What I'm Reading This Month
By Nadine Holder
May 2007
A People's History of the Civil War, Struggles for the Meaning of Freedom, by David Williams, The New Press, New York, 2005.
This is another book so jam packed with information that I will probably not finish it - my brain just won't hold that much! This is indeed a history of the common people during the Civil War:
"The people who lived through that time fought through everyday struggles whose collective meaning and results were ultimately much bigger than battles, much greater than leaders, and much broader than the Civil War itself."
- David Williams
Some things we just didn't learn in school and I am deathly afraid today's children are learning even less. It had always been my impression that most of our freedoms in America (for white folks) came from the Revolutionary War and the "founding fathers." Not so, evidently. The early chapters of the book focus on women's lot during the war.
The soldiers who fought in the war were from the poorer classes as anyone with any wealth or power was able to get an exemption from the draft. Planters who exempted themselves from fighting in the war stayed home and concentrated on making fortunes from growing cotton and tobacco which they sold overseas. This left a dearth of food and since it was the women and children who were left at home they are the ones who starved. For awhile, and then the women began to take matters into their own hands. With what poor weapons they could lay their hands on they began to band together and take what they needed from planters and shop keepers and to destroy the cotton and tobacco crops. Some who were literate were able to write letters to government leaders and some even succeeded in having their men sent home (if they were still alive) but the majority of them just went out and did what they had to to survive. Many women were able to get work that had previously been done by men and thus the beginning of the "government girls." They were paid less than half what the men had been paid and lost their reputations, as women working among men were suspect as "loose" women, but they did what they had to do. This planted the seed for later struggles for women's rights.
I peeked ahead at the last chapter "Was the War in Vain?" Part of a quote from William Sylvis, a labor organizer: "when the shackles fell from the hands of those four millions of blacks, it did not make them free, it simply transferred them from one condition of slavery to another; it placed them upon the platform of the white workingmen and made all slaves together." My ancestors luckily were independent farmers for the large part and had migrated to the Northwest Territory (Indiana and Illinois in that time frame!) so their women were able to raise their own food though they often had to pull the plows themselves since horses were stolen and sold for profit during the War. Even tiny children participated in the labor but it made them into solid and productive citizens when they grew up.
I had intended to stop here but picked it up one day and read the chapter "My God are We Free?" about the slaves and the Civil War. Many took freedom into their own hands and went north and actually fought on the northern side during the war. Many more tried to make a living in the south but were soon sucked back into low wages, company stores, and virtual slavery again, along with the poor whites. Contrary to what we learned in school, Abraham Lincoln was not in favor of freeing the slaves and as he was gradually forced into doing something he made an emancipation proclamation that freed them but basically told them they would be deported from America. It wasn't until a Constitutional amendment was passed that they were actually free and could live freely in America. One statement really hit home with me though as it mentioned their hunger for literacy and said that black children were as thrilled with going to school as white children were thrilled with school holidays. What a contrast to today when so many seem headed straight back to illiteracy.
A wonderful book and so different from most Civil War books that concentrate on the battles. The People's History books are a series that take a different look at history from the standpoint of the common people and their everyday lives. I originally picked this up as I struggled with my thoughts on the Iraq War and it helped me a lot in sorting things out as I learned so much about the hardships of war on those who were not involved in the battles and a great deal about the politics of the time (that never changes!).
Copyright © 2007 Nadine Holder.
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