War Crimes Against Southern Civilians
by Walter Brian Cisco
Pelican Publishing Company, 2007
This is the first book that I can remember reading in which I did not underline or highlight a single sentence. Not because there was nothing significant, but because every sentence was!
The author concisely recounts the atrocities inflicted by the Union Army upon the non-combatant citizens of the seceded states simply because they were Southerners. As familiar as I have become with some of these incidents, this account brought me alternating emotions of anger, sorrow, shame, outrage and disgust.
You can read:
- of the extremes to which the U.S. Army went in order to keep Missouri in the “Union” — of Order No. 11.
- of the oppression in Tennessee under the U.S. military governor, Andrew Johnson. A native son, yet full of spiteful hate toward his own neighbors.
- of the complicity of “christian” President Abraham Lincoln. (A preacher quoting Lincoln is as anathema as quoting Hitler in support of faithful living.)
of Major Generals Benjamin F. Butler, Robert H. Milroy and Henry W. Halleck. - of the Lieber Code for military conduct.
- of women and children imprisoned.
- and that it was against Southern civilians that Brigadier General George Custer and Major Generals Philip H. Sheridan and William T. Sherman learned the fine art of extermination which they later used so effectively against the plains Indians.
I cannot say that you will enjoy reading War Crimes against Southern Civilians. But after reading it, you will have a greater understanding of native Southern sympathies against “damn” Yankees. If ever there were a legitimate public apology needed from anyone for actions during the 19th Century, it should be from the United States government to its citizens in the Southern states.
(Reviewed August 2007)