What This Cruel War Was Over

by Chandra Manning

  48. Lt. Francis Audsley, Forty-fourth Mo., to wife, January 30, 1865, Eastport, Miss., Audsley Papers, UMOC.

  49. “Missouri is Free!!! Slavery is Buried!!,” Soldier’s Letter, January 28, 1865, Fort Riley, Kans., p. 3, KSHS. The same page also celebrated the news that Tennessee had abolished slavery, and reported that only four convention delegates had voted against emancipation in Missouri. Soldier’s Letter was the regimental newspaper of the Second Colo. Cavalry.

  50. Sgt. James Taylor, Second U.S. Colored Infantry, to Editor, January 29, 1865, Key West, Fla., A-A, February 25, 1865, p. 2. For a celebration in New Orleans, see Chaplain George LeVere, Twentieth U.S. Colored Infantry, to Editor, February 2, 1865, Camp Parapet, La., A-A, February 25, 1865, p. 2.

  51. For an account of the Thirteenth Amendment, see Vorenberg, Final Freedom. Voting tallies for the House and Senate appear in Tables 1 and 2 in the Appendix, 249–50. Vorenberg demonstrates broad support for emancipation (or at least the unwillingness of most Northerners to oppose emancipation) in ch. 4, and portrays the passage of the amendment and the North’s positive response on 185–208.

  52. Pvt. Joel Molyneux, 141st Pa., diary, February 3, 1865, near Petersburg, Va., in Kermit Molyneux Bird, ed., Quill of the Wild Goose: Civil War Letters and Diaries of Private Joel Molyneux, 141st P.V. (Shippensburg, Pa.: Burd Street Press, 1996), 264. See also Soldier’s Letter, February 4, 1864, Fort Riley, Kans., p. 2, KSHS.

  53. Pvt. John Foote, 117th N.Y., to sister, February 8, 1865, Federal Point, N.C., John B. Foote Papers, DU. Foote reiterated this point at the close of the war, when he wrote of his jubilation at the “joyful tidings” that peace once again reigned, “and not a disgraceful compromising peace, but one which will make this a land of liberty and a home for the oppressed of every race. Let us give thanks unto the Lord & sing praises unto his holy name.” See Foote to mother, April 14, 1865, Wilmington, N.C., John B. Foote Papers, DU.

  54. Rufus, Twenty-fifth U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, February 7, 1865, Chapin’s Farm, Va., A-A, March 11, 1865, p. 1.

  55. Cpl. Chauncey Welton, 103d Ohio, to parents, February 18, 1865, Washington, D.C., Chauncey B. Welton Letters, SHC.

  56. Lt. Edward Bartlett, Fifth Mass. Cavalry, to sister, February 5, 1865, Pt. Lookout, Md., Edward J. Bartlett Correspondence, MHS.

  57. Pvt. Theodore Upson, One Hundredth Ind., diary, November 18, 1864, Indian Springs, Ga., in Winther, With Sherman to the Sea, 136.

  58. Lt. Charles Brewster, Tenth Mass., to mother, October 12, 1864, Norfolk, Va., in Blight, When This Cruel War Is Over, 332–33.

  59. Capt. Van Bennett, Twelfth Wis., diary, October 16, 1864, near Resaca, Ga., Van S. Bennett Diary, SHSW.

  60. The 83rd Illinoisan, April 14, 1865, Clarksville, Tenn., p. 2, TSLA. For analysis of the tension between racial justice and northern whites’ desires for quick reunion, see David W. Blight, Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001). Chs. 5 and 6 specifically address soldiers.

  61. Pvt. John English, Ninety-second Veteran Reserve Corps, October 5, 1864, hospital, Evansville, Ind., John English Letters, EU.

  62. Pvt. George Hudson, One Hundredth Ill., to folks at home, April 10, 1865, Blue Springs, Tenn., George A. Hudson Collection, PAW, Coll. 138, Reel 54.

  63. Pvt. (acts as Ass’t Sgn.) Robert Winn, Third Ky. Cavalry, to sister, January 22, 1865, near Savannah, Ga., Winn-Cook Papers, FC. Emphasis in original.

  64. Pvt. Wilbur Fisk, Second Vt., to Green Mountain Freeman, February 8, 1865, City Point, Va., Rosenblatt and Rosenblatt, Hard Marching Every Day, 308–09.

  65. Sgt. Horatio Barrington, Fourteenth Ill., to Editor, December 18, 1864, Savannah, Ga., Bloomington Pantagraph, January 7, 1865, p. 1.

  66. A. Sanford, white officer of the Fiftieth U.S. Colored Infantry, to Editor, April 6, 1865, before Fort Blakely, Ala., Canton (Ill.) Register, October 3, 1864, p. 1.

  67. Soldier’s Letter, June 17, 1865 and February 13, 1865, Fort Riley, Kans., KSHS.

  68. Lt. Rufus Kinsley, Seventy-fourth U.S. Colored Troops, diary, March 6, 1865, and May 10, 1865, Ship Island, Miss., Rufus Kinsely Diary, VTHS.

  69. Sgt. William Bradbury, 129th Ill., to wife, January 2, 1865, Chattanooga, Tenn., William H. Bradbury Papers, PAW, Coll. 26, Reel 6.

  70. Affidavit of Pvt. William Jones, 124th U.S. Colored Infantry, March 29, 1865, Camp Nelson, Ky., in Berlin, Reidy, and Rowland, Black Military Experience, 276.

  71. Chaplain A. B. Randall, Fifty-fourth U.S. Colored Troops, to Brig. Gen. Lorenzo Thomas, February 28, 1865, Little Rock, Ark., in Berlin, Reidy, and Rowland, Black Military Experience, 712.

  72. R.H.B., Third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, September 7, 1864, Jacksonville, Fla., CR, September 17, 1864, p. 1.

  73. Pvt. Henry Hoyle, Forty-third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, February 18, 1865, near Richmond, CR, March 18, 1865, p. 1.

  74. Sgt. George Massey, Forty-third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, March 14, 1865, near Richmond, CR, April 8, 1865, p. 1.

  75. Resolutions of the Fifty-fifth Mass., October 10, 1864, Folly Island, S.C., in both the A-A, November 12, 1864, p. 1, and the CR, November 12, 1864, p. 1. The resolutions were probably sent to the newspapers by Sgt. John Shorter, who acted as one of the secretaries of the committee on resolutions.

  76. Pvt. Zack Burden, Eighth U.S. Colored Troops, to “Mr. Abebrem Lenken the Presdent of the U.S. stats,” February 2, 1865, City Point, Va., in Berlin, Reidy, and Rowland, Black Military Experience, 647–48.

  77. John Cajay, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, March 24, 1865, Ft. Jackson, La., A-A, April 22, 1865, p. 4.

  78. Sgt. Maj., One Hundredth U.S. Colored Infantry, to Editor, March 22, 1865, along the railroad line in Tenn., A-A, April 22, 1865, p. 4. See also Moses Foskey, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, December 20, 1864, Fort Banks, La., A-A, January 14, 1865, p. 4.

  79. Sgt. Maj. Twenty-ninth Conn., to Editor, February 5, 1865, before Richmond, A-A, February 18, 1865, p. 1. The society was named for Frederick Douglass, famed abolitionist, orator, and political advocate, and Henry Highland Garnet, a black abolitionist minister.

  80. Members of the society often wrote to the Anglo-African about their meetings. See, for instance, Sgt. A. H. Newton and Sgt. J. D. Kellies, Twenty-ninth Conn., to Editor, December 21, 1864, Chapin’s Farm, Va., A-A, January 7, 1865, pp. 1–2; Newton and Kellies to Editor, January 19, 1865, in field before Richmond, A-A, February 4, 1865, pp. 1–2; Sgt. Maj. Twenty-ninth Conn., to Editor, February 5, 1865, before Richmond, A-A, February 18, 1865, p. 1.

  81. Sgt. Maj. Dudley Asbury, 101st U.S. Colored Infantry, February 10, 1865, Nashville, Tenn., A-A, March 4, 1865, p. 1.

  82. “Proceedings of the National Convention of Colored Men, Held in the City of Syracuse, N.Y., Oct. 4–7, 1864,” in Howard Holman Bell, Minutes of the Proceedings of the National Negro Conventions 1830–1864 (New York: Arno, 1969), 41–43.

  83. R.H.B., Third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, September 7, 1864, Jacksonville, Fla., CR, September 17, 1864, p. 1.

  84. Moses Foskey, Eleventh U.S. Heavy Artillery, December 20, 1864, Fort Banks, La., A-A, January 14, 1865, p. 1.

  85. Pvt. T. H. Sands Pennington, Twentieth U.S. Colored Infantry, to father, September 22, 1864, Camp Parapet, La., reprinted in A-A, October 22, 1864, p. 1.

  86. Rufus, Twenty-fifth U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, February 7, 1865, Chapin’s Farm, Va., A-A, March 11, 1865, p. 1. Despite his disillusionment, Rufus was confident that there was “a power at work which will brook no delay nor submit to no deviation from that path” that led to justice for African Americans; he simply believed that God would have to take a more forceful role in nudging the nation down that path than he had once hoped would be the case.

  87. Sgt. James Trotter, Fifty-fifth Mass., to Edward Kinsley, November 21, 1864, Folly Island, S.C., Edward Kinsley Papers, DU.

  88. James Lewis, former captain, First La. Native Guards, to James Ingraham, November
1, 1864, New York City, reprinted in A-A, November 12, 1864, p. 1.

  89. Chaplain J. R. Bowles, Fifty-fifth Mass., January 4, 1865, Beaufort, S.C., A-A, January 21, 1865, pp. 1–2.

  90. Sgt. John Brock, Forty-third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, March 9, 1865, near Richmond, CR, March 18, 1865, p. 1.

  91. Pvt. Henry Hoyle, Forty-third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, February 18, 1865, Richmond, CR, March 18, 1865, p. 1.

  92. John Scott, Kans. Battery (Col’d), to Editor, January 27, 1865, Fort Leavenworth, Kans., A-A, February 11, 1865, p. 2.

  93. Charles Gilbert, Twenty-sixth U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, April 13, 1865, Beaufort, S.C., A-A, May 6, 1865, p. 1. A member of the Twenty-seventh U.S. Colored Troops who signed his name as “Spartan” also noted the promotion of Delany; he remarked that white reaction to the promotion was mixed. See Spartan to Editor, April 2, 1865, Faison’s Station, N.C., A-A, May 6, 1865, p. 1.

  94. John Cajay, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, March 24, 1865, Fort Jackson, La., A-A, April 22, 1865, p. 4.

  95. Moses Foskey, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, February 15, 1865, Fort Banks, La., A-A, March 11, 1865, p. 1.

  96. John Cajay, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, March 24, 1865, A-A, April 22, 1865, p. 4.

  97. Sgt. James Payne, Twenty-seventh U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, n.d., no place, CR, September 17, 1864, p. 1.

  98. Drummer R. M. Smith, Third U.S. Colored Troops, to Editor, September 18, 1864, Jacksonville, Fla., CR, October 8, 1864, p. 1.

  99. John Cajay, Eleventh U.S. Colored Artillery, to Editor, March 24, 1865, Fort Jackson, La., A-A, April 22, 1865, p. 4.

  100. Lt. Charles Kerrison, Second S.C., to uncle, September 19, 1864, near Culpeper, Va., Kerrison Family Papers, SCL.

  101. Capt. S. Hubert Dent, Ala. Light Artillery, to wife, September 10, 1864, near Lovejoy’s Station, Ga., in Ray Mathis, ed., In the Land of the Living: Wartime Letters by Confederates From the Chattahoochee Valley of Alabama and Georgia (Troy, Ala.: State University Press, 1981), 110.

  102. Commissary Sgt. William Chunn, Fortieth Ga., to mother, September 11, 1864, near Jonesboro, Ga., William A. Chunn Letters, EU. Capt. S. Hubert Dent Ala. Light Artillery, also emphasized the impact of Atlanta on the 1864 election. See Dent to wife, September 10, 1864, near Lovejoy’s Station, Ga., in Mathis, In the Land of the Living, 110.

  103. For Confederate hopes that McClellan would win the Union presidential election, see Nelson, Ballots, Bullets, and Rhetoric.

  104. Pvt. Grant Taylor, Fortieth Ala., to wife, November 18, 1864, Holly Wood, Ga., in Blomquist and Taylor, This Cruel War, 304.

  105. Pvt. Abel Crawford, Sixty-first Ala., to wife, Dora, November 16, 1864, near New Market, Va., Abel Crawford Letters, TSLA.

  106. Lt. E. L. Cox, Sixty-eighth N.C., diary, November 9, 1864, Fort Delaware Prison, E. L. Cox Diary, CMM Ser. A., Reel 13.

  107. Capt. George Dewey, First N.C. Cavalry, to sister, March 15, 1865, Stony Creek, Va., George Stanley Dewey Correspondence, SHC.

  108. Pvt. Cornelius Oliver, Twenty-fourth N.C., to wife, December 14, 1864, Petersburg, Va., Mrs. O. H. Winstead Collection, NCDAH.

  109. Pvt. Spencer Barnes, Thirtieth N.C., to sister, January 1, 1865, near Petersburg, Va., Spencer Barnes Letters, MOC.

  110. Pvt. Jim Griggs, Forty-second Va., to cousin, late 1864, Petersburg, Va., Griggs Family Papers, VHS. Griggs further pointed out that if the men in the elite army of the Confederacy, Lee’s army, felt that way, things could only be worse everywhere else. “If the troops of the victorious 1st Corp are this demoralized what do you expect of the men who have known nothing but defeat for the last seven months?” he asked.

  111. Pvt. Felix Prior, Fifth Ga. Militia, to wife, near Savannah, December 7, 1864, Felix Prior Letters, GDAH.

  112. Pvt. Robert A. Jackson, Thirty-fifth Ga., to parents, December 21, 1864, near Petersburg, Va., Daniel Andrew Jackson Sr. Collection, GDAH.

  113. Pvt. William Barry, Fourteenth Miss., to sister, September 29, 1864, near Palmetto Station, Ga., Barry Letters, MDAH.

  114. The strongest case for continued high Confederate morale even in the waning days of the war is made by Gary Gallagher in The Confederate War. Gallagher includes a barrage of blustery, fight-to-the-last-ditch quotations, but overlooks the fact that most of them come from the earlier days of the war rather than the winter of 1864–65, as well as the possibility that the tone bespeaks more desperate bravado than real assurance. Mark Grimsley and Brooks Simpson adopt a less impassioned tone in The Collapse of the Confederacy (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), but even their moderate contention that Southerners regarded the situation of 1864–65 as no worse than that of 1862 (1–2) underestimates the gloom expressed by most soldiers. George Rable, “Despair, Hope, and Delusion: The Collapse of Confederate Morale Reexamined,” in Grimsley and Simpson, The Collapse of the Confederacy, 120–67, rightly attributes lingering optimism to “wishful thinking” (138–39), but he credits that wishful thinking with elevating morale more than it did, and conflates soldier and civilian morale in the process. Of his eighty-two footnotes, all but eleven cite exclusively civilian sources (especially politicians and newspapers), and of the eleven that quote at least one (usually only one) soldier, only five express optimistic sentiments, and only one expresses a gritty determination to fight to the end no matter how dark the situation appears. In other words, historians have habitually exaggerated high morale among Confederate soldiers in the winter of 1864–65. Even allowing for the exaggeration, some troops, especially in the Army of Northern Virginia, remained determined.

  115. Surgeon John Kinyoun, Sixty-sixth N.C., to wife, October 9, 1864, southeast of Richmond, John Kinyoun Papers, DU.

  116. Cpl. Ethelbert Fairfax, ANV Signal Corps, to mother, September 3, 1864, near Petersburg, Va., Randolph and Ethelbert Fairfax Letters, MOC.

  117. Pvt. David Ballenger, Hampton’s Legion, to mother, December 12, 1864, Shenandoah Valley, Va., David Ballenger Papers, SCL.

  118. Sgt. Archie Livingston, Third Fla., to sister, November 20, 1864, near Florence, Ala., Livingston Family Letters, MOC. Pvt. Jesse Hill also expressed angry impatience with the “big secessionists” who so prolonged the war. See Hill to wife, January 27, 1865, Petersburg, Va., Jesse Hill Letters, NCDAH. Pvt. David Ballenger, Hampton’s Legion, who complained about the moral failings of Confederate citizens, found their leaders just as reprehensible. “I have at last come to the conclusion that I have been fighting to place despots and tyrants over me and my posterity,” he announced. See Ballenger, to mother, December 12, 1864, Shenandoah Valley, Va., David Ballenger Papers, SCL.

  119. “K.” to Richmond Enquirer, December 20, 1864, trenches before Richmond, Va., reprinted in Atlanta Daily Constitutionalist, January 14, 1865, p. 1.

  120. Pvt. Cornelius Oliver, Twenty-fourth N.C., to wife, February 5, 1865, Petersburg, Va., Mrs. O. H. Winstead Collection, NCDAH. Oliver’s outburst against “drunken politicians” came in the context of a letter in which he explained to his wife why deserting was an honorable rather than dishonorable course of action, and one that he himself considered taking. In a later letter, Oliver said he would never desert, and in the end he lost his opportunity to do so. He was wounded and captured the following month, and died in prison.

  121. Pvt. Cornelius Oliver, Twenty-fourth N.C., to wife, February 17, 1865, near Southerland Depot, Va., Mrs. O. H. Winstead Collection, NCDAH.

  122. Pvt. Henry Morgan, Thirty-first La., to wife, January 24, 1865, Alexandria, La., Henry Morgan Letters, CWMC; Pvt. Spencer Barnes, Thirtieth N.C., to sister, January 1, 1865, near Petersburg, Va., Spencer Barnes Letters, MOC.

  123. Pvt. Robert Jackson, Thirty-fifth Ga., to parents, December 21, 1864, near Petersburg, Va., Daniel Andrew Jackson Sr. Collection, GDAH; Pvt. Grant Taylor, Fortieth Ala., to wife, November 18, 1864, Baldwin Co., Ga., in Blomquist and Taylor, This Cruel War, 304.

  124. Pvt. Jesse Hill, Twenty-first N.C., to wife, January 6,
1865. See also Hill’s letters of November 26, 1864, and December 4, 1864, near Petersburg, Va., Jesse Hill Letters, MOC. See also Pvt. James Bracy, Fortieth N.C., to mother, October 14, 1864, near Plymouth, N.C., Lyman Wilson Sheppard Collection, NCDAH.

  125. Quoted in Beringer et al., Elements of Confederate Defeat, 153.

  126. For more on Orr’s resolutions (for peace) in the Confederate Congress and Union cabinet member Francis Blair’s overtures leading to the meeting, see Wilfred B. Yearns, “The Peace Movement in the Confederate Congress,” Georgia Historical Quarterly 41:1 (March 1957), 12–15; Charles W. Sanders, Jr., “Jefferson Davis and the Hampton Roads Peace Conference: ‘To Secure Peace to the Two Countries,’” Journal of Southern History 63:4 (November 1997), 808–15; Edward Chase Kirkland, The Peacemakers of 1864 (New York: Macmillan, 1927), 141–42, 196–205, 222–26; and Steven E. Woodworth, “The Last Function of Government: Confederate Collapse and Negotiated Peace,” in Grimsley and Simpson, The Collapse of the Confederacy, 28–29. For discussion of the February 3 meeting, see Sanders, “Jefferson Davis and the Hampton Roads Peace Conference,” 816–24; Woodworth, “The Last Function of Government,” 32; and Kirkland, The Peacemakers of 1864, ch. 5.

  127. Cpl. William Andrews, Tenth Va. Battalion, first heard rumors of the mission of Stephens, Hunter, and Campbell on January 29. He hesitated to get his hopes up too high lest this rumor prove as false as so many earlier ones, but still, he “hope[d] it may be so.” See Andrews to father, January 29, 1865, Darbytown Road, Va., William B. G. Andrews Papers, DU.

  128. Woodworth, “The Last Function of Government,” 31–35; Kirkland, The Peacemakers of 1864, 242–53.

  129. Pvt. Cornelius Oliver, Twenty-fourth N.C., to wife, February 10, 1865, Petersburg, Va., Mrs. O. H. Winstead Collection, NCDAH.

  130. Pvt. Hiram Harding, Ninth Va. Cavalry, diary, February 11, 1865, Richmond, Va., Hiram Harding Diary, MOC.