With the new Vietnam documentary being aired, I'm finally getting around to watching Burns's Civil War doc from 1990.
One takeaway I have, just over halfway through, is to marvel at how often Lincoln's generals just flatly refused to follow his orders.
That, (imho) out of all the Presidents this country has seen (in our relatively short history) ... Lincoln probably had the biggest balls of them all (and good for him .... and the rest of the country's history).
It's incredible the war lasted as long as it did given the disproportionate army sizes and resources available to each side
It's incredible the war lasted as long as it did given the disproportionate army sizes and resources available to each side
Yeah, not having a military background Lincoln was not one to give orders as: "Attack Lee at Manasses on July 23." Rather he would make suggestions or give more general directives like "Press the enemy" that left a lot of latitude to the generals. More specifically we're mostly talking about McClellan.
The south had a lot of advantages in the war. The weapons of the day favored the defense which was all the South needed to do. They didn't have to conquer, just prevent being conquered. And having inside lines and the railroads let them shuttle their smaller numbers from theatre to theatre as needed, offsetting the North's numerical advantage.
That said, the North should have put it to be in 1862. The South was still disorganized and if pressed would have broken. McLellan was at the gates of Richmond with a superior force but was his usually slow self. And out west Grant had an opportunity to finish off the only major Confedrate western army after Shiloh but was held back by his commmander Henry Halleck.
I get how you'd have that impression from the brief glossing over given the Civil War in most schools in the north. But in general, the Civil War was an exception to the "History is written by the winners" rule. The history of this war was largely written by the losers.
The North mostly just wanted to forget the war when it was over, and few detailed histories came from there. The South on the other hand wrote copiously, creating the whole "Lost Cause" movement and turning Lee, Jackson, etc into icons. Those writings became the basis of almost every history of the war for over a century. Only in more recent years has a more discerning dissection of the war been made.
Also, I'd note that this documentary (and people in general) takes a very Eastern-centric view of the war. The Union largely dominated the war in the west. Chickamauga was the only major Southern victory out west, and it was reversed in fairly short order.
Halleck was recommended by Winfield Scott, who was US Army commander for decades up until shortly after the war began. Halleck was very smart and had performed well during peacetime, but had (like most) little practical war experience. As Commander of the Western Theatre early in the war he oversaw victory after victory, though these were really Grant's doing. That got him appointed Army Commmander.
Eventually Lincoln realized Hallecks limitations, calling him a "first-rate clerk".
However the north was well supplied during the war
This is one of the first wars too where many of the generals published memoirs to cash in after the War. Most of these are available free on-line. If anyone wants to read further, Grant's memoirs and Sherman's memoirs are both very good. Grant's major obsession during the war? Horse fodder. He mentions it constantly and the army does not move where it cannot feed the horses.
Great documentary, open rebellion to protect "states rights", the Southern soldiers were motivated to protect their homeland and many were from the country - better in the woods, better marksmen.
Booth did the south no favors by killing Lincoln.
This is one of the first wars too where many of the generals published memoirs to cash in after the War. Most of these are available free on-line. If anyone wants to read further, Grant's memoirs and Sherman's memoirs are both very good. Grant's major obsession during the war? Horse fodder. He mentions it constantly and the army does not move where it cannot feed the horses.
Fun fact: over 1 million horses were killed during the Civil War, about double the number of people.
I enjoyed The Fateful Lightning - good understanding of Sherman's march to the sea -
"As we were marching thru Georgia"
On the other hand, Burns fails to discuss how the north didn't bring to bear air superiority on the South. Why not hit them with choppers and arial bombardment. McClelland sucked!
Seriously, it is was interesting that Grant was thought of as a butcher by some, but was willing to fight and press the one advantage he had, ...men.
I enjoyed The Fateful Lightning - good understanding of Sherman's march to the sea -
"As we were marching thru Georgia"
I second this about Jeff Shaara, but he's got solo many other great novels about the civil war too. All good reads. He dies massive research and makes the novels very interesting to follow. They're more story-like then typical history novels.
We arrived in Gettysburg at nightfall, still a little light in the sky and it was unseasonably warm and a steady wind was blowing.
I played the Gettysburg DVD with the part that talks about the 20th Maine's defense of Little Round Top.
Drove up to Little Round top, parked and put down the windows, and let the tape play, very eerie.
There is a path that leads to the 20th Maine monument off the parking lot. My wife and I grabbed a small flashlight and started to get out of the car. My kids refused to get out they were spooked.
We walked down the path and it was very eerie. Great memory and great trip.
Joshua Chamberlain - wow.
No, it's not. Ken Burns has done some extraordinary documentaries, but his Civil War documentary suffered because he basically gave control over it to Shelby Foote, who was a popular historian (and not one by schooling, he was a novelist before he took over the civil war trilogy). As a result, the film is basically Footr's take on the civil war and not a balanced history. Foote also had a deep affection for Southern soldiers such as Lee and especially Nathan Bedford Forrest, which I am not sure is justified by the evidence. Definitely worth watching, but in terms of history it is very limited for the wide range/scope it takes.
I have read that the VC/NVA could literally smell the US soldiers due to diet, shampoo/soap/deoderant and cigarette smoking.
Sure enough, this was mentioned by a NVA veteran that was interviewed - "we could smell the cigarette smoke".
How stupid to you have to be to insist on smoking on patrol.
Many pictures in the documentary depict a young soldier(appearing to be on patrol) with a smoke in their mouth, crazy.
Definitely agree, some of the best television shows I've ever seen period.
We arrived in Gettysburg at nightfall, still a little light in the sky and it was unseasonably warm and a steady wind was blowing.
I played the Gettysburg DVD with the part that talks about the 20th Maine's defense of Little Round Top.
Drove up to Little Round top, parked and put down the windows, and let the tape play, very eerie.
There is a path that leads to the 20th Maine monument off the parking lot. My wife and I grabbed a small flashlight and started to get out of the car. My kids refused to get out they were spooked.
We walked down the path and it was very eerie. Great memory and great trip.
Joshua Chamberlain - wow.
The first time my wife and I went to Gettysburg, we took the car tour in our convertible. At dusk, around Devil's Den, this weird mist seemed to come up from the ground. A few minutes later, I took a picture of her with the wheat field in the background and there are over a hundred orbs floating behind her. I took a second picture minutes later and they were gone. We were totally creaped out and decided to find a bar at that point.
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IMO rifling gets too much credit. Yes they were more accurate: around 3-4 times the effective range than the smoothbores they replaced. But that rarely made any difference. Gun accuracy is only as good as the man firing it, and practically none of the soldiers had any marksmanship training. And these were hard guns to aim for long distance: with their slow muzzle velocities you had to aim several feet over a man's head to hit him.
And even the good marksmen had few opportunities in battle to use their skills. These were black powder guns and once everyone starting firing a gray haze would cover the battlefield. Unless there was a strong wind to carry the smoke away, you couldn't see anything past 100 yards to hit it.
Studies done on the battles found that practically all the casualties occurred inside 100 yards.
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About the civil war until that doc. Since then I've read a lot and visited several battlefields. I'm always amazed at the courage of the men charging again and again into those big thick relatively slow bullets and cannon fire while the medicine of the time was so far behind the ability to inflict damage. And early on the tactics we had were made for the less accurate smooth bores, but guns had become an order of magnitude more accurate with rifling.
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IMO rifling gets too much credit. Yes they were more accurate: around 3-4 times the effective range than the smoothbores they replaced. But that rarely made any difference. Gun accuracy is only as good as the man firing it, and practically none of the soldiers had any marksmanship training. And these were hard guns to aim for long distance: with their slow muzzle velocities you had to aim several feet over a man's head to hit him.
And even the good marksmen had few opportunities in battle to use their skills. These were black powder guns and once everyone starting firing a gray haze would cover the battlefield. Unless there was a strong wind to carry the smoke away, you couldn't see anything past 100 yards to hit it.
Studies done on the battles found that practically all the casualties occurred inside 100 yards.
There was a company of Northern Sharpshooters with the 7 shot repeating rifles that held off the 4th and 5th Alabama's (IIRC) attack on Little Round Top because of superior rifles. Think they were outnumbered 20 to 1 but were able to keep falling back in a delaying tactic while beating up the Rebs pretty good.
The Confederate Soldiers themselves talked about the Yankee repeaters that could be loaded on Sunday and fired all week.
But in massed attacks which were on the way out during the Civil War but still the preferred method of attack, a smooth bore still had a chance at 200-300 yds because all the lines were so packed the bullet might hit the guy next to or behind the man aimed at.
Spencer Rifles - ( New Window )
There was a company of Northern Sharpshooters with the 7 shot repeating rifles that held off the 4th and 5th Alabama's (IIRC) attack on Little Round Top because of superior rifles. Think they were outnumbered 20 to 1 but were able to keep falling back in a delaying tactic while beating up the Rebs pretty good.
The Confederate Soldiers themselves talked about the Yankee repeaters that could be loaded on Sunday and fired all week.
But in massed attacks which were on the way out during the Civil War but still the preferred method of attack, a smooth bore still had a chance at 200-300 yds because all the lines were so packed the bullet might hit the guy next to or behind the man aimed at. Spencer Rifles - ( New Window )
You're speaking of the 7 shot Spencer rifle but those weren't Spencers they were using. The sharpshooters were armed with Sharps breechloaders, which were single shot rifles. Rate of fire was at least twice that of the muzzleloaders, probably even better in battle conditions. Very accurate gun, probably twice the range of the Springfield rifles.
Spencer repeater manufacture was just ramping up. The only Spencers used at Gettysburg were by a unit of cavalry under Custer.