Year of Glory by Monte Akers: An Excellent Book

Major General J.E.B. Stuart

       I just finished reading the book Year of Glory by Monte Akers. The book deals with Jeb Stuart's military career from June 1862 to June 1863. I'll be the first to admit that I've never been a very big Jeb Stuart fan, but Monte's book has since changed my mind. I couldn't put the book down. I even read several parts of the book to my wife and she said, "He was your clone."

       Working on the railroad I earned the nickname "Instigator" because of pulling pranks and jokes on people and enjoying a good laugh. Jeb was much the same way. This book is full of funny stories about some of Jeb's funnier moments. I'd always read how Jeb was seeking personal attention when he left Lee's Army blind in Pennsylvania during the Gettysburg Campaign. Monte Akers helps explain how and why things occurred the way they did. He doesn't do like most biographers and attempt to make his subject sinless, but points out that Stuart was human and prone to make mistakes. The book is a great read and I highly recommend it. I could hardly put it down and there is a part two to this book that I'm already in the process of purchasing. Book two covers from Gettysburg until Stuart's death and if it's half as good as this book, it will be a great book. 

       There are several interesting stories and many are commical, especially the story of a Prussian staff officer sitting on a wet painting, but there was one story that particularly interested me. In the chapter on Chancellorsville, Stuart and his staff camped beside a barn that served as a field hospital for Federal soldiers. The Prussian volunteer staff officer named Scheibert made a note of the difference in wounded Confederate soldiers and wounded Federal soldiers. According to Scheibert, Confederate soldiers considered it a disgrace to groan aloud when they were wounded, but suffered stoically in silence. He said a person could tell if the hospital was Federal or Confederate by the sounds. Scheibert mentioned meeting a captain walking to the rear during a battle with his hat covering one hand. Scheibert asked the captain if he was severely wounded, there being a great deal of blood on the officer's uniform. The captain replied, "No, only the hand is gone." Scheibert went on to mention other instances to back his claims that Southern soldiers took wounds with little complaint while the Federal soldiers groaned and cried aloud. 

       I'm not trying to say Southerner's are tougher or stronger than Federal soldiers. It was the Southern ideal of honor and bravery that made them act in such a manner even when they understood their wound was mortal. According to the book Attack and Die by Grady McWhiney and Perry Jamieson all of this was a direct result of Southerner's ancestry. The descendants of the Celtic people mostly settled in the South. The Celt's were a warring people. Take that and have part of the population intermarrying Native American's and you have yourself a perfect fighting machine. 

       Again, I highly recommend Year of Glory by Monte Akers. I have come away with a completely different view of Major General Jeb Stuart and now I must have the next book.

       

Who Cries For The Children?

The above cartoon represents industry devouring children

       My last blog saw me going into a diatribe about how horrible Southerners were to own slaves and how terrible it is to have memorials to Southern soldiers (even the ones that owned no slaves). I thought I would touch base on a few facts about the Holier Than Thou Northerners during the War Between the States. If you who don't want to know the truth about America's history you'd better stop reading here. You will of course be offended or pretend none of this is true. 

       For some reason, everyone is so offended by slavery, yet ignore the fact that northern industries relied on child labor (slavery) during the war. How much did they rely on children? Most numbers suggest up to fifty-five percent. You heard me right, fifty-five percent of the Union's industrial force was made up of children. Who cares, right? After all, those children were mostly poor Irish immigrants and not of a darker complexion. 

       Now I can hear the northern apologists and liberals crying out that these children weren't owned, but in fact they are wrong. When you make a nickel a day, working seven days a week, and learn at the end of the week you owed the company twice the money you've made since they fed you during one of these sixteen to twenty hour shifts, you may wish you were a Southern slave. 

Does the above cartoon remind you of an Auction Block?

       The cartoon above is a demonstration of Northern capitalist during the Civil War bidding on children to work in their factory's for little to no pay. Poor children like these were kidnapped off the streets and forced to work. Not only are children required a certain amount of rest for their growing bodies, they are also in dire need of a good diet. In these northern factories, they received little of either. Why would these business owners want children to work for them? That answer is easy. Children are easier to control, just take a leather strap to them if they slack off working, and there is no danger of them going on strike. Plus, it was basically slavery under a different name, but like I said before, who cares about them, they are too light complected. White lives don't matter, remember?

       Now you may think they weren't that rough on these children, but you'd be wrong. They were forced to mine for coal, tend to furnaces, and do all types of jobs that are considered dangerous to grown men. 

       Worse than slavery, child labor has been in existence in this country far before 1776 and did not end when African slavery was abolished in 1865. No, child labor carried on sixty plus years following the Civil War, but it's alright because it was mostly a northern factory thing. The rich got richer and the poor got poorer. Greed, same problem we have in this country today. If you haven't heard of the northern sweatshops during the Civil War, you've been hiding your head in the sand. Nobody ever mentions any of this today, it's all about the African slave. 

       By 1820, forty percent of northern cotton factories were employed by children between the ages of eight and twelve. This percentage increased to fifty-five percent during the Civil War to keep pace with military needs. All of this is fine right, because the humanitarian Union Army was fighting to free the poor mistreated Africans. Once the war was over guess what those northern factories added to their employment lists? You guessed it, African children. Now I hear everyone beginning to protest, but somehow this has to be the South's fault. The north is sinless in all regards and get the free pass as usual. 

       Let's briefly take a look at what happened in the country of Cuba in the year 1912. The black race was being taken advantage of by big business owners in Cuba and the United States. The mistreated African's began what was labeled the "Negro Rebellion" against harsh working conditions. Now this same country that invaded the South over concerns for slavery sent 2,789 marines to force these blacks back to work and put down their rebellion for better living conditions. By the time it was all over somewhere between 3000 and 6000 African-Cubans had been killed. Why did the United States side with the Spanish against the Africans? The answer is simple. Follow the dollar in this country. Below I leave you with a few photographs of northern slave labor that lasted until the 1920's. 

Age's 7 and 9 in Massachusetts

Connecticut

Maine for 15 cents per day

Indiana

New Jersey

Pennsylvania

Vermont

Dawn Aberg: Another Expert on the War Between the States

The James Deshler Monument

       Boy did my proposal for a monument to James Deshler stir up a hornets nest around here. I never realized there were so many ignorant people in the world. This Dawn Aberg I'm mentioning in the title wrote a letter to our local newspaper about being offended herself about another "Confederate Monument." I guess she has trouble with reading and writing because we proposed a "Military Monument" to Brigadier General James Deshler. Of course like others, she must place her own spin on things. Never mind the truth, that would get in her way. 

       First let's review a few things she claimed in her letter. Her first twist comes with the fact that Deshler's father came to Tuscumbia, Alabama to cash in on the booming cotton trade to get rich off products provided by slave labor. David Deshler came to Tuscumbia in 1825. What did he move here to do? To build a railroad linking Tuscumbia to Decatur, Alabama. He served as director of that railroad. He was a strong advocate of building up Tuscumbia to become a major town at that time. So, where is the twist? Well Ms. Aberg says he made his money off slave products. That is quite a spin there. Because the man built a railroad means he made a fortune off slave products? Has this woman lost her ever loving mind. With that line of reasoning, we should shut the entire town of Tuscumbia down today because at the time it was making money off slave products. Let's not stop there, but shut down the entire South. That was one of her more remarkably stupid comments, but there's more. 

       Ms. Aberg claims the real reason James Deshler is famous today is because of his father's wealth. Where in the hell did she get this information? Let's look at the Deshler family that moved to Alabama. David Deshler and his wife moved here in 1825. They had three children, David, Charlotte, and James. Charlotte grew sick at age 13 and died. David went to West Point and while bathing in the Hudson River, he drowned. He rests in the National Cemetery there today. James Deshler then graduated high in his class at West Point. There were several notations by high ranking government officials about his intelligence. He served in the United States Army and was with Sidney Johnston during the Mormon Expedition. Now this is the part that only really educated people can understand, because you have to be capable of looking at history the way it was, not as you see it from today. Ms. Aberg, never can. 

       Ms. Aberg claims she has deep roots to Colbert County, Alabama (her mother grew up here), but has spent the majority of her life in Massachusetts, California, New York, Sweden, and France. Now someone with that much extensive travel surely knows what the definition of a state happens to be. A state is a country. When Hitler was rallying Germany what did he cry, "Das Gans." The State. Before the War Between the States, each state was it's on country first and attached to the Federal government second. So when the Southern States began to leave the Union, what did all the officer's from those states do? They left to join the military forces of their home state to defend it against an unconstitutional invasion. (By the way, it was constitutionally illegal for a state to invade another state until Lincoln took control). 

       James Deshler came home and fought giving his life for his native state (country) as I would hope anyone at that time should have done. Thus you have these idiots today that look at history through modern eyes. I have a few questions for Ms. Aberg that I would love for her to answer for me. 

       First, why is it just the Southerner's who are offensive? There were slaves in the North, but they get a free pass. I've never understood that. Why do the cities of Philadelphia, New York, Chicago, and many more get a free pass when they all owned ships that raced back and forth between Africa and America selling slaves? They too get a free pass from being offensive. What about the thousands of Irish children snatched off the streets and sent to the Northern states to work in factories at ages as young as eight and forced to work 20 hours a day for a nickel per day, only to find that they'd owe the company more than they made at the end of the week by taking meals? They were worked until they were completely broken down and then discarded on the streets to fend for themselves. This of course doesn't bother Ms Aberg in the least. That is fine with her, she'll take all the Northern brainwashing she can get. 

       I hate to bring up race in all this, but several have taken this argument there, so I will answer one of the above questions for you. Why do we not care for those poor Irish children who were treated much worse than slaves? Because, they are the wrong color, they don't sit around and cry about they way their ancestors were treated, and they are mature enough to not cry every time something offends them. 

       Oh, and by the way, when David Deshler finally died, he left everything he owned to the city of Tuscumbia. I hope you don't shop in that racist town, Ms. Aberg. I also noticed Ms. Aberg is one of those who was moving to Sweden when Trump was elected president, but like the rest, she's still here.