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Quote by Bradley M. Gottfried

“While President Jefferson Davis in Richmond and his own soldiers continued to support him with unwavering trust, Gen. Lee wrestled with his own demons, including his ill-fated invasion of Pennsylvania, which had been successful through the first day of fighting at Gettysburg. Other more tangible challenges included his ongoing concern about the well-being of his men due to a lack of adequate supplies, and by his own lingering health problems. His “violent back pains” were probably the result of the chronic heart problems that would kill him in 1870.10”

Quote by Bradley M. Gottfried

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Bradley M. Gottfried

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“by spring 1862 it became universal throughout Confederate regiments for the soldiers to elect their leaders from colonel down to sergeants, the very imposition of military democracy that would lead some to bemoan the demagoguery and wire-pulling with the men in order to seek election.”

“Isaac, the black body servant of Colonel John Nisbet of the Sixty-sixth Georgia, joined his master in the breastworks from time to time to try his hand at shooting Yankees. Amos Rucker was technically a body servant in another Georgia regiment, but it was "well known that he was in the fights around Atlanta on several occasions". When Rucker died many years later, his former comrades-in-arms saw to it that he was laid to rest in the uniform of the Confederate States Army.”

“Probably the biggest laugh of all that rainy night was at the expense of Private T.C. Green of the Second Regiment. Before the battle Green had been outspoken in the number of Federals he intended killing, and at day's end went through the camp recounting how many of the enemy he had shot before something went wrong with his gun. When a messmate examined the weapon, he found that the gun had not been fired at all, but was full of unexploded charges. In his excitement Green had gone through the motions of loading and firing, but had omitted some essentials, such as changing caps and pulling the trigger, and hence had done absolutely no harm to the enemy.”

“Chancellorsville marked the culmination of achievement for Lee's "glorious army" that remains indelibly etched in the nation's history. No American army, against such odds and in less than a year, compiled such a record as that of the Army of Northern Virginia, and none altered the direction of a conflict more.”

“The Army of Northern Virginia was also developing its own distinctive character. It had a harder, more tragic fate, and yet there is more laughter in its legend - as if, in some unaccountable way, it worried less. Out of hardship, intermittent malnutrition, and desperately-won victories it was creating a lean, threadbare jauntiness. Beneath this was the great Characteristic which it derived from its commander - the resolute belief that it could not really be beaten no matter what the odds might be. It had paid many lives for that conviction and it would pay many more before it reached the last turn in the road, but what it got seems to have been worth the price.”

“The Army of Northern Virginia kept moving, one heavy foot after another, marching through a trance. Hour after hour it diminished. Its line of march now was marked as it had never been marked now - by hundreds and hundreds of abandoned muskets, some just dropped by the roadside, other standing butt-upward, bayonets thrust in the ground: weapons discarded by men who had given up and drifted out of the ranks. Many of these men, beaten and weaponless, continued to tramp along with the army, staying where Lee was because he was the only man they could be sure about in their disintegrating world.”

“Local commanders went to bizarre lengths to prevent mistakes in identification during the early stages of the war. Realizing that many of the Federal troops wore gray while his own 33rd Virginia wore blue, "Stonewall" Jackson issued an order before the 1st Battle of Manassas (Bull Run) directing his men to identify themselves by tying strips of white cloth around their arms or hats. So as to make absolutely sure that no mistakes were made, his men were further directed to strike their left breasts with their right hands while simultaneously shouting "Our homes!" immediately they encountered an unknown unit. According to one disgruntled soldier, who presumably declined to take part in this somewhat lunatic theater, the commanders had "failed to tell us that while we were going through this Masonic performance we [were thus giving] the other fellow an opportunity to blow our brains out, if we had any." (page 48)”

“Sam Watkins knew what it was like to march day after day, half starved and half clothed, in an army that looked like it was composed of homeless people but, in fact, contained some of the bravest and most dangerous warriors on the face of the earth. Soldiers on both sides knew what it was like to watch a seemingly endless wave of men come toward you across a field, intent in taking your life, or to charge a fortified line and see all your officers killed and your friends shot to pieces all around you. Shortly the survivors of the Army of Tennessee would also know what it was like to go home to a devastated country and try to put their lives back together. For the most part, the men on both sides were average folks, trying to get by in turbulent times, take care of their own and survive with a little dignity.”

“Among the Confederates killed in this evening encounter in the village was Pvt. Jesse Hutchins of the 5th Alabama Battalion. He enlisted on April 15, 1861, in Livingston, Alabama, and had survived four years of war, only to die in the final few hours.”