On this date in 1863 ...

[Driftwood]

On the first three days of July 1863, the North and South battered at each other before the Southerners broke and ran for home. On the fourth day of the month, the North won the war — not at Gettysburg, but at Vicksburg.

That "fortress town" on the Mississippi River was the last one on that river that the United States had not taken. At 10 a.m. July 4, the Federals celebrated their country's birthday when 29,000 Confederates — over 3,000 less than their total casualties from the siege — marched out of their lines, stacked their rifles and furled their flags.

Without food or supplies, the Confederate soldiers and civilians inside the Union lines were starving. Confederate soldiers had seized civilians' meat and vegetables, and those civilians had resorted to slaughtering mules, cats and other animals to survive. Eventually, the civilians abandoned their homes, as noted by Grant following the surrender:

…I found that many of the citizens had been living under ground. The ridges upon which Vicksburg is built, and those back to the Big Black, are composed of a deep yellow clay of great tenacity. Where roads and streets are cut through perpendicular banks are left and stand as well as if composed of stone. The magazines of the enemy were made by running passage-ways into this clay at places where there are deep cuts. Many citizens secured places of safety for their families by carving rooms in these embankments…. Some of these were carpeted and furnished with considerable elaboration. In these the occupants were fully secure from the shells of the navy, which were dropped into the city night and day without interruption.​

This cut the Confederacy in half, with Louisiana, Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas on the "wrong" side of the line.

This is the victory that led Lincoln to replace George Meade with Ulysses Grant as the commander of the Army of the Potomac.

The Federals' victory at Gettysburg was the end of the beginning. Their victory at Vicksburg was the beginning of the end.

Glad that others know the extent and importance of the western campaigns. Because of the Lost Cause trying to deify the ANV, much of the important history gets lost.

 

[Driftwood]

Things must have gone to heck pretty quickly in Vicksburg. In May 1863, my ancestor sent a letter home talking about how good things were, how lush Mississippi was, how much corn was growing, etc. Six weeks later, they were all about starved to death. He was paroled in July and put back in rotation a month of so later. Not long after, he was medically discharged because he was no longer capable of fighting because of the malnutrition he'd suffered.

 

[Justin_Rice]

I'm reading part one of Shelby Foote's Civil War trilogy and have been for like three years lol. Reading about military maneuvers and campaigns is some laborious work, albeit rewarding.

McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom > Foote.

 

[Driftwood]

Nope

 

[Neutral Corner]

One day I will take on Lee's Lieutenants, by Douglas Southall Freeman. He's an alum of my alma mater but they've taken his name off of a dorm there because he was a big believer in eugenics. He still has a high school up on Three Chopt named in his honor, though.

I inherited my father's Civil War (and WWII) library, including his much beloved copies of Freeman's "Lee's Lieutenants" and "R.E. Lee". There is so much depth in those books. The personal letters and wartime reports of those officers show a degree of scholarship, literacy, and faith seldom seen these days. I walked many a Civil War battlefield with my father. I have such mixed emotions about the war. There was so much bravery, sacrifice, and heroism in service of such an ignominious cause. They're an interesting, if dense, read.

British Calvary Colonel G.F.R. Henderson's bio of Stonewall Jackson and his examination of the campaign in the valley is also worth a look.

 

[micropolitan guy]

 

[CD Boogie]

I am impressed and take heart in the evidence posted here that there are groups of people who still analyze and draw opinions about events that are far removed from them temporarily, yet resonate in the present because of what happened 160 years as a precursor to now.

History, language, science, sociology — ya ain't likely to make a name for yourself or reap rumernative satisfaction; but damn if those aren't the true patriotic, the hoi palloi, the humps who can actually recite the Constitution and use it as a guide and not as a cudgel.

This country ain't forked. All that's forked is the racist, ignorant, insular people who think recoiling into tribal tropes right now and declaring everyone else "other" is better than acceding an inch to potentially gain a mile.

My biggest takeaway from the Founding Fathers? What made them inspirational and heartfelt and compromised? The same thing I take away from FDR and JFK and obversely to Obama: they sold out their personal social class to get shirt done for the better of others. That's the only leaders we ever want and need. The guys who are the first to volunteer for voluntary weapons buyback program; who see what the future needs and use that insight and capital to get things done, irrespective of getting re-elected.

And that's why term limits have to be the first new amendment to the Constitution: a willingness, as the Founders exhibited, to be a public servant who hears the issues, weighs the competing factors, then makes a decision based on something far beyond the consideration of getting re-elected. Will some of these dead ducks sell their votes to special interests as they head to the door? I'm sure they could. But their influence would be markedly diminished if you precluded them from being a lobbyist — on any isssue — for six years past the end of their representation.

White men have really forked up in this country bc we had the opportunity to recognize and relinquish our stronghold on society with a modicum of input and control on the evolution of that narrative of being displaced. Now we've lost here, have receded so far from what people wanna hear, that the average percentage of male contributors to literary magazines is like 20 percent. And the irony nowadays is that the opinions of white, educated males are unwanted first, misunderstood second, and then mocked for their supposedly conservative and backwards ways of seeing.

The ignorant, skipped over ilk of the Proud Boys or the Oath Keepers, who reacted to potentially losing their influence as a group by lashing out in direct response to a guy — Trump — who sold them on the idea he had betrayed his social class, have been further demoted in society because they thought that acting anti-socially had practical benefits, since, after all, their candidate of choice was voicing (if not sharing) their disenchantment.

But Trump is no maverick. He has no social class to betray. The people he's betrayed are the people who saw him as a vessel for their concerns. And one of them, mark my words, is gonna be the one to take him out. Trump won't be assassinated by a liberal; he's gonna be eventually taken out by someone who has been humiliated across the board by supporting him. Someone has the tape of him admitting he knew the election wasn't rigged, but that his supporters are disenchanted and gullible, which gives his inane lie traction.

That will close the loop and be a fitting end to this whole effing era.

 

[Twirling Time]

Gonna be hard for Twitchy to accept the nomination with a speech from Attica. That is my hope, although his famous delaying tactics might prevent this.