The War, 1861 - 1865

Battle of Spotsylvania by Thure de Thulstrup (Public Domain)

On my recent trip out to California, I picked up a book in the airport at Phoenix. I have just finished reading that book. You can probably guess what the book was about by the topic of today's post.

An excellent read. Though a mite depressing. This topic always leaves me somewhat confused as to how I'm supposed to feel about it.

Growing up we were taught a few things about the conflict which began in April of 1861 and ended four years later.

1. It was called the Civil War.
2. It was about slavery.
3. The North won because it was larger, had more people and industry.
4. Northerners weren't natural soldiers but learned.
5. Southerners were all outdoors-men and crack shots.
6. The South had better military leaders
7. People thought the war would end after one big battle

Before I address those points you need to remember that when I was a young lad we were celebrating the centennial of the war. I turned 10-years old in 1963. Two days after my tenth birthday was the centennial of the death of Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. An event which was not remarked upon at all when I was a boy. After all, he was on the "wrong" side.

So I was young and impressionable and there was a great deal of interest in the war at that point in time. I remember attending a fireworks display in July of 1963, a hundred years after the battle of Gettysburg. There were some young men dressed as Union soldiers in attendance. My kid brother, The Olde Vermonter and I were amazed, at the fireworks and at the guys in blue who, to our young minds, had emerged from the mists of time.

To put things further in perspective, we are now in the midst of the centennial of another great conflict from the past, World War One. When I was born, there were many WWI veterans still alive. There were also a number of Civil War veterans still alive.

They're all gone now. Even World War Two vets are getting scarce!

Okay, point (1) - One of the first things I learned about the war was that the South tended to name the battles differently from the North, for instance

• North: First and Second Bull Run, South: First and Second Manassas
• North: Antietam, South: Sharpsburg

Of course, that's not atypical. The Battle of Waterloo had three names, depending on which army you served in: Waterloo (Anglo-Allies), La Belle Alliance (Prussians) and Mont-St-Jean (French). Having more than one name for the war itself? Makes perfect sense viewed in that light.

Point (2) - Yes, slavery was a causative factor, but not the reason for the war. A trigger yes, the reason, no.

Point (3) - Well sure, that has a lot of bearing on the outcome. But the South almost drove the North to be tired of the cost of the war. Especially the cost in lives. (Something we forgot a number of years later. You don't have to defeat the enemy on the battlefield. In fact, you can win most, if not all, of the battles and still lose the war. Defeat the will to continue and you will win the war.)

Point (4) - Many Northern troops were from the cities, but not all. One thing the South forgot from the Revolution, fight enough battles and you learn to be a soldier. You don't have to be born to it.

Point (5) - No, not really. Many were small time farmers, the South was more rural than the North. Farmers are excellent material for soldiers. That's been true since war began. That's only an advantage early on, experience of battle will make up the difference between a country boy and a city slicker soon enough.

Point (6) - The South did get a lot of West Point graduates. Even now, a large chunk of the American officer corps comes from the south. (That might have something to do with having a large number of military bases in the south. The weather is better, you can train more of the year.) Over time the Northern officers learned the brutal trade of warfare. Some of them got very good at it.

Point (7) - As late as World War One people thought that one big battle would decide everything. Everyone remembered Waterloo, one big battle did end Napoléon's attempt to retake the French throne. But that was an anomaly. Everyone forgot (I guess) the long bloody struggle to get him off that throne in the first place. (Over ten years!) Then, as now, people have very short memories.

I consider my education, with all its perceived flaws, to be much superior to what is on offer these days. At least we learned about the war. Not sure history is even taught anymore. At least not real history.

One can understand why there might be more than one name for a war. Many Southerners, I learned as a teenager, call it The War Between the States. I've even heard it called The War of Northern Aggression. That latter name I don't care for, call me a fossil if you will but P.G.T. Beauregard's guns started the war when they opened fire upon Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor. Seems aggressive to me. But I can entertain arguments to the contrary point of view. The folks in Northern Virginia and in Georgia still have less than fond memories of the armies clad in blue who destroyed their homes and crops.

Pierre Gustave Toutant-Beauregard (Matthew Brady photo)

But, as I learned growing up, the South had their reasons for opening fire on Sumter. Just want to acknowledge that. I've been there and walked the ground, the passions of the time used to escape me. Not so much these days.

When I was a boy, another man I had issues with was Robert E. Lee.

Robert Edward Lee by Julian Vannerson

Superintendent of West Point, a superb record in the Mexican-American War and arguably one of the best field generals ever produced by our country.

However, he swore an oath, an oath not much different than the oath I myself first swore long ago. He violated that oath. He turned his back on the United States and later took up arms against that nation. When I was a lad, there were still those who named him "traitor."

While that's not a stance I ever really held, his actions made me uneasy. "How could he?" I asked myself many times. How could this great man do what he did?

As you get older, you begin to understand things a little better. Especially in these days when the Federal government is throwing its considerable weight around. Makes me nervous it does. Nervous indeed.

I have stood on the grounds of General Lee's home, at Arlington. For whatever reason, it gives me pain when I consider how that beautiful place came to be. A place where I wish to be buried someday is there because the government seized it from the Lee family. From my readings on the subject, there was a great deal of hatred of General Lee in the North, at least amongst the political classes.

Robert E. Lee's citizenship was finally restored in 1975, over a hundred years after his death.

All I really know about the time is that political interests on both sides were determined to have their way, regardless of the outcome.

I would be willing to bet that very few politicians died in that war.

No surprise there.

The cost of that conflict was high, very high. It deeply affected the psyche of this country. There are some, particularly in the South, who are still bitter about the outcome.

There is an old saying, attributed to George Clemenceau (who's bitterness towards Germany at the end of WWI gave us Hitler, World War II and many other wonders, at least in my reckoning):

La guerre! C’est une chose trop grave pour la confier à des militaires.

Which has come down to us as "War is too important to be left to the generals."

I would make the argument that it is too important to be left to the politicians.

What say you?

Dead Confederate soldiers from Starke's Louisiana Brigade, on the Hagerstown Turnpike, north of the Dunker Church.
Battle of Antietam (Sharpsburg)
Photograph by Alexander Gardner