Aug. 31, 1864 Life has been rough here in the camp, while I may not be on the front lines with General Sherman, I am still an active member in the Civil War. The dog tents aren’t so bad once you get used to them. Once a week they come back to the camp and recruit more of us to go to the front lines and fight. Today is the day they come and I hope I get recruited. The confederates need to be stopped, slavery is wrong. I’m waiting to see if my name gets called. When my name doesn’t get called my heart sinks. Then I hear it. “ 99. Did I count everyone?” General Grant asked. “Yes, but we skipped a name on the roll call, Noah D Bracewell, please step forward,” William called to me, it was the happiest day of my life. Sept. 01 1864 Today we marched for what had felt like hours. I didn’t know that the only people that got to ride horses …show more content…
were the Generals. You could hear them calling “Left. Left. Left. Right. Left.” The guns felt like they weighed 100 pounds, but really it only weighed about 11 pounds. I knew we were going to be getting into action really soon because General Sherman started to load his colt navy revolver. “Soldiers, at attention,” General Sherman ordered.
“We are about to march into Atlanta, it’s not going to be pretty, but we are going to burn it to the ground, and siege it.” I was thinking about all those innocent people that were going to die, all the children. No, I thought to myself, these people all have given support toward the confederate army. These people treat other people like they are feculence. General Sherman started to speak again. “Soldiers, we are not going to hurt any civilians that choose to cooperate with the Union Army, but if they try to kill any of your brothers, you must kill them. You may take whatever food, clothes or women you would like, but remember, they fight burn their house to the ground.” We started marching into Atlanta, and instantly the villagers started to fight us. General Sherman called out to them to warn them. “Civilians, today we are not here to hurt you, we will only harm you and our family if you decide to fight us. We will be taking food and whatever else my men would like to take. You harm a single hair on any of these boy’s heads their brother will shoot you in yours, are we
clear?” You could feel the tension in the town the first time someone fought us. The man that fought us happened to attack my best friend Zach. I still have flashbacks to that day, because I didn’t even hesitate to shoot that man in his chest. I heard the loud shot of the shot of the musket. I could see the blood start pouring out of him the second after I shot him. His eyes instantly glazed over and he fell, hitting his head on the brick street under him, making the red bricks even redder than they were. The metallic smell that came wafting up to me made me sick to my stomach. It was like I could taste the blood in my mouth, even though it was not me that was bleeding to death on the street. His son was next. He couldn’t have been more than 16 years old, but he attacked me, it was ordered, I must shoot. The man’s son didn’t even make it within three feet of me when my partner shot him.
Nevertheless, an attitude they show is their cause for engaging in the war. On page 110, Lee describes, “With every step of a soldier, with every tick of the clock, the army was gaining safety, closer to victory, closer to the dream of independence.” His words reveal that their reason for coming was to gain their long overdue independence. Without a cause worth fighting for on each side, the war would have no fuel or reason to continue. In like manner, another attitude of the South was their admiration for their commander general. On page 251, Longstreet proclaims, “Colonel, let me explain something. The secret of General Lee is that men love him and follow him with faith in him. That’s one secret.” I believe this clarifies that the bond of brotherhood and respect for each other in this army would allow for these soldiers to follow their leader blindly. The overwhelming amount of faith and trust among the Army of the Northern Virginia is inspiring. The Confederates prove in these appearances that they do indeed have an important cause that they are willing to die
The book ‘For Cause and Comrades’ is a journey to comprehend why the soldiers in the Civil War fought, why they fought so passionately, and why they fought for the long period of time. Men were pulling guns against other men who they had known their whole lives. McPherson’s main source of evidence was the many letters from the soldiers writing to home. One of the many significant influences was how the men fought to prove their masculinity and courage. To fight would prove they were a man to their community and country. Fighting also had to do with a duty to their family. Ideology was also a major motivating factor; each side thought they were fighting for their liberty. The soldier’s reputations were created and demolished on the battlefield, where men who showed the most courage were the most honored. Religion also played an important role because the second Great Awakening had just occurred. Their religion caused the men who thought of themselves as saved to be fearless of death, “Religion was the only thing that kept this soldier going; even in the trenches…” (McPherson, p. 76) R...
On March 5, 1861 Abraham Lincoln got a message for Maj. Robert Anderson, who was at Fort Sumter, saying that there was less than a six week supply of food left. On April 8, Lincoln told Gov. Francis Pickens of South Carolina that he was going to try to refurnish the fort. The Confederate government ordered Gen. Beauregard to demand the evacuation of the fort. If it was refused he was to force its evacuation. (www.us-civilwar.com/sumter.htm) Anderson received a letter from Gen. Beauregard telling him to evacuate the fort or h...
In James McPherson’s novel, What They Fought For, a variety of Civil War soldier documents are examined to show the diverse personal beliefs and motives for being involved in the war. McPherson’s sample, “is biased toward genuine fighting soldiers” (McPherson, 17) meaning he discusses what the ordinary soldier fought for. The Confederacy was often viewed as the favorable side because their life style relied on the war; Confederates surrounded their lives with practices like slavery and agriculture, and these practices were at stake during the war. On the other hand, Northerners fought to keep the country together. Although the Civil War was brutal, McPherson presents his research to show the dedication and patriotism of the soldiers that fought and died for a cause.
Thousands of men died in November 1863. Within in a couple of days bodies laid scattered across the battle fields while tens of thousands men sat in a hospital. All of these men participated in one thing, the Civil War. Fighting for the rights of the people and what our constitution stood for. Families and friends had to pick a side, South or the North. Each had their reasoning for why they stood to fight, but surprisingly their reasoning was similar. Each state was proud they live in a country that had broken away from British. They marveled at the idea that all men are created and equal and have certain rights. Americans were proud. Proud to the point that they never stopped pay attention to all that they did. Proud because they put laws on humans and threw them into bondage. In 1861 people started to take sides. In some ways it was unconstitutional, but in others they were fighting for the people. The Civil War had begun. The fate of our country was in the hands of the people. On opposite sides of the war, Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee wrote The Gettysburg Address and Letter to His Son there were three astonishingly similarities and differences in the two works: the people are one, acts were unconstitutional and the nation is on shaky ground.
“All up and down the lines the men blinked at one another, unable to realize that the hour they had waited for so long was actually at hand. There was a truce…” Bruce Catton’s Pulitzer prize winning book A Stillness at Appomattox chronicles the final year of the American Civil War. This book taught me a lot more about the Civil War than I ever learned through the public school system. Bruce Catton brought to life the real day to day life of the soldiers and the generals who led them into battle.
Not all soldiers had a definite answer of why they fought, but it was definitely an open-ended question. In order to find a realistic answer to the question, McPherson gathered physical emotions from personal letters and diaries from soldiers during their war experience (1). The two sides, Confederate and Union, both had their reasons for going into war voluntarily and forcefully. He wanted to know what motivated volunteer soldiers to
This statement absolutely applies to all the soldiers who fought in the Battle of Gettysburg. Both the Union and Confederate soldiers were symbolic as killer angels, people who fought for what they believed was right, even if that meant killing other soldiers. The people who were fighting were citizens of the same nation, sometimes brother against brother. Tom Chamberlain and Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain were an exception to this. These brothers were both fighting on the Union Army. Sometimes soldiers fought people who they were formerly friends with. Ultimately, the war turned the two sides of the nation against each other. This led to the mass destruction and killing of our nation’s population. Each soldier was a killer angel in his own way in which he fought and carried on through one of the bloodiest battles of the war.
...ly as possible. Intelligence of the fort’s defenses and abilities received from Sherman’s scouts allowed the General to conduct his mission planning to take Genesis Point. Both his and Major Anderson’s mission command were efficiently in both the areas of offense and defense operations. Despite only lasting 15 minutes against Sherman’s forces, Anderson’s garrison was stubborn to the end and would not surrender without a fight.
"After the Attica Uprising | The Nation." After the Attica Uprising | The Nation. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2014. .
“Foundly do we hope-fervently do we pray- that this might scourge of war may speedily pass away… 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 lasting peace, among ourselves, and with all nations”
The American Civil War, also known as the War Between the States, or simply the Civil War in the United States, was a civil war fought from 1861 to 1865, after seven Southern slave states declared their secession and formed the Confederate States of America . The states that remained in the Union were known as the "Union" or the "North". The war had its origin in the fractious issue of slavery, especially the extension of slavery into the western territories. Foreign powers did not intervene. After four years of bloody combat that left over 600,000 soldiers dead and destroyed much of the South's infrastructure, the Confederacy collapsed, slavery was abolished, and the difficult Reconstruction process of restoring national unity and guaranteeing rights to the freed slaves began.
I asked the General if he had any orders his response was “My superior General H.W. Halleck has ordered me to sit tight at Shiloh and wait for the reinforcement of General Don Carlos Buell and his army from Ohio to arrive.” I then asked him hat did he feel was the catalyst of this war? “ Well in my opinion I fell that if the South just could have thought about their morals and how immoral slavery was which is why the North made it illegal and wanted it abolished from the South.” Are there any other reasons you think the war started? “Yes I also feel that when the South succeeded from the Union was also a large factor.” Thank you sir for all of that information the people up north will be enveloped with your opinion.
I shall never surrender or retreat ... I Am determined to sustain myself as long as possible and die like a soldier who never forgets what it is due to his honor and that of his country-VICTORY OR DEATH." This was a letter sent by William Barret Travis during the siege of the Alamo on February 24, 1836. It was a cry for help to anybody and everybody willing to listen.
Thesis: The war overseas, but there are millions of veterans still fighting the war at home.