-- Soldier's Quotes from the War

[thea_447]

"It is stated in books and papers that Southern children read and study that all the blood-shedding and destruction of property of that conflict was because the South rebelled without cause to preserve human slavery, and that their defeat was necessary for free government and the welfare of the human family.

As a Confederate soldier and as a citizen of Virginia, I deny the charge, and denounce it as a calumny. We were not rebels; we did not fight to perpetuate human slavery, but for our rights and privileges under a government established over us by our fathers and in defense of our homes."
-- Colonel Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, at the dedication of the Confederate monument at Old Chapel in Clarke County, Virginia.

[hoosier]

The following comes from columnist George Will:

At the battle of Shiloh in April 1862, a wounded soldier who had been told to leave his weapon and go to the rear soon returned, saying, "Gimme another gun. This blame fight ain't got any rear."

[johan_steele]

"Good God, where does the South find such a class of corrupt liars to call leaders? Give Georgia men who were willing to give their all to the cause. I don't mean the shirkers, dodgers and outright cowards who now call themselves veterans of the War; I mean the MEN, who fought and were willing to die for their country. Those are the men I respect of the South. To hell with the rest."

Captain Aldretch, US Army. Clarifying his view of post-reconstruction Georgia.

[thea_447]

Charles A. Dana, U.S. Assistant Secretary of War, said after the war, "We think after the testimony given that the Confederate authorities and especially Mr. Davis (President Jefferson Davis) ought not to be held responsible for the terrible privations, suffering, and injuries which our men had to endure while kept in Confederate Military Prisons; the fact is unquestionable that while Confederates desired to exchange prisoners, to send our men home, and to get back their own men, General Grant steadily and strenuously resisted such an exchange."

[unionblue]

"I would sooner stay here...than have our Government acede to their demands in regard to the negro soldier...Anyone, whatever may be his color, who wears the blue of Uncle Sam is entitled to protection, even if thousands have to be sacrificed in protecting him."

James Gaunt Derrickson, Union Army Captain, prisoner of war when the Union refused a prisoner exchange unless the Confederates treated black prisoners according to the rules of war, 1864.

Unionblue

[thea_447]

"I enlisted with the hope and desire of rendering aid to the great and glorious cause of Southern independence, prompted by principle, religiously believing that the time had arrived when we were justifiable in resisting Northern aggression, and even at the expense of this once unparalleled Republic. As for my part I don't want to survive a subjugation of my country." --Colonel J. Goodner

[thea_447]

"Resolved, that the war is not waged on our part, in any spirit of oppression, or for any purpose of conquest, or for interfering with the rights, or established institutions of these States, but to defend and maintain the supremacy of the Constitution, and to preserve the Union, with all the dignity and rights of the several States unimpaired." --Federal Congress, 1861; Memoirs of Service Afloat, Adm. Raphael Semmes, page 62

[thea_447]

"If we oppose force to force, we cannot win, for their resources are greater than ours. We must substitute esprit for numbers." --Gen. J.E.B.Stuart

[hoosier]

At the battle of Harpers Ferry in September 1862, the Union garrison of over 12,000 men was surrounded and captured by Confederate forces led by Stonewall Jackson, with help from McLaws, Walker, and A.P. Hill.

Following the surrender, Jackson rode out to review the Union troops that were to be paroled. Jackson, never especially particular about his appearance, was wearing a somewhat dirty and bedraggled homespun gray suit and the usual battered kepi, riding a relatively nondescript cream-colored horse (apparently not Little Sorrel).

One of the Union soldiers spoke out and said, "Boys, he's not much to look at, but if we'd had him, we wouldn't have been caught in this trap."

[thea_447]

Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain
(Confederate surrender at Appomattox...)

...On they come, with the old swinging route step and swaying battle flags. In the van, the proud Confederate ensign. Before us in proud humiliation stood the embodiment of manhood; men whom neither toils and sufferings, nor the fact of death 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? On our part not a sound of trumpet more, nor roll of drum; not a cheer, nor word, nor whisper or vain-glorying, nor motion of man, but an awed stillness rather, and breath-holding, as if it were the passing of the dead!