Transcripts For CSPAN3 Lorien Foote Rites Of Retaliation 20221008

Allow users to track the escape routes federal prisoners of war took as they escaped these camps in the Confederate States during the war. But most recent book which of course is the subject of tonights event and my prop for this evening is rights of retaliation civilization soldiers and campaigns in the American Civil War and this came out just a few months ago from unc press. I really enjoyed reading it and i know were gonna enjoy listening to dr. Foot talk about it tonight. And of course its available at all booksellers under the sun wherever you buy your books from no doubt you can obtain a copy of rights of retaliation. So tonights agenda is dr. Fort will speak for about 30 to 35 minutes. Were not super strict. But but thats the general target and well have time for discussion at the end. So we always invite audience questions audience comments and so far at least the audience has never failed to provide us with excellent questions and comments and im sure tonight will be no exception and the way you can do that is typing directly into the q a box in zoom. So the chat function will not work. You wont be able to turn off or turn on your microphone or your camera. Everything will do through the q a box and then dr foot and i will keep an eye on the q a box. Well get to as many questions as we can and well wrap up at the latest by about 8 15 eastern time. So just a little over an hour from now. So thats all from me for now. Im really grateful to dr. Foot for joining us this evening really looking forward to the talk. So i think we should give her a virtual round of applause and welcome her to our screens. Thanks so much for being with us. Dr. Quickly, thank you so much for inviting me. Im just delighted to be here and to share the the research with you. I found it fascinating and so i hope that the audience will find it fascinating as well. So i want to begin by telling you about something that happened on february 23rd 1865 the confederate leadership committed an act that violated the principles upon which they had promised to fight their war for independence on that day confederate agents in virginia delivered to the United States 14 black Union Soldiers for exchange as prisoners of war and then four days later when us naval commanders in the gulf of mexico propose that free black sailors and soldiers fighting in the confederacys. Mississippi department be treated as prisoners of war Confederate Military officials agreed and these two moments happen because us authorities had conducted a retaliation ritual in the department of the south to protect northernborn free black us soldiers and this ritual change confederate policy. Today many writers and historians conflate retaliation with revenge, but during the American Civil War retaliation was a ritual with a purpose and that purpose was to negotiate civilized war and manage how campaigns were conducted. So what i like to speak with you tonight about is this ritual of retaliation and how it worked to change peoples behavior during campaigns. So im going to share my screen with you here. Um to help you follow along. So let me get that shared and then ill continue so thats the kind of starting point that i want to be sure that we all understand that retaliation is a ritual with a purpose to negotiate civilized war and manage how campaigns are conducted. So retaliation is consistent with the code. Ill hold on a moment with the code that governs the conduct of us armies in the field, which is general orders number 100. Which this was issued on april 24th 1863 article 27 of general orders number 100 proclaimed that civilized nations acknowledge retaliation as the sternest feature of war a reckless. Enemy often leads to his opponent. No other means of securing himself against the repetition of barbarous outrage. The next article continued the retaliation is not revenge, but rather a means of quote protective retribution. Retaliation was only legitimate if it was done cautiously and unavoidably and only after careful inquiry into the real occurrence the author of the code Francis Lieber who was an expert on the International Laws of war cautioned that unjust or inconsiderate retaliation removes the belligerence farther and farther from the beginning mitigating rules of regular war and by rapid steps leave them leads them nearer to the war of savages. So i think this these lines in this are interesting the the reference to civilizing customs of war and the war of savages because this is going to get us to one of the themes of my project which is actually civilization and what it meant to americans who are fighting the civil war because retaliation against prisoners of war is actually a common feature of the American Civil War field commanders use retaliation during nearly every military campaign and civilian leaders frequently turned to the practice when they confronted contentious policy issues union and confederate officials shared a ritual of retaliation that played an Important Role in determining how each side fought the war. Equally important retaliation reflected the cultural worldview of civilization americans talked constantly about civilized war anyone whos done even only a Little Research into primary sources in the civil war will acknowledge that the word civilization or the word savage is used constantly in correspondence diaries official correspondence. Americans litter their correspondence with reference to the rules of civilized war and they incessantly accuse the other side of savagery and private and public formats. This is because americans in the civil war era considered themselves to be part of a transatlantic set of civilized nations that they believe represented the pinnacle of social evolution to that point in history. So there are three essential elements to civilized war as the majority of americans understood it at this time. The first is restraint. Selfcontrol order and deliberation underlies the violence of a civilized war which was most easily defined through contrast with its opposite. Animal like anger uncontrolled passion and unlimited an indiscriminate violence marks a savage conflict. Civilized nations fought with uniformed combatants who represented the state and were under the discipline and control of gentlemen officers gentlemen officers ensured that the effects of violence on noncombatants were minimized. The second indispensable aspect of civilized war was that combatants participated in the accumulated wisdom of civilized people stretching back to ancient times americans perceive themselves as part of a shared history and took care to contextualize every action taken in warfare as a consistent outgrowth that history they mind history for example from warfare to justify their policies or to accuse their enemies and consistently and constantly cited precedents for the actions that they took official and private correspondence during the civil war was filled with historical references. Finally civilized war was honorable not in the modern sense of just or virtuous but in its classical definition. Nations had a reputation to uphold before appear audience. You could not claim yourself to be a worthy nation unless other civilized nations acknowledged your claim. The union and the confederacy had to convince other civilized nations who observed and judged them about the righteousness of their conduct. Civilized war is a performance where mastery of rhetoric protocols and etiquette were vitally important to establishing a nations claim to civilized status. So the purpose of retaliation is to enforce the customs of war among civilized nations. Military leaders on both sides in the civil war agreed on the basic rules and the established rituals of retaliation. Retaliation is different from revenge by both purpose and procedure. Its intent is to prevent the enemy from continuing specific barbaric acts and to enforce the civilized usages of war. So a Major General Henry Hallett who served as general in chief for union armies for nearly two years and was an acknowledged authority on the subject wrote that the object of retaliation is deterrence and prevention. As lincoln instructed one of his generals and here im quoting lincoln. I wish you to do nothing merely for revenge, but what you may do shall be done solely with reference to the security of the future. Confederate secretary of war james a said in believe the point of retaliation was to produce a thorough reformation of the offending nation. The head of the confederate bureau of war thought a little real shooting of prisoners would do good prevent suffering and save life. So a combatant he was considering retaliation wrote a letter to his component that can say that contains several elements placed in sequence. First was a statement of the desire to fight the war on civilized principles. This was always the first thing that the writer did in his letter then the writer named a specific barbarous act that the enemy had committed that supposedly violated the International Customs of war. Then the letter writer offered an opportunity for the recipient of the letter to disavow this barbarous incident by propering three suggested acceptable explanation. The first was that perhaps the writer of the letter was misinformed and the incident had not actually a second acceptable explanation was that the incident did happen but the guilty parties who committed the atrocity had acted without the sanction. The official sanction of the military that they were in so everybody acknowledges that periodically a soldier will commit an atrocious act and that wasnt sanctioned by his authority. Or a third possible explanation. Is that yeah, the incident happened. But it wasnt sanctioned and the perpetrators will be punished by the side who soldiers or officials or whoever committed the atrocious act. So the addressee the person who receives the letter could submit evidence that the perpetrators would be punished. So then the writer of a letter concludes with a time limit to receive a response. And if he hasnt received an acceptable response within that time limit then the writer of the letter names a specific measure of retaliation that will be implemented against a named individual or group of people. And that retaliation is supposed to be proportional to the offense that was committed. So these negotiations framed every military campaign of actually that occurs in the civil war but specifically in the department of the south which i chose is the subject for my book because i thought it was important to zero in on one military theater because retaliation is best understood. Is he follower retaliation incidents from beginning to end and follow the characters in each theater because only then can you really understand the nuances of how retaliation operated . So my book includes a military history of the department of the south that covers its officers its soldiers and its campaigns raids battles bombardments so for our purpose here, i want to use three examples three points of contention between the union and the confederacy in the department of the south and the retaliation incidents that kind of exemplify how this works. So the first issue of contention in the department of the south was the unions deployment of black soldiers. Here the union successfully used retaliation to change confederate policy towards black us soldiers who had been born free in Northern States. So it begins in 1861 and 1862 when an abolitionist Union General david hunter. Created regiments of black soldiers from South Carolina, georgia and florida deployed them in raids along the coast of South Carolina and georgia to destroy plantations and liberate enslaved people. And so heres a map that kind of shows the South Carolina sea islands, which the Union Military took control of in 1861. So this is the source that that hunter saw for recruits and these are going to be the rivers that he is going to use for raids by 1863 as many of us have heard of theres raids like the june second 1863 combaji river raid by portions of the second South Carolina, and then so you can see here the burning of the rice fields the liberating of enslaved people. The confederate government after a very interesting internal negotiation, which i fully cover in the book issued a retaliation resolution that required black soldiers, even if they were born free in Northern States to be turned over to states or trial as survival insurrectionist. So many historians are familiar with this resolution and may of 1863 by the confederate congress, which said that can help Confederate Military courts could try us commissioned officers and command of black troops for inciting surviolence direction and put them to death or otherwise punish them and that blacks taken in arms and the language in the resolution is very specific. Even if born free in a Northern State would be delivered to state authorities in the state where they were captured. So it took until the summer of 1863 for confederates to take any black prisoners in the department of the south after this retaliation resolution was issued, but it happened in the summer of 1863 when captured black soldiers from the 54th, massachusetts who had been captured here on sol legear island and then all so in an attack on fort wagner here in Charleston Harbor during the Union Military efforts to capture charleston. Um, so at the same time that these black soldiers from the 54th, massachusetts most of whom were born free Northern States were captured. The us Water Department received a letter smuggled to nassau by three black sailors of the union navy asking for protection by the Us Government. Orange Brown William h johnson and William Wilson were three black sailors who had been born in the state of new york their ship had been captured. But all the white sailors had been exchanged. They were put in the charleston jail. They managed to smuggle this letter and which found its way eventually to the Us Navy Department and with this letter which gave specific evidence of what confederates were doing was northern born black us military personnel. The Union War Department was able to act. They also have the backing of the Union War Department of the incredible publicity in the north and in europe about the fate of the prisoners of the 54th, massachusetts because the regiments organizers were rich and powerful new england republicans with International Literary types. So because of this situation the United States issued general order 252 on july 31st 1863. It stated that to sell or enslave any captured person on account of this color and for no offense against the laws of war is a relapse into barbarism and a crime against the civilization of the age. So the retaliation proclaimed in this border. Was that a confederate pow would be put to hard labor for every us soldier sold into slavery and that the United States would execute a confederate pow for every us soldier but to death so historians are well aware of general order 252, but what theyve completely missed because they havent gone into the weeds of retaliation incidents across time and specific departments is that this order was issued to specifically address the situation in the department of the south and do explicitly address the capture of northern warren free black soldiers and in the retaliation correspondence that goes along with this general order the confederate War Department receives a message in their own internal correspondence. Its clear that they understand that this order was issued to protect free black sold. Particularly because what other historians have missed is that the Us Government sets aside three white South Carolina soldiers prisoners of war as hostages to secure the enforcement of this order. And the confederate War Department again understood that these three white South Carolina soldiers were hostages for the men of the 54th, massachusetts, but more specifically the three black sailors from new york. So this created a crisis in the confederate War Department because some within it argued that the us did have the right to arm its own citizens as free black men clearly were so for example, robert. Garlic heal keen who was the director of the confederate bureau of war. He wrote his superiors. It is very clear. The United States have the right to enlist any of their own citizens. They have long in those states regarded negroses citizens as in massachusetts allowing them the right of stuff of suffrage. International attention also swayed secretary of war seddon and president jefferson davis, they realized the incredible International Publicity attending this particular retaliation issue and that the civilized world was watching what they were going to do and so eventually they ordered southern governors to ignore the retaliation resolutions and to put freeborn black us soldiers who were captured as a battle of a lusty in florida, which happened in february of 1864 in andersonville with white prisoners of war. So after black soldiers were captured after a massacre that occurred that i can talk about in the q a those who work captured were treated as prisoners of war and put in andersonville with white pows the soldiers of the 54th who are captured in charleston where eventually integrated into the Confederate Military prison system and those three black sailors from new york were exchange. And additionally the confederacy actually puts in writing their change of policy. So sedan gave instructions to governors that the congressional resolutions were defunct because of the embarrassments attending the problem of free black prisoners. He talked about the serious consequences, which might ensue from rigid enforcement of the act here. Hes talking about the execution of those three white South Carolina hostages, and he orders governors and Confederate Military officers to treat free black men as pows accepting some trivial particulars indicative of inferior consideration. And then the confederacy finally in february actually puts amendments to their retaliation resolution to make a distinction between formally enslaved black soldiers and black soldiers born free in the north the language changes from employing slaves. Oh it changes to employee slaves instead of employing and war against the Confederate States it repealed the sections that required military courts to execute or punish white officers, and it repealed the section that required confederate officers to deliver black prisoners to stay the authorities. So in this long retaliation incident that occurred eventually the confederacy changes its policy and puts it in writing. The second big issue a parent in the department of the south was confederate treatment of union creek pows. My Research Uncovered a retaliation incident that academic historians have been completely unaware of in 1864 the commander of the department of the south was John G Foster and when confederates brought Union Prisoners from georgia to charleston during the federal bombardment of the city and put them in locations under fire from union guns. He received permission to bring confederate pows to the islands in the Charleston Harbor to put them under fire from confederate deaths. So this aspect historians have know about and that both the union and the confederacy bought brought prisoners of war to Charleston Harbor and put them under fire but heres the part that wasnt known until you follow the retaliation through to its conclusion. So during this time the condition of the Union Prisoners held at andersonville and didnt make an in georgia became known to fost because escape prisoners crossed into union lines and reported what was going on particularly the low quantity and quality of the rations. So when confederate . Confederates ultimately removed the Union Prisoners from Charleston Foster sent the confederate pows that he still held he sent them to fort pulaski and georgia and the hilton head and ive got a picture here of the building where he put them and he ordered that these 600 confederate prisoners of war received the exact same rations that Union Prisoners had received at andersonville. Under this regimen the confederate officer sicken and federal medical inspectors wrote that their health could not be sustained under that diet. Now interestingly fosters retaliation was actually not legal and not an example of how the retaliation ritual was supposed to work because he did not notify his opponent about what he was doing and if you dont notify your opponent, they cant change their behavior. So because of that when he was relieved of command his subordinates who always disagreed with this retaliation and some of whom even tried to mitigate the condition of the prisoners they were able to convince the new commander to stop this retaliation. The third issue was federal treatment of noncombatants . This was highlighted during shermans march to the sea and through, South Carolina. During this campaign william to come to sherman marching his army through georgia and then up through South Carolina Union Officers in his staff and in his command so ive got a picture here of sherman Staff Officers in may 1865. They were very concerned about civilization and how to make to maintain selfcontrol and discipline of soldiers while unleashing them to destroy wheat resources and wage psychological warfare on the confederate population. So whats really interesting right before shermans march his staff has joined by Henry Hitchcock who was new to the war. Whove been a lawyer in st. Louis. He was related to ethan allen hitchcock. Who is the us commissioner for exchange of prisoners and he decides in the fall of 1864. He wants to join the union army and his uncle sets up for him to be on shermans staff and hitchcock brings to the war a typical concern about civilization and he becomes obsessed about whether this army that he is joined is behaving in a civilized fashion. So he conducts a personal investigation that he records in his diary and every night he sits down with other officers and ask them questions the german pillage did they act civilized today . How barbaric were they . Did you do anything to stop them if they were behaving in a barbarous fashion, and he records the answers of officers in his diary . Does obsession and that of other likeminded officers was pillaging . Because the International Laws of war allow for foraging by an army, but pillagine is the hallmark of a savage army. It is a sign of out of control out of control soldiers who are looting and destroying for no reason but violence and bloodlust. So theres a faction of shermans army that that of officers in shermans army that become increasingly convinced over the course of the campaign that a portion of their army is out of control and then theres a faction of officers who claim that its not and only a few men commit acts like pillaging and that no army can control everyone. So this reaches kind of a a summit point when shermans army arrives in South Carolina and kind of the behavior and the misbehavior soldier escalate soldiers, escalate. So what happens is starting in georgia but escalating in South Carolina confederate soldiers and citizens begin murdering union stragglers or foragers after they had surrendered and this is going to launch another retaliation incident. Union general judson kilpatrick, whos the head of shermans cavalry wrote his counterpart general Joseph Wheeler about the murder of 18 Union Soldiers whose throats had been cut. And kilpatrick follows the protocol the ritual of retaliation. He follows it exactly. He specifically describes the incident the atrocity. He asked for an explanation and then he said if no explanation is forthcoming that he would shoot 18 confederate prisoners. Wheeler responded as you should respond in this ritual. He said he was shocked and outraged to hear about this. He promised to investigate he promised to do justice and he said if the report was correct that he agreed that retaliation should happen, but he preferred that it will be inflicted on the guilty parties and not on innocent prisoners of war. So kilpatrick was satisfied and he said that he trusted wheeler to investigate and find the guilty parties and then kilpatrick makes an extraordinary statement in his correspondence that reflects this obsession with pillaging and civilized war that we see in both armies during the American Civil War. Heres what he said. He writes to wheeler if stragglers from my command are found in the houses of any citizens committing any outrageous, whatever my own people are directed to shoot them on the spot. And of course, i expect officers and soldiers of your command to do the same. So here kilpatrick is can encouraging confederate officers to shoot Union Soldiers if they are caught entering houses or committing other outrages. So this should have ended matters. But when kilpatrick reported to sherman that the 18 Union Soldiers had papers on their bodies that said death to all foragers. Sherman ordered the immediate execution of 18 prisoners of war and here was why the sign on their dead bodies that said death to all foragers. Indicated that the Union Soldiers were mutilated and killed that their throats were cut because they were foragers not pillagers. And sherman knew that it was a war right under the International Law of war for invading armies to forage the countryside. So he then orders his commanders to take life for life if any foragers were murdered and to leave labels on their body indicating the intention to kill man for man. Sherman did this because he fought the people of the confederacy would police themselves if they truly believed a terrible punishment on their soldiers or their community would follow so after sherman issues this order the next day federal scouts found the bodies of 21 Union Infantry naked with their throats cut. So sherman wrote Lieutenant General wade hampton who commanded all confederate cavalry in South Carolina and whose home had been burned and pillaged by Union Soldiers just a few days before. Sherman wrote to hampton that foraging was a war right and that he would protect his forgers with retaliation of life for life. But he also wrote he would not protect his pillagers. He told hampton in this letter that if the people resisted his foragers, he would not deem it wrong. And then sherman back this up with circular orders that he issued to divisions and brigades in his army. This was on february 25th. 1865 and here is what he said in the circular he ordered officers in his army to retaliate life for life in any forgers were killed after capture and to keep a record. He also ordered that foreigner should be kept within reasonable bounds for the sake of discipline. And then he said i will not protect them when they enter dwellings and commit wanting waste such as womens apparel jewelry and such things as are not needed by our army, and he also instructed his his commanders that have citizens of South Carolina resisted forgers. I will not deem that wrong. So here again, we see how retaliation is a way for commanders to put on record what they will accept what they wont accept to show how theyre following the the civilized rules of war and to actually change their change kind of orders and attempt to curb the behavior of soldiers if that becomes necessary through this ritual. So hampton wrote back that he would execute two prisoners for every one confederate prisoner who was executed. He characterized union forgers as thieves who robbed citizens and fired their houses, and he said that he ordered his men to shoot down all unions soldiers who were caught burning houses. He told sherman that his army was composed of wild beasts rather than men and its interesting because then retaliation correspondence and theres a constant use of animal metaphors because civilization draws a sharp distinction between the human and the animals. So the worst thing that you can do is to accuse someone of being animal like or animalistic hampton set aside 56 prisoners of war as hostages in case sherman continued his execution policy. But sherman did execute and he executed 43 prisoners of war in South Carolina more than any other commander during a single campaign. In this case retaliation reflected an escalating cycle of violence rather than keeping the violence in check. So i use this retaliation incident incident to talk about how retaliation can miss function and misfire instead of checking violence. It can actually be something that contributes to an escalating cycle of violence. And in this case, its a perfect storm of the personality of the commanders a mistakes that sherman makes during this ritual but also a pattern of revenge and violence that had occurred throughout this campaign. So americans on both sides in conclusion are deeply concerned about this escalating violence in the department of the south for it seemed to undermine the important case that their war was civilized. So my book is really about the worldview of civilization what americans meant by this and what it meant for their identity. And it also shows what happens as we see here in shermans campaign when americans begin to fear that theyre not as civilized as they fought they proclaim at the beginning of the war that they have a place in civilization and theyre going to fight a war with restraint and honor and then they look at where things are and they dont see that restraint. They fear that they have committed acts that shame them before the world of Public Opinion. So studying the rights of retaliation allows us to understand the war as americans experienced it not just as a precious crisis of nationhood or a crisis of republicanism, but they experienced it as a crisis of their civilization. So if youre interested in learning more about the crisis of civilization and as dr. Quigley mentioned you can buy my book rights of retaliation on amazon many other booksellers and then you and see press website, which is currently having an online sale that will give you 40 off if you order using the Discount Code and that i have here on the slide so im gonna go ahead and stop sharing my screen if you want to jot down the Discount Code you can do that quickly now or you know go back and look at this later on youtube, but i want to get back to full screen so you can see me better and stop sharing. And and ready to take questions. Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for your presentation. That was really fascinating and i encourage everyone to type your questions into the q a box. And we have a question about the practice of trying to persuade or coerce prisoners of war into joining your services galvanization. Sometimes called did that play into the retaliation culture at all that it have any impact on retaliation . Oh, thats an interesting question that no one has asked me before and i dont see that it did i didnt come across. I mean, of course i came across discussion of galvanized soldiers both by soldiers in the department of the south. I mean and there were soldiers who galvanized in the department of the south and of course, but i didnt see that actually impact the retaliation ritual or discussions of civilization in any way. Thank you. We have another question about the india the ongoing indian wars and the ways in which those conflicts contributed to retaliation culture ideas about retaliation culture. And of course those comparisons of civilization versus savagery that you that you know, so central in your book. Right now thats a great question. So one of the things that occurs is that civilized combatants make a distinction between when theyre fighting other civilized combatants and when theyre fighting people that they view as savages so people that are viewed as savages because they dont have restraint because they dont have honor you cant use retaliation to reform them. So the view is you have to fight savages like savages because you cant apply the rules that you could apply if you were fighting a civilized opponent, so youre not going to see the same kind of customs and rituals and etiquette in the indian wars because those opponents are viewed as savages and so you know, and and its interesting too a lot of times in the retaliation correspondence that plays out in how Union Commanders are gonna treat white and gorillas within the confederacy because gorilla warfare is seen inherently as warfare general orders number 100 does not recognize guerillas as legitimate combatants. They can be summarily executed. They can be treated as pirates bandetti highway robbers savages. And so we see a very different dynamic how the union is going to respond to guerrilla warfare and Indigenous Peoples warfare because those are viewed as not legitimate combatants who are behaving in a savage way. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense and one of the questions im sure you get asked a lot is how did all of this apply to warfare in other theaters and campaigns including guerrilla warfare in other parts of the civil war . Well and that you know, and its and its very interesting because the gorilla warfare the retaliation regarding that has a very different dynamic so in an essay that i have in a in a book called crossing the deadline thats edited by mike gray. I have an essay about retaliation where i go into a lot of detail about gorilla warfare because theres theres a lot of retaliation along the Mississippi River because grant and sherman in 1862 and 1863 are really concerned by gorillas who are firing from the banks of the Mississippi River onto an armed union transports. So this launch is a whole retaliation incident with pemberton the confederate general at vicksburg, and these incidents are always very different because the problem is the Confederate Military leadership while they would use retaliation to defend partisans. They actually are also uncomfortable with unaffiliated gorillas. In other words the confederate leadership concedes that unaffiliated guerillas are not a civilized component of war that people who arent in uniform and that that are not responsible to to a commander whos part of the state because their violence isnt regulated. Its out of control. So the confederacy kind of fails in all of their retaliation incidents in the transmissivity because the confederate leadership just basically concedes the Union Position on gorillas and wont you know wont do anything about unions summary executions of gorillas in missouri, kentucky and along the Mississippi River. So we get we often get comments on social media about the events that were hosting and this reminds me one of the one of the pithy comments i saw about this event was Something Like civilized warfare. Theres no such thing and you know, it is kind of a problem, isnt it when you thinking about what these guys are doing to each other even in quote unquote regular warfare to think about the difficulties of claiming that that is civilized, you know versus other forms of violence, which are not right, but i think thats one reason that my book is important because we can as modern people make these pithy comments. Theres no such thing. But they believed there was such a thing and they really believed it. And so if were going to understand how they could do the things they did but so also claim theres such a thing as civilized war and we need to understand the worldview of civilization and how that worldview accounted for atrocities and what they tried to do about atrocities because the whole point is thats what retaliation existed. And you know americans were appalled by some of the atrocities that occurred that their own side committed, but that was the point there was within their customs of war something that you were supposed to be able to do about it to try to rein that back in to try to to stop those atrocities from escalating. And so thats what they were trying to do with these rituals that they implemented now, you know whether they worked or not. We also have to understand when they worked and how they broke down, but weve got to understand their worldview and we may not think that work could be civilized that they did. Yeah, that was really well. But thank you. So one viewer is asking about the destruction of private property when it was for warm. So were not talking about retaliation or revenge. Were talking about destruction of property that can help one side or the other achieve their war aims. How does that fit into the retaliation debate . No, thats a great question. Thats part of what the ritual is also designed to help. So of course the customs of war and the International Laws of war are not this list of clearcut rules, and theyre theyre put down in big complex books by european philosophers and legal experts that eventually the United States is going to try to kind of distill in general orders 100, but the point is within the customs of war. There are aspects of war such as destroying private property. When is that legitimate . When does it cross the line who can do it . Can you forage in particular ways and not in other ways. These are some things that there is some debate about and theres examples i talked at the beginning of the presentation that you mine history. For example, so like what if civilized nations done in their warfare . Thats part of kind of what guide you but you can provide examples from roman warfare from french warfare from british warfare that can kind of justify different practices. So one of the things so for example in the union bombardment of charleston, theres a retaliation ritual i talk about in the book that i didnt talk about in this presentation that gets into the heart of can there be destruction of private property through bombardment . And where does the how far away do you have to be to be able to bombard a city . You have to have the city under siege for it to be legitimate for you to bombard the city. Do you have to give notice in advance . These are sign of questions that it wasnt clear what the answers were and thats where the the ritual is supposed to allow both sides to debate and so in a lot of the letters that i read during the retaliation ritual, i mean the commanders who are writing these letters they will be 10 pages long and they will be filled with references to past conflicts and quoting from learned books trying to prove you committed in atrocity. Here are all of the historical examples that show that this isnt atrocity that its not acceptable and then the other side will write back and say but wait a minute theres counter examples the british. Did this the french did this the romans did this and so what we did doesnt highlight the laws of war you can destroy private property in these circumstances. And so it allows them to sort through areas where its a little cloudy. Yeah. The letters are really interesting to me and listening to your presentation in particular. I was so reminded of dueling correspondence in the you know, the precision the exhaustiveness with which theyre exploring the issues accusing each other, but often kind of leaving the opportunity to back out or say, you know, it didnt really happen that way or we can explain it all the parallels there in you know, did people bring lessons from dueling correspondence to this retaliation culture . Yes, because i think i think that gets back to. Their belief that in civilized war the officers are gentlemen, so they would they would come to this with one of the essential hallmarks as hallmarks of a gentleman is honor that you understand that reputation matters. And so what they understood from the dueling ritual is something that they understand then how to put that into their retaliation rituals as well. And i mean, i i think its interesting because one of the things that i saw frequently in internal correspondence, so this wouldnt be when theyre writing their enemy, but when theyre but when officers or when civilian administrators are kind of discussing whether to start a retaliation ritual or whether how theyre going to respond to one they always say Something Like how will this look to the eyes of history . They use that phrase a lot because they they really believe they know everybodys going to read their correspondence. They know that someday alorian foot is going to sit down and read their correspondence. And they really care. How are they going to be judged . Theyre honor even extends to how people in the future are going to look back on them. So if we do this will history condemn us. That matters to them and thats part of honor yeah, and i think that goes into one of the other themes i really like about the book is the sense that theyre in that moment. Theyre playing to the coat of International Opinion around them. So not only in the future but in the present tense, theyre worried about what other people especially quote unquote civilized nations. Think about what theyre doing. And i think thats why they back down on the issue of free black soldiers. So the confederacy is convinced that the International Laws of war support them on their position of people who are formally enslaved. They believe that they can point to all of these examples, you know, theyll say even napoleon did not free russian serfs, right because you you never start a survival insurrection and when youre combating an enemy, so so they think theyre on solid ground, but they recognize that actually the idea of employing your own citizens, even if those citizens would be considered enslaved people for one of the combatants that theyre on and so their correspondence they frequently talk about this is embarrassing. This is dangerous. They use that word that there its very clear that the unions International Publicity Campaign Around the 54th, massachusetts the confederates believe that theyre being sh in the International Court of Public Opinion and thats one reason theyre going to shift gears on that one. Thank you, and one viewer is asking whether there was a Prisoner Exchange system in the department of the south like there was another theaters and how did the early use of black troops in this region influenced that . Right, so thats a great question, so i didnt go into detail in this talk at all in the book. I spend a lot of time talking about what happens in 1861 and 1862 because not only is hunter trying to raise a black regiment but black men on the sea islands on their own our arming themselves and trying to protect their local communities from confederate raiders who are crossing on to the islands and trying to kidnap people or reen slave them. And so there theres an incident where confederates capture six black men who are in federal uniform, but this is really before any you soldiers have been mustered into the union army the confederacy will execute these soldiers so david hunter he starts on his own stopping exchanging prisoners because he wants to protect not only black soldiers but black men who are trying to protect themselves. So he tells his confederate counterpart that hes doing this. So theres kind of a breakdown of exchange in the department of the south even before theres a breakdown of exchange in the wider military conflict because hunter really does want to protect his soldiers so he even has when the first and second South Carolina when the first South Carolina starts doing escalating. Its raids in november of 1862 hunter instructs them to capture prominent white citizens so that he can hold them as hostages in hilton head for the safety of his black soldiers and so he collects hostages from beginning of the war to try to protect so then something im kind of a different way of answering that question when foster and sam jones whos the confederate commander of the department of South Carolina george in florida in 1864. They try to conduct a whole bunch of Prisoner Exchanges, even when theyre superiors, tell them not to so one of the things i talk about in the book foster is so traumatized by i mean, hes the commander on the ground. For hearing the first reports about andersonville and whats happening at macon . And so in addition to trying retaliation, he also just desperately wants there to be a Prisoner Exchange. So he keeps trying to arrange and exchange of prisoners with his counterpart and both of them get so out of control and and do so many special exchanges that both the Union War Department and the confederate War Department rebuke them and say, you know, youve stopped now and so yeah, theres a lot of local exchanges that actually have to be reined in in the department of the south at one point. Great. We have a it sounds like more of a philosophical question. Okay, most of the others which goes like this. You just sketched out the rationalist argument about proportionality. What was the discourse if any about the applicability of the mosaic argument that limits retributes of justice to an eye for an eye . Okay, so thats that is a great question. Let me let me answer that in a way. What in one way to answer your specific question and then also to bring in a point you didnt ask in the question. So theres a lot of discussion among the philosophers not so much just your ordinary officers who still use the ritual and still kind of seem to understand it. But theres a lot of discussion for example between hallock and lieber. Um as they try to write general orders number 100 as how it kind of oversees lot of the retaliation. How you apply . Principles from the bible and principles from the International Customs of war so for tat actually is the phrase i for an eye for tat is the phrase that libra and hallock used in their personal correspondence to enunciate the principle that you can never go above. For tat it has to be limited to that. And and part of that is of course, youre trying to limit the violence, but part of it is they believe thats kind of the judeochristian tradition. Drawing from you know that tradition. So but on that note, ive got to throw in and i talked about this a little bit in the book a lot of christians. Who are who are you know active in Bible Studies in the department or who are particularly identify as christian, they are vocal opponents of retaliation because they argue that christianity should trump civilization and that christians do not retaliate in any way that it doesnt matter if your enemy is committing atrocious action. You cannot respond to that by killing innocent prisoners of war. Youre supposed to love your enemy and retaliation undermines that so there are important voices both nationally and in the department of the south that argues that retaliation is antichristian. And so thats kind of an interesting sub part of that. And so ill throw this in as an example when the Union Leadership in washington dc is considering whether to do a National Ration retaliation against confederate prisoners of war ethan allen hitchcock. Whos the commissioner for exchange of prisoners. Hes worried about how this will look in the eyes of history. So he writes letters to prominent. Reformers and transcendentalists in new england and says, okay. Were thinking about cutting the ration for prisoners of war in our hands. Should we do that or not . What do you think and he writes Sophia Peabody man. He writes. No thats married man. So people Sophia Peabody hawthorne. Im sorry and mary man and some other women in new england and ask them what they think. And its really interesting because one of them rides back she says there cant be retaliation because of christian principles. We just have to do the right thing regardless of what the other side is doing and to purposely sicken or starve anyone. Im even if thats allowed by the rules of retaliation would be wrong. So theyre theyre really exploring this before they do anything and again if were taliation is done properly. Youre supposed to investigate youre supposed to do it. Deliberately. Youre not supposed to do it in a spirit of passion or revenge and so, you know at the times when its operating properly, theyre actually trying to gauge opinion from who they think are important constituencies that would tell them how people are going to react to it. Yeah. Yeah fascinating. I thought that question might stump you but youve obviously given a love song obviously as a lot of kind of traction in the 1860s as well with people really giving a lot of active thoughts of that. Sorry, i have another kind of question different from the others which is about the process of writing the book and what you know readers and listeners might not know immediately. Is that the book took shape in the context of a distinguished lecture series at Penn State University and i was wondering how if its all that affected the way you wrote the book the way you approach the topic and the final product, you know would have been different if you would just you know done the usual thing and come up with the topic for a book and gone out and written it. Yeah, i think it would have been heres why because you know the bros lectures i was so honored and privileged to be able to present the bros lectures at um Penn University and the the purpose of that is you have three nights. You get to do three lectures and then you have you know this audience of other faculty and grad students and the general public but by doing three lectures i was able to present my ideas very much indepth and then i got all of these questions and then at the end the director of the richardson Civil War Era Center who in this case is rachel sheldon. She sends me like a sixpage report, you know about what people were saying after my lectures and then her own thoughts about it. And so what what was in that report, was the fascination with the civilization aspect and so that really got me thinking about how to bring that out and kind of a different way. I think that i had planned originally when i really wanted to focus on the effect on the campaigns and how retaliation worked in the military history aspect and that really got me thinking about the world you that that kind of over was the overarching element under which all the rest of this was operating. So yeah, those lectures really shaped the civilization aspect of the book. Thats really interesting. Yeah, and i do think that was very profitable then because i think that huge significance where you know, you make the argument that the civil war wasnt just you know, a crisis of nationhood or republicanism. It was also about different definitions of trying to define civilization and what civilized warfare might look like. I think thats a really important argument to make well, and i think it was kind of one of those. The rose lectures kind of in conjunction with id already kind of started the research for my next project which it entails actually reading a lot of Animal Studies literature. And so i was starting to read the Animal Studies literature as i was getting ready to write rights of retaliation, and that was really helpful because the Animal Studies literature does a lot with how people in the 19th century viewed humans and animals and theyre constant use of civilization and savagery and animal behavior. So reading the Animal Studies literature gave me a whole new way of understanding when they say things like your men are wild beasts or when every prisoner of war talks about their treating us like hogs. Theyre putting us in a pen like sheep. Were being treated like hawks. I mean before those metaphors, i understood what they were saying, but the true depth and significance of it had gone over my head because i didnt really understand how 19th century people view the difference between human and humans and animals and understanding that really helped the civilization will be yeah. So earlier we touched a bit on the theme that you know leaders on both sides were playing to the court of international Public Opinion and thinking about that place in history and that kind of thing. How did that actually work out for them . Would you say did these examples of retaliation these carefully, you know this careful correspondence and so on did that go on to be used in future conflicts around the world or did it just kind of stay restricted to the American Civil War . So i think it it has a little bit of an effect. It was interesting to me because the london times reprints in full a lot of the retaliation correspondence and that occurs in the department of the south so that that told me that you know the british really were kind of watching these campaigns and kind of seeing how it played out. And so i think we see the impact of that. In the fact that the International Conventions that occur in the 1880s and the 1890s and you know european militaries dont respect the american militaries by that point and still, you know, they dont consider the us with its army thats been redemobilized in the 1880s to be a significant force, but its clear. Because of the influence of general orders number 100 on the convention that the hague and the treaties that are signed in frog its clear that this did have an impact on how european nations started to codify their own views of the International Laws of war because general orders number 100 does influence that strongly and so i think between the fact that theyre watching these retaliation incidents occur, and then that the war does produce that order it does impact what theyre thinking later. Did that answer your question . Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that was really useful. So it seems as though its one point, you know, its influenced by the International Laws of war that already exist and then goes on to affect people peoples thinking about the laws of war after that as well. Yeah, because i mean for a century after the civil war, i mean how labor defines what a combatant is based on his reading of i mean, thats even today. I mean theres been modifications that i mean. I read some of the literature on the laws of war today when i was researching for this book and i mean, its they basically use webers definition from general orders 100. Very interesting. Yeah. So i think were about to wrap things up here. I just have a couple of things to say by way of conclusion and one of them is just to thank everyone in the audience for attending this evening. Its really good of you to bring your questions and your comments and your interest in the topic. We really appreciate that. I also want to thank the donors over the years to the Virginia Center for civil war studies. They they make everything we do possible. I really appreciate that support and i hope i see audience members that future events whether its on webinars i mentioned our next one is on april 26th, we all so have imperson events in blacksburg. We have our annual civil war weekend coming up at the end of next week, which im very much looking forward to so, i hope i see some of the attendees at future events, and id also like to thank our speaker doctor for bringing such a fascinating presentation giving great really thoughtful answers to the questions as well, and im sure im not the only one whos intrigued by your next project and hopefully once that takes shape and you know you youll be able to come back and tell us all about that one as well. But for now, thank you very much for being with us this evening much appreciate. At first ladies dot cspan. Org. Good evening, everybody. Im very happy to welcome you to the Hoover Institution and to welcome our distinguish. Speaker Andrew Roberts i think everybody realizes who he is and what hes done. Hes the author of churchill walking with destiny leadership