The Real Cause

“Old Abe Lincoln was inaugurated today amidst bayonets bristling from the housetops as well as streets. His speech was just what was expected from him, stupid, ambiguous, vulgar and insolent, and is everywhere considered as a virtual declaration of war.” (Mar. 4,1861, p. 11)

A review of For Cause and Comrades: Why Men Fought in the Civil War (Oxford, 1997) by James McPherson

Miss Emma Holmes of Charleston, SC, and a survivor of the War Between the States, has left us one of innumerable diaries from the South about the conflict of 1861-1865 (see The Diary of Miss Emma Holmes, 1861-1866 edited by John E Marszalek [Baton Rouge: LSU, 1979]. A few quotes from this source will serve to introduce Prof. McPherson’s latest work which is also a much needed corrective analysis of what the Civil War was all about.

“‘The United States,’ now alas broken into fragments through the malignity and fanaticism of the Black Republicans….Doubly proud am I of my native state, that she should be the first to arise and shake off the hated chain which linked us with Black Republicans and Abolitionists. . .” (Feb. 13,1861, p. 1)

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