Posted on 06/12/2007 10:31:16 AM PDT by mngran
Actually, secession ALWAYS works - unless there is a tyrant in power!
Within the last 15 years, we have literally seen secession break out WORLDWIDE - and we have supported it EVERYWHERE!
Did you not support the secession of West Germany from the Soviet Empire? How about the Czech Republic? Poland? Or for that matter, each and every state of the former Soviet Union?
Maybe you did not support, for that matter, the idea of 13 British colonies from Britain in, say, about 1776?
Actually, Moose4, Clemson football and NASCAR probably tie for 2nd behind Christianity.
As for those guys down at USC, well, there’s a few bad apples in the best of crowds!
Clemson Alumnus, 1982
GO TIGERS!
Not so sure about USuC fans being so loyal. I remember the 63-17 bashing Clemson gave USuC a few years ago in Columbia. By halftime, the stands were empty except for the folks wearing orange.
You’re right, in everything else, though. Their passion would be endearing, were it not so misguided. They have to be, howevere, some of the least knowledgeable football fans I know of....
Stainless, I know that you know your history.
The story of Andersonville has never been (publicly) told completely.
The death rate of the Confederate sentries was actually slightly HIGHER than that of the northern prisoners. The prisoners got EXACTLY the same rations as the Confederates - only about 700 calories a day. The Confederate army, at the end, was a starving, skeleton army.
However, the situation in northern prison camps was the same (or worse, in some instances), but the reasons were totally DIFFERENT. The northerners had PLENTY of food, they HAD provisions to protect their prisoners from the elements, they HAD medicine to give them.
The yankees didn’t provide for their prisoners simply because they were war criminals.
Back at Camp Sumter, half of all the prison guards, many thousands, were sick and dying. There simply was not enough resources in the South. U.S. Maj Gen Foster opened negotiations with Winder to supply the camp, and Grant shut him down. It gets worse though. US Maj Gen Scammon refused to accept unconditional custody of thousands of Camp Sumter inmates. The Union rejected its own men.
Wirz was the fall guy. The Union offered him freedom if he testified against Davis. There was never any proof of the charges against Wirz, but it didn't matter. Wirz would not sell out Davis for a bunch of lies, even if it cost his life.
Thanks for the post - sounds like you have studied the subject.
I think all those secession movements were good ideas. I think though, the countries in the Soviet orbit were separate countries to begin with, and wanted their independence.
I guess it’s hard for me to think about the states of the United States wanting to be independent countries.
Yeah, right. These Southron tales, if true, certainly wouldn't say much about the good people of the surrounding Georgia countryside who would let confederate soldiers in their midst starve while they had enough to eat. It certainly wouldn't say much about the rebel leadership who had the trains to get prisoners to the prison but not to get food to their troops guarding them. So is that what you're trying to say here? That the people of Georgia and the government of Jefferson Davis were so unfeeling that they let their own soldiers starve? Or could it possibly be that you're...enhancing the tale just a little?
The long and the short of it is that the treatment of POWs on both sides was deliberate and criminal. Both governments could have cared for their prisoners better but didn't. Both could have fed them better but didn't. Both could have housed them better but didn't. There was no more justification for Andersonville as there was for Elmira, Libby Prison was no more acceptable than was Camp Douglas. Wirtz swung because he deserved it and because the Union won and caught him. Had the confederacy won then the commanders at Douglas or Elmira would have had their necks stretched. In reality both Wirtz and his Union counterparts should have paid a price, along with General Winder and his equivilent on the U.S. side.
And it looks like he carries on an old tradition of modifying his message depending on where he is: in Vermont, he likened Christian Exodus to the libertarian Free State Project in neighboring New Hampshire, but in South Carolina he plays up Confederate themes.
These are NOT “Southron tales”. I am more than willing to pull ANY random sampling of pictures of Confederates - or of the general Southern populous, for that matter, taken in 1864 - 5, and see if they do not show very thin, underfed people. There are many - MANY - journals from Southern officers saying the same thing-that their troops were starving to death.
The South gave all it had in its’ attempt to win its’ independence. Something like 1/3 of all men of fighting age. All its’ wealth. Everything it had.
The rations of the Confederate army in -64 and early -65 are very well documented, for anyone willing to do a little research. If you don’t believe me, do some reasearch. The entire South was literally starving to death.
This says nothing about the “rebel leadership”. It says something about the dedication Southern men made to go to war; about the minimalist Southern navy and the effectiveness of the blockade; etc. The WAS NO FOOD, PERIOD. And that’s not all. There was no paper; there was not cloth to make clothing; nothing.
Life for troops in Andersonville was tough, no doubt. 95 degree heat in the south Georgia sun isn’t a lot of fun. What is even less fun was the yankee gangs that collected within the camp and beat up on - even killed - each other.
Yankee camps near Chicago (and other places north) were different. While a 95F afternoon in Geogia ain’t fun, a sub-feezing day in northern Illinois means DEATH. As stated, the yankees COULD have provided food and shelter - they just DIDN’T.
Ever read a transcript of Wirz’ trial? It was a complete kangaroo court. Union ‘judges’ thanked yankee witnesses who claimed to have seen Wirtz’ abuses for their “good and honest testimony” - until it was proven that the “witnesses” were not even AT Andersonville.
In fact, at Wirtz’ trial, there is only ONE witness who could not be discounted. He claimed that he had personally seen Wirtz shoot a prisoner in cold blood. Only two problems with his testimony:
1) Wirtz was not even AT Andersonville on the day the witness claimed; and
2) Sometime later, it was proven that this single “witness” was not at Andersonville at all. He was a Union deserter who wasn’t even there.
Wirtz was innocent. He paid the price for yankee radicals who wrote stories of “abuses” in Southern prison camps in northern newspapers, much has they had published repeated stories of abuses of Southern slaves. Take a little bit of truth, add in a bunch of over-the-top sensationalism, and you’ve got a real story. Actually, the liberal press isn’t a whole lot different today.
There was indeed someone who was guilty for what happened in the Southern prisons, though.
You see, the Confederacy asked Lincoln for medicine and food for the northern prisoners; even guarranteed passage for Union medics. Lincoln refused.
The South offered prisoner exchanges that would have saved their lives. Lincoln refused.
There was, indeed, a criminal involved.
His name: Abraham Lincoln.
Please do. I'm willing to look at any information at all on the starving Southern civilian population, and evidence of famine or widespread hunger, you may have. And if you can show where it was occuring in south Georgia, a fertile area untouched by the war, then you get extra credit.
The South gave all it had in its’ attempt to win its’ independence. Something like 1/3 of all men of fighting age. All its’ wealth. Everything it had.
They made their choice and they suffered terrible consequences as a result. But are we supposed to feel sorry for them?
The rations of the Confederate army in -64 and early -65 are very well documented, for anyone willing to do a little research.
As are the reasons why. And lack of available food had nothing to do with it. It was lack of transportation and sheer bloody incompetence in the confederate commissary that caused the problems. In his book "The Cause Lost: Myths and Realities of the Confederacy" William C. Davis points out that once John Breckenridge was appointed War Secretary he was able to accumulate several million rations for the army without much trouble. The issue was getting the food to the troops, currently bottled up in Petersburg and running for their life from Sherman.
If you don’t believe me, do some reasearch. The entire South was literally starving to death.
Well you've done the research, or so you say, so let's see the fruits of your labor. If the South was literally starving to death then there should be some evidence. Numbers who died of starvation or malnutrition. Pictures and tales of widespread hunger and deprivation. Let's see what you've been able to come up with.
This says nothing about the “rebel leadership”. It says something about the dedication Southern men made to go to war; about the minimalist Southern navy and the effectiveness of the blockade; etc. The WAS NO FOOD, PERIOD. And that’s not all. There was no paper; there was not cloth to make clothing; nothing.
Ah but there was.
Yankee camps near Chicago (and other places north) were different. While a 95F afternoon in Geogia ain’t fun, a sub-feezing day in northern Illinois means DEATH. As stated, the yankees COULD have provided food and shelter - they just DIDN’T.
And I'm not denying it. But the fact of the matter was that the South could have provided adequate food and decent shelter but they too refused to do so. The difference between us is that I don't try and justify the Union death camps while you go to ridiculous lengths trying to justify the Southern ones and try and lay blame everywhere but where it belongs, with Southern leadership.
Ever read a transcript of Wirz’ trial? It was a complete kangaroo court. Union ‘judges’ thanked yankee witnesses who claimed to have seen Wirtz’ abuses for their “good and honest testimony” - until it was proven that the “witnesses” were not even AT Andersonville.
War crime trials tend to be that way. I can only imagine what the Southern ones would have been like had they one their rebellion.
You see, the Confederacy asked Lincoln for medicine and food for the northern prisoners; even guarranteed passage for Union medics. Lincoln refused. i>
And had Lincoln done so that food and medicine would have no doubt found its way to the rebel army somewhere.
The South offered prisoner exchanges that would have saved their lives. Lincoln refused.
Because the South refused to include black Union POWs in the exchanges, insisting that they were runaway property and not soldiers. Why should the Union have dealt with the South if they weren't going to be upfront and honest about it?
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