The Civil War Podcast

The past days’ accounts of Confederate exiles sailing to safe harbours put me in a sailing mood, so here’s an unusual blog post for today.

I stumbled across this CD a few years ago while on a quest for Civil War music, and it’s one of my favourite period performances. The band describes themselves as,

An actual string band of the Civil War Era singing a wide variety of traditional American songs in authentic, “living history” style.

“Living” is the key word, there – these guys sound like they’ve been issued double grog rations and the promise of some weekend shore leave in a bordello-lousy port. While Bobby Horton’s catalogue of songs is impressive, his singing leaves a lot to be desired. Such is not the case here. The shanties are rollicking and well-performed.

I didn’t recognise any of the titles except for Shenandoah and Drunken Sailor, but the Navy songs never got the kind of publicity that the Army’s marching songs did, so that’s understandable. The Mermaid is now a personal favourite, and I dare anyone to refrain from singing along to Jolly Grog.

The best part about writing this post is that I’ve just noticed the band has a whole series of other Civil War CDs. If I ever figure out how to make money off this site, I know how I’m blowing my first paycheque.

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/97thrsb8

Well, while we could never really be considered any cog in an Axis of Evil, Canada did offer harbour (complete with extraneous “u”) to Confederate agents during the war years. http://www.cfhi.net/WilmingtonsWartimeCanadianConnection.phpthe site I mentioned yesterday details some of the efforts of the Confederate Secret Service, who coordinated cross-border activities during the conflict, including the St. Albans’ Raid and the attempt to burn down New York City.

I’ve added yet another e-book to the Library, this one written by one of the New York conspirators, and goes into great detail on the planning and (failed) execution of this and other raids.

Confederate Operations in Canada and New York

I caught a passing mention, years ago, that Jubal Early’s memoirs had been written in Toronto, but wasn’t able to follow any trails to more local information. This website was interesting, though, in providing quite a long list of famous Confederates who lived here or in Niagara-on-the-Lake, which seems to have become a kind of Richmond North, post-war.

The war’s end brought General John C. Breckenridge and his family to Toronto first, and then Niagara on the Lake in May 1866. Breckenridge served as vice president of the United States under James Buchanan 1856-1860, was a candidate for president in 1860 on the Southern Democratic ticket, (received nearly 850,000 votes) and a Major General in the Confederate service. He and his family rented a small home on Front Street overlooking Lake Ontario for twelve dollars a month. Immediately opposite the home on the New York bank of the river was Fort Niagara. Breckenridge gazed at the fort often, “with its flag flying to refresh our patriotism.” To him it seemed both a symbol of the Founder’s republic he tried to save, as well as a taunt that threatened arrest should he cross the river.

One who frequently visited the exiled Southerners was Lt. Colonel George T. Denison, commander of the Canadian Governor-General’s Body Guard, another was General Breckenridge’s “beloved old adjutant,” J. Stoddard Johnston of New Orleans. Johnston was the nephew of General Albert Sidney Johnston, and also served as an aid to Generals Bragg and Buckner. General George Pickett was also in Canada, though perhaps living in Toronto. Soon to join the ex-vice president at Niagara on the Lake were Confederate commissioner to England James M. Mason, General’s Jubal Early, John McCausland, Richard Taylor (son of General Zachary Taylor), John Bell Hood, Henry Heth, William Preston; and a host of lesser officers and their families. They often commiserated in the shade at Mason’s home, “discussing military matters and the practice of the soldiers art under the modern conditions inaugurated” by the War Between the States.

There’s even an account of Jefferson Davis coming for an extended visit, and being greeted by a cheering throng on Yonge Street.

Davis’ departure invoked this tribute from The Niagara Mail:

It is a subject of pride to Canadians that they can offer the hospitality of the soil and the shelter of the British flag to so many worthy men who are proscribed and banished from their homes for no crime at all, viz. to assert the right of every people to choose their own form of government.

One assumes the pro-Southern rhetoric can be attributed to the fear of many Canadians (D’Arcy McGee is quoted on this earlier) that the US would use its standing army to get that whole Manifest Destiny thing out of the way, at last.

http://www.cfhi.net/WilmingtonsWartimeCanadianConnection.php

The most depressing thing about the current economic crisis is that governments are tackling the crisis through austerity measures and cutbacks. When you see websites like this one, you’re reminded of what was accomplished when the WPA assigned the country odd jobs (in a literal sense) and gifted its results upon later generations.

The ethnomusicology work performed by the Federal Music Project has fascinated me since my University days; I was a history student working at a late, lamented, legendary record store to pay my tuition. Unlike my much cooler coworkers I was more than happy to cover shifts in the Folk section, where I had access to all the Smithsonian Folkways CDs and very few customers to complain if I played them.

The CDs I listened to were preserved music, but I knew of the interviews’ existence. Thank goodness for the Internet; an easily-accessed repository for these chronicles out of time. I’ve listened to Fountain Hughes’ interview already – it was excerpted in the Ken Burns series – and I can’t wait to get at some of the others. I mean, how’s this for a teaser?

I got my name from President Jeff Davis. He was president of the Southern Confederacy. He owned my grandfather and my father. Brought them from Richmond, Virginia.

Voices from the Days of Slavery – Library of Congress http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/voices/

I was looking for the source of Walt Whitman’s war reminiscences, and happened upon the Walt Whitman Archive. Not only does it have the published anecdotes, it also offers all his poetry and a trove of letters, too.

Whitman’s writing is very readable. I planned to leaf through some of the Memoranda, and wound up reading almost the entire collection. It’s a fantastic resource they’re offering, here.

http://www.whitmanarchive.org/

This letter – an emancipated slave responding to his former master’s request that he come back “home” – has made the rounds on the web, but if you haven’t seen it, it’s spectacular. I publish an excerpt just to give readers a taste – read the whole thing for the full, bitingly sarcastic effect.

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin’s to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/01/to-my-old-master.html

One of my favourite blogs, (the totally unrelated to all things Civil War) Cool Tools, has a feature I very much enjoy: Rather than visit the site daily to see what new tool is being recommended, the editor sends out a weekly email with all of the upcoming week’s blog entries.

When I first started my own blog here, I didn’t dare attempt such a thing. I was worried about a paucity of content and the occasional “blank” day. So far, this hasn’t proved to be an issue. Barring the odd time-sensitive substitution, such as plays or gallery notices, I generally have a week’s worth of blog entries ready in advance. I now feel comfortable offering these in a weekly digest email, which gives subscribers an insider’s look at all the week’s posts, and – if I can swing it – the occasional special offer.

Below (and on the sidebar at right) is the sign up form for anyone wishing to get their Civil War Podcast fix in one big, weekly update. As with the Podcast Alert email list (also on the sidebar at the right), your contact information remains confidential and will never be sold, and each email contains an unsubscribe link at the foot, for easy opt-out should you wish to do so.

A two-for-one posting: An interesting article that mentioned a memoir which I’ve added to the Library. A Canadian girl disguised herself as “Frank Thompson”, and joined the Union Army. Given this description from the article, the memoirs will be quite the Victorian potboiler:

How did Emma and 400 other male impersonators that served in the Union Army pass inspection? Since neither a physical examination nor proof of identity were required, it was easy to fool recruiters whose sole concern was putting warm bodies in uniform…

But Emma did not want to spend the war playing post office. Itching for more action, she jumped at the chance to join the Secret Service.

Unsexed: or, The Female soldier. The thrilling adventures, experiences and escapes of a woman, as nurse, spy and scout, in hospitals, camps and battle-fields

http://smmercury.com/19299/bartee-haile-woman-pulls-off-civil-war-masquerade/

God, I love nerds. The speaker in this video is fantastic: Speaks for 11 minutes without notes, with a great deal of enthusiasm, and even with a stereotypical “retainer lisp” on Thaddeus Lowe’s involvement in the war, covering everything from the technology to the chronology of the Balloon Corps. A terrific little introduction to a fascinating sidenote of the war.

An odd choice of topic for Valentine’s Day, but this Wikipedia entry (pulled up when I was investigating comparative slavery systems for that Atlantic Monthly article) contained a paragraph that warmed the cockles of my patriotic heart:

By 1790 the abolition movement was gaining credence in Canada and the ill intent of slavery was evidenced by an incident involving a slave woman being violently abused by her slave owner on her way to being sold in the United States. In 1793 Chloe Clooey, in an act of defiance yelled out screams of resistance. The abuse committed by her slave owner and her violent resistance was witnessed by Peter Martin and William Grisely. Peter Martin, a former slave, brought the incident to the attention of Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe. Under the auspices of Simcoe, The Slave Act of 1793 was legislated. The elected members of the executive council, many of whom were merchants or farmers who depended on slave labour, saw no need for emancipation. White later wrote that there was “much opposition but little argument” to his measure.

Isn’t that us in a nutshell? Plenty of griping, but resigned to the pragmatic solution. Take that, South Carolina.