Transcripts For CSPAN3 Road To Appomattox 20170916

War a authoril talks about his book justice at the appomattox. Describes robert e. Lee and ulysses s. Grant leading to the surrender of the army of virginia in 18 55. The gettysburg Heritage Foundation hosted this talk that is just under one hour. That is great pleasure get to introduce ralph peters. For those of you unfamiliar with ralph he is a prizewinning bestselling author of a wide range of books from his civil war novels to strategic analysts. As a former enlisted man with extensive overseas experience he is currently a fox news analyst. Analysis he has covered topics from africa to iraq. For a wide range of newspapers and magazines. Began withhich gettysburg, the valley of the shadow, the dam at petersburg and will conclude with justice at appomattox which will be released on august 29. He will all caps to see the initial copy of this. We do have Copies Available over labor day weekend. I apologize that this is not released until the end of august. You will have a opportunity to get one. You have been coming here since 2013, he is one of our favorites we havent the heritage center. Thank you. [applause] ralph let me get my regular microphone back. It is great to be back. Everyone knows that this is a special place. Certainly a haunted place. Whenever i go here i get excited and i want to give you the best i can think we have a general here today and i am very glad to see that, the chief of artillery. At the end of this decade of my these have been doing five book cycles of gettysburg at the appomattox. There is a sense of accomplishment but there is also that i am incredibly proud of these books, they are the best thing i have done in my life read nevertheless you are always aware that it will fall short. A member of the audience and i were discussing earlier you can approximate the best we can but we will not fully recapture what they felt and what they did. For those of you who have been kind enough to follow me through these books and i know many of you have created what i am trying to do is get beyond the famous names and give credit to thirdyear characters who will often when the battles. Behind the statistics of humanity. Wonderful, cowardly and courageous heroic ignoble, and selfless,ish this brilliant complexity of men who fought that war and the women behind the men sometimes beside them. You always know that you will fall short, you know you did your best. Is notough the new book out until august 29 i want to talk about it. I want to talk about the appomattox campaign. I am going to do something i do not do. I want to read a few passages. Directly to this effort to recapture what they felt, what it was like for them. First of all the appomattox most peoplek for who have a superficial awareness of the civil war it goes from petersburg and then to the appomattox. Which ifhis campaign you go from fort stedman onwards it is barely two weeks. Some historians will date that from sheridans move from the 29th. Isrever you date it, there incredibly high drama. Every single day is a fight. If it is at fort stedman in the inning with generally robert e. Lee breaking out on his own terms. Obviously theuse five forex. The union breakthrough. All of these skirmishes day today. Sailors creek, cumberland church, all of these dramatic fight right up to the last morning with a breakout attempt at appomattox. They are all high drama. Emotions are running very high. The union is out for blood and they have a sense of the endgame. We will not quit. The army is crumbling around. Stedman the attack on march 25. The winter has been hard. That winter snow in of 1865. A bitter winter. People are not starving but the troops are hungry and they are malnourished trade. Scurvy is one of the many diseases. Desertion is high in the army of virginia. If you hundred are coming over. They are hungry. Strangely enough you also have Union Soldiers deserting to the confederacy and then running for the petersburg line at night. That i cannot figure out. Except for the fact that they did not want to fight. When you get to fort stedman the back story is that robert e. Lee knows he is pinned. He knows his last desperate hope give grantout and the slip and get to carolina. Defeat sherman and their combined armies will turn around and defeat grant. It is a most helpless but he is not going to quit. Finding the bright star of the confederacy. He has no military background before the war. He has a genius for war. He had been a lawyer and a newspaper man. When john gordon puts on a uniform he finds it. There are several. Closest in some ways to grant. Grant was not meant to do anything else after he became a successful politician and so forth. Gordon was tasked with a plan to punch through the union lines between the confluence of the appomattox and punish them and badlyt them so much so that it buys time for him to move out and get to north carolina. President s time Jefferson Davis of the confederacy will not listen to him. He is trying to warn him. Knows he cannot hold out much longer. Davis is he is hurt all of this before. When all this collapses richmond is not ready and that leads to the panic in the fire. John brennan gordon does is very best. He gets control about half of the army of northern virginia. Fort stedman east of the james river. Over the month they are very heavily fortified. Fort stedman is not very far where there was a quite a summer before. It is the point where the lines get very close. He does his homework, he sends out his scouts, they have spies. They are getting reports that, they can a know everything that they cannot see. You are going to make a night attack, punch through and then you have broken through. Point go down the city and it will take a lot of coordination. He really thinks he has done everything. He is a man who always had good luck until fort stedman. After ifore that did the First Reading with the First Reading it describes what of thelike as a private platoon affiliated forever with louisiana. They are tough guys. They are overwhelmingly irish and the part i am going to read to you is about the initial wave of the attack. Forwardis own divisions that many trust and many know. As i always try to do in all of the books. Even the privates are real people. We do not know terribly much about this man. A know he is a recent immigrant into new orleans. Know he was captured at least twice that hes been some time in the hospital but he is now back in the fight to this is at the beginning of the battle. I will not even get to the bloodiest part. I am trying to give a voice to the dead. To bring them alive as people. How did they speak . How do they think . What was it like . These guys go forward into the dark. , with cloth white tied to the back of their color. It is something you can see in the dark when you do a night attack you have to the shoulder to shoulder, literally touching the guy next to you at these can spin out of control. As quiet as he could they have cleared the links to the obstacles and they have engineers ready to move forward. Forward anddy to go the unionay through and take the fort and push out and take the surrounding batteries and take the flanking force. Everything is supposed to go right. In more nothing ever goes right. Pushingprivate daniel out into the no mans land of the attack. twas black is a englishman so, he rushed out with the rest. With his rifle in his midst. A rifle left unloaded on different orders but the tip of the bayonet cap sharpened. Of strategyis wave irishman. Every man hoped he would not be skewered by a mess made. That fellll word forward in the dark. The time it past in took to stumble and move forward. No man spoke a word. Enough. Them not cries of asking to surrender. With the thump of axes no shots yet paid hundreds and thousands of shoes wore thin. Oneshot, too. Recovering to sense his way in the dark. It should have gone off at the circus. Extension is recognized for battles and prisons and brawls. Shouts and struggles as a surprise. Shots, help the kernel. Curiosity, a vice more trouble than drink. A hurry of hands pulled the kernel out. Shoes. Art, he shredded he cursed and ran out of was keeping why were they running downhill . Their purpose was to attack before. Even if they would not put it on a downslope that they have mistaken their way. A answer. How differently based on that he always knew the officers. Half left. Then came the price few of a candidate greeted by a bright flash of faces like his own. Other guns flared, they spotted the rampart ahead. Fearfuled for the wall of the cannons on the front. Up and over. Men howled out of habit. Reliably, instinct led his rifle as he blocked one men who are no ribbon. Bending him to a gas. The weapon raised a hand and clatter down. He brought this down onto his partners shoulder beating him to the ground. The yankee had been laid out properly. Heard the lovely crackup splintering wood. Not even a last cry. That is the point he grunted. Then the attack accelerates. Rate the attack starts out well. Surprised, are Brigadier General captured. They branch out and capture the batteries. Then inserts to fall apart. They cannot take the flanking force. The Union Artillery turns and insulates them. A general who is group ofmmand of a recruits manages to rally his men and the reserve and these Young Pennsylvanians right at the right moment when everythings hangs in the balance they slam into the confederates who are full of confusion. There has already been a big problem. He tried to bring order to things. They cannot get enough troops forward. The lanes they opened are too narrow. The troops that do get forward are moving into each other. First dawnhave the light as the union line is forming up. Commandos moving forward to take key areas. Been assured that they are thereby scouts and spies. He has these commandos out there, three teams looking for the fort and they sent runners back sammy cannot find them. They did not exist. It was just that intelligence. The intelligence is never perfect. Even with all of the stuff we have to date. Way the days by the union has much better intelligence than the confederates but that is another story. Last attackhis folders and falls apart. Back asps are running guns are hitting the stuff the sport on three sides. 3000 confederates are lost. The numbers are hard to pin down. 50,000, thehas union has a forced twice that size. The confederates have more rifles in the field per unit. He cannot afford to lose that many troops. There is a union counterattack elsewhere on the left flank that morning makes a little bit of progress. Setting upg up for the big push. They know it is coming. Then he gets a reprieve. It ranks and it rains heavily. He has artie the five orders by showing up at petersburg. Close the gap. Get to the appomattox. Who is in a member number of the books in the series. It is a snake of a man. He is vicious with his rivals. He is a very ambitious man that is for a hungry. Again a terrific soldier. A terrific soldier is not always a guide who is heroic and wonderful. You just never know what you are getting. At any rate after the conference will grantonferences is almost tired of him. He says fine, if you get through ahead and try it. Is heading for the courthouse. Is crawling slow. Best cavalry commander in charge of protecting the train. Why . He knows if anyone can move those wagons through the mud it will be the cavalry. They worked their way out to the courthouse and move forward. Cavalry is soon to be his finest hour followed by his worse. They really handed to sheridan. He is pushed back at the courthouse. He is only saved because custer has been pulled up and does his usual magic trick of luck. They stabilize the lines. The mother has been a attack. Governor laurent of little round has been thinking about what he saw that day. So, the court had held. There is this gap that opened up in the army. Is that weekend cut off part of the corporate body as it were. Raining, telegraph lines are not all the way out. Message and he is right. He takes this to grant but does not tell him that war and team up with the idea. Not because his record take the glory, grant is mad at work. Who is not a party to the boss what to do. Giving commandy to the general sheridan. Also the secret authority to relieve or in. Sheridan is that going a chance to going to miss a chance to push up a rival. They have really is at the last minute that they have to pull back. They cannot go back public to the railroad. He has made it clear that they have got to hold the area. That is the key to hold in the railroad and everything else. His plan even though there is still a cap, his plan is good. His cavalryto take corps and attack frontally well his divisions are moving around their flank. Orders toim specific be on this axis. Cavalry got it wrong as to where the confederate line is. The six car is moving right past the confederates. Here but it ends actually ends over here. He is going out this way. Suddenly they see that the confederates are over there. It turned out better because the six core pivots. What other confederate commanders doing while all this is happening . The Union Cavalry is pushing on the front. The entire court is swinging around to envelop them. Pixley and pickett have been invited to a whipping. He was assured that he would not attack that day. They are not even two miles from the battlefield. There is a sound anomaly where under the cover of clouds they cannot hear the canon let alone the rifles. There is a battle going on. Where is fixedly . These guys are getting drunk. It is a nice afternoon and they are telling stories and having a good old time. Ony find out what is going and they think they may have heard a little bit of rifle fire. They sent some scouts down. As and as they cross the stream and feel of this the Union Infantry emerge from the woods and capture the lead scout. After that they relate something is up. A absolute ball. It is just shattered. Cavalry are terribly embarrassed. It is a debacle and they lose good men and there was thousands of listeners. They are push back on surveillance station. At this point grant knows it is time for the big push. In the very early hours of april 2 to push comes. The breakthrough at multiple points. Easternes to hold the front to keep them out of petersburg. They are just delaying the union long enough to get to the afternoon. Describing this very much in detail in the book. It is incredibly dramatic. As the confederates are just trying to hold on till dark so they cross the bridge of the appomattox. They had gone to a peninsula and they had less. There is fighting down at sutherland station. There is battle after battle. They moved so quick that the davise reaches jefferson while he is still at church. He is for you because you cannot believe that his general let him down with this. Richmond turns into a debacle. It becomes one thing after another because they do not want drunkenness they break open all of the whiskey barrels and pour them out. You have people lying in the gutters drinking all of the whiskey. They decided to destroy the government stores. The confederates would set them on fire. The fire got out of control. What happens when you wait a fire near ammunition . There are explosions. Heart is burned out. The flames are stopped just shy of the federal capital. That is still with us today. That is a wild absolute debacle. Confederatese the are moving with amazingly agile grace and speed. He gets his troops north of the james river. They are leaving half of their guns and provisions behind. They are already low on provisions to begin with. The men are already hungry. Trains, not to supply trains to meet them at the courthouse where the army rendezvous. They will bring the garrison of richmond down. They will rendezvous at the courthouse, get some russians and keep moving. A very short version of this there is drama and for more drama. And get to the courthouse there are seven buskers waiting period boxcars waiting not one ration. These groups have nothing to eat. They have got to eat. Out aays and sends proclamation to the people, please our troops in your troops need food or they will have a celebrity proclamation. They pause overnight. The wagons come back almost all of them empty. They have been picked over. The governor has already confiscated everything. The people are just trying to survive. Is a killer. He is rushing ahead and pushing ahead. I am sorry, i forgot. After war and is hillary does not do much. After war and his leading charge himself. He fires them. He claims all the genius of the victory for himself. The governor served alter the war her likely courageously. Annoying, is brokenhearted, clearng decades trying to his name. His great rival is george me. Sheridan figured out the public has room for three heroes, grant , it will be sheridan if he can help it. Meade, when it sheridan is pushing ahead, meade forwardshing supplies to help sheridan. Everyday is a fight for delaying action. Then you get to the real lack thursday of the confederacy, Sailors Creek. If you havent been there, you need to go. Three separate battles. What has happened is long streets corps has pushed ahead. Gordons corps is the rearguard. In the middle you have the anderson voice, picket, yule, the naval brigade about the size of a battalion actually drawn from the navy yard and defense batteries. Two surrender are the sailors. They fight to the bitter end. Custer is at his best. He sees a break in the line as the light rains are Holding Things up. S. Am simplifying thing the wagon trains are Holding Things up. They start chewing and fake charge and charge again. They dont get decisively engaged, but they dont let the confederates move forward. The Confederate Center is fixed at five force. Another train that gordon is supposed to be protecting yet ordered off to the north to hybrids, and gordon is ordered to follow the trains, so he follows the trains, and that opens the center. Immediately, and earlier i said the sixth corps when i was talking about warren, i met the fifth. Apologies. The sixth is coming up. It is his favorite corps. He likes it. He knows it. Gordon is pulling off to the north to protect the trains. It opens at half direct to Sailors Creek and the middle of the confederates, who are soon virtually surrounded. The cavalry fight is progressing. Infantry moves up and hits them after initial setback. The union troops just swarm over the confederates. Lee loses a third of his army. The only one that performs well that they is John Brown Gordon day is John Brown Gordon. They protect the trains as best they can. They take a hammering, but they hold together. Corps will hold his together the best he can. They will fire the last shots fired by the army of northern virginia. After five forks, it is clear now it is over. You cannot mean. He cannot win. He has lost thousands along the way. It will be a fight at highbridge, cumberland church. You cannot win. Lee just cannot bring himself to give up. Ps2 brad. He spent he is too proud. He spent his whole life constructing this marble facade. My personal view, he just cannot stand the idea, excuse me, that he is going to be beat by ulysses s. Grant. He cannot even remember grant from mexico. He cannot remember what he looks like. Had a of course, reputation for being drunk in. Drunken. Lee is smart enough to discard it. Whatever he was in the past, he is not drunk now. It has always been an army of incredibly high morale. The day after five forks, the morning after, lee has gotten two hours of sleep in farms will farmville. After that two hours of sleep, he is coming downstairs. Wise,er governor, henry is going to barge in. That is the other thing i am going to read you. These words that general ys sa says, you havee to smooth out some of it, but this is what he told lee. It is a little long. I think it will give you a feeling for what the men are feeling two days before surrender. Came downstairs, leaving the beauty and sweetness of the featherbed provided by mr. Jackson, he was guided to the back porch where a basin and warm towel awaited his toilet. He closed his eyes and doused his face. The warmth of water made the world seem less cruel. Shots sounded in the distance, direction unclear. It did not sound significant. He slashed his face again, worked up a ladder with soap and cleansed himself. He wished he might remain on that porch to rest and savor the bracing morning air. A rumpus, barely outpacing the visitor, marshall announced andadier general wise, sir, the former governor of virginia burst onto the porch, eyes, theious distortion of his cheeks and forehead gave him the look of a madhouse inmate. Wise is a year older than lee. He walks with his troops as a Brigadier General. His face is shaven, but he has a rough beard. Wise was sane if angry. He had saved most of his brigade yesterday, refusing to quit. Lee wondered if he should not have promoted henry wise to division command, but there had always been arguments against it. Lee felt the weight of yet another error, another misjudgment. Discarding ceremony, this subordinate who seemed to be made of wire charged with lightning paused in the doorway to make a declaration. My poor men are on yonder hill, more dead than alive. Without for a week nothing in their belly. Lee paused. Stepshant move another without something to eat. Come in, general. They shall eat. The rations are here and plentiful. You must share my breakfast. The former governor decided to dine on spleen. Cowards. Damn cowards. Fastf them run off so yesterday, johnson was the worst. He bore down on lee. Got any idea what it is like to serve under such a worthless, no good, wise paused on the edge of profanity. Lee know it was the truth, but he could not tolerate it. Gently he replied, general wise, are you liable for courtmartial . Wise would not be deflected. Officer shouldng be giving commands, not running off the way johnson did. He stepped forward. Shoot me. You cannot afford to shoot the men who fight. Shoot me. I wish you would. I say, i wish you would. Save the yankees the trouble and need the bother. He tried another tack. General wise, let us set such issues aside. I would value your judgment of the situation. Situation . There isnt any situation. It is time for spring planting. We lost. Look at yesterday. Purpose did any of those boys die for . This army is hopelessly whipped. Those men have stuck it out for high fairytaleme of confederacy. I say to you, sir, emphatically, to prolong this struggle is murder, and the blood of every man killed this day forth is on your head. While others had approached him to cautiously raise the prospect of surrender, no man had dared to speak to him so directly. Waving his hand in annoyance, lee said, dont talk so wildly. I bear burdens enough. He grasped for words. What would the country think of me if i did what you suggest . Wise spat, country be damned. Aint no country. You are the country to these men. They fought for you. This armyou held together, nothing else. Even now, you ask them to die for you, and they will, as will i, for that i am. Now, no man,his no decent man will ever gainsay you. I repeat, the blood of every man killed hereafter is on your head alone. For a time, lee could not respond. Wise stood there waiting, unmercifully. The silence endured until the arrival of at which lee said, i shall excuse myself. I have pressing affairs. That is what i am trying to do with these books, get beyond the nonsense of northern or southern propaganda and the sterilization of our history. This is about life and death, hungry men fighting on two a bitter end for the southerners. Yankees die along the way as well. This is april 7, two days later there will be a last desperate attempt by lees calvary and john gordons corps to break out of yankee encirclement at appomattox. They think they might be able to open a hole and squeeze the army through. Gordon, fitzlee just takes off with his cavalry. Give much of a fight. Throughby god he busts the yankee cavalry, pushes on until they reach the top of the ridge, and before him are the leading brigades and divisions of two yankee infantry corps. At that point it is all over. Phil sheridan knows it is over. Phil sheridan wants to attack. He wants to kill them. He wants to destroy the army of northern virginia. Grant wont do it. He knows it is over. He is not out for blood. He wants the country heels together as his surrender terms will show. Messages have been crossing for days between granta and lee. At this point the message finally catches up to grant that lee is ready to surrender. You can imagine the heartbreak. You have heard about the growing mens tears. They were real. The north, too, the yankees are disarmed. It is over. By god, it is over. Men have many different reactions. Some in the union are bitter. Home. Just want to go i wont tell you exactly what the last scene is in the book, but i will say it might give you a slightly different insight into appomattox. The new book, out august 29, cover, judgement at appomattox i think all of you who followed me for the first four books. I hope all of the books have given you a new perspective, and a sense of what those men, great and small, were really like. Above all, as the fourth of july approaches, we thank all of those who fought for this country, including north and south in every war. Personally, i thank them. You very much for coming tonight. [applause] time for a few questions leave time for a few questions if anyone would like to ask them. We have a microphone. Back to mykes me rock n roll days. How much input did you have on the sexier cover of the book . That is a story in itself. I picked all the cover art. I am a clean writer. My editor doesnt have to do a lot. He is a wonderful man, former steelworker, put himself through college, Great Stories about everyone from henry miller to harold robbins. He has been added a long time at it a long time. Gettysburg, that is not hard. Richmond ishell in the colorm in of the valley of shadow is harder, but they got digital photos of that as well as the Capital Building in montpelier, vermont. The really hard one was the dam at petersburg. I remember during my childhood, at the centennial, all these wonderful paintings. I remember that picture of the crater. I have never seen another illustration remotely as good. Other people helped me track it down. We could not do it. Nobody could find it. Thes him, my editor, and ast, heof great editors p tracked it down through a recent sale to a private owner, and we were able to get permission. If you look at the covers, i am proud of what is in the books, but i am really proud of everything. We work on the typeface, the design, the maps. They are wonderful maps. Positions, and be patient with me because authors can be maniacal about maps. The answer is i picked out all for, including fouur appomattox. Dont compromise on anything you dont have to. You want typeface that is a pleasure to read. Even borders, it all matters. The thing that matters most to qualitytwo things, our writing, to write and write and write until it is the best you can do, and of course i love the music of the language. The other thing, of course, is historical accuracy. , butare technically novels they are dramatized history to me. The german tradition from wonderfulown to a german woman, who is tough, she stood up to heller, but she would not let him drive her out of her country. She wrote this dramatized history, which is what these books are. They stick closely to the facts. I am not making up wild romances. This is what really happened. What pushes it into the dramatized history, the fiction, is im trying to get inside the heads. We know a lot of what people said, although the history tends to clean it up. How did they speak . You have to read the diaries and letters and the memos until you have got the voices. Fortunately, growing up irb had all the irish voices in the hadous books i already all the irish voices in the various books. It was really a polyglot nation then,even more nation the more so than today with spanish migration. There were entire regiments that spoke german. That is a long way to answer. The answer is i claim the genius of picking out the great art, but hardworking people than me make it happen. Questions. Microphone is coming. The microphone is coming. Over here. I think it was in the dam at describeg where you the concentration between warren warrent, and apparently wanted to do what the russians did to the germans in stalingrad. Hunt would have none of it. Henry hunt is a really balanced person. I am doing research to a prequel to the cycle of books on chancellorsville. One of the problems that occur makes for himself that hooker makes for himself is that he will not listen to henry hunt about how to use artillery and how to deploy it effectively. As a result, the artillery barely gets to where it has to be for the confederate isakthrough on may 2, and still moving on may 3 until a young man is put in charge. Hunt is one of the Unsung Heroes of gettysburg. The way he uses artillery, he gets into an argument with hancock. Hancock does not understand artillery. He just understands troop morale. At 20 of badarren days, and that was probably just one of his bad days. Days, andnty of bad that was probably just wanone of his bad days. Did he have input from sheridan and others about letting the confederates retain their arms at the end . The generous terms of surrender, that is purely ulysses s. Grant. Grant is not a hater. He is not a mean guy. We have this picture that still persists in some quarters of grant the butcher. He cannot stand the sight of blood. His states have to be charred black. He can be coldblooded because you look at all the casualties until grant comes, and what did they achieve . Grant takes command, and he suffers significant casualties, although whatever grant and lee fight as the proportion of forces engaged, lees casualties are heavier. Magicald lincoln have a report. Lincoln has finally found his general. Grant is not a talker. He is a listener. Everythingrbed lincoln has to say. Lincoln loves to get out of washington with the troops. He has really internalized lincolns instructions. Later sherman gets into trouble because when joe johnston surrenders, shermans terms are even grander in some respects, and they have to call them back and redo it. Ulysses s. Grant, i have been reading about it, and largely admiring him all my life, and he is really one of the people that remains an enigma at some level. You can track all the things he does. You can say he did this because of this experience earlier, but at some point he is just an enigma. Even though he wrote this articulate memoir, he is at some level they articulate genius who knows what to do the inarticulate genius knows what to do. Last question, anybody . Thank you all very much for coming. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] interested in American History tv . Visit our website. You can preview upcoming programs and watch college lectures, museum tours, archival films, and more. American history tv at cspan. Org history. , tonight at 10 00 eastern David Osborne on his book, reinventing americas schools, creating a 21st century education system. He is interviewed by the present americas of the fort and institute. Theresident emeritus of fordham institute. The fastest improving cities around the country. Im not saying make every school every Public School a charter, but if we look at the data and what to do what works for kids, lets treat every Public School like a charter. We can call it something else, an innovation school, renaissance school, pilot school, whatever, but lets give it the autonomy so the people that run the school really make the decisions and create a school model that will work for the kids they have to teach. Lets hold them accountable for their performance, and if they do a great job, let them open another school. If they do a terrible job, lets replace them with a stronger operator. Words tonight at 10 00 p. M. Eastern on cspans book tv. This weekend on american worked tv, Frank Johnson for United Press International in the 1960s and the washington ost for 35 years, this interview is from the university of texas at austin. Here is a preview. Decided no one was going to go. It turned out they knew charlie was in the room. All the reporters said this man is one of the only survivors. Let him go out there along with a photographer. Straws,rew photographers in the room, and i drew the short straw. Charlie and i flew from type, and up to port we get up in the air and there is a helicopter sitting on the side. We jump in the chopper. Be theinto what would door gunners seat on the side of the door was open. We took off fairly low. We were maybe 500 feet off the ground, and flew over the compound. As we started to approach the compound, we saw these people outside the pavilion, great colors on. I am shooting. The closer i get to the scene as we come overhead, i realize it was no one moving. No one at all on the ground. In, and in and walk walked into the compound, and there are dead people outside all over the place. The first group i came upon was a group of about six people with a child between them. They were all facedown, arm in arm. The child had sneakers on. They were dead. The first people i photographed, and at the end of the compound it was just a sea of bodies on the inside. I look to my left, and there was a throne, and there was a sign over the throne, and it said those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Watch the entire Program Sunday at 7 00 p. M. And 11 00 p. M. Eastern on American History tv only on cspan3. That one is going to deny dr. Melvin gave senator menendez all these trips on his private jet or the Campaign Contributions were made. No one is really going to deny that senator menendez did lobby with various executive Branch Officials on melvins behalf. Why did it happen . The government alleges it is because of this correct relationship they had. The senator claims it is because dr. Melvin is my friend. Sunday night on q a, former federal prosecutor and George Washington University Law School Professor talks about the ongoing trial of uighurs she new jersey Democrat Robert menendez. Cspans washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Andrew rossng, discusses republican efforts to change the tax code. The author of why are all the black kids sitting together in the cafeteria addresses the history of racism and hate in u. S. Classrooms. And the author of remember the