Raising the White Flag

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Silkenat
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Laws Of War ◽  
Cultural Meanings ◽  
Culture Of Honor ◽  
Fort Sumter ◽  
Comprehensive Study

The American Civil War began with a laying down of arms by Union troops at Fort Sumter, and it ended with a series of surrenders, most famously at Appomattox Courthouse. But in the intervening four years, both Union and Confederate forces surrendered en masse on scores of other occasions. Indeed, roughly one out of every four soldiers surrendered at some point during the conflict. In no other American war did surrender happen so frequently. David Silkenat here provides the first comprehensive study of Civil War surrender, focusing on the conflicting social, political, and cultural meanings of the action. Looking at the conflict from the perspective of men who surrendered, Silkenat creates new avenues to understand prisoners of war, fighting by Confederate guerillas, the role of southern Unionists, and the experiences of African American soldiers. The experience of surrender also sheds valuable light on the culture of honor, the experience of combat, and the laws of war.

Introduction

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Jim Powell
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Full Length ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Specific Reference ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Cotton Trade

This chapter describes the objectives of the book. No full-length work exists on the crisis in the British cotton trade during the American Civil War, and the only substantial study of the raw cotton market in Liverpool was made by Thomas Ellison 130 years ago. The book remedies these omissions. It has two objectives. First, to establish the factual record of Britain’s raw cotton supply during the civil war. Second, to examine the impact of the civil war on Liverpool, and on the operation of the raw cotton trade there, with specific reference to the role of the cotton brokers. The chapter discusses the existing historiography and its deficiencies, and describes the primary sources that underpin this study. It establishes the crucial, and neglected, importance of price to the trade in raw cotton.

scholarly journals A Soldier’s Faith: The Civil War Experiences and Reflections of William Porcher DuBose

2018 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 170-187
Author(s):  
Robert B. Slocum
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Theology Of The Cross ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Prisoner Of War ◽  
Confederate Army ◽  
Military Chaplain ◽  
War Experiences ◽  
Peace And Reconciliation

AbstractThe noted Episcopal theologian William Porcher DuBose was a seminarian when the American Civil War began. He was torn between continuing his studies for ordination and joining the Confederate Army. He felt duty bound to defend his homeland, and he served heroically, wounded in combat, and taken as a prisoner of war. Troubled by the senselessness and inhumanity of war, he was eventually ordained and served as a military chaplain. He devoted himself to faith and ministry when he realized his country and culture were lost. DuBose vividly presents his views on war and faith in his wartime correspondence with his fiancée and later wife Anne Barnwell Perroneau, and other writings. His experiences of loss and poverty were the basis for his theology of the cross and his understanding of the role of suffering in the Christian life, and he subsequently dedicated himself to faith, peace, and reconciliation.

African American Civil War Soldiers

2019 ◽  
Vol 105 (4) ◽  
pp. 1101-1103
Author(s):  
Donald R. Shaffer
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Civil War ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Civil War Soldiers

Kentucky Rebel Town

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
William A. Penn
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Civil War ◽  
Confederate Army ◽  
Newspaper Editor ◽  
Secession Crisis ◽  
The Town ◽  
Union Soldiers ◽  
The Way ◽  
State Representatives

This is a detailed Civil War study of a Kentucky Blue Grass town and county. This extensive research of Cynthiana and Harrison County reveals the area’s divisive sectional animosities and personalities. As the title suggests, Cynthiana was widely perceived to be a Rebel stronghold when the secession crisis erupted. The county’s state representatives, Lucius Desha and W. W. Cleary, were among Kentucky’s pro-secession supporters during neutrality, and Desha was arrested for treason when accused of recruiting for the Confederate army. Belief that the town was a den of Southern sympathizers was further supported when Union soldiers arrested and imprisoned for disloyal activities about sixty citizens, including several county officials and newspaper editor. Countering these secession activities were Home Guards and Union supporters, such as attorney W. W. Trimble. John Hunt Morgan’s raids in Kentucky resulted in the First and Second Battles of Cynthiana, which the author carefully researched and enhanced by new battlefield maps. Readers will learn of the central role of the county in the Union military defenses of the Kentucky Central Railroad corridor. The book also describes from both the soldiers’ and citizens’ viewpoints the Confederate army march through the county on the way to threaten Cincinnati in 1862. It also describes the recruiting activities of Union and Confederate supporters, and the controversial African American enrollments.

“Benefit of the Doubt”: African-American Civil War Veterans and Pensions

2008 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 377-399 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry M. Logue ◽  
Peter Blanck
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Civil War ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Pension System ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Union Army ◽  
War Veterans ◽  
Pension Income ◽  
Two Stages

Laws that provided pensions for Union army veterans were putatively color-blind, but whites and African Americans experienced the pension system differently. Black veterans were less likely to apply for pensions during the program's early years. Yet, no matter when they applied, they encountered two stages of bias, first from examining physicians and then, far more systematically, from Pension Bureau reviewers. The evidence suggests that pension income reduced mortality among African-American veterans, underscoring the tangible results of justice denied.

scholarly journals "To see some few proofs of enormous wickedness": The Use of Photographs and Wood Engravings of Prisoners of War in Six American Civil War Publications, 1864-1865

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emily McKibbon
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Civil War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
American Civil War ◽  
History Of Photography ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Photographic Reproduction ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual

This thesis addresses the use of a set of photographs of returned prisoners of war (POWs) published both as tipped-in albumen prints and as wood engravings in six different publications from 1864 and 1865, including three versions of Narrative of Privations and Sufferings of United States Officers and Soldiers while Prisoners of War in the Hands of the rebel Authorities, one pamphlet, and two magazine articles, The discussion focuses on the dissemination of these images by the United States Sanitary Commission, the ways in which the photographs were presented in the individual publications that contained them, the decisions that the engravers made in translating the photographs into wood engravings and the visual codes that informed the photographs and the related engravings. The illustrated essay situates these photographs and wood engravings within the political context of the American Civil War and the history of photography in the 1860s. The dissemination of photographic imagery via wood engravings before the widespread use of halftone reproductions, beginning in the 1880s, is presently under researched. The paper encourages consideration of wood engravings when examining the history of photographic reproduction during this transitional time period.

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