29 March 2016

Civil War for the day

Answers.com has an article about little-known facts about Da Wawah:

1. It was a war fought by immigrants. Many recently immigrated from Ireland, Germany, and France.
There were also a large number of former slaves; African Americans made up nearly 10 percent of the fighting force (photo).
2. There was another Jefferson Davis; he was a Union general. This caused a significant issue during the war. During the Battle of Chickamauga, Union troops called out to a group of approaching soldiers,:"What troops are you?" They lowered their guard when they heard the response, "Jeff Davis' troops." They were quickly surrounded by Confederates and forced to surrender.
3. The Civil War marked the first appearance of battlefield reporters. They served on both sides, and sent out their messages via telegraph:


4. It was an extremely expensive war. The Civil War is estimated to have cost six billion dollars. In today's dollars, that equates to about a hundred and fifty billion dollars. Not as much as some modern wars, it doesn't take destroyed property into account, only the actual costs of warfare.


5. Harriet Tubman (photo) led a raid during the war. The goal was to free slaves. Tubman, of course, is famous for running the Underground Railroad to free slaves in the South. Tubman's raid freed over seven hundred slaves, more than the number she'd freed before the war began.


6. Robert E. Lee's home in Virginia was taken by the Union and, as a sign of disrespect,  was converted into a makeshift cemetery. The idea was to force Lee to look upon the graves of the people who had died in his war. However, the family never took the estate back after the War. The government later turned the property into Arlington Cemetery (photo).

7. There were prisoner of war camps. In total, there were over a hundred thousand camps. Conditions were poor. Over fifty thousand soldiers died.

8. It was easily the most costly war of American history, in terms of lives lost. Two percent of the population of the United States died in the War. That's about six hundred thousand people. More soldiers died in the Civil War than in the four largest wars of the twentieth century, World War One, World War Two, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War, combined.


9. It was where General George Armstrong Custer (photo) started his career. Custer quickly rose through the Union ranks during the War. When the war ended, he was reassigned to the Indian Wars. This led to his famous death at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.


10. Soldiers at the Battle of Shiloh reported glowing wounds. Amazingly, the soldiers with "glowing wounds" seemed to heal faster than others. This was attributed to divine intervention. However, scientists now believe that conditions were perfect for Photorhabdus luminescens, a glowing bacterium that inhibits pathogens.


11. It was the first (known) war in which conjoined twins were drafted. Well, one of them was drafted, anyways. Chang and Eng Bunker were conjoined at the sternum. Eng was drafted by the Union, but Chang, a devoted Confederate, refused to comply. In the end, neither served in the War.


12. General Robert E. Lee had a pet chicken. He nicknamed her Nellie, but she met a harsh fate: Lee's slave cook, William Mack Lee, slaughtered the chicken to make dinner. William later recalled that it was the only time Robert E. Lee ever scolded him.


13. Abraham Lincoln was almost assassinated earlier in the War, surviving an attempt on his life in 1863. Lincoln was wearing one of his famous stove-pipe hats. After the shot rang out, his hat left his head; it was later found with a bullet hole through it, but Lincoln was unharmed.

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