Never had a chance.

[wausaubob]

I've heard several people call him a "lost causer". I disagree. He speaks about the war as if he lived during that time period... and he's just a pleasure to listen to. One of the reasons Ken Burns chose Foote was because his ability to captivate an audience with his storytelling, and his incredible memory regarding small details of the war, or quotes from the soldiers.

Much of his narrative is about the Confederacy experienced the war, and its heroes, like General Forrest. But he had read also the period newspapers and magazines in the north, and his comments in the documentary are about how fast the US was modernizing. Even if the Confederacy had achieved some type independence, the US going to bypass the south. I always understood that since Foote had seen Mississippi poverty first hand, he knew that as war became increasingly industrialized, the Confederacy would eventually be swept away by a militarized party taking control of the US.

 

[wausaubob]

Far more importantly forty percent of the South's population is enslaved which provides the Union with invaluable men for military service and or labor.
A significant amount of the white population is not willing to fight and die for the Confedracy quite the opposite with 104k enlisting in the Union Army.
If a smaller section big a country wants to seceede it needs all hands on deck not oppressed forty percent of it's population based on skin color.
Leftyhunter

Because the Secessionists actually beleived that the Union would quickly capitulate and have no stomach for war after maybe a few short sharp battles. One major secessionst leader said he would drink all the blood spilled in a thimble.
Leftyhunter

But the Confederate leadership was willing to take that gamble. They were thinking they could win a big Napoleonic victory before their society began to unravel. The miscalculated because the did not think carefully about Missouri and the far west, and they miscalculated how long their coastal and river forts would last against big naval guns and combined arms operations.

 

[Rhea Cole]

The fall of Fort Pulaski at the mouth of the Savannah River is a useful way to think about the Southern existential weakness in 1860. Engineered by RE Lee himself, Fort Pulaski was unassailable when it was built. The CSA garrison could do no more than hide as 30 pdr Parrott bolts battered down the fort's wall. They had no choice but surrender without firing an effective shot. Technology had made every masonry fort in the world obsolete. As events would make plain, all those forts that the nascent CSA was so eager to capture were relics of a bygone age.

Jefferson Davis made a point of saying that he was a rebel, not a revolutionary. The SC hotheads went to war secure in the belief that a lifestyle that a First Century Roman would have recognized as normal was divinely ordained. The industrial might symbolized by the rifle bolts that battered down the wall at FT Pulaski was never a factor in their thinking.
It is very hard to see what is coming if you are always looking backwards.

 

[CowCavalry]

As a way of quickly reporting information already known to the opponent, it caused a large acceleration in the pace of war.

Not understanding the first part of this sentence.

3. With respect to Harvard v Yale boat races, its just a reference to how little the Civil War displaced life in the US. Colleges functioned.

Contrast that with schools of the South, like the University of Mississippi, where almost all of the student body enlisted.

 

[Crazy Delawares]

I believe Gen. Sherman essentially said the same thing before the war started. He warned the South about what would happen.

 

[Rhea Cole]

Not understanding the first part of this sentence.

Contrast that with schools of the South, like the University of Mississippi, where almost all of the student body enlisted.

Yes, all 72 of them enlisted. More telling, when AP Stewart reestablished the college after the war, it became a coeducational institution. The plight of young women who had no hope of finding husbands was the driving force for such a radical cultural change. The Mississippi declaration of why it seceded is very brief & declares the preservation of slavery as the cause for which they seceded. How ironic that at U Miss the result was both the liberation of the slaves & education of young women... something inconceivable five years earlier.

 

[wausaubob]

The fall of Fort Pulaski at the mouth of the Savannah River is a useful way to think about the Southern existential weakness in 1860. Engineered by RE Lee himself, Fort Pulaski was unassailable when it was built. The CSA garrison could do no more than hide as 30 pdr Parrott bolts battered down the fort's wall. They had no choice but surrender without firing an effective shot. Technology had made every masonry fort in the world obsolete. As events would make plain, all those forts that the nascent CSA was so eager to capture were relics of a bygone age.

Jefferson Davis made a point of saying that he was a rebel, not a revolutionary. The SC hotheads went to war secure in the belief that a lifestyle that a First Century Roman would have recognized as normal was divinely ordained. The industrial might symbolized by the rifle bolts that battered down the wall at FT Pulaski was never a factor in their thinking.
It is very hard to see what is coming if you are always looking backwards.

The US could bring their guns to Fort Pulaski by sea. They could be deployed onshore, or remain on the naval vessels. The caliber and munitions used were varied, but industrialized.
A few Confederate naval people, and General Lee, were not surprised by the increase in range and accuracy of large caliber naval guns.

 

[wausaubob]

The fall of Fort Pulaski at the mouth of the Savannah River is a useful way to think about the Southern existential weakness in 1860. Engineered by RE Lee himself, Fort Pulaski was unassailable when it was built. The CSA garrison could do no more than hide as 30 pdr Parrott bolts battered down the fort's wall. They had no choice but surrender without firing an effective shot. Technology had made every masonry fort in the world obsolete. As events would make plain, all those forts that the nascent CSA was so eager to capture were relics of a bygone age.

Jefferson Davis made a point of saying that he was a rebel, not a revolutionary. The SC hotheads went to war secure in the belief that a lifestyle that a First Century Roman would have recognized as normal was divinely ordained. The industrial might symbolized by the rifle bolts that battered down the wall at FT Pulaski was never a factor in their thinking.
It is very hard to see what is coming if you are always looking backwards.

Therefore the price of the counterattack at Shiloh, to attempt to kill Grant and demolish his army, included the US breakthrough at Island No. 10 and an insufficient garrison to counter attack at Fort Pulaski. It was followed by the successive loss of New Orleans, the town of Pensacola, and the town of Norfolk. Not long after that they Confederates withdrew from Corinth and Memphis. But journalism and history stated it was no big deal and the south could survive, though it never recovered any of those towns and forts.

 

[wausaubob]

A few military insiders knew that modern naval guns could fire both solid shot and exploding shells with great accuracy. Not only were unarmored wooden ships obsolete, but masonry forts soon joined the past too.

 

[Rhea Cole]

The US could bring their guns to Fort Pulaski by sea. They could be deployed onshore, or remain on the naval vessels. The caliber and munitions used were varied, but industrialized.
A few Confederate naval people, and General Lee, were not surprised by the increase in range and accuracy of large caliber naval guns.

I have no idea what Gen Lee's thoughts were when they started putting up batteries far outside of the range of Pulaski's cannon. Reportedly, the garrison laughed at such incompetence.

 

[Rhea Cole]

Therefore the price of the counterattack at Shiloh, to attempt to kill Grant and demolish his army, included the US breakthrough at Island No. 10 and an insufficient garrison to counter attack at Fort Pulaski. It was followed by the successive loss of New Orleans, the town of Pensacola, and the town of Norfolk. Not long after that they Confederates withdrew from Corinth and Memphis. But journalism and history stated it was no big deal and the south could survive, though it never recovered any of those towns and forts.

There was always a certain magical thinking element to newspaper accounts back then.

 

[wausaubob]

I have no idea what Gen Lee's thoughts were when they started putting up batteries far outside of the range of Pulaski's cannon. Reportedly, the garrison laughed at such incompetence.

If he wasn't convinced that the US could land guns wherever they wanted to, build approaches and emplacements wherever they needed to, he would have been convinced after the US Fort Pulaski operation.

 

[wausaubob]

However, author Foote's point was the same point that Lincoln was demonstrating in the preliminary report on the census. The US was a dynamically growing economy and the war barely deflected that process or even accelerated it. Cotton and slavery was never going to be a platform to overcome the US, and Foote had a good deal of knowledge about the south on which to base that conclusion.

 

[archieclement]

Herein has always lain the rub for me. What was it that Confederate leaders saw in 1861 that would ensure either or both of the first two possibilities (given the impossibility of the third)?

Perhaps they didn't.

Most all revolutionary efforts face long odds, many do fail. All that is required isn't a guarantee of success, but simply a conviction it's worth risking dying for.

In reality in 1776, if one had impartially stepped back and gave odds for 13 upstart colonies against the greatest colonial empire, they would have looked probably equally as bleak.

 

[wausaubob]

Perhaps they didn't.

Most all revolutionary efforts face long odds, many do fail. All that is required isn't a guarantee of success, but simply a conviction it's worth risking dying for.

In reality in 1776, if one had impartially stepped back and gave odds for 13 upstart colonies against the greatest colonial empire, they would have looked probably equally as bleak.

But its not evident they ever seriously considered the odds of success, before, during or after the result. Because no one realistically considered that after the US controlled the Mississippi, as well as most of Arkansas and Tennessee the Confederacy was not a viable nation. They never seriously admitted that slavery was dying and dying rapidly.

 

[wausaubob]

Herein has always lain the rub for me. What was it that Confederate leaders saw in 1861 that would ensure either or both of the first two possibilities (given the impossibility of the third)?

Most of the enthusiasm for secession came from older men, or people with little military experience and no knowledge of the Crimean war.
Military men allowed themselves to be persuaded, but there were numerous exceptions regarding southerners who doubted the efficacy of secession.

 

[archieclement]

But its not evident they ever seriously considered the odds of success, before, during or after the result. Because no one realistically considered that after the US controlled the Mississippi, as well as most of Arkansas and Tennessee the Confederacy was not a viable nation. They never seriously admitted that slavery was dying and dying rapidly.

I agree, chances of success have little to do with a conviction of right or that they are pursuing the proper course.

There's always that difference between idealists (fire-eaters in this instance) and realists (everyone else).......what's harder to understand is how often the realists can get swept up into the Idealism

 

[wausaubob]

I agree, chances of success have little to do with a conviction of right or that they are pursuing the proper course.

There's always that difference between idealists and realists.......what's harder to understand is how often the realists can get swept up into the Idealism

It was very hard to know the relative strength of the two potential belligerents in 1860. Foote had subsequent history to help him. But the contemporary Confederates of 1861 did not know much about the US economy. And even as the census results were published in 1862, they weren't necessarily overwhelming.
It was very difficult to see how overwhelming US artillery power would be by 1862, and in most cases they thought by maneuver and avoidance they could neutralize the US advantage.
And in Texas, Arkansas, and sw MO, distance and inertia were a legitimate advantage for the Confederates.

 

[BillO]

I suspect back in 1862 if you would have asked the folks in eastern PA., western MD. or southern OH. they would not have felt quite so sure of things. Hindsight is a handy thing.
Rhea Cole earlier in this thread said that if you are always looking backwards you fail to see the future.
Seems a rather peculiar thing for a historian to say as that's' your primary function and I believe that if you don't occasionally look behind you you won't notice that the idiots are gaining.

 

[Rhea Cole]

I suspect back in 1862 if you would have asked the folks in eastern PA., western MD. or southern OH. they would not have felt quite so sure of things. Hindsight is a handy thing.
Rhea Cole earlier in this thread said that if you are always looking backwards you fail to see the future.
Seems a rather peculiar thing for a historian to say as that's' your primary function and I believe that if you don't occasionally look behind you you won't notice that the idiots are gaining.

My point was that, as Jefferson Davis said, he wasn't a revolutionary. He was living in profoundly revolutionary times. During his lifetime, the steam engine & telegraph had come of age. How many weeks did it take Andrew Jackson to go from the Hermitage outside Nashville to Washington for his inauguration? How many days did it take for a letter he wrote home to go & receive a message? Davis had personally experienced a profound revolution that was just beginning to get in stride.

I live in Murfreesboro TN, so have the vast historical riches of Middle Tennessee all around me.

Braxton Bragg & William Rosecrans left the army at about the same time. Both needed to make some money for their families. Bragg received a sugar plantation as a wedding present. He worked his slaves with characteristic rigor & made a success of it. He lived a life that , apart from a few details, a Roman patrician would have recognized instantly. Rosecrans built the first successful oil refinery west of the mountains. He held patents for derivatives from oil.

Both men objected to secession in remarkably similar ways. Perhaps predictably, each made a decision to join an opposing army & met in one of the decisive campaigns of the war.

Nashville was surrendered without firing a shot because the "Gods of Nashville" refused to lend their very valuable slaves to the army to build fortifications. Under Rosecrans' command, within six months self-liberated & requisitioned slave labor had constructed a triangular fortress complex forty miles on a side to secure a vast logistical base. The Nashville & Northwestern RR was built with black laborers who then enlisted in regiments like the 14th USCTI that defended it against constant attacks.

In June 1863, on the eve of the decisive Tullahoma Campaign, Bragg's quartermasters had no meat to issue to the Army of Tennessee. Efforts to repair the RR that linked the army with its base in North Alabama had been abandoned. Only a 500 year rain event saved Bragg from being surrounded & destroyed where he stood.

The Roman patrician & the oil refinery developer both had access to the same technology & labor pools. Their HQ's were 25 miles apart. What they did with those assets is representative of one society looking to the past & one focused on the future.

I figured one sentence made more sense in context than this mini dissertation. Thanks for the question.