"Soldiering in the Army of Northern Virginia" Topic

I've just been reading "Soldiering in the Army of Northern Virginia – A statistical portrait of the troops who served under Robert E. Lee" by Joseph T. Glatthaar.

It's safe to say it's unlike any other Civil War book I have ever read and at the same time if the Professor can make the time to do a companion volume on the Army of the Potomac I will be at the front of the line to buy one!

OK, cutting to the chase, if you are only interested in Battles and Uniforms rather than the men who fought and wore them, stop reading now. If on the other hand you would like a dip into the lives and experiences of those men before and during the war and a picture of ‘the old South' this one is for you.

Glatthaar is a historian by trade but the depth of research and statistical analysis, including learning modern computer based technics employed by him in this work are outstanding and fully ratified by others holding Doctorates in these areas – it's not guess work. In fact although a math disaster myself even I (thanks to friends who employ such tools) recognised the fully standardised accuracy tests employed. All done to recognised levels of accuracy employed by the Census Bureau and Government Agencies.

So what does it say? Well trying to summarize is virtually impossible.

Almost every page is crammed with facts and comparisons as the author looks at casualties, social class, wealth, desertion, length of service, age groups, sickness, pre-war employment, slaveholding, conscription etc. Year by Year, divided by Infantry, Cavalry and Artillery and with cross comparison all over the place!

I almost forgot to say, the data sources include ANV muster rolls and the 1860 Census so if it has flaws they are original ones!

You will learn things you didn't expect and even where you knew or thought you knew there is data and explanation to confirm your previous impressions.

Got your time machine handy?

Well, if you want to join the war: Don't be an officer (25% chance you will die). Don't join the infantry (75% of you will never go home in one piece). Do join the cavalry, you will live longer (Yes, the old wise cracks were true).

Artillery men are better educated and more dedicated but die pretty quick when the action starts – this surprised me as I've only ever seen % of total army casualties.

Army level desertion is continuous and after Grant gets to Petersburg and Lincoln gets re-elected, endemic. Generally the ANV hangs together pretty well before that but interestingly when Longstreet is sent West after Gettysburg, those regiments who find themselves nearer home lose men in droves.

The detail just goes on and on.

Glatthaar makes a pretty good fist of keeping the reader engaged it what could have been dry as dust number crunching but he is honest enough to give apologies in advance in case is attempts at narrative fall flat. Personally, I think it was unnecessary, given the task in hand.

One thing I imagine a lot of people will focus on is Slavery and its part in events. Here the book is particularly interesting in view of that seemingly timeless (or is that endless) debate on the causes of the war and what people actually fought for.

44% of Lee's army came from slave holding households, as a percentage of the Southern population this is massively above the community as a whole. Even in States with low slave numbers they came from the Counties were slaveholding was high.

They took higher losses in killed and wounded and deserted far less than non-slaveholders – they were committed to "The Cause" and obviously had a lot more to lose.

So those who claim States Rights as the reason for the war, may be correct in some fashion but in reality I would suggest it was very particular ‘Rights' those on the ground had in mind!

Big thanks to fellow TMPer Don Effinger for pointing up this book in his recent joint article (with Mike Evans) on Confederate Infantry, for Wargames Illustrated.

Actually that 44% number is only a little high. While only 10% of Southerners technically owned slaves, that low figure is based on the oldest male member of the household being the legal owner of the slaves. In the 1860 census fully 40% of Southern households owned slaves. So while only a small number of Southern soldiers owned slaves it was a very good bet that their father or grandfather or uncle owned slaves that the soldier drew benefit from (and possibly stood to inherit). And in the South in those days the "American Dream" was to be able to own a slave. So there is no doubt that many of them were consciously fighting for slavery,

Sounds like an intertesting book, and you are right: he needs to do a companion volume of the Northern soldier.

Scott, The author was interviewed on Civil War Talk Radio. He said he is going to do a follow-up with Union soldiers from the AotP.

Actually the 44% stated by Trajanus is accurate. It refers to the households not individuals. The author states that if the Father owns say… 100 slaves and there are 3 sons then they would stand to inherit the holdings of the Father, same as today. This means that the 'family' owns 100 slaves, so that makes 4 soldiers 'owning' slaves. The author explains his methodology in the book. He used standard statistical analysis's practices.

The key thing is "Households" as it broadens the concept of having a stake in slavery away from direct ownership. If you had a stake in the future of slavery you fought for it.

As Glatthaar points out, having a stake in slavery came in many fashions, working on a plantation or farm where slaves were the main labor force, supplying goods or services to such establishments, transporting produce, all were more inclined to make you fight to preserve the institution, regardless whether you personally owned a slave or not.

In the end it didn't matter if the individual held white supremacist views or just saw things as his everyday employment, it all contributed to the same resistance to abolition. However, those with a direct stake appear to have fought the harder for it.

Another interesting, and often intentionally ignored, bit of information from the 1860 Census rolls is the number of free blacks in the Southern States (and some northern) who were also slave owners.

One of those great contradictions.

It also easy to forget the number of black people who took an active part in the slave trade from the African end, through tribal or economic reasons. Has to be said though that they neither started or systematized the process.

At the end of the day people are people and will act as individuals, for better or worse. The color of your skin makes no difference.

I'd imagine that being a free black in the south would mean being under enormous pressure to follow all the rules and blend in as much as possible. A free black who was successful and had money would probably feel compelled to own slaves like all his neighbors. After all, even the free blacks had basically no legal rights and if they made themselves unpopular (like by having anti-slavery attitudes) they could find themselves in real trouble.

I suspect that interracial peer pressure had very little to do with black ownership of slaves. If you are talking about the "classic" slave ownership model, namely owning field hands, blacks would have owned slaves for the same reason whites did-to increase production. There was a great deal of money to be made in cotton and tobacco production, and this was true regardless of race. Free blacks did enjoy significant property rights, although they did not have the same civic rights as whites.

The wild card in black slave ownership is that the numbers are skewed by those who owned family members. A free black who wanted to marry a slave might, if they had the resources, buy their spouse. You also had parents buying their children and children buying their parents. Having done so these free blacks ran into the same legal barriers that limited emancipation of slaves by white owners.

I'm not sure where you come up with 40% of southern families owning slaves in 1860 Scott. Most sources I've seen put the percentage at around 1/3 or less. Not surprised that slave ownership percentages would have been higher in the ANV.

The figure that really surprises me is the 75% of infantry did not go home in one piece. Having read several unit histories I was surprised at how low the total death and invalided out numbers were for some units.

Bill, The 40% number comes from the census of 1860. Can't recall exactly where I read that, but the census was cited as the source.

OK, sorry the 75% was my paraphrase. Like I said its real hard to pick and chose with all this data!

Here's the real deal for Killed, Wounded, discharged through wounds, died of disease or being made POW, based on when they entered the army:

1861 74.4%

1862 83.1%

1863 52.7%

1864 66.7%

Bearing in mind the likely state of health of returning POWs you can see joining up was not a smart move!

Scott-I am getting my numbers through civilwarcauses.org/stat.htm which I understand is also based on the 1860 census.

I would note though that these numbers are probably fuzzy, as it appears they simply divide the number of slave owners by the total number of families without adjusting for families where you might have multiple family members owning slaves. It probably makes little difference in the overall numbers, but it may explain why in some places slave ownership might come close to or exceed 100% of households.

The author, Glatthaar was interviewed on Civil War Talk Radio a couple years ago, and discussed his books.
Interesting and informative listening while painting figs.
Here's the link:
link

"I'd imagine that being a free black in the south would mean being under enormous pressure to follow all the rules and blend in as much as possible. A free black who was successful and had money would probably feel compelled to own slaves like all his neighbors. After all, even the free blacks had basically no legal rights and if they made themselves unpopular (like by having anti-slavery attitudes) they could find themselves in real trouble."

Or maybe they saw that that was the economic system of the time and didn't see anything wrong with it. Or perhaps they considered themselves Virginians, or Mississippians, first and black second.

Trajanus,

I'm glad I turned you on to that book. It was an eye-opening book. As Avidgamer pointed out, the author was interviewed on Civil War Talk Radio. That website is a GREAT way to pass the time painting and finding out about good books I would want to check out. The on-demand archive has superb interviews.

BTW… the articles we did for WI was a lot of fun but sadly we only had a limited amount of space for each one. There is so much that was left out due to space constraints. It was tough editing out all the other stuff. It made me sad. I hope you enjoy the rest of the upcoming articles.

Don

actionfront.blogspot.com

"Who ever saw a dead cavalryman?"

In reference to free blacks in the South owning slaves, yes that is correct. However, many of those who "owned" slaves were actually family members they had purchased from their white owners. As they could not legally free their wives or children once purchased they had to stay "slaves".