Summer reading list. Send us your choices at booktv is our twitter handle. Post on our facebook page, facebook. Com booktv or send an email to booktv cspan. Org. What is on your Summer Reading list, booktv wants to know. Booktv covered a book shoot after it was called the confederate battle flag a historian at the American Civil War museum in richmond. Ten years ago, what has changed with regard attitudes on the confederate battle flag in the last ten years. The question is how much change in the last ten days . Met has been the remarkable shift in attitudes or a remarkable period for the history of the battle flag as an object of discussion. Ten years ago when the book came out still fresh some of the controversies that occurred in states like alabama and South Carolina where compromises had been reached to retire flags, flags from the capital of those two states to other positions on the Capitol Grounds and they were contextualized with historical displays by confederate monuments in South Carolina and flag display explicitly historical on the old Capitol Grounds in alabama and those talking about removing those. The sale of battle flags and battle flag memorabilia call ma all kind of largescale markets, addressed the question of the use of the battle flag on license plates issued by federal states to the sons of confederate veterans. To that point the lower level Appellate Courts upheld the presence of the flag on license plates and and last week, the u. S. Supreme court designated at as official government speech and had the right to regulate presence on the flag and what happened in the last week, the evolution of opinion or change of opinion as a result of murders, church and South Carolina influence opinion further. It has been a very eventful week. All these things relevant to the things i wrote about ten years ago. Is the reaction to the battle flag as a historian, deal feel that is a reaction to the battle flag that is legitimate . Guest as a historian, the angle of my book the angle of the exhibit what the museum did ten years before has always been to try to provide background and prospective, not to recommend to anyone what they think or do about it but based on the premise that in order to be an intelligent participant in the discussion, it would behoove you to understand the full history of the Confederate Flag, history not only as the confederate symbol during the war but how it has been used for continues to be used and therefore the perceptions and meanings of that use creates and generates and studied the history and decide what to do, i see this as what is happening today as a continuation of a longterm process. A kind of generic process in any culture of the discussion about what does or does not belong in public spaces in our symbolic landscape and how we go about deciding it, who participates and how we decide that. I dont try to recommend, but to the observer and to think about the interest of the story, and their own part of the story. Ones own viewpoint what history is relevant here and what it means to me and generalize to some profound single capital t truth about the meaning of the flag and i think it belongs where it belongs and realize from a commonsense standpoint lot of other people involved in this discussion they dont share your perspective why it was viewed to understand why they do or do not spend its stand share your perspective. Host john coski is his story of the American Civil War museum and author of the confederate battle flag americas most embattled emblem. Booktv coverage john coski ten years ago on his book and we want to show that to you now. In recent years the confederate battle flag has become as much a news item as a historic artifact. Intense public debate over this provocative image has polarized americans about its meaning. It is viewed with a widest range of demotions, pride, fear, anger, nostalgia, discussed. You can hardly pick up on newspaper without reading about some incidents involving the Confederate Flag. Case in point when the controversy last week in a nearby County School about students wearing confederate symbols. That is the subject many years after the civil war, it clearly needs a cool dispassionate perspective to be understood is that is what our program is about today because our speaker has written the definitive account. His book the confederate battle flag americas most embattled emblem tells the story of the flag from its creation during the civil war to the present day. The author will suggest how this symbol which has stirred so many conflicting emotions in so many people might provide americans with the Common Ground of a shared and complex history and a chance to buy the book in the museum versus the lecture. John coski was born in california but he likes to say he became a naturalized va citizen at 83. He did undergraduate work at Mary Washington college and a masters and ph. D. From william and mary. He is the author of several books, can include an account of the army of the potomac at Berkeley Plantation and one about the james river squadron. John coski has worked at several civil war sites. And Mary Washington. Since 1988, in the library and research. For any historian interested in the collection at the museum of the confederacy. From personal experience i would like to take this public opportunity to thank him for his help with research on my book. On as encyclopedic knowledge on the civil war and generally has researchers. You can see results in the acknowledgements section of virtually every book published on the civil war. Every book on the war that touches on virginia bears the thank you to john for his advice and counsel. Please welcome a good friend of the Virginia Historical society and many of us in the hall today, dr. John coski who will speak to was on his latest book the confederate battle flag americas most embattled emblem. [applause] thank you all very much for inviting me. How is the sound here . Am i audible to all of you in the back of the room if i speak like this . As nelson said i have been part of the Historical Society family for many years. My wife and i are members of the Historical Society and have been for 14 years and spent many days sitting out where you all are now listening to lectures so is a real honor to be here. I feel like i have finally made it. The Historical Society has been for many decades has been the measure of good scholarship in the state of virginia. Nelson may not remember 20 years ago i submitted an article for the virginia magazine of history and biography. He didnt exactly reject it but sent it back with some helpful suggestion on how to revise it. I am still thinking about the revisions. This opportunity to speak gives me an opportunity to rectify terrible oversight. Nelson mentioned his acknowledgments in the book and i know how flattering it is to be mentioned. I rose acknowledgments in this book that read like a bad Academy Award acceptance speech, went on and on and failed to thank the Virginia Historical society for the research i did here and a couple key collections and also want to thank dr. Brian for a loan and a photograph to the research. And the library for help in researching this book and many other projects over the years and by thanking you all here in front of the Television Cameras and several hundred people i am reaching far more people than i would have divided in the pages of the book. I dont feel so bad after all. The topic of the book and of the talk is much about Current Events as it is about history. It is both. You will find it in some major bookstores under current affairs. Because of that passion that surrounds everything nelson described, mikey diss passion which is real, what does the flag mean to you . Some tongue in cheek but completely joy. What does the flag mean to me . It means 12 years of work working on the book. That is what it means to me. That is the personal association it has there wracking my brain and thinking back a couple decades, there are encounters with the flag that perhaps shaped my perception. They all go back a ways but are worth repeating. I was a typical civil war nerd in tidewater, va. And i do what we all do at some point when we get our drivers license, got into a car with my best friend and drove in southern virginia to the Civil War Battlefield from fredericksburg, manassas, up the valley, back home by appomattox and st. Petersburg, and tie it to the aerial of my 1970 toyota and confederate battle flag, the blue cross flag. And another ten years or so. A yearandahalf later, a good country boy had on the wall inside wall of our dormitory a confederate battle flag, 3 x 5 feet or so. A good southern boy and that is his way of saying he was a good southern boy. And complaining the flagman racism and slavery, how dare we have this flag on our wall . John beg to differ and affected their no further incidents i recall the rest of the semester. A yearandahalf after that roseanna and i were invited to appoint party in the late 70s. And quite fit the image, no peer things anywhere on my body, something to do with rebellion. I took one of my tshirts and tore it and got a confederate battle flag and carried it or attached it, cant remember which but it spoke to rebellion. Within the space of three years, these encounters in a sense i had witnessed or professed several different contexts and meetings of the flag. The south and the civil war it means the confederacy, it means the south according to my roommate, it means recess and and slavery according to our friend, it means rebellion, a symbolic middle finger of the punk rockers of 1990, it means all of the above. I became acquainted with various meanings when i was in college before i made this the subject of an intense study. I dont think it influence the but perhaps it did. When i came to a museum in 1988 those headlines nelson referred to about what the headline writers refers to as flag flaps were going strong. You really couldnt read a newspaper without reading something about a controversy at the local level, state level or national level. This was the beginning of this wave of controversy. At a lower level occurring even today. At the museum we decided to provide a service by doing an exhibit about the history of the flag to provide background and perspective. What do people need to know to understand the controversy is occurring about the flag, to give it in objective and unbiased fashion as possible background and perspective to allow people to better understand the issues of the day, various perspectives and means attached to the flag over 140 years 130 years then, of the flags life. The exhibit am battle emblem ran two years and traveled to South Carolina. It was such a fascinating topic that i continued research on my own hook from the mid 1990s until the book came out earlier this year. What i would like to do for a little while is to give you what is necessarily a broad overview, very Broad Strokes about some of the points, i suspect there will be some questions too as i locate abroad points in the question and answer period because this is an overview. We had a few slides. I think i can get this right. There you go. A few click slides to make points about the historical evolution of the battle flag. Start with some definitions here because this flag has become known as the Confederate Flag. Most of the know it was not the confederate battle flag or the Confederate Flag. What i am talking about when i say the Confederate Flag or confederate battle flag i am oversimplifying by necessity. Any variation of this flag, the red background, blue cross with white stars, the cross was technically a self here, heralded device, not a cross that known as the southern cross, in fused with all kinds of religious significance which is ironic because the man who designed it and promoted it wanted it to be a nonsectarian, nonreligious symbol. He turned the cross from the upper right Georgian Cross to the st. Andrews cross and made a heralded device so that it wouldnt at the request of the Jewish Community of South Carolina, charleston which requested the National Flag of the confederacy not have a religious device on it. This was first promoted as the National Flag of the confederacy in 1861. As a lot of you know there are all kinds of options of size and shape and details. This looks like what people referred to as the naval jack. In fact it is the army of tennessee pattern battle flag for those keeping score, that was used in late 1860s 36465. Is not a naval back at all but these variations and there are so many of them are important to the history of the flag during wartime but this important history of the flag as a symbol over the 140 years of its life which is my purview in the book and in this talk so when i referred to the battle flag i am referring to this flag in whatever size, shape and pattern. One thing this flag is not to take nothing away from this lecture, realize this flag is not the stars and bars. This is the stars and bars. I know it is tempting to call the other stars and bars because it rolls off of the tongue and there are stars and bars but this is the flag that was known as the stars and bars and known as the first National Flag of the confederacy adopted in march of 1861. It resembles basically the stars and stripes. That is the liver was delivered and is extremely important for understanding the history of the Confederate Flag as a whole and the importance of the confederate battle flag as southerners, white southerners in 1861 did not consider themselves to be rejecting the old union. They were among the most patriotic of americans in the antebellum years and they said let the northerners and lincoln government have their foolish kinky doodle but let us keep the flag of the beloved old united states, the old union. The suggestion of a flag the close and resemble the stars and stripes was very deliberate and in a sense was a manifestation of southern airs wean themselves away from the symbols of the once united nation, but weaning is the critical word here. This flag was the National Flag and also employed on the battlefield by armies of the confederacy in the first months of the board. The flag that was meant to be distinctive and easily seen and identified on a battlefield that resembled so closely the flag of the opposing army would create some problems and indeed it did. There were incidents of friendly fire the first battle of manassas and other certainly it early civil war battles and the confederate generals throughout the south to adopt other patterns a barrel from patterns that distinctive and would serve better more effectively as battle flags and that is the origin of this. This is an example, classic example of the army of Northern Virginia pattern battle flag from the museum of the confederacys collection. The largest in existence if you havent come to see it please do. The square pattern as opposed the rectangular one was used by what became robbery bes army in regina and associated closely with lees army. The first issues were caught in bentinck. Being associated with the most Successful Army of the confederacy, the one that kept alive made it an important symbol to the confederate people as a whole. More importantly really the Flags Association with soldiers a battle Flags Association with soldiers who marched, fought and died under it was important to one distending why people revere this flag today, why so many people review the symbol because it was consecrated by the soldiers and the blood of the soldiers and so closely associated with the soldiers. If you want to understand the passion put a flag that exists today you must understand that association but is it fair to say that is the end of the story . That this flag was only the flag of the soldier . It really isnt true. It would be nice if people began to write after in the war that this was the flag of the soldiers aged not be confused by the flag of the nation or one what might think about the confederacy, but again only if you believe the confederacy is so closely associated with slavery. Leave the battle flag out of it. That would be a nice way to resolve differences if it were true. Is not true. Here is the second National Flag of the confederacy adopted in may at the king 63 and the story behind this is the first National Flag the stars and bars became unpopular when rejected by the opinion makers of the south but the same reason it was adopted in the first place, it resembled the stars and stripes, the stars and bars as i mentioned earlier was the flag by which southerners been themselves off of the symbols of the united states. As their sense of independence group, battles became more intense and lives were lost and southerners began to think of themselves as confederates they needed a symbol of what headline writers referred to as mature independence rather than confirmed independence. When the debate began in spring of 1863 to adopt a new National Flag the only pattern that was discussed was the battle flag so closely associated with the soldier and the army of Northern Virginia. There was