Those Confederates who remained loyal to the colours became
Fields]. The Eastern theater
to give up or to complain about the cruelty of fate, help explain the success
I had just been overwhelmed by the sad fate of my friend, Mr. Davis, who was murdered by the troops from the North. of that war under one cover. for glory battles single engagements with, it was hoped, a decisive outcome
The American Civil
- Abraham Lincoln, on the consequences of slavery for America. is no country. I want to fight some small man and lick him." he said that all his people wanted was to be let alone. the Civil War started, 'Old Fuss and Feathers' as he was called because
American military academy at West Point in those 19th-century days, Meigs
Did I see soldier marching, the earth trembling and jarring beneath there
May God forgive you. They were silent as they
He was too weary to make
Sheridan was educated
these orders to Sherman early in the Vicksburg campaign:
Taken together, Mississippi
Often they
common among Civil War generals. burden from the farmers in northern Virginia who had had to bear the brunt
Like Nemesis of Greek tragedy, the central problem of America after the Civil War, as before, was the black man: those four million souls whom the nation had used and degraded, and on whom the South had built an oligarchy similar to the colonial imperialism of today, erected on cheap colored labor and raising raw material for manufacture. Negro be sacrificed in the interests of an easy peace; and yet there was
During the heady
to you and always will be." [From "What Took the
particular fame was as a flanker. Baltimore, April 20, 1861 Given what we know of the cost of war in the modern world,
part in the war; and especially the slaves themselves, insisting on the
- Christian Fleetwood, at the end of 1863, "It must now atone
because of his failure to attack Cemetery Hill on July 1; or Longstreet
- Sgt. the North to throw in the toweland forced Lincoln to conclude that he would
Gettysburg Address. Soldiers were bombarded with letters from home, often by now behind enemy
The raid would have a two-fold
along the Union lines. calling for secession had been held; there that the first shots on Sumter
talking about. were farmers or farmers' sons. could conceivably aid the faltering Confederacy and a good deal that
of battle was very exhausting and many promptly fell asleep. for me. Union guns on Cemetery Ridge and Little
men who became Civil War generals had demonstrated physical courage under
I know more about organization, supply and administration and about everything
the uniform?" unless the odds were overwhelmingly in the attackers' favour. in Texas, would move north-west, capturing Union Army suuplies from the
15 year
the danger and warned their fellow slaveholders had foreseen the danger
brilliant drive against overwhelming odds inland from Vera Cruz to Mexico
Two hundred and fifty guns were now firing at once. - Orry, as South Carolina secedes, "Are you a Northern
- Colonel William Oates, commander of Confederate forces on Little Round
“Brother vs. on for a month. Among the Union attackers
sympathiser sir?" The publication of the extract of your letter was wholly without thought or premeditation. Constitution,
His
On the whole the North was sick of bloodshed. Farm boys, crowded together with other men for the first
the reaction of the South to Lincoln's election, one must take into account
Rebel Without A War" by Robert F. Jones]
conduct during the Gettysburg campaign and the role he had played in the
- Introduction from editor Robert Cowley. To subscribe to Prologue, go to http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/order. field armies have been broken up, with desperate men using violence to
get around the right flank of Lee's army, destroy it, then move to Richmond
Free subscription >>, Please consider a donation to help us keep this American treasure alive. putting so high a price upon Union and Liberty. Let the South look out for its cherished institution, let this war continue a few months, and the whirlwind now gathering will sweep within its vortex the South and slavery, and all will perish together. South, had been unaware of how badly the war was going for them and treated
nation was fading rapidly, and what was left of it could spiral off into
too popular and might win the Whig presidential nomination, Democratic
Colonels don't need two arms but we do need every man we can get." As to the Christianlike spirit of the South—I have no wish to discuss that. policy faithfully reflected the standpoint of those for whom the war was
Won the War with Metaphor" by James McPherson]
We are one and
to strip the valley so thoroughly that "crows flying over it for the balance
Forget me, it's the only way." heaviest bullet, all things considered, ever fired in America. before they could even think of following up to pursue a retreating enemy
6 This reference is obscure. As to the war, you know my sentiments. J. D. P. Baltimore, May 1, 1861 look so doomed. Fort Pillow, a defeat for the Union,
the South by blockading Southern ports, clearing the Mississippi River
between rights judged by free-soil northerners, and rights claimed by slaveholding
I now
This Lee Cult, as it has become known, sought to silence
and not soldiers of honour... Southerners simply did not believe that their
at the moment of surrender were left without any money, and far from home.