I taught Jr High history for many years. I really think a lot of what you point out is due simply to the passage of time. The last Civil War vets were dying off when I was in school, so the Civil War was still almost within living memory. There were lots of children and grandchildren of Civil War vets still alive to keep the memory alive. Today’s high school history texts cover about 1/10th the CW battles that my schoolbooks mentioned.
Then there’s today’s political correctness factor. I saw one textbook that devoted more space to the role of women in the CW than Grant & Lee combined.
The same thing is happening to the coverage of WWII. If the Battle of Guadacanal is even mentioned, it will rate a sentence or two at most. Patton, MacArthur (except for his defiance of Truman in the Korean War) and Halsey together are covered less than the Tuskeegee Airmen or women in the workforce. The internment of the Japanese is covered for several pages, the Bataan Death March, not so much.
Definitely; revisionist historians will completely gut those topics to suit their agendas.
WWII will disappear because not only was the military segregated, but blacks weren’t used as combat troops. Not that some didn’t end up in combat; they simply weren’t assigned to combat units, but instead to support roles.
You bring up a good point. I’m something of a military history buff, although leaning more towards the technology aspect. I could name off important Civil War battles and Generals, but to put them in logical sequence and levels of importance? Nope.
WWII however, I could really get in depth. I had many relatives that served. I picked their brains about their experiences, and they were shocked that a person my age knew so much about that time. My Wife’s Grandfather was a Corsair pilot in the Pacific. He was stunned at how much I knew when we met.
Waterloo though? That’s like Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Brits should at least know the results of that battle, if not the minute details... Just as Americans should know the results of Gettysburg.