I hadn’t gotten far into my
project of working on lawyer-generals before I discovered that I knew next to
nothing about the Civil War. Although I’m something of a military history buff,
my interest is largely confined to ancient and medieval military history. I can
tell you a lot more about the Roman Civil War battles between Caesar and Pompey
than I can about the American Civil War battles between Grant and Lee. This
means that when reading accounts of the careers of the various generals, I
cannot put them into the context of the entire Civil War. I decided to correct
this deficiency by suspending investigation of individual generals until I had
learned more about the Civil War as a whole.
My first self-inflicted reading
assignment was James McPherson’s Battle
Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era, a one-volume history of the war
which runs to 909 pages. The first 1/3 of the book, which deals with the
lead-up to the war, was interesting and informative, but I was impatient to get
to the fighting. Once Fort Sumter was fired on, the book became much easier to
read. It seemed to me to be equal parts narrative and analysis, and it opened
my eyes to what a close-run affair the war actually was. I had always been
under the impression that the South never had a chance to win and had committed
cultural suicide by seceding from the Union. McPherson seems to be saying that
the South had a good chance to win, and he can’t quite figure out why it didn’t.
I next picked up a copy of Bruce
Catton’s Civil War, which is a one-volume compilation of his
trilogy on the Army of the Potomac. It’s only 730 pages, but the print is much
smaller. So far, I’ve gotten through the first volume, Mr. Lincoln’s Army, and the lesson it seems to teach is that if the
North’s generals hadn’t been a gaggle of incompetent boobs, the North would
have won the war in 90 days. Actually, I’m overstating somewhat. Catton seems
to like George B. McClellan, blaming much of McClellan’s timidity on false
intelligence given him by Allan Pinkerton. It seems Pinkerton had a penchant
for grossly over-estimating the size of the Confederate forces arrayed against
McClellan. Catton seems to think that if Lincoln had kept McClellan in charge
after Antietam, McClellan could have whipped Lee. If past performance is any
measure of future performance, Catton’s assessment is wrong.
There’s a joke about two types of
trial lawyers. One type is “always ready, never prepared.” The other is “always
prepared, never ready.” I think this contrast captures the difference between
Lee and McClellan. Lee was always ready to give battle, even when he was
outnumbered and his troops were bedraggled and used-up. No matter how prepared
McClellan was, he always needed just a few thousand more men, a few more
cannons, a little more rest for his men, or a better alignment of the stars before
he was willing to risk action. When Lee had his adversary on the ropes, he went
for the jugular. When McClellan had Lee on the ropes, he let him escape.
McClellan just didn’t have the killer instinct that Lee and Grant had.
Catton contends that what kept the
North in the Civil War during the first year was the fact that the men of the
Army of the Potomac were far better than their generals. The picture he paints
shows the fighting spirit of volunteer enlisted men mitigating the blundering of
amateur generals. It is reminiscent of the legions of Republican Rome during
the Second Punic War. Rome’s citizen militia led by blundering amateur generals
suffered repeated defeats at the hands of the military genius Hannibal. The Roman
Legions kept coming back time after time until finally they crushed Hannibal at
the Battle of Zama. The Army of the Potomac kept coming back time after time
until finally it crushed Lee at Appomattox.
Catton’s appraisal seems to be
echoed by the Confederate attorney-general Clement A. Evans, who wrote a brief
history of the Civil War as part of the twelve volume Confederate Military
History. Evans had this to say: “The courage of the several great Northern
armies which struggled often and long with the army of Northern Virginia, will
never be questioned by Confederate soldiers.”Confederate Military History,
Volume 12, page 218.
After
I get through with Bruce
Catton’s Civil War, I plan to read Shelby Foote’s three volume
work, The
Civil War: A Narrative (2,976 pages). By that time, I ought to be
somewhat less ignorant on the subject of the Civil War, and I can go back to
working on Attorney-Generals.
Here
is a hyperlinked bibliography of public domain books on the Civil War. I will
update this list from time to time as I uncover additional books which are
relevant to my research into lawyer-generals. If a single hyperlink will connect
you to all volumes of a multi-volume set, The title is listed only once.
Because most books have separate hyperlinks for each volume, each volume is
listed separately for most multi-volume sets.
There are three commonly held beliefs about the Rebel Yell. It is commonly believed that the Rebel Yell was inaugurated at the Battle of First Manassas by Stonewall Jackson, when he told his men "Reserve your fire until they come within 50 yards. Then fire and give them the bayonet, and when you charge, yell like Furies!"
The second common belief is that it was a terrifying sound on the battlefield. In the PBS Documentary The Civil War, historian Shelby Foote quotes a Union soldier as saying "If you claim you heard it and weren't scared, that means you never heard it." Ambrose Bierce, himself a Union veteran, described the Rebel Yell in these words: "It was the ugliest sound that any mortal ever heard." Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, page 277.
The third common belief is that nobody today knows what the Rebel Yell sounded like. This third belief is wrong. We have a pretty good idea what it sounded like, and it sounded nothing like "YEEEEHAWWW!!!"
In 1892 Private J. Harvie Dew, Company H, 9th Virginia Cavalry, gave a speech in which he demonstrated the Rebel Yell, and the speech was later published in the April issue of Century Magazine. Dew not only described the Rebel Yell, he described the corresponding Yankee Yell. Because he wandered somewhat from his subject, I have excised irrelevancies from the excerpt set out below. I should have excised his description of the military maneuver which the Confederates called the "skedaddle," but it has interest in its own right, so I left it in. I also left in his analysis of why the Rebel and Yankee Yells sounded so different:
***
There is a natural tendency in
the minds of most men, as they move onward along the “River of Time,” to
forget, or in a great measure to obliterate from their memories, unpleasant
things, and, on the contrary, to recall and treasure those that have
contributed to their joys, comforts, and successes. With no one is this
peculiarity more marked than with the old soldier. When he talks of his war
experiences, it will constantly be found that his trials, privations,
discomforts, and disappointments, have been largely forgotten or overshadowed
by the memory of his comrades, of social gatherings around the camp-fires, of
songs that were sung and stories told, of adventures and narrow escapes, of
battles lost and victories won.
Among the incidents of active
service there were probably no events more thrilling and more exciting to the
soldier than those of a charge, for in its dash there were displayed not only
the boldness and the fury of the occasion, but, of necessity, much of the savagery
of war.
It was in the charge that the “war-whoop”
was heard, the savage “yell” with which men wild in battle endeavored to send
terror to the minds of their enemies.
Each foe, in every clash of arms,
sought to arouse all of the military energy, the enthusiastic vigor, the
martial spirit, and the determined endeavor, which could possibly impress upon
its enemy the overwhelming force with which its charge or its resistance was
made, and no feature added more to the accomplishment of this purpose than the
enthusiasm of the yell.
I was a member of the Ninth
Virginia Cavalry, a follower of Stuart and his successors, and on many a
well-fought field I have seen, listened to, and participated in charge after
charge. The defenders of old Virginia were not by any means successful at all
times in defeating their adversaries, and not infrequently by force of
circumstances were induced to take their turn in a more or less graceful “skedaddle.”
Whenever I was one of the “skedaddling corps,” I found some consolation in
recalling a little family incident.
My grandfather was an officer in
the war of 1812. Once in his old age, while relating to a number of his
grandchildren gathered around him some of his experiences in war, he told of an
encounter with the British in which his troops were forced to retreat in
decided haste. One of the little boys who had been listening, with his mouth
agape, no doubt, in the intensity of his interest, asked, “ And, grandpop, did
you run?” The old man replied, “Ah, yes, my child; and braver men than your
grandfather ran that day.”
That there existed a marked
difference between the yells of the opposing armies during our late war was a
recognized fact, and a frequent source of comment. The notes and tones peculiar
to each of them were well defined, and led to their designation as the “Yankee”
and the “Rebel” yells. It is interesting to note some of the reasons why they
differed so widely.
Southerners have always been
recognized by those who have known them best as a people possessed of unbounded
enthusiasm and ardor. They have been considered and often called a “hot-headed,”
a “hot-blooded,” people. Among the rank and file, as well as among the
officers, of the Confederate armies, were to be found men of Intelligence,
birth, position, and distinction in the communities in which they lived; men in
whose veins ran the invigorating blood of the noblest ancestry; men who were
proud in peace, courageous and fearless in war.
These peculiarities of birth,
character, and temperament, coupled with the fact that they were chiefly an
agricultural people inhabiting a broad expanse of country but thinly settled,
and confined in no large numbers (comparatively) to the narrow limits that city
and town life impose, had much to do with the development of their soldierly
qualities as well as of their capacity for yelling.
Life in the country, especially
in our Southern country, where people lived far apart and were employed
oftentimes at a considerable distance from one another, and from the houses or
homes in which they ate and slept, tended, by exercise in communicating with
one another, to strengthen and improve their voices for high and prolonged
notes. A wider range to the vocal sounds was constantly afforded and frequently
required.
...
The Federal, or “Yankee,” yell,
compared with that of the Confederate, lacked in vocal breadth, pitch, and resonance.
This was unquestionably attributable to the fact that the soldiery of the North
was drawn and recruited chiefly from large cities and towns, from factory
districts, and from the more densely settled portions of the country.
Their surroundings, their
circumstances of life and employment, had the effect of molding the character
and temperament of the people, and at the same time of restraining their vocal
development. People living and working in close proximity to one another have
no absolute need for loud or strained vocal efforts, and any screaming or
prolonged calling becomes seriously annoying to neighbors. Consequently, all such
liberties or inconsiderate indulgences in cities, towns, etc., have long ago
been discouraged by common consent.
It is safe to say that there are
thousands upon thousands of men in the large cities, and in other densely
populated portions of the North, who have not elevated their vocal tones to
within anything like their full capacity since the days of their boyhood, and
many not even then.
To afford some idea of the
differences between these “yells,” I will relate an incident which occurred in
battle on the plains at Brandy Station, Virginia, in the fall of 1863. Our
command was in full pursuit of a portion of Kilpatrick’s cavalry. We soon
approached their reserves (ours some distance behind), and found ourselves
facing a battery of artillery with a regiment of cavalry drawn up on each side.
A point of woods projected to the left of their position. We were ordered to
move by the right flank till the woods protected us from the battery, and then,
in open field, within a few hundred yards of the enemy, we were ordered to halt
and right dress.
In a moment more one of the
Federal regiments was ordered to charge, and down they came upon us in a body two
or three times outnumbering ours. Then was heard their peculiar characteristic
yell — “Hoo-ray! Hoo-ray! Hoo-ray!” etc. (This yell was called by the Federals
a “cheer,” and was intended for the word “hurrah,” but that pronunciation I
never heard in a charge. The sound was as though the first syllable, if heard
at all, was “ hoo,” uttered with an exceedingly short, low, and indistinct
tone, and the second was “ ray,” yelled with a long and high tone slightly
deflecting at its termination. In many instances the yell seemed to be the
simple interjection “heigh,” rendered with the same tone which was given to “ray.”)
Our command was alone in the
field, and it seemed impossible for us to withstand the coming shock; but our
commander, as brave an officer as ever drew a saber, frequently repeated, as
the charging column approached us, his precautionary orders, to “Keep steady,
boys! Keep steady!” and so we remained till the Federals were within a hundred
yards of us. Then, waving his sword in air, he gave the final order, loud
enough to be heard the field over: “ Now is your time, boys! Give them the
saber! Charge them, men! Charge!”
In an instant every voice with
one accord vigorously shouted that “Rebel yell,” which was so often heard on
the field of battle. “ Woh-who — ey! who — ey! who — ey! Woh-who — ey! who-ey! “
etc. (The best illustration of this “true yell” which can be given the reader
is by spelling it as above, with direction to sound the first syllable “woh”
short and low, and the second “who” with a very high and prolonged note deflecting upon the third syllable “ey.”)
A moment or two later the Federal
column wavered and broke. In pursuit we chased them to within twenty feet of their
battery, which had already begun to retreat. The second regiment to the right
and rear of the battery then charged upon us, and for a moment we were forced
back; but by that time our reserves were up, and we swept the field.
In conclusion, let us rejoice in
the fact that war and its incidental accompaniments are with us only in memory,
and let us hope for our loved country, and for ourselves, that peace,
happiness, and prosperity will dwell with us and our children’s children now
and evermore.
***
We need not be content to read about the Rebel Yell, we can actually hear it given by aging Confederate veterans. Here is a YouTube video of octogenarian Confederate veterans doing their best to re-create the Rebel Yell. As one of the veterans said before the demonstration, "We don't have much left, but we'll give it what we've got."
Imagine yourself confronted by a sea grey-clad teenagers armed with muskets, bayonets fixed, charging down upon you as fast as they could run, each one of them giving a youthful version of the Rebel Yell. I think you might agree with Ambrose Bierce that it was the ugliest sound any mortal ever heard. It's certainly more likely to make you want to "skedaddle" than "Hurrah!"
