April 1865 Quotes

“Most civil wars, in fact, end quite badly, and history is rife with lessons that how wars end is every bit as crucial as why they start and how they are waged.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Every one I talk to is in favor of putting negroes in the army and that immediately … I think slavery is now gone and what little there is left of it should be rendered as serviceable as possible.” For her part, Mary Chesnut lamented, “If we had only freed the negroes at first and put them in the army—that would have trumped [the Union’s] trick.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“But where Lincoln’s absent hand was felt most keenly was in race relations. Black codes were passed in state after state across the South—as restrictive as the antebellum laws governing free blacks (Richmond’s old laws had even regulated the carrying of canes). These codes propounded segregation, banned intermarriage, provided for special punishments for blacks, and, in one state, Mississippi, also prevented the ownership of land. Not even a congressional civil rights bill, passed over Johnson’s veto, could undo them. For their part, the Northern states were little better. During Reconstruction, employing a deadly brew of poll taxes, literacy requirements, and property qualifications, they abridged the right to vote more extensively than did their Southern counterparts.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“The next day, it was still raining when Lee issued his final order to his troops, known simply as General Orders Number 9. After four years of arduous service, marked by unsurpassed courage and fortitude, the Army of Northern Virginia has been compelled to yield to overwhelming numbers and resources. I need not tell the brave survivors of so many hard fought battles, who have remained steadfast to the last, that I have consented to the result from no distrust of them. But feeling that valor and devotion could accomplish nothing that would compensate for the loss that must have attended the continuance of the contest, I determined to avoid the useless sacrifice of those whose past services have endeared them to their countrymen. By the terms of the agreement officers and men can return to their homes and remain until exchanged. You will take with you the satisfaction that proceeds from the consciousness of duty faithfully performed, and I earnestly pray that a Merciful God will extended to you His blessing and protection. With an increasing admiration of your constancy and devotion to your country, and a grateful remembrance of your kind and generous considerations for myself, I bid you all an affectionate farewell. For generations, General Orders Number 9 would be recited in the South with the same pride as the Gettysburg Address was learned in the North. It is marked less by its soaring prose—the language is in fact rather prosaic—but by what it does say, bringing his men affectionate words of closure, and, just as importantly, what it doesn’t say. Nowhere does it exhort his men to continue the struggle; nowhere does it challenge the legitimacy of the Union government that had forced their surrender; nowhere does it fan the flames of discontent. In fact, Lee pointedly struck out a draft paragraph that could have been construed to do just that.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Appomattox was not preordained. There were no established rules or well-worn script. If anything, retribution had been the larger and longer precedent. So, if these moments teemed with hope—and they did—it was largely due to two men, who rose to the occasion, to Grant’s and Lee’s respective actions: one general, magnanimous in victory, the other, gracious and equally dignified in defeat, the two of them, for their own reasons and in their own ways, fervently interested in beginning the process to bind up the wounds of the last four years. And yes, if, paradoxically, these were among Lee’s finest hours, and they were, so, too, were they Grant’s greatest moments.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Robert E. Lee had done his duty and, however heartbroken, was prepared to do his duty still. Having devoted himself to winning the war, until the bitter end, he was now beginning the transition to an equally fervent commitment, reuniting the two halves of the divided country. As he slowly rode back to his camp, some fifteen minutes away, advance soldiers began to shout, “General, are we surrendered?” Lee struggled for words to express his sense of despair and came up short; he was speechless. But soon, two solid walls of men began to line the road, and when he came into view, they began to cheer wildly. At the sound and the sight, tears started to roll in the general’s eyes, and his men, too, began to weep.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“To be sure, late that afternoon, Union soldiers drifted into the Confederate camp, and soon knots of blue- and gray-clad men dotted the hills around Appomattox Court House; bullets were indeed replaced by backslaps, the rebel yell with a hearty Southern drawl, war fervor with the first hints of war nostalgia, unbridled hatred with nascent relief, and, by the next day, West Point mini-reunions were even breaking out at the McLean farmhouse. But”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“but now it was no longer simply enough to ambush and gun down the enemy. They had to be mutilated and, just as often, scalped. When that was no longer enough, the dead were stripped and castrated. In time, even that was insufficient. Then the victims were beheaded. And even that wasn’t enough. So ears were cut off, faces were hacked, bodies were grossly mangled. Soon,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“In a thousand little ways, it seemed as though Grant was fated to fight this civil war. In battle, what galled Grant most was indecision. Once, an aide asked if he thought he was always right. “No!” Grant ripped back. “I am not, but in war anything is better than indecision. We must decide. If I am wrong we shall soon find it out and can do the other thing. But not to decide… may rum everything.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Freeing negroes seems to be the latest Confederate government craze … [but] if we are to lose our negroes we would as soon see Sherman free them as the Confederate government,” insisted one Southern woman. “Victory itself would be robbed of its glory if shared with slaves,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“James Madison wrote, “each state … is considered as a sovereign body independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation then the new Constitution will … be a. federal and not a national constitution.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“They knew that most republics throughout history had been overthrown by revolution, or had collapsed into dictatorship or civil war, or had succumbed to uncontrollable anarchy.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Presidents may do many things, but they do not have the luxury of complaining, or blaming others, or eluding responsibility, no matter how terrifying it is in all its dimensions. Second-rate presidents may act “great” during routine times, when it is easy to do so, but it is only the truly great ones who act great during the difficult times.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“quickly realized there was no clause in the Constitution that established the Union’s perpetuity.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“One young man, upon taking the loyalty oath, was upbraided by his patriotic Southern father: "You have disgraced the family!" The son noted that General Lee advised him to do it. "Oh," the father sighed, "that alters the case. Whatever General Lee says is all right.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Without having planned it—and without any official sanction—Chamberlain suddenly gave the order for Union soldiers to “carry arms” as a sign of their deepest mark of military respect. A bugle call instantly rang out. All along the road, Union soldiers raised their muskets to their shoulders, the salute of honor.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“At Lincoln’s second inaugural, a drunken Johnson, who had had one too many whiskeys that morning, plunged into a long, rambling, incoherent discourse, shouting about his humble origins and lecturing the assembled dignitaries from the Supreme Court and the diplomatic corps (“With all your fine feathers and gew-gaws”) that they were merely “creatures of the people.” Then, as he took his oath, Johnson visibly and audibly slobbered upon the Bible.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Presidents may do many things, but they do not have the luxury of complaining, or blaming others, or eluding responsibility, no matter how terrifying it is in all its dimensions. Second-rate presidents may act “great” during routine times, when it is easy to do so, but it is only the truly great ones who act great during the difficult times. And where the second-rate presidents are somehow always shaped, and prodded, and manipulated by the forces of history, great ones find ways to bend those forces of history to their goals.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“And where abolitionists preached slavery as a violation against the higher law, Southerners angrily countered with their own version of the deity, that it was sanctioned by the Constitution. In the vortex of this debate, once the battle lines were sharply drawn, moderate ground everywhere became hostage to the passions of the two sides. Reason itself had become suspect; mutual tolerance was seen as treachery. Vitriol overcame accommodation. And the slavery issue would not just fade away.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“the country sat at a defining crossroads, ready to veer in one direction, but just as able to choose another, it”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“to his everlasting credit, as he fought “that enemy” who, in his words, repeatedly demonstrated “Herculean deeds of valor,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“Lincoln dumped his bland second-in-command, Hannibal Hamlin, for Johnson,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“He set up a store, which failed, then set up as a postmaster, but was unable to make a living at that. When a circuit court issued a judgment against him for overdue notes, the sheriff attached his personal possessions, even his horse. Then his store partner died. Forced to shoulder the hefty $1,100 burden of remaining debt, Lincoln spent fifteen years paying it off. His first lady friend, Ann Rutledge, died suddenly, of an attack of “brain fever.” His first love, Mary Owens, turned him down. Later, like many an ambitious politician, he eventually did marry well, joining with Mary Todd,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“One black man, overcome by emotion, dropped to his knees, prompting the president to conduct a curbside colloquium on the meaning of emancipation. “Don’t kneel to me,” said the president. “That is not right. You must kneel to God only, and thank Him for the liberty you will enjoy hereafter.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“In the thirty days since Grant had first fired upon Lee in the Wilderness, his Army of the Potomac had lost 50,000 men. That same army had lost only twice that—100,000—in all the previous three years of war. A good many of his finest and bravest had fallen; far many more—another 100,000 alone in just that year—had refused to reenlist. Lincoln, stunned, soon pronounced that the “heavens are hung in black.” Across the North, Grants critics only raised their voices further and included the first lady: “Grant is a butcher and not fit to be at the head of an army,” Mary Lincoln protested. “He loses two men to the enemy’s one. He has no management, no regard for life.” Added one Union man, “We were all quick to criticize McClellan’s … fear of the Army of Northern Virginia,” but “anyone that has seen that army fight and march would, were he wise, proceed … with caution and wariness knowing full well that defeat by such an enemy might mean destruction.” Said another critic, “It is foolish and wanton slaughter.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“concern. Tellingly, there were those in the North, such as the prominent intellectual Ralph Waldo Emerson, who as early as August 1862 deeply feared that the Confederacy might preempt the Union and adopt emancipation first. In so doing, he believed that the South would appear before the world as the champion of freedom, gaining recognition from France and England, and putting the North in a disastrous position. Emerson’s fears were hardly unfounded. Within months, in the South, the issue did indeed come under serious debate.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“On the matter of slavery, he reproached but absolved the South of the ultimate blame: “It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask God’s assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men’s faces; but let us judge not that we be judged.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“But not for Jefferson. “I view cities as pestilent to the morals, the health, and the liberation of man,”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“But, by the same token, there are also moments that can act as catalysts for peace.”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America

“The ultimate fate of nations is often measured and swayed not by large events, but by tiny ones, small, symbolic gestures that shape men’s passions, assuage or incite their fears, and quell or inflame lingering hostilities”
― Jay Winik, April 1865: The Month That Saved America