“We think we are wholly superior people,” said the Civil War historian Shelby Foote. The 50th and 75th Anniversaries of the Civil War Battle of Gettysburg were poignant, inspiring moments. The words spoken of those occasions give cause to wonder. In the welter of emotions, have we forgotten what we need to remember?
Footage of Civil War Veterans at 50yr Anniversary in 1913 & 75yr Anniversary in 1938
We think we are wholly superior people. If we’d been anything like as superior as we think we are, we’d never have fought that Civil War. But since we did fight it, we have to make it the greatest war of all times. And our generals were the greatest generals of all time. It’s very American to do that.
“Who knows,” Berry Benson, a Gettysburg veteran asked, as his narrative drew towards its close, “Who knows but it may be given to us after this life to meet again in the old quarters, to play chess and draughts, to get up soon to answer the morning roll call, to fall in at the tap of the drum for drill and dress parade, and again hastily to don our war gear while the monotonous patter of the Long Roll summons us to battle.
In 1959, President Eisenhower took Churchill on a tour of Gettysburg. Charlotte Thibault’s painting captures what they may have imagined. (Courtesy of the artist).
“Who knows but again the old flags, ragged and torn, snapping in the wind, may face each other and flutter, pursuing and pursued, while the cries of victory fill a summer day? And after the battle, then the slain and wounded will arise. All will meet together under the two flags, all sound and well. And there will be talking and laughter and cheers. And all will say: Did it not seem real? Was it not as in the old days?”
William Faulkner said once that history is not “was,” it’s “is.” And what we need to remember is that the Civil War “is” in the present, as well as the past.
The generation that fought the war, the generation that argued over the definition of the war, the generation that had to pay the price in blood, that had to pay the price in blasted hopes and a lost future also established a standard that will not mean anything until we finish the work.
On behalf of the people of the United States I accept this monument in the spirit of brotherhood and peace.
Immortal deeds and immortal words have created here at Gettysburg a shrine of American patriotism. We encompass “The last full measure of devotion” of many men and by the words in which Abraham Lincoln expressed the simple faith for which they died.
It seldom helps to wonder how a statesman of one generation would surmount the crisis of another. A statesman deals with concrete difficulties—with things which must be done from day to day. Not often can he frame conscious patterns for the far off future.
* * *
But the fullness of the stature of Lincoln’s nature and the fundamental conflict which events forced upon his Presidency invite us ever to turn to him for help.
For the issue which he restated here at Gettysburg seventy five years ago will be the continuing issue before this Nation so long as we cling to the purposes for which the Nation was founded—to preserve under the changing conditions of each generation a people’s government for the people’s good.
The task assumes different shapes at different times. Sometimes the threat to popular government comes from political interests, sometimes from economic interests, sometimes we have to beat off all of them together.
But the challenge is always the same—whether each generation facing its own circumstances can summon the practical devotion to attain and retain that greatest good for the greatest number which this government of the people was created to ensure.
Lincoln spoke in solace for all who fought upon this field; and the years have laid their balm upon their wounds. Men who wore the blue and men who wore the gray are here together, a fragment spared by time. They come here by the memories of old divided loyalties, but they meet here in united loyalty to a united cause which the unfolding years have made it easier to see.
All of. them we honor, not asking under which flag they fought then—thankful that they stand together under one flag now….
* * *
That is why Lincoln—commander of a people as well as of an army—asked that his battle end “with malice toward none, with charity for all.”
To the hurt of those who came after him, Lincoln’s plea was long denied. A generation passed before the new unity became accepted fact.
In later years new needs arose. And with them new tasks, worldwide in their perplexities, their bitterness and their modes of strife. Here in our land we give thanks that, avoiding war, we seek our ends through the peaceful processes of popular government under the Constitution.
We are near to winning this battle. In its winning and through the years may we live by the wisdom and the humanity of the heart of Abraham Lincoln.
2 thoughts on “Civil War Memorials: What We Need to Remember”
Past doubt to the first thought. Those sentiments, and Lincoln’s, were intended, then and now, for 99.9% of Americans.
Churchill too deprecated statues of him. He said once he would much prefer a park for East End children to play in. We are still waiting for the park.
Lee was my boyhood hero, before I learned why, in an otherwise exemplary life, he placed loyalty to Virginia over his oath to the Union, despite aversion to slavery and secession (and why that choice, in his case, was inevitable). It is well that the Gettysburg battlefield, where statues of both sides stand, has said it will make no changes.
The question of pulling down statues in other places, which is a local matter, is fraught enough without getting into why each was erected 100 years ago. They involve complexities not grasped by those who see some statue of a figure they know little about as all about them. I would like to see Frederick Douglass added (as he has been recently at Hillsdale College) than Lee subtracted. I confess to no particular brief for John Calhoun, if statues of him still stand. But people need to understand the differences.
Lofty sentiments, to be sure and those that I learned studying that era. I doubt though the recently emboldened hate groups would subscribe to Lincoln’s plea of “charity for all.”
Honoring the Confederate dead was only a secondary reason for the establishment of the now controversial monuments. They were erected primarily as symbols of white supremacy and the timing of their establishment coincides with the imposition of Jim Crow laws in the late nineteenth century and the rise of the civil rights movement in the mid twentieth century.
The memories of the fallen are sacred, but Lee himself wanted no grand monuments erected. His wish was only for the care and preservation of the combatants tombstones.
2 thoughts on “Civil War Memorials: What We Need to Remember”
Past doubt to the first thought. Those sentiments, and Lincoln’s, were intended, then and now, for 99.9% of Americans.
Churchill too deprecated statues of him. He said once he would much prefer a park for East End children to play in. We are still waiting for the park.
Lee was my boyhood hero, before I learned why, in an otherwise exemplary life, he placed loyalty to Virginia over his oath to the Union, despite aversion to slavery and secession (and why that choice, in his case, was inevitable). It is well that the Gettysburg battlefield, where statues of both sides stand, has said it will make no changes.
The question of pulling down statues in other places, which is a local matter, is fraught enough without getting into why each was erected 100 years ago. They involve complexities not grasped by those who see some statue of a figure they know little about as all about them. I would like to see Frederick Douglass added (as he has been recently at Hillsdale College) than Lee subtracted. I confess to no particular brief for John Calhoun, if statues of him still stand. But people need to understand the differences.
Lofty sentiments, to be sure and those that I learned studying that era. I doubt though the recently emboldened hate groups would subscribe to Lincoln’s plea of “charity for all.”
Honoring the Confederate dead was only a secondary reason for the establishment of the now controversial monuments. They were erected primarily as symbols of white supremacy and the timing of their establishment coincides with the imposition of Jim Crow laws in the late nineteenth century and the rise of the civil rights movement in the mid twentieth century.
The memories of the fallen are sacred, but Lee himself wanted no grand monuments erected. His wish was only for the care and preservation of the combatants tombstones.