# Was General Lee Wrong For Continuing To Fight? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 4, 2015, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645 "2015-06-04T17:42:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/61 "2015-06-06T03:17:56Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > The idea that Grant was a drunk was a rumor circulated by his rivals. Grant never drank to excess during the war. > > And I feel you’re under-rating Grant’s insights. He did a lot more than realize he could afford to lost more soldiers. He applied the knowledge that he had greater manpower in a way that won the war. He coordinated attacks along multiple fronts so the Confederates couldn’t move troops back and forth to defend against them. And he designed his offensives as campaigns rather than battles so that the Confederates wouldn’t have an opportunity to rest and rebuild. Grant’s strategy was highly effective. Where other generals would retreat or regroup after a defeat, Grant simply requisitioned more men and moved on. It was highly effective. But also indifferent, so far as the lives of his soldiers were concerned. Unless my memory has failed me, Grant was officially demoted and/or disciplined for drunkenness before he became a general. There are numerous first-hand accounts of his drinking, including drinking during battle. And of course Lincoln famously offered to send barrels of whatever Grant was drinking, to any general who would bring him victories. > [@](#): > > It’s no coincidence that the war, which had been dragging on for several years, ended within one year once Grant was placed in command. > What Sherman did (with Grant’s full approval) was highly honorable. He saw that he could defeat the Confederates by destroying their resources rather than killing their soldiers. The wealthy Confederates who owned that property might have been upset but I bet a lot of the Confederate enlisted men secretly approved of Sherman’s way of conducting a war. The saying about it being “a rich man’s war and a poor man’s fight” existed before Sherman came along. > > And Sherman’s methods, like Grant’s, were effective. Confederate politicians had been willing to see tens of thousands of soldiers die. But once some plantations were burnt, there was finally some serious talk about negotiating an end to the war. Sherman burned towns, cities, and fields, and appropriated or destroyed livestock and other sources of food wherever he found them. Who the former owners were - or whether they were “wealthy Confederates” - had literally nothing to do with it. The crimes of Sherman’s soldiers included rape: > [@](#): > > The poor negroes were terribly victimized by their brutal assailants, many of them . . . being left in a condition little short of death. Regiments, successive relays (emphasis by Simms), subjected scores of these poor women to the torture of their embraces, and – but we dare not farther pursue the subject – it is one of such loathing and horror. > > …Two cases are described where young negresses were brutally forced by the wretches and afterwards murdered – one of them being thrust, when half dead, head down, into a mud puddle, and there held until she was suffocated. [link](http://civilwarodyssey.blogspot.com/2011/03/behind-curtain-rape-and-other-horrors.html) This is not surprising: rape, and invasion by a foreign soldiers, frequently coincide. The idea that Sherman’s troops limited their depredations to “wealthy Confederates” is, at best, wishful thinking. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/62 "2015-06-06T03:32:01Z")
> [@Claverhouse](#): > > If or when the United States is on the ropes, completely defeated militarily and without resources to continue the fight — and one day that time will come if war continues in this stage of civilisation, since **Everything Dies** \* — **I feel certain that 95% of Americans will say: “We will never surrender.”** [bolding mine] > > And that’s because what their values are — ( and those values I don’t share in this case, being a royalist an’ all ) — are more important to Americans than what they retain by knuckling under. Even if they were each given the wealth of many Indes as recompense. > I don’t care much for Edmund Ruffin but he knew how to die. And therefore died personally undefeated. > > - > > _Here on the level sand > Between the sea and land, > What shall I build or write > Against the fall of night? > Tell me what runes to grave > That hold the bursting wave, > Or bastions to design > For longer date than mine._ > > ``` > --A. E. Housman, 1936 > > ``` That is a good point [the part I bolded]. I suspect many of the people who condemn Lee or other for fighting “too long” would also say - as you said - that they’d “never surrender”, if America was invaded. ---
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/63 "2015-06-06T04:27:06Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I agree. Lee kept planning on how to win battles and didn’t have a plan for winning the war. At least, not a realistic plan. > > The Confederates won decisive battles - and the Americans kept fighting. So it should have been obvious that the war wasn’t going to be decided by decisive battles. And Lee should have recognized that and changed his strategy accordingly. I guess I’m going to have to quote myself on this point. > [@Flyer](#): > > As things stood, however, I would argue that he was correct to ignore a lot of events elsewhere. His job was to fight in his theater of operations, nothing more. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/64 "2015-06-06T04:50:28Z")
Yes, that point is important to make, Lee was not THE\* actual \*head of the whole CSA war effort until too late in the game, outside the AoNV he was the “marquee” name, the symbolic figurehead but not really the one calling the overall strategy. Which as pointed out for the CSA was mostly “survive until something good happens”, with a side of “hope for Lee to deliver a knockout blow”. Just so happens he WAS good enough that by the end the AoNV \*WAS \*the remaining army-in-being of a dead-but-unburied rump CSA, while just about everything everywhere had fallen to pieces and the Confederate “cause” was dying its well deserved death. It was the political class of the South that remained in wilful denial. That Lee’s surrender of the AoNV constituted effectively that of the Confederacy itself, reflects how the civil government of CSA had fallen apart and lost even fake legitimacy by then. At that point, Lee was the one left with any moral standing to be the one who said “this is it, it’s over”. But on the policy side, as far as the 1864 election it would not have been his call to stop the war itself, absent his leading a de facto coup. All he could have done was resign the office and Davis would have found someone else to take over in the hope of holding on for a McClellan win and cutting a deal. Someone else who when the walls finally came down may not have been able to lead an orderly surrender (as opposed to going down in a blaze of wasteful glory, grinding attrition or a prolonged agony of insurgency). Meanwhile the Union kept a game of musical generals until they got hard men who made hard choices and came down hard on those opposing them. And yeah, like all US victories after 1812, the Union was able to bring to bear superiority in resources and a willingness to use it to curbstomp the opponent until he cries uncle. So sue me if that’s likelier to bring victory than élan and tradition. And that does include what we now call strategic warfare, as in destroy the enemy’s capacity to maintain a war effort and a functioning economy, and yes that includes wreck its civil economy and social order. Plus of course a bit of the old-tyme Scourge of God you should have surrendered when asked nicely nastyness. It’s how you win, not with quaint chivalric notions. You boys fighting gallantly for the honor of your land? Well, huzzah for its “honor”, whatever it is; I’m tearing its beating heart out. Stop me. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/65 "2015-06-06T12:15:13Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > While I agree with much of what you say, the bolded part is not accurate. Lincoln said, publicly and repeatedly, that ending slavery was not the goal of the war: > [@](#): > > If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. Let’s put that in some context. It was part of a letter to Horace Greeley, the editor of the New York Tribune. Here is the entire section: > [@](#): > > If there be those who would not save the Union, unless they could at the same time save slavery, I do not agree with them. If there be those who would not save the Union unless they could at the same time destroy slavery, I do not agree with them. \*My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or to destroy slavery. \*If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that. What I do about slavery, and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union; and what I forbear, I forbear because I do not believe it would help to save the Union. I shall do less whenever I shall believe what I am doing hurts the cause, and I shall do more whenever I shall believe doing more will help the cause. I shall try to correct errors when shown to be errors; and I shall adopt new views so fast as they shall appear to be true views. > > _I have here stated my purpose according to my view of official duty; and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men every where could be free._ So Lincoln was speaking as Commander-in-Chief and President, not in his ‘personal’ voice. And his major goal from the first (and one supported in the North) was to save the Union. The second quote: > [@](#): > > I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. This was from the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858, two years before Lincoln became President and the Civil War broke out. In it he was echoing standard Republican doctrine for the time (in fact, it was in his platform for the 1860 election. The Republican Party felt that it was more important to _contain_ slavery where it was, so that it could ‘die on the vine’ rather than expand elsewhere. No doubt, Lincoln and other Republicans may have wanted to free the slaves; but they also wanted a policy that could get them elected, and this was acceptable to many Northerners (who as mentioned above, did not want blacks competing for jobs and who in general were as racist as any Southerner). It turned out it was not acceptable to Southerners, and so the war came. And war has it’s own way of changing the rules and stances and opinions. IMHO as always. YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/66 "2015-06-06T14:58:31Z")
The Emancipation Proclamation applied to slaves whose owners lived in areas in rebellion. There were thousands of slaves who had escaped from owners like this and crossed over behind American lines. Their status had been ambiguous; they were still theoretically the property of the owners and could have conceivably been returned to slavery as party of some negotiated settlement. The Emancipation Proclamation eliminated that possibility. It declared that these people were free. So the Emancipation Proclamation freed several thousand people at the moment that it went into effect. And it went on to free millions more as its reach was expanded. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/67 "2015-06-06T15:24:10Z")
> [@Claverhouse](#): > > If or when the United States is on the ropes, completely defeated militarily and without resources to continue the fight — and one day that time will come if war continues in this stage of civilisation, since **Everything Dies** \* — I feel certain that 95% of Americans will say: “We will never surrender.” > > And that’s because what their values are — ( and those values I don’t share in this case, being a royalist an’ all ) — are more important to Americans than what they retain by knuckling under. Even if they were each given the wealth of many Indes as recompense. That isn’t an answer either, though. You’re putting “People believe this” in many different ways, but I’m wanting to know, if possible, _why_ that is. I certainly believe there are people who believe in fighting to the death, and a certain subset of them would do so. But why? Why is that a noble or respectable position, even to the extent that you can admire a deplorable person, or a foe, who carries on “to the bitter end”? > [@](#): > > I don’t care much for Edmund Ruffin but he knew how to die. And therefore died personally undefeated. Oddly, that’s the opposite of my viewpoint. I hadn’t heard of him before, but I looked him up, and I think I would say that such was the complete victory over the man that even he himself was forced to turn against him. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/68 "2015-06-06T15:34:12Z")
> [@usedtobe](#): > > Lee lost his chance for Nobel Hero when Pickett asked (after the battle was lost) is he should go ahead with his “charge” - and Lee said yes. > Short form: > 11 cannon, 1700 rifles behind a stone fence. > The Confederates lined up in a stand of trees across a (wheat?) field - a grass about knee high, and started to WALK across the field. > Pure suicide. > The plan had been that the troops behind the fence would have been attacked by artillery. That didn’t happen. > What did happen was the Union was ordered to hold fire until ordered. > > 11 cannon and 1700 rifles point-blank into a single line. Simultaneously. > > There was no excuse for that “attack”… I’ve questioned that decision too, but at the risk of rationalizing: Lee’s position was extremely precarious. He didn’t have a secure supply line to the South. He was scarcely provisioned. Some of his troops were marching without shoes(!) (Gettysburg started over a rumor of a supply of shoes near Gettysburg.) Lee had his reasons for going north, but it was an extremely risky venture. Had he been caught up there - cut off or surrounded - the Army of Northern Virginia would have faced surrender or annihilation. It would have been a devastating blow for the South. Lee, as a result, could not stand still. He couldn’t allow the North to figure out where he was, or to cut off the roads around him, or to allow himself to be encircled. Lee had gone North, in part, in hopes of fighting a decisive battle. But it would have to be a battle fought on the offensive. He couldn’t set up a defensive position, and wait to be attacked. Gettysburg was not a planned battle. But the first two days were marked by successes. By the third day, Lee had most of his army on hand, and even hoped that this might be the battle he was looking for. He had planned attacks on both wings, hoping to roll up the Northern line. My impression is that he pinned his greatest hopes on the attack on the Union left flank, an attack that was to be led by General Longstreet. Longstreet, however, did not deliver. The troops did not get where they were supposed to be, when they were supposed to be there. We may never know the truth of it, but it’s been suggested that Longstreet may have sabotaged the effort, because he never supported the plan in the first place. In his own report (and I’m paraphrasing) Lee said, “My orders were not carried out, for reasons I was not able to discover.” That’s about as strong language as Lee ever used, when talking about one of his own generals. I suspect he felt not just disappointment, but perhaps a sense of personal betrayal. In any event, the attack on the right wing also failed. After that, Lee had three options. He could attempt to retreat. He could do nothing. Or he could attack. Doing nothing was not a good option. It would only give the enemy (“those people”) more time to bring in more divisions and strengthen its position. Retreating in the face of the enemy is always a dangerous proposition. Lee’s army had a lot of stuff - cannons, wagons full of provisions, wounded troops, etc. He would necessarily have to move slowly. Lee didn’t know exactly what was behind him. And turning your back on an enemy that’s in a position to attack is an invitation for them to do just that. Lee had one fresh division - Pickett’s - and it was positioned in the one place Lee had not attacked: the center. Lee - I suspect - knew that Pickett’s chances were small. But under some circumstances even a small chance of victory may be worth it. He knew that the attacks (or at least one of them - Longstreet’s) had nearly succeeded. There was at least a reasonable possibility that Meade had pulled troops from the center, to reinforce his flanks (and if memory serves, he had). If Lee could break the Union lines at the center, he could yet pull victory out of defeat. And if he could pull off a victory, on Northern soil, it would be an enormous and important victory for the South. At the very minimum, it would have meant Lee could have kept his army in the North, and could continue to threaten Washington. Lee, I believe, understood that if you’re starting from a losing position, your only hope of victory is to take risks - I would argue that that insight is one of the things that made him a great general. When a risky move pays off, you look like a genius. When it doesn’t, you look like an idiot. Unfortunately, there’s no way to know in advance. Anyway, Pickett’s charge was a gamble, and the odds were against him. But people forget, sometimes, how close it came to succeeding. Pickett did in fact break the Union lines, if only temporarily. And, more importantly, the next day, when Lee’s army was no longer in a position to attack anyone, Meade stood still. He did nothing. And day after that, when Lee did retreat, Meade still didn’t attack - he didn’t even follow - at least not immediately. He allowed Lee’s entire army to escape, unmolested. There’s no way to know how much Pickett’s charge figured into Meade’s thinking. But if it was part of the reason Meade allowed Lee to return to Northern Virginia, it provided a service, even though- or despite the fact - it failed. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/69 "2015-06-06T16:47:54Z")
> [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](#): > > Let’s put that in some context. It was part of a letter to Horace Greeley, the editor of the New York Tribune. Here is the entire section: > > So Lincoln was speaking as Commander-in-Chief and President, not in his ‘personal’ voice. And his major goal from the first (and one supported in the North) was to save the Union. > > The second quote: > This was from the Lincoln-Douglas debates in 1858, two years before Lincoln became President and the Civil War broke out. In it he was echoing standard Republican doctrine for the time (in fact, it was in his platform for the 1860 election. The Republican Party felt that it was more important to _contain_ slavery where it was, so that it could ‘die on the vine’ rather than expand elsewhere. > > No doubt, Lincoln and other Republicans may have wanted to free the slaves; but they also wanted a policy that could get them elected, and this was acceptable to many Northerners (who as mentioned above, did not want blacks competing for jobs and who in general were as racist as any Southerner). It turned out it was not acceptable to Southerners, and so the war came. > > And war has it’s own way of changing the rules and stances and opinions. > > IMHO as always. YMMV. I don’t know that we disagree, at all. I was quoting (the second quote) from Lincoln’s Inaugural Address, but he may have said the same thing during the L-D debates too. I was quoting Lincoln’s official position regarding slavery: that the war was not to end slavery, but to preserve the Union. I personally suspect that Lincoln very badly wanted to end slavery, but couldn’t say that publicly. I think that both ending slavery and preserving the Union was Lincoln’s preferred outcome, and that is of course what happened. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [June 6, 2015, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/70 "2015-06-06T17:51:52Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > Unless my memory has failed me, Grant was officially demoted and/or disciplined for drunkenness before he became a general. There are numerous first-hand accounts of his drinking, including drinking during battle. And of course Lincoln famously offered to send barrels of whatever Grant was drinking, to any general who would bring him victories. That’s true, he was. Although there was more to it than that. Here’s a more complete look at General Grant and alcohol: > **[Ulysses S. Grant's Lifelong Struggle With Alcohol](https://www.historynet.com/ulysses-s-grants-lifelong-struggle-with-alcohol/?f)** > > Throughout his legendary military and political career, U.S. Grant battled accusations that he was overly fond of the bottle. Did his alleged excessive drinking make him an alcoholic, or for that matter, did he really drink that much more that the... As for the story about Lincoln saying that, it’s apocryphal, and Lincoln himself denied saying it, pointing out that the story was a retelling of the anecdote about General Wolfe and George II. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2015, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/71 "2015-06-07T03:54:13Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > General Lee is one of the very few people I put in the category of “hero”. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Is he in there with Benedict Arnold? Maybe **LinusK** is one of those people who can see more shades than black and white, and who understand that spotless paladins and mustache-twirling villains only exist in Saturday morning kid’s cartoons? Lee in fact did not fight to the bitter end; after Appomattox, no person in the South did more to encourage reconciliation with the North. On at least two occasions, he dissuaded Confederate soldiers who wanted to take off their uniforms, take to the hills, and continue to fight as guerillas. He also discouraged young Southern farmers from accepting Brazil’s offer of homesteads - they were trying to jumpstart their cotton agriculture, and slavery was legal there. He encouraged Confederate veterans to take the loyalty oath, and would have taken it himself had he been so permitted. He wrote to one Confederate widow “Dismiss all sectional bitterness, and raise [your children] to be Americans”. Most significantly, he accepted the presidency of an obscure liberal arts college and transformed it into one of the most innovative private universities in the country; Washington College, (now Washington and Lee University) was the first in the nation to offer courses in journalism and photography, and one of the first to offer courses in modern languages. Lee added engineering and business departments, and a law school. He recruited students and faculty from all sections of the country; indeed, one of the college’s most successful fundraisers was a dinner organized by businessmen in New York, who recognized his efforts to both promote harmony between the North and South, and education in the nation. According to biographer Charles Bracelen Flood, were he to be judged solely on his achievements after 1865, Lee would be known as one the great educators of American history. In all this, he was doing - in his mind -exactly the same thing he did when he accepted his commission in the Confederate Army: serving Virginia as best he could. So: Hero? Maybe not. Villain? Only to those who can’t see the difference between history and a morality play. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 7, 2015, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/72 "2015-06-07T04:32:33Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > So: Hero? Maybe not. Villain? Only to those who can’t see the difference between history and a morality play. Well, sure, _“were he to be judged solely on his achievements after 1865.”_ But I happen to think he should be held responsible for his actions on and before 1865 as well. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/73 "2015-06-09T15:50:54Z")
> [@Claverhouse](#): > > … > I don’t care much for Edmund Ruffin but he knew how to die. And therefore died personally undefeated. … Did Hitler, who also witnessed the wreckage his ideas had wrought, and who also chose to blow his own head off, also die personally undefeated? To me, that’s pretty much as defeated as you can get. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/74 "2015-06-09T17:21:40Z")
> [@smiling\_bandit](#): > > You are demonstrably incorrect. > > There are two things often misunderstood, both at the time and afterward. Lincoln understood that his power, even in wartime, was not absolute. He had previously pointed out the deep Constitutional problems with attempting to end slavery by Presidential fiat. But he _could_ justify ending slavery as a war measure to attack rebel strength, and did so. He himself privately said that it was a covenant with God, and could not back down from that. In fact, he would have issued it even before Antietam but felt he could not do so until the Union forces achieved a victory. > > You might reasonably ask, however, “What slaves did it free?” The problem with asking that is that the answer is obvious: the document explains clearly. Every single slave in the seceded states not in areas under Union control was now free. Which might not seem impressive except that the Union was at that very time preparing to strike deep into the heart of the Confederacy. The Emancipation Proclamation caused slavery in every corner of the Confederacy to crumble more every single day. Not only did it codify the policy of Union forces of assisting escaped slaves, but it caused mass defections among slaves, who simply decamped to Union lines. Every inch of southern soil invaded further crumpled the already-shaky system. > > Finally, Lincoln made the end of slavery one of the only two plain requirements he demanded for peace, the other being restoration of the Union, which rather speaks for itself. When you say I’m “demonstrably incorrect”, I notice you didn’t provide a cite or a quote or anything else that supports your statement that **“Lincoln made the end of slavery one of the only two plain requirements he demanded for peace”**. So far as I know, the only requirement Lincoln made was that the states rejoin the union. It may be that you’re saying the proclamation itself made emancipation a requirement. In other words, you’re saying if a Southern state had said, “look, we’ll rejoin the Union, as long as we get to keep our slaves,” Lincoln would have said “Nope. We’re going to keep fighting you as until every slave is free.” That’s a possibility. We’ll never know, since no Southern state ever said such a thing. (They were, after all, fighting for independence, not for slavery.) IMHO, had a Southern state agreed to rejoin the Union, so long as it got to keep its slaves, Lincoln most likely would have agreed. After all, by the terms of the proclamation itself, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, Maryland, and parts of Louisiana and Virginia continued to be slave states (or parts of states). When you already have 5 slave states in the Union, what’s one more, if it will help the war effort? As for the other part: > [@](#): > > Lincoln said, publicly and repeatedly, that ending slavery was not the goal of the war: I provided at least two public, easily accessible examples of Lincoln saying exactly that. How can you say I was “demonstrably wrong,” about something that is demonstrably correct? Can you provide any statement at all by Lincoln saying the purpose of the war was to end slavery? ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/75 "2015-06-09T18:04:00Z")
> [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](#): > > So due to that fundamental disconnect, the war had to be fought out to a finish. That’s pretty much my analysis as well- the Federals weren’t going to let the Confederacy exist as anything but states within the United States, and the Confederates weren’t willing to roll over and just re-integrate into the US. That said, it’s not always totally clear when the war’s lost; that’s more a matter for the historians to decide. For example, in WWII vs. Germany, the Battle of Kursk was the point when the Germans lost the strategic initiative- from them on out, the Russians dictated when and where the Germans would fight. That was the real turning point of the war; Stalingrad was a massive defeat for the Germans, but didn’t necessarily put them on the ropes- they still held the initiative until Kursk. Gettysburg was that same point for the Eastern Theater; prior to the battle, the initiative had switched several times, but after Chancellorsville, Lee had the initiative, and chose to go north into Pennsylvania. After the battle, the Confederates in that theater never regained the initiative. The thing is, that may not have been so clear to Lee or anyone else; there was nothing at the time that said that Lee would never win another big battle and regain the initiative, and make the Union react again. ---
**Author:** ![LinusK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/258eb7/32.png) [@LinusK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LinusK)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/76 "2015-06-09T19:01:37Z")
> [@JRDelirious](#): > > And that does include what we now call strategic warfare, as in destroy the enemy’s capacity to maintain a war effort and a functioning economy, and yes that includes wreck its civil economy and social order. Plus of course a bit of the old-tyme Scourge of God you should have surrendered when asked nicely nastyness. It’s how you win, not with quaint chivalric notions. You boys fighting gallantly for the honor of your land? Well, huzzah for its “honor”, whatever it is; I’m tearing its beating heart out. Stop me. I hear what you’re saying, there’s certainly a point to destroying the enemy’s _ability_ to fight. That would include, at minimum, weapons depots, munitions factories, transportation infrastructure (railroads, for example). On the other hand, killing civilians, destroying civilian homes or other buildings, raping them, and other attempts to destroy the enemy’s “willingness to fight”, are both morally wrong and counter-productive. Think of the times (few that they are) that America has been attacked. Did 9/11 make Americans say, “You know what? We’re scared of this Bin Laden guy. We better do what he says.”? Did Pearl Harbor undermine America’s willingness to fight? If - say ISIS - exploded a dirty bomb in, say, Boston, would the US say, “ISIS, we give up! Just please don’t attack us anymore.”? Other countries (to the extent the Confederacy was another country) react the same way “we” do: attacks against civilian targets \*\*hardens \*\*people’s willingness to fight; it doesn’t degrade it. ---
**Author:** ![Sailboat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sailboat/32/461_2.png) [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/77 "2015-06-09T19:57:17Z")
You know who could have done something about Sherman’s March to the Sea? John Bell Hood. But he chose not to. He went north (NNW if you’re nitpicking) with the stated intent of bringing the war to Ohio. Not unlike Sherman’s move SE. The differences were, Thomas was ready in the most heavily fortified city in America to stop Hood…and Hood was a bad commander, unlike Sherman. You want to call someone a butcher without concern for his own men’s lives, look at Hood before Grant. Hood accused his own troops of cowardice before sending them to their deaths. And the knly tool in Hood’s toolbox was frontal assault. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/78 "2015-06-09T20:09:27Z")
> [@Sailboat](#): > > You know who could have done something about Sherman’s March to the Sea? > > John Bell Hood. But he chose not to. He went north (NNW if you’re nitpicking) with the stated intent of bringing the war to Ohio. Not unlike Sherman’s move SE. > > The differences were, Thomas was ready in the most heavily fortified city in America to stop Hood…and Hood was a bad commander, unlike Sherman. > > You want to call someone a butcher without concern for his own men’s lives, look at Hood before Grant. Hood accused his own troops of cowardice before sending them to their deaths. And the knly tool in Hood’s toolbox was frontal assault. Just to clarify, Sailboat is talking about the Battle of Franklin [Battle of Franklin - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Franklin_(1864)) which pretty much wrecked Hood’s Army before George Thomas finished it as an effective fighting force in two battles in Nashville. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/79 "2015-06-09T20:25:38Z")
> [@LinusK](#): > > On the other hand, killing civilians, destroying civilian homes or other buildings, raping them, and other attempts to destroy the enemy’s “willingness to fight”, are both morally wrong and counter-productive. Killing and raping civilians was not a policy or strategy ever employed by the Union armies during the Civil War. I am sure some murders and rapes took place, as indeed have taken place in pretty much every large armed conflict in the history of the human race, but to characterize this as something Sherman deliberately made happen is complete nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2015, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645/80 "2015-06-09T21:17:55Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Killing and raping civilians was not a policy or strategy ever employed by the Union armies during the Civil War. > > . However, it \*was \*by the CSA. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/was-general-lee-wrong-for-continuing-to-fight/721645.md?page=5)