Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion On Our Man In Charles

Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book Discussion On Our Man In Charleston 20150831

Clear patient with their moderator and have a good evening. [inaudible conversations] youre watching book tv, television for serious readers. You can watch any program you see here online at booktv. Org. Here is a look at the current best selling nonfiction books. Topping the List National correspondent for magazine, between the world and me. Former president jimmy carter reflects on life and political career in a full life. Also in the denver postlist of nonfiction best sellers is h is for hawk by helen mcdonald, being mortal, and the what if, randal monroe. Many of these authors have or will be appearing on book tv. You can watch them on our website book booktv. Org. Christopher dickey is next on book tv. He he recalls the the war bunch in the american civil war. [applause] its working . Okay. Good. Its great to be here, politics and pros, which is really one of the great independent bookstores in the United States. I love independent bookstores. [applause] i was here once talking years ago and i never forgot it and been looking forward to coming back ever since. Its great to be here to see friends from washington post. I appreciate that. Im going to tell you a little bit about the book and how i came to write it and move as quickly as possible to questions and answers or at least questions and attempts at answers at about the book, the south, confederacy, the Confederate Flag if youre not tired of talking about it. See, that accent coming back already. Were in the south. Actually i was born in nashville, tennessee, my mothers family is from west tennessee around union city tennessee, and then i grew i went to Elementary School in atlanta and then we moved to oregon when i was 1 11 years old. Everybody made fun of me with accent. What do you want me to say . They all cracked up. You lose it but it does come back. If i go into a filling station in South Carolina from filler up on im speaking with a southern accent. Also i think its safer to do that. [laughs] otherwise you get that you aint from around here, are you . [laughs] so 25 years ago i was reading a biography of a famous british explorer and spy that visited the United States in 1860 and disappeared for several weeks some where from washington, d. C. And new orleans. I dont know what he was doing, and i dont think anybody does. I had a hunch that there was a compelling story of british spies in the American South in the eve of the war. It seems like a good idea. This was a project that i picked up and put down. The one day that i said im just going to do nothing and work on this book was early in september 2001, i closed the doors, i turned off the tv and thank god the super of the building came in and said, you see the planes the hit the center. Finally it took me about 15 years before i came across the private and correspondent of british console which was in South Carolina. No one had ever looked closely at who he was and what he was doing. In fact, all interpretations were completely wrong. Indeed, till this day, i just checked, theres not even a wikipedia entry. Everyone says, wow. Anybody gets a pick wikipedia. Theres no english entry for robert bunch so far. I was able to find a lot of his correspondents. I read through dispatches and letters and were scattered all over england. I realized that he was a critical player in what Amanda Forman this minor diplomat had helped mightily to defeat the confederacy and determine the faith of these United States, so i knew i had my man. And the book taking shape was no longer in any respect going to be a work of fiction. This was a history that might change the way we think about the civil war, and growing up in the south i thought a lot about the civil war. But in the meantime, a great dealhistory had been made. United states developed a following even as a black man that echoed lincoln, elected to be president of the United States. News broke of the massacrer in charleston, once again a fur use debate about the confederate battle flag and the civil war and what it is that we should or should not remember about all that. The coincidence was appalling, but it wasnt completely surprising. One of the things i had learned over a quarter century while covering as a Foreign Correspondent the succession of American Military actions, most of which have been forgotten, one war that never ends for many people in the United States is a war between the states and one of the most important lessons i learned about that war is how badly we had failed to understand the most obvious lesson. It needs to be remember that the history of wars is largely a history of delusions, those dreams of rapid victories based on simple strategies that lead to long nightmares of slaughters pattology that takes over politics and eventually the whole people discouraging all debate. Costs are not calculateed. Ill leave it to you to ponder for which it is a problem today. The first lesson that we should learn a war from the states it was based on delusions which a man in charleston, british counsel robert bunch understood and reported on with accuracy. The reasons that the fightings began in 1861 and the reasons that it turned out as it did seemed simple to me when i studied the conflict more closely. States rights, yes, free trade, the insults, the south law dominance of the federal government and the economies addictions of savory all drove the southerners towards the session. Amid the turmoil the extremist played each other that the voices of the moderation, the voices of the majority on each side were lost and to an amazing extent have remained obscure today Many Americans ever since. And yet as console bunch saw clearly, and, indeed, stated in the whord ordnances. Theres no question that the south succeeded to defend slavery and the north to stop succession. You can reduce to 140 characters. Next time you hear anybody say the war was not about slavery, you can tweet that out. The south suck sided to defend slavery and the north went to war to stop succession. Thats what the civil war was about. There should be no debate about that today, and yet, there is because people claim to delusion and conviction than they devote to facts. Lets not debate why it was the south succeeded, why it was the north went to war, but here is an aspect of history that is not denied so much as it is ignored. Lets understand that when succession finally seemed inevitable the notion that made it possible, was based on a single stunningly simple and stunningly wrong calculation. The successionists assumed that britain most powerful nation had no choice but to support. If it came to a fight, the british would supply the money, the arms and the naval power to guaranteed the south separation from the union. They would sweep away, they would bottle up what was, in fact, a federal army at the beginning of the war and that would be checkmate, game over. Raw cotton was the most Important International commodity of the 19th century. You could say it was oil to the 21st. Britain got 80 of its raw cotton from the slave owning south. So the succession has figured that britain would have no choice but to back them. The confederate tail would wag the british bulldog. I dont think ill say that again. [laughs] were what they did not count on was that the british might hold their knowses would butt. London could say, that was an internal problem for the United States, but there were limits. Where the british drew the line on this whole question of slavegrown cotton was on the question of slave trade in africa had recognized for more than 50 years as essentially a holocaust and fight, africa, cuba, south america. What console bunch did in his secret dispatches was to take the rhetoric of the southern extremists and turn it against them. Argued that slavery was not a Necessary Evil in their world, which was the popular view, but a positive good for the inferior black race which god, in fact, had created to be enslaved. The slave trade with africa must be reopened. How could you say it was a bad thing. That was denying slavery was a good thing. It also escaped nobodys notice that the south was running low on slave labor and the price had risen. One of the things that people dont understand was that it was a bubble market in humans just before the civil war. To keep expappedding the cotton growing economy the south needed more land. Thats what texas is about, thats what the war with mexico was about and thats what the efforts to take cuba was about. Once we got the land, once we conquered the land it needed more slaves to work the land. The land really wasnt worth that much unless you can open it up and grow the cotton and move on. The great thing about slaves is that they were portable. You could just keep taking your labor force with you. They didnt have to think about it. So all of this plays and so convincing was he that with his arguments that they had no choice but to open the transit slave trade even when the constitution banded it in 1861, dont pay any attention to that, thats just something theyre saying for now and theyll change, of course, immediately as soon as they win their independence if that happens. Every time that the crown came close to backing the confederacy and there were those times certainly in 1861 and 1861, the question of the slave trade came up and every time the south gave the wrong answer to the british cabinet. So what was it that drove bunch to do all this . Ultimately although he was no master spy, i have to say in some key respects he was george smiley, he was a professional recipienting the interest of his government as best he could a prowhose job involved excursions in the Human Behavior disciplined by the application of their own deduction. Which i think some of my colleagues in the National Post will find it familiar of a job. Thanks to our man in charleston the United States remained united even if in the minds of some the war between the states goes on. Thank you. [applause] so now questions and answers. Come on, please. Yes. Actually i have two questions for you. The first one is a simple fact. I grew up from charleston and im curious if you knew yeah, he started off okay. 58 trad street is now what it is now. Right. But its a couple of doors away. Okay. It was just two blocks. Very much. My real question is in South Carolina in the revolutionary war, basically a civil war, clear ugly, lot of hard feelings, a lot of of the independence quarters were down in charleston. I can see economic reasons to cooperate on both sides, but did the oldhard feelings still influence some of the politics between confederacy and britain . Well, actually it was kind of confused in charleston as a result of those emotions. Hes sending back, theyre quartering me, the succession was saying to the british, we really would like to be part of the empire again, maybe we could answer again. At the same time they were celebrating evacuation day, the day that british pulled out of charleston. There were mixed messages not only from the same community but from the same people. You mentioned that he sent so many dispatches and reports to london, et cetera, sometimes through washington, apparently to british ships, apparently used some kind of code because i find it clear odd that messages were not intercepted and read from the south. How did he get away with it . Not the words that was actually revealing what he was doing. In fact, he was at the center of a huge diplomatic incident because stewart had spies everywhere, but he we think was not opening dip diplomatic back, but after the war had gun, often had to employ couriers who had come from britain and one of them got caught by stewarts people, two of them and one of them had a note that bunch had been involved with an effort to talk to the confederate government about observing british neutrality. Stewart threw a fit and demanded that bunch be removed from the office and the british refused to do it. They knew what bunch had been reported and where his actual analysis was and where his loyalties were and they refused to take him out. It set the stage where the british and americans almost went to war all that happened within three months. Used a code. What kind of code . I hope youre a photographer because a lot of the letters, quite a few of the letters that i got were were in code and i fear that it was one time pad. In fact, theres uncoded correspondentence, you know, i think im going to master this code thing. Im doing my best on it, but its, you know, so time consuming, he would break out of codes frequently. There are some letters that are in little bit of code and some handwritten and then theres a couple in the collection that if its not a onetime pad might allow photographer because theyve been decoded. Well, thank you for all of this. I come from a different perspective as a descendant of people that wb enslaved, so i take the whole issue of slavery, its causes, ramifications, the way in which we see it still reflected and certainly in carlos tone clear serious. Im sure that youre aware that mother e im glad that you mentioned him several times in your book. Im curious as to when how much time you spent there and what your thoughts are about contemporary charleston and if you seen the statutes that just now in hampton park. Yeah. Magnificent statute. Yeah. I went before the incidents in emannuel. Im going back in a couple of weeks, as a matter of fact, but as to get a sense ton ground of on the ground to see the way things are. Ii have friends talk to go me about talk to me about the situation going down there. I was horrified by what happened, but gratified by the reaction to it by finally by the powers of in the state government, with nikki hailey comes out and says, we have to take that flag now. Thats good if you a a republican state senator. You know, a lot of them saying, its time for it to come down, and the debate is good. Its good for people to remember that that flag, the battle flag of the Northern Virginia was the flag that was flown by robert e. Lee and he surrendered. It started flying again as a response to the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s. Thats what that flag represents. When i was going to school in atlanta, you know, most of the state flag of georgia was the battle flag of Northern Virginia, and of course, it was flying over the state capital the whole time. My father was teaching in the university of South Carolina. Im glad that people are finally looking at that issue, more or less, although there have been 100plus proconfederate rallies, i dont know how big scattered on the south. And it will continue to be and i dont want anyone to underestimate i dont think so. Unbelievable acts of you know, forgiveness. Cristianity. Absolutely. I know yall are going to have to fight it out there. [inaudible conversations] ive been noting that the texas state board covering textbooks has been recently considering history books in this treatment of slavery. Im curious whether you have whether you have had any opportunity to talk about your book in texas or not yet. Or or communications with those people and what you might recommend to those trying to a broader view of history seems to be reflected. I would recommend that ever grade [laughs] buy this book, but i dont think thats going to happen in texas. I mean, texas is still one of those places where politicians stand up and talk about succession. I mean, what are they thinking. Two questions, the first and smallest, when this was made into a movie who would you like to play bunch . I dont know, i havent really given it any thought. The second question is when you decided this was the person of interest, where did you start your research and what primary resources would you discover . We started i focused on bunch when i was doing this research about Richard Francis burden and i was going to the counselor dispatches which is a great to work. You could go, its terrible well organized and for this work, anyway, looking at 19th century diplomatic you can photograph all of it. Thats what i did. I would go into go to cue and get what i wanted and photograph hundreds of pages and look at everything on my computer when i was working on the book. But that a lot has been looked at for about maybe half a dozen books and papers over the years. What hadnt been looked at is correspondents. There was a oxford, library where you can find the correspondence up until 1856. His correspondence with others was north of Record Office in england, and then as it happened, the biggest pro its the most unusual experience that i ever had, castle, which is the duke of north state was and still is, its an enormous castle. If you ever saw the movie young victoria, it doubled and the archives are kept in the ar chie tower and you go into security and you go to the archive tower and they have a table covered with green cloth and you sit there and look through correspondence. All of that. Its just fantastic stuff but its also kind of a funny, funky place to be because youre all with boxes of letters and people and youre looking through glass and there are these sort of leaning against the wall victor ia posters and that was the motherload. His personal personal dairies. Hes clear witty and clear acerbic and doesnt hold anything back. He says outrageous things, but usually true. Great, thank you. I one time where both parties used the same like the bible or telephone book in this case it would be random symbols. In this case it would be random symbols. The code was in a a lot of the code was in greek letters, but not all of it. One time pad is actually a pad that is given out to two parties or multiple parties and then there is a way of figuring out the corr correspondence. For both partyies . Around the time of the john brown affair where it looked like everything was going to go to hell in a hand basket. The ones that are decrypted are talking about true deployments in South Carolina as a result of suspected slave uprising but you have to guess what these things are when its not decrypted. You mentioned the trent affair. One of the people who was arrested in that on the high seas i believe was a former congressmen from louisiana who was serving as a secretar

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