Place in mr. Mcleans parlor settled the issue of who would be the victors of the American Civil War but many questions remained unanswered. Soldiers echoed their thoughts in letters and diary entries. While letters of Union Soldiers reflected jubilation, their words also reflected concerns. In the front lines of appomattox chaplain jl mulligan of the 140 pennsylvania wrote a few days later, though the army of Northern Virginia is ours, still grave questions remain to be settled, for which god alone can give the true wisdom and guidance. A confederate are atillerist had an entry on april 11th that lee had surrendered his whole army. Surely the last 24 hours has been a day of the most intense mental anxiety i have ever experienced. Thousands of thoughts have passed through my mind as to what fate awaits my country my family my neighbors, my friends, and myself. And several months earlier morgan w. Carter, with the 28th United States colored troops expressed his concerns in a letter home.
Bothersome debate. And maybe its a symptom of why so Many Americans are kind of put off by the war. Why do you argue about stuff like that . But lets look at those names in a different way. Each of those names represents a perfectly valid perspective on the war. And each is a potential gateway for americans to engage in this story. This worldchanging story. The problem is and for reasons that seem mysterious to many, people who are not inclined toward history the problem is we continue to throw barriers large and subtle in the way of those intellectual gateways into this history. We view the labels, these names as not able to stand side by side but mutually exclusive. If the war is a war of northern aggression, it cant also be a war for emancipation. But, in fact it was. It was all those things. And thats okay. So like our fellow americans our history always challenges us to be better. We draw strength and inspiration from those who risked and gave all for our communitys protection, ou
Exists than the rest of the world combined than all. Society thinks of itself as being nonmilitaristic and i think in our essence we are. Preserves battlefield land to such a degree. Now our traditional view of the civil war was born on the postwar period. The reunification of our nation. Think about the fact in United States capital today are seven statutes to man supporting the rebellion against the federal government during the American Civil War. They dont do that in syria, libya. They do it here. Thats remarkable. Now there are lots of ways and the reconciliation scholars have shone is buried and incomplete in some areas and in some ways. How did that come to pass . Part of the answer is when you want to make up with somebody you find Common Ground. Place where you can both be comfortable. To some degree we did it on a national level. In the aftermath of the civil war few things everybody could agree with or most people and that was that the american soldier be he dressed in gray
Patrick, is as you know his story, in the courthouse in National Historic park. And hes worked with me one of our other speakers, the third speaker today ron wilson, is the person who helped get this seminar together for the first time in 1999, the e 20 0. And then when ron retired patrick took over with working with longwood on this seminar. Patrick has history degrees from Shepherd College and from virginia tech. Hes worked as a Seasonal Employee and probably, as many of you know patrick has written numerous books related to that campaign and other aspects of the war. Several pamphlets. The 30 millionths about lees surrender, cemetery at aplamatics. Probably his most important work is we came to fight, a history of the fifth new york volunteer infantry. He helped finish the vortex of hell. Thats a great book to have. Both of those. Patricks book and the one he helped brian finish. Hes very heavily involved in battlefield preservation, set up the fund with the preservation trust. His
Courthouse civil park. And Liz Ben Varon talks about the ending of the appomattox civil war. This is about 50 minutes. Thank you. Thank you very much. It is a pleasure and honor to be here and share the stage with these wonderful scholars. Im grateful to Patrick Schroeder to having included me. So you have the surrender scene and i would like to turn to the surrender aftermath and the political debates spawned by appomattox and ill argue that lee and grant had distinct visions of what an honorable possess would look like and peace would look like and the two of the myths of the gentlemens meeting of the minds and they had fundamental visions of what an honorable peace would look like and why the war turned out the way it did. But i will try to take us beyond lee and grant as the appomattox drama unfolded the countrymen and women would crowd the scene and vest the surrender with their oesh as pir own aspirations and agendas and dreams and the dream in the eyes of africanamericans and so