Editor in Chief Bill | 21 Jun 2015 1:56 p.m. PST |
Provocative article… link |
Winston Smith | 21 Jun 2015 2:10 p.m. PST |
I know where you got that, Bill. I tried to post a "thank you" to Mac for posting that but I got my usual "blacklisted for spamming blah blah blah" bs reject answer. |
Winston Smith | 21 Jun 2015 2:13 p.m. PST |
Interestingly the lefty who wrote that article made exactly the same points about Sherman that Victor Davis Hanson made in a few books. He even hates Sparta too, just like Hanson the famous right winger who writes for National Review! |
BW1959 | 21 Jun 2015 2:19 p.m. PST |
Thanks for the link. I enjoyed the article and found it correct. |
ochoin | 21 Jun 2015 2:35 p.m. PST |
Any non-American, 'lefty' or not, would view Sherman and his tactics as being inherently sound. The article, like the whole issue, is infused with current American politics IMO. |
pzivh43 | 21 Jun 2015 2:36 p.m. PST |
Sherman was a thoughtful man, a great general, but not a cruel man. He hated war, but was of the mind that, if it must be done, it should be done without sentimentality in a manner to get it over quickly. As a guy who was born and growed up in the South, I don't think he ordered Atlanta to be burned. He may have said something out loud to the effect it should be burned, and that got twisted and repeated the wrong way, and before you know it, Atlanta was in flames. It was war, and mistakes happen. I do take issue with the author's assertion that the Union army was better than the Confederate Army on a man-to-man basis. His bias is showing there! Although, there is a theory that Sherman had to burn Atlanta to cover his subsequent retreat to the sea!! :) Mike |
svsavory | 21 Jun 2015 2:40 p.m. PST |
Good article, thanks for the link. Yes, Sherman was right! |
steamingdave47 | 21 Jun 2015 3:28 p.m. PST |
I notice the author of the article is writing from Kuwait City. "Human rights in Kuwait has been the subject of criticism, particularly regarding migrant workers rights and the Bedoon. 60% of Kuwait's population is Arab (including Arab expats), the remaining 40% consists of non-Arab expatriates, mainly South Asian migrant workers. The kafala system leaves migrant workers prone to exploitation. Many human rights organizations have criticized Kuwait for failing to protect migrant workers from exploitation." Perhaps he should focus his polemic on modern day abuses? Or does Kuwait need a modern day Sherman? |
Dynaman8789 | 21 Jun 2015 4:52 p.m. PST |
Why should he not write about Sherman since he lives in Kuwait? Does the one preclude the other? |
Blutarski | 21 Jun 2015 4:56 p.m. PST |
The author is living proof of the law of broken clocks. B |
wminsing | 21 Jun 2015 5:42 p.m. PST |
Any non-American, 'lefty' or not, would view Sherman and his tactics as being inherently sound.The article, like the whole issue, is infused with current American politics IMO. Yes, your opinion on Sherman largely depends where in the US you were born and how you vote today. From any objective standpoint his methods were not out of line for any 19th century conflict. I'd recommend 'The Hard Hand of War' by Mark Grimsley for a good analysis of Sherman's methods, and how the war was fought generally. -Will |
John the OFM | 21 Jun 2015 5:54 p.m. PST |
Winston was merely pointing out the irony of a lefty haviong virtually identical opinions as someone who is automatically rejected because he writes for NR. |
Intrepide | 21 Jun 2015 6:05 p.m. PST |
Pretty much the same sponsors and culture which brought us Beecher's Bibles, Sand Creek and Wounded Knee and a few generations before that the Expulsion of the Acadians. Nothing new here, just an unusually candid expression of continuing animus. |
Panzerfaust | 21 Jun 2015 6:07 p.m. PST |
Sherman's tactics may have been sound from a military standpoint but in the context of the times it amounted to a war crime. We are taught in this cynical age that the ends justify the means. If we have to incinerate thousands of innocent women and children to end a terrible war then it's the right thing to do and the men who do it are heroes (I'm referring to bombing cities in WWII). I suspect most mid nineteenth century people would not agree, at least if you had asked them just before the war. High principles are hard to hold onto in war. I would argue that the idea of deliberately and systematically destroying civilian property, burning peoples homes to the ground, was certainly a departure from accepted American ideas of the time. Don't be fooled by a Ken Burn's montage set to happy banjo music. American women and children suffered and died because of Sherman and Sheridan and their soldiers. The linked article displays a simple minded black and white view of history and right and wrong that leaves me unimpressed. |
Blutarski | 21 Jun 2015 6:54 p.m. PST |
Sherman did not massacre the civilian population wholesale. He consciously destroyed the civilian economic support structure that was keeping the Confederate army in the field. Did civilians suffer as a result? Absolutely. Did it end the war sooner. Absolutely. Did it save lives and suffering in the final calculus? I think it did. It's a terrible calculus to undertake, but war is a terrible business best ended as soon as possible. B |
rmcaras | 21 Jun 2015 10:22 p.m. PST |
Usually Mr. Peabody was correct |
Dn Jackson | 21 Jun 2015 10:47 p.m. PST |
How did it end the war sooner? Once his army passed through an area there was no chance it would supply anything to the southern armies. The railroads were destroyed, all horses, cattle, and swine taken for the Federal army. So how did burning them out add anything? |
steamingdave47 | 21 Jun 2015 11:36 p.m. PST |
@dynaman8789 He can write about what he likes wherever he is living. My point is that he currently lives in, and presumably supports by his labour, a country which exploits people in a manner which is almost as bad as the way in which the South exploited its slave population. He justifies Sherman's actions (which I personally think were justified in the context of war, rather like the bombing of Dresden was justifiable in the context of war, horrendous act that it was) as being necessary to make the southern population aware of the extent of the evil that they had inflicted. |
doug redshirt | 22 Jun 2015 5:16 a.m. PST |
Didnt burn enough of the South to the ground to be honest. The upper class traitors deserved worse. Too many of the upper class traitors survived reconstruction to come back and take back leadership positions. It was as if the war never happened. So the entire country suffered due to those unreformed traitors. |
A P Hill | 22 Jun 2015 5:26 a.m. PST |
Doug redshirt talks a big game. To bad it is ONLY part of the issues. You didn't live back then and you have no real idea what was happening. You point in one direction and that makes you blind. |
B6GOBOS | 22 Jun 2015 6:41 a.m. PST |
Yes. Sherman was right. He did way he had to do to ensure the war. And ever since the south has howled and exaggerated the damage. I also agree with Douglas redshirt. The entire class of slavery werks who helps start the war went back into power and tried to set back the clock and win via politics what they lost on the battlefield. The terrorist actions of men like Wade Hampton's Red Shirts and Nathan Bedford Forrest' KKK are a terrible stain on our history. |
Baranovich | 22 Jun 2015 9:01 a.m. PST |
Sherman's conduct during the Civil War, including the burning of Atlanta, is most certainly sound and justified from a military perspective, his views on war were quite bluntly correct in every aspect. My opinion of Sherman's character as a man isn't dampened until after the Civil War. His view of the American Indian was nothing short of reprehensible, and he became another "We are destined by God to have this land all the way to the Pacific". That is where I lose respect for Sherman. That he could be so deeply philosophical about war and have such depth of insight towards the enemy – and then somehow just switch if all off with regards to the Indians. In his defense it could be argued that he wasn't unique for that time, in terms of America's belief that the Indians were simply in the way of America's destiny, that mentality goes all the way back to George Washington, so Sherman can't be blamed for being unique in that regard. But I certainly lose a lot of my respect for him post-Civil War. |
Panzerfaust | 22 Jun 2015 9:31 a.m. PST |
And speaking of upper class slave driving traitors, how do you fellows revere George Washington and Thomas Jefferson on the one hand and revile Jefferson Davis and his contemporaries on the other? I would call it a classic case of propaganda induced double think. George Washington and his compatriots are called patriots only because they won their war of secession. Had they lost they would be a footnote in history found under the heading of traitors to king and country. Had the Confederate States of America won their war Davis and Lee would be held in the same esteem as George Washington, and not just in the south. |
donlowry | 22 Jun 2015 9:36 a.m. PST |
At some point in his memoir, Sheridan pointed out that people will make small sacrifices and willingly send their sons off to fight -- somewhere else -- but when the war comes to their own doorstep they quickly lose interest. That was the essence of what Sherman and Sheridan did -- and it worked. Incidentally, Grant approved. His order to Sheridan was to use up the Shenandoah Valley so that any crows flying over it would have to carry their own provender. They did it not to be cruel, but to cut the support, both economic and moral, out from under the Confederate armies. And soldiers' wives and mothers started writing to them to come home. (The same women who often shamed any men with doubts about a military solution into joining the army back in '61 and '62, when they thought it would be a short victorious war.) |
Panzerfaust | 22 Jun 2015 10:00 a.m. PST |
Early in the war Thomas Stonewall Jackson proposed doing to Pennsylvania what Sherman later did to Georgia and the Carolinas. President Davis rejected this proposal and when Lee did enter Maryland and Pennsylvania the rules of war were scrupulously followed. If Jackson had gotten his way and yet still lost the war I guarantee that his actions would today be considered a war crime. In those simpler times there was the idea that war had rules. You didn't kill civilians or wantonly destroy their property. To do so took you out of civilized society. Never mind that it was an expedient tactic to win. Do you accept that argument when used by people whose cause you don't agree with, the German army of the second world war for instance? |
Weasel | 22 Jun 2015 10:29 a.m. PST |
So funny to see the reactions to Sherman, then pop on over to a discussion about Vietnam or the modern middle east and suddenly, people are all gung-ho about bombing and "harsh measures". I'm sure there's a perfectly rational explanation. |
Patrick Sexton | 22 Jun 2015 10:31 a.m. PST |
I think comparing either side in the ACW to the German army in WWII is far fetched. To the point of insulting. |
Clays Russians | 22 Jun 2015 10:35 a.m. PST |
Patrick, a voice for sound reason. Thank you……. |
John the Greater | 22 Jun 2015 10:41 a.m. PST |
First: Sherman was right. In this and in so many other things. I am interested in the discussion of "war crimes." Compared to most civil wars, the American Civil War was fought almost genteelly. For example, the Federal government would have been perfectly within their rights under the accepted rules of the time to execute every Confederate prisoner they took. Note how the French killed over 20,000 communards in 1871 and no one said "boo." Also note how Early burned down Chambersburg, not out of military necessity but because the city fathers wouldn't pay a ransom. He was never brought up on any sort of charges. I could go on, but I will close by saying the southerners got off really easy. Try losing a civil war to the Serbs to see what losing is like. |
Bill N | 22 Jun 2015 11:26 a.m. PST |
I have never understood why anyone finds it necessary to try to justify Sherman or Sheridan's actions on moral or legal grounds. They did it. The U.S. won the war, and they were treated as heroes in the loyal regions after the war was over. That is what matters. Those who were the victims of Sherman's, Sheridan's and Hunter's actions, are certainly entitled to condemn them for it, but in the 19th century the popular opinion among the losers of a conflict usually didn't matter much. However if you are going to try to justify what Sherman and Sheridan did, you can't simply stop with the "War is Hell", "It worked" and "It shortened the war" arguments. What Sherman, Sheridan and Hunter did went beyond the norms that both sides had followed up to that point, and much of what was done in the last weeks of the war by Stoneman, Wilson and Sheridan amounted to little more than vandalism. Sherman and Sheridan carried out their destruction largely after the Confederacy had ceased having the ability to retaliate in kind. And when the Confederacy did retaliate in kind to Hunter's actions, the U.S. condemned it to the same extent as citizens of the Georgia, South Carolina, and the Shenandoah condemned Sherman and Sheridan. If the destruction in the deep south or the valley was legitimate, then so was the destruction of Chambersburg PA and the plot to burn New York. As for whether it really did shorten the war, that is debatable. I do find it strange that the author entitled the Article Why Sherman Was Right to Burn Atlanta when he talked so little about that particular act. Much of what was done in Atlanta would have been justified based on what both armies did up to that point in the war. Also I think Sherman gets blamed for some of the damage actually done by Hood. |
B6GOBOS | 22 Jun 2015 11:28 a.m. PST |
About Washington and Jefferson. You picked two very intetesting contrasting views. Jefferson clung to slavery and as he became older became more conservative over the issue. Washington on the other hand grappled with the issue of slavery all his life. Like Lincoln his views evolved and changed over his life. In his will he did free his slaves and provided money be put aside to educate or train in a trade his wife's slaves. He also saw the issue of slavery would divide the country. He told Edmund Randolph, according to Thomas Jefferson's notes, that if the country were to split over slavery, that he Washington "had made up his mind to move and be of the northern." Rather then propaganda our war for independence saw a rethinking of a commonly held belief. The more thoughtful mulled over all men are born equal and the hypocrisy they saw around them. Both sides saw men of color free and slave serve in the ranks as brave soldiers. While Great Britiania would take the lead in the abolishing of the slavery trade and slavery itself thoughtful men in north America also reevaluated believes. .the times they were achanging…. |
duncanh | 22 Jun 2015 11:54 a.m. PST |
Always entertained by anyone discussing the American Civil War, War Between the States, War of Norhern Aggression, please carry on. Oh no I'm not. Oh no, yes I am. |
enfant perdus | 23 Jun 2015 1:53 p.m. PST |
FWIW, Woolworth's Nothing But Victory: The Army of the Tennessee, 1861-1865 has good coverage of the evolving policy in the Western Theater regarding Secessionist property (real, personal and human). The March to the Sea obviously gets a lot of attention in this regard. |
donlowry | 24 Jun 2015 9:01 a.m. PST |
The difference between Jefferson and the AWI, and Jeff Davis and the War of the Southern Rebellion, is that in the AWI we had slavery, yes, but it had nothing to do with the causes of the war -- it was not fought to preserve or end slavery, and would have been fought whether slavery had existed or not. |
Panzerfaust | 24 Jun 2015 10:14 a.m. PST |
@ don lowry, At the risk or lecturing a Civil War expert, in my opinion the issue of slavery as an excuse for the war does not fly. Yes the southerners fought their war of independence partially to protect that institution. But the U.S. government did not invade the south to free slaves! Some slaves were freed as a consequence of the emancipation proclamation half way through the war and only in breakaway states. This was done as a war measure to deprive the southern war effort of labor. The majority of men who fought for the U.S. government would and did vehemently deny they were doing it to free black men. Lincoln was a life long racist who tried setting up a program to deport all blacks off of American soil. As a candidate he said he would support a constitutional amendment enshrining slavery as a permanent fixture. The guy was a politician who said whatever he thought would help his political career. Unlike the patriots in their war of secession from Great Britain, Jefferson Davis and co. had law and precedent on their side! They had the benefit of a written constitution that did not forbid secession. Like Lincoln you could make the argument that it was implied in the preamble by the language "to form a more perfect union". Would you play a wargame that allowed implied powers that could be made up at any point in the game when you tried to make a move? They had the precedent of the original secession that transformed thirteen colonies into thirteen sovereign states. The king of England signed a peace treaty naming each individual colony, not the united states. Those new states allied themselves in the articles of confederation which explicitly forbid secession. This government then died when the states seceded from it in favor of the constitution! The more perfect union created by this contract did not forbid secession. Three states including Virginia and New York agreed to the new constitution with the understanding that they could leave the union if they found it displeasing. Southerners felt their rights were threatened by the new Lincoln administration. The reasons involve the balance of national power, slavery, the new tariff etc. It really doesn't matter. As free men they had the sacred right to self government. This is the most fundamental American principle. Southern state legislatures voted democratically to leave the union, which they had every right to do. They then fought to protect their newly formed country, which they had every right to do. The happy result that slavery was ended does not absolve the Lincoln administration from the evil that was done. An illegal and immoral invasion and conquering of free Americans that forced them to submit to a central government against their will. Nothing could be more un-american. |
Bill N | 24 Jun 2015 12:25 p.m. PST |
in the AWI we had slavery, yes, but it had nothing to do with the causes of the war Some historians have suggested it played a role in the leading the colonies to declare their independence. In the early 1770s a British court ruled that slavery was not authorized in the British isles and slaves brought to Britain cold not be removed against their will. While the ruling did not apply to the British colonies, it did give slave owners another cause to be nervous about British rule. Once the fighting started you did have British officials officially or unofficially offering freedom to slaves who escaped to the British. |
svsavory | 24 Jun 2015 1:17 p.m. PST |
@ Panzerfaust, IMHO, the war was indeed primarily about slavery, especially the status of slavery in the territories. The series of compromises in the decades leading up to the war largely dealt with slavery in the territories; these compromises temporarily averted the crisis by establishing some balance between free soil and slave territories/future states. I'm not a constitutional scholar so I can't argue about the legality of secession, but I think the matter was ultimately settled by force of arms. Also, I believe the Supreme Court ruled after the war that secession was unconstitutional, essentially ratifying the results of the war. Also, while I agree that by today's standards Lincoln was a racist, so was just about every other American in the mid-19th century. Still, Lincoln opposed the further expansion of slavery into the territories and his election was the last straw as far as the deep south was concerned. The document entitled "Confederate States of America – Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union," adopted 24 December 1860, is fairly clear. There are eighteen references to slavery but not a single reference to tariffs. link Also, see "The Declaration of Causes of Seceding States" (Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia). These documents are likewise full of references to slavery. link I also agree that the north did not invade the south to free the slaves, at least not initially. But slavery was the primary cause of the war insofar as sectional differences over the expansion of slavery was the primary reason for secession. Consider for a moment what might have happened had the war not started immediately after secession. I believe war would have been inevitable eventually because of westward expansion into the territories. Bleeding Kansas would have happened on a larger scale, with both sides reinforcing and escalating the conflict until it became a full-blown war. To put it another way, I believe that had slavery not existed, there would have been no war. Any other sectional differences over issues like tariffs or internal improvements would likely have been resolved through compromise. |
138SquadronRAF | 24 Jun 2015 2:22 p.m. PST |
Some historians have suggested it played a role in the leading the colonies to declare their independence. In the early 1770s a British court ruled that slavery was not authorized in the British isles and slaves brought to Britain cold not be removed against their will. While the ruling did not apply to the British colonies, it did give slave owners another cause to be nervous about British rule. Somerset v Stewart (1772). Whilst it required an Act of Parliament to formally abolish slavery outside of England. Scotland having a similar case in 1774 being governed by a separate legal system. The case was used as justification for abolition in northern colonies during in the period 1777-84. In southern colonies after independence the case was ignored and slavery expanded. Since the British abolished slavery without incident in 1833 it's interesting to speculate what would have happened had the American colonies remained British at that date. |
Old Contemptibles | 24 Jun 2015 2:35 p.m. PST |
General Orders No. 73. ANV "The commanding general considers that no greater disgrace could befall the army, and through it our whole people, than the perpetration of the barbarous outrages upon the unarmed, and defenseless and the wanton destruction of private property that have marked the course of the enemy in our own country. … It must be remembered that we make war only upon armed men, and that we cannot take vengeance for the wrongs our people have suffered without lowering ourselves in the eyes of all whose abhorrence has been excited by the atrocities of our enemies, and offending against Him to whom vengeance belongeth, without whose favor and support our efforts must all prove in vain." General, Robert E. Lee, ANV. |
Weasel | 24 Jun 2015 4:08 p.m. PST |
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