Boy Soldier of the Confederacy: The Memoir of Johnnie Wickersham
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.92 (940 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0809327228 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 192 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2013-03-23 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
Davis has written that "virtually all wars have their winners and losers. To the vanquished the manner of being beaten may post more peril than defeat itself, for the character of every peace is shaped by the close of hostilities that gave it birth. Never is this more the case than in a civil war."2 Wickersham describes the final surrender thus: "Our eyes involuntarily turned in the direction of that beloved battle flag which had never known dishonor or disgrace, and we thought of the many, many heroes who had died under it, and with one accord we struggled to obtain a scrap of it. The war was over, and we had lost" (pp. 11" which expelled residents of the rural western Missouri counties of Bates, Cass, Jackson, and Vernon. The order evacuated all residents, no matter Union or Confederate, from these counties. Shortly following the evacuations, Union troops burned, in a scorched-earth policy, all buildings, crops, and persona
Jerri Garofalo said thank you for sharing this story with us as i really enjoyed it. i do agree that it can be. It is interesting to read memoirs such as these and to gain insights from our country's the past. This is especially true when it is about a youth growing up during war time, and his becoming a soldier. thank you for sharing this story with us as i really enjoyed it. i do agree that it can be hard to know when or why someone embellishes the fact. It is very likely the author is right about adjusting the truth, but we really don't know, unless an obvious lie.. A Confederate Captain at Fourteen Johnnie left for the war at age fourteen. The war exploded around him without warning in his first experience in combat and when it was over, he reported to General Price to describe the affair, and was commissioned a captain. It was decades after the war that he wrote his memoirs for the benefit of his grandson. A fascinating record of the Civil War by one who was but a teenager at the time.
Gorman describes a man who nostalgically remembers the boy he once was. Fifty years after the war, he wrote his memoir at the request of family and friends and distributed it privately in 1915. She maintains that the older Wickersham who put pen to paper decades later likely glorified and embellished the experience, accepting a polished interpretation of his own past.Wickersham recounts that during his first skirmish he was "wild with the ecstasy of it all" and notes that he was "too young to appreciate the danger." The memoir traces his participation in an October 1861 Confederate charge against Springfield, Missouri; his fight at the battle of Pea Ridge in March 1862; his stay at a plantation he calls Fairyland; and the battle of Corinth.The volume details Wickersham’s assignment as an orderly for General Sterling Price, his capture at Vicksburg in 1863, his parole,