Memory:Fred. Douglas Mem vs. Oliver W. Holmes Mem & Lost Cause Mem. Is one used more than others – how are they used ?
Anthony Buffone-3/10/12
In the Ken Burns Civil War Documentary, Burns utilizes all three of the schools of memory: Douglass, Holmes, and Lost Cause to illustrate the Civil War. None are more prevalent however, in the first half of episode 1, The Cause, than the Douglass school of memory, which emphasizes the issue of slavery as the primary reason for the war. Once All Night Forever starts, we see the horrific lives that the slaves of the South had to endure under their masters through both the information provided by the narrator and the pictures that are shown. The narrator goes on to say that about 4% of the slave population made it to the age of 60 and in 1860 7/11 Americans belonged to another, which is a trulty horrendous statistic that exemplifies the in humanity of slavery in America. Then it goes on to speak of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and then in, Bleeding Kansas, during which they included the quote from Lincoln, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. Including this quote illustrates how there was a clear and present division in the country that was not going away lightly. One of the last issues that the series deals with for a while, that associate itself with the Douglass memory is the incident at Harper’s Ferry with John Brown, which had the direct effect of the South believing that all Northerners were militants and would come down and kill all the South in their sleep. So the South built militias and pair that with the Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln gaining the presidency led to the secessions and Fort Sumter. Burns, in the first half of this episode, makes a great case for the Douglass school of memory for the Civil War but this train of thought then vanishes until later on in the series and the essence of Douglass is lost.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 1: In episode 1, Ken Burns uses all three schools of memory, including Frederick Douglass's memory of slaver, the inner and national lost causes, and the Oliver Wendall Holmes school of memory. The most prevalent use of memory that Ken Burns uses is the Frederick Douglass memory of slavery. Throughout the episode, Burns uses images and text to explain the cruelty and atrocity of how slaves were treated.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 1: The second part of episode one delves more into the inner lost cause of the war. Ken Burns dives into the Southern lifestyle and the old Southern way of doing things. He uses events like the caning of Charles Sumner and the "secessionitis" idea to explain the intents and values of the South. Although the film talks about the South as being hostile and unfair, it also talks about the North to some extent. The film talks a lot about the life and presidency of Abraham Lincoln and also about the raid of Harper's Fairy by John Brown as the two main factors that caused the Civil War to erupt.
An article about "secessionitis": http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/us19.cfm
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
The second half of episode 1 however detaches itself from the Douglass memory and begins to delve more into the Holmes memory which focused more on the plain idea of the bond of battle and less on the issues around the war, such as slavery. It is at this point in the series that it turns into more of historical documentary by talking more about the political and military side of the war, discussing such things as the battle at Fort Sumter and the set up of the Confederacy. Next, the episode tells of the set-up of the two opposing armies and what would lead up to the Battle of Bull Run (Manassas), which was supposed to be an allied victory but instead, was a Northern rout. It goes on to narrate about future battle plans that the North had and finally ends the episode with a soldier, who is later killed, writing a letter to his wife telling of the struggles that he is currently experiencing on the front of the battle lines. The end of this episode begins a trend that we will see through the next several episodes that will focus more on the bonding of the soldiers that are fighting in the bloody battles and less on the issues that surround the overall conflict.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 2 is the part of the film that deals with the military and historical side of the war. This film explains a lot of the strategies used by each side: the Union and the Confederacy. It also takes the person watching it deeper into the armory of personnel used by each side during the war. This film introduces many more of the first couple of battles that were fought during the Civil War, including Bull Run, the battle of Yorktown, and the battle at Shiloh.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 2 is entitled A Very Bloody Affair, turns out to be just that. This episode continues to deal with the historical, more militant side of the war and portrays some of the feelings that the soldiers were having at the time of the dire struggles that they were facing. It seems Burns really wants to draw attention to the situations that the soldiers had to deal with day-to-day, which in my opinion is sometimes an overlooked issue. He does this by using such information, like the average chance of a soldier: dying in combat one in 65, being wounded one in 10, dying of disease one in 13. Information like this causes us, who are looking back on the Civil War, to rally behind all those who lost their lives in this horrific struggle.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
The title, A Very Bloody Affair shows the hatred that the South showed towards the North, and vice versa. The tension between the two was about to erupt into a full blown war, and the problem was that they just couldn't agree on anything. The South wouldn't compromise on any of their values or beliefs, and the North was not willing to give up its moral and ethical values just so that the South would get their way.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
The episode does deviate from the Holmes way of memory, for a slight period of time however and switches over the inner lost cause, which is defined as the South believing that they were betrayed by their leaders. And the instance that illustrates this type of memory is when the Confederate draft was called for by Jefferson Davis. This act did not fly with the southern states as they saw their own government turning into the same centralized power that they had just left. This idea however of having little power belonging to the central government helped the individual states power but ended up hurting them in the long run, as this was a primary factor of the Confederates losing the war.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 3, Forever Free, contains a combination of both Douglass and Holmes, switching between the two over the course of the episode. This episode does go more into political surroundings, specifically international for a brief time, and then also deals with feelings and emotions that the non-enlisted citizens were feeling at home. The episode starts out right away with Lincoln realizing that the war needed a new tactic of emancipation to keep this an internal war without France and England, signifying the Douglass memory. But then the story shifts to Holmes as it describes the battles of Bull Run 2, and the gruesome slaughter at Antietam, which both show the devastation that was facing the soldiers on both sides of the battlefield. Then it switches back again to Douglass with the Emancipation Proclamation which solidified the wars purpose as freeing the slaves from the bondage that they were enduring.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 3 deals with mainly the Holmes school of memory. This episode tended to center itself around the overall feel and tensions of the citizens and the soldiers during the war. It jumps from focusing on the political and tactical ideas of the war to the Battle of Antietam and then to the objectives of both Lincoln's Union and Davis' Confederacy.
Trench after the Battle of Antietam:
Sean Lawton-3/11/12
Episode 4 mainly focused on the Lost Cause of the war. This part of the film had a central theme of the inner lost cause and talked a lot about the Battle of Fredericksburg. This section of the documentary stressed the importance of the Confederate Generals and their role in keeping the Confederacy alive. According to the documentary, if it hadn't been for the generals that the South had, the union would have easily overtaken the South and won the war.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 4, Simply Murder, incorporates both Inner Lost Cause and Holmes, but with the latter being the more dominant one, once again. The main conflict talked about is the battle at Fredericksburg, in which the Union sent 14 waves against Marye’s Heights before giving up. This fact alone illustrates the horrendous situations that the soldiers faced charging head-long to their death, knowing full well that they were probably not going to make it. Then it ends with the significance of the Dust-Covered Man, Grant, which is significant because it illustrates the bond that grew between these soldiers to point even that the commanding officer of the army is in the trenches right next to his own men. In between these two major events in the episode however we see the Inner Lost Cause in the South as they experience economic problems and they begin to riot over not having enough money for essentials, like food. This shows how the people were frustrated with the government for having followed them into the fray of a new country and yet this new state cannot provide for its own people. A couple stats that illustrate this fact is that 2/5 of the army had gone AWOL by the end of 1863 and the fact that by the end of the war there were “Unionists” who were turned away from the Confederate viewpoint back to the Union in the North.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 5 deals mainly with the Oliver Wendall Holmes school of memory and the Lost Cause memory. There are two pivotal points that the Confederate soldiers faced. On day 2 at the battle of Gettysburg, General Lee had enough confidence in his soldiers to make them advance into Pennsylvania and try to take Little Round Top. General Longstreet, however, feels that an attack was a bad idea and would rather wait. The second pivotal point in the documentary was day 3. Pickett's charge was a huge mistake by General Lee, however, General Longstreet is blamed for the loss.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 6 is called the Valley of the Shadow of Death. This episode portrays the National Lost Cause school of memory, and eventually turns into the Douglass school of memory toward the end. The first half of the episode deals mainly with the war strategies used by General Lee and General Grant during the end of the war. The second half deals with Lincoln's possibility of re-election fading because of the Union winning the Civil War. The horrendous casualty list also increases rapidly.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 7, called Most Hallowed Groud, is about the election between Lincoln, and his former general, George McClellan. This section of the film deals with the Douglass school of memory. It then switches to the Holmes school of memory and talks about General Scherman's march and destruction across the South.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12 Episode 8 is called War Is All Hell. This episode begins with the Lost Cause memory and the talk about the aftermath of General Sherman's March across the South and how it solidified the Union win, and destroyed the South. It later shifts to the Douglass memory where it talkas about Lincoln's second inauguration as president of the United States. The episode then ends with John Wilkes Booth dreaming about the revenge of the South and how to replenish Southern pride.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 9, The Better Angles of Our Nature, deals mainly with the surrender of General Lee at Appomatox and the assassination of President Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth. The film used the Lost Cause school of memory throughout the entire episode. It really had a feel of Union win and Confederate loss to it. You could see the dampening of Southern pride, and the uprising of Northern agenda. However, this feeling of confidence and victory eventually fades when the president is assassinated by John Wilkes Booth.
Memory: Fred. Douglas Mem vs. Oliver W. Holmes Mem & Lost Cause Mem. Is one used more than others – how are they used ?
Anthony Buffone-3/10/12In the Ken Burns Civil War Documentary, Burns utilizes all three of the schools of memory: Douglass, Holmes, and Lost Cause to illustrate the Civil War. None are more prevalent however, in the first half of episode 1, The Cause, than the Douglass school of memory, which emphasizes the issue of slavery as the primary reason for the war. Once All Night Forever starts, we see the horrific lives that the slaves of the South had to endure under their masters through both the information provided by the narrator and the pictures that are shown. The narrator goes on to say that about 4% of the slave population made it to the age of 60 and in 1860 7/11 Americans belonged to another, which is a trulty horrendous statistic that exemplifies the in humanity of slavery in America. Then it goes on to speak of the Kansas-Nebraska Act and then in, Bleeding Kansas, during which they included the quote from Lincoln, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. Including this quote illustrates how there was a clear and present division in the country that was not going away lightly. One of the last issues that the series deals with for a while, that associate itself with the Douglass memory is the incident at Harper’s Ferry with John Brown, which had the direct effect of the South believing that all Northerners were militants and would come down and kill all the South in their sleep. So the South built militias and pair that with the Republican candidate Abraham Lincoln gaining the presidency led to the secessions and Fort Sumter. Burns, in the first half of this episode, makes a great case for the Douglass school of memory for the Civil War but this train of thought then vanishes until later on in the series and the essence of Douglass is lost.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 1: In episode 1, Ken Burns uses all three schools of memory, including Frederick Douglass's memory of slaver, the inner and national lost causes, and the Oliver Wendall Holmes school of memory. The most prevalent use of memory that Ken Burns uses is the Frederick Douglass memory of slavery. Throughout the episode, Burns uses images and text to explain the cruelty and atrocity of how slaves were treated.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 1: The second part of episode one delves more into the inner lost cause of the war. Ken Burns dives into the Southern lifestyle and the old Southern way of doing things. He uses events like the caning of Charles Sumner and the "secessionitis" idea to explain the intents and values of the South. Although the film talks about the South as being hostile and unfair, it also talks about the North to some extent. The film talks a lot about the life and presidency of Abraham Lincoln and also about the raid of Harper's Fairy by John Brown as the two main factors that caused the Civil War to erupt.
An article about "secessionitis":
http://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/us19.cfm
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
The second half of episode 1 however detaches itself from the Douglass memory and begins to delve more into the Holmes memory which focused more on the plain idea of the bond of battle and less on the issues around the war, such as slavery. It is at this point in the series that it turns into more of historical documentary by talking more about the political and military side of the war, discussing such things as the battle at Fort Sumter and the set up of the Confederacy. Next, the episode tells of the set-up of the two opposing armies and what would lead up to the Battle of Bull Run (Manassas), which was supposed to be an allied victory but instead, was a Northern rout. It goes on to narrate about future battle plans that the North had and finally ends the episode with a soldier, who is later killed, writing a letter to his wife telling of the struggles that he is currently experiencing on the front of the battle lines. The end of this episode begins a trend that we will see through the next several episodes that will focus more on the bonding of the soldiers that are fighting in the bloody battles and less on the issues that surround the overall conflict.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 2 is the part of the film that deals with the military and historical side of the war. This film explains a lot of the strategies used by each side: the Union and the Confederacy. It also takes the person watching it deeper into the armory of personnel used by each side during the war. This film introduces many more of the first couple of battles that were fought during the Civil War, including Bull Run, the battle of Yorktown, and the battle at Shiloh.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 2 is entitled A Very Bloody Affair, turns out to be just that. This episode continues to deal with the historical, more militant side of the war and portrays some of the feelings that the soldiers were having at the time of the dire struggles that they were facing. It seems Burns really wants to draw attention to the situations that the soldiers had to deal with day-to-day, which in my opinion is sometimes an overlooked issue. He does this by using such information, like the average chance of a soldier: dying in combat one in 65, being wounded one in 10, dying of disease one in 13. Information like this causes us, who are looking back on the Civil War, to rally behind all those who lost their lives in this horrific struggle.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
The title, A Very Bloody Affair shows the hatred that the South showed towards the North, and vice versa. The tension between the two was about to erupt into a full blown war, and the problem was that they just couldn't agree on anything. The South wouldn't compromise on any of their values or beliefs, and the North was not willing to give up its moral and ethical values just so that the South would get their way.
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
The episode does deviate from the Holmes way of memory, for a slight period of time however and switches over the inner lost cause, which is defined as the South believing that they were betrayed by their leaders. And the instance that illustrates this type of memory is when the Confederate draft was called for by Jefferson Davis. This act did not fly with the southern states as they saw their own government turning into the same centralized power that they had just left. This idea however of having little power belonging to the central government helped the individual states power but ended up hurting them in the long run, as this was a primary factor of the Confederates losing the war.
More information on the draft and rebel soldiers' reaction about half way down the page: http://www.etymonline.com/cw/conscript.htm
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 3, Forever Free, contains a combination of both Douglass and Holmes, switching between the two over the course of the episode. This episode does go more into political surroundings, specifically international for a brief time, and then also deals with feelings and emotions that the non-enlisted citizens were feeling at home. The episode starts out right away with Lincoln realizing that the war needed a new tactic of emancipation to keep this an internal war without France and England, signifying the Douglass memory. But then the story shifts to Holmes as it describes the battles of Bull Run 2, and the gruesome slaughter at Antietam, which both show the devastation that was facing the soldiers on both sides of the battlefield. Then it switches back again to Douglass with the Emancipation Proclamation which solidified the wars purpose as freeing the slaves from the bondage that they were enduring.
Sean Lawton- 3/11/12
Episode 3 deals with mainly the Holmes school of memory. This episode tended to center itself around the overall feel and tensions of the citizens and the soldiers during the war. It jumps from focusing on the political and tactical ideas of the war to the Battle of Antietam and then to the objectives of both Lincoln's Union and Davis' Confederacy.
Trench after the Battle of Antietam:
Sean Lawton-3/11/12
Episode 4 mainly focused on the Lost Cause of the war. This part of the film had a central theme of the inner lost cause and talked a lot about the Battle of Fredericksburg. This section of the documentary stressed the importance of the Confederate Generals and their role in keeping the Confederacy alive. According to the documentary, if it hadn't been for the generals that the South had, the union would have easily overtaken the South and won the war.
A page dedicated to the Southern Generals:
http://www.sonofthesouth.net/leefoundation/Confederate_Generals.htm
Anthony Buffone-3/11/12
Episode 4, Simply Murder, incorporates both Inner Lost Cause and Holmes, but with the latter being the more dominant one, once again. The main conflict talked about is the battle at Fredericksburg, in which the Union sent 14 waves against Marye’s Heights before giving up. This fact alone illustrates the horrendous situations that the soldiers faced charging head-long to their death, knowing full well that they were probably not going to make it. Then it ends with the significance of the Dust-Covered Man, Grant, which is significant because it illustrates the bond that grew between these soldiers to point even that the commanding officer of the army is in the trenches right next to his own men. In between these two major events in the episode however we see the Inner Lost Cause in the South as they experience economic problems and they begin to riot over not having enough money for essentials, like food. This shows how the people were frustrated with the government for having followed them into the fray of a new country and yet this new state cannot provide for its own people. A couple stats that illustrate this fact is that 2/5 of the army had gone AWOL by the end of 1863 and the fact that by the end of the war there were “Unionists” who were turned away from the Confederate viewpoint back to the Union in the North.
Southern Unionist Blog (during and after Civil War): http://southernunionistschronicles.wordpress.com/
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 5 deals mainly with the Oliver Wendall Holmes school of memory and the Lost Cause memory. There are two pivotal points that the Confederate soldiers faced. On day 2 at the battle of Gettysburg, General Lee had enough confidence in his soldiers to make them advance into Pennsylvania and try to take Little Round Top. General Longstreet, however, feels that an attack was a bad idea and would rather wait. The second pivotal point in the documentary was day 3. Pickett's charge was a huge mistake by General Lee, however, General Longstreet is blamed for the loss.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 6 is called the Valley of the Shadow of Death. This episode portrays the National Lost Cause school of memory, and eventually turns into the Douglass school of memory toward the end. The first half of the episode deals mainly with the war strategies used by General Lee and General Grant during the end of the war. The second half deals with Lincoln's possibility of re-election fading because of the Union winning the Civil War. The horrendous casualty list also increases rapidly.
A photo comparing General Grant and General Lee respectively.
http://www.ar15.com/archive/topic.html?b=1&f=63&t=905359
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 7, called Most Hallowed Groud, is about the election between Lincoln, and his former general, George McClellan. This section of the film deals with the Douglass school of memory. It then switches to the Holmes school of memory and talks about General Scherman's march and destruction across the South.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 8 is called War Is All Hell. This episode begins with the Lost Cause memory and the talk about the aftermath of General Sherman's March across the South and how it solidified the Union win, and destroyed the South. It later shifts to the Douglass memory where it talkas about Lincoln's second inauguration as president of the United States. The episode then ends with John Wilkes Booth dreaming about the revenge of the South and how to replenish Southern pride.
Sean Lawton- 5/15/12
Episode 9, The Better Angles of Our Nature, deals mainly with the surrender of General Lee at Appomatox and the assassination of President Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth. The film used the Lost Cause school of memory throughout the entire episode. It really had a feel of Union win and Confederate loss to it. You could see the dampening of Southern pride, and the uprising of Northern agenda. However, this feeling of confidence and victory eventually fades when the president is assassinated by John Wilkes Booth.