New and Noteworthy: Mississippi's Wartime Homefront

Mississippi in the Civil War: The Home FrontTimoth B. Smith, niversity of Mississippi Press, illustrations, bibliography, index, $40.00.

In Mississippi in the Civil War: The Home Front, Timothy B. Smith examines Mississippi’s Civil War defeat by both outside and inside forces.

The Union army dismantled the state’s political system, infrastructure, economy, and fighting capability. The state saw extensive military operations, destruction, and bloodshed within her borders. One of the most frightful and extended sieges of the war ended in a crucial Confederate defeat at Vicksburg, the capstone to a tremendous Union campaign.

As Confederate forces in Mississippi became overwhelmed militarily, the white populace’s morale began to crumble. Realizing that the enemy could roll unchecked over the state, civilians, Smith argues, began to lose the will to continue the struggle. Many white Confederates chose to return to the Union rather than see continued destruction in the name of a victory that seemed ever more improbable. When the tide turned, Unionists and African Americans boldly stepped up their endeavors. The result, Smith finds, was a state vanquished and destined to endure suffering far into its future.

The first examination of the state’s Civil War home front in seventy years, this book focuses new light on previously neglected groups such as women and African Americans and it is the fourth book in the Heritage of Mississippi Series.

Tim Smith teaches history at the University of Tennessee at Martin. He is the author of several books, including The Untold Story of Shiloh: The Battle and Battlefield and Champion Hill: Decisive Battle for Vicksburg.

Text Source: Mississippi Department of Archives and History

News---Village Site of Slaves/Contrabands/Freedmen Once Located At Arlington Cemetery

Arlington's Lost Black City, Jesse J. Holland, The Associated Press, April 25, 2010.

Now covered by graves, Freedman's Village was a thriving town for former slaves. Charter buses roll up to Arlington National Cemetery every day, depositing tourists who scramble uphill to see the eternal flame on President John F. Kennedy's grave. People stream in all directions, toward the Tomb of the Unknowns or to remember at tombstones of loved ones lost to war. Few, however, head downhill to a quiet corner near the Iwo Jima Memorial.

Down here, there are no memorials to ancient battles, no ornate headstones honoring long-dead dignitaries. There are only rows of small unassuming white tombstones, many engraved with names like George, Toby and Rose. They are the only visible reminders that part of the nation's most storied burial ground sits atop what used to be a thriving black town -- "Freedman's Village," built on land confiscated from Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Milton Rowe recently shuffled around the famous grounds, slowly making his way up a hill with Wayne Parks. There's nothing here now to tell visitors that freed slaves once lived here, but the two men say they feel a kinship, a connection with this land because they can both trace their ancestors to Freedman's Village. Mr. Parks said he remembers his grandfather repeatedly bringing him to the cemetery as a child to explain the bond. Mr. Parks' great-grandfather, James Parks, lived in Freedman's Village and other locations around the cemetery after being freed from servitude to the Lee family.

"I was sitting on this wall gazing out over the cemetery and all of a sudden I got it," Mr. Parks said. "Our DNA is intrinsically intertwined in this property, integrated in this property. The spirits of my ancestors continue to exist here in this property, so I find like my grandfather, I now come here for strength, I come here to commune with them."

Arlington National Cemetery was established on land confiscated from Lee and his family in 1861 after the general took command of the Confederate forces.
The Civil War leaders of the Union buried dead soldiers on the property in hopes that Lee would never want to return, and Parks' ancestor dug the very first grave near the Freedman's Village burial site. The federal government turned some land about half a mile north of Lee's mansion into a town specifically for freed slaves, referred to as contraband, who had nowhere to go. Freedman's Village was no ramshackle camp. At its height, more than 1,100 former slaves lived in a collection of 50 one-and-a-half story duplexes surrounding a central pond.

Although the town was supposed to be temporary, the freed slaves put up churches, stores, a hospital, mess hall, a school, an "old people's home" and a laundry -- to make a life for themselves. "I think it would have very much resembled a town anywhere in America today with that population. They had the same needs as anywhere, and they sustained themselves by working," said Thomas Sherlock, historian at Arlington National Cemetery.

Living in Freedman's Village wasn't free. Workers with government jobs on nearby farms or those doing construction were paid $10 a week, but half their salary was turned over to the federal government to pay for running the town. Everyone else who lived on site was charged between $1 and $3 rent. Dignitaries from around the nation came to see -- and sometimes stay -- with residents. The most famous was Sojourner Truth, the fiery black abolitionist and preacher, who spent about a year at Freedman's Village as a counselor and teacher.

Truth taught courage and urged residents to stand up to nearby white landowners who had taken to raiding the village to kidnap children for slave labor. Freedman's Village parents who had reported the kidnappings earlier had been thrown in jail. But when authorities came to jail Truth for encouraging parents to keep complaining, she swore to "make this nation rock like a cradle" if they tried to silence her. They backed down, and the raids soon ended. Life was difficult. Virginia residents resented the villagers, and threats were made against their lives. Freedman's Bureau record show that on July 27, 1865, an Army assistant commander ordered "the arrest of W. J. Miner (white man) near Freedman's Village for threatening the lives of colored people, collection of unjust claims" and other crimes. There's no indication an arrest was ever made.

Eventually, the village site, with a spectacular view of the nation's capital and the Potomac River, became more and more desirable for development. Despite impassioned protests from the freed slaves, the federal government paid the residents $75,000 for the buildings and property, and tore down the town in 1900. "Unfortunately our government didn't see the historic value of some of those things," Sherlock said.

Saving the city would have been a "gift to the American people to remember the struggles which seem like was a long time ago, but 150 years is not that long ago," Mr. Sherlock said. When the villagers dispersed into nearby cities and towns, many brought along bits and pieces of Freedman's Village. To this day, the 84-year-old Mr. Rowe and his family attend a nearby church, Lomax AME Zion Church, that got its start in Freedman's Village in 1863.

Several villagers later held prominent positions around the former town's site. William Syphax was elected to the Virginia General Assembly. After Mr. Rowe's great-grandfather, blacksmith William A. Rowe, left Freedman's Village, he became the first black policeman in Arlington County, Va., and later held other county posts, Mr. Rowe said. "They were very instrumental in setting up Arlington County when they moved out," he said.

Arlington National Cemetery holds little to tell people that Freedman's Village ever existed. There's a model of the town inside Arlington House, Lee's former home, but no markers or plaques on the town's site. The only trace of Freedman's Village left on the grounds are the lonely graves in Section 27 near the Iwo Jima Memorial. Walking among the gravestones, Mr. Parks points to the word "citizen" on some, and "civilian" on others -- a recent addition. Originally, Freedman's Village residents were buried with the word contraband on their gravestones. "As time went on and the headstones started to deteriorate and they were being replaced, the historian saw fit to give them the honor they were due and affirmed their status as civilians," Mr. Parks said.

More people should know about the struggles of the villagers, Mr. Parks said. We hope people will "continue to tell their stories, to bring their stories to light, in part really to give them back their dignity that the institution of slavery robbed from them but also to let the current generation know the sacrifices they made and the triumphs they had over extremely adverse circumstances," Mr. Parks said.

CWL: Was Freedman's Town ever 'LOST'? Was it ever a city? It appears not. Below is the city of Arlington's information on the village.

Freedman’s Village survived long after the Civil War, thriving for 37 years and sowing the seeds of Arlington’s African American community. Arlington’s Mount Zion and Mount Olive Baptist churches both descended from the village’s Old Bell Church. Residents of Freedman’s Village gained political influence in the 1870s, enabling villagers to elect officials who went on to become some of Arlington’s most prominent leaders. After 25 years of existence, the village was closed in 1888, and the land returned to military control. Former Freedman Village residents who remained in the area established such continuing neighborhoods as Arlington View, Butler-Holmes, Halls’s Hill and Nauck.

Text Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.com

Top Image: Freedmans' Village Roadside Marker

Second Image: Flickr

Third Image: Library of Virginia

Bottom Image: Arlington Cemetery

New and Forthcoming: Intriguing Titles From McFarland Publishing

Rebel at Large:The Diary of Confederate Deserter Philip Van Buskirk, Philip Van Buskirk Edited and with an Introduction by B.R. Burg, McFarland Publishing, notes, bibliography, index, 208 pp. softcover, 2009, $35.00

This diary is one of the most unusual produced during the Civil War because it contains very little about military life. Early in the war Van Buskirk abandoned his regiment, working as a schoolmaster, farm hand, and casual laborer. He wrote of the suffering civilians endured at the hands of contending armies. But he also found time to chronicle his fascination with handsome young lads he encountered during his life as a deserter—unwittingly providing modern readers an illuminating glimpse of class differences and sexual mores. Naval, social and sexual historians, in particular, will find much valuable source material.

To Petersburg with the Army of the Potomac: The Civil War Letters of Levi Bird Duff, 105th Pennsylvania Volunteers, Levi Bird Duff Edited by Jonathan E. Helmreich, McFarland Publishing, ,33 photos, maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index, 240pp. softcover (7 x 10) 2009, $45.00.

The letters of Levi Bird Duff present a perceptive picture of life in the Army of the Potomac from 1861 to 1864. They are unusual for their literacy, descriptions and continuity, the strength of opinions expressed, and their source: a private who rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel, thus a witness of the army at several levels. Leadership, organizational, weather, and morale problems that plagued Union troops are made clear. Written only for the eyes of Duff’s love, the messages reflect the tension experienced by many soldiers between the conflicting calls of duty and affection.

Tinclads in the Civil War: Union Light-Draught Gunboat Operations on Western Waters, 1862–1865, Myron J. Smith, Jr., McFarland Publishing, 90 photos, maps, appendices, notes, bibliography, index
softcover (7 x 10), 2009, $55.00.

Once the Union Army gained control of the upper rivers of the Mississippi Valley during the first half of 1862, slow and heavy ironclads proved ineffective in patrolling the waters. Hastily outfitted steamboats were covered with thin armor and pressed into duty. These “tinclads” fought Confederate forces attacking from the riverbanks, provided convoy for merchant steamers, enforced revenue measures, and offered tow, dispatch, and other fleet support services. This history documents the service records and duties of these little-known vessels of the Union fleet.

Text and Image Source: McFarland Publishing

New---The War and The Hearth in Dixieland

Weary of War: Life on the Confederate Home Front, Joe Mobley, Prager/Greenwood Publishing, illustrations, bibliography, index, 200 pp., $49.95.

Providing a fresh look at a crucial aspect of the American Civil War, this new study explores the day-to-day life of people in the Confederate States of America as they struggled to cope with a crisis that spared no one, military or civilian. Mobley touches on the experiences of everyone on the home front-white and black, male and female, rich and poor, young and old, native and foreign born.

He looks at health, agriculture, industry, transportation, refugees city life, religion, education, culture families, personal relationships, and public welfare. In so doing, he offers his perspective on how much the "will of the people" contributed to the final defeat of the Southern cause. Although no single experience was common to all Southerners, a great many suffered poverty, dislocation, and heartbreak.

For African Americans, however, the war brought liberation from slavery and the promise of a new life. White women, too, saw their lives transformed as wartime challenges gave them new responsibilities and experiences. Mobley explains how the Confederate military draft, heavy taxes, and restrictions on personal freedoms led to widespread dissatisfaction and cries for peace among Southern folk. He describes the Confederacy as a region of divided loyalties, where pro-Union and pro-Confederate neighbors sometimes clashed violently. This readable, one-volume account of life "behind the lines" will prove particularly useful for students of the conflict.

Table of Contents:
Introduction
1. Death, Sickness, and Despair
2. Agriculture, Industry, and Transportation
3. Destitution, Poor Relief, and Ersatz
4. Conscription, Desertion, and Internal Conflict
5. Slaves, Free Blacks, and Foreigners
6. Refugees, Cities, and Towns
7. Religion, Education, and Cultural Life
8. Courtship, Marriage, and Family Life
Epilogue

Source: text from publisher

CWL: Weary of War: Life on the Confederate Home Front by Joe A. Mobley is the third in the series 'Reflections on the Civil War Era' and released in March. True Sons of the Republic: European Immigrants in the Union Army by Martin W. Öfele is the second in the series and was released in February. Decision in the Heartland: The Civil War in the West, the first in the series, was released in January.

CWL---Just Published: Medicine, Family and Homefront

Images of Civil War Medicine: A Photographic History, Gordon E. Dammann and Alfred Jay Bollet, Paperback, heavily illustrated with b/w photogrpahs, 192 pages, Demos Medical Publishing, $34.95.

From the Publisher: Dr. Alfred Bollet’s Civil War Medicine: Challenges and Triumphs won wide acclaim as an expert study. Now, in collaboration with Dr. Gordon Dammann, Dr. Bollet has taken his expertise one step further and pictorially illuminated this fascinating chapter in medical history. Featuring 250 rare archival photographs, Images of Civil War Medicine is a comprehensive visual encyclopedia of medical care during a seminal event in American history. The book showcases the uniforms, equipment, and members of a large group of individual Civil War doctors — “Cartes de Visites” — along with resonant images of existing pre-war structures used to heal the sick. Also here are prominent medical educators, hospitals, stewards, and ambulances,as well as images of surgery, dentistry, nursing, and embalming. Ideal for Civil War buffs, historians, and medical history enthusiasts, Images of Civil War Medicine gives a complete overview of this era's medical realities.

Why the Confederates Fought: Family and Nation in Civil War Virginia, Aaron Sheehan-Dean hardcover, 312 pages, The University of North Carolina Press, $34.95.

From the publisher
In the first comprehensive study of the experience of Virginia soldiers and their families in the Civil War, Aaron Sheehan-Dean captures the inner world of the rank-and-file. He challenges earlier arguments that middle- and lower-class southerners gradually withdrew their support for the Confederacy because their class interests were not being met. Instead he argues that Virginia soldiers continued to be motivated by the profound emotional connection between military service and the protection of home and family, even as the war dragged on. Aaron Sheehan-Dean is assistant professor of history at the University of North Florida. He is editor of Struggle for a Vast Future: The American Civil War and The View from the Ground: The Experience of Civil War Soldiers.

The Civil War and the Limits of DestructionMark E., Jr. Neely, Harvard University Press, 288 pp., hardcover, $27.95.

From the Publisher
In a perceptive and rigorously argued call to resist the temptation to describe the Civil War as an unusually destructive or brutal war, Mark Neely finds new ways to examine old questions and to challenge prevailing interpretations. This is another first-rate work from one of the best and most imaginative scholars working in the field of Civil War history. --Gary W. Gallagher, author of The Confederate War

Neely tackles a fascinating and important topic: were terror and brutality a key part of the Civil War? He makes a compelling case that the combat was more controlled than we now often accept. His account is original­-in some cases clearly pathbreaking­-and his tone passionate and gripping. This is a major contribution that will capture a wide readership. --Ari Kelman, author of A River and Its City

The Civil War is often portrayed as the most brutal war in America's history, a premonition of twentieth-century slaughter and carnage. In challenging this view, Mark E. Neely, Jr., considers the war's destructiveness in a comparative context, revealing the sense of limits that guided the conduct of American soldiers and statesmen.

Neely begins by contrasting Civil War behavior with U.S. soldiers' experiences in the Mexican War of 1846. He examines Price's Raid in Missouri for evidence of deterioration in the restraints imposed by the customs of war; and in a brilliant analysis of Philip Sheridan's Shenandoah Valley campaign, he shows that the actions of U.S. cavalrymen were selective and controlled. The Mexican war of the 1860s between French imperial forces and republicans provided a new yardstick for brutality: Emperor Maximilian's infamous Black Decree threatened captured enemies with execution. Civil War battles, however, paled in comparison with the unrestrained warfare waged against the Plains Indians. Racial beliefs, Neely shows, were a major determinant of wartime behavior.

Destructive rhetoric was rampant in the congressional debate over the resolution to avenge the treatment of Union captives at Andersonville by deliberately starving and freezing to death Confederate prisoners of war. Nevertheless, to gauge the events of the war by the ferocity of its language of political hatred is a mistake, Neely argues. The modern overemphasis on violence in Civil War literature has led many scholars to go too far in drawing close analogies with the twentieth century's "total war" and the grim guerrilla struggles of Vietnam.

New for Fall: Live Free, Die Hard

Diehard Rebels: The Confederate Culture of Invincibility, Jason Phillips, University of Georgia Press, 272 pages, b/w historic cartoons and illustrations, notes, bibliography, index release date November 15, 2007 $34.95

Well into the final months of the Civil War, countless Confederate soldiers earnestly believed that victory lay just around the corner. How could this be? Jason Phillips reveals the deeply ingrained attitudes that shaped the reality of these diehards not only during the war but in the subsequent era, when the myth of the Lost Cause was born.

Much is known about what Confederate soldiers fought for; far less is understood about why they fought on despite long odds and terrible costs. Drawing on soldiers’ letters and diary entries from 1863 to 1865, Diehard Rebels explains how religious dogma and perceptions of Union barbarity and ineptitude affirmed in many soldiers a view of an indomitable South. Within the soldiers’ closely circumscribed world, other elements reinforced convictions that the South was holding its own against great but surmountable odds. Close comradeship and disorienting combat conditions were factors, says Phillips, as well as conclusions drawn from images and experiences contradicting the larger reality, such as battlefields littered with enemy corpses and parade-ground spectacles of Confederate military splendor.

Troops also tended to perceive the course of the war in far-off theaters, the North, and overseas in positive ways. In addition, diehards were both consumers and conduits of rumors, misinformation, and propaganda that allowed them to envision a war that was rosier than the truth but still believable. Instead of crippling diehards after defeat, old notions of southern superiority helped them uphold southern honor. The central elements of Confederate invincibility fueled white southern defiance after surrender and evolved into the Lost Cause.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments
Introduction. Southern Invincibility and Confederate Defeat
Chapter One. The Smile of Providence: Confederate Religion and Invincibility
Chapter Two. The Mask of Cain: Enemy Images in Rebel Minds
Chapter Three. Without a Murmur: Confederate Endurance and the Immediate War
Chapter Four. Gray Grapevines: Rumors and the Distant War
Chapter Five. The Face of Surrender: Diehard Rebels in 1865
Conclusion. The Aftermath of Invincibility

Jason Phillips is an assistant professor of history at Mississippi State University. He has also taught at Texas A&M University.

James B. McPherson, whose 2007 book is 'This Mighty Scourge: Perspectives on the Civil War' likes it--
"Diehard Rebels is a major contribution to the history of the Confederacy and the history of Southern culture. It offers an important corrective to the hindsight perspective that portrays an irreversible slide down the slippery slope of demoralization and defeat after the twin defeats at Gettysburg and Vicksburg."
—James McPherson,

Bertram Wyatt-Brown, author of 'The Shaping of Southern Culture', likes it too--
“Phillips persuasively answers a Civil War mystery. Why did so many Confederates doggedly keep fighting when any rational observer would have recognized looming defeat? Examining a most impressive array of sources, he finds that religious faith, cheerleading propaganda, admiration of the officer class, hatred of Yankees, military discipline, bonding in the ranks, stubborn denial of the obvious were all factors. Phillips eloquently and poignantly recounts the deprivations and sacrifices that were endured in vain hope of eventual victory. Every Civil War student, both the professional and lay reader, will find Diehard Rebels highly moving and tragic.”

Text Supplied by The University of Georgia Press with edits by The Civil War Librarian

New for the Fall: Virginia's Families and Soldiers At War

Why Confederates Fought: Family and Nation in Civil War Virginia (Civil War America), Aaron Sheehan-Dean, The University of North Carolina Press, Hardcover, 272 pages. $34.95, release date October 31, 2007

In the first comprehensive study of the experience of Virginia soldiers and their families in the Civil War, Aaron Sheehan-Dean captures the inner world of the rank-and-file by utilizing new statistical evidence and first-person narratives. Aaron Sheehan-Dean is assistant professor of history at the University of North Florida. He is editor of 'The View from the Ground: The Experience of Civil War Soldiers' which The Civil War Librarian thoroughly enjoyed and discussed the individual essays in May, June and July.

CWL --- Commitment: Battlefront vs. Homefront

The Army Is Not Near So Much Demoralized as the Country Is: Soldiers in the Army of Northern Virginia and the Confederate Home Front, Lisa Laskin, in The View From the Ground: Experiences of Civil War Soldiers, A. Sheehan-Dean, editor, Kentucky UP, pp. 91-121, notes.

“Commitment to Confederate war aims, a common feeling of superiority over the enemy, and pride in their army, and its leadership contributed to the ANV soldiers’ unity and high morale . . . until the last days of the war,” and the single greatest persuasive argument for desertion came from the home front. Laskin’s review of “of soldiers contemporary writings about their relationships with Southern civilians illuminates” a paradox. “The people to whom soldiers looked for emotional support, also proved to be the group most capable of sabotaging soldier morale.” (pp. 91-92)

Women’s patriotism served the Confederacy. Early in the war, civilian animosity towards those who had not quickly enlisted intimidated young men. This goading provided reinforcement to the Southern war effort. In the patriarchal worldview of Dixie women embodied home and sacrifice. Their vulnerability motivated soldiers forward on the march to victory. Southern notions of honor included the protection of families from both the invading Northern barbarians and rebellious and revengeful slaves.

The author of this essay has found a discrepancy between soldiers’ idealization of women’s patriotism and their obvious hostility to the southern soldier. She cites incidents in Virginia, Tennessee, North and South Carolina from Southern soldiers’ papers that reveal that civilians did not welcome their presence. Also, the spring of 1863 food riots in the urban South drew the attention and comments of Rebel soldiers who “uniformly disparaged the rioters as a lawless, marauding mob incited by foreigners.” (p. 101)

In soldiers' writings, three types of homefront attitudes were particularly disturbing: the avoidance of military duty, wartime profiteering, and rising tide of despair coming from homefront letters. By the war’s end, soldiers of the Army of Northern Virginia concluded that they alone were the final repository of honor in the Confederacy. The author notes that the thousands of ANV deserters have not been heard.

In the middle of reading the essay, this reader wondered what Gary Gallagher thought about Laskin’s notions. The final page of the essay takes into consideration Gallagher’s work on the Army of Northern Virginia and the Confederate homefront. Laskin states that “the ANV’s impressive battle record helped boost the spirits of the folks at home, but it could never entirely overcome the inherent friction in soldier-civilian relations.” Laskin concludes that “soldiers’ commitment to the war—or at least to seeing the job through—was in stark contrast to the wavering commitment of those at home.” (p.111)

Help Note: This chapter can be obtained by using your local library's inter-library loan services or by contacting me.