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The Civil War
Contextualization: The date is April 12, 1861 and the location is Fort Sumter in South Carolina; Confederate forces, states
that seceded from the Union, attacked Union troops stationed at the fort to officially begin the American Civil War. Republican
President Abraham Lincoln led the Northern forces and President Jefferson Davis led the Southern forces. There were many underlying
reasons for the eleven Southern states to secede from the Union, but the main argument was whether the South had the right
to own slaves or not. In the first year the bloodiest battles were fought such as The Battle of Antietam, responsible for
the most casualties of any single-day battle in US history, and The Battle of Shiloh, taking place in Tennessee. Also in the
first year, President Lincoln delivered his Emancipation Proclamation making all slaves free men. Both sides had great generals
commanding the troops; General Robert E. Lee and General Thomas Stonewall Jackson were in charge of the Southern troops while
General, and later President, Ulysses S. Grant was in command of the Northern forces. After many battles and countless lives
lost the Southern army began to thin because of casualties and desertion until finally on April 9, 1865 General Lee surrendered
his Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia. The outcome of the war was the freedom of all slaves,
though African-Americans were still not equal to the Whites, and almost complete destruction of the South. Reconstruction
was the next major period of the US helping to rebuild the South.
Salient Points: Literature was very important before and during the time period of the Civil War. Harpers Weekly was a
magazine that featured stories, articles, cartoons, and other literary works that were pertinent to topics of this time. Before
the Civil War the magazine was liberal between the North and South, especially when dealing with slavery, but as the war broke
out, Harpers Weekly quickly pledged their allegiance to the North. Following the Civil War Harpers Weekly remained big supporters
of the Republican party and helped Ulysses S. Grant get elected into office twice.
Uncle Toms Cabin was an anti-slavery novel written by Harriet Beecher Stowe that was quickly praised by abolitionists
and protested by Southern slave owners, so much so that the book became illegal to own in the South. Many Southern slave-owners
thought the book was largely exaggerated, but Stowe released her second book, A Key To Uncle Toms Cabin, which contained journals,
newspaper articles and other factual documents proving the authenticity her book. The religious themes in the Uncle Toms Cabin
were popular with many religious Whites of the day and helped propel the book to be the best selling novel of the 19th century.
Impacts of the book are still felt today, especially in the way that the book stereotyped African Americans, such as the Pickaninny
children in the book or the happy dark.
The most famous executive order of President Lincoln, the Emancipation Proclamation, was written during the Civil War.
Though many people think that this proclamation freed all slaves, it actually only freed slaves in states that seceded from
the Union, even though these seceded states were not part of the Union, and could not be applied unless the Union won the
war. Also, the Emancipation Proclamation was just a proclamation, not a law; President Lincoln said he had the power to proclaim
this, however, because he was Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy.
Influence on Short Story: The Civil War was the bloodiest and deadliest war for America, and short stories started to
reflect the grotesqueness and horror of the war. Although Poe had shocked and disturbed audiences of his time, no one was
ready for the realness of short stories that came to follow the Civil War. Many immediate authors had fought in the Civil
War and saw first hand the horror and devastation of brothers fighting against each other. One such author was Ambrose Bierce;
he joined the Union forces and fought in the 9th Indiana Volunteer Infantry and later served in the Western theater. His stories,
such as An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, and Killed at Resaca, were first hand accounts of what he saw and experienced during
the war; and not even the sickest mind of Edgar Allen Poe could come up with the nightmare stories of the Civil War.
Connections to Our Class: Obviously the biggest connection to our class is An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, written
by Ambrose Bierce, where Bierce relays what he had seen first hand being a Union soldier. Bierce does not just simply tell
the dull story of a man being hung on a bridge, he goes into detail of what happens between that instant that the plank is
let out and the neck is snapped. The story is quite boring and does not convey the realness of a man being hung without the
plot twists of Bierce and the journey back home of the main character, Peyton, only to find out that it was all a dream and
now Peyton is dead.
Another connection that the Civil War has to our class is with the author Mark Twain. Twain lived in Missouri at the time
of the Civil War, and although the state never joined with the Confederacy, Twain and his friends formed their own local militia,
though they were short lived. His short two weeks in the militia is expressed in his short story, The Private History of a
Campaign that Failed, where a locally formed amateur militia accidentally kills an innocent man because of the failure to
prepare and over eagerness of the militia.
Citations:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_civil_war
http://www.harpweek.com/
http://www.africanaonline.com/slavery_toms_cabin.htm
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/featured_documents/emancipation_proclamation/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambrose_Bierce
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Twain
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