The Lost Cause

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

Sitting home watching TV

Another CSPAN weekend

This lecture was interesting

Touchy issue - Connecticut Yankee in Bama - prof shows good research chops but still misses some chances to make additional points - kids are engaged

Civil War Legacy in the South

University of Alabama professor Lesley Gordon taught a class about the end of Reconstruction, the removal of Union troops from the South, and the Compromise of 1877.

www.c-span.org

 

[secondasky]

Sitting home watching TV

Another CSPAN weekend

This lecture was interesting

Touchy issue - Connecticut Yankee in Bama - prof shows good research chops but still misses some chances to make additional points - kids are engaged

Civil War Legacy in the South

University of Alabama professor Lesley Gordon taught a class about the end of Reconstruction, the removal of Union troops from the South, and the Compromise of 1877.

www.c-span.org

I've studied some of the Civil War and heard many lectures. Not sure if I want to listen to the whole hour. Any major points she makes ?

 

[TMFT]

I've studied some of the Civil War and heard many lectures. Not sure if I want to listen to the whole hour. Any major points she makes ?

I listened to it last night. It's good, but not really anything groundbreaking. It's probably a 300 or 400 level undergrad history class focused on the Civil War although she says later on in the video that they spend a fair amount of time on some antebellum & Reconstruction Era parts because it's all part & parcel.

Seemed like a good class with good participation and good discussion. Seemed like the kids & prof were open minded enough to not see anything as starkly black & white. Like, the Lost Cause narrative talks about the relative population size & industrial strength of the North vs. the South and how a northern win was inevitable. There's some truth to the statement about how the North had some really serious advantages in that regard, but it also misses the mark on some other things.

If you're into Civil War history I suggest going on youtube and searching for "Checkmate Lincolnites." The videos are long but really in depth and fairly entertaining.

*EDIT* for pure lectures, videos from this channel are really great in depth stuff.

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

I've studied some of the Civil War and heard many lectures. Not sure if I want to listen to the whole hour. Any major points she makes ?

The term “lost cause” was coined early in a 1866 book by editor of Richmond newspaper who hated Jefferson Davis and felt South woulda coulda shoulda won. Him and Jubal Early tried to make Virginia look good, and so needed to re-moralize the ”cause.” No real “guilt” over slavery. “Slavery is gone now - but we’re still superior to free blacks.”

Confederate vets had to lay low, so women and their small local clubs and societies drove the early “lost cause” movement - hard to criticize widows and mothers trying to find and re-bury dead sons and husbands, even if they are “glorifying” the “cause.” They morphed into selling that the “genteel” South was still more moral than the industrial North. Joined the chorus of “we were better, we just lost because the North had numbers.” Sold the South as an example to all or proper society.

Early monuments were basic obelisks, then sympathetic figures, then cookie cutter soldiers.

North just wanted to put it all to bed - “yeah yeah, fought brave, faced cannon and muskets like us, OK, let’s sell some shit.”

 

[TMFT]

North just wanted to put it all to bed - “yeah yeah, fought brave, faced cannon and muskets like us, OK, let’s sell some shit.”

That was one spot where I think she missed a salient point when the kid asked about northern opinion of what was becoming southern conventional wisdom. Truth be told, even in today’s super connected society, I don’t have the first clue what is being taught in school’s in Idaho, for example. I’d imagine back then, the vast majority of northerners had never heard the phrase “war of northern aggression.” People who were clued in might have let it pass just to get it behind them, but I’m guessing most just had no clue what was going on down there.

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

That was one spot where I think she missed a salient point when the kid asked about northern opinion of what was becoming southern conventional wisdom. Truth be told, even in today’s super connected society, I don’t have the first clue what is being taught in school’s in Idaho, for example. I’d imagine back then, the vast majority of northerners had never heard the phrase “war of northern aggression.” People who were clued in might have let it pass just to get it behind them, but I’m guessing most just had no clue what was going on down there.

I thought she missed the opportunity to make a few good points, but I appreciated how she encouraged the students views.

When she mentioned that some Southerners thought God was punishing the South, it was an obvious time to mention to Lincoln’s Second Inaugural comments about the war being the “woe” for “offences,” but in truth, Lincoln’s comments likely had little effect on the South’s views of the Lost Cause.

I think the majority of Northern soldiers hated Abolitionists, but had respect for both black soldiers and southern soldiers. and didn't much care how the South branded itself after the ass-whipping, so long as it didn’t re-start hostilities.

 

[DrHoops]

I thought she missed the opportunity to make a few good points, but I appreciated how she encouraged the students views.

When she mentioned that some Southerners thought God was punishing the South, it was an obvious time to mention to Lincoln’s Second Inaugural comments about the war being the “woe” for “offences,” but in truth, Lincoln’s comments likely had little effect on the South’s views of the Lost Cause.

I think the majority of Northern soldiers hated Abolitionists, but had respect for both black soldiers and southern soldiers. and didn't much care how the South branded itself after the ass-whipping, so long as it didn’t re-start hostilities.

All men are created equally

 

[Rockport Zebra]

All men are created equally

I like Kilrain's perspective. I'm fighting against aristocracy.

 

[bub-rub]

That was one spot where I think she missed a salient point when the kid asked about northern opinion of what was becoming southern conventional wisdom. Truth be told, even in today’s super connected society, I don’t have the first clue what is being taught in school’s in Idaho, for example. I’d imagine back then, the vast majority of northerners had never heard the phrase “war of northern aggression.” People who were clued in might have let it pass just to get it behind them, but I’m guessing most just had no clue what was going on down there.

interesting to think about

semi-related: I’ve read some interesting stuff about how the Midwest eventually “united” America via the Mississippi River basin, allowing for commercial, political, cultural integration of the nation. Pre civil war america looked a little more like Europe w different cultures based around disconnected rivers.

 

[TMFT]

interesting to think about

semi-related: I’ve read some interesting stuff about how the Midwest eventually “united” America via the Mississippi River basin, allowing for commercial, political, cultural integration of the nation. Pre civil war america looked like Europe w different cultures based around disconnected rivers.

I’d buy that to an extent. It still has sectional tendencies like how southern Indiana has an Upland South migration history where people came from Virginia into Tennessee then into Indiana by way of Kentucky. Northern Indiana had more Polish and Slavic immigration from east to west after landing at Ellis Island. But overall I’d buy the Midwest melting pot theory, if for no other reason, that the Midwest accent is more or less neutral and not really geographically connected to anywhere else.

 

[secondasky]

Here's a little known fact but the famous painting you see of the surrender at Appomattox which is usually Lee and his secretary and Grant and a couple of other Union officers, both sides had college graduates from just two colleges. WestPoint and IU.

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

Here's a little known fact but the famous painting you see of the surrender at Appomattox which is usually Lee and his secretary and Grant and a couple of other Union officers, both sides had college graduates from just two colleges. WestPoint and IU.

It wasnt discussed in this lecture, but Lee stoked the Lost Cause myth even at Appomattox.

Lee was not aware of Grant’s instructions from Lincoln to be liberal in surrender terms, and took steps to protect his officers from adverse consequences, basically suggesting “yeah, you have numbers, and we are willing to stop the killing and yield to the inevitable, but we can also fight on, so be reasonable.”

Grant granted unexpected terms anyway.

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

All men are created equally

Equal.

Only 4 words, and you missed.

 

[DrHoops]

Equal.

Only 4 words, and you missed.

Well you can’t count because there are 5 words in that sentence.

FAIL

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

Well you can’t count because there are 5 words in that sentence.

FAIL

Umm. You got 4 right, then missed.


(Do you live alone? Have caretakers?)

 

[DrHoops]

Umm. You got 4 right, then missed.


(Do you live alone? Have caretakers?)

Amazing attempt to redeem your ability to add.

FAIL

 

[MyTeamIsOnTheFloor]

Amazing attempt to redeem your ability to add.

FAIL

Keep deflecting. You should be ashamed for misquoting the Declaration of Independence, but you aren't. Doesn't bother you in the least. THAT is how shallow you have become.

PS - “counting” is not “adding”