It was the last day.
They rode into the courthouse square and got down from their mounts. The General was in pain and gingerly walked up the steps . His staff slowly mounted the steps of the porch and halted at the door. General Lee went in alone and took a seat at a small oval table at the window.
They rode into the courthouse square and got down from their mounts. The General was in pain and gingerly walked up the steps . His staff slowly mounted the steps of the porch and halted at the door. General Lee went in alone and took a seat at a small oval table at the window.
They waited patiently on the porch for the Yankees to
arrive. The end had come. There was no need to rush it.
Colonel Taylor stood rigid and erect as he waited. Eyes on all the rest. A hawk standing vigil over squabbling chicks. Vengeful and implacable faces twisted in agony and
despair. Captain Young stood swaying
from side to side with his anger barely in check. Surgeon Guild was chewing
fiercely on a chaw of tobacco. Sending a quick splatter of juice contemptuously
out to the courtyard as if he could smother this evil day in a spray of foul
smelling spittle. None of them worried Taylor. He had his eyes on Edwards.
Captain Edwards had been chief of Scouts for the past two
years after the General had met him at Gettysburg. Served with General
Hood in his Texas Calvary before Lee had met him. Lee was always buoyed
by his boundless ferocity and rock solid
determination. He could depend on him to not fail him like Stuart had. What
would he do in defeat? At the surrender. At the end.
Could he stay his hand and bend his will to the discipline
that Marse Robert demanded of his subordinates. Had this final indignity loosened those bonds
enough to release an inner demon on the Yankee high command that
would soon be within grasp.
It was worrisome.
23 comments:
Where was Mead during all this?
Mowing the lawn.
Or maybe ploughing a very infertile field.
So to speak.
Our cleaning out the doghouse, he may be in it.
I don't like that story. Too sad...
It's just the start Sixty.
The earth will turn a long while before he starts on the search for Debbie.
I thought I could just have some fun.
With malice toward none, with charity for all,..
One of my distant great grandfathers returned home to his farm near Viola WI to see the gravestones of three young kids who had died of diptheria while he was away at that war. I saw the graves for the first time last time I was back. People had dozens of kids then though so families muddled through it.
A friend called me one day to see if I wanted to accompany him to Spring Hill, TN for a Civil War reenactment. He had thrown his back out and needed someone to drive. I went with him. He's a descendent of General Hood. In fact, he's Gen. Hood's twin. It was a hoot walking around with him. When he was dressed up, there was no mistaking who he descended from. Dress in civilian clothes, it took a little prompting. When he mentioned Hood, people literally gasped, the resemblance was so close.
There were noble people both sides.
Grant was very gracious in victory. As was Lee in defeat. It was all very gracious. Well, I'm not going to make fun of them, though the urge is great. They both acted in accord with models of grace, models that had been internalized long before they met. That's one way of saying there was a code. Which they honored. And thereby honored themselves and more important the men, the causes, they represented. The urge to mock comes out of no longer having such a code, not in the way it was integral to those two men in that time.
Afterwards Grant got blind drunk. At least he had that outlet. I doubt Lee would permit himself such a release. He endured, stoically.
Yes, poor Meade the guy never got any respect. People forget he was there at Grant's side - running the Army on a day to day basis, consulting and advising Grant.
Compare Lee and Jefferson Davis and how both acted at the end of the war. Show's how great Lee was.
Do you know on the 5th day God said there will be tits?
I just watched the entire Barnard commencement. I was expecting a bunch of dykes but the bitches had long hair and were hot.
Much hotter than Harvard women.
And don't get me started with the dykes from Smith.
Obama at Barnard. Romney at Liberty.
The country is really divided.
What does one do with a Religion Degree from Liberty?
tits.
I liked it.
Titus, Very astute observation. I hope a buxom jogger lets you touch her tits today.
Virgil Caine is my name and I served on the Danville train
Til Stoneman's cavalry came and tore up the tracks again
In the winter of '65 we were hungry, just barely alive
By May 10th Richmond had fell, it was a night I remember oh so well...
I noticed that the "Justified" theme song opens with three drum beats...just like The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.
Is that common knowledge.
When General Joseph E. Johnston surrendered to the rape-monger Sherman at Bennett Place the Confederate troops under his command were bivouacked on the land where my house now stands.
Beside the river that flows nearby there is a trail that runs from Richmond to Georgia - that trail has been in use for over 10,000 years, long before Richmond and Danville and trains were even thought of.
Yep, we have a bit of history in the 'hood.
The energy that moves humans to act is peculiar in deed.
When I read this week about the black depression that engulfed the "rape monger" following the death of his son, I wondered what role his experience of lived darkness may have played in subsequent choices and behavior.
War is Hell. No one knew that better than those who fought it. I get wanting to defeat the enemy. But raping the women? How very Y*nkee-like of them.
I've a different view of evil than some. I believe evil moves and acts through rage, a dark energy beyond anger. Raping women and beating children and slaves who cannot fight back is wrong no matter which side does it.
Sherman was one of the greatest Generals that ever fought in the Civil war. He gave all the Southern braggarts a chance to "die in the last ditch" as they'd often shrieked - and of course they declined.
They've hated him ever since.
The South was militarily defeated by November 1864, but they refused to give up, and continued to shoot their mouths off.
Sherman had to show them they'd lost the war but marching through the south destroying railroads, burning Cotton, and stealing livestock. Once they were hit in the pocketbook they finally gave up.
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