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The Civil War As They Knew It: Abraham Lincoln's Immortal Words and Mathew Brady's Famous Photographs
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224 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published October 1, 1985
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July 2, 2020
As June-teenth came and went; I was left wondering what history could tell me about the past and how the future may be shaped by events of current day.
I learned who and how Fort Hood, Bragg, and others may have been left as historical monuments, names for military bases, and eventually put myself in the "boots" of a recruit eventually stationed at such controversially named locations for those that fought for the South during the Civil War...
Robert E Lee having been a Colonel for the United States Army (USA) had eventually succeeded to his home "country" after leading the United States Marine Corps (USMC) to Harpers Ferry where the succesioinist John Brown raised hell.
Gen. Lee was a young boy hero of mine; however, now having read what "The Civil War as 'They' Knew 'it'," I am educated on who "they" were, how "we" got through the Revolutionary War, Civil War, Civil Rights Movement, and now the current geo-political American/Global situation is through COVID-19, the Black Lives Movement, and the actual political situation throughout these United States of America or throughout the entire world, cyber space, and actual space as "I" currently understand it.
Amazingly, I understand the importance of history, but also the delicate humanitarian situation still searching for peace, liberty, and justice for all.... but I find myself saddened, I ask what would the "breaker of Chains" honest Abe Lincoln would say pre-post presidency and from the heavens above he so eloquently spoke of when writing the "Emancipation Proclamation." Further, from what I read, I realize how little I remember or knew about the past, present and sensitivity of current situations causing what some would call Anarchy or even a revolution, but to limit the actions of all is degrading to label all as "Protests" protestors, or protesting.
In reading the history of General Hood of the Confederacy, I was left scratching my Texan head that even after a USA mass-shooting by a "Soldier of One," a muslim, a homegrown and local terrorist served at what is and was a Fort named after a Confederate soldier is alarming, thus the reading and the following notes through June-teenth, the current social and geo-political times as it relates to the past and "the Civil War as they Knew it."
It should be noted, THE CIVIL WAR AS THEY KNEW IT (TCWATKI) the Bantam Gallery edition was published November 1961 and the current copyright at 1961 by Bantam Books, Incorporation (BB Inc) ISBN 0-553-25408-1 opens with a lione from the THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION (ec.) "... that on the first day of January in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any state, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion agains the United States, shall then, thenceforward and forever free..." as declared by Abraham Lincoln on the opening of the book on page (pg.) one.
Next, an illustration of the Battlefields of the Civil War are depicted and followed by a reminder that this book is ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S IMMORTAL WORDS AND MATHEW BRADY'S FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHS, and then upon turning to pg seven paragraph (para.) one by stating, "In this book, Pierce G. Fredericks of the New York Times has combined two uniquely distinctive statements about the Civil War: the words of the President of the Uniteds States (US) and the pictures of the first photographer to cover an entire war. Working from the massive collection of Lincoln's papers and the enormous treasury of Brady's photographs housed in the Library of Congress and Nation Archives, Mr. Fredericks' reveals the most memorable conflict in American history as these two eyewitnesses knew it."
Flip the pg. and find "To Begin With... Why there was American Civil War? The men who fought it would have said that the question was whether a state or states had the right to secede from the Union. Later, historians would talk of the economic conflicts between the agricultural South and the industrial North. In the end, though, the answer has to be 'slavery'." The other problems were certainly there, but the big one that boiled over into war was slavery." (pg. 8)
Feeling comfortable that the names, history, and realization of the past and present through historical reflection drove me to A1) historical knowledge and boot camp teachings from Robert E Lee and the USMC, A2) by digging into the USMC History Book with Illustrations, and A3) Robert E Lee literature found in the Leadership Lessons of Robert E Lee at 2:45 am on 27 June 2020, I've discovered the following:
A1) No mention of Rob. E Lee; however, 3% of officers U.S.M.C. or not but resigned U.S. Commission to join and serve Southern States as I knew of the Virginian." I am reminded of Duke of Hazards, the Confederate flag atop, Bubba Watson the Professional Golfer that was mistakingly named by a CNN anchor when speaking of the Bubba Wallace NASCAR finding of a nooze in a half/black and white driver's garage by one of his teammates and mechanics.
A2) Within the opening sentence of Rob E Lee's "On Leadership" by H. W. Croker III states "until he was 43 years old, he was employed by the USA as an engineer. His job was to build things." H. W. Crocker III pg 29. Chapter Two "apprenticeship in Mexico."
A3) Serving under Robert E Lee, Marines with a Virginian, "Then home on leave." USMC a Complete History pg 84 1859 Harper's Ferry Citation "Marine Barracks 8th and I, dispatch a company to put down insurrection launched by John Brown at Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, in what was then Virginia. The forces led by USA Colonel Rob E Lee, then home on leave in Virginia."
A4) Brerret Col Lee at harper's Ferry and John Brown "abolitionist" an illustrated History USMC
Skimming pages 8-10, we learn that the new Western movement had pro/anti slavery Southern and Northern concerns and John Brown killed 5 Southerners, seized the Federal Arsenal at Harper's Ferry, Virginia with plans for raising a slave rebellion. Marines, under a Regular Army colonel Rob E Lee marched on Brown for a 'Hanging';" and, "In 1860, Abraham Lincoln, who had already noted that "... this Government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free," stating before being inagurated
"flatly that no slavery would be allowed to go west to the new states, in February, 1861, the frustrated South inaugurated Jefferson Dvis as president of the seven states which had then seceded and the nation was on the road to a war which would last four years" and through his death till some would argue present day. Lincoln is recorded having said, "Brady and the Cooper Union Institute made him president;" however, I would submit his vision for a free peoples in a land by the people and for the people since winning Independence in 1775 by the Revolutionary War where our first president General George Washington is recorded having understood the delicate nature of our country, and the need to be a free and equal nation, yet the delicate economic and political nature surrounding the subject of slavery...
Consequently, I find that Marines lead by Rob E Lee seized Harper's Ferry, but what of John Brown's statue or Christopher Columbus or even the Abraham Lincoln Emancipation Proclamation statue torn down as the Fort Bragg, Gen Hood recognition and others unravels. Understanding the bases and statues may have been products or produced by southern whites influencing Congress and local/federal authorities to approve base naming, statues and park dedications for those of such a geo-political sensitive subject...
in the end, i am convinced those sensitive topics should be addressed through democratic measures and not abrupt anarchy or racial motivations; rather by voting as surely the bases and the monuments in particularly sensitive locations of the USA should be voted as to how, where, and through what political process will those that founded, shaped, and gave to the history of our America and these United States....
lets get this right as Lincoln reminds us, "... with malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan - to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." (pg 195)
I learned who and how Fort Hood, Bragg, and others may have been left as historical monuments, names for military bases, and eventually put myself in the "boots" of a recruit eventually stationed at such controversially named locations for those that fought for the South during the Civil War...
Robert E Lee having been a Colonel for the United States Army (USA) had eventually succeeded to his home "country" after leading the United States Marine Corps (USMC) to Harpers Ferry where the succesioinist John Brown raised hell.
Gen. Lee was a young boy hero of mine; however, now having read what "The Civil War as 'They' Knew 'it'," I am educated on who "they" were, how "we" got through the Revolutionary War, Civil War, Civil Rights Movement, and now the current geo-political American/Global situation is through COVID-19, the Black Lives Movement, and the actual political situation throughout these United States of America or throughout the entire world, cyber space, and actual space as "I" currently understand it.
Amazingly, I understand the importance of history, but also the delicate humanitarian situation still searching for peace, liberty, and justice for all.... but I find myself saddened, I ask what would the "breaker of Chains" honest Abe Lincoln would say pre-post presidency and from the heavens above he so eloquently spoke of when writing the "Emancipation Proclamation." Further, from what I read, I realize how little I remember or knew about the past, present and sensitivity of current situations causing what some would call Anarchy or even a revolution, but to limit the actions of all is degrading to label all as "Protests" protestors, or protesting.
In reading the history of General Hood of the Confederacy, I was left scratching my Texan head that even after a USA mass-shooting by a "Soldier of One," a muslim, a homegrown and local terrorist served at what is and was a Fort named after a Confederate soldier is alarming, thus the reading and the following notes through June-teenth, the current social and geo-political times as it relates to the past and "the Civil War as they Knew it."
It should be noted, THE CIVIL WAR AS THEY KNEW IT (TCWATKI) the Bantam Gallery edition was published November 1961 and the current copyright at 1961 by Bantam Books, Incorporation (BB Inc) ISBN 0-553-25408-1 opens with a lione from the THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION (ec.) "... that on the first day of January in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any state, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion agains the United States, shall then, thenceforward and forever free..." as declared by Abraham Lincoln on the opening of the book on page (pg.) one.
Next, an illustration of the Battlefields of the Civil War are depicted and followed by a reminder that this book is ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S IMMORTAL WORDS AND MATHEW BRADY'S FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHS, and then upon turning to pg seven paragraph (para.) one by stating, "In this book, Pierce G. Fredericks of the New York Times has combined two uniquely distinctive statements about the Civil War: the words of the President of the Uniteds States (US) and the pictures of the first photographer to cover an entire war. Working from the massive collection of Lincoln's papers and the enormous treasury of Brady's photographs housed in the Library of Congress and Nation Archives, Mr. Fredericks' reveals the most memorable conflict in American history as these two eyewitnesses knew it."
Flip the pg. and find "To Begin With... Why there was American Civil War? The men who fought it would have said that the question was whether a state or states had the right to secede from the Union. Later, historians would talk of the economic conflicts between the agricultural South and the industrial North. In the end, though, the answer has to be 'slavery'." The other problems were certainly there, but the big one that boiled over into war was slavery." (pg. 8)
Feeling comfortable that the names, history, and realization of the past and present through historical reflection drove me to A1) historical knowledge and boot camp teachings from Robert E Lee and the USMC, A2) by digging into the USMC History Book with Illustrations, and A3) Robert E Lee literature found in the Leadership Lessons of Robert E Lee at 2:45 am on 27 June 2020, I've discovered the following:
A1) No mention of Rob. E Lee; however, 3% of officers U.S.M.C. or not but resigned U.S. Commission to join and serve Southern States as I knew of the Virginian." I am reminded of Duke of Hazards, the Confederate flag atop, Bubba Watson the Professional Golfer that was mistakingly named by a CNN anchor when speaking of the Bubba Wallace NASCAR finding of a nooze in a half/black and white driver's garage by one of his teammates and mechanics.
A2) Within the opening sentence of Rob E Lee's "On Leadership" by H. W. Croker III states "until he was 43 years old, he was employed by the USA as an engineer. His job was to build things." H. W. Crocker III pg 29. Chapter Two "apprenticeship in Mexico."
A3) Serving under Robert E Lee, Marines with a Virginian, "Then home on leave." USMC a Complete History pg 84 1859 Harper's Ferry Citation "Marine Barracks 8th and I, dispatch a company to put down insurrection launched by John Brown at Harper's Ferry, West Virginia, in what was then Virginia. The forces led by USA Colonel Rob E Lee, then home on leave in Virginia."
A4) Brerret Col Lee at harper's Ferry and John Brown "abolitionist" an illustrated History USMC
Skimming pages 8-10, we learn that the new Western movement had pro/anti slavery Southern and Northern concerns and John Brown killed 5 Southerners, seized the Federal Arsenal at Harper's Ferry, Virginia with plans for raising a slave rebellion. Marines, under a Regular Army colonel Rob E Lee marched on Brown for a 'Hanging';" and, "In 1860, Abraham Lincoln, who had already noted that "... this Government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free," stating before being inagurated
"flatly that no slavery would be allowed to go west to the new states, in February, 1861, the frustrated South inaugurated Jefferson Dvis as president of the seven states which had then seceded and the nation was on the road to a war which would last four years" and through his death till some would argue present day. Lincoln is recorded having said, "Brady and the Cooper Union Institute made him president;" however, I would submit his vision for a free peoples in a land by the people and for the people since winning Independence in 1775 by the Revolutionary War where our first president General George Washington is recorded having understood the delicate nature of our country, and the need to be a free and equal nation, yet the delicate economic and political nature surrounding the subject of slavery...
Consequently, I find that Marines lead by Rob E Lee seized Harper's Ferry, but what of John Brown's statue or Christopher Columbus or even the Abraham Lincoln Emancipation Proclamation statue torn down as the Fort Bragg, Gen Hood recognition and others unravels. Understanding the bases and statues may have been products or produced by southern whites influencing Congress and local/federal authorities to approve base naming, statues and park dedications for those of such a geo-political sensitive subject...
in the end, i am convinced those sensitive topics should be addressed through democratic measures and not abrupt anarchy or racial motivations; rather by voting as surely the bases and the monuments in particularly sensitive locations of the USA should be voted as to how, where, and through what political process will those that founded, shaped, and gave to the history of our America and these United States....
lets get this right as Lincoln reminds us, "... with malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan - to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations." (pg 195)
June 1, 2014
A very old and excellent book with stunning photographs taken over 100 years ago. If you like American history, photography, the Civil War or any 1 person retelling of historical events, this book is written and organized in such a fashion, it's impossible to hate. One of my new favorite books about the Civil War. I think I'm going to keep it forever if I can.
January 19, 2014
it was really good.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews