June 29, 2005
Civil War Verse
It's Poetry Wednesday again over at Annika's and this week, in honor of the upcoming anniversaries of Gettysburg and the fall of Vicksburg, she posts a poem by Walt Whitman, "The Artilleryman's Vision".
This is very cool. As I've mentioned before, my own great, great-grandfather was a Union artillery officer, a lieutenant to be exact. I know his unit saw action (in the Atlanta Campaign), but I can only speculate whether these verses applied to his experiences.
(I may mention, by the way, that if the whole reparations movement ever comes to fruition, I am going to use this fact to demand a credit against whatever amount Uncle tries to gouge out of me for it. See if I don't.)
Posted by Robert at June 29, 2005 05:19 PMthanks for the link Robert! i agree about the reparations. My family came here after the turn of the 20th century, so i should be totally off the hook. There is a possibility that a distant relative fought for the Union, and if so, i will want the same credit.
Posted by: annika at June 29, 2005 09:23 PMI had one quarter of my family here before the Civli War (only 1/4 of reparations). One guy (great-nth uncle/father) was a doctor for the Union army. So I get credit there, plus, for when I'm in the South I can just claim that he probably killed as many Union soldiers as any of their ancestors.
Oh, and my ancestors who were here during the Revolution had to move to Canada afterwards for a while. Seems they picked the wrong side. Hey, wait, I demand reparations for that.
Posted by: rbj at June 30, 2005 12:48 PMDo you know what unit he served with? One of my great-great-grandfathers was also with Sherman's Army of the West during the Civil War.
Posted by: Dave Schuler at June 30, 2005 09:33 PM
