.C. Standard however, these people really submit to the secessionists. If an individual believes strongly about something, is it not more honorable to defend one's views, even in the face of overwhelming opposition? That is certainly what the secessionists do, in the wavering states and against the nation as a whole. Submitting to another viewpoint sounds like a surefire way to lose one's honor. Many leading figures, such as Stephens or the judge Wyatt-Brown referred to, spoke out against secession. If they eventually side with the secessionists, that means submitting to the will of someone of equal or lesser status. If these people had defended their own honor, who knows what might have happened. Stronger opposition to secession, and perhaps fewer seceding states. Perhaps a peaceful solution could have been reached, but as Ali suggests, such a solution might have had greater consequences in the future.

Now that we've gotten to the actual secession of the southern states and the outbreak of the war in our reading, I'm rather surprised at how concievable it is that a last second compromise or a different sequence of events at Fort Sumter might have averted war entirely. Its true that Lincoln and his administration did not recognize any legal right of the southern states to secede, but I wonder if Lincoln had not chosen to resupply Sumter, if there had been a few more months of quiet after the initial round of secessions, would the North would have resolved to start a war just to bring the southern states back into the union? As far as the Wyatt-Brown discussion of honor goes, I think that his argument certainly applies to the many of the state legislators, newspaper editors, and other secessionist leaders, but I have to question the pertinence of a "southern honor" to the life of an average non-slaveholding farmer. It was perhaps the misfortune of the South that the Standard's argument for "delay" did not prevail, at least for a while. The extra time would certainly have enabled the South to better prepare for the coming war. We have wondered on several occasions in class rather the political leaders would have found a way to compromise and avert crisis if they could have known the consequences of the war in advance. An interesting question to consider at this point; were Lincoln and the Federal Government justified in fighting the war to preserve the Union? In hindsight, were the 600,000 lives worth the preservation of the United States? I have a feeling most people would say yes without hesitation, but it's still an interesting question.

Today's information can be reviewed at (http://history.furman.edu/~benson/civwar/cw4.htm)

I would have to agree with many of my peers in the point they are making that this class has opened up new perspectives of the civil war conflict that I have never thought of before. Prior to taking this class, I always thought that the civil war was a war fought on the issue of slavery. Not slavery alone, but slavery as the main issue. It is interesting to think that the large plantation owners in the south were origionally opposed to secession. On one hand, if war came, and the south lost, they would loose their work force. On the other hand, if the south seceeded, those same large plantation owners would most definitely loose their strong economic ties to the north. So far this class has showed me that the secession issue runs much deeper than just slavery.

Reading the articles on Lincoln, I was able to get a much better idea about the critical time period leading up to the attack on Fort Sumter. Reading the letters from Lincoln to Trumbull and Gilmer, I found that Lincoln was a very professional president, well written and always in search of peace and compromise...As long as it didn't involve extension of slavery or the dissolusion of the Union. The passage concerning congressman John A. Gilmer of North Carolina was a good addtion, because it brought to light the fact that many southerners were against secession. They all weren't out brandishing their pitchforks, hell bent on securing their confederate statehood. The more and more I read about the Civil War, the further I develop the opinion that the South was definitely just using state's rights as a cover for their addiction to slavery. That's why the Union was temporarily dissolved: slavery and nothing else. Both Senator Gilmer and Secretary of State William H. Seward were quite on point in their theories of possible outcomes to a Civil War. Gilmer talked of an ultimate, defining quarrel, and Seward carried the message further commenting that the South were going to attack the resupply ship headed for Sumter.
     Next, I would like to dispel the rumor that Lincoln knew what he was doing and provoked the attack on Sumter knowing full well the consequences. Firstly, as Kenneth Stammps essay states, Lincoln was using a defensive strategy. He was in a very precarious situation, and the time for negotiation was long past. He didn't want to abolish slavery, or tread on the South, he just wanted the Union to remain intact. He would have happily readmitted all seceeding states to the Union and probably give them some minor consessions as well. The only argument which could point towards Lincoln initiation coercion would be that the Whig Party had fallen apart on compromise and inaction and Republian party nembers, not wishing to follow in the footsteps of the Whigs, demanded that something be done. And so it was. Lincoln developed an ingenious strategy taking into account all factors, and his plan worked beautifully. In initiating the attack, Lincoln was able to portray the south as the aggressors, gain more clout for the Republican cause, sway more Southerners to his side, and keep himself clean in the mess. After all, it was not he who initiated the attack, he did what he had to do to preserve the union, and he did it with about as much grace as could possibly be attained. Furthermore, The South's ridiculous actions of trumping up the Sumner caning and the Kansas disaster, culminating in their crusade to take back Federal forts and deface Federal territories and symbols, led to the unavoidable events leading to the Civil War.

I would agree with Hunter that slavery is a dominant issue in the Southern perspective. However, not with the statement, "the South was definately just using states' rights as a cover for their addiction to slavery". First, an addiction or a way of life? Was not the "addiction" for the slaveholder of one or two slaves to feed his family or to ensure their well being? Secondly, the cover of states' rights: one must take into account states' rights is a viable issue. The Fourteenth Amendment was not an amendment in 1860 so the bridging to the states of the Bill of Rights could not be assumed. Further, the Court's stance pre-1860 was one maintaining the rights of states. States' rights in 1860 was far from a cover but a necessary issue.

What a story we have here! I don't know about the rest of you, but I have never delved so deep into all of this before. The Stampp piece about Lincoln's strategy was so interesting to me. I knew that Lincoln never really wanted to go to war, but I had no idea what his exact stance is. We have talked a lot about different interpretations dealing with sectionalism and reasons the war broke out, so is this just ONE interpretation of Lincoln's stance? Or, can I take this as the way it was, as fact? I as I have taken more history class I've realized that you cannot take everything you read as fact, but I feel like I'm not sure when I should believe something or not.

Anyway, I'm off the subject. It seems that any way you slice it Lincoln was going to come off looking like the good guy. What a calm, cool, calculated plan: move in to supply something you see as rightfully yours even though you probably know it's going to cause a problem. My question is do you think Lincoln really knew the potential that SC and the Confederates would retaliate? Or did he truly hope things would go smoothly?

Heh, you're right Megan. These articles about Lincoln have offered more insight on the man that I have ever read before. Intriguing to say the least. The Stampp essay was engrossing, but what a sticky, confusing situation Lincoln was in. Thomas Jefferson once said something like, "When deciding how to act, imagine the whole world is watching and act accordingly." I keep wondering if Lincoln had something similar in his mind during the first few weeks of his presidency. He had to know the eyes of history were watching him as well as the rest of the country.
Like Megan said, the whole plan was "calm, cool, and calculated." When putting myself in Lincoln's shoes though, I can't help but feel rather nauseous.

To answer her question: I got to believe it was a gamble of the highest proportions, and that whatever move Lincoln made, it was up to the Confederate response. Just like what was repeated through the whole Stampp article, if a war's going to start, the shot will come from the Confederacy. What Lincoln wanted to happen, we can only keep guessing and deducting from clues given through evidence in letters and speeches. I wish to God he would have the time to write a personal memoir...

I found the reading very interesting and it opened my eyes to the different views between citizens in the same state. What I found appealing was the difference between two congressmen in the state of Georgia and their views on secession. Former Congressman Alexander H. Stephens speaks about having a Southern States conference in order to secure united cooperation. He then believes that states of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and other Western States will join with them. Stehens says he will then take it New England and they too will see the way and follow with the other states. But if all these states do not join in with the south then we will still have an undivided South. Stephen's view is a positive and reassuring one to the South as he says at the end that if all fails, the South will know that they have done their duty and "all that Patriotism could require." I believe that if all southerners had the same view as Stephens then war coulf have been avoided. He believes that war is not the answer and that we can work it out through compromise.
    On the other hand, the reader sees the excited and patriotic view of having war if it comes down to it. Senator Robert Toombs of Georgia compares the notion of connection with the North as the connection between the American Colonies and the British in 1775 and 1776. He believes that South must break from the north peacefully, but if not they will fight for their independence just like America did. Consequently, the South will establish their own strong Union.
  In response to Sara's discussion about what Lincoln wanted to happen, I believe that Lincoln did not want a war, he did not want the first shot taken by the Confederates, and he did not want his nation in total chaos. He was president in a tough era and he handled himself well. He rolled with the punches and I believe he did the best he could with what he had. Consequently, Lincoln is ranked as one of the most respected presidents ever and has thye highest approval rate, as I was told last term in political science class.

Alot of things in this reading caught my attention. First of all, the series of letters were very insightful. They showed the struggle within the South about whether to secede. In reality, there were more people against seceding than you hear about. These letters also give an overview of Lincoln's policies, which are discussed in detail in Stampp's essay. This essay is very helpful in understanding the whole situation on the brink of the Civil War. I've always heard that Lincoln was against slavery, but I've never learned about his specific policies. This passage tells the reader alot about Lincoln. It also shows why he was such a good political leader. His policy of nonaggression forced the South to make the first move and start the Civil War by attacking Fort Sumter. The thing that interested me is that Stampp sees Sumter as a victory for the North, not the South. Even though the South did destroy the fort, the North came out looking like the good guys since the South made the first move of aggression. To answer Megan's question, yes I do think that Lincoln knew the Confederates would attack. The essay said that when Lincoln heard of the attack he was neither suprised nor excited. In other words, he knew that it was cming due to his policy. A few months after the attack Lincoln said to an Illinois senator, "The plan succeeded. They attacked Sumter- it fell, and thus did more service than it otherwise could."

Edited by author 03-20-2002 12:13 AM
Finally, some shooting…

While I was reading the Lincoln letters in our assigned reading, I couldn’t help but think about the modern stigma surrounding this president. Today, we refer to him as a hero - The Great Emancipator. It’s funny how “pop history” doesn’t directly acknowledge his initial support for the Fugitive Slave Law and keeping Southern slavery intact (though he didn’t want it to spread to the territories).

Megan raises an interesting question as to whether or not Lincoln knew resupplying Fort Sumter would cause such a conflict, and I think he knew the southern states would retaliate (though not to the full extent that the Civil War would become). I don’t mean to jump into Lincoln’s head and make unfair assumptions, but I think he knew the South would react violently to federal intervention in the South. After all, the Sumter plan was to coax the secessionist into firing upon a federal fort parked out in the middle of Charleston. The documents/articles show and describe Lincoln as being too cool and collected to not know what he was doing. You don’t hint at the fact that you might land “men, arms, or ammunition” without expecting a violent reaction (79). Thus, I conclude that Lincoln really did want the South to attack Fort Sumter, and he knew the reaction would involve men, arms, and ammunition. It’s just that Lincoln didn’t know how violent or how long the reaction would become.

With that being said, I’d like to address Hunter Michelsen’s post. He states, “The South's ridiculous actions of trumping up the Sumner caning and the Kansas disaster, culminating in their crusade to take back Federal forts and deface Federal territories and symbols, led to the unavoidable events leading to the Civil War.” I somewhat disagree with the fact that the South trumped the Sumner caning and the Kansas disaster. Instead, I believe they were promoting the state’s rights issue more (state’s rights, I might add, that were rooted in the protection of slavery against the abolitionists, thus protecting their way of life and economies).

First, I'd like to address the point that Lincoln was cool and calculating or that he's not a "Great Emancipator." In his December 1860 letters to Trumbull and Gilmer, he makes what to me is a convincing case that he is passionate at heart about the issue of slavery. In the letter to Trumbull, he says about popular sovereignty, "Have none of it. Stand firm. The tug has to come, & better now, than any time hereafter." (65) Then, on the next page in his letter to Gilmer, he writes, "You think slavery is right and ought to be extended; we think it is wrong and ought to be restricted." Granted, he also says that he doesn't want to harrass the people of the North or the South, but I suspect this is because, as other people on this forum have emphasized, he was contemplating just how far he could push either side without completely jeopardizing his own position. We know that Lincoln borrowed much of his style from an older Whig, Henry Clay. I think this fact speaks plainly that Lincoln tried to master the art of compromise, and that means that he will inevitably have to give up something so that he can reach his ultimate goal. If he's good enough at compromise, he can actually reach that goal in the end.

With those points in mind, I'm partially inclined to believe that Lincoln had at least a little to do with provoking the South into making the first move. First, it just sounds cool (secret political maneuvering behind the scenes, intrigue, drama, suspense, deceit, etc.). Second, it's something I would do. If I were in Lincoln's position, I would probably sense that there was no more room for compromise and that situation was quickly degrading into a state of civil war. So the only thing left to do would be to make the South look like the aggressor and the North seem a civilized, peaceful defender. I might go so far as to say that Lincoln was also defending the right of the black people to be released from slavery, but I don't think Lincoln would ever say that, especially in the years directly preceding the beginning of the Civil War.

I know it’s not my day to post anymore, but I felt compelled to disagree with one of Austin Chapman’s comments. He says, “I might go so far as to say that Lincoln was also defending the right of the black people to be released from slavery, but I don't think Lincoln would ever say that, especially in the years directly preceding the beginning of the Civil War.” I think the Lincoln letters make it fairly clear that he had no intention to free the slaves. As a matter of fact, he said he’d continue the slave trade in the South and would not object to seeing slavery in Washington D.C. in his letter from December 15, 1860. To say that he was out to free the slaves is making unfair assumptions and jumping inside his head too much. (Hope that doesn’t sound too rude) I understand that later he will emancipate them in the south, but I think it’s for political reasons he only does that, not for the moral reasons “pop history” has made it out to be. But, anyway, that’s another point we’ll be studying about later, and I’m sure I’ll make some comments about the reasons behind emancipation then. Peace.

After reading the material for last night I began to think about Megan's question. Stampp says "During the weeks when members of the Cabinet and military officers discussed the Sumter crisis, they simply took for granted that a federal relief expedition would result in a Confederate attack" (Major Problems 78). If this is true then I think Lincoln, his Cabinet, and military advisers all must have thought that SC would retaliate. If the Confederates did not retaliate it would look like they were not serious about secession, it would have been even less likely for any more states to secede, and all over the South the Confederates would have lost support, so looking at it from a Southern view, they had to attack, which I believe Lincoln and his administration understood. I would also like to say I agree with Kenneth, I do not believe Lincoln wanted to free the slaves. The issue he stood for was the expansion of slavery, of which he would not allow and this one issue he explicitly says he will NOT compromise on. In Lincoln's letters and speeches he says nothing at getting rid of slavery or evening hinting at it, perhaps he believed that if slavery was not allowed to expand, slavery would eventually phase out. Also, Lincoln could not have abolished slavery if it was his will, as President he did not have the power to do that, the Congress would have to make that amendment. This is why after the war and the southern states are readmitted Lincoln quickly pushed for the 13th Amendment, because he realized that it was unconstitutional to abolish slavery in states that belonged to the Union.

Ok, and finally to what I was supposed to post about in the first place. The Ayers and Thomas site is very intriguing, it has so much info on it. I find it interesting that Dr. Benson has an essay on here and also a comment about what we talked about in class today about fertility rates and "patriarchial" vs. "companionate" households. I like how they use pictures and graphs to help convey their information. The one thing I agree with is the importance they place on slavery. By reading this website I feel as though they are trying to say that the most important reason for the war was slavery. In agreeing with something I read in Men of Secession, if slavery was the main issue then why did it wait until 1859 to become a huge deal. I am not saying slavery was not important, but I do think it was not all about slavery, it had to do with the people involved. Before 1858 politicians were willing to Compromise, yet as new politicians came to power no one wanted to compromise any more. They totally threw compromise out the window, which I believe is a bigger issue that slavery itself. By reading the site and examining the graphs I do not see how someone can claim the North and the South were more dissimilar that they were similar. Yes there are some small dissimilarities, but Franklin and Augusta County are more alike than not. It is easy to find two locations and show how they are dissimilar and blow it out of proportion, Greenville is not the same as Columbia, Charleston and Gaffney differ, but people would not say these were all that different and they are no more different than if you compare them to cities of their same size in the North. It was not as much an objective difference, but a subjective difference between the two regions. The South argued "that white people in the South were actually better off than those in the North" and I would bet the North would say the same thing. This I believe points to the subjective pride issue that both sides think they are better than each other, neither is willing to give in, all the while blowing the small differences into huge proportions.

Edited by author 03-20-2002 08:34 PM
      I found the Ayers and Thomas Analysis:Summary to be very indepth and thorough. I enjoyed how the piece began with different interpretations of the differences and similarities between the North and South, culminating to the question of "If the South and North were more similar than different, why did they go to war?" This question, more or less, surprised me. Having grown up in the South, I've always heard that the North was bad and the South was good, the North was industrial and the South was agricultural, and so on. I know we've dispelled many of the myths about the differences between the North and South in class but I guess it really didn't hit me about how similar the North and South were until I read the question in the analysis. Ayers and Thomas explore this question in what I thought to be a very effective manner. Through their evaluation, they showed that in a general sense, the North and South are quite similar. For example, they both were very prosperous economically. It is when you break things down into the specifics that you see the real differences between the two(the ways and means in which the two prospered economically can be viewed as totally different). This reminded me of a roommate problem I had last year. We generally had the same exact interests: music, art...but when it came down to it, we were totally different and almost killed each other!
     I found the juxtaposition of the Northern and Southern counties, Franklin and Augusta, in the analysis to be very useful in showing the specifics between the two regions. This approach reminded me of the Nichols piece in that it used specific examples and stories about each county rather than just comparing the general North and South. The only question that I had was: Were these counties atypical in the North and South and could this information lead us back, once again, to broad generalizations? It's just a thought; I could be completely wrong! All in all, I found this analysis very interesting and was impressed with the amount of work that it must have taken to produce a project such as this.

P.S. Yay for watching Gone with the Wind in class today! Fun Tidbit: The actor who played one of the Tarleton twins, shown at the beginning of the movie, is the original Superman.

     On this occasion, I am inclined to focus on a point that seems quite trivial (maybe even simple). The southern states that decided to secede from the Union exhibited a bit of ignorance and thoughtlesness. I honestly believe that they wholeheartedly assumed they could secede, form their own Confederacy, and live side-by-side with their former countrymates. I do not recall a great deal of contemplation concerning federal lands, posts, and such. Seeing secession as a totally legal and viable option, I guess the states naturally assumed that they would take control of land formerly deemed "federal". This hasty assumption strikes me as odd. How could a sense of statehood so heavily override national loyalty?
     I agree with Kelly in that the North and South really were not that different. My essay centers around the idea that socioeconomic differences alone were not nearly enough to case war. I assert, rather, that impatience, inflexibility, and injudicious assumptions led to the Civil War. Kudos to J.G. Randall...he got the "blundering" part right, even though I would argue that it was not an entire generation as much as it was a few powerful extremists...

How true is Ayers and Thomas's statement, "...must embrace full complexity of the evidence and it must be explicitly comparative"? Ayers and Thomas noted previous discussions on the difference between North and South including the differences in modernity, among whites, in politics, and even the view of few differences at all. It's hard for me to distinguish which difference seems more plausible (and this class is making it even harder). So, I look forward to discussion. I will throw this out from personal experience - the differences between Northerners and Southerners as Pessen wrote are exaggerated. The likeness is odd considering the sectional prides.

To reflect on Rusty's statements, I believe he is right on target with his essay and the influence of the powerful leaders. However, I would argue or rethink the view of the South being "hasty", "impatient", "thoughtless", and "ignorant". Had not the South waited for 40 years with a number of compromises before seceding? Did not Jefferson Davis understand the implications to leveling Sumter. He knew and the South knew - the time for war was upon them.

As Ayers and Thomas point out, it is very interesting how similar the North and South were in some respects like a, "common language, religion, history, ethnic background, political structure, economic orientation, and fundamental ideas about race". However, despite these similarities, the North and South could not avoid war. I agree with Rusty that it does seem like most Southerners (besides Rhett Butler) never considered the realities of their planned secession before they did it. Even though hindsight is 20/20 it seems very apparent to me that the North would never willingly allow the South to simply remove itslef from the Union. To me it seems that even though both sides knew the situation leading up to the start of the war was dangerous neither thought war would come because they both thought the other side would backdown first. The South seems like it thought it could peacefully seceed from the Union, and the North seems like it thinks the South is just throwing another temper tantrum and they can convince the South to peacefully come back into the Union.
    Overall, I agree with Rusty and Kelly that the North and South were not all that different. One of the main differences, which Ayers and Thomas state, was the issue of slavery as a form of profit maximization in the economy. It is amazing to me that a compromise could not be formed. However, I am sure that if Jefferson Davis and Abe Lincoln had the convienence of jumping ahead in time to look back in time they would have tried harder to compromise. And as a final note I completely agree with Kelly that it was awesome watching Gone with the Wind in class today, it's a good way to switch up things.

The Ayers/ Thomas argument for secession seems to be articulated in this one point--"It was the very overlap, convergence, and certainty of compromise on the border that drove some Northerners and Southerners to believe that they could say anything they wished because the conflict would be worked out, because the other side would back down." I had never really thought about the significance of the borderline states in relation to southern secession. Certainly the Union was trying to prevent more southern states (other than the first 7) from seceeding, and therefore these border states are important to both the Union and the Confederacy. I never really thought about how the presence of these "gray areas" seems to have heightened the tension between the two camps with even greater intensity.... but it makes sense, even if their initial ambivalence only served to extend the amount of time the two camps needed to gain momentum for their planning America's future. I have to agree with Alex in saying that both sides seemed to count on the other backing down. I like his image of a kid (the South) throwing a temper tantrum to the parents.... its really funny because I had that exact same image in my mind earlier in class today!
I'm going to have to side with Rusty (sorry Neal!) on the idea that the Confederacy acted somewhat "hasty" in their secession.... it seems to me that their hastiness came in their vulnerability to the influence of several agitators. By that I mean, at this point I tend to agree with Abrahamson when he argues that several influencial men were capable of cultivating a seed of secession in the south and that they conditioned these states to believe that secession was the only way. Certainly it was the responsibility of the masses as to whether they decided to believe and follow these agitators. Their eager support (although yes- it may have taken some 40 years) of secession without careful consideration of it's ramifications, does seem to me to fall under the catagory of "hasty."

As of right now (8:45 p.m.) there is a problem with the server that sends out the Ayers and Thomas article. I encourage you to write as much as you can about their argument, based on what you can recall from memory. [If you haven't already read their essay (you were supposed to before class today), then, well, shucks, what can I say?]Complete your draft tomorrow morning when their server comes back up. Some of your classmates may have printouts which you might be able to borrow. Obviously, you will need to discuss the Summary: Conclusions essay to pass the assignment. Therefore, if the server is not up by 8:00 am tomorrow I will make the appropriate deadline adjustments.

May I speak for the class when I say technology is not all that it's cracked up to be (regarding the Ayers and Thomas article). Back in 1861, people didn't have to worry about servers. Back to the black chalk slates!

I know im late to post about the ayers and thomas article but I got my dates and assingments mixed up on the sylabus. Now that we are having technical difficulties I will have to wait a bit longer. Hopefully I can post some time tomorrow or whenever the system is ready again.

I think it's a Computer Power Conspiracy. The Revenge of the Computers. They hate us, and they're out to screw up our papers!

I have mounted a temporary copy of the Ayers and Thomas article at (http://history.furman.edu/~benson/hst95/ayersthomassummary.html).

So here is my posting on Ayers and Thomas now that we're getting back the system.

I am struck also by the significance of the border states. I don't think about them as much but it is interesting to think that there has to be a line somewhere. Your neighbor could be on the North and you on the south. THough your lives are very similar, you are now enemies.

Elizabeth makes a good point that it was important which states left the union and which stayed. Maybe this is just because I'm from Maryland but it seems that that was a crucial state. If Maryland had joined the confederacy, then Washington DC, the capital of the Union, would have been completly surrounded by seceeded states.

I also agree that it seems that neither side was taking the war too seriously or at least didn't realize how bad things could get. That showed up in the film the other day in how everyone was so caught up in the "glory" of war that they didn't realize that the North had all the factories to build cannons for example. I've heard stories too that at the first battle people brought picnic baskets to watch. I guess in a few days we will start hearing that too.

I just finished reading the reading for today. I thought it was very interesting. "The battle for the border," was definitely an important step. Lincoln knew that he needed as many of these "swing" states as he could. Some he lost, including N.C., Virginia, Tenn., and Arkansas. But he won a few as well. A big one was Kentucky. (At least it seems so now, from the reading. For all I know it could have little significance). Kentucky would act as a staging ground to send Union forces into Tennessee. With the overall objective of the army was to grab important ports and supply points to the south and “squeeze” the life out of them. This was know as the “Anaconda Plan.”

What interests me the most is the parallel in military strategy going on today. All of these are crucial parts to our war against the Taliban. First we had to gain hard to attain allies so that we could have a staging ground (Pakistan). Then we went in and took out strategic points that served as supply areas. Then we gained support of allies in the region. Then we squeezed. (The Afghanistan squeeze tactic is actually called “Operation Anaconda”) I just found this all fascinating.

Although the reading tonight was short it was packed with information on president Lincoln's "strategery." (In the spirit of our fearless, or more like feared leader GWB) Without Congress in session, he was in a difficult position concerning sending troops into the deep South after the Southerner's seige of Fort Sumter. His decision to use the militia act of 1795, was probably a good move, but cost the Union three more integral states, VA TN and NC to the Confederate side. I thought the millitary strategy discussion was interesting as well. It is interesting that the American army at the time of the Civil War was ill- equipped to have any fight, much less the war that was to come. The American army and people were most outfitted for a defensive strategy, while the prevailing army strategies of the day called for a Napoleonic, offensive tactic. The stuff Mike posted about the US's tactics in Afghanistan are extremely interesting and I didn't really equate the two strategies.
The next section talked about the vital importance of the Mississippi River to both sides of the fight. Reading about this and thinking about it, it makes total sense that the river was extremely valueable for the countries commercial interests. The Union's retention of Kentucky and Missouri was key for them to maintain trade along the river's Southern end.

I had the great chance to go to Charleston this past weekend, which was great considering the subject we've been studying. When I was walking downt the battery and looking at all the houses, there was a plaque on one that said the owner had once been a wealthy unionist but had switched to the confederate cause and had become a blockade runner and lost his entire fortune - it was a great weekend - had to add this side note!

I thought the descriptions of people's reactions to the fall of Sumter was really interesting. I think that the phrase, "news of the fall of Fort Sumter set off a string of contradictory emotions," describes the sitaution perfectly. There is the north "sick moment of silence" vs. the "the national flag was fling everywhere" and "the flag - THE FLAG - flew out to the wind..." The people were described as being excited, sick ,and mad all at the same time. The same excitement also grabbed the south. CAR said Davis had never been ablt to make his fellow southerners understand the full consequences of secession. Well why not? I can MAYBE understand the northerners and even Lincoln thinking that the war wouldnt' be long. To "let the federal govt. show its resolve, and the rebellion would collapse before a rebirth of Union loyalty" might be realllllly optimistic but not necessarily implausible. But how could southern secessonists have believed that the federal govt. would give in easily. I find that hard to believe. Was that just talk or did they honestly believe that? They couldn;t have all been Charles Hamiltons - This book makes it sound like no one had any sense. I can understand being swept up in the patriotism or the pride of your state, etc... but I think the hesitancy of the states like VA, Md, etc.. to make a decision proves that there's a lot more involved besides emotions, and YET I think it's interesting that the emotions instilled in the people largely by the political leaders are the emotions that end up pressuring them into making decsions down the road like that "Scott's cautious approach...was overwhelmed in the outpouring...northern nerwspapers, which were already demanding that an immediate offensive on Richmond be mounted.

The first section was interesting in describing how lincoln's plan to flex the union's muscle backfired, actually costing the union the company of virginia which soon gained allies in north carolina, tennessee, and arkansas. and almost maryland. the descriptions of military strategies were very interesting but somewhat confusing. i never really think of the strategies used on the battlefield but rather just see two sides colliding. that parallel to the campaign in afghanistan is indeed an interesting one. at the end of the section, the south's readiness to war is compared to the north's in a disadvantagous way. although it seems both sides are immediately ill prepared, the book describes how the south was outnumbered 3 to 1 in terms of military age men and how the south was dwarfed by the north in terms of money and resources (arms and uniforms). declaring war on someone is easy when one doesn't think of all that will actually be needed in order to be able to fight and win.
the second section was interesting in its description of the great mississippi river and the importance of the route. i liked the story of lincoln being a lawyer for the yankee railroad company that was sued by the owners of the new orleans steamboat. lincoln seemed to have lived a fated life, always caught in the middle of some conflict between northerners and southerners.

Reading about the enthusiasm that swept throughout the Union and the first battles of the war, it's really interesting to think that that was when the nation of America was truly born.

I'm not surprised that most people misjudged the length of the war. Both sides were so alike it just didn't seem like they would both fight each other to the bitter end. Although perhaps anyone attuned to the mentality of both sides before the war could have seen that it would be a longer ordeal than everyone else thought; unfortunatly it doesn't seem like anyone was that attuned to both sides.

It was interesting to read about fight for the loyalty of the border states. I'm sure it must have been really excrutiating for Lincoln and Davis waiting to see which side the legislatures and the peoples would fall on.

I found the description of the Pennsylvanian reactions to be very telling. The "moderate mob" is very characteristic of the fickle state that we portrayed in class during the Democratic Convention of 1860.
     I can't believe how close Virginia came to staying in the Union. How could a state that voted to stay in the Union so easily join the other side and fight ardently for the secessionist cause?
     The military strategy was something new. No one was ready for the war, at least not for an offensive. They certainly didn't have the supplies. The people of America are shown to be even more impulsive when one considers this truth. How ironic that the president of the Confederacy had been the soothsayer, warning that secession would mean a war, and a long and violent one at that.

The site for this week's presentations can be found at (http://history.furman.edu/~benson/civwar/cw5.htm)

Edited by author 03-25-2002 12:14 PM
The fact that the United States as a whole, both Confederacy and Union, hadn't prepared for war was not a surprise. Yet, the degree of ill preparedness was a very interesting, especially the fact that there weren't even standardized uniforms for the new military units that formed on either side.

The different style of warfare that were apparently practiced at the outbreak of the Civil War illustrate the progression of battle tactics if one looks at the end of the conflict. Battles incorporating trench warfare in the years of 1864-65 demonstrate how the Napoleonic style of fighting was obsolete even before the war began.

Finally, the struggle for Lincoln to keep the Border States from seceding was one I found surprisingly difficult. I had always been under the impression that states like Maryland and Kentucky were always leaning toward the Union, but after the reading, which spoke about the succession conventions in the respective states, I now find it startling that both stayed with the Union.

As several people noted from yesterday's reading, the degree of ill-preparedness of the armies before this conflict was pretty amazing (as James made note of, even down to the lack of standardized uniforming, etc). While last night's reading hit on the ill-preparedness from more a strategic standpoint, tonight's gave a much more personal sense of the what the state of the armies meant for individual soldiers, as well as a lot of the psychology behind why these volunteers joined up and what they were exposed to as the conflict grew. Much of what CAR had to say reemphasized matters discussed in class today (especially hometown loyalites, with the mention of Philip Lee in Kentucky [174-175], and the idea of proving the viability of the experiment of republicanism). I found a couple of points especially interesting: (1)in the discussion of the Texan (Douglas Carter--CAR p. 174) and why he joined the Confederate army, he made note of the "fanatical followers" of northern secession movements--being in Texas, I wonder how much exposure he got to the way events had played out in South Carolina (the hotbed of secession), versus what he heard about the abolitionists, and how being more or less informed on either side might have changed his point of view; (2)Also, I found the discussion of the problems of volunteers (and how they often ceased to see themselves as individual Americans, rather than a collective unit) interesting, especially as it came to play such a major role, not just in commanding orders for battle, but even down to the way medical advice was taken.

Chapter six of Guelzo ("the soldier's tale") really added a new dimension to my understanding of the Civil War. Like Shannon pointed out, the chapter emphasized what originally drew men into the war and, then, what conditions they faced once they were there. I think that if we did not examine the war from this individual/personal perspective, our overall understanding of the conflict would be quite limited. Only when we realize that "few of the white Union recruits listed any interest in destroying slavery as a motivation for enlistment" (175) and "to enlist was a conversion to true manhood" for Confederates (179), can we begin to understand the individual nature of the Civil War. Most often, men did not enlist because they desired to join some great national cause; they fought because of local or individual pride. Even the "legacy of Republicanism" motivation for war that we discussed in class today revolves around the pride of Union soldiers who wanted to prove to Europe that their government would work.
I cannot help but wonder how "patriotic" the CSA and USA soldiers were considered to be during the Civil War. According to Guelzo, a volunteer soldier may have enlisted to "avoid becoming a 'woman'" (178) or for other equally prideful reasons (not because he wanted to defend his Constitutional rights, etc.). Yet we hail the soldiers of American wars as patriotic heroes--men (and women) willing to die for their countries. Were the soldiers of the past merely fighting to protect their individual prides? Does real patriotism even exist or is it just the name given to the "real" (selfish?) reasons why people fight wars? Just a thought...

I have to agree with Shannon and James that both armies involved in the Civil War were incredibly unprepared, but I think that much of this was due to the circumstances. A lot of this was attributed to the fact that neither side really had time to become fully prepared before they were forced into a conflict by the public. One point that I found particularly interesting was the statement made about discipline. I guess I hadn't really thought about the mechanics of war as something that would be hard to learn, but most of the men had not experienced any form of combat. I thought that the comparison between slaves and army discipline was very interesting. I can see how the southern soldiers would be resistant to anything that resembled slavery. They could admit that slaves were inferior and needed the strict discipline; therefore, they did not want to be treated as inferior creatures who needed such discipline.

Chapter 6 truly hit on a topic we have mentioned in class a fair amount, and that is the reasons to secede, compared to the reasons to fight. Janna talked a lot about the reasons the men, both Union and Confederate, joined up. And it was rarely for the same reasons that the south had seceded, or for the reasons that the north was attacking. Abolitionists in the north were a huge cause of war, yet William Pippey claims, “I don’t believe that there is one abolitionist in one thousand, in the army”(175). Some of the southern fighters have similar reasons, most of which are rooted in pride. Pride in the South and pride in their manhood.
The amount deserters, 12 percent in the Union and 16 in the Confederacy amazed me. I was under the impression that deserters were shot, and that sufficiently scared the rest from even attempting it. At one point in the chapter, it is speculated that a third of the soldiers didn’t even fire a shot on the field. How could an army even pretend to be motivated when no one even wanted to fight? But of course, as it was shown earlier in the chapter, these men didn’t even know how to fight, so it is no wonder that they were terrified. And even if they did know how to fight, it was extremely likely that they would return to the slaughterhouse that was field hospital. As a result of all this, the definition of bravery was formed, and that was looking certain death in the face, yet still running at it full force.

I've just been itching to get to some actual fighting since this class started, but after reading Guelzo's description of Civil War reality in "The Soldier's Tale" I think I might like to go back to the political stuff. Like Randall pointed out at the beginning of the blundering generation article, it's impossible to keep the reality of war in mind unless it's actually set before you in all its revolting realism.

I think Janna makes a good point about the individual psychology and motivation of enlisting to fight in a war. I wonder how many of the men who enlisted during the emotional frenzy of a recruitment rally would have done so if they could have read Guelzo's description of life in the Civil War before they signed up.

I hate this war. I hate it because its romance and glory are a house of cards with a shaky foundation. A true and noble cause is the foundation that makes war acceptable (and beautiful to some) when it is necessary, but the causes to which both sides laid claim in this conflict smack of political self-righteousness, self-interest, and twisted morality.

Much like Sean, I too couldn't help but note the dual motivations at work: the desire to secede or volunteer and the will to fight. Guelzo points out many of the same motivations we've seen in class, but what I find really interesting is the fact that many Northern soldiers changed their views as they moved further south. I knew from previous readings that Union troops came in contact with slavery to some degree, but I never expected that so many would change their views, as Guelzo indicates. I wonder, then, if Confederate troops underwent any change in their motivations. For that matter, how did a Civil War soldier even maintain some kind of motive?

The life of a soldier was shockingly brutal. After enduring so much, even for a short period of time, it is a wonder that a soldier could hold on to some sort of belief. Pride, glory, Republicanism -- all of these things seem pretty empty when you realize how harsh and gruesome a soldier's life must have been. Why not leave, go home, and tell the hotspurs and secessionists that they can keep their war? I agree with Thomas: the larger forces at work seem awfully petty, especially when you're fighting for your life.

Still, I was equally shocked to read how much of the soldier's hardship could be attributed to the soldier himself. What a difference it would have made if more soldiers had followed orders and showed some measure of discipline. Medical knowledge may have been sorely lacking at the time, but simply following basic sanitation orders could have made a significant difference. Furthermore, others have commented on how unprepared the troops were. I wonder, if two professional armies had faced each other, what might the result have been? A professional army might have been a more efficient killing machine, but the troops would at least have a better understanding of how to survive on and off the battlefield. Then again, the armies were fairly effective killing machines. Effective, that is, at killing themselves.

Now that we finally have a war, I'd like to engage (briefly) James' idea that Napoleonic tactics don't work -- or even that they are doomed to produce enormous casualties. (Maybe I'm just a Devil's advocate, but McDowell wasn't an idiot.) Knowing that rifle fire was hideously inaccurate [see CAR 183] (if longer in range than its smoothbore predecessors -- think Revolutionary War British muskets and point-blank range), McDowell tried to win by putting his numbers -- just masses of untrained men -- in the places that would most disrupt the Confederates. It almost worked; in fact, one version of the battle plans holds that the Confederates tried to do the same thing (i.e, a flanking maneuver) ... the fact that the Confederates couldn't get their army to move on time meant that (luckily for them) they were in an appropriate position to repel McDowell's army.
For those poor readers who want nothing to do with strategy or tactics, I'll stop now (though the terrain at Bull Run is worthy of a few words, particularly the bridge). I agree with the Circle cadre's comments about war as a miserable thing that probably impressed soldiers with its pettiness, not grandeur or glory. But we're missing something that I'm sure a good ROTC cadet would remind us about: loyalty to the unit. Just as Yankees and Rebels (it's fair if I use BOTH nicknames, right?) felt their strongest bonds to "home," they typically fought with their homes transplanted around them. Companies were often drawn from single counties or towns, with the captains chosen from the respected men of the community. If you deserted, could you go home again? Could you stay at home if the most of the male population marched off to war, no matter how terrible you (hypothetically) knew it was?
One last thought: I wager that the war really could have been won at Manassas in 1861 for either side. "On to Richmond!" or "On to Washington!" was so nearly within each side's grasp -- or was it? Knowing what we know about Lincoln and each side's war aims and army organization, could it have happened?

First, I agree with Craig that either the North or the South could have won Manassas. Both lacked the training and resources necessary to have the upper hand over the other, so victory for either side was up for grabs. The South just had a lucky day and was fortunate enough to win. I also think the victory involuntarily exemplifies the Offensive-Defensive strategy we discussed in class. If the Confederates hadn’t been so disorganized following Manassas, I bet they would have gone on the offensive towards Washington D.C. This is purely speculative and an opinion, but, hey, there had to have been some angry Southerners amongst the crowd thinking “On to Washington!”

Okay, on to today’s readings. I have to say that Guelzo presents George McClellan to be a pretty interesting guy as he refers to him as “The Young Napoleon.” McClellan definitely learned from the mistakes of Manassas by training his army and getting them prepared for combat. However, Guelzo describes McClellan as being arrogant (and also notes that Lincoln fired McClellan), but Guelzo doesn’t necessarily use those terms to describe Halleck, Buell, or Grant. I somewhat have a problem with this as I think the generals were somewhat arrogant. Though Guelzo explains the strategies and motivations behind certain actions particularly well (ie. the occupation of the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers were to isolate Confederates and force them to retreat), he touches on the fact these actions were really based on pride but really doesn’t dwell on that point too much. Each general wanted to attain the recognition and glory victory brought, and in my opinion that shows that the generals were not only just doing their jobs. They were attempting to fulfill their own self-serving interests.

Finally, let me just say that I find it interesting that we were referring to this first conflict as Manassas rather than Bull Run in class. Are we always going to refer to all the Civil War battles using the Southern terms? Since we’re taking a Civil War class in South Carolina, I shouldn’t be surprised at the use of our language, but at the same time I think it’s noteworthy to point out the fact we’re using Southern terminology (but it really doesn’t bother me either way).

Edited by author 03-26-2002 07:58 PM
Like Kenneth, I agree that the generals were slightly arrogant, but I would protest his condemnation of Guelzo in not admonishing the other generals for their supposed arrogance. Guelzo goes in depth to back up his claims about McClellan, showing the extent to which arrogance possessed the general and affected his performance. McClellan went as far as publicly calling the president an idiot. His head had ballooned up to the point where he felt all in the war effort were inferior, which is why Guelzo rightly brandished him. He did do a satisfactory job in acquiring the eastern seaboard, but calling him "The Young Napoleon," was silly and a gross overestimation of his talents. The statement was derived from overexcitement in the North, eventually leading to McClellans arrogance and removal from command. While the other generals may have been arrogant, they were cooperative and did not outwardly slander the government.
     As Guelzo constantly points out and students like Shannon and James agree, the biggest detriment to both sides in the war was poorly constructed bases, poorly trained soldiers and officers, lack of supplies and lack of aggression/movement. The theme constantly rears it's ugly head as a major setback for North and South. I think both sides were waiting for the other to crack and did not anticipate the events that unfolded, for example the confederates not knowing of the push down the Tennessee River left them undermanned and caught by suprise, and Grants subsequent fanning of his soldiers at Shiloh left the soldiers confused and unprepared. Blunders and inactivity on both sides drew the war along, but I guess they can be expected in every war. It was Grant's ability to move though that threw the stagnant Confederates for a loop at Fort Henry.
     Finally, I would like to comment on the advantageous strategy of Hallek and Grant to change their attack route farther to the West. I recently drove through the mountains of Tennessee on my way to Nashville last weekend, and what I saw was a trap for the Union. To get up and down those mountains, the North would slow themselves down considerably, soldiers will and physical ability would be taxed greatly, and the Union would be more vulnerable to attack coming up and down the mountains. The roads along that route would have been terrible to trudge through as well and would lead to exhaustion. The idea of following the river allowed for faster easier movement and the use of Gun Boats which were key in the campaigns involving Forts Henry and Cumberland.

I agree with Kenneth that the generals were arrogant. It is interesting to see how the first few months of the war came out. It was wierd that the general with the most prestige was demoted from his position pretty quickly. It seems that General McClellan let all his popularity go to his head. True, McClellan did have his troops well trained, fed, and equipt, but he was not as aggressive as he needed to be. Grant on the other hand, was more aggressive, which won him success. It is interesting that the general with the least experience had the most success and became very well-respected. I also didn't know that Grant's real name was Hiram, and that it got messed up at West Point.
     
The border state conflict was also very intriguing. The states of Missouri and Kentucky were crucial to both the North and South. I don't understand the South's reasoning in invading Kentucky. General Polk decided to invade Kentucky and occupy Columbus. Jefferson Davis supported Polk, and the Confederates then invaded Bowling Green. As a result, Kentucky decided to go to the Union. The loss of Missouri and Kentucky probably hurt the South alot. I don't agree with the South's decision to invade Kentucky.

I would like to comment on the great success of Ulysses S. Grant and how he became a great American hero. The beginning of Grants life was not as stunning as the end. Grant became enrolled in West point due to en error with applications. The congressman mixed up his name with his relative and therefore was able to attend school there but had to change his name form Hiram Ulysses Grant to Ulysses Simpson Grant. He was not a brilliant student and finished 21st in a class of 39. He first took action in the Mexican American War and was promoted to captain. A period of no action drove Grant to alcohol and his resignation. This period of his life was the worst. After seven years his father gave him a job in his store and dabbered with the Know Nothings and then finally turned to the Democrats. He was then appointed to Colonel of the 21st Illinois Volunteers and then found himself under Halleck's coomand in Missouri.
  Now, the greatest opportunity of his life was presented on a platter for him. Under Hallecks command Garnt lead his famous attck up the Tennesse and Cumberland River on route to attack Fort Henrey and Fort Donelson. Grant easily took Fort henrey and half of the fort is under water. Then Grant went on to Fort Donelson as he had a tougher time bust still defeated the Confederate forces. Grant was then made a national hero. They say that the reason why Grant was so successful was because he was not well trained in military tactics form West point and was very good in readiness and reaction to the situation.
  Grant's attack on Fort Donelson and Fort Henry proved to be a very crucial move for the Union. It tore apart the Confederates by dismantling their transport system. I found this reading very interesting. I was able to learn about the history of grant and the crucial moves during the civil war.
  I would agree with Hunter when saying that the reason why the forces of the Confederates fell apart, especially at Fort Donelson was because they were not organized and the leadership was not good.

I agree with the majority of the postings refering to the arrogant manner displayed by Union generals. I find McClellan to be an incredibly interesting character in this whole thing. He knew he had the assets to make a good army. Time to train, good equiptment, and so forth. I think he felt the way many northerners did about slavery. He wanted end the practice, but give no respect to the people who were part of it. I was surprised to learn that McClellan thought of the presidential cabinet as geese. And he thought of the President as an idiot. I wonder, what exactly did folks in the north think of there commander in chief. Did Lincoln really have the support we thought he had leading into secession, maybe so. It just makes you think, that when the commander of the northern army, Lincoln's number 1 soldier, has little respect and faith for Lincoln, maybe others don't either. Of course, McClellan did seem to have dictator type ambitions.

In response to Hunter’s post, Guelzo spends a lot of time detailing how arrogant McClellan was, but at the same time Guelzo only mentions how the other generals performed actions that were to benefit their own reputations and to glorify their names. True, McClellan was more arrogant as he commented on the president’s intelligence and insulted the government, but why didn’t Guelzo call what the other generals were? All the generals were arrogant, but just not to McClellan’s degree. I thought Guelzo missed an opportunity to make a parallel.

I would like to comment on what Eric wrote. I really think Grant's life is interesting too. For starters, the guy who got him into West Point got his name wrong! I just find that slightly amusing. Although, maybe I understood the reading wrong. It sounded to me like the congressman accidentally got his name wrong. Anyway, Grant's actions that led him to take the 2 forts was pretty amazing to me. It just seems like a fairy tale story.

I've really enjoyed reading the details of the tactics and people involved. I too found it surprising that McClellan called Lincoln an "idiot" and the people in the cabinet "geese". I also find it sad that we, as Americans, know so little about our Civil War. I certainly wasn't aware of the many intricacies of the war. Why don't we delve into this stuff more in high school?

Gosh, what is there to say that hasn't been said already?

I agree with the rest of my group that McClellan was an egotistical figure of the Civil War, to sum it up swiftly. I was thinking about how Guelzo talks about McClellan expecting all of these great things for himself (President, Dictator) and then fumbles it all up by being slower than molasses in January. And then on the other hand we have Grant, who comes from a less prestigious background, has skeletons in his closet that could jeopardize his military career, and he ends up getting what McClellan wanted, the glory and eventually the Presidency. Very interesting.

In response to the last paragraph Kenneth's first message, I didn't notice that we were using the Southern terms for battle names in class. Then of course, I didn't know there were Northern and Southern terms for particular battles of the Civil War, other than "WE lost that one" or "WE won that one". Also, I didn't know the Battle of Bull Run was also called Manassas until I got to the battlefield itself three years ago. Could be a biased Northern education, or just plain old ignorance. Oh well.

Yeah, what more *is* there to say? I've procrastinated too long. Well, I'll just say what's on my mind.

The thing that struck me the hardest in our reading for today was General Grant. I really like this guy. He seemed hopeless in peacetime life, becoming an alcoholic, always staying away from his family, and just being mediocre at whatever job he drifted to. That is, until he got into the Civil War. The thing I appreciate most about him is his unorthodox tactics at Forts Henry and Donelson and his seemingly only care: to fight, not get entangled in politics. I even laughed at how he just casually let his superiors know that he was going to proceed to Fort Donelson right after finishing off Fort Henry, as if he had just snapped his fingers and casually said, "next." The tragic part of the story, though, is his future, when he became President. I remember from History 21 that he was an ineffective president. That's too bad, considering his impressive war record.

In response to the complaint about McClellan being unfairly called a "Young Napoleon," I just want to throw in my opinion. True, McClellan may not have been as great a general as Napoleon, but he at least brought some brains to the Union war effort, and his arrogance eventually got to his head, which is, I think, something he shares in common with Napoleon. I admit it's been a while since I've had Western Civ, but if I remember correctly, Napoleon wasn't exactly modest himself.

Also, a comment on "Operation Anaconda." Personally, I think it's a brilliant idea. Charging to Richmond was just stupid. Neither side was ready, and Manassas (or Bull Run) really could have gone either way. If only the Union had more resources (and I think they could have mustered the resources if they had converted their economy to one geared for war, but that probably would not have gone over well with the people, considering their penchance to republican ideals), they perhaps could have pulled it off. It's an age-old idea: siege! The winner is whoever can hold out longer. Unfortunately, the grim reality of the war was that both sides had untrained and inexperienced soldiers who did not know how to fight a war.

Edited by author 03-27-2002 10:42 AM

Battle Accounts

Suddenly the everlasting roar of musketry increased in volume toward the
extreme left, and the conflict seemed to grow fiercer than at any previous
time. This was about six o'clock, and as I galloped over the field, I looked
back and around upon the most sublime scene that the fierce grandeur and
terrible reality of war ever portrayed. The thousand continuous volleys of
musketry seemed mingled into the grand roar of a great cataract, while the
louder and deeper. discharges of artillery bounded forth over those hills and
down that valley, with a volume that seemed to shake the earth beneath us.
   The canopy of smoke was so thick that the sun was gloomily red in the
heavens, while the clouds of dust in the rear, caused by the commotion of
advancing and retreating squadrons of cavalry, was stifling and blinding to
a distressing degree. That memorable scene will never be effaced from my
recollection, and it seemed most like a battlefield, of any representation,
either real or upon canvas, that I ever saw.

-- Reporter for the Cincinnati Commercial at Gaines' Mills (Moore, ed., Rebellion Record, V, 240.)

Gallantly they sprang to the encounter, rushing into the field at a full run.
Instantly from the line of the enemy's breastworks a murderous storm of
grape and canister was hurled into their ranks, with the most terrible effect.
Officers and men went down by hundreds, but yet, undaunted and
unwavering, our line dashed on until two thirds of the distance across the
field was accomplished. Here the carnage from the withering fire of the
enemy's combined artillery and musketry was dreadful. Our line wavered a
moment, and fell back to the cover of the woods. Twice again the effort to
carry the position was renewed, but each time with the same results. Night at
length rendered a further attempt injudicious, and the fight, until ten o'clock,
was kept up by the artillery on both sides. To add to the horrors, if not the
dangers, of the battle, the enemy's gunboats, from their position at Curl's
Neck, two and a half miles distant, poured on the field continual broadsides
from their immense rifle-guns.

 The battle-field, surveyed through the cold rain of Wednesday morning,
presented scenes too shocking to be dwelt on without anguish. The woods
and the field before mentioned were, on the western side, covered with our
dead, in all the degrees of violent mutilation ; while in the woods on the west
side of the field, lay, in about equal numbers, the blue uniformed bodies of
the enemy. Many of the latter were still alive, having been left by their
friends in their indecent haste to escape from the rebels. Great numbers of
horses were killed on both sides, and the sight of their disfigured carcasses,
and the stench proceeding from them, added much to the loathsome horrors
of the bloody field.

-- Reporter for the Richmond, Virginia, Examiner at Malvern Hill (Moore, ed., Rebellion Record, V, 266.)

What always surprises me is how bad the Union generals overestimate Confederate forces. McClellan thinks Magruder has a ton of men, where as with only 15,000 men McClellan could easily clean house of the Confederates and take Richmond by storm. Then later McClellan believes Joe Johnston to have 200,000 men, whereas in actuality he only has 55,000. These common miscalculations easily explain why the Federal generals were so hesitant to make an attack, always waiting until they had their full force up. The Confederates, especially Lee and Jackson, will take the initiative, without their full numbers. Jackson took 15,000 men and easily confused 3 Union forces totaling 40,000. Because Gettysburg is so well known I'll use that as an example. The fight there was an accident, but although Lee did not have his best corp on the field he went ahead and fought the first day, whereas a Union general would have pulled back because he did not have his full force. I still wonder though, how with cavalry, scouts, spies, and pickets, one could so overestimate the strength of his opponent. Or did McClellan overestimate on purpose? Was he inflating the number of the enemy so that when he won it would be even a greater victory or in case he lost he can say he lost to far superior numbers?

I knew of the blockade, the blockade runners, Farragut, and the battle between the Virginia and the Monitor, but I did not know of the other naval affairs. In no previous American History class I've ever taken have I heard about how important the navy was in the Civil War. I find it very interesting how important both sides saw sea control to be. I never knew that the blockade nearly took us to war with England, I thought to be highly intriguing, that because of Wilkes England nearly came in to the Civil War against the Union. How different the war would have been had that happened then. After reading this section about War at Sea, we can once again see how the Union's supplies dwarfed that of the Confederates. The Confederates didn't have many sailors, did not have the supplied needed to build ships, or the money and capabilities to repair ships. Once again the Union has a distinct advantage over the Confederacy.

I generally prefer to wait until the late evening to post my discussions so that I can respond to what others have said; however, my mom is visiting today in celebration of her birthday. Thus, I find myself posting early, while I have an open block of free time in my day.

I resonate with Matthew Heathman in my previous underestimation of naval importance during the Civil War. Judging from Guelzo's treatment, one could almost assert that the federal blockade on Confederate ports and such was one of the two or three single largest causes of Northern victory. After all, Guelzo makes a nice point in saying that the blockade took away Confederate ability to "make war". Well, 1/2 of winning a war comes from being able to make battles that are beneficial to one's respective side. Hence, inability to make war brings inability to win war.

We need not look to hard to realize that Guelzo is not the world's #1 McClellan fan. He paints the Union general as selfish, overambitious, and even cocky. The error, I feel, comes with Guelzo seeming to imply this as a unique, personality-rooted stigma. McClellan's actions, in my mind, reflect the negative aspects of military structure. When one man possesses control of thousands and thousands of troops, who can blame him for having a sizeable head? I mean, a single individual has supreme authority over innumerable individuals that end up doing the "gruntwork". McClellan was like the CEO of a company that uses sweatshops for labor. A man with power to make such decisions--who succeeds often and early--is naturally going to develop egotistical, superiority feelings. No patriotic fervor or Union loyalty will ever trump such personal glory and individual achievement.

I agree with all of Matthew's statements. I do believe there was overestimation on both sides of the war, however. The South usually had more urgency and more to lose which could explain their lesser degree of hesitancy.

To note a discrepancy in Guelzo's CAR, written in 1995, and the main reason to always be questioning material is his account of the Hunley. "The Hunley destroyed itself along with the Housatonic" (p242). However, we now know the Hunley was, in fact, not destroyed. First, there was always the belief of the Hunley surviving the explosion because lookouts on land saw the Hunley's blue lamp after the sinking of the Housatonic. Second, it was discovered and surfaced two years ago and is now on display in Charleston. Here's a good link for the Hunley - www.hunley.org.

Another note, one cannot take the importance of the Peninsula campaign for granted. What if McCellen had succeeded in capturing Richmond? I don't believe the war would have ended but it's history would have been drastically different. Was McCellen too hesitant? Did he miss a grand opportunity? Or, was Lee that much more of a military genius? Did he not save Richmond? The Peninsula campaign is one of those turning points in Civil War history. Could one argue even more important than Gettysburg?

Rusty makes a good point when he says that McClellan was not the only Union general that was selfish, overambitious, and cocky. I think most of them were this way. Grant is an unusual Union general, he does not have the same personality as the other Union generals, he is not trying to be better than any of them, he is not trying to get his name in the newspapers, he is just trying to get his job done. Guelzo harps on McClellan, but Halleck is just as bad. Halleck is doing his best to be number one. He is trying his hardest to be supreme commander in the West, he does not want Buell to do as well as he. This is why Halleck pushes for a route that would be easy to take and not get bogged down like Buell. Most Union generals have the traits Guezlo cracks on McClellan for having. Guezlo also attacks McClellan for being overcautious, which his replacements were also, a reason for this I believe is that if they do not do well Lincoln will yank them and replace them. The Union generals wanted overwhelming odds before they would attack, today it is the United States's military strategy to only attack when the odds are in their favor of 3:1, if this were the case back then there would have been no attacking, very few battles had those types of odds. If you worked most you life to get to the top and then finally you get to the top, wouldnt you be a bit cautious to not lose that position? I believe that the politics in Washington made the Union generals overcautious. Lincoln tells Grant when he promotes Grant to Lt. Gen. that he will stay out of Grant's way in running the army. Lincoln will anxiously sit back and watch and try to keep his hands out of to many military affairs. I think this makes a huge difference in the attitudes and strategies of the Union generals.

I am surprised by the South's ingenouity and inventiveness in their navy. I would think that the North would be the ones comming up with all these new designs and leading the way in ironclads since they had all the industry. Guelzo told the story in a great way so that when the North appeared with the Monitor I was just as surprised as the South might have been. I figured the Monitor came later after a few years of development. If the Virginia had been able to penetrate DC and NY the war could have taken a different turn.
I agree that the guys like McClellen were pretty cocky. There is something about Lee, though, that is really likeable. Maybe it was his seeming opposition to the war or at least a desire to avoid it.

hmm... this made for some interesting reading- i generally agree with the others in the discussion of McClellan's apparent cocky attitude and lack of initiative. Guelzo certainly makes him out to be "vain" and "slow." As i read, i found myself examining and entertaining some potential motivations behind McClellan's behavior-- laziness, fear of defeat ( for his life and reputation), stubborn attitudes (wanting to operate under his own schedule... not that of Lincoln), etc. But as i read on, Guelzo points out that Lincoln became aware that he needed to make the war into a fight over the issue of slavery, in order to rally fervor in the Union camp. A strong motivation for the Union effort seemed to be dwindling. Obviously, McClellan did not embody such fervor and motivation. Perhaps his inactive, static behavior was more a reflection of his doubt in the overall Union cause than just an issue of laziness. I don't mean to defend McClellan, because he definitly didn't fulfill his given position and role--he was disobedient and defiant to Lincoln-- but i think Guelzo almost paints him as too selfish and lazy without considering the possible morale (and therefore rationale) the Union as a whole was evidently experiencing. ..... perhaps i have been too generous to this Union commander who failed in his job miserably (be it overestimating Confederate numbers or refusing to take responsibility and blame for his own unaggressiveness).... what can i say??... i'm one of those "give the benefit of the doubt" people.
I was incredibly surprised to read about the impact of naval warfare at this time. i was aware that naval forces were implemented in blockades, but i had no idea what a twist it placed on the overall war. Yes- the Union was aggressive in obstructing major southern ports and preventing necessary commerce for the Confederate war effort. They must be given credit for their initiative. But their first establishment of blockades seemed to be almost haphazard- "Welles chartered one of almost everything that could float, armed in a makeshift fashion, and sent them off to pound a beat outside southern rivers and harbors." So although the Union did take initiative in naval warfare, it seems to me that it was originally a scare tactic, meant to intimidate Confederates... "makeshift fashion" seems to imply "bark" without real "bite." Having read earlier of the diminished Union morale, it makes me wonder if original naval efforts aren't another reflection of the need for rallied fervor in the Union camp. Reading on, it is apparent that naval warfare adopted a much more serious nature than that of intimidation measures (this is obvious in the way it impacted the Civil War overall.... i just think it is interesting that both passages we read today seem to point to Lincoln's need for an inciting war motivation.

  I also found the reading to be very interesting. McClellan was definitely a character! It seems as if Lincoln had to pull teeth just to get him to do what he wanted. It's funny to see how many times McClellan and slow(ly) are used in the same sentence. I believe that McClellan was more of a hassle than he was worth and the fact that he always thought he was outnumbered didn't help much either.
  I, along with others in the group, was surprised at the fact that the Navy was so important during the Civil War. I had learned that both sides built ships that looked like "a tin can on a shingle," but I didn't know how much time, planning, and labor was involved to bring these "tin cans" into fruition. Trial and error seemed to play a big role for both sides. Each side took what worked and scrapped what didn't. This especially was the case with the Confederacy's interest in submarines after the Hunley sank. Once it went down, they more or less gave up the idea. I agree with Neal's remark about historical accounts and the Hunley in particular. I watched the raising(is that the proper word?!) of the Hunley on tv and remember being amazed at it's relatively small size, the fact that 9 people manned it, and that they were willing to man a ship that had already sunk twice before. The claustrophobia and possibility of death involved does not sound very enticing to me but this just shows the great amount of dedication to the Confederate cause the soldiers felt.

I guess I'll start off the discussion of "The Soldiers". There will probably be a number of different topics touched on by the class. I will narrow my posting to two topics and see other postings.

One, I think it would be interesting to see the importance of the campfire setting on Civil War soldiers. The campfire scene was mentioned twice in our reading - Brewster and Mitchell. The "gay" stories told and the light-hearted atmosphere allowed soldiers to "move on". The campfire setting strenghtened comraderie, gave emotional outlets, allowed the focus to shift from war, and honored fallen friends.

Second, Mitchell describes the war's enthusiasm. He also mentions the waning of this enthusiasm because "the sight of the soldier became commonplace". Or, does this fact support the fanaticism bringing the Civil War? Had the joy and love for the moment of war turned to a complacent civilian population? Did the civilians become bored with the romantic ideal of war and/or did they become distracted with "daily pursuits"(p145)? I don't think this can be compared to our current situation with soldiers in Afghanistan. Or, can it? The Civil War affected society much more than Afghanistan does us. The reason it affected Civil War's society more is partly due to the war being on American soil, to more family/community members participating in the Civil War which resulted in more information through newspapers, intimate letters, etc.

One thing that always gets me is the brutality of the war. We see pictures and hear stories of how bad the battles were and what the carnage looked like, but then we turn the page and don't think back on the scene. Whereas these guys saw this day in and day out, they were living in the muck, during battles they were crawling around this carnage, and if one was unluckily enough he to be wounded and survive, he could spend the night, or a couple days with the dead, decaying bodies. What a ghastly night or couple of days that had to be. Entrails, blood, body parts lying all over, the screams of the other wounded filling the night. This I think is a reason why Dooley and Brewster talk about soldiers not fearing death less. The more fighting you see, the more people you see die, the more you think that you might be next. No matter how much you harden to the carnage around, thinking it natural, you'll still fear death, because in the back of your mind you know you have a good chance of being next.

Blight talks about how soldiers will never be the same, how a return to civilian life will be a battle for them. This should be easily understandable. Playing football I've heard the scream of agony from a torn up knee, I've heard the sound of bones shattering, and seen someone fall lifelessly to the ground because they were knocked unconscious. But all this pales into comparison what these guys or any soldiers go through. It is amazing to me that these guys did not have more psychological problems than they did, from having to shoot their fellow countrymen, to having to get used to seeing such carnage, and from revisiting the war every time they heard the thunder or any other thing that would remind them of the cannons roaring or another aspect of the battle.

An overview of the reading: War Sucks. The readings for Tuesday told an all to familiar story, the tale of death and misery that the common soldiers underwent. The Mitchell and Blight essays went on and on as if they thought they were relaying information that we hadn't heard over and over again. Yes, everyone knows war really isn't romantic or noble, but actually gruesome and barbaric. Yes, everyone knows that all soldiers are scared, and fictitious characters with unending amounts of courage like Rambo don't exist. Yes, everyone knows that soldiers undergo significant strains caused by the differences in society and military service. Thank God Mitchell and Blight are there to tell us things we already know.

Anyway, the reading concentrates mainly on the horrors of the Civil War, and the way it looked from the soldier's point of view. Blight reaches the dramatic conclusion, after studying the letters of a Union officer Charles Brewster, that most soldiers were normal people that were homesick, bored of military routine, and most of all, scared of death. The fact that Brewster is torn between his duty as a soldier and his own personal fears of dying, is a dilemma that has plagued combatants in war through all of time.

Mitchell writes that society treated the soldiers of the Union and CSA differently as the war dragged on. While emulated in the early part of the conflict, the armies eventually became somewhat of a commonplace in Northern and Southern cities. It's a good thing Mitchell noticed this, after all, this has only occurred since the days of the Roman Empire. While it was a bit startling how one Southern city almost barred soldiers from walking on the sidewalk, the military and civilian realms have never coexisted perfectly, so why would it be any different in this war?

Right off, I have to disagree with James some. Yes, people may know the horrors of war, but do they REALLY know? I found the readings painted a very vivid picture of war that is often not seen. Brewster's letters and Blight's description of Brewster's life were a very interesting insight into what an every day soldier goes through. As many of the readings discussed, war is often talked about in terms of generals and strategy, not the soldier and what he went through.

In Blackford's letter home to his father I felt the sense that he really was disappointed that his company didn't get to help with Manassas. He seems very unemotional and talks about the events in the week before Manassas in a very matter of fact manner. Dooley's piece on fear gives us this lasting impression of death as he compares it to "jaws of destruction".

Mitchell's essay about the psychology of volunteer soldiers gave insight into the life of a soldier who is a product of the war. I go back to my original statement. I disagree with James. Yes, we may know that war is horrible, but can we ever read enough about it to gain a realistic sense of what these men went through? Can we ever really know what it is like to stand on a battle field and have our friend standing next to us shot dead? I think the best we have are these little insights into a soldiers personal life because we can never really know what it was like for these men.

This selection opend my eyes even more to the the horrific truths of the war. These readings illustrate the grusome realitis of war by describing the bloody battles that soldiers went through. Blackford touches upon the disease that one encounters, for example scurvy, in the camps and the lack of blankets and food to keep the soldiers well. Dooley writes about the fear factor. The fear that death is upon soldiers as each day progresses. Any day at any time one can encounter death, but courage keeps them going. Unlike these true stories of the terrible encounters on the battle field one man believes that the truth will never be in the history books.
  I found it very interesting that Walt Whitman believes that "Real War" will never get in the history books. He believes that future years will never know the true stories and realities of war. He4 believes that the stories of the "actual soldier" will forever be lost and what will be written is the hospital part of the war which he says deserve sto be written about. He explains that the bloody battles, the armies, and campaigns,to name a few, is what should be expounded upon.
  The last thing I would like to talk about which I found intersting was an idea presented by Brewster. Brewster loved the war so much that he could not picture hiimself doing anything else. When retirement was drawing near he started to worry about his future plans. Brewster illustrates the idea that for soldiers it is scary when the leave the war. They have no lans in the future and no job. Brewster shows that he is worried about where he will work and what he will do with his life. All he has had is the war and he mentions that maybe he would like to keep fighting for he will always have a job. In addition to James Cash, I also found that Brewster touches upon the idea of homesickness in the war. War is a tought time especially when you are swept away to fight and have to leave your families. War is such a terrible thing because you never know if you will see your famiy again.

This chapter gives us a totally different perpective of the war. You can learn alot from the solider's letters to home, as opposed to historian's critiques of Lincoln, Davis, and the major generals. The reader gets a realistic account of the actual war. These selections show how bad the war really was. Dooley's letter tells about how soliders became more fearful throughout the war. Brewster's letters seem to give a very realistic and factual account of his experiences in the war. Brewster's letters are very helpful because he was in almost every major battle of the war. One reoccuring theme of Brewster's was his quest for respect from his fellow soliders and the people at home. This quest for respect sometime's drove soliders to feelings of jealousy because of other's rank. For example, Brewster was excited that a Lieutenant was close to death, because he hoped that he would recieve his position. This promotion also helped Brewster's day to day health. He said that with his new position he was getting paid more and doing less work. Brewster also states that, "...and their greatest comforts would be miseries to people at home." He gives the reader a picture of the war being a day to day struggle for survival. The concepts of manhood and courage were also represented throughout Brester's letters and Blight's article. Brewster did not consider hiself a brave man, but felt that acting courageous would gain him respect with his fellow soliders. To what Eric said, I do not think that Brewster "loved" the war. As I read the article, I noticed alot of his insecurities and fears about war. I think that Brewster was fearful about returning to society because he had been away for three years, and he was also unsucessful before the war. I was wondering throughout the reading: How did the soliders families feel when recieving these letters. I'm sure they felt a sense of relief that their son was alive, but hearing all the gruesome details of the war would make me worry about my son twice as much.

When we talk about war, and one's willingness to fight, we must take a look at the issue of soldier morale. In the Blackford letter, we were given a first hand account of the everday situation of a confederate soldier. A soldier would march miles on end each day with no protection from the rain or other elements. His mouth" filled of scurvey". He had no blanket, no descent food. Typically in a situation such as this, morale would be so low that a soldier would give up his willingness to fight. But Blackford states that he cannot complain, he is content to fight onward. I believe that he says that he cannot complain because of his personal pride, and respect for hi father and the C.S.A. I think this was the same for most soldiers writing home. They wanted people to know the truth, but they wanted to keep their pride as well.
  In the Dooley article, we learn of a soldier's growing fears throughout the war. I think that what Dooley was trying to say was that although soldiers grew more fearfull, at the same time they in a state of somewhat unconsciousness. When you see people dying all around you, in so many different ways, in so many different battles, you are obviously scared, but also numbed of everything you see as well. You know that you may die, but you see it so much, so it becomes easier to accept.

Eugene Blackford and John Dooley, if placed in a 6x6 foot room, would provide for an entertaining discourse. Blackford, though he conveys a quasi-sense of the war's horror and darkness, seems to possess no real sense of fear; he goes so far as to use the phrase "never was cooler in my life". Dooley, contrastingly, holds that soldiers maintain a pervasive fear of death regardless of the number of battles fought. This is quite a radical idea. Though I am in no way likening war to driving, let us briefly consider the analogy: when one continually drives above the speed limit without being ticketed, does one not lose his fear of being caught by police? I would say so. Thus, the idea of a never-decreasing fear of death, though not at all surprising, is somewhat intriguing (I guess that is the word I am looking for).

The Brewster essay provided many helpful pieces of information, but I would like to focus particularly on his attention on the idea of "willingness to fight". His assertion that people only want to fight as long as they are not called to fight resounded strongly with me. People can claim to "want to fight" all they want, but things change quickly when they are placed on the line or are called to blow some brains out in rescue of fellow soldiers.

David Blight's essay was quite enjoyable, and from it I gathered 2 chief notions: personal ambition and disenchantment with civilians. The fierce personal gains sought by officers is simply evidence of human nature(which cannot be escaped even in war). Although men are fighting for a common cause, anyone would jump at the opporutnity to become a ranked official, one which numbers of troops would look up to and admire. The idea of civilian discontent was quite a surprise to me. The idea that civilians would look down upon and even chide the very people that were fighting to save their idea of society and every day life is unbelievable. I would attribute this, I guess, to the lack of knowledge that each side developed for the other. How can one expect a store clerk or woodworker to understand what goes on from day to day in Manassas or Vicksburg? Even so, I am still unable to account for the extreme disrespect supposedly shown by some civilians...

From the Mitchell essay, I was particularly taken by one quote: "If I stay much longer in service I fear that I will never be fit for anything but the army". This is a strakly useable piece of talk. I am confounded when trying to imagine what a person can possibly do for a living after coming back from the complete slaughter of other human beings. Does this sound like a logical, do-able sequence?: employee, soldier, shoot 10 men in the head, walk over dead bodies, then go back to normal occupation. This seems unfathomable. Accordingly, a great number of military men chose and still choose to make careers of the service. Can you blame them?

In closing, I would offer kudos to James Cash. I agree that we hear cliche-esque, prototypical stories of warlife again and again. However, when asked for a suitable alternative, I am left speechless. Repetition of pseudo-fairy tale stories may be the only way that war is ever realized or contemplated. Though this would be a tragedy, I guess it is better than no information at all. Or is it?

I found the documents on the soldiers' stories extremely interesting. The first essay, focusing on one Union soldier portrays a good microcosm of a real soldier's fears. It seems that his biggest fear was coming back into the world after the war. It seems that this was a common fear among soldiers, because they did not know if they could continue their former lives when they returned home. I really liked the Mitchell piece for many reasons. It seems that war was so horrible, filled with disgusting sights, smells and everything, that soldiers became very dehumanized. The story of the soldiers scavenging the dead cow was extremely interesting. Another intriguing thing about the Mitchell piece were the quotes from the various soldiers. All or most of the Union soldiers wrote in perfect English with nothing mispelled, most of the Confederate soldiers' writings were bad grammar and full of mispellings. This goes back to our discussion of the education or lack therof in the South. I find the soldiers experiences during the war yet another perspective on the senselessness the this war brought to America.

Like most those who have already responded I have been struck by these documents treatment of battle and the soldiers response. I found the story and letters of Charles Brewster to be quite interesting. Blights treatment of him is quite good. As Matt Heathman has said, Blight shows how the soldier’s experience has changed them in drastic ways. Soldiers during this time were faced with some of the worst constitutions in modern warfare. It is amazing what they had to go through. As Mitchell states they went from extreme to extreme. Not just the chance of death at any moment, a fear that never went away as Dooley points out, but also of disease and even “worse yet”, being thought a coward. I think the biggest fear from Brewster was being thought a coward. He seems to hate everything that this title suggested. This is clear in his treatment of Fred Clark in his letter of July ’62. He says that this man was nothing but a trembling little coward, and he’s glad that Clark shot himself. This also comes through when illness kept Brewster from battle and he was scared of how people would treat him, would they think he was a coward and a weakling.

I think this can be a motivation throughout history. There are many instances where war is shown as a test of courage, many who joined WWI and WWII where trying to do what a man was expected. And like many of the soldiers of the Civil War, they were never the same. I don’t know how many of you have grandfathers that served in WWII, probably nearly all of you, but mine never would talk about it. He may say a little here or there but never that much. Its just too emotionally hard to remember. I know one person in particular that experience so much that he truly was a totally different person from the person that went off to war. As Mitchell points out this was one of the greatest fears of soldiers and families; how would this war change men? That is why I think these treatments of soldier psychology and motivations are so intriguing. I think it is a very important part of understanding history.

I was struck by the story of Brewster in Blight's article. Brewster was interesting because he was so insecure. This gave way to his suspicions and assumptions. His character shows a side of the war that probably isn't talked about too much. His life wasn't really going anywhere and so for him the war is something to do. It also gives him some upward mobility. He is given a happy ending as he finds his place in the world after the war.

Mitchell's article talks a bit about the unknown future of the soldiers in the war. For some the war would change them totally. It is also important to realize that even though these soldiers were praised (at first), they weren't all noble. They were still thieves, cheats, liars, gamblers, and swearers. I was also intrigued by the lose lose situation the soldiers were in. They could go off to war and risk losing their arms, legs, or lives or they could come back and be treated like dogs. I was surprised to learn how poorly they were treated and respected. I was really surprised by the paragraph that talked about how some soldiers's families would become indifferent to the war and their son's fate.

"We have no protection against the rain...no blanket...[and] was never so dirty before in my life". Blackford's previous description of a soldier's life is definitely not the romanticized view of war often depicted. The situations these soldiers were put into simply blow my mind. For example, consider Blackford's letter to his father in which he states that, when in battle, he became used to the minnie balls of the enemy flying by his head every second. Also, in Blight's article on Brewster, Blight explains how death was so much a part of everyday life that soldiers could never really escape it. He informs the reader that many times soldiers who died only days before would receive letters from back home. This obviously did not help to boost morale at all and he describes it as, "terrible sorrow connected with it". So not only were soldiers faced with death on the battlefield but off it as well. I think it is very important to note the courage and valor of the everyday soldiers who get no glory or praise for their tireless work, but who did all the grunt work. Brewster sums it up appropietly when he says that, "A soldier has more misery in one day than occurs in a lifetime of a civillian ordinarily and their greatest comforts would be miseries to people at home". Wars need great generals to lead the mass of troops into battle, but they are often portrayed as the only heroic figures involved in the battles. Yet, it needs to be remembered that it is the soldiers' blood that is daily spilled out onto the battlefield.

the psychology of the soldier is a very interesting issue. what do these people experience when they are in battle? what provokes them to fight and possibly die? what do they expect to get out of war? i'll agree that it was the romantic ideal of war that first convinced many volunteers to join. they really had no clue of the brutality of battle and they were almost peer pressured into fighting. i can understand how many really didn't know what they were fighting for and many were simply pawns of the system and of generals and whatnot. once the soldiers were actually fighting, it is incredible to hear of all the things these people had to endure. brewster's letters talk of the weird kind of kinship expressed between the 2 sides. he could not help but feel bad for the death of a union soldier, even if that soldier was intent on killing him. his letters also describe the alienation he felt by civilian life. once a soldier, always a soldier kind of thing. brewster became a machine of war and he realized it would be hard to break from that. he also talks of the fear of being labelled a coward, even though he may be incredibly scared. constantly being exposed to the concept of courage and images of death are definitely unique to the life of a soldier. each soldier is shaped differently by this, for better or worse.
mitchell's article also focuses on the psyche of the soldier in battle and talks of all the things they had to endure. he brings up feelings of alienation that soldiers experienced. this seems to be the general concensus amongst soldiers but how they react and deal with these feelings are unique to the individual. some question what they were doing, fighting while others stayed home and got rich. others knew exactly why they were fighting and were more at peace with themselves. the article also talks of the way people became transformed once they were labelled a soldier. some felt at liberty to act like monsters. this is a scary idea but certainly plausible. participating in war, after growing up in a society with certain values and morals, is a definite psychological jolt. it is organized killing...and some grew to love it, some grew to accept it, and some grew to despise it. the effect of war on a surviving soldiers psyche (on a whole different level) is almost as brutal as the actual killing that occured in the battlefield. it's a vicious cycle and it is good of us to learn from these things.

First off, I’d like to address the comments made by Megan and James. From what we’ve read for class, the theme that war is hell definitely applies. Though troops were better trained and more organized since Manassas, the simple fact that life for the soldiers was rough can’t be ignored. It’s a common theme in all wars, and documents, letters, and secondary information sources (ranging from the Crisis of the American Republic to the Mitchell essay to movies such as Gettysburg) show that war isn’t a day at the beach. However, will we ever know to what extent this hell was? Probably not as the Walt Whitman article claims (and, yes, I know we weren’t assigned this one, but it’s still important). Though we have documents to showcase specific cases of how hard and bloody life was, our readings can’t illustrate the full extent as to how bad the Civil War really was for the men involved in the fighting.

The Mitchell essay was a good read. I’d never heard of the communities abandoning the soldiers like that. To read these statements shocked me, and I can see how it added to the psychological trauma these men were experiencing. How would you feel if your brothers on the field were dying in horrific ways and your family and community were abandoning you? It’s interesting to compare Mitchell’s work to the Dooley letter on fear. These men had experienced so much death and been so close to losing their own lives that they no longer feared death. Perhaps the men were more afraid of living a life they wouldn’t recognize anymore. By losing their family and community support and having to live with horrific war memories, that’s a fate worse than death as it could involve more suffering and heart ache than one’s own death on the battlefield.

In regards to the texts we’ve read for this course, they often contradict each other yet somehow work with each other. As history is a field that’s open to numerous and varied interpretations, this doesn’t surprise me. However, I must admit that sometimes I’ve felt lost in the readings, trying to decipher what is true and what isn’t. By reading so many different ideas and well supported arguments, we as a class have been dumped out in the woods, and it’s up to us to find our way back home. We’ve been raised to believe that slavery was the root cause to the Civil War. Randall claims fanaticism was responsible. McPherson believes northern exceptionalism caused regional differences leading to the conflict. While there are various, well-supported opinions revolving around this war, it’s up to us to decide what to believe and what to discard. We’re smart individuals, and we have the resources to find our way back home. So, I’m glad we’ve read what we’ve read, and it sure makes history open to our own analysis.

This is the part of history I enjoy most, the stories straight from the lips and pens of those who saw it all. Like the rest of my class mates, I found Brewster's story to be fascinating. Brewster represents to me the everyman soldier looking for praise and accomplishment, and yet having the nerves left raw by the exposure to battles. I can't find the quote I'm looking for, it was either Blight or Mitchell who stated that it was woe to the literate solider whose mind was then saturated with memories and visions that were now incommunicable. However letters were the soldier's outlet, as well as one of the few connections to civilian life. Communication outside of the war was probably one of the few stable things the soldiers had to rely on. "Letters represented the continuity of life, even when they were to or from the dead."

Mitchell's article is just as interesting as it offers a patchwork of different opinions, quotes, and memories from both sides of the war on a wide array of topics. From the treatment of soldiers by civilians (echoing of Vietnam), to the psychology of the soliders themselves, I feel more able to grasp the sociology, the anxieties, the beliefs of both soldiers and citizens. The Civil War is hard enough to comprehend for a student, imagine being immersed within it as a solider, or a soldier's loved one.

After reading the letters, essays, and the postings on them, I realize that there is not one true mindset of a soldier. Simply because Blackford and Dooley have different emotions while on the battlefield, does not mean one is right and one is wrong. In reading these personal accounts, we are attempting to steer away from the generals’ vantage point on the war, down to the grassroots of the privates’ experience. But what makes wars so unique is that it is fought between individuals, in a group, not a group of identical men. Each men react to the gunshots, the charges and retreats, the 26 miles, the death of a friend just inches away, in different ways. That is why we cannot pinpoint any particular feeling or emotion. Matt wonders why more soldiers didn’t suffer from psychological effects after the war, because everyone who fought in the war reacted differently.
Brewster tells how Cal was so noble, yet then a few lines later he talks about another soldier who “was a trembling little coward”. These or two extremes brought out of the men by all the killing and carnage.
This is why I like Rusty’s illustration of putting Dooley and Blackford in the same room, because they are so different, yet fought for the same cause.
This can also explain why 140 years later, Jimmy and Megan are discussing wheather Blight and Mitchell are making redundant points or simply pounding home what needs to be focused on because of the severity of it. We forget how hearts and minds are touched differently, through different experiences and senses. I think they both make great points, but it illustrates the larger point that each man was deeply and uniquely by the war.

Like Nicholas, I find the psychology of the soldier to be an interesting issue. I cannot even imagine what it must have been like to be in the middle of a battle, but I think these readings give us a good idea of how soldiers felt. Many times, people can get caught up in the bigger issues of war without remembering that individual lives were affected by this enormous process. The letters and essays help to remind us that in addition to famous generals, regular people were deeply involved in this war. I agree with Sean that this war affected each soldier in different ways and this also helps to emphasize the individuality of the soldiers. This war is complex because so many soldiers have varying reason for fighting. Each motivation for joining the war causes each soldier to have a different reaction to the horrors of battle and soldier life. I was really struck by the description of the psychology of the soldier and his ideas about fear. I can imagine that being spared from death would not make one fear it less, but only be more apprehensive that it could happen to him next time. At the same time, there were soldiers who became desensitized to death because they experienced so much of it. These two views help to reassert the idea of the individual soldier and the unique way he was affected by this war.

These personal-level accounts of the Civil War soldier's life held a lot of interest for me simply because I'm curious about what happens to everyday John Doe's mind in that particular set of circumstances. Before I had read these essays and letters, I'd had some vague idea about soldiers fighting for a cause that they believed in. But Blight quite clearly points out that Brewster took advantage of his situation as a soldier to improve his material well-being, cause or no cause. It is interesting, though, to see how Brewster's attitudes shift through the course of the war. At times, he admonishes runaways as "cowards," yet he at other times complains limitlessly about camp life. However, in 1864 and 1865, towards the end of the war, most soldiers realized the grimness of the situation, and I doubt that there was much of romantic ideals of glory floating around the armies by that time.

Another interesting point that Blight makes is the camaraderie of camp life as compared to the dull return to civilian life. For many soldiers, including Brewster, the thing that mattered the most in the war experience was hanging out with one's war buddies. My uncle, a Vietnam veteran, often speaks of his war buddies as brothers, and I suspect this is the way many Civil War veterans remembered their fellow soldiers. Some may have even viewed the return to civilian life as a way to become "soft," or somehow less manly. Even though there were some celebrations at the return of the soldiers (especially in the North) at the end of the war, the experience had changed the soldiers' lives in a way that civilians could not understand, and this, I believe, is the main reason for the alienation from civilians that the soldiers experienced. In addition to this estrangement, the soldiers could never forget the horrors of battle and the seemingly endless days of boredom between chores and battles. In the end, the conflict for the soldiers did not end in 1865; it continued in one way or another for many of them for the rest of their days.

Like several of you mentioned, a romantic view of war provoked many individuals to enlist in both Confederate and Union armies. The "image" of war was not the "reality" of it, however. The documents and essays that we read for today are linked by this theme of "image v. reality," "romanticism v. realism"...

Men entered the war for several reasons but I would argue that, primarily, they enlisted because of individual PRIDE, the desire for respect, and/or a sense of duty. I found it quite interesting that Brewster's enlistment, in large part, was motivated by his intense desire for honor and fear of dishonor. (Haven't we mostly associated "honor" with southern culture so far this term? Isn't Brewster from Massachusetts??) Men believed that, by fighting in the war, they would gain respect, admiration, etc.

However, the war brought unexpected (definitely NOT romantic) results. The death and gore, as well as the lost profits and suffering families at home made soldiers question their "duties" and forget their selfish prides. The lack of respect given them by their home communities and families made it difficult for soldiers to even imagine returning home. Clearly, the war was not at all what it was expected to be. The soldiers' romantic visions of fulfilled duty, increased respect, and pride in great accomplishments were trampled by the reality of war...

One more thing: The Blight article ends with a description of veteran (GAR) reunions. According to Blight, the alienation that soldiers felt during the war led to the creation of a "community" comprised exclusively of soldiers. After the war, many soldiers felt estranged from civilian society but continued to feel as though they belonged within their communities of soldiers (the GAR). I imagine that the reunions were dominated by romanticized war stories, with little mention of death and disappointment. Perhaps the romantic "image" of war (that was destroyed in battle) returned in the post-war years. I mean, would America have ever willingly fought another war if the veterans of this one had not “forgotten” "the reality of combat" (p.144)??

I definitely have to agree with Megan in disagreeing with James. You can't ever read about too many experiences. To say that Blight and Mitchell don't say much past what we already know about war is like saying that once you've read a few love stories and a few diaries of love-struck individuals, there's no need to read another one. There are an infinite number of experiences and reactions just in ordinary life not to mention war. The readings did more than just "sum up" the "ironic actions" in the war experience. I thought the authors did more to raise questions, etc... than to answer specifics. And id disagree with james on another point too (sorry james) The treatment of soldiers by civilians is different in this war b/c they were directly involved in the decision for war in the first place. "In a democratic society the volunteer thad helped make the decision to go to war. The casue of the Union or of the South was bound up with one's community, one's home, etc..." The same applies to the civilians. OR if civilian feelings was not the same as was perceived by soldiers.......whether or not the civilian feeling was the same as perceived by the soldier, the psychology behind the civilian/soldier relationship has many implications. I thought Mitchells' point about the reality of men in the "shared army life" was neat too. I'd never thought of the camp as "the place to see human nature in all its different varieties" - a point so subtle and yet so important

Edited by author 04-02-2002 04:51 PM
I have to begin by agreeing with Megan (and others) that we can never truly know the horrors of war, no matter how much we may hear the "all too familiar story." It is important to note that this lack of knowledge about the realities of war is no different for us than it was for the men who fought in this conflict. They too had no idea what they were REALLY getting into; consequently, their first-hand accounts are the best source we have for understanding.

From today's reading, I first have to comment on the relationships the soldiers had with those outside the conflict, both in their families and their communities. Following those who commented before me in disbelief that communities could so desert their loyal soldiers, I think of modern day examples, that with any conflict of this scale, not everyone is going to agree with the course being taken, and the tide of public opinion can be a powerful thing. What is perhaps saddest to note, however, was the feeling that Mitchell noted, when talking about the military hospital, and the sadness it brought to the soldier, considering himself and others an "appearance of cheerlessness"--much a different feeling than the early "war as festival idea" described in the beginning of Blight's article (Brewster also notes wondering where all the brave ones who were "on their way" are--a relaization of the truth of the turn in opinion). As concerning relationship with family, I am struck by what a mixed blessing mail must have been, knowing that a loved one was alive, but then being tortured by the emotional tales they had to tell. Blackford even makes the point to say he is quieting his fathers fears that he may be dead; and considering the confusion there must have been surrounding mail and the time it would have likely taken for a family to recieve it in those days, even that was no gaurentee, the family literally being forced to live from letter to letter. And finally, of course, the worry of what to do after the war was over, how one can return, to those, who, like us, know nothing about the realities of the conflict in which these men were fighting (Rusty describes this quite vividly).

One other thing I wanted to make note of, were the various reasons discussed (especially in the Mitchell reading) for fighting, even through the intense horror which permeated so many of the first hand accounts. Obviously the honor and duty motivation was a big one, as it still is today. What I found even more interesting, though, was the discussion of the development of hatred of the other side as both a motivation and justification for fighting (Mitchell 154). On the one hand, this makes sense, but on the other, it seems at least a degree in opposition of the "suprising amounts of fraternization" mentioned in the CAR reading on the soldier (specifically 191 ff.). Reducing the enemy to a nameless, facless image to be hated in the camp is definately one thing (and propaganda played no small part, as it still does today), but actually carrying this image out onto the battlefield and staring someone down . . . it must have been a lot harder to hang onto in that situation, and probably contributed mightily to the extreme psychological effects the war had on its soldiers.

  I think it is very important that historians are now focusing on and interested in the "ordinary people." I find it to be very fitting since these are the people who experienced the war first-hand. From today's readings, which were focused on the lives of the soldiers, I've realized that the Civil War was not just a physical battle but a mental one as well. In the Blight article, it says that men of this Victorian age had the values of manhood and courage deeply instilled within them. This idea of courage is shown repeatedly in the articles as the soldiers struggle with their war experiences and try to maintain the courage that they know they should have. This mental struggle rings true in the Blight article, once again, when it relays how Brewster "could manage to assert his own manhood only by attacking that of others." So basically, Brewster could rationalize his actions and prove his courage to himself by comparing his actions with those of others. I think people still do this today to an extent. I've heard "Well at least I'm better off than[insert person's name here]" many times. I think this example just reiterates the importance of historians focusing on the "ordinary people." Through this focus, the readers can relate to what the soldiers are going through. Granted, many people have not experienced the horrors of war, but we have all had our own mental battles and struggles.
  As a whole, I found the articles to be very vivid accounts. I found Brewster's frenzied words on the situation of war(top paragraph of page 128) very interesting in that they seemed almost poetic.

Like Kenneth, I was appauled after reading about the indifference and even disdain showed to soldiers in the war. The same people who cheered them off to battle with banquets, poetic praise, and brass bands were turning their backs on something they helped to start and something they would never be able to understand. They were never immersed in battle, forced to kill fellow Americans and try to justify it, often by demonizing their opponents. The quick romanticized victory and end to the war expected on both sides turned into the bloodiest war in American History, and as the Mitchell article relates, citizens turned their backs on the soldiers when they realized the mess that they helped create. As Blight writes, more than three million Americans fought in the war; one of every six whites and one of every five blacks died. They fought and died for what they thought was right or what they perceived everyone else thought was right and they were abandoned by many of their early followers. "Six months ago a soldier was the greatest thing in the world, but now they are worse than the devil not countenanced by nobody at all but the soldiers." The fairweather citizens also didn't realize how demoralizing and depressing their lack of support was to the soldiers who felt abandoned and lost sense of purpose. "Civilian disdain was as potent a source of degradation as military life."
     As everyone in class has stated in their posting, which I will make brief and try to elaborate on, it was better to read accounts from actual participants in the battles and their feelings than the generals who remained in the back. Not to take any importance away from their duties, they just didn't have the same experience in the graphic horrors of war as the common soldier. Soldiers accounts of entering their first battle excited for action and the "shattered remnants" of who they were, discussed in Blights article showed the true range of emotions in the Civil War. From "naivete to mature realism, from romantic idealism to sheer terror, and from self-pity to enduring devotion."
     Finally, I think the Brewster letter describes the event and aftermath of battle best: "...the war, the smoke, the whistling bullet, the screeching shell, the shouts and cheers and then the silence, and the survivors gather together and relate the wonderous tales, the narrow escapes, with a pitying word and lowering voice, for the missing companion, then the shovel and spade, and hasty burial and the survivors move on."

Edited by author 04-02-2002 05:06 PM
After reading the personal accounts in this selection, I'm still stuck on a topic we discussed previously: motivation. Why did these soldiers struggle through the war? Guezlo, Blight, Mitchell and the letters themselves remind us that war is hell (perhaps too much, if you agree with James). Mitchell adds a new dimension by discussing the psychological effects of war. Dr. Benson gave us his list of motivations last week. With these readings as evidence, perhaps we can add a few more, from a soldier's perspective at least.

Rusty mentions that Blackford, from what he writes in his letter, appears to have little fear. Without going into gruesome detail, he gives a clear enough description of the hardships he faces. Despite that, there is an air of indifference about his letter. Aside from the coolness line cited by Rusty, I think the last few lines of his letter are particularly telling. Blackford describes his meal, mentions offhand that firing is going on, and abruptly ends his letter with "Your affectionate son". Perhaps indifference was one of the things that kept a soldier going, simply not caring about the war. Mitchell's essay would seem to support this: when your community offers little else but disdain, and when faced with the prospect of degenerating into a savage beast, perhaps indifference was the only way to maintain some shred of humanity.

Like others, I too found Brewster to be an intriguing individual. We know that some people used the war for personal gain (like Dr. Benson's example of soldiers on the supply lines), but I think this is the first account I've seen of a soldier who viewed the war as a means of moving up the social ladder. Blight goes to great length in describing Brewster's views on becoming an officer and his failure as a civilian prior to the war. Brewster's example of war as a means of career advancement is surprising, and no doubt served as motivation for other troops.

Lastly, I think I must jump on the bandwagon with those who disagree with James. I suppose the litany of "war is hell" accounts can get a bit excessive, but Blight and Mitchell provide useful insights on the soldier's plight. As others have said, Brewster is an interesting individual, and Blight's description of his experience points to a number of larger issues in the war. Mitchell's discussion of the psychological aspect of the war raised a number of interesting points, particularly the insights into community opinion and the fragility of the soldier's psyche. So war is hell, and I agree with the others who say that, no matter how many accounts we read, we'll never truly know just how hellish it is.

I was especially interested to read the actual first hand accounts of the war through soldiers' letters. I found myself imaging what the receiver of such a letter during that era must have been thinking-- today, war is not so removed from civilians... it invades our homes through television, the radio, newspapers, magazines and the internet. Considering also that photography was a relatively new thing, the atrocities of warfare caught on film must have shocked and horrified the civilians of the 1860s in an unprecedented fashion. Letters from husbands, sons and brothers, telling of "frightful and novel kinds of mutilation" and "wagon loads of bodies," must have had significant psychological effects on the civilian population. These soldiers letters are invaluable because they are so candid and revealing of what life was really like on the Civil War battlefield-- they were not written in hindsight, were selective memory might seek to alter the truth of the soldiers' experiences and emotions.
The account of Charles Harvey Brewster was also telling of personal ambitions that contributed to soldiers' motivations. Brewster seems to have been obsessed with personal success... upward mobility consumed this guy! Whatever his initial intentions in joining the war effort, he certainly used the war as a vehicle to promote himself. I thought he presented an interesting example of how "perceptions" were constantly on the minds of both the Northern and Southern sections. By constantly comparing himself with other soldiers, he was consumed in self-perception. This, in turn, led him to wonder how others perceived him... he strove to gain the approval, love, and respect of his men. This is just an example of how important perceptions were to soldiers within their camp, not to mention their concern with the perceptions of the opposing section.
I never realized the severity of alienation that ultimately existed between civilians and soldiers. Again, it seems that perceptions are key to Mitchell's argument. The soldiers perceived that they were unappreciated, generally misunderstood, and unfairly judged. Regardless of whether or not these perceptions were true, the mind of the soldier had become convinced that the civilian population held them in contempt and they were bound to operate out of those perceptions.
In conclusion, let me say that I whole-heartedly agree with Sean when he notes that each soldier was effected in unique and deep ways. I the complexity of the soldiers speaks loudly of human nature and character.

I also believe that we will never know war and all its gruesome realities until we experience it, but I do not think we should speak of it as if it is a completely foreign notion, an event that into which the human heart and mind get engaged. Each account shows the changes in a soldier as he has come face-to-face with the deepest realities of his heart because he meets death in all its anti-splendor. Death and the fear of it seem to be main ideas in each soldier's letter, but they did not arise from the war. They were revealed by the war, unhindered by the "niceness" of peacetime America. In the same way, each man encountered the violence of his own heart when he was allowed to kill, the selfishness of his own heart when he saved himself instead of his fellow soldier, etc. On the opposite side of the coin, glory and honor went forth on the field, not in the way our Gone with the Wind characters viewed it, but rather amid the horrors. When all gentlemanly behavior was thrown aside, when all was raw and at the core, who would stand in the face of death and his own fear, and that increasing with every battle(Dooley)? Who would pick up his fellow soldier? Who would remember his purpose during all the violence? (This lack of remembrance of purpose that Shaw notes in his downplay of the "Proclamation of Emancipation" and Fisk demonstrates in his discussion of the soldiers' hatred of compromise is alarming.) Who would humbly accept the consequences(like Tally Simpson in his confession of pride and acknowledgement of God's judgment)? War, as the unnatural state of things, is really just the revealer of the natural. It is society with the veil torn off. For that reason, though it may often be unnecessary, it is both horrific and potentially glorious on a level seldom seen in peacetime, "the place to see human nature in all its different varieties(150)." One should never conclude that any dangerous and at all noble venture of a human cannot be honorable or glorious. The scary and sad thing is that most soldiers became completely disillusioned with what they saw in the Civil War. They ended the war afraid, traumatized by death all around, lacking confidence in their fellow man like Brewster did. The sickness of the human heart was put on display.

This is interesting reading to me. I find the soldiers' letters particularly fascinating as they seem to contain the most honest, most personal descriptions of battle and of life in the army. The horror of war is something that most everyone has commented on and that certainly seems to be a common theme in most of the first hand sources we have looked at. I was also struck by the emphasis on individual courage and bravery in
Dooley and Brewster's letters. At one point Blight mentions the importance of this personal honor, or fear of dishonor, in holding together the fragile organization and discipline of both armies in the early stages of the war. Based on the account given in CAR of the lack of discipline and training that plagued both sides, particularly in the first year of the war, it seems impossible to overestimate the importance of the ideas about honor and bravery that so many of the common soldiers on both sides seem to share. I think this also presents an interesting parallel to the role that these same concepts of honor played in the political arena in the coming of the war.

The Nolan and Thomas pieces were some of the better readings that we have done so far because the articles bring up the question whether Robert E Lee was a good general or not. Americans, especially Southerners, have always been under the impression that Lee was one of the greatest generals the world has ever known. Yet, Nolan disagrees, arguing that Lee acted recklessly with the limited amount of troops he had, and if hadn't been in such a offensive mindset, then the CSA might have had a better chance at winning the war.

Nolan first puts to rest the myth that Lee was a defensive general by bringing up example after example of his aggressive behavior. The Seven Days Battle, Antietam, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg were all offensive maneuvers against the Union. Besides being aggressive in battle, Lee seemed to have an utter disregard for the amount of casualties that his army suffered during the early battles (in his first 4 months as commander, he suffered more than 120,000 causalities). Some historians attribute this to Lee's desire to end the war quickly in an offensive push into Northern Territory. However, if Lee had saved these men, and waited for battles like Fredericksburg to arise, those 120,000 men could have been put to better use in prolonging the war. A longer war might have led to a peace settlement and thus Southern victory.

Thomas writes an elaborate account of the Seven Days battle, which Lee fought against McClellan. The picture he painted of Lee was one of disorganization and missed opportunities. Stonewall Jackson came off as a inept general who failed to report his troop movements, and even failed to attack on the first day of battle, and didn't bother to tell anyone about this decision. Lee also makes obvious mistakes with his choice to attack Mavern Hill, a position held firmly by Federal troops. The Mavern Hill also demonstrates the inability of Lee to control his desires for an offensive end to the war, something that would come back to haunt him in his decision to invade the North in 1863.

With apologies for the tardiness of the post, I'd like to follow up Thomas's and Shannon's comments on the soldiers' mail.
Did no one else shudder to think of the mail FROM the dead men reaching their families ... especially if, by some quirk of fate, the personal letters travelled more slowly than the official notification of casualties? Like the final pager messages or e-mails from the World Trade Center on 9/11, our means of communication leave us with some poignant moments -- which Ken Burns exploited *at length* in his mini-series, as I recall.
On a more analytical note, in Brewster's letter, did anyone question his disposal of the Confederate soldier's letters to his family members? Is this a subtle dehumanization -- not only of the enemy, but of Brewster himself, who refuses to empathize fully with his fallen foe and keeps his letters as "souvenirs"? I don't know if this can be dismissed as mere "emotional distance," as Blight suggests (137). Battlefield ethics are certainly not the ones we live by here in at Furman, but this particular incident makes me wonder just what the war is doing to its combatants ... and how far men's minds/souls -- or at least their codes of coduct (if we can somehow judge these things) -- are being modified by the experience of war.

 I believe that it would be hard for anyone to argue that Lee was a defensive general, he took the initiative in many of the battles and as we all know he invaded the North on multiple occasions. Although he invaded the North, Lee had the opportunity to fight defensively, he could have easily listened to Longstreet and moved down south of Gettysburg and found good defensive terrain to defend, but he did not. I totally disagree with Nolan for saying that Lee was reckless. Lee knew exactly what he was doing with his army. As we all know each man fought in the Civil War for a different reason, many times people having their own motive, before one accuses Lee of being a poor general or being reckless one must examine Lee’s motive for joining the Confederate forces. Nolan goes astray here; he does not pay attention to Lee’s reason to join the war. Lee could have been the top dog in the Federal army if he had wanted, but alas, he turned down this great opportunity nearly any man in the service would jump at, why? one asks. It is because Lee would not fight against Virginia. Therefore the first thing on his agenda was Virginia. If there was a forge in force in your territory and you wanted them to leave, how would you go about it? Would you sit around waiting for them to attack? Or would you attempt to drive them out? Of course you would attempt to drive out the invaders. Lee could have easily fortified his position around Richmond and protect it for a couple of years, but this would not get the invaders out.
 If one were to map out the battles of the Easter Theater nearly all of them would be in Virginia. Having two armies from 30,000 strong to 120,000 strong living off this land for a short period of time, much less 4 years would do a number on this land, not to mention fighting battles here. Virginia was becoming barren, Lee knew that to protect his home and to supply his troops he had to take the war elsewhere, which is why he fought so hard and spent so many lives in the attempt of taking the fight to the North.
 More strategic reasons for Lee to be offensive were that the morale is higher in an offensive campaign, morale would soar when Union forces were driven off the field, but morale did not grow when the Confederates would stay in trenches and repel a Union advance. The gaining of territory helps morale. Tied into that is desertion and recruitment. People will not volunteer for a war that is not moving anywhere, during the siege of Petersburg, Lee got no recruits, no one wanted to join and sit in a trench, they wanted to drive the Federals from the field. As for desertion, as bad as war is, the soldiers would rather fight than sit around and do nothing as Brewster told us.
 Lee also had political reasons for being offensive and aggressive. By taking the war to the North, the Northern people would see the devastation that war causes. Public opinion would support ending the war effort. It is easy to sit in your cushioned seat in New York and not worry about the war when it is fought in Mississippi or Virginia, just as now, who is worried about the war in Afghanistan or in Rwanda? But if war were in the states everyone would have this at the forefront of their thoughts. When public opinion turned against the war, Lincoln would be forced to end the war, or he would be voted out of office in favor of someone who would put an end to the war. The offensive may cost more lives now, but in the long run less lives will be lost. If half of Lee’s current army were lost in this campaign, with the war ending in less than a year, there would have been fewer casualties and less destruction. This was a gamble Lee was willing to take, just as Truman was willing to take in dropping the A-Bomb. This argument is pretty much exactly the same, with the exception of Truman being successful in ending the war and Lee not.

Sorry for the late post, I'll try to be more punctual with this stuff in the future. After seeing what has been posted it's difficult not to repeat what has already been said. I too was struck by how the soldiers were abondoned by society. Why would people turn on the men they sent to fight for their principles? I think the main reason for this might be that the war took place on American soil and that it just seemed to drag on and on. War became far more tangible for the general populace during this period, and thus the romanticism attached to soldiers and fighting was destroyed. To normal people, it could easily seem that the only thing that kept the war going on were the men who fought in it. In many ways it reminds me of Vietnam, which although it didn't take place on American was soil, was made more tangible to the American public through a media which wansn't available during the nineteenth century.

I would have to disagree with James' summation and with Nolan. Nolan is well-intentioned to point out possible mistakes by Lee. Nolan has two flaws in his assumptions however. One, he has perfect, errorless hindsight. Second, I think he misses why Lee is admired. Nolan was too specific in the reason for Lee's admiration resulting from Lee's audacity or his offensive mind. His admiration flows from his results. He withstood a far superior army for three years. The fact that we can study the Civil War and the length of it is notable. Lee took charge in 1862 with his army defending Richmond's gates. Not only did he defend Richmond but he developed the opportunity to invade Northern territory.

I don't agree Lee had a offensive grand strategy. I do think he had an defensive-offensive strategy. I think it's wrong to look at specific battles as proof without understanding each situation. During the Seven Days, as Matthew said, was Lee's sole intention to defend and fortify Richmond or to expel the Union from Confederate territory? Another issue that makes the question of Lee's true strategy hard to ascertain was that his plans were never followed with perfection. Gettysburg, as Nolan and James say, was the epitomy of Lee's aggression. Lee however did not have the intention to fight at Gettysburg. Nolan continues "even during the final days of the war, Lee attempted the offensive" as if something was wrong with that. Should Lee have given up his army? I think - much like the complex issue of the reasons for secession - the true strategy is complex. One must look at each situation militarily, strategically, politically, and with morale, foodstuffs, and following of orders also as factors.

The reason this issue is complex is stated clearly by Nolan, "whether these qualities were wise or unwise, would seem to depend on one's criterion."

This reading gave me a different perspective on Lee. Lee has always been known as a great general throughout history. Yes, Lee did do alot for the Confederacy and won many decisive victories, but his losses seemed to be very devastating to the cause. Nolan's article shows that Lee's strategy was offensive throughout most of the war. Sometimes Lee's strategy seemed to cost the Confederacy more lives in battle. One example of this is the Battle of Gettysburg. I have watched the movie Gettysburg numerous times, and have read the book a couple times, and I still cannot figure out some of Lee's decisions. I can't understand why Lee didn't see Pickett's Charge as committing suicide, which is what it actually did. Not only did these devastating blows hurt the army's numbers, it also hurt their morale. The Confederacy also suffered a high rate of desertion. Many soliders would just leave the army and go home. I wonder why General Grant is known for the high number of casualties in his army and Lee isn't. Nolan points out a number of battles where the Confederates percentage of losses is significantly higher than the Union's.

Thomas' article brings up another interesting point. This article shows the amount of confusion and miscommunication that went on in the Civil War, probably in both armies. The name of the article is fitting, if Lee's plan could have been carried out. The article also shows how much of a toll the war took on the soliders. While in persuit of McClellan's troops, Jackson had to stop to rebuild a bridge, but mostly because they were tried of there long march. Jackson was crucial in the Seven Days Battle, and stopping his march really hurt the Confederacy's chances to win and destroy McClellan.

I agree a lot with what Neal said; Lee was a defensive general, who needed to make offensive moves. Through much of the Nolan passage, he discusses the offensive defense as not very defensive. He believes that Lee is an aggressive fighter who wants nothing more that to charge the enemy. Nolan gives a lot of information to support this. Lee at many times was ambitious in his offensive moves and many times these moves backfired. However, I think it is unwise to assume that Lee looked at the Southern forces and believed they were up to an offensive strategy when he admits that they were not. They lacked in numbers, they had poor morale, and they were weak. Nolan writes, “there were at least four aspect’s of Lee’s own assessment... that ran counter to the logic of his grand strategy of the offensive.” This is true, and I don’t think that Lee would have a strategy of the offensive if he knew it weren’t possible. Lee’s offensive moves were only used in time where he needed to.

Thomas brings this fact out in chapter 19. Lee’s attack, which started “the Seven Days,” was attempted because “he wanted to...strike a decisive blow before it was too late.” He planned for a long time, and sent out many spies to see if he was right on all issues. All of his attention was on this one thing. As is seen when Lee forgets that his grandson is dead, when he writes his daughter a letter. Lee was focused on preparation. Even though there were some kinks in his plan, as became obvious later, all the information Lee had gathered said this would work and this was the time. Lee did this many other times, he wanted to attack specific points of interest, like supply line hubs. He knew these were key elements and if he didn’t use the offensive the confederates would never survive. He had to weaken the opponents as much as he could, or the Confederate defense would be up against a very strong Union offense.

I found the readings on Lee to be very interesting and informative of his character and actions. Through the years I have been taught that Lee was a general who was unfalable and made great decisions. Furthermore, I was taught that he was a hero to the Confederate cause. Through this reading my opinion changed due to Lee's decisions on the battlefield. In "The Federal Army Should Have Been Destroyed" I learned that Lee was not all cracked up as everyone made. Throughout the reading I observed that Lee was a general who made bad decisons at crucial points and also was not well organized. Lee was never in close contact with his commanders on when to attack and what plan to follow. He was always wondering where hsi fellow troops where located, especially during Mechanicsville. Jackson was one commander which Lee never new what location he was at and did not follow orders well. Jackson was always slow in getting to battles which cost the Confederates lives and crucial land. Furthermore, Lee's mistakes of attacking and when to lay low cost him dearly. Almost on every battle Lee lost more troops than the Federals. Lee made some bad decisons which committed his army to suicide.
  The other reading explained to me that Lee was a determined and ruthless general. Unlike what Neal said, I feel that Lee only believed in attacking and not playing the defense, which ultimatly cost him in the long run. He was always wanting to attack the Federals somewhere and would not rest until they were "driven from the fields." Lee believed that the only way to restore peace was by driving out the Federals from the fields. Another thing that caught my attention was lee's trouble with dealing with runaways from the army and the stragglers. Lee lost many troops from people fleeing, not wanting to fight anymore. This ultimatly caused Lee's downfall because he never had enogh troops to have equal fighting strength against the Federals.

I feel like the readings for today were fairly straightforward in pointing out that Lee was, in fact, an offensive general. The offensive-defense strategy that we discussed in class is evident throughout the depictions of various battles. However, I would have to agree with Neal about chapter 19 of the Thomas book (which portrayed Lee as quite disorganized in terms of battle plans)...Lee's "plans were never followed with perfection." So is it really fair to blame Lee's lack of organization for the mistakes of the Confederate forces? Wasn't it Jackson that didn't show up (Thomas 236)?
There were a few details that caught my attention while I was reading, especially in the Thomas book. First, Stuart's "Ride Around McClellan," desribed on page 232, made Stuart an "instant hero"...not because he had necessarily accomplished anything...just because the country was "desperate for anything but more bad news." Interestingly, Lee achieved similar hero status after the Seven Days, despite the fact that he "committed his army to suicide" at Malvern Hill (243). Although thousands of soldiers died under Lee's command, Lee was still revered by Confederates who were just happy not to have been entirely defeated by Union forces.
One more thing: as I was reading, I got the sense that the generals (both Union and Confederate) moved their soldiers around like little chess pieces or something... This depiction of soldiers as nameless, faceless "things" to be moved around at the generals' whims contrasts greatly with the depiction of soldiers that we read in the Major Problems book for yesterday. I think it's important for us to examine both the generals' views of the soldiers and the soldiers' views of themselves...the perspectives seem to vary greatly...

I agree with Jenna that today’s readings were fairly straightforward. I particularly liked the Thomas text and the way he organized his description of the Seven Days Battle. I was able to get a real sense of what the general’s strategies were and why they did what they did. It ties in nicely with some of the themes of communication and battle strategy. The Nolan chapter was fairly insightful into the Lee’s strategy. I particularly liked the way he researched his argument: using Lee’s occasional communications indicating how the war could have been won, military movement and actions, and battles north of Virginia. It’s a great example of how a historian can make statements and conclusions based on random pieces of evidence.

With that being said, on this message board we’re debating a lot about how Lee was either offensive or defensive. I think I’ll partially disagree with Neal’s argument and agree with the notion that Lee was mostly an offensive minded individual at first. However, each situation called for a different strategy as a general must adapt to his environment, so he would have to go on the defensive from time to time. But that didn’t make Lee an offensive-defensive general early in the war. I believe Nolan makes a fairly good and well-supported argument that Lee was an offensive general, and one of the only things that hindered his strategy was the numbers. As we read about the Seven Days Battle in Thomas, would Lee have continued to be on the offensive if his numbers got too low? Probably not. However, McClellan underestimated his chances of success and retreated, thus allowing Lee the opportunity to win the battle despite his causalities. Had this not have happened, he’d be forced to go on the defensive. Does this strategy make him ruthless? Not quite since he was forced into it. According to the readings, Lee lost 120,000 lives in his first six battles, but the offensive strategy was the best as it served the Confederacy the best in my opinion. However, as the war dragged on and (as Nolan claims) Lee was forced into the north, that’s when he became an offensive-defensive general. I believe Lee was attacking the north to defend the south in the grand scheme of things.

James, I don't think Nolan is saying at all that lee was not a good general. It seems to me that Nolan is simply trying to dispel some myths. i think Nolan can be critical of some of Lee's decisions without saying that he wasn't a good military leader. I've always thought of Lee as "THE" general of the war, so its interesting to learn about his actual accomplishments and mistakes. I iamgine that the myth of Lee is arguably just as prominent in the average person's mind as the images from Gone With The Wind. The excerpts we read don't devalue his accomplishments, but it's interesting how his mistakes (significant ones it seems from our readings last night) have been forgotten or skimmed over. The psychology of those who have sort of rewritten the character of Lee is, to me, just as fascinating as the heroic figure himself. Why Lee? Why not Longstreet for example? Nolan does a good job in humanizing Lee. Just as in the letters we read for yesterdy, when it came down to it, Lee had ambitious goals and concern for rank, etc.. just like every other soldier, so recognizing certain characteristics like this as factors for his motivations in strategy, etc.. is significant to understanding his actions. I'm having a hard time deciding what I think about Lee's supposedly overly offensive tactics. I keep trying to think of the big picture and what would have been better in the long run. Did the offensive tactics drain the confederacy? Would a more consistently defensive strategy have put a greater strain on the Union and, therefore, have helped the Confederacy? Thomas said, "Lee could hardly afford many more victories like Gaines mill" and yet he kept taking risks. Is success at the expense of waste ok?

I actually read the Emory Thomas book fall term for a research paper and it really provides an interesting description of General Lee. Like Eric, I think many people see Lee as an invincible character who was the hero of the South. I think these readings help to show that he was a regular person who made mistakes like everybody else. The chapter out of the Thomas book not only shows the disorganization of the Confederate troops, but it also shows how the war consumed Lee's personal life to the point that his family had to take second place to his job. This is obviously to be expected when your job consists of commanding an army during a war, but Thomas shows how Lee swtiches from his role as the head of an army to his role as the head of a family by using the scenarios with his wife, grandson, and son. I agree that Lee preferred the offensive to the defensive position which may have cost him certain battles. The second reading even says, "Lee believed that the South's grand strategic role was offensive". Unfortunately, this didn't work for him because the North had more men. Lee was obviously aware of this problem, but he was still devoted to the offensive strategy. Perhaps this represents a fallacy on his part or perhaps he truly thought he knew the best approach. Either way, I think both these readings show Lee's weaknesses as a general as well as his strengths and his devotion to his battles.

I'm going to have to back Ali up all the way here. I too have seen Lee as "THE" general, and probably all my information I learned about him was romanticized until now.
You have to admire Lee for being human, mistakes and all. All of the leaders and commanders involved in this war were far from perfect (ahem ahem... coughMcClellancough), and yet previously history has viewed them as Gods on Mount Olympus waging war with the Titans. However, the Nolan article does a good job of reminding us of how misleading it is to make Gods and Heroes out of simple men trying to do their jobs as best they can.
Perhaps it was suicide at Malvern's Hill, or to even start offensive tactics in what was for the Confederacy, at the beginning, a merely defensive war. However, for a man who forgets that his own grandson is dead, you've got to think he's got nothing but war on the brain. The goal was to win your battles, put a dent in Union forces, and send good news to the homefronts, through defensive or offensive tactics.
And to agree with Janna, yes this sounds like one big old game of chess. In fact I saw a Civil War chess set at the mall, and was reminded of it while reading the assignments for today. Lee was king on one side. The generals may have been the brains of the manuevers, but the pawns carry it out and view the whole panorama of war.

I really enjoyed the human-ness of Lee that was portrayed. The information about Lee's family was interesting. Through history many figures have become so elevated that we forget they are real people, like us. I appreciated the level that Lee was brought down to. We need to remember that Lee made mistakes. So, I agree with Sara and Ali.

I think it is obvious, even with his mistakes, that Lee had a great mind militarily. That is evident in both the readings for today. As with most things we've read so far, I've enjoyed the different spin than previous classes I've taken. It kind of makes you wonder about what exactly you learned in high school.

It is very interesting to me that about a year into the war one Lee, of the South's most prominent generals, had seen less of the war than his wife. This just proves to further my opinion that even though the war was directed by generals it was the everyday soldier with a family back home to worry about that was the backbone of the war. I completely agree with Janna that the soldiers seem like chesss pieces in the way that they were thoughtlessly moved around and manipulated about the batlefields. On the other hand generals seem to get all the credit from the war even though some of the time they never even stepped foot on the battlefield. For example, the expectations put on Jackson and his troops were preposterous to say the least. They were supposed to, "march 15 miles, deploy his troops for battle, engage the enemy" and somehow get inspired to pursue a defeated foe by something their leader Jackson would say. As it turned out Lee was counting on this to happen and to me it seemed like he didn't think this was a long shot or anything out of the ordinary.

Also, it is very intriguing that Lee had never commanded a battle in combat before this and he began with close to 100,000 men. Maybe its just me but that seems like a ton of pressure for your first time. Next, the level of communication in the war was unbelievable. For instance, McClellan thought he was up against 200,000 rebels when it was half this in reality. Overall it is just interesting to see these generals in a different light than they are normally portrayed.

Thomas shows us Lee's Pyrrhic victories in the Seven Days, and Nolan reveals Lee as a general obsessed with the offensive (even as his beloved Stonewall Jackson was); in a wonderful bit of French that so characterizes military history, the offensive was Lee's "idee fixe" [Nolan 77].
In the interests of stirring up even more debate, I contend that Lee was simply and absolutely wrong. At the one place where an offensive move might have won the war (Antietam/Sharpsburg), Lee fought a defensive battle (with some help from McClellan) on untenable ground. The best he could get was a stalemate, I argue. And why? Because he lost the Seven Days.
After that week of battle, the Union army on the Peninsula withdrew, it's true, but Lee frittered away an army of 90,000 men (more than he'd ever have again) to scare off Little Mac. The offensive is ideal, but the Confederacy could never replace those men. (I find myself agreeing with Longstreet and J. Davis on this matter more and more as I get older -- a frightening trend.)
With Washington, D.C. an impregnable target by 1862 and Gettysburg a very long way from Lee's supply line, the Confederate command (as Longstreet suggested) should have taken up more defensive positions, assuming the strategic offensive only when the terrain and circumstances allowed it, to exploit the Federal errors that would certainly occur. If Lee wanted to fight an offensive campaign, he should have named Joseph Johnston (the defensive mastermind) to succeed him in the East and gone west to Chattanooga with Stonewall. Lee at Perryville instead of Bragg ... ah, what might have been.

Edited by author 04-03-2002 03:40 PM
I took Alan T. Nolan's consideration of Robert E. Lee as yet another verbose exploration into the psyche of a prominent figure. Granted (no pun intended), Lee was the most important Confederate leader and is one the most revered men in the annals of American lore. Even so, attempts to indirectly penetrate the mindworkings of historical figures is often quasi-futile. The principle point that I gathered from the Nolan pages was that Lee was an oxymoron, a conservative risktaker. He was portrayed as always wishing to be on the offensive--usually feeling aggression and assertiveness as the best means of success. However, Nolan suggests that Lee was somewhat of a realist in that he knew what levels of offense were needed in certain situations. Also, Lee feverishly strived to get the most effort out of whatever men he had at a given time. It seems as if no number was too small or mountain too large. My only gripe with Nolan--and not so much Nolan in particular, but these types of pieces in general (again, no pun intended)--is that they sometimes overestimate the importance of "Commander's psyche". Regardless of what a General orders troops to do, the ultimate outcome of the battle will FOREVER be determined by the mindset of the soldiers, the men with the guns, aptly described by Sara as the "pawns".

Emory Thomas's treatment of the Seven Days ordeal was simultaneously puzzling and refreshing. The alledged ancident in which Stonewall Jackson sat "sucking lemons" while slackily overseeing the repair of a bridge is quite disturbing. The refreshing part, though, comes from the pages on Lee's mistakes. In accordance with Stephanie and Eric, I also find it a nice detour to consider a historical God as a fallibe human being. Lee was not perfect; he made many miscalculations, assumptions, and took many risks. The slaughter suffered at Glendale seemed to really shake him up and resonate within him. I would be willing to bet that it greatly affected his future decision-making and strategy.

Edited by author 04-03-2002 03:46 PM
Once again the readings show the lack of experience, men, etc. The Confederacy may well have defeated the Union in the Seven Days' war basically ending the Civil War altogether, but once again the sloppiness and lack of preparation which riddled all aspects of the war shone through. Lee's reorganization of the Confederate army and the battles which proceeded were one big mess. His strategies were developed allowing little error, which rarely if ever worked. Jackson's failure to make it to the beginning of the battle due to the usual lack of maps and uncharted, strenuous terrain, and Hill's starting of the battle on the assumption Jackson would be there, were both grave mistakes which cost the Confederate army dearly. The confederate loss on that day was four times the Union loss. Continual blunders and sluggish movement by Conferderate Generals, mainly Magruder and Huger slowed a movement which could have caught Union soldiers running. It seems as though everytime the Confederacy had a chance to score big, someone or something let them get away. Jackson's presence was basically non-existent. He spent his time resting and rebuilding a bridge when he should have been fighting. The killer for the Confederacy was faulty communication which resulted in a disfunctional offensive and mass execution of Confederate soldiers which according to D.H. Hill was "...not war...It was murder."
    That gets us to the point of Ali and Sara. Lee had quite a load on his shoulders and had no kind of war and defense staff to help him devise strategy. Lee himself realized that he could not handle everything himself as he ran back and forth in the crisis that was the Seven Days' war. As to his strategy, I would agree with Kenneth and Janna in saying that he was all out offensive. He felt the only end to the war could result from all out attack and complete victory. Nolan relates this in plain english on page 78: "He believed that the South's grand strategic rule was offensive. He had consistently planned and advanced the offense." He felt that the Confederacy must annihalate the enemy army in one foul swoop or victory was out of hand. Taking into account the limited men in the Confederate army, Lee felt like they could not withstand a defensive war.
     Both Nolan and Thomas show quite a bit of failure in the strategy of Lee, but we have to take into account all that went wrong which I mentioned earlier. His strategy was good, but it could not be carried out to his design at all. The campaign was sloppy with too few men and too few artillery. He probably should have withdrawn to regroup, but his idea of annihalation pushed him on. The thought of complete victory influenced all of his campaigns and seemed to envelop his conscious to the point of making irrational decisions. At Gettysburg,he "Failed to accept reality...He simply wanted to go on and attack because he wanted to attack." It seems his goal got the best of him and cost too many lives for the Confederacy. He knew that he could not be resupplied with men and he forced attacks anyway. He was a good general, he just got overzealous with too little to work with.

Edited by author 04-03-2002 04:01 PM
i would tend to agree with anyone who characterizes General Lee as one of the greatest in american history. of course my understanding of Lee is biased due to my years of education in the great southern city of columbia, south carolina. if my history 21 class taught me anything it's to not always trust what you hear. history has a tendency to be romanticized and great people have been elevated to unwarranted heights. however, i still believe much of the praise Lee receives is far from excessive. of course he made mistakes in judgement as he had to take many serious risks. war has a tendency to be a fairly risky game of chance. as the Thomas article proves, each battle relies on a number of factors to work out perfectly so that the result you want becomes a reality. the first few days of the seven days battle did not work out the way Lee had hoped because of such factors (namely Jackson and his late arrivals to battles). shit happens and when it did Lee and the confederate army felt the full effects.

the northern army's superiority in terms of numbers of soldiers and other resources is an important factor that Lee was not unaware of. although his "attack grand strategy" seemingly contradicted his awareness of inferior manpower, he stuck with his belief that the south had to strike a decisive blow against the north to win. his decisions to attack when it was seemingly unwise to do so simply provide evidence of his thirst for victory and his somewhat stubborn determination. his plan to strike the north a decisive blow did not work due to consequences from this very decision (i.e. decreased number in manpower due to not only casualties but also desertions). perhaps this road that Lee took was the only one that the south had a chance to win with. Lee certainly seemed to believe this. although the man did make mistakes in judgement, many of these mistakes were due to unforeseeable problems. as fate would have it, the south was defeated but Lee was not. his memory survives, at least in the south, as one of the greatest generals in american history.

  I agree with everyone else that these excerpts were extremely straightforward and dispelled many of the myths about not just Lee but his underlings as well. I think that Thomas said it perfectly in refering to Lee and his top men as the "Southern pantheon." We have all heard of their greatness and many people try to emulate them but most importantly, I think we should realize that they were REAL people who were flawed. In the Thomas article especially, flaws were abounding. The account of the Seven Days campaign seemed to list out one flawed action or decision after another with nothing that Lee ordered ever really coming into fruition. Both articles showed Lee as being thoroughly involved and committed to the war, I just think that the main problem was execution and things not falling into place when they should have. Lee ordered what he thought was best for an army to win the war, mainly being his grand strategy of maintaing an offensive. Unfortunately, this is shown in the Nolan article to be flawed as well. For example, Lee had a smaller army, an irreplacable army, and a problem with desertion which led to not enough men to forge effective offensives against the Union army. Lee had the right idea, but it was applied to the wrong situation. In conclusion, I think both of these articles show the top men of the Confederacy in a true light and as in our other readings, bring the war to a more personal level.

While its true that Lee did make many mistakes and was disorganized, I think it's unfair to criticize him for pursuing an offensive policy. While its true that obscene numbers of people died in the pursuit of an offensive strategy, I think it was realistic for Lee to consider it the only real way to be victorious. Most wars are won by offensive strategies and not defensive ones. Of course in the individual battles defensive positions will have to be taken at many times, but overall it just doesn't seem like the war ever could have been won based on a defensive strategy. Also keep in mind that the longer the war went on, even without battles, the South would have been suffering economically from naval blockades (which although weak, it seemed that the British weren't going to violate) in addition to not having their normal avenues open for commerce open in the North. The South had a major interest not just in ending the war, but in ending it quickly, and the only way to do that was an offensive strategy. It was just unfortunate for the Confederacy that nothing seemed to fall into place like it was planned.

I'm going to have to agree with Nick that General Lee must have been a great military leader in some respect. Sure, legends grow, but 1)they need a foundation of greatness and 2)the Civil War is pretty highly documented. I think Nolan's "Lee Considered" chapter is overgeneralized and biased towards the purpose of proving Lee to be impulsive and rash in battle because of his nature. The Thomas stuff seems to give a more accurate picture of Lee as a leader because it includes the difficulties of communication between leaders and the frustrations of delegating orders to men who do not come through. Even through the blunders of the "lemon sucking" Jackson and Magruder's failure, Lee held the upper hand until the last day of the seven. He showed his abilities as a strategist an an overseer of large forces by taking a smaller army and mearly hosing the Union forces. Granted, the last day's charge was errant, and he gave us a close-up of his humanity(as opposed to legendary divinity) by being impulsive, but he had received false information about the Union's retreat. The Thomas article shows the failure of the team. Lee just valiantly held himself fully responsible. Nolan's argument would be much more effective if he presented the notion of Lee's overaggressive methods without beating the man into the ground and blaming him for Confederate defeat. Maybe he puts some positives in the rest of the book, but I have a hard time swallowing the argument. Lee was clearly fallible as a general, but he was not totally depraved.

Craig's right. Lee was wrong. So was every general at some point, but Lee made a handful of mistakes, in some cases overriding the protests of his subordinate commanders, that cost the Confederacy any chance of "winning" the war. Lee's chronic desire to crush his enemy once and for all, and his recurring belief that his opportunity to do so was at hand dominated his strategic thinking. On several occasions, Lee's impulse to press an advantage, percieved or real, and obliterate the Union army, seems to have gotten the better of his judgement. The second day at Gettysburg is certainly the most famous and the most glaring example of this. Almost to a man, Lee's subordinate officers seemed to know that to attack the Union position was madness, but the enthusiasm of the previous day's success and Lee's belief that this was his opportunity to deliver a decisive and crushing blow carried the day. All this is not to say, as Alli pointed out, that Lee was not a great general. He had many other attributes critical to success as a military leader, and his popularity with the troops under his command is astounding. Unfortunately for the confederacy, the mistakes he did make came at the wrong times and places, and their consequences were infinitely significant in the Confederacy's effort to win its independence. This from someone who grew up playing underneath giant twin portraits of Lee and Jackson hanging in the living room. Its hard for a good southern boy to accept, but Lee's strategical blunders may well have cost the Confederacy its objectives in the eastern theater.

Wow, Lee gets a whole day to himself in this class! What an interesting (if a bit disorienting, for me) shift from the bottom of the ladder to the top. Like Nolan, I wonder what made Lee tick, what force drove him to fight the Army of the Potomac like he did. He was at a pretty daunting disadvantage the entire time, what with inferior numbers and not much margin for error due to the lack of potential recruits to replace lost soldiers. Yet Lee's army suffered about the same amount of casualties as (if not more than) the Union. I think that, in a way, Lee may have been fighting defensively. Knowing he was at a disadvantage, and not wanting to become besieged by the Feds at Richmond, he had to make a stand, because that was his only (perceived) chance at winning the war for the Confederacy. I see as kind of a wounded-animal-in-the-corner situation. So I certainly disagree with Vandiver's assumptions as Nolan records them ("addicted to the offensive").

Now, the Thomas excerpt. The lengthy summary of the Seven Days' Battles, to me, is solid proof that Lee concentrated on the offensive. I think that's obvious to anyone. What is not so obvious is why Lee went on the offensive when he knew that his forces were inferior. Again, I think Lee's possible desperation comes into play here. While I admit that 1862 is a bit early in the war, I cannot overlook Lee's apparent audacity. One thing that Nolan did not point out was Jackson's ineptitude, which came to a climax at Malvern Hill. Thus we have another factor to contend with. First, Lee mounts a daring offensive as the only way to defend his Confederacy in hopes that fortune might favor the bold, but all those hopes were dashed in the face of incompetent or lazy subordinates, namely Jackson. Even though Lee managed to rout the Feds, he suffered too many casualties to make it worthwhile (those Pyrrhic victories Craig was talking about). In conclusion, I think these two pieces together paint an important picture of Lee as the general who fought for the survival of his nation even though he knew the numbers were against him.

Maybe it's true that Lee apparently made mistakes, several crucial mistakes. However I would tend to agree with Suzanna that you have to analyze the elements present at the time, such as poor communication and simply generals who did not come through for Lee. It seems from reading these two chapter that the Lee myth has been rather blown out of proportion, but not as blown out of proportion as the author of the "Lee Condidered" chapter. I did find it interesting in the "Lee Considered" chapter that one of the general's main goals was to sway Northern opinion. He thought if he could make people in the North uninterested in supporting the war then the South could remain free peacefully. This is an interesting tactic. The "Lee Considered" chapter sets up the fact that Lee's strategy was based on the offensive. I think from reading both of these chapters Lee's main strategy could be one more defined by mobility that offensive drive.

I agree with Rusty and his assertion that Lee was a realist. He is one of the most revered men in southern history, and I don’t see much in these two chapters that should take away from that. He did more than could be expected of him, and even though he didn’t win the war, he brought the south much further than they ever should have gone. Craig mentioned how Lee “frittered away” his army of 90,000 men with an offensive mentality, yet he saw it as the only way to have any chance at defeating the north. His offensive strategy at least gave him an attempt to decide where and when the battles are fought, but this obviously failed when Lee admitted that he wasn’t ready to fight in the big battles.
Nolan mentions that Lee had an “impulsive nature”, but what he doesn’t realize that impulsivity is not only what the south needed, but it was an essential characteristic of the secessionist movement and the entire army itself.
Saying that Lee was wrong simply doesn't address the issue. Looking back of course we can say that he was hasty and wasted the lives of good soldiers, but what we don't see is what would have happened with a different, defensive minded general. The north would have overrun the south and ended the war years earlier, without giving the south the slightest chance. Granted, Lee was not a perfect general, and yes he probably did order needless death, but the south was doomed from the start, he simply delayed the inevitable.

The Nolan chapter made me feel that Lee shouldn't be as celebrated as he is. I'm not from the south so I don't feel I know a lot about Lee but I've always respected him as being the better general. Perhaps he was and he was just dealt the lesser hand. The chapter does talk a lot about his loses and lack of reinforcements. There was the one statistic that pointed out that even when the Union had a loss that was 1000 more people, it was only 13.3% of the the army while the confederate army lost 19%. But despite Lee's struggle with his own military the article seemed to point out his mistakes. His offensive strategy came across as being somewhat hasty and overconfident. At times it was all that he could do. It said thought that when he did switch to the defensive for the last two years it worked a lot better.

To kind of synthesize what Nick and Craig have said (and follow some of the same path as Chris), I think today's reading show why many characterize Lee as among the greatest in military history. Before I get into his offensive strategy, I just have to say that, throughout the Thomas reading on the Seven Days Battle, I was amazed by the tenacity and tactics employed by Lee. Though I understand such is the life of a general, it is just amazing that one person can maintain any sort of strategic thinking in the kind of situation they are placed in, and to maintain it during that campaign at least relatively well does justify Lee some mark of greatness.

As far as Lee's love for offensive strategy (as is presented in the Nolan reading), I believe Lee's continued toughness in this front is notable also. In taking the conflict as what it essentially was, a fight between two independent nations, the South had, from the very beginning, sort of attemptive a preemptive strike on the rising challenger to their beloved slave society status quo, the federal union. With this in mind, it is somewhat reasonable to see Lee as a champion of the offensive, wanting to "drive the armies of the enemy from the field" (NOLAN 99). The problem, though, was, as the reading discusses, that the CSA's "Lost Cause" grand strategy was not nearly as assertive as Lee's offensive technique. Their aim, at base, was simply to convince the Union forces to give up, to allow them to continue their way of life, as a separate nation (a great victory, and an interesting situation as concerning international recognition, among other things). As the challenged state, the CSA did not seek to defeat their Union foes, but rather contain them, and preserve their own power (constitutional rights, etc . . . ring a bell?). Much of the problem here may be filtered through the idea that the actualities of power are not nearly as important as the perceptions of such, both in Lee's case, and in some of his luckiest assumptions, including McClellan's belief that he was outnumber during the Seven Days (as mentioned in the Thomas reading). On a final note, Lee's concern with creating a victory by causing Northern support to wane, thereby gaining Southern peace (either through convincing the Northerners that the CSA would return to the Union for peace, or that the costs of trying to regain the Union were too high) are extremely well-thought-out political aims, another point that allows me to give him some respect, despite his many losses. While ours is to analyze, I find interesting our ability to second guess Lee this many years later, and think it reasonable that his vision of the day and his proximately to the passions of the conflict made his offensive strategy altogether not unreasonable.

Alex began to hit on this in his posting, but I thought the levels of miscommunication among the Confederate officers in the Seven Days War was atrocious. The Thomas excerpt especially highlighted this point. He even states, "Lee was altogether ignorant of A.P. Hill's attacks." Unaware of his own army's manuevers and establishing poor lines of communication between troops, Lee seems to have opened the doors to defeat in this battle. In his defense, Lee did appear to try and clear up communication on day 6 of the Seven Days Battle-- however, his efforts were too late.
He also seems to have flawed operations by acting on assumptions at times. He assumed that Jackson would have no trouble making it to the battlefield, and later he assumed that rumors about a Federal retreat and ordered a general charge. Both of these assumptions were incorrect and cost Lee a shakey start to the battle and a disastrous finish.
Both excerpts we read today made the point that Lee felt that the Union army had to be completely crushed in order to have a true, ultimate Confederate victory. This seems to be somewhat of an extreme idea.... perhaps a little overambitious in day to day battle. I guess I have the image of him taking huge, sweeping steps, when what the Confederacy needed at the time was smaller, calculated steps. He seemed to be stubborn in sticking to his "big-view" plans as well, trying to avoid backing down from any of his original plans and strategies. Perhaps this view of Lee as a reckless abandon leader is a little extreme. Nolan paints the picture of Lee favoring offensive attack foremost-- but he also gives Lee a little more credit than Thomas does concerning the level of control Lee exerted over the intensity of his offense. I think this seems to be the more balanced view.... and i agree with rusty's synopsis of Lee as "an oxymoron, a conservative risktaker."

Thats right Austin, lots of Lee today. When you are as famous a figure and as big a player in the war, like Lee was, people seem to find a way to write about every little thing you did wrong. So much for wanting to be famous. I think Lee is a misunderstood soul. I think the the confederate break from the Union was harder on Lee and his family than many would venture to say. He was a west point man, a U.S. Army man that loved his country. But his love for his motherland Virginia was just much greater. Many of us has commented to the fact that Lee's offensive tactics were a mistake. Yes his forces were inferior, but I don't think his tactics were out of desperation. For the South to really make a statement in the war, and show that they could win it, Lee was going to have to go all the way to Washington. You don't march into Washington playing defense my friends. To think that Lee could use denfensive tactics throughout the war is ubsurd. The Naval blockade was choking the Confederate Army. The North controlled most of the supply lines, serverlly hurting the Southern defensive positions. Lee was right to go on the offensive.

Edited by author 04-03-2002 05:33 PM
From day one, we've seen how the Civil War is far too complex to simplified into general explanations, and that any number of interpretations are valid. We've seen how this complexity extends to the men in the field and now, in an abrupt (and maybe Austin's right -- disorienting) turnaround, we see that the men at the top defy simple explanation.

Nolan effectively demonstrates Lee's dedication to the offensive strategy. What struck me the most about his discussion was the argument that Lee was well aware of his limitations, and yet continued the offensive until it was impossible to continue. According to Nolan, Lee was well aware of the manpower difference and the threat of a siege and yet he continued to advocated keeping his army in the field at all costs. Was it the addiction to the offensive that kept him on this course? I tend to agree with this assessment. If he knew the limitations inherent in an offensive strategy, and if, like Nolan says "To insist on the offensive, regardless of a defensive opportunity, is simply not strategically sound,” then there must be something in Lee's nature that drove him to go on the offensive: audacity, competitiveness, "addiction." I like Matthew Heathman's assertion (pages and pages ago) that Lee, as a Virginian, was also disinclined to go on the defensive on his home soil. Lastly, I think Shannon (and Nolan, for that matter) have correctly hit on how Lee's dedication to the offensive proved to be a fatal flaw, in that the strategy was incompatible with the broader strategy of the CSA.

Like Elizabeth and Alex, I too was surprised at the level of miscommunication in the Seven Days as described by Thomas. Lee's strategy seemed fairly clever until a series of blunders (especially Jackson: what was that guy doing?) threw the plan off balance. That's not to say that Lee was blameless (Malvern Hill and Glendale come to mind), but the Thomas piece shows that Lee's failings were due at least in part to circumstances in addition to his inordinate desire for offense.

The battle quotes for Monday are located at (http://www.quicktopic.com/12/H/xQ2dPUD86sav2/p153.145#QTmsg149)

The screens for today and next week are located at (http://history.furman.edu/~benson/civwar/cw6.htm)

Edited by author 04-07-2002 09:49 PM
There really wasn’t that much reading this time but there are a few things I found interesting. McClellan, unable to reach Richmond, became a discredited general that Lincoln wanted to get rid of. Lincoln was unable to do this, mainly for political reasons, and this seems to be some good luck for McClellan, Lincoln, and the Union. He had put John Pope in charge of the army of Virginia. Lincoln slowly moved McClellan’s troops to Pope. Lee took advantage of the situation and caught Pope before his army was big enough and while McClellan was inactive. This allowed for the second Manassas. This one was an even bigger upset. Lee moved into Maryland and Lincoln was forced to ask McClellan to go after him. Aided by a letter found by a Unions soldier in which Lee discussed his troop placements, McClellan was able to pin Lee down Sharpsburg, Maryland.

I think this is a continuation of the passages we read late week about Lee. Here, Lee went on the offensive. The first move was one of pure offensive-defense. I don’t think it can really be argue otherwise. Lee knew that if he struck when he did he would have a much better chance at victory. He did. Then, though, he continued. I think this was a good strategy but I think it borders on the offensive more than defensive. He went into Maryland to try and garner support from locals and to attack a major supply line (railroad junction) in Pennsylvania. This turned out to be a bad move, but Lee, I think, was justified in his action. He wanted to make some advances that would hurt his enemies and make them less able to mount an attack.

I know that a lot of people think it was a mistake for Lee to continue on his offensive despite the increasing difficulty for him to do so, but like Mike I think he was justified in those actions. But not just for the practical military prospects of undermining your enemies ability to attack, but also for the morale aspect. I think that hearing that you've been unable to take a piece of land or stratigical position from the confederates would be a lot less demoralizing than hearing that you've just lost an important railroad and have a powerful confederate army which has not been driven out despite the efforts of your own forces. I don't think it's just that the offensive was an addiction for Lee, I think he saw the powerful effect it could have on the Northern mentality.

it's easy to defend some of the actions of Mclellan in battle but it's easier to call Lee a great general. Lee's strategy was obviously the superior one. i think Lee's strategy and how it affected the morales of both armies is also important. it also greatly influenced Lincoln's decision to get rid of Mclellan. for political reasons, however, Lincoln was forced to delay the inevitable. this, of course, caused more problems for the union as Lee foresaw Mclellan's inability to fight and attacked Pope's army before it could gain more troops from Mclellan's diminishing army. Mclellan was able to somewhat redeem himself after finally taking the offensive and fighting back Lee's troops. apparently his success at this was also due, in great part, to luck as he found a paper with Lee's orders on it. this section pretty much affirms the idea that Lee was one of the greatest generals in american history, and Mclellan was simply a great paradox. a general who cared too much for his soldiers to let them get hurt.

It is interesting how Lee is much more offensive in strategy than some of his counterparts like McClellan. He also seemed to learn from previous Confederate experiences like Manassas, and after wounding McClellan's army, Lee "scenting blood" went after the retreating army to try and crush them and Union morale. As a result of Lee's persistance and other previous battles Lincoln became aware that the Confederacy was not going to surrender because of a few defeats. Lincoln also seemed to realize that the Confederacy was not going to be nice and civil in war and was tired of being bullied around. So Lincoln hired Pope to command the Union forces; and Pope would not follow any of the polite rules of war while in Confederate lands.

It was also interesting that even though Lincoln wanted to get rid of McClellan he did not because of political reasons. His reasoning was that with the upcoming elections he needed to make sure he kept all his votes is understandable, but I guess I never thought about how big a part politics plays in wars. However, it was to Lincoln's advantage that he did not can McClellan because shortly thereafter he would lead his army to face a dilapidated Confederate army led by Lee.

I thought the section on the politics of war was really intteresting. I hadn't thought about the difficulties Lincoln faced not only with the shooting war but the political war which sounds just as complicated if not more so. Although he was criticized at the time, it seems that he was successful in keeping up civilian and soldier support and morale more than people realized. The slowness of his success, however was slowed by his inexperience with national politics and his remaining Whiggish principles about his excetuve position. But at least he regcognized his limitations and surrounded himse;f with people like Salmon Chase, Stanton, Meigs, Taylor, and Ripley, all who played very important roles in making the federal cause work. I noticed when reading that many of the federal strenghts were the Confederacies weaknesses. The railroad system and the manipulation of it for example was a critical northern advantage. The kind of talent that Lincoln recruited was also lacking in ther Confederacy with the exception of Davos himself. I was surprised at similarities between Davis and Linclon. It's ironic that in trying t solve the "problems" of the Confederacy, the South ended up becoming more and more like "the very centralized nation-state that the seceders had been fleeing in 1861."!!!!!!

Paper Comments

This was a complex assignment that produced a stimulating array of responses. The best papers showed the four works in conversation with each other. There were some very sophisticated efforts to combine seemingly irreconcilable interpretations into an integrated model of sectional differences and secession. I was especially curious to see how you would make McPherson's 1980 essay about deep structural differences coexist with Randall's 1940s "revisionist" view that the conflict had no necessary connection to social or economic structures. These authors would see their views as mutually exclusive. With the help of examples from Abrahamson and Ayers/Thomas, however, many of you were able to develop a plausible case for the notion that while differences did not necessitate conflict they were a necessary underpinning for the secessionist's arguments. Other papers made a plausible case supporting Abrahamson's notion that sectional extremism was contingent on local circumstances. Where the political process had become monolithic (deep South, New England), dissenting voices had few institutional means for resisting those who were most ideologically passionate. In the upper South and the lower North (including Franklin and Augusta) the process was much more complex, and sectional polarization only occurred once the crisis had been precipitated by South Carolina and the Republicans. Or so the authors claim. Explicit and thoughtful evaluation of these claims was always a good thing.

Most of the papers respected my frequent injunctions against over-simplifying this process into a conflict between a monolithic region "the North" and a unified entity "the South." Although McPherson adopts this language for the sake of clarity in a short article, he would certainly agree with the evidence presented in Abrahamson and Ayers/Thomas that such differences were often subtle, and that they expressed themselves in complex or even paradoxical ways. Indeed, it is one of Abrahamson's main points that even among the Southern white political elites he focuses upon the reactions to the crisis were many and varied. As he argues, any interpretation of sectional differences has to account for why the views of men such as Rhett and Yancey were rejected by the majority of Southern voters until 1860 (or even after), why South Carolina seceded, Virginia delayed, and Kentucky remained in the Union, and why some Southerners (Andrew Johnson) and Northerners (James Buchanan) supported the dominant views of the other section. Both the Ayers/Thomas piece and Abrahamson book offered explanations of how such diversity was possible. The most interesting papers supported or challenged these models in clever ways.

Three of the four works argued for the importance of slavery and race relations as crucial factors in regional distinctiveness and in the secession process. To the extent that papers contended with this issue explicitly, that was a plus. Here, too, the evidence from Abrahamson and Ayers/Thomas would suggest that no simple answers are possible. Clearly the secessionists considered the Republican challenge to slavery and the South's racial castes to be a significant one. Despite the explicit language of the 1860 Republican platform disavowing any intentions to interfere with slavery in any existing state, Southern radicals understood that Lincoln's patronage power could put antislavery postmasters in every Southern town, serving as a nucleus for a yeoman-based Republican party (i.e. Helper), and allowing, for the first time since 1836, the delivery of abolitionists tracts into the region. Likewise, the President's ability to appoint federal judges who opposed the fugitive slave law, and to chose not to back federal enforcement of such laws against state resistance (i.e. the Anthony Burns case) would be a decisive shift in policy enforcement, regardless of whether any new legislation could be blocked by Democrats in Congress. Finally, the president's ability to appoint antislavery officers in any new territories would effectively prevent Southern slaveholders from having "property" protections. (See Abrahamson, 82-90). Yet despite this overt danger, only the deep South, containing less than a third of the South's white population, saw the need for immediate secession. To the degree that your papers addressed why there were such important differences in the timing and geography of secession, that was a good thing.

I was impressed by papers that had a logical organization, a consistent thesis, and that used good examples throughout (especially from Abrahamson, our largest work). Many of you used quotes from one or more of the works. In general, it was best to do this sparingly. It is usually better in a short essay to put things as much as possible in your own words. It is especially risky to quote the author when he quotes someone else. How do you know whether the quote is representative or not? At the same time, I was pleased to see so many of you approaching these works as interpretive views, containing arguments that needed to be attributed to someone. For example, it was better to say "as McPherson points out, the proportion of Northerners involved in agriculture had dropped to 40 percent by 1860" rather than to just assert the percentage without explaining where you got the numbers. The more conscious and explicit you are about how you came by the information, the smarter you will get, I believe, in critically evaluating these kinds of arguments. Some of you cited the textbooks or lectures -- in a formal essay you are advised to avoid these and seek the sources the text authors or the professor used to construct their claims. Guelzo's "Further Reading" section at the end of each chapter will help you find the sources he relied upon. Since these (unlike the text) contain the supporting arguments and evidence, you can better judge the validity of the claim than you can from his second-hand summaries.

On the technical side, be sure to read the syllabus guidelines before submitting your next paper. There were lots of little problems that could have been avoided by reading the instructions. The guidelines, of course, may need clarification, and I will be happy to answer questions about what I really intended. Woe unto any author next time who flagrantly ignores these. You will want to pay especially close attention to footnote styles. These should be single-spaced, with author's name in normal order (James McPherson instead of McPherson, James), article titles in quotes, book titles in italics or underlining, and the specific page numbers included. Subsequent references should use Ibid<I>., or a short title. The short title should be meaningful and in correct order (so Abrahamson, <I>Men of Secession, rather than Abrahamson, Men.) There are examples in the syllabus, the textbook, and all of the monographs we are using.

This was a stimulating batch of papers to read. Even the least well-developed, well-organized, and well-documented papers gave evidence of engagement with our authors and approached things with an interpretive sophistication appropriate to the materials. None of the papers was sub-par. All of you had at least one original twist on the material, and some insights, even in improvable papers, were dazzlingly good. Thanks.

Lloyd Benson

Edited by author 04-08-2002 04:37 PM
Sorry I'm late posting... I guess it just slipped my mind. The short section we read in CAR was interesting, mainly because of the struggle McClellan faced to maintain his job after his defeat at the Seven Days battle. It was interesting that Lincoln kept him as general of the Army of the Potomac for political reasons. It seems that McClellans army must have really respected him and probably thankful to be under his command. It was also interesting that Lee was much more likely to sacrifice soldiers in a fierce offensive strategy, as compared with McClellan's perhaps overprotection of his soldiers. Lee was the better general of the two and definately proved this in the Seven Days campaign. It appears at this juncture, the Confederacy really had no idea that they were going to lose and had great hope for Lee's Maryland offensive. Looking forward to Antietam.

I think it's interesting that different people had contrasting opinions about the victors of the battle of Antietam. This battle was so indecisive that both sides could say that they had won. I think Gallagher does a nice job of analyzing the battle from both sides by discussing the benefits gained by the Confederates. Although they didin't ultimately win the battle, they did manage to "take the war out of Virginia, gather food and fodder, and threaten Washington from the west". Nevertheless, Antietam represented a turning point in the war that was not advantageous to the South. I can understand that Lincoln wanted to keep McClellan for political reasons, but after Antietam I don't see how he could have justified NOT firing McClellan. It is interesting to note that Antietam did have positive consequences for the North in the long run despite the lack of a decisive victory. If the southerners had won the battle then European countries might have been more willing to come to the aid of the Confederates. Ironically, one of the most important battles of the war was the most debatable.

Edited by author 04-08-2002 07:15 PM
A lot of interesting stuff in the reading today. First, from the letters from McClellan and Lee: McClellan's assertions that "pillage and waste should be treated as high crimes," etc.(93)--this section definately didn't represent the demonization and "baby-killing" represented in the views of the opposition we looked at today in class; instead, McClellan stressed moderation, saying a declaration of radical views would disintegrate the present armies. On the other side of things, Lee's letter definately represented his opportunistic offensive plan, beginning his line of argument that the armies were weakened and demoralized, that there reinforcements were not yet organized, and that, thus, this was "the most favorable" time for a campaign into Maryland (94).

As goes Antietem, I second Stephanie's choice of quotes, showing the gains for the Confederacy, in a campaign that was ultimately a turning point for the Union, though largely indecisive. A note--Gallagher's statement: "If Lee's gravest error was in striving to do too much with a limited force, McClellan's was in asking too little of a powerful one."(108) In his view, then, it would seem that neither general was really all that good at estimating and utilizing the capabilities he had before him. Was the difference here one of philosophy, Lee taking more of a utilitarian view, sacrificing soldiers in what he thought would be decisive ends, while McClellan had an over-concern which costs him advantages, or was Lee, as Matthew has asserted, the decidely better general of the two?

Posting slipped my mind, but here goes for last night. Points of interest: Guelzo gives more of a big picture of the Seven Days' battle than does Thomas. Lee clearly showed the pros and cons of aggressive persistence, as he was whipped, then did the whipping, then got whipped again. His all-or-nothing strategy, while risky and not wholly successful, did the job of keeping Richmond. Don't knock him until you see the results, Dr. Nolan.
     As we have argued often, slavery was not the all-consuming reason for sectional differences and maybe not secession, but it seems that the war saw sectional differences oversimplified, and slavery was the undisputed dispute.
     If Guelzo is right, then Pope was an unmannered punk who murdered civilians and had no concept of wartime etiquette. It looks like he forgot the purpose of the war and became a barbarian for the sake of killing(like Britain's Tavington in The Patriot). I guess his war etiquette was on a par with his war tactics. He got hosed at the 2nd Bull Run.
     McLellan must have been a scrub. He had Lee's private reports, which revealed a very vulnerable Confederate army, and he couldn't close the deal at Antietam. Very interesting how little blunders like losing a private battle plan can lead to the tide turning.
     Lincoln's political awareness(for his own election, that is) damages my heroic vision of him. I would love to just once live through or read about a president who lives with wholly noble purposes and real integrity. I won't just tear him down, though. Lincoln proved himself highly capable in the war effort, as he was involved much more than I would have expected.

Like Stephanie, I found the debate about Antietam's victor interesting. Both the essay by Gallagher and the assessment of Antietam by Alexander emphasize McClellan's greatest opportunity and Lee's "greatest blunder." Why would Lee risk the lives of Confederate troops when victory was highly improbable? Why would McClellan not seize the opportunity for a decisive and complete Union victory? On page 98 of the Major Problems book, Alexander seems to have finally reached a point (35 years after the war) where he can "gratefully accept things as they were" rather than constantly ponder why or how things happened as they did at Antietam. Like Alexander, I find the "narration" of things that actually happened to be slightly more productive than the contemplation of possibilities. Although Antietam was, perhaps, a big "blunder" (for both Lee and McClellan), its effects on the war's outcome and southern society were significant. Lee's retreat paved the way for Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation (Guelzo 126) that encompassed (officially) the entire "social fabric" of the Confederacy (Major Problems 112). Before Antietam, the possibility of a return to antebellum society through compromise existed for southerners; after Antietam and Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, the only way that southerners could ever return to their old lifestyle was through total defeat of the Union armies (Major Problems 112). Despite the missteps of Lee and McClellan, Antietam served as a pivotal point in the Civil War...

How crazy is it that Lincoln and the northerners bash McClellan for his indecisiveness, while Alexander claims that he was full of mercy. It seems so odd that his side is tearing him down while the other is building him up. If the South had won the war, how much more important would this day have been: The greatest general of the Confederate army makes a grave miscalculation, while the disaster-stricken Union general has a perfect opportunity to redeem himself from previous mistakes. The president comes down and gives the order himself to give pursuit one last time and end it all. It’s almost a storybook ending for McClellan. Instead he is dominated by his fear, and the war stretches on for two more grueling years. Imagine for a second, if Lee had joined up with the Union, how would this battle look? Lee probably wouldn’t even let the troops rest under nightfall, so eager to pursue them. Lee would have never would have kept Porter and Burnside at bay, rather sending his entire force upon the fleeing and faltering confederates. And today there would be no debate over Lee, he would be the greatest general ever, the defender of American freedom. Instead we see the cowardice and the foolish decision of McClellan to “stand on the defensive”.

I also think it is very interesting in Lee’s letter to the president, how in the end he ask for more shoes and ammunition from the Quartermaster Department. I wonder how important these two items were, and weather they had a decisive impact on the outcome of many battles. With this new evidence, maybe we should go back and look at those two pictures from class today, and see which one truly captured the war as a whole.

Ah, subtlety. I enjoyed reading Sean's and Janna's descriptions of the blunders near Antietam Creek, but I think Guelzo has perhaps led them atray in his critique. McClellan was a non-presence on the battlefield that day, 'tis true, and there is his great mistake -- just as in the Peninsula Campaign, he's still trying to lead from the rear.
But his Union commanders on the field were a mixed bag. McClellan did not intend for the attacks to be "poorly coordinated"; he wanted a simultaneous attack across the badly-fortified left, right, and center of Lee's line. It was a good plan, like the Peninsular Campaign. As with that earlier scheme, McClellan didn't what he wanted ... and we will see again the generals who don't get it done: Hooker, Sumner, and (the day's premier idiot) Ambrose Burnside, who fought over a bridge all day when he could have forded the creek almost anywhere else.
McClellan at least had a plan, and the average Union fighting man (at a time when the Army of Potomac was at its smallest and most vulnerable) performed well in the murderous business of the day, standing and dying in all the ridiculous places that his generals put him.
But Lee? Alexander is absolutely right; this was among his his worst hours. Almost destroyed on the first day, he stayed on the field for another day, seemingly DARING McClellan to come after him. McClellan, who loved his men and was probably neck-deep in casualty reports, did not commit ... we could see that coming. But the only Confederate hero we can find at Antietam was A.P. Hill, who marched like Jackson of the Valley to save Lee. Lee had none of his legendary brilliance at Antietam (neither did Stonewall nor Longstreet), and with a handful of talented commanders on the first day (or an ounce of brashness on the second day), McClellan could have destroyed him.
One parting thought: is it a testament to McClellan's genius or Lee's foolishness that McClellan's plan for Antietam, even so poorly executed, STILL managed to wreck havoc upon the Army of Northern Virginia?

The great rise, but the even greater fall of General McClellan. From most of the material I have seen on General McClellan, I would say that he is actually a well polished general, who for the most part knows his stuff. The common theme in McClellan's inability to get the job done, was his indecisiveness, and not being willing to see things through till the end. McClellan had Lee on the ropes at Antietam, but he was reluctant to deliver the death blow when he had the chance. Antietam could be seen as a Union victory based on the withdrawl of Lee's troops. But in reallity, it was in my opinion a win for the Confederates. Not only did they escape the grasp of the Union Army, but in the process, the Union Army lost a fine General who simply made a few poor decisions.

The Maryland campaign was definitely a complex period, and Gallagher capably explores the ambiguity of the conflict. No clear winners or losers, but certainly major consequences for all concerned, as others have said. What I found most interesting is the fact that this single campaign had such a profound effect on the course of the war and the course of American history. What's even more interesting is the fact that all of these developments hinged on just two men. In their own ways, both men are amazingly headstrong: Lee, brashly pushing ahead into Maryland, knowing he is at a disadvantage; McClellan, opting to stand idle even when the President wants action. Of the two, McClellan had the most far-reaching effect on the war and its aftermath. If he had acted more boldly, the war could have ended soon afterwards and the Confederate states might have returned to the Union under different circumstances. As for which general had the most devastating effect on the Confederate army, the genius McClellan or the fool Lee, I opt for the latter. He dove into the campaign, well aware that he was at a disadvantage. Had Lee been more cautious, as his circumstances seemed to warrant, the "genius" would not have wreaked havoc on the Army of Northern Virginia in the first place.

Lee's and McClellan's letters prior to the campaign are intriguing. Lee clearly knew that he was at a disadvantage, remarking on his limited numbers and resources, yet, in an interesting choice of words, he says the time has come to free Maryland from "oppression." This calls to mind some of the inflammatory language in Longstreet's letter on Monday. While Lee is comparatively mild, it would seem that this is his genuine feeling about Maryland's plight. After all, he is writing to his superior, who probably has his own understanding of the situation and thus needs no propagandizing like the average soldier. Nevertheless, although Lee urges action, he comes across as fairly mild in his letter. McClellan, on the other hand, sounds more like a brazen general. He calls for action, no matter the "cost in time, treasure, and blood." Parts of his letter seem more like a rallying call than a diatribe on grand strategy. Where was this enthusiasm on the field?.

Reading Lincoln's personal letters to his staff helped to describe the tentative position he was in. He had people from both sides of the slavery debate constantly badgering him and arguing for their case. He knew what it took to keep the Union together and he knew when and when it was not advantageous to declare emancipation. Lincoln was also quick to share military advice although never claiming to have the answers. The Paludan article shows how his undying allegiance to the constitution helped to put his ideas on slavery into perspective. While he disagreed with slavery, he could find no constitutional reason to end it and felt constitutionally obligated to protect it. Paludan was clever in his argument that Lincoln had to emancipate whites from the ideas before he could emancipate blacks from slavery. He had to construe the constitution in order for people to understand the wrongness of slavery and his backing of the declaration through the constitution eventually helps him towards the goal of making all men equal.
     In his article, Berlin makes it clear that the emancipation effort was more powerful as a military move and a symholic gesture ushering in a new round of the war effort and political clashes over slavery rather than a document which made all slaves free. It only applied to slaves in territories that were out of Federal authority and exempted Deleware, Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri. Thousands of slaves were not included in the proclamation. Berlin goes further in his article to emphasize the central role slaves played in Union victory and in their own emancipation. Slaves knew a Union victory was imperative to any chance of freedom and they overlooked Lincoln's early plans of allowing the continuance of slavery, believing they held the power to get themselves freed.
   Finally, what I found most interesting I found in the Berlin article. He reveals Lincoln's early reservation about ending slavery. According to Berlin, Lincoln himself doubted whether blacks and whites could live as equals in American society. What the history books usually don't tell us is that Lincoln favored relocation and recolonization of slaves back to Africa. In April 1862, $100,000 was appropriated in Congress for relocation and the Second Confiscation Act added another half million. It was cool to learn something of a different nature about Lincoln.

Edited by author 04-10-2002 12:56 AM
I found Phillip Paludan's article on Lincoln and the emancipation the most interesting of all the articles read on the issue of freeing the slaves. In this article the the author demonstrates Lincoln's intentions on freeing the slaves and having equality for all by battling constitutional obstacles presented by his opposers. What really caught my attention in this selection by Paludan was the debate over whether Lincoln was a devoted to the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence. These documents stand for what this nation is founded upon. The constitution stands for national supremecy and the Decleration of Independence stands for all men are created equal. Some believe that Lincoln was a defender of the Declaration rather than the Constitution and some believe the other way. But Paludan suggests that Lincoln turned both The Declaration and the Constitution into his devotion. Lincoln, the politician and lawyer, cared about the suffering of the slaves but did it in a way that was not radical. Lincoln did not join an abolitionists group to get his feelings across, he did it in a peaceful and business-like manner which was the emancipation.
  Butler illustrates that during the talk of emancipation and even after it the slaves were still not actually free. Therefore they would flee to the Union camps for protection. They risked their lives trying to escape because they felt a sense of security with the United States and the Union. But Butler is confused and does not know what position the blacks hold, are they slaves, are they free? Butler shows that he takes them in and even employs them as they dig trenches and other things. Does this seem almost as if Butler is using the blacks as slaves or are they being paid or from their own free will?

Out of the selections from the three chapters, I found chapter six the most interesting. This section deals with Lincoln's strategies as a political leader. It seemed that Lincoln was most concerned with saving the Union at all costs. Ending slavery was secondary, but still very important. He wanted to show the nation that the political system they had could work. Lincoln was fighting to save the nation even before the war started. He was opposed by Stephen Douglas and Robert Taney. Lincoln attacked the Constitution, and defended the Declaration of Independence. He had to show that the Constitution supported his position of "all men are created equal." To do this he said that the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence were essentially the same thing because they were both "bonded in the act of founding the country." Therefore, the the authors of both documents did believe that all men are created equal.

Another thing that was interesting was Lincoln's stance on slavery. Throughout our education, we are told about how much Lincoln hated slavery and how he wanted to abolish it. It was new to me when I read that it was the second issue on his agenda, in a way. Chapter 10 states that some of Lincoln's " initiative was less Bold." This says that his emancipation on January 1, 1863 freed no slaves and didn't help the cause.

Edited by author 04-10-2002 01:05 AM
My group is alive!
I enjoyed the Paluden article as good insight to Lincoln's purposes and ideas behind emancipation. Especially found it interesting Lincoln's "redefining the meaning of 1776," and how he used history and the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and and the Constitution in his reasons for emancipation. Sorry, I just have to quote him because this is one of the main reasons why I think Abraham Lincoln is so beloved in our country (penny, five dollar bill, monument, Lincoln, Nebraska, etc.), "Near eighty years ago we began by declaring that all men are created equal, but now from that beginning we have run down to the other declaration, that for SOME men to enslave others is 'a sacred right of self government.'"
"The earliest Congress, under the constitution, took the same view of slavery. They hedged and hemmed it in to the narrowest limits of necessity." I think that it is a stroke of brilliance for Lincoln to mention an idea that helped spark of the revolution of 1776 and foundations for a new government as a reason to unite and forward the country. Especially since both sides of the war had declared that they were fighting to uphold the ideas of 1776. This shows Lincoln's need to uphold the Constitution and the Union to prove that the US' new form of government could work. Perhaps he was as unstable on the issue of slavery just like the majority of Unionist, but he also knew what it would take to progress the Union.

Despite McClellan’s military conduct, I believe Antietam was a Union victory in the long run. Marylanders remained in the Union despite their sympathy for the CSA, and Lee’s men never got a chance to threaten Pennsylvania. Antietam also helped detour England and France from offering the CSA recognition and assistance. In conjunction to today’s readings, emancipation also aided towards the lack of European assistance to the CSA. England didn’t want to look like it was supporting, and Lincoln’s emancipation highlighted the fact that the CSA was a slaveholding nation. Britain (and ultimately France) didn’t want to support such an institution or its supporters, and they forsake their own economic gains for morals. Beautiful stuff!

Now, to focus more on emancipation (the issue at hand today), let me just say that reading the letters in conjunction with the Guelzo text and essays was an enlightening experience. They show how complex the whole ordeal was, and they highlight a number of domestic and foreign political issues. Lincoln makes the right decision in emancipating the slaves despite its unconstitutionality (taking away “property” without properly compensating the owners). He gives the war a bigger and more defined purpose, and (as stated before) gets Europe to not support the Confederates.

Perhaps one of my favorite reading today was the Shaw text. It’s interesting to hear a Union representative dismiss emancipation because it’s not “practical.” Another thing: knowing what we know now, it’s almost ludicrous for us to hear him say that Davis will hang all Union prisoners in response to emancipation. It surprised me, but I think I can somewhat understand why Shaw would make such a comment – he was scared. Another piece I liked was the Butler essay. It exemplifies how demeaning, cruel and horrible slavery really was. Were these blacks slaves or people? We all know now that these people were, in fact, human beings, but slavery clouds the issue, saying they’re property and thus “contraband.” This confusion over the issue demeans these black men, women and children, and shows how horrible this slavery institution truly was.

I was particularly enthralled by today's readings about emancipation. I never before realized how important it was to the long-term success of the Union in the Civil War. I wasn't really surprised, though, to see that Lincoln was wheeling and dealing his way to emancipation, but that's not really a bad thing. He knew how to work the system, and that seemed to be the only way to accomplish emancipation, which would turn out to be more of a blessing than anyone had ever expected. I think the Glatthaar essay best explains this point. Not only did Emancipation in effect cause 190,000 men (blacks) to "defect" to the Union, but it also gave Lincoln what Glatthaar calls the "high moral ground." So now the Union had a decisive advantage in manpower and a destructive path of sabotage left by the defectors, plus the Union also had now squashed, by means of having the moral high ground, any possible British intervention on the side of the Confederacy. It was amazing and exciting to me that the singular event of emancipation held so much moral and strategic importance that it gave the Union an almost complete guarantee of victory.

Edited by author 04-10-2002 10:12 AM
On Monday I will be talking about photographic images of Antietam. The complete Library of Congress list of these is available at http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?amme...attle+of,+Md.,+1862)) (if this link creates a query problem, add two right parentheses to the URL and it will work.)

It may be helpful for you to look through all of these beforehand. Which two or three images best capture the impact of the battle, do you think?

You may also wish to look over Vattel's Law of Nations, (http://www.constitution.org/vattel/vattel_03.htm) especially section 24 on the just causes of war and sections 139 through 147 on the treatment of civilian enemies.

Did women profoundly im