471A3--Week 3 Questions/Comments--Thursday

Blight brings up a speech that Roger Pryor, an ex-confederate general, made at a Decoration day event in New York in 1877. Pryor's speech gives a fascinating insight into the way memory was shifting for many in the South in order to better suit the reconciliationists attitude that was spreading across the country. One of his most telling points was his argument that the war was an "unnecessary war". He blames the politicians for the violence and absolves the soldier from any responsibility. Blight hints that this idea would carry on into the twentieth century and understandably so: if the war was unnecessary and the solider was not to blame there was little need for bitterness to linger. This is an idea that remains still today in some minds, its power is in the freedom from responsibility that each side could claim and thus feel their cause was justified without feeling anger towards the other. -Sean Blight makes an interesting point about the feelings of Americans at the time about realistic descriptions of the carnage and destruction of the war. Blight says that Americans were not prepared at the time for such descriptions and the dark side of war was largely ignored in favor of a romanticized version that emphasized valor, courage and honor as well as the peculiarities and ironies of the war. This seems to be in stark contrast to our current desire to know the grittiness of war, as evidenced by the popularity of helmet cameras from Afghanistan that show battle in raw detail and our immensely popular on Youtube. -Sean I agree with Sean, after having such a destructive period in their history, Americans needed time to put themselves back together instead of trying to fight each other after the war, they needed to pick each other up and recognize that the losses were on both sides and only as a collective country were they able to overcome the losses and devastation. -Meg O &lt;p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Appropriate remembrance of fallen soldiers is an important part of the healing process for grieving people. The amount of attention and resources devoted to recovering fallen Union soldiers and identifying and marking their final resting places was astounding. The fact that little to no effort was made by the federal government to give Confederate soldiers the same treatment almost certainly drove a deeper wedge between the two sides. Devoting federal resources to identifying and properly burying former Confederate soldiers as fellow American citizens would have been the right thing to do and would have gone a long way toward healing the nation as a whole. -Jason &lt;/p&gt; &lt;/p&gt; The resistance to Memorial Day evolving into a Blue-Grey reconciliation is understandable. It is also understandable for many veterans to want to heal the hatred that manifest itself in them for their fellow American. Unlike other conflicts, where the “enemy” is foreign to you, in the Civil War it was “brother vs brother” and the guilt that many soldiers on both sides must have felt was tremendous. Soldiers in foreign conflicts often feel guilt for taking the life of someone that doesn’t look like them, speak the same language, share ideological views, etc. For an American soldier to take the life of a fellow American soldier had to be psychologically traumatic. At the soldier’s level I understand the appropriation of Memorial Day for their own. At the national level the idea of taking what was once Decoration Day, created by blacks, and changing its meaning is reprehensible. Finding a way to help the soldiers, Blue and Grey, to deal with their demons could have been accomplished in other ways. &lt;p&gt;-Jason &lt;/p&gt; The tradition of celebrating the life of a loved one is definitely important to the larger process of moving on, and decoration days tried to do just that. I think that decoration days were extremely important to the push towards reconciliation because it would be impossible to move forward with the soldiers improperly honored. The fact that these were whole days of celebrations rather than individual funerals is an important aspect as well because it allowed survivors and family members to lean on each other for support and created a bond over a common loss. However, such concentration on the amount of death that came out of the Civil War could also be seen as having a detrimental impact on reconciliation because it would allow for feelings of anger and resentment to stew. -Cameron F. Soldiers' memories of war is a complicated subject because it is impossible for people who haven't been through such a violent, desperate conflict like the Civil War to comprehend their experiences. The horrors that the soldiers had seen made each account personal and individual to each soldier, which makes it difficult for a larger picture to be constructed. In the case of the Civil War, the graphic and savage stories shared by the soldiers only incited the need for revenge and added to resentment on each side. -Cameron F. We have seen this with other readings. The idea that soldiers do not want to share what happened on the battlefield to their loved ones because they don’t want to burden them with that whether once they returned or in letters from the battlefields. I think that remembering the war was difficult and was something that other people could only understand up to a certain point. They were not there and had not seen what the soldiers had seen. Understanding how to process these memories would be difficult for the soldiers returning home. –Kayle P I agree Kayle. I think this same issue would probably still exist today and most definitely throughout the wars in the past. I would think its hard to live with seeing the horrors of war and no one to share a piece of mind with. I know that there are support groups and therapy to help soldiers cope nowadays, but I'm not so sure soldiers from the Civil War had that advantage.- George H

I like the idea of dedication days. I think that it provided the love ones a way to move on but also a way to remember their love ones. I tend to agree with Cameron though. I think that the amount of death that came out of the Civil War makes it harder to move past it with the large celebrations. Also as Jason pointed out, people were fighting against family friends and neighbors and that could also play into the resentment. I think that it is a nice idea to give closure but like Cameron I wonder how much closure it really gave the families?-Kayle P&lt;/p&gt; I agree with Kayle, I like the idea of the Dedication Days, I think it was a great way to add a sense of closure during a difficult period of time. I think the celebrations needed to be more personal than large because of all of those affected during the Civil War. -Meg O

&lt;p&gt;Pryor's view on the issue of race behind a rhetoric of reunion surprised me a bit. "The war had nothing directly to do with slavery,"(91) and that Southerners were comfortably reconciled to the destruction of slavery because it had only been the 'occasion not the cause of succession.''What are your reactions to this? What does this say for the views of other Southern re-constructionists?- Ana Y.'' &lt;/p&gt; I find it very interesting that soldiers could not wait to tell or write about their stories from the war. Prior to learning this, I thought that there would at least be a period where the soldiers would want to suppress their stories because of how horrific it might have been. The letter written to Alexander from a former comrade, said that historians would recognize their struggles with the availability of the "true" facts. (158) This of course makes perfect sense, what soldier that fought hard would want anything less? Furthermore, I find it more interesting that another soldier responded with a bit of hesitation but continued to write a long recollection of his third day at Gettysburg. -Ana Y. I wasn't aware of Confederate general Jubal Early's "obsession" with preserving the memory of the Confederate south in an honorable manner. Blight writes that "His principle aim was not only to vindicate Southern secession and glorify the Confederate soldier, but also to launch a propaganda assault on popular history and memory" (79). At the beginning of the chapter, Blight discusses the three main groups of commemorators: blacks and abolitionists, Northern whites, and Southern whites. Clearly, Early would fit into the "Southern whites" category, but I was under the impression that the efforts of this particular category were carried out by women. I'm curious as to why he (an ex-Confederate general) would go to such lengths to remain in the spotlight and to alter the way in which the Civil War is preserved? Do we see any aspects of his extreme Southern pride views still present in the Civil War's memory today? Sorry, a lot of different questions thrown into one comment/thought--Carly W. Memoirs were a way of soldiers sharing their memories and validating their efforts to the post-war world in the many years to come--even today we are engrossed with reading and interpreting memoirs...combining what the person says to the known facts, trying to make sense of why they wrote what they did. Blight mentions the success and popularity of Sherman's memoirs at the time (and even in the years to follow). Something that struck me though was Johnston's analysis of Sherman's memoirs as he "began paragraph after paragraph with page numbers from Sherman's work, then proceeded to declare how the Union general's descriptions were 'misinformed,' 'highly improbably,' or 'extremely inaccurate.' (165). I think this is a good reminder that, although many soldiers were coming to terms with one another after the war, especially through shared experiences, many were still quick to defend their own beliefs and honor.-Carly W.   I liked that Blight brought up the fact that for years following the war, soldiers had issues expressing their memories or experiences. Decades before the idea of PTSD even surfaced, Civil War veterans were struggling with what they had experienced. In his conclusion of the chapter Blight states "...ex-soldiers groped for ways to express the trauma of their personal experience..." (170) and I think it is important to recognize that those who have witnessed war first hand have issues explaining their experiences to those who have not been through what they have. I agree with Kayle, remembering the war was hard for everyone no matter how they experienced it whether on the home front or the battlefield. --Mary O. It is important to remember that PTSD happened even if it wasn't diagnosed as such in the time period. It also affected non-belligerents. Those in Fredericksburg during the battle were, understandably, shell-shocked after the battle, both due to the fighting as well as to the looting that occurred in town.--Carly B Like Kayle, I agree with Cameron also in regards to the amount of lives that were lost in the Civil War and honoring the dead with large celebrations. When it comes to honoring and remembering the dead, I have to agree with the “Holmesian mode of memory” that Blight mentions (96). The important thing to remember is that the soldier’s fought with passion and heroism no matter what side they fought for and that is what ultimately what they should be remembered for. –Mary O. It was very interesting to me how, in the 1870's, Blight seemed to argue that the fervor of ceremonies seemed to fade.(pg. 94) while at the same time, the North and South started participating together on memorial and decoration days.(pg. 84) To me this showed that quickly the country wanted to forget the bloodshed and horrors of war and the narrative of the memory seemed to quickly adopt a theme of honoring the soldier's and their honor.(pg. 95) This narrative disconnects the war and those who fought in it from any political cause and makes reconciliation easier for both sides. -Matt Something that struck me was the significance of women and flowers, especially together. What might that have symbolized? Why was it such a staple?--Carly B

&#160; I would like to talk about the description given by Charles Brewster on page 145. He describes a savage scene of endless gunfire, piles of dead bodies mixed with wounded men clinging to their fallen friends. he finishes this description by stating that "...it is a terrible terrible business to make the best of it." I would not even begin to imagine the emotional trauma of seeing this scene let alone being one of the wounded soldiers in the pile such as the one he sees in the morning praying. All I know is that from this description, I can understand the pain and sorrow felt by the soldiers and feel that forgetting would be the only thing possible to heal those wounds. Although forgetting was probably impossible, in time this may have led to the reconciliation spirit of many. -Matt I’m honestly shocked that so many veterans could write about the war without going into the meaning or purpose of it. In the McPherson article we read a couple days back, he was trying so hard to prove that the soldiers were very aware of the purpose of the war while they were fighting it, so now, we reach the post-war memory of the soldiers, and most try to distinguish between what they were doing in battle or in camps from the reasons they were fighting. I have to say, for wars in the twentieth century, I wouldn’t be shocked if a veteran broke down his or her war experiences to such a basic level, but this is the Civil War we’re talking about here. I also want to add that I would totally see a movie about a wounded Union veteran going back to the South to find the Southern girl that he met. There would be that awkward, “I hate Yankees!” coming from the father-in-law and I can just picture Matthew McConaughy as the soldier. Just no drawl this time Matthew. Even doing my own research I can’t fathom having picnics on a battlefield when you can probably still see skulls and bodies and graves. Similar to that, why did Memorial Day become a day for “amusement and sport” (71)? Blight says it then doesn’t really explain. At what point does remembering the death of thousands of soldiers become something for amusement?-- Brooke It is interesting to see how the Memorial Day impacted the memory of the War for so many. Blight states, “Memorial Day rituals did their part in helping many Northerners become early believers in reunion” (73). It seems that it may have been more about trying to bring back together a country torn apart then to remember those that were lost.- Kelly F.

I thought it was interesting how John Esten Cooke once said: "There is nothing intellectual about fighting. There is really nothing heroic or romantic or in any way calculated to appeal to the imagination" (156). The contrast between his writing and his ideological views make me believe in order for Cooke to blossom into the "writer of the South," he was forced to write about the war in an ideal, romanticized fashion (156). The popular southern notion of the Lost Cause idealized the Confederate effort during the War and although, many veterans and veteran societies did not adhere to this romanticized ideal, Cooke's writings transformed the Confederate soldiers into a heroes. It seems all of this was a ploy for higher sales rather than speak the truth about both Cooke's true beliefs and veterans beliefs about the war. -- Donald P

What struck me was Blight's discussion of black veteran voices: "Throughout his (George Washington Williams) speech Williams portrayed American history as dialectic between the two forces of slavery and freedom, and described African American as founders and preservers of the republic" (169). Blacks were now free and had a more prominent voice in society and Washington showcased African American's rise by decreeing America's need for them. After I read Blight's statement I began to wonder whether Washington's idea of black importance to American society was the beginning of the idea of a civil rights movement in the US. -- Donald P

It seemed that Decoration Day was a reminder to southerners of freedom day. It puts more blame on southerners and fuels tension at the start of Reconstruction. The country did not properly fund or put forth effort to properly identify and bury Confederate soldiers. This would make southerners angry. Memorial Day was a rebirth for American nationalism and helped people understand their sacrifices. It was a way of reinforcing the fact that blacks were free and they could parade with support. Memorial Day reinforced 19th century notions of manhood; the courage, bravery, and valor of fighting. When people start to think about what the war meant to them and why so many men died, many take initiative to make changes, like "a variation on the emancipationist legacy- the idea of a people's war for an expanding free labor society." (75) - Hannah

I'm curious as to when Memorial Day changes from commemoration and dedication to sport and amusement. - Hannah

An interesting aspect which Blight brings up is how the war is remembered during the years right after the war. The North would seem to have an easier time giving the facts of what happened since they came out victorious. However, the South would have a tougher time with their celebration and lasting memory. The South lost the war and had not just their homeland destroyed, but a big portion of their way of life from the war. These factors come into play when trying to remember the war in the South's perspective. The Lost Cause would dennounce the fact that the war was fought over slavery and the South fought for independence from the North.- George H