> My regret is that Sherman and the rest of Lincoln’s thugs didn’t hang for war crimes. <
Only the defeated get hanged for war crimes, of course. And here one must give the North - and Andrew Johnson in particular - some credit. From the North’s point of view, the entire Confederate leadership had committed the capital crime of treason. Yet not a single one of them was executed.
If I’m not mistaken, the only Confederate executed for war crimes was Henry Wirz, the commandant of Andersonville prison.
the post war/reconstruction period was even more complicated that the cultural and political lead up to the civil war, which was obviously irresolvable without armed conflict. I’d recommend Fateful Lightning, by Allen Guelzo, a noted historian that conservatives can read without wanting to throw the book across the room.
the book I most enjoyed in the past few months was The Civil War of 1812, by Alan Taylor. I had no idea how ignorant I was of that frequently overlooked period after the revolution and before the civil war. that book filled many gaps in my understanding.
The reason that Confederate leaders weren’t tried for treason is the probability the courts would have found them not guilty and secession legal. It was not because Union leaders were good guys, many of them wanted to hang Davis but were uncertain how the trial would turn out.
>>Leaning Right wrote: “From the North’s point of view, the entire Confederate leadership had committed the capital crime of treason. Yet not a single one of them was executed.”
Perhaps the North didn’t want to take the chance that Lincoln’s lies would be exposed during a trial. They were hell-bent on sanitizing Lincoln’s war crimes, as are left-wing “historians” are doing even today.
Mr. Kalamata