It was the Southern states, or perhaps better said, some of the Southern states, who precipitated the War because of intemperate haste to resolve the underlying questions, and because of a mistaken belief in their military superiority. I continue to believe that the Southern states could have proceeded peacefully to a resolution that would have been much more to their liking than the results of the War. I hope you will forgive me for the observation, but the fact that the South suffered devastation as a result of the war does not illuminate questions as to how the war started. There is no doubt that the War Between the States was the occasion of terrible suffering. He presents the Southern case very well indeed. Thank you, Malgus, for suggesting the Aiken essay. The monument in Baltimore that shows Jackson and Lee parting on the eve of Chancellorsville has always touched me, particularly Jackson's quote, inscribed on its base, 'So great is my confidence in General Lee, that I am willing to follow him blindfolded.'Īnd in the delerium which accompanied his death from a septic wound infection, he gave us his beautiful last words, 'Let us cross over the river, and rest under the shade of the trees.'Īnd I have long saved a Jackson calendar, which tells each day what the General was doing during his War.īut this is the same Jackson who told his aides, after a day in which 20,000 casualties were recorded, including 2600 deaths, as he calmly ate a peach, 'God has been very kind to us this day.'īelieving the Armies of the Confederacy to be the very Host of the Lord, the war he would have carried to the North, had he lived, and had he been permitted, would have wreaked devastation besides which the property destruction of Sherman's March through Georgia would have paled.

Henry kyd douglas i rode with stonewall