Posted on 12/27/2006 2:50:04 PM PST by LibertyBelt
Can any good brothers from Maine or Alabama confirm to me the source of this quote, said to be found in a book written by Joshua Chamberlain.
An Amazon review says this is found on page 21 in the book, but a search of other internet links does not mention this letter as much as one would imagine. Here is the Amazon quote/review:
A letter written to Chamberlain...by a Confederate combatant of the 15th Alabama Regiment which assaulted Little Round Top on July 2...is astonishing(p.21).The former rebel soldier simply states that he COULD HAVE SHOT CHAMBERLAIN TWICE during the battle but spared him: "I rested my gun on the rock and took steady aim. I started to pull the trigger but some ...notion stopped me.Then I got ashamed of my weakness and went through the same motions again. I had you,perfectly certain. But that same ... something shut right down on me.I couldn't pull the trigger, and gave it up--that is,your life. I am glad of it now, and hope you are...Yours truly"
Was ever such a letter written? Can anyone check if you have the book? My son needs it for a college essay. He wants to argue what would have happened if the bullet had struck Chamberlain, and the 20th Maine would have lost the left flank at Little Round Top? Would there be two nations in the US today?
Thanks!
While Gettysburg is a grand drama, full of sturm und drang and derring do, in any strategic sense it pales in comparison to Vicksburg.
While Lee was brilliant tactically, he was devoid of strategic sense. He had the capacity to make the war long and bloody but no realistic chance of winning.As each day passed after Chancellorsville the CSA got weaker and the Union got stronger.
In functional terms the worse enemies of the South were RE Lee and John Wilkes Booth. Lee because of his tactical brilliance but strategic blindness and Booth becasue he killed the only man standing between The South and A Brutual Reconstruction scheme.
Small point and I guess its nitpicking, but his name was Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain. He went by his middle name.
According to Mr. Longstreet, whom admired Lee a great deal, Lee though brilliant was too expensive for the south. The south could not afford the costly victories which Lee achieved.
I agree, Vicksburg was by far a greater loss to the south.
Deo Vindice
I am fascinated by the notion of great men in service to a bad cause. Lee is the supreme example. Zhukov is another, Rommel. Napoleon perhaps.
IN the aftermath one of the saddest realizations is there will never be a great biography of Lee. Once the process of military sainthood occurs the reputation of the saint is so jealously guarded by the faithful any hope of an honest and revealing biography becomes impossible. Lee became the marble man well over a century ago.
I think in most cases (except for Napoleon) you will find men bound by duty rather than loyality to cause. You do your job because you are loyal to your country in spite of what idiot's in charge.
I picked up a copy of Lee's biography, but I could not read it. I think the author worshiped Lee as god. Longsteet gives a much better and more honest perspective.
Zhukov, now that would be interesting if an honest book could be found.
I don't believe the cause of states' rights was "bad." But I don't believe Lee was fighting for that cause so much as he was acknowledging his debt to his beloved Virginia.
My judgment of Lee's military record is almost exactly the opposite: that he was strategically brilliant and too aggressive, tactically. He knew that it would take a major victory on northern soil to create the conditions for southern independence.
Where I think Lee can be criticized is for his tactical handling of his Army -- he nearly always assumed the tactical offensive -- and so nearly always lost more troops than he could afford. To be fair, there wasn't a good tactical solution available in the 1860's to negate the casualty-producting technology of the rifled-musket.
Yep...You note the problem. Every biography of Lee was hagiography from 1870 onwards. What we get is not the man but a marble statue in commemoration.Lee himself was not effusive and demonstrative.Having written no autobiography and everyone else being idolators he gets lost in the mists.
Well...I don't cotton much to the " State's Rights" Theory. I think the war was about economics.Much of the South's fungible capital ( 22-27%) was tied up in slaves. The supply of slaves was growing while the demand remained flat.Limiting slavery meant those assets would have declining value ( more slaves and less demand= less value) Price data from the period supports the theory. Then the abolitionists come along and send the message we not only intend to bankrupt you by limiting the value of your property we intend to sever your property from you by force and paint you as immoral and hypocritical simultaneously.
The abolitionists weren't trying to bankrupt anyone. You yourself have said that it was the market that had reduced the value of slaves.
As to the severing of property by force, when the "property" is another human being, I'm not sure that's indefensible. And there's no need to paint slavery as immoral; it is inherently.
But governments not being moral institutions, the matter at hand had to be cast in political terms. So the desire of southern slaveholders to maintain their source of labor became a matter of states deciding whether to allow slavery or forbid it. By extension, it also became a debate on whether the federal government could overrule the states, and what recourse was available to the states should it do so.
I know that this is a matter of some debate, but that's my view.
How much more equitable could it have been? Take any other rebellion in history that you care to mention and compare the fate of the losing side in that cause with what happened to the south.
Don't hold your breath. "Gods and Generals" was such a box office bust that Ted Turner pulled his funding for "Last Full Measure".
Had McClellan won he wouldn't have been inaugurated until March 1865. By that time the southern cause was all but over anyway. Besides, McClellan had repudiated the Democrat peace plank in the platform before being nominated.
ping
Interesting discussion.We now have the use of that stellar tool ,hindsight, to guide us. Using it I have always thought the Confederacy lost a superb opportunity to end the war after Chancellorsville and negotiated a peace from a postion of strength.
1. The abolition of slavery on a phase out basis and compensation at fair market value.( a 20- 25 year payout basis)
2. An international board of tariff arbitration between the CSA and the Union.
3. The CSA returns to the Union without prejudice.
4. No reconstruction or occupation.
Enough honor their for everyone.
Unfortunately,the CSA got "Victory Disease" after Chancellorsville and Davis and Lee thought they were invincible.
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