(best viewed in Internet Explorer, Netscape likes to do strange things with my pictures...)
The Wren Building, College of William and Mary
Welcome! My name is Sara McClure and I'm a freshman here at the College of William and Mary. In this course, History 212: Revolutionary and Civil War Virginia, we will be taking weekly field trips to different historical sites throughout Virginia. As we go along, I will be taking pictures and posting them on this site along with my own analysis of the assigned readings and the places we visit. I hope you enjoy and visit again when there's more to see!
January 31, 2004
Revolution!
Yorktown Victory Center, Yorktown
Battlefield and the Nelson House
Yorktown,
VA
February 7, 2004
The
First New Nation: What Next?
Moses Myers House,
Willoughby-Baylor
House
Norfolk, VA
February 14, 2004
How
to Survive a Revolution in VA: The FFV
Shirley Plantation, Westover
Plantation
Charles City County, VA
February 21, 2004
The
Perils of Transition - Light Horse Harry Lee
Stratford Hall Plantation
Westmoreland
County, VA
February 28, 2004
The
West
Monticello and the Frontier Museum
Charlottesville
and Staunton, VA
March
6 & March 14, 2004
March 27, 2004
April 3, 2004
April 10, 2004
April 18, 2004
April 24, 2004
May 1, 2004
Week
One: "Revolution!"
For our first trip, we traveled to Yorktown, VA, to
visit
the Yorktown Victory Center, the Nelson House and the Yorktown
Battlefield.
The Victory Center is an interesting museum (Melinda and I particularly
enjoy the children's section: I like to color while Melinda likes to
criticize
the costumes... we're such dorks! We also really liked playing Mancala,
though it's obvious that I'm pretty bad at it!).
Spring
Break ~ Take Me Out to the Ballgame!
Phillies
Spring Training
Clearwater,
FL
March 20, 2004
Slaves
& Masters
Bacon's Castle, Chippokes Plantation
Newport News, VA and Surry
County,
VA
Federal Richmond
Poe Museum, Kanawha Canal, John
Wickham
House, Tredegar Iron Works
Richmond, VA
The Battle for Hampton Roads
Mariner's Museum, Fort Monroe
Newport News, VA
Williamsburg's Civil War
Local Civil War
Sites
Yorktown and Williamsburg, VA
Pamplin Park
Optional Sunday Trip
Petersburg, VA
The Seven Days
Battlefields
of the Seven Days
Hanover, Henrico, and Charles
City
Counties, VA
Is Richmond Burning?
Museum of the
Confederacy, Hollywood Cemetery, and Capital Square
Richmond, VA
Special thanks to: Professor Whittenburg for such a fascinating year of
Saturday classes and to Melinda for being such an awesome friend and
supplying me with several pictures! We're going to have so much fun
down the line!
Yorktown, VA
| The encampent (photo on right was taken in Fall 2003 during History 150W... to see it as it looked on January 31, 2004, just imagine snow and ice covering the ground!) is also a part of the Victory Center. There we learned about the life of soldiers and about the women who followed the army. Chapter four of Holly Mayer's book, Belonging to the Army: Camp Followers and Community During the American Revolution, discusses the women that moved with the Continental Army. Mayer writes that from the army's perspective, women were a neccessary evil. Not only did they perform small jobs and services to the men, but they also boosted morale. The fact that many of the jobs that they did were the same ones that they would have been doing at home shows that women were not having a "revolutionary experience" like men were. Their lives probably would not be directly affected by the outcome of the conflict. What we saw at the encampment generally supported Mayer's arguement. One of the interpreters showed us a recreated sign with how much women charged for washing clothes, for example. We could also see the kinds of quarters the women were forced to live in - they were not tents like the soldiers had - at the encampent they simply looked like tiny huts made from branches from evergreen trees! | 
Yorktown Encampment, Fall 2003 |
Recreation of a yeoman farmer's home, Yorktown Victory Center, Fall 2003 |
He (the farmer) probably would have been a responsible member of the community and, unlike the big planters in the Tidewater region, investing his money right back into tobacco rather than into his home. However, as Emory Evans writes in his article, "Planter Indebtedness and the Coming of the Revolution in Virginia," everyone was in debt. Debt was a huge part of life for everyone: from yeoman farmers to the richest planters. Yeoman farmers were indebted to bigger planters because those planters had ships that could not only transport tobacco across the ocean, but bring manufactured goods back to the colonies. So smaller farmers would first get seed and other neccessary items from a planter then use that year's crop to repay those debts, only to accumluate more against the next year's crop. The big planters were continually in debt to British merchants who dealt in manufactured goods and with places like the West Indies and other areas in the British empire. It would seem logical then, that a big reason for Virginians joining the Revolution would be to escape their debts to the British. Evans argues otherwise, saying that Virginians fully expected to pay off their debts. His article along with Woody Holton's "Rebel Against Rebel" suggest that Virginians joined the conflict because Governor Dunmore, in threatening to free the slaves, was threatening their way of life. The system of deference was of the utmost importance, and big planters that were benefiting so much from that system did not want their lives to change. |
| The Nelson house was built by Thomas "Scotch Tom" Nelson in 1729. Scotch Tom was an upper-middle class merchant from Scotland and he built his house like a conspicuos consumer: to show off his wealth. The portland stone keystones over the windows and the fieldstone would have to have been imported from New England because the Tidewater just does not have that kind of stone. Also, the rubbed and gaged bricks are reminiscant of many of the other sites built by the rich that we visited this year. The beltcourse that runs all the way around the house between the two floors is for decoration only and serves no purpose whatsoever. The house suffered some damage during the French-led Siege of Yorktown in 1781 and also during the Union's Siege of Yorktown during the Peninsula Campaign of the Civil War in 1862. Pictured below is some graffiti that was carved on the left side of the front door during the Union occupation of Yorktown. The prominent "1711" carved in the bricks cannont be a date simply because the house was not yet built in 1711! | 
The Nelson House, Fall 2003 |
Civil War Graffiti on the Nelson House, Fall 2003 (Bricks, bricks, bricks!!)
Next week it's on to another Virginia Port: Norfolk!
Readings:
Emory G. Evans, "Planter Indebtedness and the Coming
of the Revolution in Virginia," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd
Ser., Vol. 19, No. 4. (Oct., 1962), 511-533.
Woody Holton, " 'Rebel Against Rebel': Enslaved Virginians and the Coming of the Revolution," Virginia Magazine of History & Biography, 105 (Spring 1997), 157-192.
Holly Mayer, "Retainers to the Camp: The Conjugal Family," chapter 4 of her book, Belonging to the Army: Camp Followers and Community During the American Revolution (1996), 122-161.
Week Two: "The First New
Nation:
What Next?"
Norfolk, VA
"During the early years of the Republic Norfolk was a typical American port." ~Winifred J. Losse
| Norfolk, Virginia. Norfolk. As a Pennsyvanian (and Yankee...), it took me a little while to be able to say Norfolk like a Southerner, without the "l." Luckily, but the time this trip was over, I could say it pretty easily. Today's trip was relatively short - travel time was only about 45 minutes each way and we only visited two sites: The Moses Myers house and the Willoughby-Baylor House. Moses Myers was a Norfolk merchant and the Willoughby's were builders. Before we left the basement in Wren, we talked about the changes that were made in the houses and the fact that entertaining was becoming more impersonal as time went on. It was becoming easier for the average person to buy into an empire of goods, as T.H. Breen puts it, and the elite started to change the rules in order to preserve their upper class status and avoid people with wealth from "new money." Upon arriving at the Moses Myers' house, we discovered one of these changes: Myers moved his front door to change his address to Catherine Street. | Moses Myers house. Courtesy Norfolk Historical Society |
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The Willoughby-Baylor house was built in 1794, with the front porch you see in the picture above added 25-30 years later. The Willoughbys were a member of the FFV, recieving a 200-acre grant in 1636, and our docent called them "Norfolk's first family." The floors are orginal, but not much else because in the 1890's the house served as a boarding house and went into decline. It is a "side passage townhouse," typical of the urban south. The house was also "builder built" because there were few architects in early America and style as well as function were important. The wealthy could make a choice to stay behind or move ahead, and the Willoughbys seem to have chosen to stay back unlike their neighbors, the Myers'. On the first floor there were only three rooms: a hall, front parlor, and a multipurpose back parlor that could also have served as the master chamber or a diningroom. Entertaining was probably quite different in the two houses, one family choosing to change with the times, the other taking the more conservative route. However, this also could have something to do with the fact that the Willoughbys were builders. Norfolk eventually stopped expanding, especially when people were not as wealthy as they used to be, so a builder would not have been neccessary. But merchants were always needed, especially during and after the Revolution, so Moses Myers continued to grow more wealthy. |
| Norfolk was an important port in the years following the Revolution as Winifred J. Losse describes in her article, "The Foreign Trade of Virginia, 1789-1809." In 1789, Norfolk was second only to Richmond in the value of exports. It also "experienced a rapid rise in the first decade afte rthe Constitution was established" and Norfolk's importance also increased along with Richmond's because merchants of the fall-line usually did not deal directly with Europe or the West Indies. However, not only did both French and British privateers gave Virginia merchants trouble, but merchants often had a hard time estimating the demand of goods in foreign markets. In the decade between 1799 and 1809, Virginia's foreign trade followed trends in Europe very closely, benefiting from America's neutrality until the depredations committed by privateers on both sides became too great. Shipbuilders and owners in Norfolk were especially prosperous because of neutrality. Unfortunately, Norfolk suffered a disasterous fire in 1804 that destroyed 265 dwellings and houses along with seven ships. | 
Norfolk, outside the Moses Myers House |
Readings:
Norman K. Risjord, "The Virginia Federalists," The
Journal of Southern History, Vol. 33, No. 4. (Nov., 1967),
486-517.
Winifred J. Losse, "The Foreign Trade of Virginia,
1789-1809,"
The
William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd Ser., Vol. 1, No. 2. (Apr., 1944),
161-178.
An interesting picture I found: http://www.vintagedesigns.com/id/spec/myers/
| This picture is the hall in the Moses Myers House as it appeared in the 1920s. I just thought this was interesting for a couple of reasons. First, you can see the decorative plaster on the ceiling. Also, you can see that there is a heavy curtain across the doorway into the drawing room. Finally, the author of the website from which this picture came identifies the picture hanging next to the doorway as a well-known painting of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson during the Civil War. Sixty years after the Civil War, it's apparent that these Confederate heros were still very important to Virginians. |
Week Three: "How to Survive a
Revolution In VA: The FFV"
Charles City County, VA
 |
 |
Pictured above are the two entrances to the main house of Shirley Plantation. The left picture is the carriage entrance, used by those who were not wealthy enough to afford a boat, whereas the right picture is the scene that would be viewed by someone leaving a boat and walking up the bank of the James to visit the Carters. The Carter family has owned and occupied this home at Shirley Plantation since the main house was completed in the 1730s. The basement and second floor both have central passages though the first floor, the only floor we were allowed to see, does not. The specific useage of rooms was dependent on the time of day, time of year, number of guests, etc. In the early Federal period, Charles Carter was in charge of the plantation, and he added decorations and running water to the house. His daughter, Anne, married "Light Horse Harry" Lee who was seventeen years her elder and eventually gave birth to Confederate General Robert E. Lee (who apparently credited his mother with his positive characteristics). When Charles died, his grandson Hill was too young to become master of the plantation, so Hill's uncle was made master. When Hill came back to take charge when he was twenty years old, he found the plantation in pretty bad shape. His uncle had many gambling debts and had tried to use Shirley to make some quick money to pay them off. It was then that Hill decided that tobacco would no longer be grown at Shirley - a decision that insured the survival of the plantation for almost two hundred years. Instead, Hill grew corn, wheat, cotton, peas, clover and oats at Shirley, making good use of crop rotation and available fertilizer technology. He also put money back into the farm rather than into his house so he could afford mechanization when Cyrus McCormick invented the mechanical reaper in the 1830s, making a large scale labor force unneccessary. Not needing a large scale labor force would make life after the Civil War much more profitable.
| In the spring of 1862, Union General George McClellan (pictured to the right), launched a campaign up Middle Peninsula. The Carters tried to stay as neutral as possible as the army came through. Outbuildings became hospitals for the large number of wounded troops and the women who had remained at the house offered services to the men, making bandages, giving out food, doing things that they would hope women would do for their men if they were injured or killed far from home. To show his gratitude for their services, McClellan put a Federal safeguard on the Carters and their plantation, protecting them throughout the rest of the conflict. |
At lunch we talked about the patriachal system that represented America's relationship with England before the Revolution. However, the Revolution took the father (England) out of the picture, making a marraige system a societal ideal. Jan Lewis discusses this relationship in her article, "The Republican Wife: Virtue and Seduction in the Early Republic." Women were supposed to be able to seduce their men into being better people, yet not take any visible part in politics or other things of a public nature. Elizabeth Bennett in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is an excellent example because she was able to make Mr. Darcy more warm to those he considered below his station in life. However, it didn't always work; for example, Anne Hill Carter Lee must have felt very ashamed when her husband, Light Horse Harry Lee was put into debtor's prison. Also, women were educated through novels. In her article, "The Novel as Teacher: Learning to be Female in the Early American South," Catherine Kerrison writes, "Novels never dominated 18th century southern reading, but their presence in southern libraries merits attention, for their influence can be detected in ways that women thought about female virtue, friendship, and identity." Education was "rather haphazard" in the South in the 1700s and though novels did serve as recreational reading, they contained moral lessons as well.
Westover Plantation River Entrance, Fall 2003 (with damage from Hurricane Isabel)
Mark A. Mastromarino writes about the participation of Charles City County in the Revolutionary War in his article, "'The Horrid Disposition of the Times': Charles City County, Virginia, and the American Revolution." Though most believe that Westover was built by William Byrd II in the 1730s, dendochronology tests tell us that it was actually built later in the century, by William Byrd III, son of the more well-known Byrd II. Mary Byrd, wife of Byrd III, was first cousin to Peggy Shippen, wife of Benedict Arnold. General Arnold, now a British commander, stayed at Westover for two days in early January 1781, according to Mastromarino, pillaging the countryside. He also went to neighboring Berkeley Plantation where he seized the owners slaves and killed his livestock. The head of the Harrison family who occupied Berkeley was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a friend of George Washington. Mastromarino also writes, "Charles City County had more significance as a supply center for the army and a construction center for the Virginia Navy than as a battleground."
Readings:
Mark A. Mastromarino, " 'The Horrid Disposition of the
Times': Charles City County, Virginia and the American Revolution," in
James P. Whittenburg & John M. Coski, eds., Charles City
County:
An Official History (1989), 45-51.
Jan Lewis, "The Republican Wife: Virtue and Seduction in the Early Republic," William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd Ser., Vol. 44, No. 4. (Oct., 1987), 689-721.
Catherine Kerrison, "The Novel as Teacher: Learning
to
be Female in the Early American South," Journal of Southern History,
Vol. 69, No. 3, (Aug. 2003), 513-548.
Week Four: The Perils of Transition
- Light Horse Harry Lee
Westmoreland County, VA
Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee, courtesy of http://leechapel.wlu.edu/education/teachersguide.html |
Before departing for Stratford Hall, best known as the birthplace of Robert E. Lee, we discussed what we read of Charles Royster's writing on Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee. Lee was at odds with most other Virginia political leaders after the Revolution. He wanted a military command and went to France where he was offered a position but did not accept it because of the French Revolution. By the 1790s Lee was greatly in debt due to speculation in land, coal and the Potomac River. After being put in debtor's prison, Lee eventually abandoned his family and died at fellow Continental Army General Nathaniel Greene's plantation in Georgia. Debt was a pretty common thing around the time of the Revolution and Emory Evans argues that it was not a big cause of the Revolution. In fact, he says that the non-payment of debts was an effect of the Revolution rather than a cause; Virginians always intended to pay back their debts and it was only a few years after the Revolution that they even got the idea that they could get away without paying them. |
| Thomas Lee, the
builder of Stratford,
purchased the land for the plantation in 1717. About twenty-one years
later,
the Georgian house, pictured to the right, was completed. His eldest
son,
Phillip Ludwell Lee, inherited Stratford. Upon his death in 1775, the
house
become the home of his eldest daughter "divine Matilda," who married
her
cousin, Light Horse Harry Lee. When she died in 1790, Light Horse Harry
became the sole owner of the plantation and married Anne Hill Carter of
Shirley Plantation. The most famous Lee of all, Robert Edward Lee, was
born there in 1807 but did not live there long. Less than four years
after
Robert's birth, the family was forced to move away from the plantation,
to a home in Alexandria.
The house is built using 600,000 bricks in mostly Flemish bond with glazed headers. There are eight chimneys in the house for sixteen fireplaces and eighteen rooms. Around the same time that Moses Myers added his huge diningroom, the owner of Stratford altered a wall to make more socializing space. The ground floor of the house orginally had a warming kitchen, housekeeper's room and servants hall on the east wing. Light Horse Harry partioned the room under the great hall into two separate rooms with separate doors from the north (riverside). Under the west wing of the house, Light Horse Harry made bedrooms, a schoolroom and guestrooms. |
Stratford Hall Plantation |
West Outbuildings, Plantation Office in foreground |
East Outbuildings, kitchen in background |
Readings:
Emory G. Evans, "Private Indebtedness and the
Revolution
in Virginia, 1776 to 1796," The William and Mary Quarterly, 3rd
Ser., Vol. 28, No. 3. (Jul., 1971), 349-374.
Charles Royster, Light-Horse Harry Lee and the
legacy
of the American Revolution (1981), 56-185.
Week Five: The West
Charlottesville and Staunton, VA
This trip was optional and under pressure from my non-history freak friends, I decided not to go to class, though I now regret that decision!!! Anyway, below is a synopsis of the readings and of the sites the class visited.
West Front of Monticello, Courtesy of http://mysite.verizon.net/duncan.brook/gallery/11new/monticello.jpg |
The mountaintop upon which Monticello sits was cleared in 1769, but the mansion itself was not completed until almost 40 years later. In 1808, the North Pavillion was completed and the South Pavillion was remodeled. The first floor has 11 rooms, including a grand entrance hall, library, greenhouse, Jefferson's bedroom, a dining room and a tea room. There are also two rooms at the North end of the house that served as guest rooms. Frequent guests included James Madison, 4th President of the United States and his wife, Dolly. The second and third floors (not open to the public) consist of bedrooms and a dome room. The grounds are very attractive and one can tour Mulberry Row, where Jefferson's slaves lived and worked. There are also gorgeous gardens full of flowers and vegetables, some of which are quite rare, on the 1000-ft long terrace. Jefferson was quite the botanist and enjoyed growing and recording the growth in his gardens. |
| According to Dumas Malone's biography of Thomas Jefferson, Jefferson was born in 1743 at Tuckahoe Plantation. He spent two years at the College of William and Mary (1760-62). Anti-British from the beginning, Jefferson served in Virginia's House of Burgesses. After writing the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia in 1776, he returned to Virginia to serve in the legislature and was elected governor in 1779. During his tenure, Jefferson moved the captial to Richmond then fled to Monticello when British troops arrived. After the Revolution Jefferson served in Congress and then became Minister to France from 1785-89. He was a good diplomat and a Francophile. In 1790, he became Washington's Secretary of State and later was elected Vice President under John Adams. Jefferson anonymously wrote The Kentucky Resolutions which decried the Alien and Sedition Acts, legislation that attacked foreigners and freedom of speech and freedom of the press. In 1800 Jefferson was elected 3rd President of the United States only because he tied with Aaron Burr in the Electoral College and Jefferson was considered the lesser of two evils. Jefferson purchased the Lousiana Territory in 1803, doubling the size of the United States even though he had qualms about it because he was a strict constitutionalist. After eight years in office, Jefferson retired to Monticello. He sold his library to Congress in order to ease his debts and founded UVA in 1819. After Jefferson's death on July 4, 1826, Monticello was sold to pay his outstanding debts. | Courtesy of The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, PA(!) |
Courtesy of http://www.clinchmountainhome.com |
After lunch, the class headed to the Frontier Culture Museum in Staunton, Virginia. The main purpose of going to the museum was to see how German Scotch-Irish and English architecture influenced American architecture in the west. The problem with the museum is that the houses are sort of plopped down in the middle of Virginia and not really in the right climate and the English house is more upper class than is actually appropriate. The German farm was orginally located in the Rhineland-Palatinate region of Germany and the peasant house dates back to 1688. Coming from County Tyrone in Northern Ireland, the Scotch-Irish farm dates back to at least 1830 because it appears on maps of the region from that time period. The American heritage farm originally stood in Botetourt County, Virginia, lived in from 1835-1972. Finally, the English farm exhibits the period from 1675-1700 and includes buildings from two regions of England: West Sussex and Worcestorshire. |
Readings:
Gail S. Terry, “Sustaining the Bonds of Kinship in a
Trans-Appalachian Migration, 1790-1811: The Cabell-Breckinridge
Slaves Move West,” Virginia Magazine of History
&
Biography, 102 (1994), 455-476.
Elliott J. Gorn, ""Gouge and Bite, Pull Hair and Scratch": The Social Significance of Fighting in the Southern Backcountry," The American Historical Review, Vol. 90, No. 1, Supplement to Volume 90. (Feb., 1985), 18-43.
Dumas Malone, Thomas Jefferson: A Brief
Biography
(1933 and 1992), 12-48.
| After taking our midterm exam, we headed out on the road. I was lucky enough to have my friend Jen from home visiting - it was really nice to have her along! :) Anyway, first we went to Lee Hall Plantation in Newport News, VA. Built in 1859 by Richard D. Lee (unrelated to the Lees of Stratford Hall on the Northern Neck), Lee Hall Mansion is, according to www.leehall.org, "the only large antebellum plantation house remaining on the lower Viriginia Peninsula." Our guide told us that Richard Lee was the second wealthiest man in Warwick County. |
(Courtesty of http://www.leehall.org/images/hall.jpg) |
The floorboards in the central passage are original but they are mostly covered by the floor covering seen above. The covering made for easy cleaning for the slaves. There were some other interesting things about the interior of the house. First, the curtains were all very intricate and the ones that weren't ostentatious were (I thought) absolutely gorgeous. Many of the rooms also had wall-to-wall carpeting, which I found surprising. The carpeting, which our guide told us came from Europe, must have been expensive, however, the mantles on the fireplaces were made of wood. They looked like marble, but, as our guide explained, they were really just wood painted a special way to look like marble. This illustrates Kenneth Greenberg's point that Southerners are generally more concerned with appearences rather than substance or a deeper meaning. During our discussion at lunch, we found that gender roles in the South were, in some ways, strangely reversed. Though contemporary articles in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries labeled women as vain, men were the ones building their homes to show off their wealth as much as possible. |
(model of Bacon's Castle before additions)
For more information on a tour of Bacon's Castle, feel free to visit my
page on our trip here during Fall 2003.
Though we did tour the main house, our main
objective
was to tour the antebellum slave cabin on the grounds, one of the few
left
that is in good condition. Larry McKee's article, "The Ideals and
Realities
Behind the Design and Use of 19th Century Virginia Slave Cabins,"
describes
the ideas behind slave cabins like this one.
(Courtesy
of Lori's Webpage)
At first glance, the structure seems like a fairly
decent
sized home, as slave cabins go. However, it turns out that there are
four
small rooms inside, and probably at least four families lived there.
Also,
there few windows so the rooms are rather dark, especially the rooms
upstairs.
Also, the cabin is raised about a one and a half to two feet off the
ground.
According to McKee, there were two reasons why cabins were built this
way.
Planters liked to write or tell other people that they were buildling
raised
cabins because it was healthier for their slaves. In the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries, people believed that airflow was key to good
health.
However, it also took away an important part of a slave's privacy.
Excavations
of slave cabins older than this one have shown that slaves often dug
root
cellars in the earthen floors of their cabins to store personal and
private
items. But by raising floors up off of the ground, planters took away
the
possibility for those root cellars, therefore exercising a little more
control over their slaves. Also, though planters had been moving slave
cabins further and further away from their mansions, they began to move
them closer to the house, presumably in order to keep a closer eye on
their
activities.
Readings:
Larry McKee, "The Ideals and Realities Behind the
Design
and Use of 19th Century Virginia Slave Cabins," in Anne Elizabeth
Yentsch
& Mary C. Beaudry, ed., The Art and Mystery of Historical
Archaeology,
Essays in Honor of James Deetz (CRC Press, 1992), 195-213.
Kenneth S. Greenberg, “The Nose, the Lie, and the
Duel
in the Antebellum South,” The American Historical Review, Vol.
95,
No. 1 (Feb. 1990), 57-74.
Week Seven: Federal Richmond
Richmond, VA
I was unable to attend class this week because I was on tour with the William and Mary Women's Chorus in West Virginia, Kentucky, and Western Virginia. However, below is a synopsis of the readings and of the sites the class visited.
Tredegar Iron Works; Photo courtesy of www.civilwarphotos.net/files/industry.htm
The first stop the class made was at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. According to Melinda, the class was told that Edgar Allen Poe was not an alcoholic, gambled out of necessity, and left UVA because he couldn't afford it, not because he was kicked out. Whatever the case may be, at the museum they have a 3D model of Richmond, showing the town as it appeared in the first half of the 19th century, complete with churches, rowhouses and the James River. The next stop was St. John's Episcopal Church, built in 1741 and the site where Patrick Henry delivered one of, if not the most famous lines in American history, "Give me liberty, or give me death!"
| Construction began on the John Wickham house in 1812, designed by a Boston architect. John Wickham was mainly a lawyer but added to his wealth through real estate deals in Shockhoe Bottom, investment in coal mining on the Western Frontier and two plantations outside Richmond. The interior of the house spoke to the wealth of the family, complete with Greek- and Roman-based wall paintings, wall-to-wall carpeting, draperies, and furniture from Philadelphia, Baltimore and New York City. Maybe Mrs. Wickham was a "Whig woman" like Elizabeth Varnon describes in her article, "Tippecanoe and the Ladies, Too: White Women and Party Politics in Antebellum Virginia." The purpose of the article is "to close the gap between women's history and political history." Traditionally there has been a focus on the 19th-century idea of "separate spheres" with women occupying the domestic sphere while men lived and worked in the public sphere. However, Whig womanhood "embodied the notion that women could - and should - make vital contributions to party politics by serving as both partisans and mediators in the public sphere." Varnon describes the ways in which women participated in party politics without being allowed to vote or have a voice in decision making. | 
The Wickham House, Courtesy of Melinda |
Tredegar Iron Works, Richmond |
Tredegar Iron Works had its beginnings in the 1830s as part of the Virginia Foundry Company. Charles Dew's article, "Ironmaker to the Confederacy: Joseph R. Anderson and the Tredegar Iron Works," is about Anderson and how he made Tredegar into the huge business that it became. Dew writes, "After assuming direction of the company's affairs in 1841, this talented and determined Virginia entrepreneur had transformed the small, debt-ridden foundry and rolling mill into the South's largest and best equipped ironworks." Anderson's first move was to negotiate contracts with the Federal government to secure a market for Tredegar iron. He also pressed Washington for a contract to build "Iron Steamers." Though compared to the rest of the South, business was really booming, Tredgar was at several disadvantages: a small market, expensive transport, less technology than the North, less raw materials than the North, plus strong competition from the North and Great Britain. Even the fact that Tredegar used slave labor didn't help reduce prices to a competitive level and immigrants were actually the biggest demographic of workers. In order to secure Southern rail orders in the 1850s, Anderson not only expressed his patriotism but extended "liberal credit to Southern roads." However, as tension mounted between the North and South in the 1850s, Anderson came to find that there was little profit to be had if Virginia stayed with the Union. |
Readings:
Elizabeth R. Varon, “Tippecanoe and the Ladies, Too:
White Women and Party Politics in Antebellum Virginia,” The Journal
of American History, Vol. 82, No. 2 (Sept. 1995), 494-521.
Charles B. Dew, Ironmaker to the Confederacy : Joseph R. Anderson and the Tredegar Iron Works (1966),1-37.
Sheila R. Phipps, Genteel Rebel The Life of Mary
Greenhow
Lee (2003), 12-53.
Week Eight: The Battle for
Hampton
Roads
Newport News, VA
Today we headed to first to the Mariner's Museum where the remains of the Monitor that have been brought up from the bottom of the ocean are being kept, cleaned and studied. Before we left, however, we talked about some interesting symbology. The Confederate flag has been an important symbol since the Civil War though it has come to mean different things. Whereas it once stood for a separate nation, the flag was used as a response to the Civil Rights Movement in the 20th century. We also discussed that fact that there are still Confederate widows living today(which really surprised me!), though these women obviously did not live through the war with their husbands. I was also amazed to learn that the last Revolutionary War widow died in 1905, which just seems impossible! Or maybe I'm just surprised by the fact that young women would marry such old men... Anyway, on to the Mariner's Museum.
"Are you guys history majors?" asked the banjo-playing fellow dressed in a sailor's suit at the Mariner's Museum.
"Well, yes..." Melinda and I answered.
"You're going to starve," he said, matter-of-factly. "You can either write books, teach or starve. Marry rich! Find a doctor."
Less than a full year after its launch, the Monitor sank in a severe storm off Cape Hatteras, December 31, 1862. Courtesy www.cssvirginia.org. |
The USS Monitor was launched on January 30, 1862. Designed by John Ericsson, the ironclad ship was in many ways more like a submarine than a gunboat. William H. Roberts writes about the nontechnical aspects of the design process that brought about the Navy's committment to Ericsson's design, and Ericsson's design only. Normally, one would expect that the Navy would simultaneously build and test competing ironclad designs in a process engineers call variation selection. Ericsson presented a model to them that had the shallowest draft and the shortest construction time, two of the most important qualties in a Navy ironclad. However, John Ericsson had previously had a lot of trouble with the Bureaus; they showed him minimal cooperation and he treated them with contempt. He managed to get by this problem by forming a Monitor syndicate, whose members provided capital and influence. When the Monitor had some success against the CSS Virginia in the Battle of Hampton Roads, it appeared to be an answer to Ericsson's prayers. In reality, however, the battle just validated a deal already worked out between the Navy and the "monitor cartel." There was little counter-pressure to the deal and soon a "New York ring" of shipbuilders was formed in and around New York City. Even shipbuilders outside the area were often connected with the syndicate. While the cartel did gain the commerical advantage it desired, it delayed the Union ironcald program by at least two months and established the pattern for a highly specialized, defensively oriented fleet. It seemed that at the Mariner's Museum, Ericsson was generally hailed as a brilliant engineer, not as a member of a syndicate who apparently cajoled his way into having the Navy accept his design. |
Me standing next to the Monitor turret's conservation tank. Courtesy of Melinda |
Our main objective at the Mariner's Museum was to see the results of the efforts to conserve what is left of the Monitor. The wreck of the Monitor was found in August 1973, sixteen miles off Cape Hatteras. Since then, NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), often along with the US Navy and the Mariner's Museum, have been recovering artifacts and large pieces of the wreckage from the ocean floor. During lunch we discussed the Civil War ironclads and especially what surprised us about them. In reading William Still's article about the Confederate ironclads, I had bee surprised that there were so many of them. Previously I had assumed that since the Monitor and the Merrimack were the only ironclads to have a battle well-known enough that I learned about it in junior high and high school, they were the only ones built by each side. Still's article gives details on many of the vessels built by the Confederacy and what became of them. The only ones to meet any real success were a few in the Western theatre, though there were several still guarding the James River towards the end of the war. We also discussed the irony that the CSS Virginia, pictured below, was beached and burned; the ship was built to defend a river that it could not get into. Similarly, the Union built shallow draft ships to get up the rivers of the South but they couldn't get to those rivers because their shallow drafts didn't make them very see worthy vessels. |
Courtesy www.cssvirginia.org
After lunch we drove the short distance to Fort Monroe in Hampton. The Fort Monroe that stands today was built between 1819 and 1834, but the history of fortifications in the area goes all the way back to the days of John Smith in 1609, when the settlers built Fort Algernourne on what was then called Point Comfort. During the Civil War, Fort Monroe never fell into Confederate hands. At the Casement Museum, we learned that the fort housed runaway slaves after General Benjamin Butler decided that he was not going to return them to their masters any longer. Butler's actions help to show that Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation was not a humanitarian act, but an act of war instead, giving the Union the moral high ground. At the museum we also learned some interesting facts: 1) Edgar Allen Poe was station here briefly from December 15, 1828 - April 4, 1829, and 2) Harriet Tubman was the chief nurse at the Contraband Hospital of Fort Monroe. Also, Jefferson Davis, former President of the Confederate States of America, was held prisoner at Fort Monroe. Captured on May 10, 1865 near Irwinville, Georgia, Davis was brought to Fort Monroe in shackles on May 22, 1865. He was indicted on a charge of treason but was never tried and was released in May 1867.
Moat outside Fort Monroe |
A view of Fort Monroe's moat and thick walls |
The class with large cannon inside Fort Monroe. Cannon this size were transported by boat but could not be fired from a boat - it would tip right over! |
After his capture in 1865, Jefferson Davis was held prisoner in this cell in Fort Monroe until his release in May 1867. |
Readings:
Lesley J. Gordon, "Virginia, 1861-1862: War Meant
Something
More," chapter 6 from her book, General George E. Pickett in Life
&
Legend (1998), 68-83.
William N. Still, Jr., "Confederate Naval Strategy: The Ironclad," The Journal of Southern History, Vol. 27, No. 3. (Aug., 1961), 330-343.
William H. Roberts, ""The Name of Ericsson":
Political
Engineering in the Union Ironclad Program, 1861-1863," The Journal
of
Military History, Vol. 63, No. 4. (Oct., 1999), 823-843.
Week Nine: Williamsburg's Civil
War
Williamsburg and Yorktown, VA
Today we stayed close to home, touring Colonial
Williamsburg
but trying to see what it was like during the Civil War with the help
of
our T.A., Melissa. Before we left the Wren Building, Melissa explained
to us what happened at William and Mary during the Civil War.
Wren Building circa 1856, oldest known photograph
Courtesy www.williamsburgpostcards.com/wren/wren.htm
| Benjamin S. Ewell,
pictured
below, was the president of the College of William and Mary from
1854-1888.
A graduate of West Point, Ewell was a good man to have in charge during
the Civil War.
Courtesy College of William and Mary As war seemed imminent, the students formed a military company with Ewell at the head. After the outbreak of war, the College closed on May 10, 1861, becoming a military barracks and later a hospital and serving two Generals: "Prince John" Macgruder and Joseph Johnston. |
Before the war broke out, there was a fire at the College (1859) that gutted the Wren Building. After the fire it was unclear whether or not the College would be rebuilt, but the people of Williamsburg fought to keep the Wren or have it built anew. In a strange sort of compromise, the Wren adopted a Grecian inspired look with Italinade towers on the front. Courtesy www.williamsburgpostcards.com/wren/wren.htm |
Jamestown Island, from ferry crossing the James, Fall 2003
Palmer House, site of Vest Mansion, Duke of Gloucestor Street, Colonial Williamsburg |
On April 4, 1862,
Union General
McClellan began his peninsula campaign. Ewell was the architect of the
Williamsburg line, the third line of defense against the approaching
Union
army. After William and Mary was closed, the Wren building was used as
barracks and later as a hospital and storage facility. General Joseph
E.
Johnston arrived on the lower peninsula to assume command on April 17,
1862. While he was in Williamsburg, he stayed at the abandoned home of
William W. Vest, a "wealthy merchant and treasurer of the Eastern
Lunatic
Asylum." After the Union won the Battle of Williamsburg and occupied
the
town, Vest's store was converted into a hospital, along with the
Methodist,
Baptist, and Episcopal churches and the College. Also, a telegraph
station
was set up on Jamestown Island.
Vest mansion, Courtesy Colonial Williamsburg |
| On September 9, 1862, the men of the 5th Pennsylvania Cavalry set fire to the Wren Buildling. They erected a line of earthworks across the yard, "incorporating the walls of the Wren Building and the kitchens of the President's House and the Brafferton." For the rest of the war, Williamsburg did not see any more major action but remained under Union occupation. Pictured to the right is how the Wren Building looked after it was rebuilt, yet again, after the war. Though the College did reopen after the war, parts of the school did close in the 1870s. From 1881-1888, the school was closed, though tradition has it that President Ewell rang the bell to mark the beginning and end of each term. In 1888 Lyon G. Tyler, son of John Tyler, the 10th President of the United States, took over as President of the College. In 1918, William and Mary began to admit women, a decision that ultimately saved the college. | Wren Building, 1875. Courtesy www.williamsburgpostcards.com |
George Reid House, site of confectionary store in 1862, Duke of Gloucestor Street, Colonial Williamsburg |
After leaving the Wren, we drove to the eastern end of Duke of Glouster Street then began walking back towards the Wren. Where a reproduction of the colonial Capital building stands, there was a female academy during the Civil War. Because it was a big building with small rooms and was empty, it was made into a hospital once the battles began. The Vest Mansion, pictured above and to the left, served as a headquarters for both Union and Confederate commanders. The building that today is George Reid's house (pictured to the right), was a confectionary store in 1862. At the site of Market Square Tavern there was Williamsburg Baptist Church, a Greek revival building, that also served as a hospital. The Governor's Palace was gutted and torn apart during Union occupation though in 1861, the outbuildings were still standing so they became a hospital for the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry. |
Bowden-Armistead House
During lunch we talked about Drew Faust's article, "Altars of Sacrifice: Confederate Women and the Narratives of War." The purpose of her essay was to explain that the history of women's contributions during the Civil War were largely false. In fact, she credits Southern women with helping to bring about the end of the Confederacy. Women were called to work as nurses, in textiles, in munitions, do government office work, and manage slaves. Though some of these women may have felt proud to take on these jobs initially, soon they became a burden. They sacrificed their husbands, sons, and brothers yet were expected to hide their emotions and support the Confederate cause patriotically. Eventually their pleas for the return of their men led to an increase in desertion rates, a factor that severely hindered the Confederate armies during the last two years of the war. By the end sacrifice was no longer sacred; Confederate women had had enough. During our discussion I couldn't help but think about Scarlet O'Hara in Gone With the Wind. After Sherman burned Atlanta, Scarlet returned to her plantation home, Tara, and had to work the fields along with her sisters. Later when she went to see Rhett Butler while he was in jail to manipulate some money of out him, he scolded her because the condition of her hands made it obvious that she had been working in the fields, picking cotton and growing food. That paradox, to me, seems consistent with the way Confederate women were treated during the Civil War; they had to work hard and give up a lot without showing it or gaining any sort of autonomy.
After finishing a delicious Cheese Shop lunch, several of us headed out on an optional trip to see some Civil War earthworks near Yorktown. It was an interesting trip and I'm definitely glad I went. We walked along a bit of the Colonial Parkway at one point, looking for a Confederate-built redoubt. After some confusion we did manage to find it and climb it. It is so hard to imagine that battles happened so close to where we go to school; the smoke and confusion and cries of the dying must have been unbearable. It all seems quite bizarre to me! Next week it's on to see more Civil War battlefields as we follow the Seven Days campaign.
Readings:
Martha W. McCartney, " 'O, Darkly Now the Tempest
Rolls',"
chapter 11 from her book, James City County: Keystone of the
Commonwealth
(1997),
267-336.
Drew Gilpin Faust, “Altars of Sacrifice: Confederate Women and the Narratives of War,” Journal of American History 76 (March 1990), 1200-28.
Adorable Horses :), Colonial Williamsburg
Week Ten: The Seven Days
Hanover, Henrico and Charles City Counties
"getting inside the fog of war..." ~JPW
Confederate Commander General Robert E. Lee Courtesy http://www.galleryone.com/schmehl_prints.htm |
In his chapter from The Civil War: A Narrative, Shelby Foote likens the Seven Days to Hezekiah, a Judean king who elimated Assyrian oppression. Maybe he makes this connection because Robert E. Lee managed to eliminate the pressure on Richmond from McClellan's Union forces traveling up Middle Peninsula toward the Confederate capital, even if that relief was only temporary. Foote's main theme in his chapter seems to be that there was a serious lack of communication on both sides between commanders and their suboordinates. Professor Whittenburg even mentioned between battlefields that if there had been walkie-talkies during the Seven Days, Lee could have destroyed the Army of the Potomac. Proper communication with Stonewall Jackson could have made an enormous difference, especially considering the fact that Jackson's men did not even see action most of the time. If General George McClellan had known that the Confederates had only 40-50,000 men instead of the numbers he was getting from the Pinkerton Agency of upwards of 180,000, he probably would have fought the campaign in a much less conservative manner. The Civil War could have ended in the summer of 1862 in a victory for either side, though Lee was probably the closest to victory at this point. A large sticking point in the campaign was the Chickahominy River. One of the very important bridges that crossed it, Grapevine Bridge, is pictured below as it looked on May 27-28, 1862, after being built by the 5th New Hampshire Infantry. |
Grapevine Bridge over the Chickahominy River, built May 27-28, 1862 by the 5th New Hampshire Infantry
Click on the image to view in full size
Courtesy www.civilwarphotos.net
McClellan had the right flank of his army on the north side of the Chickahominy, which was swollen from heavy rains. The Union commander had bridges like Grapevine bridge built to improve communications but even with slightly better communications, troops could still not be moved easily back and forth across the river. General Johnston, then commander of the Confederate Army, attacks McClellan on the south side of the Chickahominy at Seven Pines on May 31, 1862. During the Union victory, Johnston was seriously wounded and Robert E. Lee was made the new commanding general. Lee reorganized the army to make it the Army of Northern Virginia and took nearly a month to reinforce his defenses around Richmond and finish all reorganization before mounting a campaign against McClellan. Eventually McClellan moved more of his army to the south side of the Chickahominy and, in reality, probably could have gone straight into Richmond. However, "Prince John" Macgruder was defending Richmond and marched his men back and forth along the earthworks to make it appear that he had far more men than he actually did.
| On June 26th, the Confederate offensive began at Beaver Dam Creek. A.P. Hill was all alone, attacking the Federals on a ridge on the opposite side of the creek. Hill's troops were supposed to be supported by Jackson's men, but Stonewall never arrived. By sundown, the Army of Northern Virginia had lost its first battle, due to "Hill's impetuosity and Jackson's lethargy." The next day, impetuosity paid off when A.P. Hill's men crossed Powhite Creek. They took the creek with ease but then ran into serious trouble at Botswain Swamp. The swamp lies in a valley between two hills and across the swamp from the Confederates there were three successive lines of Union troops ready and waiting because McClellan's engineer background helped him pick a position of enormous strength. After numerous Confederate attacks, finally the blow came that would send the Union troops running. John Bell Hood and his Texas Brigade along with Colonel Law's brigade charged down toward the swamp with bayonets fixed, not stopping to fire. Shelby Foote describes what happened next, writing, "the bluecoats scattered in unison... the Texans fired their first volley at a range where every bullet lodged in flesh." The day after his first defeat, General Lee had his first victory. | 
Botswain Swamp |
Malvern Hill Courtesy of http://www.stujenks.com/gallery/humancircle/malvernhill.html |
Our next stop on our Seven Days tour was Malvern Hill, where fighting took place on July 1. Because this was his last chance to destroy McClellan before he reached the safety of the James River, Lee decided to take the risk and charge up the rolling slope of Malvern Hill. Though there was an artillery duel before the infantry assault, it became apparent that Confederate gunners were no match for their Union counterparts. The result of the infantry assault was, as A.P. Hill later said, "not war, it was murder." By dark, three times the number of Confederate troops had fallen as compared to Union troops. Lee had failed in his final effort to keep McClellan from reaching the James River. Jackson's men had sent another day without fighting, their sixth of the last seven days. Lee may have failed at his final objective, but he did not lose. More correctly, McClellan did not lose the campaign, he merely failed to win because he kept retreating to the river even though he was winning battles. The Pinkerton Agency had informed the Union commander that Lee had 180,000 men at his disposal, a gross exaggeration. |
Berkeley Plantation main house, built 1726 |
James River near Harrison's Landing |
Readings:
Lesley J. Gordon, "Virginia, 1862: Shaking with the
Thunders
of Battle," chapter 7 from her book, General George E. Pickett in
Life
& Legend (1998), 84-95.
Shelby Foote, "The Seven Days: Hezekiah," chapter
four
of The Civil War: A Narrative, 40th Anniversary Edition,
(1999),
Vol. 3, 123-169.
Week Eleven: Is Richmond
Burning?
Richmond, VA
This trip was optional and I decided to go.
Obviously
I learned my lesson from deciding not to go to Monticello and the
Frontier
Museum!
The Museum of the Confederacy, Richmond Courtesy http://usa-civil-war.com/Civil_War/richmond_gen.html |
After about an hour's drive from Williamsburg, we arrived in Richmond and headed for the Museum of the Confederacy. The museum had synopses of the major battles of the war, a section on the life of an everyday soldier, and upstairs there was an exhibit on the causes of the Civil War, that contained an orginal copy of the Confederate States of America Provisional Constitution. I wouldn't say that I was particularly floored by the museum, but it was kind of eerie to stand looking through a floor-to-ceiling pane of glass at some of Robert E. Lee's belongings. I don't know why, but that kind of struck me. There were other artifacts that belonged to Stonewall Jackson and other lesser known soldiers, but they did not affect me in the same way. Maybe because even to a Yankee Robert E. Lee is one of those leaders that is so storied that he almost seems superhuman. Anyway, I also expected that the museum would call the Civil War the "War of Northern Aggression" and have other blatant references to Southern pride, but I was wrong; it seemed to be generally well-balanced. |
| After touring the Museum, we went into the Confederate White House for their tour. We found it somewhat ironic that an African-American man was our docent, but he was a really good guide. The tour seemed to focus on Jefferson Davis, the only President of the Confederacy. The President's House was built in 1818, ten years after Jefferson Davis was born. Not long after the Civil War there was an auction, and the house became a public school through 1890. The Confederate Memorial Literary Society purchased the building in 1894 and the doors opened in 1896, with Mrs. Jefferson Davis present. George Washington was a common figure in the house, especially in the state diningroom. Confederates saw Washington as an important symbol because not only was he a revolutionary, he was a Southernor and a Virginian. | Confederate White House, Richmond Courtesy of http://usa-civil-war.com/Civil_War/richmond_gen.html |
Confederate President Jefferson Davis Courtesy http://www.civilwarhome.com/jdavisbio.htm |
Jefferson Davis was born on June 3, 1808 in Christian County Kentucky. A West Point graduate, Davis served in the United States military during the Blackhawk War and resigned on June 30, 1865 to pursue a civilian life. He became active in Congress and later re-joined the army to serve under Zachary Taylor in the Mexican War. After the war, Davis went back to Congress, serving as a Senator from Mississippi. He also was Secretary of War under Franklin Pierce and then went back to the Senate. Originally Davis fought hard to preserve the Union but eventually had to side with the South because he felt stronger ties to his home state than to the national government. Mississippi elected him as commander of the state's military forces, but a few weeks later another election brought him to Richmond, as the President of the Confederate States of America. After the war he was held prisoner at Fort Monroe but was never tried for treason. Davis died on December 5, 1889 in New Orleans, LA. His body was taken by train to Richmond where he was laid to rest in Hollywood Cemetery. |
Professor Whittenburg and the rest of the class in front of a bizarre "Egyptian Revival" building, built in 1845. It still serves as a part of Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond. |
Governor's Mansion; Richmond |
Tyler Family Plot at Hollywood Cemetary, Richmond |
After touring Richmond and having lunch, we headed to the banks of the James River to see the Hollywood Cemetary, where many famous people are buried including Joseph R. Anderson of Tredegar Iron Works, two American presidents (James Monroe and John Tyler), a Confederate president (Jefferson Davis of course), several Confederate generals (George Pickett and J.E.B. Stuart for example), and two William and Mary presidents (Lyon G. Tyler and J.A.C. Chandler). Pictured to the left are the two Tylers: Lyon G. to the left and his father, John on the right side of the photo. Designed in 1847, Hollywood Cemetery is situated on the high banks of the James River overlooking the falls. It has windy paths that go up and down small hills to be in more of a "rural" style rather than the grid-like pattern seen in most cemeteries. During our last discussion we talked about themes throughout the course, especially Southern honor. I think that Souther honor was one of the most important constants during the antebellum period, through the Civil War and still exists today (case in point: the White House docent's denial that Jefferson Davis was wearing women's clothing when he was captured). |
Over the course of the second half of the
semester, we read three chapters of Lesley J. Gordon's book, General George E. Pickett in Life &
Legend. Since we saw Pickett's grave at Hollywood Cemetery, I
thought this would be an appropriate place to recap all three chapters.
George Pickett saw the Confederate army as a chance to prove himself
even though he didn't approve of slavery. Pickett was good to his men
but definitely not one to let any opportunity for advancement pass him
by! Gordon often compares the writings of Pickett's wife, LaSalle, who
tends to glorify her husband's actions in every way possible. The
Battle of Seven Pines gave Pickett a chance to prove himself. He and
his men stumbled into a trap but fought bravely and during the
withdrawl they covered the retreat. To his superiors, Pickett seemed
"aggressive and zealous" and his brigade became known as the "Gamecock
Brigade." During the Seven Days Pickett's brigade was largely unused
but during the Battle of Gaines Mill, his brigade suffered 400
casualties, including Pickett. LaSalle greatly romanticized the story
of his wound when her writings are compared to those of Major John
Haskell who called Pickett weak and a coward. Haskell's writings are
more representative of postwar attacks on George Pickett. After
rejoining the army in Martinsburg, VA, Pickett was promoted to Major
General, mainly because there were no real reasons to doubt his
potential! By 1864, Pickett was known as a man not to be trusted
because he tended towards "instant reaction without careful
reflection." On April 23, 1864, Pickett was relieved of his
Departmental command and made the diostrict commander of Petersburg,
ironically, because he was in the direct path of Union General Butler's
army moving up the peninsula. Knowing he had only 1400 men to protect
the city, Pickett made pleas for help but they were largely ignored
because he wrote too many conflicting reports and by May 10 he
collapsed with mental and physical exhaustion. On May 19 he was back
with his old brigade in the Army of Northern Virginia. Over the winter
of 1864-65, LaSalle joined "her soldier" at Bermuda Hundred and George
Jr. was born. Pickett's divison must have been causing many problems
because Lee told Pickett's superior, General James Longstreet to
curtail the "evils of Pickett's division." At Five Forks, Pickett had
early success but it was followed by poor decision, including the fact
that he left the front for a fish fry! By completely misjuding the
possibility of Federal attack, Union General Sheridan captured 5000
Confederate soldiers. Pickett was never one to admit his mistakes, and
he refused to take responsibility for his actions, or lack thereof.
Pickett was relieved of his command before Appomattox. After the war,
James Longstreet was unnecessarily supportive of his friend and the
ensuing controversies show how difficult it is to determine what
actually occured during the confusing years of the Civil War.
Readings:
Lesley J. Gordon, "Virginia, 1864-1865: Is That Man
Still
with This Army?," chapter 11 from her book, General George E.
Pickett
in Life & Legend (1998), 135-155.
Nelson Lankford, Richmond Burning: The Last Days of the Confederate Capital (2002),.25-69.
Emory M. Thomas, The Confederate State of Richmond: A Biography of the Capitol (1971), 3-49.
(Hey Lindy, having a jabberwocky is pretty rough... *sigh* hehe ;-))