WASHINGTON BY: LEE TALLENT

SPOTSYLVANIA TREE STUMP

WHAT I LEARNED

• How many bullets were fired
• This battle was one of the most bloody and ferocious battles of the war

QUOTE FROM Henry Morton STANLEY

• "The world seemed bursting into fragments. Cannon and musket, shell and bullet, lent their several intensities to the distracting uproar... I likened the cannon, with their deep bass, to the roaring of a great heard of lions; the ripping, cracking musketry, to the incessant yapping of terriers; the windy whisk of shells, and zipping minie bullets, to the swoop of eagles, and the buzz of angry wasps. All the opposing armies of Grey and Blue fiercely blazed at each other. After being exposed for a few seconds to this dreadful downpour, we heard the order to "Lie down, men, and continue your firing!" Before me was a prostrate tree, about fifteen inches in diameter, with a narrow strip of light between it and the ground. Behind this shelter a dozen of us flung ourselves. The security it appeared to offer restored me to my individuality. We could fight, and think, and observe, better than out in the open. But it was a terrible period! How the cannon bellowed, and their shells plunged and bounded, and flew with screeching hisses over us! Their sharp rending explosions and hurtling fragments made us shrink and cower, despite our utmost efforts to be cool and collected. I marvelled as I heard the unintermitting patter, snip, thud, and hum of the bullets, how anyone could live under this raining death. I could hear the balls beating a merciless tattoo on the outer surface of the log, pinging vivaciously as they flew off at a tangent from it, and thudding into something or other, at the rate of a hundred a second. One, here and there, found its way under the log, and buried itself in a comrade's body. One man raised his chest, as if to yawn, and jostled me. I turned to him, and saw that a bullet has gored his whole face, and penetrated into his chest. Another ball struck a man a deadly rap on the head, and he turned on his back and showed his ghastly white face to the sky... Dead bodies, wounded men writhing in agony, and assuming every distressful attitude, were frequent sights... As for myself, I had only one wish, and that was for repose. The long-continued excitement, the successive tautening and relaxing of the nerves, the quenchless thirst, made more intense by the fumes of sulphurous powder, and the caking grime on the lips, caused by tearing the paper cartridges, and a ravening hunger, all combined, had reduced me to a walking automaton, and I earnestly wished that night would come, and stop all further effort."

WHAT I LEARNED

• The battles took an incredible toll on the landscape
• Soldiers had to use their landscape to their advantage

BLEEDING KANSAS RIFLE

WHAT I LEARNED

• How long the dispute lasted, which was over seven years
• How they often resulted in bloody violence

Untitled Slide

• “Far in the West rolls the thunder – The tumult of battle is raging Where bleeding Kansas is waging War against Slavery” -The New York Tribune, Charles C. Weyman, 1856

WHAT I LEARNED

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Untitled Slide

LETTER TO JOHN BROWN FROM VICTIMS MOTHER

WHAT I LEARNED

• Only two of the victims were brothers
• John brown also lost two of his sons
• She told him that she was glad he lost his sons and that he was dying.

FORDS THEATRE

WHAT I LEARNED

• The exact place where Abraham Lincoln was murdered
• How John Wilkes Booth was able to assassinate the president

LINCOLN'S FRIENDS DIARY

WHAT I LEARNED

• How sad Horatio Nelson is through his writing
• His oldest son, Charles, was one of the doctors who tended to Lincoln's wounds

ELI WHITNEY'S COTTON GIN

WHAT I LEARNED

• The patent office containing Whitney's patent burned down and officials had to recreate the records and models
• Many other legal battles concerning his patent and other's inventions ensued

LETTER FROM ELI WHITNEY TO HIS FATHER

WHAT I LEARNED

• Eli whitney's father was in poor health
• His father and he were very close
• He designed it very quickly and then quit school and devoted his life to improving it

CIVIL WAR CANNON

WHAT I LEARNED

• What kind of projectiles were fired from them
• How they manufactured them
• Who used them

DIARY OF MARY CHESTNUT

WHAT I LEARNED

• How loud the cannons were
• The battle of Fort Sumter was mainly fought with cannons by both sides

CIVIL WAR SNARE DRUM

WHAT I LEARNED

• Playing the drums was a way that many soldiers fended off boredom
• Drums were used to signal commands from leaders for different formations and maneuvers

PRIMARY SOURCE

• Union musician John A. Cockerill, age 16. “I passed the corpse of a beautiful boy in gray who lay with his blond curls scattered about his face,” he recalled as he walked the field after the Battle of Shiloh. “He was clad in a bright and neat uniform, well garnished with gold, which seemed to tell the story of a loving mother and sisters who had sent their household pet to the field of war…He was about my age…At the sight of the poor boy’s corpse, I burst into a regular boo hoo and started on.”

WHAT I LEARNED

• Drummers were typically very young
• Many young kids who were drummers were killed, even though they did not carry any weapons

BRONZE ABRAHAM LINCOLN CAST

WHAT I LEARNED

• Abraham Lincoln rose to prominence from his debates with Stephen Douglas
• That the seven southern states to secede from the union did it when he was elected

CHICAGO PRESS AND TRIBUNE ARTICLE

WHAT I LEARNED

• Newspapers that had different views would sometimes change what either Lincoln or Douglas would say to fit with their views

REPLICA OF STAR SPANGLED BANNER

WHAT I LEARNED

• The original flag was massive
• People cut and tore off pieces as souvenirs
• It was intended to be a song first, not a poem

THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER BY FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

• The Star Spangled Banner By Francis Scott Key 1814 Oh, say can you see by the dawn’s early light What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming? Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight, O’er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming? And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave? On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep, Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes, What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep, As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses? Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam, In full glory reflected now shines in the stream: ‘Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave! And where is that band who so vauntingly swore That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion, A home and a country should leave us no more! Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution. No refuge could save the hireling and slave From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave: And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave! Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved home and the war’s desolation! Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation. Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.” And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

WHAT I LEARNED

• The song was actually four verses
• Francis Scott Key saw the flag rise in the morning (I always thought it was at night)

GEORGE WASHINGTON STATUE

WHAT I LEARNED

• George Washington was looked at like a god
• Many people were afraid he would become a monarch and would have too much power

LETTER FROM COL. LEWIS NICOLA TO GEORGE WASHINGTON

• In contrast to this scene let us consider the principal monarchies of Europe, they have suffered great internal commotions, have worried each other, have had periods of vigour & weakness, yet they still subsist & shine with lustre. It must not be concluded from this that I am a partisan for absolute monarchy, very far from it, I am sensible of all its defects, the only conclusion I would draw from the comparison is, that the energy of the latter is more beneficial to the existence of a nation than the wisdom of the former. A monarch may often be governed by wise & moderate councels, but it is hardly possible for large bodies to plan or execute vigorous ones. The inference I would deduce from what I have premised is, that each form of government has its defective & valuable parts, therefore, that form which partakes of all, or of the latter & is purged of the former, must be the most eligible. In the brittish Government we have a sketch of this, far, it is true from perfect, but no despicable basis of a good one. The english constitution has been the result of repeated struggles between prince & people, but never received anything of a regular or stable form till the revolution, & yet is still short of perfection. The principal defects are pointed out by the experience of almost a century, & I believe may be reduced to two, one in the legislative the other in the executive authorities. Were elections annual, & confined to representatives for counties & few large trading cities only, & all contributing to the support of government priviledged to elect, and had the king no command of money beyond what is requisite to the support of his family & court, suitable to the dignity of his station, I believe the constitution would approach much nearer to that degree of perfection to which sublunary things are limited. In a well regulated legislative body I conceive a third branch necessary. Montesquieu observes that a hereditary nobility is requisite in a monarchy but incompatible with a republick, taking this for granted, some degree of nobility may be proper in a mixed government, but limited, suppose not hereditary.

WHAT I LEARNED

• He believed that Washington should pursue the idea of becoming the king
• Nicola believed monarchy to be the best form of government