News---Obama: Caning of Sunmer, Lincoln, and Seeing God In The Eyes of Confederate Soldiers

Remarks By The President At The National Prayer Breakfast, Washington Hilton, Washington, D.C., 9:08 A.M. EST, February 4, 2010. The White House, Office of the Press Secretary, For Immediate Release, February 4, 2010

Obama: And we've seen actually some improvement in some circumstances. We haven't seen any canings on the floor of the Senate any time recently. (Laughter.)

CWL: In 1856, during the Bleeding Kansas crisis when "border ruffians" approached Lawrence, Kansas, Sumner denounced the Kansas-Nebraska Act in the "Crime against Kansas" speech on May 19 and May 20, two days before the sack of Lawrence, Kansas.

Two days later, on the afternoon of May 22, Preston Brooks, a congressman from South Carolina and Butler's relative, confronted Sumner as he sat writing at his desk in the almost empty Senate chamber. Brooks was accompanied by Laurence M. Keitt also of South Carolina and Henry A. Edmundson of Virginia (the latter taking no part in the assault). Brooks said, "Mr. Sumner, I have read your speech twice over carefully. It is a libel on South Carolina, and Mr. Butler, who is a relative of mine."

As Sumner began to stand up, Brooks began beating Sumner severely on the head with a thick gutta-percha cane with a gold head before he could reach his feet. Sumner was knocked down and trapped under the heavy desk (which was bolted to the floor), but Brooks continued to bash Sumner until he ripped the desk from the floor. By this time, Sumner was blinded by his own blood, and he staggered up the aisle and collapsed, lapsing into unconsciousness. Brooks continued to beat the motionless Sumner until he broke his cane, then quietly left the chamber.

Several other senators attempted to help Sumner, but were blocked by Keitt who was brandishing a pistol and shouting, "Let them be!" (Brooks died in 1857; Keitt was censured for his actions and was later killed in 1864 during the Civil War while fighting as a Confederate officer).

Obama: Remember Abraham Lincoln. On the eve of the Civil War, with states seceding and forces gathering, with a nation divided half slave and half free, he rose to deliver his first Inaugural and said, "We are not enemies, but friends… Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection."
Even in the eyes of confederate soldiers, he saw the face of God.

CWL: Lincoln may have. Some of the combat soldiers too.

Text Source: White House briefing Room, Washington, D.C.

Text Source: edit of Wikipedia, Charles Sumner

Image Source: President Barack Obama speaks at the Energy Department in Washington, Thursday, Feb. 5, 2009. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak), Huffington Post

New--Federal Second Corps at Antietam

Unfurl Those Colors: McClellan, Sumner, and the Second Army Corps in the Antietam Campaign, Marion V. Armstrong, University of Alabama Press, index, notes, bibliography, maps, illustrations, 424 pages.

Unfurl Those Colors! examines the operational fabric of leadership
and command in the Army of the Potomac during one of the most critical campaigns and battles of the Civil War. The Battle of Antietam remains “the bloodiest single day of combat in American history” with over 5,000 killed, 20,000 wounded, and 3,000 missing. Many eminent Civil War historians consider it the turning point of the war.

As a result of the perceived Federal success at Antietam, Abraham Lincoln was able to issue the Emancipation Proclamation to make the war about ending slavery and terminating any hope of European recognition for the South. This book constitutes an operational study of the Army of the Potomac during this campaign and battle, carefully documenting the command decisions of army commander George B. McClellan and following the execution of those decisions through the corps level of command and down to the ordinary soldier in the Second Army Corps.

It reappraises the leadership and decisions of Edwin V. Sumner during the battle of Antietam as the one federal corps commander who was steadfast in carrying out McClellan’s plan of battle and effectively directed the battle on the Federal right. It details as no previous account has the fighting of the Second Army Corps at Antietam to include Sedgwick’s division in the West Woods and French’s and Richardson’s divisions at Bloody Lane.

"Unfurl Those Colors! is a very important contribution to the field of Civil War and military history. While a number of significant books have been written on the Battle of Antietam and the Maryland Campaign, none have narrowed down a particular phase as this book does.” states Ted Alexander, Chief Historian at Antietam National Battlefield Park and a Smithsonian Associates tour guide specializing in Civil War sites.

Marion V. Armstrong Jr. is a retired U.S. Army reserve officer and teaches history at colleges in middle Tennessee.

Source: text from publisher

CWL: It seems Antietam/Sharpsburg is having a good year when it comes to publishers' attention. The Maryland Campaign of September 1862: Ezra A. Carman's Definitive Study of the Union and Confederate Armies at Antietam by Joseph Pierro arrived on the bookstore shelves in late March and now Unfurl Those Colors is upon us. The summer reading stack is getting tall!