How Coffee Fueled the Civil War

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com ^ | July 9, 2014 | JON GRINSPAN

[NKP_Vet]

It was the greatest coffee run in American history. The Ohio boys had been fighting since morning, trapped in the raging battle of Antietam, in September 1862. Suddenly, a 19-year-old William McKinley appeared, under heavy fire, hauling vats of hot coffee. The men held out tin cups, gulped the brew and started firing again. “It was like putting a new regiment in the fight,” their officer recalled. Three decades later, McKinley ran for president in part on this singular act of caffeinated heroism.

At the time, no one found McKinley’s act all that strange. For Union soldiers, and the lucky Confederates who could scrounge some, coffee fueled the war. Soldiers drank it before marches, after marches, on patrol, during combat. In their diaries, “coffee” appears more frequently than the words “rifle,” “cannon” or “bullet.” Ragged veterans and tired nurses agreed with one diarist: “Nobody can ‘soldier’ without coffee.”

[moose07]

Available as an IV drip i understand. :)

[Monkey Face]

Only for the first hour. After that, I’m fueled and ready too go!

How are you, this fine evening, Moosie?

[rockrr]

It’s been 30 years or better since I left New Orleans and I can still recall the smell of chicory coffee brewing. I hated the stuff!

[txhurl]

But is there *caffeine* in it?

[Renfield]

One summer I worked in Montana on a temporary job, with a crew from various parts of the country. One fellow was from Louisiana and he brought his own coffee with him; it was something that apparently is only sold in south Louisiana (it did not contain chicory, btw). He drank it all day long, kept one of those mugs (that looks like an upside-down funnel) on the dash of his pickup....along with a bottle of Mylanta. He’d take a sip of coffee and a sip of mylanta all day long. One day he convinced me to try some of his coffee and that stuff was like battery acid. I can’t imagine how he had any lining left in his esophagus after drinking that foul brew.

[txhurl]

Unrelated: I took up SanPelligrino Citrus Sparkling water cans a few weeks ago (trying to kick my Coke habit), and had my first 8oz Coke today, it felt like fire burning all the way down.

This from a 40-yr Coke drinker.

[JoeFromSidney]

No can function without coffee!

I bought my wife a tee shirt that reads: "Instant human. Just add coffee." She is a real coffeeholic, and has turned me into one.

[Vietnam Vet From New Mexico]

They used to sell coffee with chicory here in Mississippi, but I have not seen it on the shelves in a long time. It tastes like real bad coffee that has brewed too long.

[rockrr]

I’m definitely not a chicory expert but my web searches say no - no caffeine.

[Octar]

I’ve always read about Louisiana folks using chicory as a coffee substitute....

Every time I drank chicory coffee I got the shits. The same with barley coffee.

[MoochPooch]

Coffee was the impetus behind the whole scientific & intellectual revolutions of the past 3 centuries. The coffeehouses were powerhouses where ideas were exchanged by caffeinated men.

(I love the stuff — can’t start my day without it.)

[NKP_Vet]

“I love the stuff — can’t start my day without it”.

Same here and the stronger the better. I wake up at 4 AM and drink coffee till about 9 AM. How many cups this is, I don’t keep track. I don’t drink it during the day or at night. Both my parents would. My old man drank coffee at every meal, black, and would drink it all day if he could. My mother had a funny little habit of drinking coffee when she ate fish. The rest of us drank iced tea but she had to have coffee with her fish.

[colorado tanker]

The William McKinley Monument at Anteitam:

The inscription reads: "Sergeant McKinley Co. E. 23rd Ohio Vol. Infantry, while in charge of the Commissary Department, on the afternoon of the day of the battle of Antietam, September 17, 1862, personally and without orders served "hot coffee" and "warm food" to every man in the Regiment, on this spot and in doing so had to pass under fire."

Since this was the bloodiest day in American military history, it was quite something for a man safely in the trains to go up to the fighting on his own initiative. He didn't get a medal, but did get a battlefield commission.

[NKP_Vet]

Would love to one day visit the battlefield.

Deo Vindice

GG Grandson of Duncan Black
15 NC Infantry
1843 to 1921

[SunkenCiv]

Serving food and drink while under fire is not everyone’s cu-, uh, never mind...

[uglybiker]

I wake up at 4 AM and drink coffee till about 9 AM. How many cups this is, I don’t keep track.

I have only one BIG cup of coffee per day.

Now, I'll top it off 5, 6, 12 times...but it's the same cup! :-P

[Little Bill]

I have been there four times, learn something new every time, and my family fought with Iowa and Illinois Regiments in the West.

[2ndDivisionVet]

[txhurl]

Happy upcoming Birthday, old fren.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 07/12/2014. Thanks NKP_Vet. If you wanna get down, down on the grounds, caffeine.