BoatBanter.com - View Single Post - Civil war

Wayne.B

On Mon, 14 Sep 2015 12:01:26 -0400, wrote:

On Mon, 14 Sep 2015 05:00:54 -0700 (PDT), Tim
wrote:

It is a great program Greg. I took interest in it when it came out. I had 3 2xgreat grandfathers that fought in the bloody thing. A 2xgreat uncle too!

I was surprised at how much anti-war activities there were in the
north. According to Burns, most of them also were not really believing
this war was over slavery. They sounded like the soldiers the US has
sent off to fight in other people's civil wars. They were not sure why
they were there, they just went because they were told to go by the
government.
The most common given by the southerners for why they were fighting
was because the union soldiers had invaded them. Again, that could
have been written today of some of our misadventures.

It really sounded like three quarters of a million people may have
died for a war that didn't have to be fought. I think slavery would
have fallen from it's own weight and the union would have come back
together ... but I have always had that opinion.

===

One of the guys that I go target shooting with is the official
historian for the local Sons of the Confederacy group. Nice guy but
definitely has strong red neck roots. He claims that the primary
cause for the "War of Northern Agression" was economic. Apparently
the federal government imposed tariffs on cotton which impacted the
southern agriculture business. After the south refused to pay, the
north threatened to blockade the ports. This may be revisionist
history for all I know but that's the official party line in some
circles.