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Soldier life during the civil war
Essay about civil war soldiers
Essay on life of a soldier civil war
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I know for a fact that some people have wondered about what everyday was like for a soldier in the Civil War. During the Civil War, soldiers would have a lot of free time in between battles. Sometimes after a war, the next one wouldn’t be till a few months from then. Back in the day during this time, they had to do something to keep themselves occupied. Civil War soldiers came up with their own types of things to do.
Some soldiers would play music or games. Most of the time during the soldier’s free time, the soldiers would have to do chores and doing drills. Soldiers would play Chess, Checkers, Backgammon, Dominoes, Bowling, Horseshoes, Baseball, and a more unsafe version of football. Also, soldiers bowled with a cannon ball and would use
Soldiers typically did two different types of work: martial or civil work. Martial work included digging entrenchments, marching, fighting, and general warfare. Civil work included cutting wood, harvesting crops, and hunting. While the soldiers got paid wages for their martial work, they expected higher compensation when performing civil work, since these usually required more skills. Most soldiers in the colonies fought using hit-and-run guerrilla tactics, but fighting was not the most important aspect of the soldier’s life. Instead, soldiers used most of their time building, digging, farming, and other grueling jobs that made them unhappy. The army increasingly looked towards its own soldiers to do work because the cost of using civilians was too high. Moreover, as the military’s numbers increased, paying soldiers became harder. Because of low wages, soldiers had to rely on illegal measures to earn money, including selling off their uniforms and stealing the goods of their fellow comrades. Soldiers often deserted because of the army broke the terms of their enlistment. When caught, almost all deserters were executed, so soldiers started to desert in larger and larger groups until finally, the entire enlisted corps started to mutiny against the officers due to unfair conditions. Since officers were usually
The book “For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought In The Civil War” by James M. McPherson examines the motivations of the soldiers who fought in the Civil War. McPherson wanted to understand why the men fought in the Civil War and why they fought so ferociously for such a large amount of time even though there was a huge possibility of death, disease and injurys.To answer the question regarding the reasons why men fought in the Civil War so viciously, and for such a long period of time, James McPherson studied countless amounts of letters, diaries and other mails that were written or sent by the soldiers who fought in the Civil War.
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...
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.
The day to day life for the regular soldier was not glorious. Many times the regiments were low on supplies such as food and clothing. They lived in the elements. Medical conditions were grotesque because of the lack of advanced equipment and anesthesia. “Discipline was enforced with brutality” as if all the other conditions were not bad enough.
For the beginning, in the middle and in the ending of the Civil War in the United States, the Black Americans were central as soldier and civilian. At first, people tried hard to get around this fact. Even President Abraham Lincoln administration sent Black volunteers home with an understanding that the war was a ''White man's war". The policy was eventually changed not because of humanitarianism but because of the Confederation's battlefield brilliance. The South brought the North to a realization that it was in a real brawl that it needed all the weapons it could lay hands on.
In World War I and in the Vietnam War, the soldiers used tools such as guns, medications to keep them calm, first aid kits, melee combat weapons, rations of food, a form of communicating such as walkie talkies, or morse code. Due to the different kinds of terrain that soldiers would be in, different tools would be needed to assist in their survival. In rocky terrain, for example, they might wear heavier and more durable boots to keep being able to trek through the terrain. “When a mission took them to the mountains, they carried mosquito netting, machetes, canvas tarps, and extra bug juice.” In World War I, the soldiers from America traveled over seas to places like Europe, the Middle East, and Asia so that they could go fight in the war. Due to the soldiers having to travel, they needed to take medications in order to not contract diseases from those foreign
In 1619, slaves from Africa started being shipped to America. In the years that followed, the slave population grew and the southern states became more dependent on the slaves for their plantations. Then in the 1800s slavery began to divide America, and this became a national conflict which lead to the Civil War. Throughout history, groups in the minority have risen up to fight for their freedom. In the United States, at the time of the Civil War African Americans had to fight for their freedom. African Americans used various methods to fight for their freedom during the Civil War such as passing information and supplies to the Union Army, escaping to Union territory, and serving in the Union’s army. These actions affected the African Americans and the United States by helping the African Americans earn citizenship and abolishing slavery in the United States.
African Americans helped shape the Civil War from various perspectives. Actually, they were the underlying foundation for the war if you think about it in depth. African Americans were slaves and had been dealt with like property since they arrived in America. The likelihood of opportunity for these slaves created an enormous commotion in the South. The issue of equal rights for African Americans brought on a gap between the states. The United States Civil War began as an effort to save the Union, and ended in a fight to abolish slavery. The Civil War, frequently known as the War Between the States in the United States, which was a Civil War battled from 1861 to 1865, after seven Southern slave states proclaimed their severance and framed the Confederate States of the United States. More Americans died in the Civil War than in World War I, World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War combined. Two thirds of the individuals that were killed in the Civil War died of disease. The medical world at the time of the Civil War and advanced disinfectants, did not exist which could have enormously lessen the spread of disease and illnesses. After years of bloody combat that left over 600,000 soldier’s dead and destroyed much of the South's infrastructure, the Confederacy collapsed, slavery was abolished, & the difficult Reconstruction process of restoring national unity and guaranteeing rights to the freed slaves began. By December 1865 the 13th Amendment had abolished slavery throughout the United States (Waldstreicher).
They followed and went wherever the battle went. These men had been enlisted or signed up and that meant they had to serve for a certain amount of time and they were to get payed for fighting. This army was generally made up of 2nd born sons who had no inheritance, men with no property, no skills or education, Immigrants, and very few women disguised as men. They fought and stayed together throughout it all. They had a structured leadership (Ex: General George Washington) and Congress supplied everything, including training. Congress often didn’t always supply tents and other supplies. At certain points, they starved and became sick and were sometimes unprepared. George Washington often tried to get the Continental army to fight the “Traditional Style” but it did not work out well and they switched to the typhoid
The Civil War is often thought of as white northerners and southerners fighting over the freedom of African American’s. African American soldiers would fight on both sides of the war. The eventual acceptance of African American’s and their contributions to the Union Army would be pivotal in the Unions success. African Americans were banned from joining the Union Army in the early part of the Civil War. President Lincoln feared that African Americans in the Army would persuade certain states, such as Missouri, to join the Confederacy. Once African American soldiers could join the Union Army they would contribute to almost every major battle of the Civil War. 180,000 African Americans served in the Union Army in 163 different units, and 9,000 served as seamen in the Union Navy.1 President Lincoln stated, “Without the military help of the black freedmen, the war against the South could not have been won.”2
When focusing on the positives of the uses of trenches one can say they provided protection to the soldiers. With the use of heavy artillery and machine guns, trenches provided an area where men would be shielded from enemy fire. Black stated that trenches were also used to provide shelter for “reserve troops.” However, the trenches did not provide much comfort for the men living in them. Robert Graves relates in his narrative that the trenches were made from bricks, ammunition boxes, and corpses. Graves, later in his narrative also states that life in the trenches depended on the battalion and the moral of those living in them. Some trenches were not unbearable whereas others were encompassed with depression. Black states that trench life was often atrocious. In many cases soldiers were exposed to wet conditions that attracted vermin and frostbite. As well as, according to Graves, “trench feet” a condition soldiers got if they slept through the night without warming their feet in their wet boots. However, life in trenches also posed another
The Civil War was the worst war in American history. More Americans died in this war than World War 1 and 2. The events that lead up to the Civil War show that it was a conflict that was going to arise no matter what happened.
The American Civil War was from 1861 to 1865 it was a civil war between the United States of America and the Southern slave states of the newly-formed Confederate States of America under Jefferson Davis. The Union included all of the free states and the five slaveholding border states and was led by Abraham Lincoln and the Republican Party. Republicans opposed the expansion of slavery into territories owned by the United States, and their victory in the presidential election of 1860 resulted in seven Southern states declaring their secession from the Union even before Lincoln took office. The Union rejected secession, regarding it as rebellion. Hostilities began on April 12, 1861, when Confederate forces attacked a U.S. military installation at Fort Sumter in South Carolina. Lincoln responded by calling for a large volunteer army, then four more Southern states declared their secession. In the war's first year, the Union assumed control of the border states and established a naval blockade as both sides massed armies and resources. In 1862, battles such as Shiloh and Antietam caused massive casualties unprecedented in U.S. military history. In September 1862, Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation made ending slavery in the South a war goal, which complicated the Confederacy's manpower shortages. In the East, Confederate commander Robert E. Lee won a series of victories over Union armies, but Lee's reverse at Gettysburg in early July, 1863 proved the turning point. The capture of Vicksburg and Port Hudson by Ulysses S. Grant completed Union control of the Mississippi River. Grant fought bloody battles of attrition with Lee in 1864, forcing Lee to defend the Confederate capital at Richmond, Virginia. Union general William Sherman ...
The Civil War has been viewed as the unavoidable eruption of a conflict that had been simmering for decades between the industrial North and the agricultural South. Roark et al. (p. 507) speak of the two regions’ respective “labor systems,” which in the eyes of both contemporaries were the most salient evidence of two irreconcilable worldviews. Yet the economies of the two regions were complementary to some extent, in terms of the exchange of goods and capital; the Civil War did not arise because of economic competition between the North and South over markets, for instance. The collision course that led to the Civil War did not have its basis in pure economics as much as in the perceptions of Northerners and Southerners of the economies of the respective regions in political and social terms. The first lens for this was what I call the nation’s ‘charter’—the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, the documents spelling out the nation’s core ideology. Despite their inconsistencies, they provided a standard against which the treatment and experience of any or all groups of people residing within the United States could be evaluated (Native Americans, however, did not count). Secondly, these documents had installed a form of government that to a significant degree promised representation of each individual citizen. It was understood that this only possible through aggregation, and so population would be a major source of political power in the United States. This is where economics intersected with politics: the economic system of the North encouraged (albeit for the purposes of exploitation) immigration, whereas that of the South did not. Another layer of the influence of economics in politics was that the prosperity of ...