HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Subject: Re: Black resistance
Reply-To: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Organization: SGI TechPubs
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 23:41:23 GMT


In article <1992Aug17.150829.26714@hubcap.clemson.edu>, System Janitor writes:
>Hmmm... I was reading last night about how the rich planters went to
>the city (Charleston) or the upstate during the summer to escape 
>malaria which hit the rice fields (main crop during the 18th century) each
>year. No mention of the slaves. I expect they were left to tend the
>rice.

My recollection was that a slave sent south ("sold down the river") as a field
hand in a rice plantation had a life expectancy of two years from arrival. 

JZ
From: tecump@ucsb.edu (Dal bello)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Longstreet/Bragg and Chickamauga
Date: 19 Aug 92 21:46:33 GMT
Organization: University of California, Santa Barbara

while longstreet was technically the superior officer on the field,
Bragg had command of the army.  Longstreet commanded the left wing
and his assault was very massive.  By a fortuitous incident,
he attacked straight into part of the Union line that was being
abandoned at the time, although his attack was so deep that the line
that was there would have most likely been crushed.

It seems that an orderly had informed Rosecrans that there was a 
hole in the union line.  This was inaccurate, as the division that
was supposed to be there, was, but concealled by the woods/underbrush.
Rosecrans then ordered the diivsion to the right (Wood's?
or Brennan's? - i think Wood's, Brennan was the "hole") to close up
on the divisison to the left of the "hole" (Reynolds).  Now,
Wood knew that there was a division in the "hole", but having got a
tonge lashing from Rosecrans for being slow in following his orders
before, he immediatley did so now.  (it was Rosecrans chief of staff -
(Garfield?) that usually wrote his orders - rosecrans' orders tended
to be unclear compared with Garfields).  Now
a hole actually existed where one had not been.  Just as Wood was pulling out,
Longstreets attack came crashing through the woods.  The last brigade,
under Harker, faced about.  Most prominent in the fighting was Emerson
Opdycke's 125th OVI, of Harkers Brigade. They soon became known as 
"Opdycke's Tigers"  Opdycke later was one of the Federal Heroes at Franklin,
throwing his brigade into the breach.

it was unlikely that the line wouldve held under Longstreets attack.  It
was fairly thin as Thomas had continually been calling for support on the
left.  

i think Rosecrans got a bad deal as while he was going to stay with Thomas,
Garfield convinced him to go to Chattanooga to set up the new lines.  Thus
he "ran" from the field.  Garfield was not too loyal a chief of staff.
Rosecrans - the General of One Mistake.

Longstreet had independent command that winter against Burnside around
Knoxville.  Not much of improtance happend to change the results of the
war.
From: dargan@iscsvax.uni.edu
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: <None>
Date: 20 Aug 92 01:04:57 -0500
Organization: University of Northern Iowa

Lee died in 1870.  Read *The Marble Man* by Thomas Connelly for a good
explication of Lee's deification and Longstreet's victimization.
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: dickwin@sequent.com (Dick Winningstad)
Subject: Re: Hood was horrible
Organization: Sequent Computer Systems Inc.
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 92 03:06:30 GMT

>>
>The first time he came up against a Union commander who knew how to march
>his army quickly he'd have been crushed. Not unlike what happened to Hood.
>Jackson also has a long record of making attacks (including frontal attacks)
>against numerically superior forces.
>
>

Whipping a superior force with attacks is what separates the
audaciously briliant commander from the stupid commander.

Lee knew he could win with attacks against the various union
commanders in the early phases of the war.  He was also smart enough
to switch to defense when Grant came on the scene (Ok, Gettysburg
probably had a little to do with this too).

Hood did not know when to switch.  It's too bad we will never know how
Jackson would have fared when the strategy needed changing.  Johnston
was probably right in his strategy of strategic withdrawal toward
Atlanta as he tried to force Sherman into a battle to his (Johnston's)
advantage several times during Sherman's advance, but Sherman would
not bite. Staying in Atlanta would have forced Sherman to attack a
heavily defended area that could not be circumvented.  And the effects
on the 1864 elections could have been different if Johnston had still
been in command.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+Dick Winningstad                                                    +
+                            Two Wheels                              +
+                          Two Cylinders                             +
+                             Two Fast                               +
+dickwin@sequent.com                                                 +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: wwarf@copper.ucs.indiana.edu (Wayne J. Warf)
Subject: Re: Secession .
Organization: Indiana University
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 19:40:47 GMT

In article <1992Aug10.141032.22300@NOC.Vitalink.COM> <roy_wells@qm.vitalink.com> (<roy_wells@qm.vitalink.com>) writes:
>
> davec@iplmail.orl.mmc.com (Dave Crowder) asks:
>>The Constitution of the United States prior to the Civil War never for bid 
>>explicitly the right of a state to secede from the Union.  And since the 
>>Constitution does state that all rights no included in the Constitution 
>>are reserved for the states, why wouldn't secession be Constitutional?  
>
>There is a question here as to whether secession is, indeed a right.
>
>Most of the States of the so-called Confederacy claimed this as a "sovreign 
>right" of their state (ignoring that they had given up a great portion of that 
>sovreignty to form the United States).
>
>How could Louisiana, which was purchased with FEDERAL funds, claim 
>to be independent?  Were the people of that state going to pay back the 
>taxpayers of New York?  (Since the largest proportion of taxes collected in 
>the period were from that state?)

This would be a sound argument if LA. were still a territory. When they
were granted statehood, they attained full sovereignty and equality with
all other states. By this argument New York should be able to run the affairs
of the states in the Louisiana purchase. 

>
>Merely not stating that secession was not made specifically illegal is 
>insufficient grounds for the South to claim legitimacy for its cause.
>
For it's cause, yes, but not secession. The southern cause and the
legality of secession are separate issues.

-- 
 +--------------------------------------------------------------------+
 | Wayne J. Warf -- WWARF@ucs.indiana.edu -- I speak for myself only  |
 |"Government is like fire, a dangerous servant and a fearful master" |
 +--------------------------------------------------------------------+
From: a750288@pan.mc.ti.com (John E. Brennan)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Re: Black Resistance during America's Holocaust
Date: 12 Aug 92 21:17:34 GMT
Organization: Texas Instruments Materials and Controls Group

In article <1992Aug11.232015.12833@cco.caltech.edu> morphy@cco.caltech.edu (
Jones Maxime Murphy) writes:>M20614@mwvm.mitre.org (Hugh Pritchard) writes:

>>However, these 3 million people had no military, political, economic, or
>>social power.  They didn't publish books or periodicals -- and not
>>because they didn't want to!  They had no "voice," however you want to
>>define "voice."

>That's bull. You really should read up on the long and bloody history of
>slave revolts in the US. Slaves had a voice, all right. That was why 
literacy>was a capital offense for a slave, since it was generally used to 
incite other>slaves to kill white people.

>>In referring to "the South," people mean those Southerners with the loudest
>>voices: the Anglo-Saxon-American landowners.

>The most guns, not the loudest voices.
>Jones
>-- 
>****************************************************************************
****
>Jones M Murphy, Jr
>Associate, Derivative Products Group


Jones,

The history of slave revolts and the things black Americans did or tried to
do in gaining their freedom was never really covered in school when  I grew
up.  Could you post the titles of some books that would help me "read up on
the long and bloody history of slave revolts".  Thanks in advance!


Take Care,
 
John 



----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                            
John Brennan 

a750288@pan.mc.ti.com 
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Subject: Re: You started it, we finished it (was Re: Confederate Flags)
Reply-To: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Jeffrey B. Zurschmeide)
Organization: SGI TechPubs
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 00:42:35 GMT

In article <1992Aug13.001711.19309@cabot.balltown.cma.COM>, richard welty writes:
>but only one leg, jeff.  the declaration also contains the phrase
>``all men are created equal'', rather than ``all white men are created
>equal'', which represents a significnat conflict with the standard
>attitudes of southern secessionists and apologists.
>i continue to maintain that secession is based on very tenuous legal
>ground.

Totally. It's about as tenuous as it gets. But the challenge was to find 
*something* that could justify a possible right to secession in the Constitution, 
not a guaranteed right to it. 

In truth, I think that the only valid "right" to revolution or secession is if you
win. (A la Shogun, for lack of a better soundbite...) If they had won, secession 
would be a right for states. (Or explicitly disallowed by amendment to the Constitution.) 

I've said before and I'll say again that I believe the formation, cause, and structure
of the CSA was flawed.  They were fighting more than the Union, they
were fighting a world that was moving beyond their society. Moving beyond tolerating
the brutal conditions of slavery and the ideology that sanctioned it. 

You will recall that Jefferson originally included words in the Declaration explicitly
decrying the slave trade (and by association, slavery at large). The Carolinas refused to 
sign until it was removed. Moreover, you and I (and no one reading 
in good faith, imo) cannot read the words "all men are endowed by their
creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among these are life, liberty, and
the pursuit of happiness" and not feel that maintaining slavery is a betrayal of
that principle. 

In short, the whole foundation of the country was against slavery, if the words 
are to be taken at face value, and yet it continued to exist.  Secession, it seems
to me, is much less of a Constitutional problem than the existence of slavery
in the first place! Slavery was a betrayal, right from the start, of our national 
principles!

So, I guess the point of this ramble is that I did not set out to defend the right
of secession so much as to offer a tenuous thesis by which a state might claim
a right to secede. (But then, I'm a Nat.Law follower, not a Constructionist, so 
it follows that I have tenuous defenses for my positions... ;^}) 

JZ    

Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: zursch@whizkid.wpd.sgi.com (Captain Coffee)
Subject: GOOD BOOKS!
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc., Mountain View, CA
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 17:56:24 GMT


Greetings Again, Fellow Aficionados,

  While I was on vacation last week, I made a pretty good haul 
of books. The star of the show, for me, was a book called "Elisha 
Stockwell Jr. Sees the Civil War." - It's a memoir, written 63 years
after the war, of this Wisconsin Volunteer. He joined in November, 1861
at fifteen years of age. He served until October 9, 1865. He was at
Shiloh, Corinth/Iuka, Vicksburg, Atlanta, Nashville, and Mobile Bay (which
was *very* interesting). It's well written. I passed up the diaries of
Elijah Hunt Rhodes for this one....

I also got various hardbacks of Catton and a copy of "Mr. Lincoln's Army" 
and an 1897 printing of 'The Campaigns of Grant and Lee'. 

All for $35! (don't you love used bookstores?) 

Anyway, better than what I got was what I couldn't afford. This bookstore
in Ashland, Oregon, had some *wild* stuff. There was an 1864 (!) edition
of a biography of US Grant called "Tanner Boy" there for $35. It's, as
you expect of any biography of a General still in the limelight and fighting
battles, EXTREMELY saccharine in its praise, but still a neat thing if
you're into it. 

They had a hardback set of Shelby Foote books for $60, and a full four-volume
hardback edition of "Lee's Lieutenants" for $150. Lots of old books and 
nice hardbacks in the $20-$30 range. 

I believe they will ship books for you...

The place is called: 

Blue Dragon Bookshop
283 E. Main St.
Ashland, OR 97520
(503) 482-2142


I recommend it. 

JZ

Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: cjt1@ellis.uchicago.edu (Charles Ten Brink)
Subject: Re: West Virginia (was Re: You started it, ...)
Reply-To: cjt1@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago Computing Organizations
Date: Wed, 12 Aug 1992 22:31:28 GMT

In article <12AUG199222183096@vxcrna.cern.ch> casper@vxcrna.cern.ch (CASPER,DAVI./PPE) writes:
>On a related note, I have never been clear how Lincoln managed to be re-elected
>President.  If the total number of senators+congressmen (for all of the United
>States) is E, you must have at least (E+1)/2 votes to be president.  But some
>fairly large fraction, say at least 0.25*E, of the eligible electoral votes were
>from states in rebellion which presumably did not send electors.
>
>So was the Constitution taken to mean you must only have a majority of the
>electoral votes _cast_ or was there some other dodge?  What if all the Southern
>states had sent people to 1864 Electoral College to vote for McClellan????
>
>I suppose that wouldn't be "honorable"...

It wouldn't have made any difference.  Lincoln carried every state
that participated in the 1864 election except Delaware, New Jersey,
and Kentucky.  This gave him 212 of the 234 electoral votes cast.
(Compare this to his 1860 performance, 180 of 303 electoral votes.)
The Confederacy would have had fewer than 100 electoral votes, so
their sitting out the election really didn't make any difference to
the outcome.  That's why the election wasn't challenged.
--Chuck



-- 
Bitnet:                 uclcjt1@uchimvs1
Internet:         cjt1@midway.uchicago.edu
From: jsa5+@andrew.cmu.edu (Joshua M. Sabloff)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Let's get a decent title for the slavery thread
Date: 19 Aug 92 14:01:08 GMT
	<1992Aug19.033357.13295@cco.caltech.edu>
Organization: Information Networking Institute, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Excerpts from netnews.alt.war.civil.usa: 19-Aug-92 Re: Mac Jones Maxime
Murphy@cco. (588)

> Hmmm, one cannot help but be amused at the determination of some people posting
> in this group to avoid coming to grips with the distressing details of slavery
> itself. This is in striking contrast to their willingness to describe the 
> gentlemanly niceties of Lee's dress. A grim commentary indeed.

I do believe that the post regarding Lee's attire stemmed from a debate
over the military tactics of Lee, Longstreet, and Hood.  The specifics
of the clothing post had to do with Lee's health at Gettysburg.  This
was a discussion of the military aspect of the war, and in no way should
be construed as an attempt to avoid the slavery question.  Is a
newsgroup not allowed to carry multiple threads??? :-)

Now on to a (hopefully) rational discussion of the issue of slavery....

If you can guess from my last name, I am Jewish.  From your arguments as
well as from my own knowledge, I can see that your comparison of the
slave trade to the Holocaust, especially that the basis of both was
racism, is valid.  However, there are several distunguishing features. 
In spite of the well-known results, the slave trade was not intended as
a wholesale extermination of a group of people.  This does not make the
slave trade right; nor does it make it even "less evil."  It is simply a
distinction that should be noted. 

 For all of your obvious knowledge and intelligence, it is sad that you
fall into the same trap that you accuse other of:  stereotyping.  All
white people are NOT racists, just like not all African-Americans are
NOT <insert favorite bigoted racial stereotype here>.  Ignoring slavery
in the face of the political aspects of the Civil War is to totally
misunderstand the Civil War.  However, the opposite also applies.

Please, let's keep this rational.

-Josh Sabloff (jsa5@andrew.cmu.edu)
"Now go away before I taunt you a second time-a!"
From: jthoppers@OCTAVO
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Re: R E Lee
Date: 14 Aug 92 14:22:28 GMT
Article-I.D.: OCTAVO.0095F143.E7C77880
Reply-To: jthoppers@OCTAVO
Distribution: usa

Marse is a colloquial shortening of the word Master. It may have been first used by the servants who accompanied Lee in the war.

JT Hoppers
9th Va Cav., Co.B
NCWA
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: pholland@iastate.edu (Paul J Hollander)
Subject: Re: Lee-Longstreet
Organization: Iowa State University, Ames, IA
Distribution: usa
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 1992 17:44:44 GMT

In article <1992Aug16.213302.6195@leland.Stanford.EDU> whale@leland.Stanford.EDU (Stephen Schmidt) writes:
> (Deleted)
>
>As I understand it, all of the allegations raised against Longstreet at
>Gettysburg are false. That said, it has always seemed to me that he was
>guilty of not allowing Hood to move one brigade to the right of Little
>Round Top. Hood believed that this brigade would have taken the Union in
>rear and found itself among the Union trains, and I've never seen anyone
>claim otherwise. In his book he is quite explicit about it.
>Longstreet only replied "General Lee's orders are to attack up the Emmitsburg
>road" and never gave any reasons why not to move one brigade right. It seems
>to me that such a move would be entirely within the discretion Lee allowed
>his corps commanders in battle.
> (Deleted)

Longstreet was Hood's superior.  He didn't need to give any reasons.

Losing a brigade would weaken the attack.  One brigade could mean the 
difference between success and failure.  It was the middle of the afternoon.
Delaying while the detached brigade moved around to the rear would bring
evening closer and give the Union forces more time to reinforce Little
Round Top.

Confederate forces moving south towards Little Round Top had to backtrack 
to avoid observation from the Union lines.  I don't know the times involved
well enough to judge whether they'd have hit LRT before Chamberlain's Maine
troops got there, if the backtracking had not been necessary.  Anyone know?

Paul Hollander    pholland@iastate.edu
Behold the tortoise: he makes no progress unless he sticks his neck out.
From: jsanders@phys.ksu.edu (Justin M. Sanders)
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
Subject: Value of Confederate Currency 1861-1865
Date: 18 Aug 1992 06:17:12 GMT
Organization: Department of Physics, Kansas State University, Manhattan KS, USA
NNTP-Posting-Host: bohr.phys.ksu.edu

I have recently typed in a table of the value of Confederate Currency
in Texas (Houston) from 1861 to 1865.  If anyone is interested in having
a copy of it, I will e-mail it to them, or if there is sufficient 
interest, I'll post it to this group.

As long as I'm at this, I also have abstracted service records for
the 15th Texas Cavalry (Co C) and will e-mail it (it is too long to
post) to whoever might be interested.
--
Justin M. Sanders    "Politics, like prison, seems to impart some 
Dept. of Physics        dubious skills to those who serve too  
Kansas State Univ.        many terms." -- Joseph Sobran 
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: trev@hubcap.clemson.edu (Trevor Bauknight)
Subject: Re: Let's get a decent title for the slavery thread
Organization: Jes Grew Carriers -- Metaphysical Bunko Squad 
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 04:50:46 GMT

morphy@cco.caltech.edu (Jones Maxime Murphy) writes:

>>> Your culture and heritage are built on the blood and suffering of mine. 

>was the wealth of the US. In any case, I was responding to someone who 
>identified the *Confederate flag* as their "heritage & culture". Surely you
>do not want to identify all "white" culture with the Confederate flag. Or

You were responding to me, and I was in no way limiting my discussion to
the "Confederate flag."  The subject header read "A fresh start...,"
meaning a departure from the discussion of the Confederate flag.  I in
no way "identified the *Confederate flag*" as my "heritage & culture."  
And no, I  do not wish to identify all "white" culture with the Confederate
flag.  "White culture," if it is indeed identifiable as such, involves much 
more than the Confederate flag, the CSA, and the oppression of other 
people...
 
Trevor Bauknight         trev@hubcap.clemson.edu    ...gatech!hubcap!trev
 
                                                     +-----------+
                                                     | _> ###    |
                  fish on                            |     |     |
                                                     +-----------+
Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa
From: renge@halcyon.com (Robert Hilton)
Subject: Re: Lee-Longstreet
Organization: Northwest Nexus Inc. (206) 455-3505
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 05:06:28 GMT

whale@leland.Stanford.EDU (Stephen Schmidt) writes:

>In article <1992Aug17.145456.5600@constellation.ecn.uoknor.edu> robert@geoblue.gcn.uoknor.edu (Robert Lindsay) writes:
>>Yeah, Hood and Johnston did not have a very high opinion of each other. 
>>IHMO Hood was the on at fault. You only have to look at the result of the
>>Battles around Atlanta, Franklin, and Nashville vs. Kennesaw Mountain
>>to see the answer.

>Having only read Hood's side of it, I don't pretend to understand it, but
>Hood's argument is that Johnston's defensive policies were causing mass
>desertions from the army which meant that the army would dissolve in a few
>more months. By taking the offensive he stopped the desertions and at least
>had a chance to win a major battle; not a good chance, but then the
>Confederacy had very no good chances left in the winter of 1864 anyway.
>It always seems logical to me; Johnston's policy seems like one designed
>to turn defeat into slightly slower defeat, whereas Hood could conceivably
>have achieved something. Hood claims he would have won Franklin and Nashville
>if he had had better cooperation from his corps commanders, for whatever
>that's worth.
>"The logical outcome of defensive warfare is surrender."

It seemed to me that Johnson was playing the defensive game in hopes of
chopping up a portion of Sherman's army, because Sherman did have three
separate army groups, and they kept maneuvering around to catch Johnso
off-guard or outflank his own army.  If not take a bite out of one of
Sherman's armies, then to watch the Union troops wear themselves out on
the solid southern defenses. However, Sherman was too adept, and his
troops too practical about their lives, to spend themselves on those
lines.  Wasn't it Resaka that Johnson nearly got a bite out of
Schofield's army, but just missed the timing due to Hood not getting
there in time?

>-- 
>Steve Schmidt			<><		   whale@leland.stanford.edu

>"We have met the enemy and he is us" - Walt Kelly

					Robert Hilton
					renge@halcyon.com

Newsgroups: alt.war.civil.usa