North and South USA

I'm pretty sure this is going to get some interesting responses... But I seriously am curious about this.

A question I've always wondered about, why do Southerners seem to, after 150 years, still not like Yankees and get upset about the "Civil War?" In my experience, I haven't seen it so much in the North. Maybe I'm biased?

I grew up in Michigan, we had lots of Southerners living their to work in the auto factories. I don't ever recall anyone saying anything generally bad about the south, or southerners.

I also lived in Atlanta for 3 years and loved it. I finished college there and remember one guy in particular, who still wanted the South to be a seperate country. Yet, I know there is lots of patriotism in the south too.

I like the line from that old Charley Daniels (I think it was him) song about America:

Were walking real tall and we're talkin real loud again in America..... We might have done some fighting amongst ourselves, but you outsiders best leave us alone...

So what's everyone here, Northerner and Southerners, take on this?

People from the North just don't "get it." Never have, never will.

The South is a way of life. The North is just a place.

I'm Southern born and Southern bred, and when I die I'll be Southern dead. Yall.

:)

All I can say about this subject is that I didn't ask to be born in the north and if it would have been my choice I would have called NC home long before I was able to.

Its the inbreading

Well, I know I'll catch a lot of flak over this, but isn't the reason that Northerners never really talk about the civil war, and some southerners are still fighting it rather obvious? They lost.

Never really understood why southerners seem proud their forebears committed treason, but the losers of a war have lots of explaining, and discussing and wishing to do. The winners don't.

Stewart Wrote:

PAMidget Wrote:

Posted by: Naomi (71.48.133.---)
Date: June 14, 2008 03:20AM
PAMidget Wrote:
Quote:
Never really understood why southerners seem proud their forebears committed treason,

Twas the other way wasn't it! The South didn't want a fight and all the Yanks were looking at was economics "not slavery" and they destroyed the South.


I can't quite agree with this one, the South wanted the fight going back to Jackson and the nullification crisis.

Not a simple question but the first place to look is who settled in the two regions; the North (yes, I'm painting with a broad brush) brought in middle class congregationalists and their families while the South brought in second sons, adventurers and transported criminals. Mostly Anglican, in fact you had to swear an oath to the Church and have a minister sign off on your religious conformity (so much coming over for religious freedom). In short, the North tried to create a theocracy like the Swiss while the South tried to recreate the social structure of England.

The Civil War developed out of economic, religious , political and social issues but some of the lingering resentment is that while the North won on economic and political, the South won social by reinstituting slavery in all but name. There's a school of thought that Reconstruction didn't end until 1968 but that's a whole different topic.

It was not the "Civil War" - it was the War of Northern Aggression.

;)

Bryanm362 Wrote:

saffyres Wrote:

I have lived in the south all my life and it is this simple if there had been no slavery
there would have been no civil war. Brilliance of the southern leadership was to draw union forces into the south so they would suffer greater casualities and get local folks motivated to defend their homes from the evil Yankee and sell them the usual bill of goods on race.Which ate up till they found how bad it looked on national TV in mid century this all so conflicted a little bit with being Gods chosen people. Economic reasons= slaves doing free work!
Dont get me wrong there are wonderfull brave people white and black who have labored to make the changes that have taken place which in my life time have been nothing short of revolutionary. But its still hard to say great grandady got tricked by his rich neighbors and sadly the church played a large role in this.

You know not one of you is trulyy a southerner> OK yes you came from the soiutherns states of America BUT there still is a lot more people who were born and lived a lot further south than any of you have.

To me you're all Northeners..

......Simon, you are confusing south with bottom.

The history books that we were taught from here in Columbia, South Carolina during my school years (1969-1980) referred to it as "the War between the States" and that it was mainly about States rights.

Simon Wrote:

I grew up in Georgia and have moved up and down the east coast and now live in upstate NY.

When I was a kid, the War Between the States was in your face every day. There were battle markers everywhere, (as most of the war happened in the South), the Southern battle flag was part of the State flag and hung in every classroom (I went to Tara Elementary School!) and Conferderate Memorials were in the middle of every town square. Heck my Mom's name is Dixie. (as was her mom and grandmom) In New York, it's never mentioned, almost as if it didn't happen. Instead you see memorials to the revolutionary war. I was always interested in why and have had many conversations about that fact with friends from NY. I've come to the conclusion, it's that way for two reasons.

1. In the South, there was a campaign of terrorism against the population. My family's home in Rex Georgia was burned during Sherman's March to the sea. I have letters from my Grandfather talking about them taking the farm animals to the swap to hide them from the armies (both). That kind of stuff gets passed down for generations.

2. In the north the war became very unpopular. 100,000's of men were killed and never came home, there were draft riots in New York and all over the north. Many people up here didn't feel complelled toward the end to fight for States Rights or to free the Slaves, it didn't concern them or their families. Much like the war now, it became unpopular.

There is only one place I've found up north that celebrates the war. It's Union Jack's in Kennebunkport, ME. It's a brewpup that I think the owners family is somehow related to Chamberlain and the Second Maine. They have all sorts off cool T-shrts with US officers from the War. I thought it was very cool and bought a few for myself! lolol Acutally, near my home, there is a huge monument and marker in an old cemetary for Col. Elmer Ellsworth. He was a secretary to Lincoln and was considered the First Officer killed in the war. The memorial is located in the back of an old cemetary, but is pretty much forgotten, overgrown and covered in weeds. It's kinda sad!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmer_E._Ellsworth


That's my two $.02

LearningMGB (Kevin) said: "...There's a school of thought that Reconstruction didn't end until 1968 but that's a whole different topic. ..."

The stuff that came before this quote was too broad-brushed to be useful. But the sentence quoted above comes the closest to answering the original question. Those of us who do not have family that lived through Reconstruction can have no idea how difficult those times were.

Regardless of what the actual basis for the war was back in the 1860s, the aftermath of the war and then Reconstruction in the south was a demolished infrastructure, very little manufacturing capability remaining, homes and farms destroyed. Banking and market properties confiscated, real estate property confiscated and sold to Union sympathizers and carpetbaggers (a source of bitter, hardened resentment). The south didn't just lose the war, they lost everything and had to start all over again with very little to start over with. There was no Marshall Plan. In addition, they were still at the market mercy of manufacturing interests in the north (one of the original reasons for the war). What raw materials they could produce were bought at prices that were set by these northern manufacturing interests. All this was too much like the memories and stories of their families' experiences in the Old Country. So succeeding generations of southern children grew up with very valid reasons for distrusting the north and outsiders. Human nature being what it is, the gradual aggrandizement of "The Lost Cause" began.

wyatt Wrote:

My paternal Grandfather was from Mississippi.....and was pissed off about the Civil War until he died. Our family owned several large plantations and were very well off.....in fact there is a Stovall, Mississippi that sprung up from the plantation that my ancestors owned ( so I have been told). I understand where my Grandfather was coming from, he started working for the railroad at 14 because my great grandfather was killed in a flu epedemic.....but on the flip side I have seen the Wills and documents from my ancestors and I'm not proud of the fact that slaves are listed in them as property. Even though the war may not have been started because of slavery the outcome was that slavery ended because of it.....and I don't think that anyone can argue that slavery is wrong. Was the South needlessly exploited after the war.....yes....but the South lost. The cold hard truth is that none of us were there and we can only guess at how our lives would have been different if things had gone differently.

I am constantly amazed at how people in modern society can hold a grudge on something that happened 100 or more years ago....Native Americans want their land back....it was a war they lost, that's what happens....African-americans want reperations for being enslaved......I will gladly ask my government to write a check to anyone that can prove that they have been lawfully enslaved in their lifetime in the USA...and where does that stop??? My heritage is English, Irish and Scot....should I be sending a bill to Rome so that they can pay me for enslaving my ancestors??? or to London for the cruelties against the Irish and Scots???

Learn from the past but don't live in it......

Yes, it was about States' rights.

Wasn't about slavery (although the Yankees have proclaimed that so loudly and so long, that everyone believes it).

saffyres Wrote:

The Wiz Wrote:

Ya'll Yanks still don't understand do ya :)

...horse crap....who cares....the are yankees and dixies that would work together better, than pure geographics alone would suggest. It's politics now more than whose dirt your standing on.

No, Naomi - they don't.

Bless their hearts. LOL

1. The South was invaded and occupied and badly destroyed by the war, but the North survived largely unscathed and, economically, even benefited somewhat from the war (factory production grew, there was a labor shortage so wages went up, etc.). It's hard for a Southerner to forget that their region was the only part of the United States ever defeated and militarily occupied in a war. The marks are still there while there are almost no marks of the war in the North. Nearly every battlefield (except Gettysburg and Antietam) are in southern former slave states.

2. The South had its entire social system destroyed by the war. The Southern economic and social system was so closely tied to black slavery by the 1850s that to end slavery would have destroyed not only the cotton planting industry but much of the rest of the southern economy. In the 1850s, cotton made up 2/3 of American exports!

About 1/4 of cotton from the South went to New England textile mills so the North also benefited economically from slavery. After the war, the South developed a slave-like system of crop liens, sharecropping, and tenant farming to try to keep cotton (and other) production up but it never worked well. The South chose not to modernize its economy both before and after the war, but clung to slavery and cotton.

3. The South had little industry and poor railroads, so when even these were destroyed by the war, the South was left economically backward at the very time that the rest of the country was exploding with railroads, steel mills, oil refineries, etc. The South was left with timber, some cotton, and a few other raw materials, so like all raw materials producers in the age of imperialism (1870s-1900), the South became a kind of northern colony -- as did the West for many decades (gold, silver, farm products, cattle, etc.).

4. Southerners made only limited efforts to develop industry, build railroads, etc. both before and after the Civil War, so bear much of the responsibility for the South's economic backwardness. Why did they not do this? Cotton was so profitable and slaves so available, anyone who wanted to get rich bought cheap cotton land. You could earn 10% annual profits doing such business in the 1850s. Nearly all efforts to create factories, build railroads, etc. went only so far. The South was almost entirely rural while the North had huge cities. These were Southern choices, not forced on it by anyone else.

5. The South bears as much responsibility for the Civil War as anyone else. They owned all the nation's slaves by the 1840s and 50s (with the exception of a few hundred who survived in a few northern states). The South dragged the nation into the Mexican War in 1846 because Southerners sought even more cotton land. The new lands won in this war (west of Texas) opened a Pandora's Box over the issue of the spread of slavery which nearly all northerners opposed, though most northerners were not anti-slavery.

The South refused repeatedly to even consider the abolition of slavery, even gradually over many decades, as it was their "way of life". Every single Southern political leader was a slaveowner or a strong defender of slavery.

Southerners even pushed for the spread of slavery nationwide during the 1850s (into Kansas, for example) and in court rulings like the Dred Scott Case. Northerners would never have accepted slavery in states and territories which had chosen to abolish slavery.

6. The South basically ran the federal government in the 40 years before the Civil War. Despite the fact that the South had only 1/3 of the nation's population, a large majority of U.S. Presidents to 1860 were either southern slaveowners (Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, Jackson, Harrison, Tyler, etc.) or pro-Southern (Pierce, Buchanan, etc.). The South also had a lock on the U.S. Senate since there was an equal number of slave and free states until 1850. And, the U.S. Supreme Court was strongly pro-Southern right up to the war. The idea that the South was marginalized and mistreated before 1860 is a myth. Slavery is even in the U.S. Constitution, though not by name.

7. Before and during the war, a very large part of the Southern population (at least 1/4) actively opposed the war and supported the North. These "Unionists" resented the planter class (who owned 90% of the slaves) for starting a war. Today, you'd think every single Southerner was a rebel. This is not at all true. West Virginia even seceded from Virginia b/c it was so opposed to the war. Half of Missouri and Kentucky opposed the war and significant areas of the hill country of northern Georgia and Alabama and much of the backwoods of the Carolinas were anti-secession and antiwar. If you live in any of those areas of the South, there's a very good chance that your and your neighbor's ancestors were not pro-secession or pro-Confederacy, just as there's about a 95% likelihood they did not own slaves.

8. After the war, the South much more than the North opposed change that would have helped the South. In fact by the 1880s most all Americans had tired of the whole issue of Reconstruction and wanted to leave the South alone (sadly because "forced" racial integration had worked well up until then and should have been continued). The myth of "carpetbaggers" looting the South comes form misleading Southern "Redeemers" in the late 19th century who wanted someone to blame for their own mistakes. These were the same people who had called for the disastrous secession in the first place, who had led the war, and who had therefore destroyed their own society. Many Southerners turned strongly against them during and after the war. Jefferson Davis was almost as disliked in parts of the South as he was in the North. Of course, Lincoln wasn't liked in parts of the North, either!

In fact, Southerners themselves who sided strongly with Northern Republicans who made the strongest efforts to reform and rebuild the South economically and socially (they were called "scalwags" by other Southerners for doing this), but they were increasingly denied the vote (white and black) by state laws adopted late in the century (literacy tests, poll taxes, etc, all now unconstitutional). It was as if the South was saying, "If we can't have slavery and be left alone, we'll just go to hell!"

8. Socially, historically, and culturally, the South had been settled largely by Scotch-Irish and other marginalized Europeans (frontiersmen like Daniel Boone, etc.) who had great resentment against "higher class" English and others, not just in the North but also the South. This character provided a lot of the anti-Northern anger from the 3/4 of Southerners who owned no slaves, who did not support the planter class, but hated more successful eastern and northern industrialists, bankers, and business types.

9. The South developed almost a local industry after the war in reinventing itself -- not economically, socially, or racially -- but historically. It was almost as if Southerners decided it was worth becoming an economic basket case as long as they could rewrite the history and, in that way, "win" the war. To do this, there were more and more mythical stories about the beauty of the Old South, the happy slaves, and so on. About 90% of this was exaggeration. Virtually no slaves were happy being slaves, of course.

The South profited greatly from cotton and slavery, but nearly all the profits went into the hands of 5-10% of the South's population which kept the money and did not reinvest it in Southern society in general. The South had great poverty, few if any public schools, few colleges, libraries, or other interests in progress for the average person. Southerners often sent thir own sons to the North to be educated because there were no public schools (They didn't want to "waste" their tax money!). The myth of Reconstruction--that the South was brutalized after the war--is part of this and is based substantially on misinformation and misinterpretation.

10. Who "started" the war is one of those arguments no one ever wins about any war. That the war was over "states' rights" is not untrue, but it's also not really true since the war was over the "right" to be left alone (under state authority, not federal) to do the things Southerners wanted to do. But, the major thing Southerners wanted to do (which the rest of the country increasingly opposed doing) was owning slaves. States' rights were the right to own slaves. So saying it was about "states' rights" is fundamentally misleading and is a common way of pretending slavery was not the real issue. Of course slavery was the real issue. If there had been no Southern slavery there would have been no war.

This is why an argument over the "rightness" of the Southern cause can never work since it fundamentally assumes the rightness of owning other people, an idea we can no longer stomach.

That Southerners were good people, intelligent, and hard-working, and that they were extraordinarily heroic during the war cannot be disputed. That the Old South was worth saving can be. The war freed 4 million people from slavery, in some ways not unlike liberating Jews from the Nazi death camps. How anyone could romanticize the Old South under those circumstances just amazes me, no matter if your Great Grandfather's Cousin fought at Antietam (sorry, Sharpsburg). But we all live by our deeply-held myths. That's what sustains us whether you believe in your right to wave a Confederate battle flag or that the "war between the states" was all the North's fault. It wasn't.

I have one ancestor who fought for the South and one I know of who fought for the Union. I respect them both. The Southerner was just a guy, not a slave owner, who wanted to defend his "homeland". I'm sure he didn't even think about slavery, but he did think about his wife and kids and his farm and wanted to protect them. If I had lived in the South, I might have grabbed a gun to defend my land and way of life from whatever the North seemed to threaten them with. That would not make me pro-slavery, but it would make my actions a defense of slavery.

Lincoln was born in the South and his wife had close relatives who fought for the Confederacy. Everyone who fought was fighting because they believed they were defending their home, their rights, their ideals, and most just got swept up in patriotic fervor.

Whose fault it was is easy to figure out: It was the fault of the generation of Americans that put slavery in the Constitution and those afterwards from 1788-1860 who failed to deal with the issue of slavery and who kept postponing the day of reckoning until finally a very small group of Southern hotheads started the war by refusing to accept the results of a legal presidential election (1860), then seceding and finally raising troops and firing on the U.S. flag in Charleston, S.C. These secessionists were a tiny minority but they controlled the state secession conventions in S.C. and other states and whipped up the media the way extremists still do today. To defend these crackpots as "founding fathers" is a joke. They were traitors, violent, small-minded men who started a needless war that killed 620,000 men. Today, based on our current national population, that would equal 6 million dead. For what? Oh, yeah, "states' rights". Appalling.

I am with you Brian, I never understood it. Grew up in WV, lived in VA, PA and OH now and I have to say I really never pay attention to where a person is from other than their accent. Never understood the reason for the bad feelings, I must have let it all go a long time ago.

mabie1978 Wrote:

I worked for a few weeks in Richmond, Virginia and I was initially scared by stories of the "Daughters of the Confederacy" and their weapons proficiency.

The only woman I know (personally) in Australia who owned a gun was my ex-wife... and she scared me, too!

Personally, being from the North (but my family has only been here since 1919) with what Drew M said. I was stationed at NAS Norfolk from 2/70-12/72. Having just been thru the race riots in Detroit, my wife and I were appalled with the way Blacks were treated in the South. We just couldn't figure out, why the riots took place in Watts and Detroit, when all the poor treatment was taking place in the south. We heard the "N" word more in a day in Norfolk then we had heard it in our entire lives in Detroit. I was a well travelled child. By age 14 I had been in ever state in the lower 48 except, Oregon, Washington and Texas. So, I was not very niave.

But, what bothers me most, and this may be a "The winners write the history" thing, but it seems to me that the good old Stars and Bars has become a symbol of RACISM, that the good people of the south seem to have no objection too. My daughter teach high school in Traverse City, Mi. She, like her mother and father, just cannot understand all the pick-up trucks in northern Michigan, the boast the S&B in the back window. The kids with these trucks HATE blacks.

So, if the "War of Northern Agression" was about "states rights" and not slavery, then where is the outcry from all you good old southern folk for your precious flag being missed used?

I realize that I am also painting with a very broad brush. But, to couch the civil war as states rights, is unconscienctionable (hope this carpet bagger spelled that correctly. I agree whole heartedly with whomever said previously that states rights equals the right to own slaves. IMHNorhternO, the south still resents not being able to have slaves. This is not to say that all southerns are racist/bigots etc. There are bad apples everywhere N&S alike. But, if you want to change my mind, get over the war, and stop hanging Blacks in effigy, which I seem to remember just happened a few months ago. Care to defend that?

And, speaking of inbreeding, I live in Utah now. The home of whoever dies with the least branches in their family tree wins! They marry their 13 yr old daughters to their 45 yr. old brothers here, and see nothing wrong with the practice. But that is the subject of a new thread that I will start when I get back from vacation.

Great essay Drew and I have to admit that if you had been one of my students I would have given you an A+ on fiction writing for that piece of work :)

Drew Maddock did an excellent summery of the whole era !

Na, care to elaborate, why is that fiction?

I tend to agree with the comments that someone made, a few back, that these days there we seem to all get along pretty well, but still some resentment out there.

I'm sure as our society becomes more and more homoginized, intermixed, and more generations pass these things will fade in importance.

Another observation, the South moved North in the 40,50, and 60's for factory jobs, and now the North has/is moving South for the high tech jobs and better weather. Plus, with modern communications and travel, regionalism becomes less and less important. Now days we need to worry about the Chinese, not our own countrymen a few hundred miles away!

Re Drew's post:

Some truth, some fiction - but written as only a non-Southerner could write it. :)

Re The Stars and Bars:

The flag in question is NOT the flag of the Confederate States. It's the Confederate battle flag. The image attached here is the first (of many) flags of the Confederacy... THIS is the "stars and bars" flag, BTW.

A quick Wiki lookup will show you the others.

Southern is state of mind and a state of pride, you don't see many Northerners riding around with state flag stickers on their cars or state T-shirts, but you do see a buttload of them moving here.

If Lincoln had his way, he would have sent them all back to Africa, he even said this in a speech before he was president, while he intially freed the slaves of the South, he did not free the slaves of the North at the same time. Robert E Lee, would have been one of the most famous Americans had he chose to lead the Union troops, and surely been a president, even though he oppossed the war, he had no other choice but to defend his family and homeland.

Was slavery wrong, hell yeah it was, did a majority of Southerners own slaves, hell no. Did union troops have to sent to some Northern farms to free slaves after the war, hell yeah. To label every Southerner as a defendent of slavery is to say every Yankee is a asshole, totally stupid, and spoken by the historicly ignorant.

OK, I have said my peace, and nothing any of you have said here changed a damn thing, I'm proud to be Southern and would not expect Northerners, or non-grit eaters to understand :)

I traveled this country, and have yet to find much of it I don't like, a little piece of SC thought is still my favorite, and it seems to catching on with bunch of Northerners and foreigners, so it much be God's country indeed :)

True, Hap, about Lincoln. Those not in the know should research Liberia.

3885KOONTZ Wrote:

To me, it is as much regional and cultural as anything else. The culture of the South persists because it was strong among those people in the first place, even as the North has had its general cultural background. I don't think we should be too surprised that a culture's history and values are important to it. Two good examples from outside this question, are Texas and the West.

The closest we get to this sort of "regionalism" in Australia is the fierce rivalry between the States - but maybe the North vs South rivalry is the Queenslanders versus the "Southern States" and the Western Australians versus the rest... the Eastern States.

This rivalry is most obvious in the sporting arena.

Queenslanders call the Southern States residents (but mainly New South Wales because they play rugby against them in a "State of Origin" series) "Cockroaches" or "Mexicans" (in reference to the fact that New South Wales borders Queensland's south in same the way that Mexico is south of the US).

Queenslanders are called "Banana Benders" (yes, they grow bananas in Queensland).

South Australians are referred to as "Crow Eaters" - probably because their State emblem is a bird that looks a bit like a crow.

Western Australians call everyone else in Australia, Eastern Staters - and (rightfully :-) declare their superiority to them. While everyone else calls Western Australian's "Sandgropers" after an insect that thrives in the sandy conditions on that side of Australia.

Western Australia frequently suggests it should secede from the rest of Australia, taking its vast mineral wealth with it (Western Australia comprises roughly a third of the country).

BUT I guess this is all made much more trivial because no State in Australia - or regions - has ever fought a war against the other... except on the sporting field.

We probably can't imagine the potential rivalry that might simmer between two "warring nations" - one of which may feel it had been annexed by the other. I would normally think of this situation existing in Europe where countries are packed into small areas and exist as neighbours after fierce wars between them throughout history.

I guess the other place would be the Middle East.

I did not marry my sister-------------------------or brother, but i do tan easily!

Cheers

Up here in the GWN we were taught about the War Between the States from text books published in the northern US. I have always looked to see where information is published to take into account the slat of it. At the time I did some library time to try to find a book that was published in the south on the topic. No luck. When I asked the librarian if they had one she said that perhaps the people in the Southern states did not publish one because they “couldn’t write”. This was coming from a Canadian! This is an example of how US culture effects other countries.

Many times I have picked up on negative comments about people from the south and have always wondered where this comes from. EG inbreeds, not to smart etc. To my way of thinking it would be impossible for the people from the south to be any different that those of the north.

After this internal war the US is still one country that has it together in spite the differences.

Many descendants from the south are currently active throughout the world fighting to help oppressed people gain their freedom. If the War Between the States never happened where would things be now? Would the south still have slave labour? I somehow doubt it.

What I have always wondered if the war between the states was to have happened in modern times and was in another country what would be the US do?

If Briton was a "super power" and helped the south or the north, how would this have affected the out come? What would the loosing side think of Briton?

Looking at Vietnam, Korea, Cuba & Cambodia where internal conflicts and civil war have and other countries have gotten involved makes me wonder? Is better to just let countries have their civil wars and stand back to let them work it out?

pauls78 Wrote:

From one of the brightest stars of the South.....

"There's a southern accent, where I come from
The young'uns call it country
The yankees call it dumb
I got my own way of talkin'
But everything is done, with a southern accent
Where I come from"


You bet.

;)

Well said Jack, what you bring up about reconstruction is often left out of these discussions, the way the "defeated" were treated was terrible. My family fought with Morgan's raiders, as the state of Kentucky was occupied from the start by union troops. I also had some family who fought in the Union army for Indiana, cousins to the family fighting for the South.

I now live in the north, but was raised and lived most of my 50 years in the South.
What I find to be true, is people from this part of the country (north) do not realize or have a clue how important heritage is to a southerner.

I value the 8 short years we lived in South Carolina, the great people and history of that part of the country is unmatched in my mind. I visited many of the ruins left by Sheman on his march to the sea. Cemeteries and tombs desecrated, bayonet marks still visible on stones, everything in his path destroyed.

Guys, (and Jack, in particular) I was just kidding around. It's that yankee humor :)Although it probably IS true that a "lost cause" has more romance to it, and so is talked about more--that part I wasn't kidding about. Also, I'm well aware that the large majority of Americans (including in the north while we had it) did not own slaves, and yes, I'm aware of why reconstructuion is (rightly) mostly a dirty word in the south.
For the record, I enjoy visiting the south and have found the vast majority of southerners to be truly warm and hospitable people. I don't want people thinking I'm returning the favor with an upturned digit, I was joking around.
Just goes to show, some topics are still touchy after all this time.

Edited: On a more serious note, I would point out that we've had poor folks and hard upbringings up here, too, believe me. (Ask me how I know.)

Good. And in jest:

lbcnut Wrote:

JackMG Wrote:

Don't worry about it Bryan.....Good discussion....No one is forcing anyone to participate....I learned a lot from the thread.

Thanks Marc, I did too!

Go to http://members.aol.com/x69xer/index.html for some quotes that will enlighten you as to Sherman's philosophy and the affects it had on many. Also in that website, there are many first and second-hand accounts of personal experiences that occurred in the invasion. Some accounts condemned the troops for disobeying orders and burning the city, while some credit humanitarian acts of the Union officers. Some are actually written by the Union troops.

Columbia, SC, was an undefended city when Sherman's troops arrived. Yet it was bombarded from across the Congaree River by the approaching troops. There are five stars on the west side of the State House marking the spots where artillery struck the solid granite structure and the sidewalk. That night, drunken soldiers burned virtually every building, except churches and the State House to the ground. I have seen pictures taken fron the State House looking north down Main St. and nothing but a huge pile of burned-out rubble.

...Hey PAMidget,...... I'm from Michigan, and I don't need no steenking flag to hate some of you sons a bitches....






...........just teasing,...but I couldn't resist.......I was also para-phrasing Clint Eastwood in the "Unforgiven".....

Wyatt, Wyatt, Wyatt....


Jack,

I for one would never try to defend the actions of Sherman and what he did. When I asked the initial question here, it was not intended to be about the Civil War.

Just personally trying to better understand some of the opinions/positions that I've heard, from both Northern and Southern perspectives.

Bryan

I was born and raised in Columbia, all my life I have seen the pictures and been told the stories about Shermans march through the South. My Grandmother , a true Southern Lady born in 1896, helped raise me singing Dixie while I sat on her knee and clapped along. Some of the earliest stories that I can remember were about her Grandparents having to take all their belongings by horse and wagon to the swamp and burying them so the Yankees would not take them.


I feel that alot of people from other parts of the country do understand how much the longtime residents of the South love and cherish our history, way of life and the land that we live and die on.

My parents were not as hardcore pro-South as my Grandmother was, and I am even less than they were. I do not own anything with a Rebel flag on it but do not think it stands for hate,ignorance or slavery. I am a American first, but I am damn proud to be from South Carolina and do not feel that my heratige is one of hate.


Some in this post have wondered why we still live in the past down here, time heals all wounds but they take longer when they are deeper. I only wrote this so others, not from around here, can get an idea of how we look at the past.

I drove past the Statehouse today, it was a beautiful sight, green grass, large trees, flowers blooming and the stars clearly visible on the side walls were the cannon balls struck the granite.





looking out from the State house



looking towards the State house

....Hey,....isn't that a picture of Detroit?

My daddy - to this day - flips the bird at every statue of Sherman & Grant that he sees...

I have read many accounts of how the Union and Sherman wanted to "punish" South Carolina for "starting" the WBS. I lived in Columbia (Irmo) for eight years and visited the state house and museum many times, the last time only a few years ago when there for spring break.. if not made of granite it would have surely been burned, Paul and Jack, didn't they burn the original state house? The one shelled by Sherman was under construction then I believe.

saffyres Wrote:

Oh, I forgot:

Keep on educating em Jack :) :)

James wrote:
You, my good sir, are a total idiot. Kids with trucks with that sticker must hate blacks? That's up there in the top ten dumbest things I've read on this site, and I posted the other 9 of them, so I should know.

James, I was not speaking of ALL kids! Just the ones in Northern Michigan. Have you ever been there to know? I have, my daughter teaches there as stated and knows these kids and their beliefs. Some of the bigest bigots I know live in Northern Michigan. Nice people, otherwise, but with some really F up beliefs. Read what I said again. It was about kids in northern Michigan and their parents think the same way. Its awefully white up there, and not right. Don't get me wrong though, I love Michigan, like you southeners love the South, but sometimes I think that if you look up racism in the dictionary, it will say "see northern Michigan."

I live in Utah now, and it is even worse here.

Didn't mean to hijack this thread, but that was not an idiotic statement. Its the truth wheather you choose to believe it or not.

Dave I read it the same way you just explained it. We also see the same thing here and that is not what the Southern life is about :)

.....3885KOONTZ...yup. very white up there. There are two basic types living in northern Mi. The working lower middleclass/poor, or the ultra wealthy....who happen to own most all the waterfront property.

john thanks for the history lesson.

I think it's time to get over it.

It's true that Northerners don't seem to think about it as much as Southerners, but Southerners are correct to be outraged. They have been treated poorly as far as negative stereotypes on television and film in the USA....probably more than anything else, because this kind of thinking "sells".

wyatt Wrote:

Rod you said exactly what I wanted to say but could not put the words together. Thanks for doing so :) :)

Rod I can think of 6 very wealthy Comedians all claiming to be Southerners and all making millions off Red Necks ,The Granny Walking Farts, Finding girls to get lucky with a family reunions talking funny etc etc. and its been that way since before Justin Wilson was a comedian. . . .
I have, unlike many who have contributed here by their own admission , lived and worked around America quite a bit. I found both good and bad with the people everywhere.
I found Yankee Hating Reb's in Texas when I was down there as a General Foreman for Fishback Electric. I had the home office forward / fax me their personal information and guess what???? They were born YANKEES! In fact Many Southerners are. . .Many have as shown here Yankee Roots . For The Love several here said there was nothing left and what was the Yankees stole it! So most who lived must be Yankees. . . and the legends live on bigger than life as always. . .Most of the south at the time were subsistence farmers they fought for their land most had no idea they were fighting and dieing for a few wealthy big land owners who owned 99% of the slaves held in the south.
BTW we are seeing it happen again today. A lot of poor folks dieing in a war making a few men . . . .very very rich, and most still dont get it even when shown the proof. . . But back to those brave southern fellows. They actually had been made fools of to believe they were fighting invaders for other purposes.

The Rebel thing. . . . is sad! Its supposed to be American thing . . .and in case some of you. . . . haven't noticed your losing much of your homeland and your jobs to outsiders again! Who you going to blame this time?
BTW the folks up in Maine weren't all that friendly to outsiders. . well not at first.
Same goes for Oregon and Utah.
Funny . . .looking back those with the biggest Axes to Grind / Grudges /Chips on shoulders / PP Attitudes were often the least educated and held poorest paying jobs.
Pride . . .Pride can be a bad thing thing . . read your bible . . . . . .
Funny though Illegal Mexicans living here are very proud too! Of what? Of Mexico , a land that has offered them very little to be proud of except some sort of Mystical Magic of long long ago.... But it was drummed into their heads at home and in school. They too believe aggression came from the North! Took Their land their lives their homes their crops their belongings. . . .sound familiar?