As you have a very different readership than mine, I’d like to clear a few things up.

Soldiers: Most Civil War soldiers weren’t much different than medieval peasants. They tended to be poor and rural. Before enlisting many had not been more than twenty miles from their hometowns.

The communications revolution that revolutionized the country after the war (telegraph, railroads) was in its infancy, so they were isolated from information as well.

Illiteracy was widespread among southern foot soldiers, less so among northerners, but not uncommon.

Racism was the norm on both sides. Southerners mainly went to war mainly to protect their homes and families. Remember, the south was immediately invaded, not the north. They were also led to believe, by their ruling class, that they were fighting for “a way of life” and that slavery was central to its existence. Many, if not most, common southern soldiers did not own slaves. In many cases, they were little better than slaves themselves.

The northern soldiers fought to preserve “the union.” The idea of a great crusade against slavery is mainly a postwar invention.

You have to make a distinction between racism and slavery. Soldiers on both sides (civilian populations as well) were overwhelmingly racist. Racism was a given throughout the country.

Even the minority who sought emancipation did not consider blacks to be “equal,” just oppressed. It was the institution of slavery they hated, but they usually considered blacks to be lesser humans, incapable of taking care of themselves, really just dumb brutes. You will find this even in Lincoln’s writing.

The worst period of institutional racism in America came after the war. The unfair treatment of defeated southern whites during the military occupation of their states, called Reconstruction, led directly to Jim Crow and the rise of the Klan.

It also led to the rise of the sentimental idea of the war as a noble, “lost cause,” and the rise of the myth of the prewar south as some kind of Camelot.

To your question, war brutalizes everyone it touches. As the war continued, soldiers fought with increasing ferocity. The carnage around them became “normal,” as did atrocities. This happens in all wars.

Blaming the soldiers or even their generals on either side for the war is absurd. They were soldiers doing their duty as they saw it. That’s what soldiers have done throughout history and are still doing today.

Statues. My problem with this post Charlottesville outburst of iconoclasm has to do with the danger of deciding that any period of history is simply evil, offensive, and not worthy of further consideration.

Any honest historian will tell you that the more deeply you study any period, the more complicated it becomes. History isn’t factual, it is interpretive and ongoing. It changes as new information comes to light. It is an ongoing process of evaluation.

If the residents of any town or city want these statues to come down, and they decide to do so, without outside coercion and threats, then fine. Most of the statues are public property. If the citizenry wants them gone, then they should go.

The problem is with censoring the past. Censorship is insidious. Once begun, it can assume a life of its own. If these statues are torn down simply because they offend, what comes next? Sanitized textbooks? Supression of scholarship? Banning the works of “offensive writers?” Who gets to make these decisions? Who decides if Faulkner or Mark Twain is too offensive to modern sensibilities? Who watches the watchers?

Slavery will always be a dark stain on American history, one of its defining characteristics. Racism, largely amplified by slavery, the war, and its aftermath is with us yet and probably will be forever. It must always be opposed, but thoughtfully.

Radical actions breed radical responses. The many articles I have seen on Medium and in the media calling for limiting free speech and initiating street warfare to fight racism are insane. There will be a massive backlash. This already fragile country may be broken for good. Certainly, liberty will become even more constrained than it is now. Unless the power of the central government collapses, social violence will make it stronger and more oppressive.

Perhaps the time of reason is over. It’s possible. I hope not. Something terrible lives where reason doesn’t.

Thanks, Ms Borg.