From: cowan@ssrl01.slac.stanford.edu (P.L. Cowan)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Yet another post on Early's Raid (Re: Washington captured, not)
Date: 21 Dec 92 12:45:36 -0800
Organization: SSRL, Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lab
NNTP-Posting-Host: ssrl01.slac.stanford.edu

In article <BzMGEo.ILq@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>, charbonn@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (gary charbonneau) writes:
> In article <1992Dec21.160505.23621@midway.uchicago.edu> cjt1@midway.uchicago.edu writes:
> 
>>>As to the point regarding alternative history, the canons of the historical
>>>profession (such as they are) forbid the asking of "what if" questions.
>>>This is methodologically sound, since there is ultimately no way that
>>>one can answer such questions.  Nevertheless, such questions will continue
>>>to fascinate.  I might also note that, unless you are allowed to ask
>>>"what if", you can't say that a general "made a mistake" in making
>>>this maneuver or that; he simply did what he did, and you can only
>>>say that what he did was a mistake if you are allowed to speculate
>>>about "what if" he had done something else.
> 
>>I didn't mean to imply that I am so soulless as to lack the natural
>>fascination with alternatives to cold reality.  (After all, I'm the one
>>who thinks Aeschylus wrote the Civil War.)  I was only stating a preference
>>for the alternatives that hew closely to what we know.  
>>--Chuck
> 
> Agreed.  You can ask whether Early could have taken Washington, and
> then argue about it.  You could then ask whether, if Early had taken
> Washington, the British would have intervened.  Still an interesting
> question, but one dependent on a previous hypothetical.  Then you could
> ask, if the British had intervened, would the North still have won?
> And then you could ask, if the North had lost, would World War I had
> turned out differently?  And if World War I had turned out differently,
> would Hitler have come to power....  After a while, even I lose
> interest.
> 
> - Gary Charbonneau
>   charbonn@silver.indiana.edu
> 

I think it is clear that if we cannot predict the weather with any
reliability more than 5 days in advance, then extrapolation
alternative histories to the present day is pure fiction. 

However (everybody emits a groan) in the case of Early's raid on
Washington European intervention was probably no longer what was at
stake, but the election of 1864 (which was only 4 months later).

Since I was a long-time resident of Frederick County, Maryland, I can
say that Early's raid is an event that is still covered in the daily
newspapers (although it is not always on the front page). 

When Jubal arrived in Maryland he attempted to extract a ransom from
the residents of Hagerstown under the threat of buring the city. The
residents claimed they were too poor to meet the sum he demanded,
calling his bluff. Jubal decided that he could not afford to waste the
time that destroying the city would cost. Next he tried the same 
tactic in Frederick with the same result. However Jubal must have seen
a trend developing that he wished to reverse, because he stayed in
town to make his threat good.  The Frederick city fathers managed to
find enough money in the local banks to make Jubal desist (a sum in
excess of $100000 as I recall, possibly $1/4 million). 

The day's delay cost Early two days on his time table since the
additional day was what was required for Lew Wallace to bring his men
from Baltimore. Thus, Jubal had to spend a second day near Frederick
fighting the Battle of the Monocacy. I'll leave it to the student to
work out the problem of what might have happend had Early arrived at
Fort Stevens two days earlier (and without the consequences of a
recent battle).

The reason this is treated in the Frederick daily papers is that each
year Sen. Mathias (now retired) used to sponsor a bill to have the
Federal Treasury reimburse the City of Frederick for the cost of the
ransom PLUS interest (an astronomical figure). It never went anywhere.
I think this is a long-standing tradition, and I wouldn't be surprised
if Sen. Sarbanes (now the senior Senator from Maryland) is carrying on
the tradition.

-- 
Paul Cowan     
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Please send replies, comments etc. (no flames thank you) to COWAN@ANL.GOV   
"If anyone disagrees with anything I say, I am quite prepared not only to
retract it, but also to deny under oath that I ever said it." Tom Lehrer
---------------------------------------------------------------------------