Guerrilla Warfare, Democracy, and The Fate of The Confederacy

 

Marcellus Jerome Clarke AKA Sue Mundy                                                    "I believe in and die for the Confederate cause."  One of the most enduring explanations for why the Confederacy lost the Civil War asserts that the Rebels were too democratic. First proposed by David H. Donald as a variation on a theme by Frank L. Owsley, it has survived, with some modification by recent scholars, as a viable part of most multicausal explanations of Confederate defeat.  To date, the argument has rested largely on the supposed political blunders of the central government, in its indelicate handling of issues that infringed on personal liberties or that injured the sensibilities of powerful state politicians, to demonstrate the disruptive effect of Confederate individualism. Occasional references are also made to problems caused by the independent spirit of the Confederate soldier, but these discussions tend to convey a greater sense of pride or respect for this quality than rebuke.  Little has been said about how military policy might have been influenced by an underlying tension in Confederate society between democracy and authority, between individualism and discipline, or between popular conceptions of the war and the government's conduct of the war. Conscription, probably the most divisive issue involving individual fights, cut across both social and military lines, but another pivotal military issue eclipsed even conscription: guerrilla warfare.  Indeed, guerrilla warfare sparked sharp policy debates in both North and South that affected the outcome of the war in no small way. More @ Guerrilla Warfare Tactics