Death of a Nation Essay Example for Free

Death of a people EssayClifford Dowdeys Death of a Nation The Story of lee(prenominal) and His Men at Gettysburg is a military history examining the Confederate loss at this epic participation, particularly the decision-making process and the southern commanders failure to perform up to their potential. Partly a fawning defense of Robert E. down taked and partly an insightful study of why the South even dared invade the North, it demonstrates the authors Southern bias without trying to justify slavery, as well as Dowdeys fusion of history and storytelling. The book looks close to exclusively at the courteous state of wars largest battle, in which Lees Army of Northern Virginia invaded the North in hopes of scaring capital of Nebraska into halting the war and recognizing the Confederacy. Instead, as Dowdeys title implies, it proven the Confederacys apex as a military power, beginning its two-year decline and ultimate collapse.Dowdey, a native of Richmond, Virginia, who pro duced numerous histories and novels about the Civil War, takes a decided pro-Southern stance and offers a rather generous view both of the Confederacy, never antennaing its defense of slavery, and of Lee, the inventive, chance-taking commander who proved the Souths greatest leader. The first chapter, Rendezvous with Disaster, conveys in its title how Dowdey sees the battle, yet he is loath to blame Lee for the loss.He opens with an account of Confederate troops occupy Pennsylvania, depicting them not as a menacing enemy but as a slimly merry band The Confederate soldiers had not connected acts of vandalism or abused the inhabitants. On the contrary, the troops had been highly good-humored in the face of taunts and insults (3). The author then introduces the general as a striking, almost godlike record, quoting an officer who deemed him a kingly man whom all men who came into his presence expected to obey (5) this description recurs throughout the book.Subsequent chapters descri be the buildup and the battle itself. In chapter two, The Opening Phase, Dowdey portrays the decision-making process that led to Lees invasion of Pennsylvania as a Jefferson Davis-engineered travesty, a necessary expedient in the insurance of static, scattered defensiveness (27). The author considers Lee almost a victim of Davis vanity, rigidity, and inability to admit his knowledge lack of military expertise, and he absolves the man he believes substantiate the image of the patriarchal planter who, as military leader, assumed benevolent responsibility for his domain (33).Throughout the battle, which dominates much of the book, Dowdey introduces Lees subordinates as characters in a novel or drama, describing their personalities in lively, even somewhat chatty detail. Jeb Stuart, whose cavalry failed in its reconnaissance duties before the fighting began, appears as a adapted soldier who refused to believe he erred Richard Ewell is a crusty but soft-hearted eccentric whose marria ge softened his fighting skills and John B. Hood is a fighter, not a thinker (174).He reserves his harshest criticisms for James Longstreet, deeming the lone general to openly question Lees decision to wage the unwise infract trump known as Picketts Charge, a lying defeatist. Dowdey claims that objective historians and Longstreet partisans have tried to re-evaluate him outside the text of controversy. This is almost impossible. . . . Many other men performed under their potential at Gettysburg, but only James Longstreet absolved himself by blaming Lee (340).By the end of the book, one realizes that Dowdey will not concede that the figure he admires may have simply made fatal errors at Gettysburg. Dowdeys descriptions of the battle cover the three days in a chiefly accurate but not original manner. He alternates between broad, sweeping pictures of dramatic combat and close-up accounts of individual Confederate units and soldiers. (He gives little mention to Union operation throu ghout the book, making clear that his sole interest is depicting Lees army and not providing a holistic history of the battle.) Though his approach provides reliable but not groundbreaking information, Dowdey makes clear that he considers Lees defeat not the venerable commanders fault (despite his own tendency to take long chances against the larger and better-armed Union Army), but rather his subordinates inability to perform as competently as they had in previous battles. In this account, Stuarts ego kept him from realizing he failed in his scouting duties, A. P.Hill lost his usually strong will, Richard Anderson staged a poor excuse for an assault on Cemetery Ridge with undisciplined, poorly-led Carolinian troops (rather than the Virginians that Dowdey, the Virginian, favors), and Ewell did not adequately prepare his troops for their attack. While Dowdey concedes that Lee, alone in the center of the vacuum, could not have been less(prenominal) aware of the total collapse of co-or dination (240). However, he implies, Lees unawareness was not his fault, but that of usually-reliable subordinates who curiously failed all at once.The work ends somewhat abruptly, with Lees broken army withdrawing from Pennsylvania after Picketts failed charge (in which the general whose name it bears appears as a minor figure) and returning to Virginia the author offers no broad conclusion or explanation of the battles meaning within a larger context. Dowdey, primarily a fiction writer and college instructor who as well produced numerous histories of the Army of Northern Virginia, approaches the work with a storytellers vigor and flair, writing this history with a novelists attention to optical details and his characters personalities and quirks.Frequently, he aims to stir the readers attention by adding what his characters may have said or thought in rich, occasionally mislead terms. For example, he deems Ewell this quaint and lovable character (121) Jubal Early becomes the bi tter man who became as passionate in his hate for the Union as he had formerly been in its defense (123) and Union general Daniel Sickles (one of the few figures for whom he shows genuine scorn) is an unsavory, showy, and pugnacious character from New York who went further on brassy self-confidence and politicking .. . than many a(prenominal) a better man went on ability (203). In trying give his characters personality, Dowdey writes often picturesque and lively prose but also offers a somewhat distorted picture that more detached academic historians may find objectionable. For example, while Lee cigaret do no wrong, Jefferson Davis, the Confederacys much-reviled president, appears as nearly as much a villain as Longstreet. Of Davis, Dowdey writes The crisis in the Souths military fortunes was caused largely by the defense policies of the president.. . . Among the limitations of this self-aware gentleman was an inability to acknowledge himself in the wrong (14). As a Lee apologis t, Dowdey implicitly blames David for the Souths collapse, though he wavers on this by adding Lincoln had at his disposal unlimited wealth, the organized machinery of government, a navy, the war potential of heavy industry, and a four-to-one manpower superiority.Davis led a disorganized movement in self-determinism compose of proud and fiercely individualistic provincials (15-16). Dowdey comments little about the South in general and does not directly glorify the Southern cause, though he also refrains from any mention of slavery or racism. He seems to simply accept the South as it was, writing his works to illustrate a particularly regionalist awareness of pride, if not in its plantation past, then certainly in Lee, its most shining example of military leadership and manhood.He reveals, perhaps unintentionally, his own champion of romance about the South when he writes In a land where the age of chivalry was perpetuated, the military leader embodied the gallantry, the glamour, a nd the privilege of the aristocrat in a feudal society (15). Characters like Lee, he implies, gave the South respectability and nobility, while lesser individuals, like the supposedly duplicitous, disloyal Longstreet and the rigid, arrogant Davis, somehow stained it and failed to match its ideals. Despite Dowdeys biases, he cannot be faulted for failing to do research.He includes a short bibliographic essay at the end, explaining his sources strengths and limitations. In adjunct to using many secondary sources, he relies heavily on participants personal documents, such as letters and memoirs, though he concedes that the eyewitness accounts are message to the fallibility of memory, and many of the articles suffer the distortion of advocacy or indictment (353). This last comment is telling, because Dowdey himself neither advocates nor indicts the Old South, but rather aims to depict the military aspects.The go away is a work that shows clear fondness for the Souths self-image as a n embattled land of chivalry, but to his credit, Dowdey does not excoriate the North or its leaders. Lincoln scarcely appears in this volume, but the author pays some compliments to Union generals whom historians have seen less favorably, such as Joseph Hooker (whom Lee soundly get the better of at Chancellorsville) or George Meade (who won at Gettysburg but failed to pursue and destroy the remains of Lees army as it withdrew).Death of a Nation is not a comprehensive history of the battle of Gettysburg, but neither does it claim to be. Instead, it is an often-entertaining, well-researched account of the Southern sides participation, including its ill-starred behind-the-scenes planning and the personal dynamics among the commanders who underperformed at this key point in the war.Though Dowdeys conclusion is so brief as to be unsatisfactory, one can draw ones own conclusion from this volumes title and the battle it describes that defeat at Gettysburg meant the Confederacys failure t o win its nationhood. Dowdey does not openly lament this fact, but instead shows the process that made this failure a reality. Dowdey, C. (1958). Death of a Nation. New York Alfred A. Knopf.