If the South Had Won the Civil War by MacKinlay Kantor

Author:MacKinlay Kantor
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

The red-bearded J. E. B. Stuart, proud of his new lieutenant-general’s commission, prouder still of the charming wife with whom he jounced in a polka, found time to establish himself before a throng of admirers and recite one of his characteristic flights into poesy:

“When Mars with his stentorian blare

Decreed that spears of war must fly,

He little recked that cannons’ glare

Would paint the chill of Northern sky!

The Dove of Peace now perches cool,

And Venus offers balm to all—”

No longer was there an auburn-haired Kate Chase wielding the imperious wand of her beauty, no longer was there a Mary Todd Lincoln to set tongues gossiping by the extravagance of her gowns. Mrs. Kate Chase Sprague was now circulating a little less imperiously in dull, crowded Philadelphia. And Mary Todd Lincoln was in Illinois.

So was her husband, the only President of the United States to resign his office. Released from detention in Richmond a month before (as a pronounced gesture of international amity) he had withdrawn quietly to his former home at Springfield.

There patiently he endured the flood of calumny, vituperation and mere criticism which rushed around him; there he received the rare affirmation of personal loyalty and affection from friends who still clung; and from there he went, a few months afterward, to practice law in Chicago, along with the stout Lamon.

More profitable legal business than he might have believed possible came Mr. Lincoln’s way. “Hill,” he said to his worshiping partner in March, “I thought to be turned out to grass, and winter-killed grass at that. Never did I expect to discover a downright clover patch!” On the evening of April 14th, 1865, he went to McVicker’s Theatre where Taylor’s trivial play, Our American Cousin, was being presented. There, while seated with friends in a box, he was shot to death by an actor whose hatred for Abraham Lincoln had survived all changes of status and of capitals, all affirmations of Peace.

* * *

“The honeymoon of war was ended. The Confederacy was now faced with the inexorable necessity for an adjustment to those mundane housekeeping tasks which a nation must accomplish, daily and yearly and eternally, if it is to dwell with itself in domestic harmony and productivity. The Southern States, by act of conflict, had annulled a distasteful marriage to the original Federal Government. But the establishment of their national independence had in no way resolved the cumulative problems of individual commonwealths’ cooperation within a centralized structure.”

Thus cogently has the basic perplexity of the new Confederate States of America been summed up by an astute political observer and historian.*

The same situation might not exist in peace which had prevailed when the Confederacy was animated by the grim demands and pressures of warfare … even then the Nation had fumbled severely. Cabinet member after cabinet member was appointed and confirmed, only to offer an early resignation. The interference of Mr. Davis with his generals had been typified as a scandal by outspoken critics of his administration, and men of as exalted position as Robert Toombs had been placed under arrest.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.