Kenneth C. Davis's Blog, page 77

Starred PW Review of “The Hidden History of America At War”

The first critical review of my book, The Hidden History of America At War: Untold Tales from Yorktown to Fallujah appeared in  a “Starred Review” in Publishers Weekly.

“His searing analyses and ability to see the forest as well as the trees make for an absorbing and infuriating read as he highlights the strategic missteps, bad decisions, needless loss of life, horrific war crimes, and political hubris that often accompany war.”

Please read the full review here

The Divisive History of Memorial Day

 

It is a well-established fact that Americans can argue over anything. And we do. Mays or Mantle. A Caddy or a Lincoln. And, of course, abolition, abortion, and guns.

But a debate over Memorial Day –and more specifically where and how it began? America’s most solemn holiday should be free of rancor. But it isn’t and never has been.

Born out of the Civil War’s catastrophic death toll as “Decoration Day,” Memorial Day is a day for honoring our nation’s war dead.

Waterloo, New York claimed that the holiday originated there with a parade and decoration of the graves of fallen soldiers in 1866. When LBJ signed a proclamation there in 1966 that seemed to cement Waterloo’s claim.

But according to the Veterans Administration, at least 25 places now stake a claim to the birth of Memorial Day. Among the pack are Boalsburg, Pennsylvania, which says it was first in 1864.( “Many Claim to Be Memorial Day Birthplace” )

And according to historian David Blight, Charleston, South Carolina can point to a parade of emancipated children in May 1865 who decorated the graves of fallen Union soldiers whose remains were moved from a racetrack to a proper cemetery.

This “We–were-first” sentiment is weighted by emotion.  Few towns, north or south were untouched by death in a conflict that claimed 800,000 lives.  Historian Drew Gilpin Faust called it a “Republic of Suffering.”

But the passions cut deeper than pride of place.

From its inception, Decoration Day (later Memorial Day) was linked to  “Yankee” losses in the cause of emancipation.

Calling for the first formal Decoration Day, Union General John Logan wrote,  “Their soldier lives were the reveille of freedom to a race in chains…”

Leader of the Grand Army of the Republic, Logan set the first somber commemoration on May 30, 1868, in Arlington Cemetery, the sacred space wrested from property once belonging to Robert E. Lee’s family.( When Memorial Day was No Picnic by James M. McPherson.)

In other words, Logan’s first Decoration Day was divisive— a partisan affair, organized by northerners.

In 1870, Frederick Douglass gave a Memorial Day speech in Arlington that focused on this division:

We are sometimes asked, in the name of patriotism, to forget the merits of this fearful struggle, and to remember with equal admiration those who struck at the nation’s life and those who struck to save it, those who fought for slavery and those who fought for liberty and justice.

I am no minister of malice. I would not strike the fallen. I would not repel the repentant; but may my “right hand forget her cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth,” if I forget the difference between the parties to that terrible, protracted, and bloody conflict.

Needing to mourn their losses, southern states created their own Confederate Decoration Days with grave decoration and picnics afterwards becoming annual rites. But the question remains: what inspired Logan to call for this rite of decorating soldier’s graves with fresh flowers?

The simple answer is—his wife.

While visiting Petersburg, Virginia – which fell to General Grant 150 years ago in 1865 after a year-long, deadly siege – Mary Logan learned about the city’s women who had formed a Ladies’ Memorial Association. Their aim was to show admiration  “…for those who died defending homes and loved ones.”

Choosing June 9th, the anniversary of “The Battle of the Old Men and the Young Boys” in 1864, a teacher had taken her students to the city’s cemetery to decorate the graves of the fallen. General Logan’s wife wrote to him about the practice. Soon after, he ordered a day of remembrance.

The teacher and her students, it is worth noting, had placed flowers and flags on both Union and Confederate graves.

On this Memorial Day, as America wages its partisan wars at full pitch, this may be a lesson for us all.

More resources at the New York Times Topics archive of Memorial Day articles

The story of “The Battle of the Old Men and the Young Boys” is told in  THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR

The Hidden History of America At War (Hachette Books Random House Audio)

 

© 2015 Kenneth C. Davis

War and Remembrance: Reflections on Memories and Memorial Day

War and Remembrance (Revised from May  25,2014 post)

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.

–Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address

 The souvenir is more than fifty years old. It is a wooden toy revolver. The legend stamped on the barrel reads, “JULY 1, 2, 3, 1863 Gettysburg, Pa.”

 

Toy wooden revolver from Gettysburg Battlefield-1963
(Author Photo)

I keep it nearby, on my desk—a reminder of what it felt like to be a nine-year-old boy standing for the first time in the fields at Gettysburg.  I was certainly too young to understand what the war was about then and the details of what had happened in those fields and rock-strewn hills 100 years earlier. But I certainly was old enough to know that something special had happened there. I probably didn’t understand what Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address meant. But I felt in my young soul that I was on the ground he called “hallowed.”

The approach of another Memorial Day, as always, comes with thoughts of duty, honor, courage, sacrifice and loss. The holiday, the most somber date on the American national calendar, was born in the ashes of the Civil War as “Decoration Day,” when General John S. Logan –a-veteran of the Mexican and Civil Wars, a prominent Illinois politician and leader of the Grand Army of the Republic, a Union fraternal organization –called for May 30, 1868 as the day on which the graves of fallen Union soldiers would be decorated with fresh flowers.

“We should guard their graves with sacred vigilance. All that the consecrated wealth and taste of the Nation can add to their adornment and security is but a fitting tribute to the memory of her slain defenders. Let no wanton foot tread rudely on such hallowed grounds.”

General John S. Logan’s General Order Number 11 (May 5, 1868)

Pointedly, Logan’s order was seen as a day to honor those who died ending slavery and opposing the “rebellion.”

Logan was inspired by the tradition of decorating graves by the women of Petersburg, Virginia. His wife told him of this ritual in March 1868 and Logan made his call for a “Decoration Day” that May. The events leading to this ritual in Petersburg are detailed in Chapter Two of THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR.

It was with that sense of war and remembrance of the Union war dead that families of Confederate soldiers were kept out of Arlington National Cemetery –a cemetery built on land confiscated during the war from Confederate General Robert E. Lee of Virginia. In response, Confederate states began to mark their own “Decoration” or Memorial Days.

From its beginnings, Decoration Day or Memorial Day, brought division.  We can do better.

 

The Hidden History of America At War (Hachette Books Random House Audio)

Don’t Know Much About® Memorial Day

(This video was originally posted May 2012. It was produced, edited and directed by Colin Davis.)

Memorial Day brings thoughts of duty, honor, courage, sacrifice and loss. The holiday, the most somber date on the American national calendar, was born in the ashes of the Civil War as “Decoration Day,” when General John S. Logan –a-veteran of the Mexican and Civil Wars, a prominent Illinois politician and leader of the Grand Army of the Republic, a Union fraternal organization –called for May 30, 1868 as the day on which the graves of fallen Union soldiers would be decorated with fresh flowers.

“We should guard their graves with sacred vigilance. All that the consecrated wealth and taste of the Nation can add to their adornment and security is but a fitting tribute to the memory of her slain defenders. Let no wanton foot tread rudely on such hallowed grounds.”

Pointedly, Logan’s order was seen as a day to honor those who died in the cause if ending slavery and opposing the “rebellion.”

Every year at this time, I spend a lot of time talking about the roots and traditions of Memorial Day.

It’s not about the barbecue or the Mattress Sales. Obscured by the holiday atmosphere around Memorial Day is the fact that it is the most solemn day on the national calendar. This video tells a bit about the history behind the holiday.

One way to mark Memorial Day is by simply reading the Gettysburg Address. Here is a link to the Library of Congress and its page on the Address.  I also discussed Memorial Day in a previous post.

One of the most famous symbols of the loss on Memorial Day is the Poppy, inspired by this World War I poem by John McCrae, “In Flanders Fields”

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place, and in the sky,
The larks, still bravely singing, fly,
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the dead; short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe!
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high!
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

 Source: The poem is in the public domain courtesy of Poets.org

 

 

Soldiers of the 146th Infantry, 37th Division, crossing the Scheldt River at Nederzwalm under fire. Image courtesy of The National Archives.

Have a memorable Memorial Day!

(Images in video:Courtesy of the Library of Congress and Flanders Cemetery image Courtesy of the American Battle Monuments Commission)

June 6-Appearing at Printers Row Lit Fest

On Saturday June 6, I will be taking part in the Printers Row Lit Fest  in Chicago. This two-day event is a book lover’s paradise. I will e speaking at 2 PM Saturday.

 

For more information about the Festival and the schedule of writers who are a ppearing, check out the Printers Row site.

June 4-Speaking at the Pritzker Military Museum (Chicago)

On June 4, I will be speaking at the Pritzker Military Museum and Library in Chicago at 6 PM. I will be there to discuss my new book, THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR:Untold Tales from Yorktown to Fallujah.

I hope you will join me

The Hidden History of America At War-May 5,2015 (Hachette Books/Random House Audio)

Speaking at Army Heritage Days- (May 17)

United States Army Heritage and Education Center Carlisle, PA

I am honored to be taking part in Army Heritage Days at the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center in Carlisle, PA.

I will be speaking on Sunday May 17 at 1 PM. The subject will be the stories the schoolbooks leave out when we talk about war –and who fights our wars.

The Heritage Center’s walking trail through military history, includes a recreation of Redoubt #10 at Yorktown which plays a central role in the opening chapter of THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR

“Did you know?” from THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR

War stories. They help shape a nation’s identity.

But if these stories sweep facts under the rug, they are ‘foundation legends,’ not history. I tell the stories our schoolbooks often leave out, the stories that don’t fit the tidy patriotic version that makes us feel proud but are not always complete or true. The real story – the “warts-and-all-version”—is always more interesting and more instructive.

Here are some “Did-you-know” facts from my newly published The Hidden History of America At War  –from the American Revolution to the War in Iraq.

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION

George Washington gets credit for winning the American Revolution. But without the French Navy, foreign loans and sacrifices by black patriots, the cause might have been lost. Washington, a slaveholder, didn’t want black men in his army. But when he got desperate for troops he opened his ranks to black soldiers and he was impressed at how bravely they fought.


John Laurens isn’t a household name like Thomas Jefferson and John Adams. But this “forgotten founder” helped lead the fight at the decisive battle of the American Revolution at Yorktown, Virginia, and was a voice of conscience who tried to convince George Washington, a slaveholder– to embrace abolition.


The son of a major slave trader, John Laurens was so intent on enlisting blacks in the military that he designed a uniform for African Americans.


It’s inspiring to think that patriotic “Minutemen” grabbed their trusty muskets and left their farms to whip the mighty British redcoats in the American Revolution. But that is not how the Revolution was won. George Washington was wary of the militias who often wanted and needed to get back to their shops and farms. Washington insisted on a trained, disciplined, standing army. Irish and German immigrants, out of work teenagers and African Americans filled the ranks of his Continental Army. But these “rabble” frightened the founding generation. The Minutemen and other militiamen come down in lore as patriots ready to take up arms and defend freedom. But Washington thought militias were undependable, calling them a “broken staff.”


Heroic images of “Washington Crossing the Delaware” don’t hint at what happened later in New Jersey when his drunken troops mutinied –he had the ringleaders executed by firing squad. Washington was a strict disciplinarian who once built high gallows and threatened to hang American deserters.


American troops fought bravely in securing victory over the British at Yorktown. But two overlooked factors helped defeat the British: ­disease and the burden of harboring refuges, slaves who flocked to the British in hopes of being emancipated.

Recreation of  Redoubt # 10 at Yorktown (U.S Army War College-Army Heritage and Education Center)

Fear of leaving slaves in charge of the homestead kept men in Virginia and other slaveholding from joining the militia during the Revolution.


Washington and Jefferson made sure to collect their runaway slaves when the Revolution ended. The American Revolution was fought to protect “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.” But insuring the continuation of slavery was high on the list of priorities for the new nation.


After the Revolution, Marquis de Lafayette had a plan to buy land where Washington could free his slaves and set an example of abolition. But Washington never took up the offer.

Civil War Commissary Cabin (Source U.S. Army War College/Heritage and Education Center)

 THE CIVIL WAR

Military casualties in the Civil War are well documented. But also horrific are the civilian tolls in places like Petersburg, Virginia, which was the scene of a nearly yearlong siege. The situation in Petersburg got so dire for the civilians that some held macabre “Starvation Parties” with no refreshments served. Flocks of local birds disappeared and local butchers sold “mystery meat.”


Lincoln initially resisted letting blacks join the army during the CivilWar.  But by the end of the war, “Colored Troops” made up 10% of the Union Army.  When U.S. Colored Troops” were admitted to the Union ranks during the Civil War, they often got the dirty work such as collecting the dead bodies and were paid less than white soldiers.

THE SPANISH AMERICAN WAR

President William McKinley couldn’t  locate the Philippines after annexing them during the Spanish American War.


Water torture didn’t begain in Iraq. Americans used the “water cure,” a form of torture, in the Spanish American War. At Senate Hearings in 1902, William Taft testified about use of the “water cure” on people in the Philippines by Americans, a national scandal that reached all the way to Theodore Roosevelt’s White House.

Theodore Roosevelt (Photo Source: NobelPrize.org)

Anti-­Catholic venom is an overlooked reason why WASP America wanted to liberate Cuba from Spain during the Spanish American War.


Black soldiers were mistakenly thought to be immune from tropical diseases. That was one reason they were sent to fight in Cuba during the Spanish American war.


The “Buffalo Soldiers,” who were black men, fought bravely in Cuba during the Spanish American War. But Teddy Roosevelt who led the Rough Riders got the headlines and glory‹and later revised the story of what really happened to reap self-aggrandizing benefits.


President William McKinley professed to have been divinely inspired to annex the Philippines and “Christianize” this largely Catholic country during the Spanish American War.


The great American writer Mark Twain opposed American imperialism and wrote about replacing the American flag with one featuring black stripes and skull and crossbones.


Racist policies surrounded Teddy Roosevelt’s “Great White Fleet.” Black sailors who had served and fought on American ships since the Revolution, were kept from service except in the boiler rooms.

WORLD WAR II

Widespread sexual violence was inflicted on women during the Battle of Berlin. Among the causes: the practice of issuing vodka to the Red Army. The number of women raped by the Soviet troops in Berlin is estimated between 95,000 and 133,000, with as many as 10,000 deaths as a result—many from suicide; altogether two million German women are thought to have been raped by the Soviet Red Army troops.


The Red Army crushed the Nazis at the close of World War II but Cold War animosities kept their crucial role out of America’s “Good War” narrative.


General Dwight Eisenhower didn’t know the Germans had been developing atomic weapons or about the Manhattan Project when he agreed to let Stalin take Berlin.

 

Vietnam Fire Support Base (Model) at the US Army War College- Army Heritage and Education Center

THE VIETNAM WAR

As President, Eisenhower weighed and then dismissed using atomic weapons in Vietnam. Seeing what devastation the atomic bombs had wreaked on Japan influenced Eisenhower to not use these weapons again, especially against an Asian country.


When television news reports brought the “Living Room War” of Vietnam into American homes and showed how the U.S. Government was lying, reporters became as significant as the troops.  The media let the public in on what was really going on– America was not winning the war.


Vietnam wasn’t only about Communism and “falling dominoes.” It was about Catholic versus Buddhist, government corruption and longstanding class differences inside Vietnam.


The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave President Johnson authority to widen America’s role in the Vietnam conflict, was drafted weeks before the questionable attack on American ships– which triggered the resolution.


The My Lai Massacre received wide media attention but purported atrocities and the killing of as many as 3,000 Vietnamese in the city of Hue got little notice.

THE WAR IN IRAQ

The battle for Fallujah exposed how little Americans knew about who was fighting the war in Iraq. “Handsome Johnny” had been replaced as a fighter as the war was being outsourced to private, for-profit contractors in Iraq in an unprecedented way. The American troops were once referred to as a “junior partner” in the war effort.

 

© 2015 Kenneth C. Davis All rights reserved

The Hidden History of America At War (Hachette Books Random House Audio)

Who Said It? Quiz (5/11/2015)

President James K. Polk (1849)
Mathew Brady, photographer Source: Library of Congress  CALL NUMBER DAG no. 391

Answer: President James K. Polk, the eleventh President of the United States in a “Special Message to Congress on Mexican Relations” (May 11, 1846)

But now, after reiterated menaces, Mexico has passed the boundary of the United States, has invaded our territory and shed American blood upon the American soil. She has proclaimed that hostilities have commenced, and that the two nations are now at war.

As war exists, and, notwithstanding all our efforts to avoid it, exists by the act of Mexico herself, we are called upon by every consideration of duty and patriotism to vindicate with decision the honor, the rights, and the interests of our country.

Source and Complete Text: Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=67907.

Speaking at RJ Julia Booksellers (Madison, CT) May 14

I am very excited to join RJ Julia Booksellers and the Madison Historical Society on Thursday May 14 to talk about

THE HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICA AT WAR.

Event date:

Thursday, May 14, 2015 – 7:00pm



Event address: 



Allis-Bushnell House
853 Boston Post Road

Madison, CT 06443

This event is FREE. Click HERE to register.

Hope to see you there.

The Hidden History of America At War-May 5,2015 (Hachette Books/Random House Audio)