The Civil War

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Recently, my_daroga and I watched the Ken Burns PBS documentary, The Civil War. It was made in 1990. This is one of the most well-made historical documentaries that I've seen.

I particularly liked:

• the music. Mostly it's rearrangements of things like Battle Hymn of the Republic and Dixie that are really well done. my_daroga says the main theme is original--it's really gorgeous, and the instrumentation is lovely.


• no reenactments!


• wonderful voice acting. Especially Morgan Freeman, because his voice ughhhh. I'm probably the only person on Earth who isn't really a fan of Garrison Keillor's voice, but he was perfect for this as well.


• this felt like a balanced approach


• hundreds of authentic photographs (and did I mention no reenactments?!?!)


• lots of first hand accounts, letters, and statements, some by famous people (Lincoln, Grant, Lee, et al) and some by unknowns


• (not purposely) hilarious and very engaging historians


• good scope and pacing--there's a lot of info, but no matter how much or how little you know about the Civil War, you'll probably come out knowing some very interesting things


• nice balance between really personal (sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes quite funny) stories and technical things, such as troop movements, and broad social issues, such as slavery

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Here are some AMAZING THINGS I learned:

• Major Anderson taught at West Point and had a student, Beauregard, who liked Anderson well enough to stay on as an assistant for a year after he graduated. Later, Beauregard became a Confederate general and attacked Fort Sumter. The Union major defending Fort Sumter? Major Anderson. GAH.


• The First Battle of Bull Run took place on Wilmer McLean's farm, where a Confederate general had made his headquarters. McLean moved away from Manassas to get away from the Union and protect his family. He moved to Appomattox Court House. Where Lee used his house to sign a surrender with Grant. It's said that the Civil War started in McLean's front yard and ended in his front parlor.


• The most shocking thing were the Union generals before Grant. I had always heard that the North mismanaged the war during the first three years, and that that was why it went on so long. I had no idea just how incompetent they were.


• The most shockingly incompetent was General McClellan, who refused to move against Lee, or who would move against the Virginia army, and not push his victories, or would lose a skirmish, and fall back, even though if he pressed he probably could've won (which Grant later proved). He kept asking for more men, even though he had three times the army Lee did. I think the part that was most headdeskful about it, though, was the letters Lincoln kept sending saying, "Move dammit! Do something!" McClellan would refuse, then send letters to his wife saying, "Lincoln is such an incompetent buffoon; why do I have to deal with his idiocy?" And then he ran for president. And would have won (probably), if Sherman hadn't taken Atlanta before the election.


• Also, I had heard Lee was a tactical genius, but I thought that was maybe a Southern pride thing? But no, he really was, and this documentary shows you how. His ability to predict the Northern generals really does seem uncanny, and he did some really risky things that only worked because they were so risky, no one expected them.


• The documentary didn't really come out and say this, but it really seems to me that if you want to win a war decisively, without question, you've got to lay in there and destroy your enemy; you have to keep on going, be willing to throw everything you have into it, and be willing to lose a lot. It felt like Lee knew that from the beginning, which is . . . kind of a shame. The Confederacy was at such a disadvantage from the get-go, that had McClellan been the Confederate general and Lee the Union general, that war would've been over with in a year. So I feel like Lee knew what it took, and didn't have the resources to pull it off. Sherman obviously knew what it took, and while a lot of people died and were devastated by his March, the worst thing about it was he should've gotten the chance to do that in '61, and everything would've been over.


• I truly feel like Lincoln believed in emancipation long before his presidency. I feel like he didn't ever state his beliefs in order to be politically successful at first, and later in attempts to hold the Union together. Frederick Douglass said, "Viewed from the genuine abolition ground, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull, and indifferent," and I definitely agree. Douglass of course goes on to say that Lincoln was the perfect man to do what needed to be done at the time. Gah, just go read his whole oration in memory of Lincoln. But anyway, I'm just so . . . impressed and depressed by Lincoln, this man with these deeply held convictions, who was unwilling to express them for so long, but when he did express them, did so eloquently and firmly in a way that helped pull our nation in the right direction. I tend to admire people who are uncompromising, but he was the compromisiest, and it was what worked. And it reminds me of Obama--who, imo, didn't actually change his mind about gay marriage, just waited for the right time to speak. It's not at all the same thing, but that ideals vs what is actually actionable always gets me.


• Martha Washington's great granddaughter was (one of the ) heir(s) to the property that is currently Arlington National Cemetery. She had a house there and lived there. She married Robert E. Lee, and he lived there too. Robert E. Lee was an American military officer. A man named Meigs served under him. In 1864, a lot of cemeteries were getting too full to bury all the dead. Lincoln charged Meigs with finding a site for a new national cemetery. Meigs chose Arlington not only because it was a good site, but because he felt that Lee had betrayed the Union by resigning and serving the Confederacy, and he didn't want Lee to ever be able to return home. At first, most of the burials were far from the house. Meigs pushed and pushed to have bodies buried right up near the house, until finally they started burying bodies in Mrs. Lee's rose garden.


• Grant and Lee had met previously during the Mexican-American War. Grant mentioned this when they met at Appomattox Court House; he remembered Lee well. Lee didn't really remember Grant.


• Lee surrendered to Grant in Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1965. On April 12, there was a surrender ceremony at Appomattox. Lincoln was assassinated on April 14. On April 26, Johnston surrendered to Sherman. On May 5, the Confederate cabinet met with Jeff Davis for the last time, and officially dissolved. Another battle was fought in Texas May 12-3. The reason this is shocking to me is that I had no idea Appomattox Court House wasn't the official "end" of the war. It shocked me that Johnston hadn't also resigned by then. And it shocked me that Lincoln died before Johnston resigned; for some reason I thought the assassination was a month or two later, not less than a week after Appomattox.


• Fifty years after the Battle of Gettysburg, Civil War vets from the North and South returned to Gettysburg, and had a reunion. They reenacted Pickett's charge. Pickett's charge was a charge ordered by Lee and led by General Pickett, that resulted in over 50% casualties on the Confederate side. It was gruesome and bloody, a huge tactical error on Lee's part, the end of the Battle of Gettysburg, and the turning point in the Civil War. At the fifty year anniversary of the charge, Union vets stood behind the stone wall where they'd held their position during the charge. Confederate vets came across the field, as Pickett had led them during the charge itself. When the Confederate vets and the Union vets met, they hugged.

After watching the documentary, my_daroga and I had a little desultory conversation about a Sam and Dean Civil War AU. It could be interesting, but I don't think there's a good enough reason to do it. It would require a more careful hand than mine to adequately address all the issues, and frankly I think there's enough Romantic literature about that particular era. That is not to say that more shouldn't be written, just that if more is written it probably shouldn't be SPN fanfic. Still, the idea's interesting to me.

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