Posted on 04/03/2012 11:07:36 PM PDT by U-238
The Civil War -- already considered the deadliest conflict in American history -- in fact took a toll far more severe than previously estimated. That's what a new analysis of census data by Binghamton University historian J. David Hacker reveals.
Hacker says the war's dead numbered about 750,000, an estimate that's 20 percent higher than the commonly cited figure of 620,000. His findings will be published in December in the journal Civil War History.
"The traditional estimate has become iconic," Hacker says. "It's been quoted for the last hundred years or more. If you go with that total for a minute -- 620,000 -- the number of men dying in the Civil War is more than in all other American wars from the American Revolution through the Korean War combined. And consider that the American population in 1860 was about 31 million people, about one-tenth the size it is today. If the war were fought today, the number of deaths would total 6.2 million."
The 620,000 estimate, though widely cited, is also widely understood to be flawed. Neither the Union nor the Confederacy kept standardized personnel records. And the traditional estimate of Confederate war dead -- 258,000 -- was based on incomplete battle reports and a crude guess of deaths from disease and other non-combat causes. Although it is impossible to catalogue the fate of each of the 3 million or more men who fought in the war from 1861-65, some researchers have tried to re-count deaths in selected companies, regiments and areas. But Hacker says these attempts at a direct count will always miss people and therefore always underestimate deaths.
"There are also huge problems estimating mortality with census data," Hacker explains.
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...
There were over 23,000 casualties at the Battle of Shiloh, which will have been fought 150 years ago this Friday.
In the end, it actually seems to have come down to starvation. Lee was "smarter" as a General than Grant, but Grant was able to cut off supplies so that Lee literally couldn't feed his men.
Game over after that.
The ancient Romans were well supplied with food which they brought in by ship and road. The armies they fought often scavenged the land. The Romans would gather up all the local crop output into their fortified positions and their opponents would begin to starve, which brought on illness, which brought on defeat.
Nothing new here.
Battles are won by soldiers.
Wars are won by logistics.
Good Point
History is so fascinating. Grant was a sloppy lieutenant under Lee at one point well before the war. Lee "corrected" Grant. Grant never forgot his humiliation. Lee didn't remember the incident.
Revenge must have been sweet for Ulysses.
The second one will really be a bitch.
I still think that Lee was one of the best generals in Western history but lacked the resources the North had. He inspired his men to fight, they stuck with him, even when they were starving and barefoot,and even where there no hope of victory.
Based on 1860 census figures, about 8% of all white males aged 13 to 43 died in the war, including about 6% in the North and approximately 18% in the South,[43]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_United_States#Civil_War
Thanks for the statistic. Just imagine losing 20 percent of the population in the South.Its staggering.
The percentages in my previous post were based on the 620,000 figure.
The numbers are still staggering. That is a huge number. The loss took decades for the South to recover.
If he had the abilty, the Confederacy could have conceivably won.
But that's another argument for another day.
Liberals won’t be hard to defeat though. Their fighting tactics are limited to defecating on cop cars and breaking the window of a Starbucks.
If Judah Benjamin was able to convince the British and French to send troops to join the Confederacy, things would have been totally different. Lee might have taken the North
Shanks Evans asks him where all his men were.
Hood points toward the front, "Dead in the field."
Antietam was the bloodiest single day battle in American history .Over 23,000 casualities on both sides.More Americans died on September 17, 1862, than on any other day in the nation’s military.
McClellan deserved to be relived of his duties after the battle.
Grant was a humble man who didn’t have a vengeful nature.
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