How Was the Confederate Catechism Used?

[Pat Young]

I have run across the Confederate Catechism a few times in a few different forms. The Catechism is similar to the old Catholic Catechism in its question and answer format. How was this Catechism used? Was it intended for the use of children? How popular was it?

 

[Pat Young]

If you have never seen it, here is the cover of the Third Edition:

 

[Pat Young]

The SCV provides a link to the 1929 edition:

http://www.scv.org/pdf/ConfederateCatechism.pdf

 

[Pat Young]

The author was President Tyler's son. He was also the president of William and Mary.

 

[Pat Young]

Here is the 1920 edition:
https://digitalarchive.wm.edu/bitst...1/A_Confederate_Catechism_1920.pdf?sequence=1

 

[Pat Young]

The Florida SCV has posted the 1935 Edition. This was the Seventh Edition, so the Catechism must have had some popularity.
http://www.florida-scv.org/Camp1599/news.htm

 

[Pat Young]

From the 7th Edition:

41. What is Lincoln's present reputation founded upon?

It is founded upon his assassination, the need of the North for a hero, his faculty of juggling with words, and the luminous propaganda put out in his favor. Washington, Jefferson, Henry, Madison, Calhoun, and Webster attracted the admiration and recognition of the people from their earliest manhood, but in the opinion of his contemporaries Lincoln never rose above the ordinary politician, and throughout his administration he was subject to bitter and remorseless criticism. Nothing was more bitterly denounced in the North than Lincoln's suspension of the writ of habeas comps in States of the North where the courts were in full operation, and the arrest under his authority of thousands of people who were confined for months in gloomy dungeons, without charge, without trial, and without being allowed counsel. Because of this, Wendell Phillips pronounced Lincoln "a more unlimited despot than the world knows this side of China." The claim that Lincoln was a democrat, that he restored the Union, that he was a friend of the South, is the purest fiction imaginable. The deification of Lincoln commenced with his assassination, and has assumed all the forms of hero worship, without any regard for truth or even probability. The most audacious of these claims is that Lincoln was a friend of the South.

 

[Pat Young]

The author of the pamphlet is Lyon Gardiner Tyler. When I saw that name, I recognized that he was descended from the Gardiner family of Long Island. Here is what Wiki says about his mother:

Julia Gardiner Tyler was born in 1820 on Gardiner's Island off the eastern tip of Long Island, New York, one of the largest privately owned islands in the United States.[1] She was the daughter of David Gardiner, a prominent landowner and New York State Senator from 1824 to 1828, and his wife Juliana née McLachlan. Julia was raised in the New York town of East Hampton as well as in the small hamlet of Bay Shore, Long Island...

 

[Pat Young]

Tyler was a serious scholar. Here is a positive article on him:
http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Tyler_Lyon_Gardiner_1853-1935#start_entry

 

[Pat Young]

William and Mary's history department is named after him:

https://www.wm.edu/as/history/about/index.php

 

[Pat Young]

President John Tyler at age 63 fathered Lyon Gardiner Tyler, who at age 75 had a son Harrison Ruffin Tyler. I have seen videos of lectures on the Tyler presidency recently in which one of President Tylers two grandsons (Lyon Gardiner Tyler Jr.was still alive in 2009) has been in attendance.

 

[unionblue]

If you have never seen it, here is the cover of the Third Edition:

View attachment 66119

Propaganda, no matter how old, is still propaganda.

 

[18thVirginia]

An article on Tyler and his "demythologizing" of Lincoln.

http://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jala/26...rs-war-on-the-mythical?rgn=main;view=fulltext

How very, very Virginian.

"Tyler was also annoyed that Northern history textbooks, which portrayed Lincoln in heroic fashion, were employed in Southern schools. The youth of the South were being fed the Lincoln myth in neighborhood schools! He joined Mildred Lewis Rutherford's effort to replace pro-Northern and pro-Lincoln texts with works more reflective of the unreconstructed South's view of Lincoln and the Civil War.[25]

Tyler thought of himself as a professional historian on a relentless search for the truth, which necessarily entailed deflating the Lincoln myth. He believed that Northerners, as the winners of the Civil War, had written all the resulting history, and had done so in a fashion that was little more than propaganda that was both inaccurate and painted a distorted image of the South. Lincoln was turned into a saint he never was. Only Lyon Tyler could rescue truth from layers of fiction by scrupulously adhering to the truth. "Real history," he declared, "cares nothing for the blare of trumpets and the shouts of the propagandists—it cares only for facts." [26]"

 

[Pat Young]

Propaganda, no matter how old, is still propaganda.

Tyler says that it is the opposite.

 

[MajGenl.Meade]

FWIW there's also this http://www.florida-scv.org/Camp1599/news.htm

Questions & Answers
Confederate Catechism
Y'all,
I recently acquired a fascinating pamphlet called A Confederate Catechism, The War for Southern Self-Government. It is the Seventh Edition: Enlarged, July, 1935 and last reprinted in 1984.
The man who authored this had the privilege of a very unique perspective of this war that gave hope for the continuance of the American ideals of Constitutional government. He was the son of an American President, John Tyler, who also was a member of the Confederate congress. Unfortunately, John Tyler died before he could take his seat. There are 46 questions and answers and an addenum. Below is a brief biographical sketch of L.G. Tyler.
— Cdr. Jimmy L. Shirley Jr.

Lyon Gardiner Tyler, 1853-1935. He began his career as a lawyer, but only practiced law for a few years. He earned a reputation as a writer and educator. In 1885, he published a two-volume work, "The Letters and Times of the Tylers" In this and other books, he worked to vindicate his father's presidency and career as well as the South in general. He was a professor of literature at the College of William and Mary. He served as President of the College of William and Mary from 1888 until 1919. He was the 13th son of John Tyler, the 10th President of the United States. One of the last acts of his presidency, on his last day in office, was to sign in Florida as the 27th State.

After a brief scan, I'd say his strongest point might be that the extension of slavery to the territories was a far more significant burr under the South's blanket than the issue of "slavery" per se. That and the failure of the North to enforce the part of the laws that the North didn't like - i.e. the Fugitive Slave laws - IMO

 

[Rebel_Giratina]

After a brief scan, I'd say his strongest point might be that the extension of slavery to the territories was a far more significant burr under the South's blanket than the issue of "slavery" per se. That and the failure of the North to enforce the part of the laws that the North didn't like - i.e. the Fugitive Slave laws - IMO

No argument there. Those were the issues that led directly to the ACW - the powderkeg that set things off. But take away the presence of slavery on the North American continent and you don't have those issues in the first place.

 

[Dave Wilma]

Tyler was a serious scholar. Here is a positive article on him:
http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Tyler_Lyon_Gardiner_1853-1935#start_entry

In reading the article from Encyclopedia Virginia the author only tangentially mentions Tyler's "well known... defense of southern causes" but does not include The Confederate Catechism among his works. I wonder if the author toned down this aspect of Tyler's work for his client.

Historians are entitled to offer conclusions based on the evidence. I regard The Confederate Catechism as propaganda that does not contribute to rational discussion of events.

 

[southern blue]

From the 7th Edition:

41. What is Lincoln's present reputation founded upon?

It is founded upon his assassination, the need of the North for a hero, his faculty of juggling with words, and the luminous propaganda put out in his favor. Washington, Jefferson, Henry, Madison, Calhoun, and Webster attracted the admiration and recognition of the people from their earliest manhood, but in the opinion of his contemporaries Lincoln never rose above the ordinary politician, and throughout his administration he was subject to bitter and remorseless criticism. Nothing was more bitterly denounced in the North than Lincoln's suspension of the writ of habeas comps in States of the North where the courts were in full operation, and the arrest under his authority of thousands of people who were confined for months in gloomy dungeons, without charge, without trial, and without being allowed counsel. Because of this, Wendell Phillips pronounced Lincoln "a more unlimited despot than the world knows this side of China." The claim that Lincoln was a democrat, that he restored the Union, that he was a friend of the South, is the purest fiction imaginable. The deification of Lincoln commenced with his assassination, and has assumed all the forms of hero worship, without any regard for truth or even probability. The most audacious of these claims is that Lincoln was a friend of the South.

I would think the truth is somewhere in between. He most certainly was not a saint and he wasn't universally popular but at the same time I believe he was the right man for the times. Dying suddenly does have a way of mythologizing someone though....just look around at the way society treats pop/movie stars who die young or suddenly. I would say similar things happened to Lee and Stonewall Jackson. They are put on pedestals and treated like plaster saints and don't you dare criticize them (even though their friends, the press and the people who served under them did).

President John Tyler at age 63 fathered Lyon Gardiner Tyler, who at age 75 had a son Harrison Ruffin Tyler. I have seen videos of lectures on the Tyler presidency recently in which one of President Tylers two grandsons (Lyon Gardiner Tyler Jr.was still alive in 2009) has been in attendance.

Sounds similar to what happened in my family although my dad was NOT that old!

 

[YankeeDoodle]

The SCV provides a link to the 1929 edition:

http://www.scv.org/pdf/ConfederateCatechism.pdf

This The Confederate Catechism is unmitigated ****! Sorry but that is the only word I can think of ...its like those Holocaust deniers that claim Hitler never killed any Jews... A shameful book of lies and slander probably written by someone who would have made a great talk show host!
Does it mention the happy dancing slaves who loved their kind masters but were taken away by those evil Yankees and that Dictator Lincoln? I got through the first page and that was as much as I could take...


PS I did return to read the rest,,,kind of like the sickening fascination you feel when viewing a horrible automobile accident...

 

[BillO]

I have run across the Confederate Catechism a few times in a few different forms. The Catechism is similar to the old Catholic Catechism in its question and answer format. How was this Catechism used? Was it intended for the use of children? How popular was it?

Thanks for posting. I don't remember ever hearing of this before.