Scraps of time

Douglas Southall Freeman is out of fashion these days. He was a great perpetuator the Robert E. Lee myth, simply by writing so damn much about him. His biography of Lee takes up four volumes:

and Lee’s Lieutenants (that is to say his generals) get three!:

Then again Lee already had a statue in Richmond, which Freeman saluted every day on the way to work:

Freeman’s work ethic was legendary. Throughout his life, he kept a demanding schedule that allowed him to accomplish a great deal in his two full-time careers, as a journalist and as a historian. When at home, he rose at three every morning and drove to his newspaper office, saluting Robert E. Lee’s monument on Monument Avenue as he passed. Twice daily, he walked to a nearby radio studio, where he gave news broadcasts and discussed the day’s news. After his second broadcast, he would drive home for a short nap and lunch and then worked another five or six hours on his current historical project, with classical music, frequently the work of Joseph Haydn, playing in the background.

from the intro to this book of Freeman’s speeches:

Freeman later remarked that a statement made by [Prof. S. C. Mitchell] during a lecture on Martin Luther meant a great deal to him:

Young gentlemen, the man who wins is the man who hangs on for five minutes longer than the man who quits.

I found some advice that I’m going to make my New Year’s Resolution, boldface mine.

Know your stuff. Now that means a lot in the way of the utilization
of your time. And it means a lot in the way of utilization of a navy
wife or an army wife. You boys think you have a hard life to lead. You
don’t have any tougher life to lead than the life of a navy wife. And
both the navy husband and the navy wife need to learn all they can,
when they can. I’d like to give you a little motto on that question. I
gave it to one of my historical secretaries. She happens to be the one
who came up with me this morning. She said it was the most useful
thing I’d ever told her. It came from Oliver Wendell Holmes, a justice
of the Supreme Court of the United States, who should have been chief
justice. Holmes would get a boy from Harvard Law School every year,
and that boy would have one year as Holmes’ law clerk, a magnificent
training, out of which in their generations have come some of the best
lawyers in public service in America. And one of the favorite things
that he would tell these boys was, “Young man, make the most of the
scraps of time.” Now believe me, if you want to know your swuff and
know it better than the other man, you’ve got to spend more time on
it; and if you are going to spend more time on it, you’ve got to make
the most of the scraps of time. The difference between mediocrity and
distinction in many a professional career is the organization of your
time. Do you organize it; do you make the most of the scraps of time?
Bless my soul, I don’t suppose that the admiral, with his dignity and
justice and regard for all the amenities, says no to you about playing
bridge; but there is many a man who would have three more stripes
on his sleeve if he gave to study the time that he gives to bridge. Don’t
say that you have to have the recreation. You have to have enough
recreation, but diversification of work is the surest recreation of the
mind.

Most of the speeches in this book were given in the late 1930s and early 1940s at The Army War College and the Navy War College. Freeman was conveying lessons learned in the Civil War/War of the Rebellion to the generals and admirals who would end up fighting the Second World War. Freeman’s own father had been in the Army of Northern Virginia.

In the book Freeman tells a bunch of good stories, here’s one about Jubal Early (who Freeman met many times):

Early had about him a carping, singularly bitter manner that alienated nearly every man who was
under him. Lee, if there was a doubt whether a fault was his or a subordinate’s, would always assume it; Early, never. Sometimes his wit was good. You may not be familiar with his great exchange with John
C. Breckinridge. Breckinridge had been, as you remember, a candidate for the presidency in 1860. Before that time he had been a great political leader, standing on the principle of the right of slavery in the territories. He fought with Early through a part of the Valley campaign of 1864. Early never forgot that he was a politician, though Breckinridge was a very good soldier. In a very desperate hour-I think it was at
Winchester-when Rodes had been killed and the situation was very desperate, Breckinridge was in full retreat. Early met him in the road and said, “Well, General Breckinridge, what do you think about slavery
in the territories now?”