These companies and more including comcast. You think this is just a Committee Center . Its way more than that. Comcast is partnering with 1000 Committee Center to create wi fi enabled connections. Be ready for anything. Comcast along with these Television Companies support c span 2 as a public service. Welcome. One and all to tonights lecture. Debating drinking and masculinity in the civil war. My name is molly and i am a postdoctoral associate with the Virginia Center for civil war studies here at Virginia Tech which is sponsoring this event. The center regularly host talks like this and other activities which include sponsoring academic conferences, scholarships and grants. Outreach programs in museums and Elementary School classrooms. And more. Besides basically sharing wonderful civil war era history with as many different people as we possibly can. You can keep up with what is going on with the center on our website which is civil war. Vte. Edu. Or go on facebook, youtube or twitter. On to tonights event. Our speaker is dr. Megan bever who is an associate pastor of history and chair of history at southern missouri university. She received her undergraduate degree at Purdue University which is where i went for my graduate work. So im excited to have that connection with her. She focuses on 19th century u. S. History with an emphasis on civil war era liquor studies. Shes the coeditor of the book, the historian behind the history and her most recent work is the brandnew, at war with king alcohol debating drinking and masculinity in the civil war era which is the subject of this evenings presentation. Dr. Bever will speak to around 3035 minutes give or take followed by a discussion with the audience. You can all type in your questions at any time using the q a button onsen. We may not be able to get to every single question but we certainly will try. We are going to wrap things up at the latest at around 8 15 eastern time. I think that is it for me. And with that, i would like to say thank you to dr. Bever for how grateful i am that she is joining us tonight to discuss her wonderful new work and to discuss her research. And with that, i would turn it over to dr. Bever. Thank you molly for that wonderful and very generous introduction. I would like to thank the Virginia Center for civil war cindy sent paul quickly as well to join you all this evening. I appreciate the virtual welcome from blacksburg. I am so glad so many of you have decided to join us. This evening. If i can share my screen i would like to begin tonight in the camp of the 118 pennsylvania. Specifically i would like to join them along the Potomac River in may, 1863. This is just days after the union defeat at chancellorsville. In the event is somewhat unrelated. I just want to set the scene. But the scene we are going to step into is a party or a shindig of sorts hosted by a captain sure what appeared before the war captain sherwood had been a hotel owner and experience as a carrier kit caterer. He treated his guests and other fellow officers to a generous supply of gin cocktail, fish has punch. And ale. And to go along with those beverages, the off firsters found in normas tubs of cold beef coupled ham, Chicken Salad and ham sandwiches. Perhaps not surprisingly the men really enjoyed themselves at sherwoods party and his tent became filled with a writhing mass of drunken men who would exchange at least some pledges of love and friendship. The next morning most of the officers lay asleep on the floors and under the tables and on the ground surrounding sherwoods tent. Only one captain who had remained sober at the party was awaken up to report for duty. And luckily, i suppose the sober captain found the incident mostly amusing. The problem and i think which i can thank for giving me a book to write is the drunkenness in the armies wasnt always as funny as sherwoods party. Later that year in the same regiment, the 18 pennsylvania, a private shields was found outside the camp will limits one october day. He was roaring drunk and disgracing the regiment using unseemly language and conduct. His captain, Francis Adams donaldson, was out of patience. Private shields was a substitute and although he was quiet and inoffensive when he was sober, he was a veritable devil incarnate when drunk. And unfortunately for private shields, he was drunk most of the time. So in this particular instance after he was taken to the guardhouse, the very combative private shields charged captain donaldson with his musket. Donaldson, being sober it was able to rest the musket away from shields and clubbed the private on the head. The blow killed private shields instantly. Captain donaldson felt justified in his actions and he wasnt punished for the mishap but he still got branded as a man killer by men in regiments camped nearby. Of course donaldsons negative experience is only part of the problem. Shields ended up dead and its by what most of us would consider an avoidable accident if he had not been so often drunk and violent. Neither the incidents are isolated. It wasnt that the hundred 18th pennsylvania was uniquely liquored up. In fact these types of occurrences both the honorary funny and the violent occurred throughout union and confederate armies. We will take you to capitol hill for testimony by defense secretary laura dawson on his failure to really notify officials about his recent hospitalization. This is
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