[On October 12th,
1870, Robert
E. Lee died—but not before the post-war
deification of Lee was already well underway. So this week I’ll
AmericanStudy that process and other aspects of Confederate memory, leading up
to a special post on a great recent book on the subject!]
This is one of those
posts where I’ll ask you instead to read a different piece of mine: this
particularly personal Saturday
Evening Post Considering History column,
on my own and our collective narratives of Robert E. Lee and James Longstreet. I
think that column illustrates the most damaging effects of the deification of
Lee, both for generations of young Southerners and for our national collective
memories (of the war, but also and especially of Reconstruction and all that
followed).
Next memories
tomorrow,
Ben
PS. What do you
think? Other aspects of Confederate or Civil War memory you’d highlight?
No comments:
Post a Comment