The letter below is my take on the subject and I actually got it published in Ronald Reagan’s favorite paper, The Washington Times.
Demeaning Our Military Heritage
This country owes as much of its enviable martial heritage to the South as the North. But now to serve popular morality, we must banish from history the Confederate battle flag and those who served under it. Responding to these assertions, I quote Joshua Chamberlain who received the Confederate surrender at Appomattox.
“Before us in proud humiliation stood the embodiment of manhood: men whom neither toils and sufferings, nor the fact of death, nor disaster, nor hopelessness could bend from their resolve; standing before us now, thin, worn, and famished, but erect, and with eyes looking level into ours, waking memories that bound us together as no other bond. Was not such manhood to be welcomed back into a Union so tested and assured?”
Winston Churchill commented concerning American entry into WW II that victory was then assured, because our Civil War demonstrated the tenacity required to defeat the Nazis.
Joshua Chamberlain
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Joshua_Chamberlain
Those who never served are in an eternal search to rationalize their decisions. They are in an eternal state of guilt because they never stood for anything except for self absorption. They want all of us to embrace their self serving ideology, but we will never do. We think them weak and beyond contempt. I’m glad that I am not one of them.
Great letter. I love the Chamberlain quote-makes me so proud of the southern soldiers, and the northern ones for their recognition of them-and I love the Churchill quote. I’d heard the part where he said that our entry assured victory, but I’d never heard the rest before, about the Civil War and American tenacity, it’s a good point and a great compliment.