Happy Birthday Civil War!




Fort Sumter

  A hundred fifty years ago today the Union troops attacked Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, winning handily and initiating the American Civil War.

It was an exciting, adrenaline inducing time, but after four long years—almost to the day—from April 12, 1861 to April 9, 1865--when General Lee surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse—the country was exhausted, almost shattered beyond existence.  620,000 Americans were dead from battle wounds, disease.  Thousands of others were financially ruined.

But you what?  We've never quit fighting that war.

Re-enacters from all over have been giving up their free time for years, struggling into their store-bought gray and navy woolen uniforms to recreate the same battles, routes, and postures.  But this time around they used fake ammunition, and if someone gets bitten by a dog or a deer, there were antibiotics at the ready.

The late George Carlin once said they should use real bullets and get it over with already.

Yeah, it’s funny, but beyond the re-enacters, there are thousands of Civil War buffs—those fascinated with the subject—the people, the coincidences, and the very horror of these innocent kids gunned down while crossing an open field.         

So it’s 150 years past, and we’re still fighting the same old battles while a brand new one just popped up in this computer age.  

Turns out it’s between two confederate states.  So what’s the argument?  For heaven sake, they already lost the war.   Now they’re bickering about who lost the most war dead.
North Carolina always held the honor, which sort of implies the most heroism while Virginia used to be fourth until one Virginian librarian recently found 31,000 more casualties, and it’s steadily creeping into first place.  North Carolina says it could care less, but librarians on both sides are working feverishly to gather more gory statistics.

Of course, this might be an impossible task.


Battle Of Gettysburg


According to Civil War scholar and Harvard University President Drew Gilpin Faust, “…records were so poorly kept at the time…that no one will ever really know how many people actually died.”  Others say that even if they could get a closer count, it will take many more years to figure.

Does that mean by the time we celebrate 200 years, someone will find a dusty old IPAD up in Grandma’s attic, and add up the final tally?  Some say it could change the history of the Civil War.  Others say it will set things straight until the next argument begins.

If we live that long.

Until then, happy birthday to one of the saddest but one of the most emotionally gripping chapters of our history.