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In the June 1969 issue of Civil War History — Volume 5, Number 2, pages 116-132 — a renowned Southern historian attacked the legacy of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.
"No single war figure stands in greater need of reevaluation than Lee," wrote Thomas L. Connelly, the late University of South Carolina professor. "One ponders whether the South may not have fared better had it possessed no Robert E. Lee."
Connelly's essay was among the first academic musket shots fired on Lee's standing as an outmatched but not outwitted military genius presiding over a Lost Cause — a reputation celebrated in fawning biographies and monuments like the one removed Friday in New Orleans.
Was General Lee overrated? Get your armchair historian on...
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The Truth About Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee: He Wasn’t Very Good at His Job
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Life is not for everyone.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Monday June 12 2017, @01:22AM (2 children)
They don't really spend any kind of time on the US civil war over here in euroland, we busy learning about our own dead kings and their failed wars. That said didn't the south lose in large part due to a massive lack of industrial support? Not enough resources -- a story that gets repeated later in two world wars and a cold one, just with slightly different opponents but similar results. So it might not be that Lee was over- or underrated -- doom was inevitable with or without him. Losing one battle usually isn't the whole war. It's nice to have a fantastic general but he alone won't win any wars.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @01:38AM
You are correct.
The North had much more industry, much more population, and more food production.
The South's only hope was to have the war end quickly, preferably with the support of a foreign power like Britain. The Northern naval blockade prevented that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 12 2017, @04:19PM
Plus, Lincoln told England that if they didn't stop trading with the south he would consider that an act of war. It could have been a different outcome if England had said piss off and continued supplying the south. What was Lincoln going to do, fight two wars at the same time?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by mendax on Monday June 12 2017, @02:00AM (1 child)
Robert E. Lee was not a bad general. That much is certain regardless of what this historian wrote. He was more than competent. He did make some mistakes on occasion, such as at the Battle of Gettysburg, which was turned out to be the turning point in the war. But when you consider that he was fighting a superior force throughout the war he did a pretty good job. I think the reason he did so well against the North during most of the war is because Lincoln kept appointing idiots as commanders of the Union Army. It wasn't until he appointed General Ulysses S. Grant that he found a general who could win.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday June 12 2017, @06:39AM
My post is much like your own: https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=19991&cid=524150 [soylentnews.org]
Grant was pretty damned good, but without Sherman, Grant's efforts would have been much more costly to the North.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by Sulla on Monday June 12 2017, @02:00AM (1 child)
Probably should reevaluate Lincoln's decision making as well. Lincoln was dumb enough that he actually wanted Lee to head up the union army.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday June 12 2017, @01:16PM
Your comment is underrated in that it was a confusing era to live thru and a bit of hero worship of Lee was important to healing the military, post war.
Before the war the army was one big happy family, right? Then for a couple years a family feud. Then in theory one big happy family again. Thats gonna take some healing.
Lee retiring from the military and having no further military contact after the war was somewhat healing to the military. Lee acting as a gentleman helped reconciliation quite a bit. Its done, time to move on and reconcile. He could have tried to gain personal power post war at a high cost to the country, but he didn't. For that the North and the South were thankful for his sacrifice and humility. So you get a little hero worship and some statues.
Yet its also true, the dude has a point, that given how screwed up the Reconstruction era was, they needed a figure of stability and nobility who was respectable sorta a-politically and if it hadn't been Lee they'd have just glorified some other dude. The important part is that seat needed filling, its of lesser importance they put Lee's butt in it. There is some truth that Lee earned his statues and fame in 1865-1870 at least as much as 1860-1865. Or that he could have screwed in all up post 1865, but he didn't.
A funny off topic analogy is postwar, Lee was treated at Washington College pretty much how Professor Dumbledore was portrayed at Hogwarts.
(Score: 1) by WillR on Monday June 12 2017, @02:06PM
He has a street and a school and a public square in every town in the south named after him because "fuck you, you goddamn yankees!"