How Vicksburg Changed the Civil War 

I plan on buying this book. U.S. Grant was a complex and determined man. I admire his unending and unfailing grit.

Just started reading Don’s book, and it’s really good. Aloha 😊📚🤙🏼

I loved the Ron Chernow authored Grant biography audiobook so this one may just be something I’ll narrate on my channel someday.

I'm fairly certain the foremost thought on most of those young men's minds wasn't slavery but rather not getting blown to bits. That's a pretty common thought in those situations.

Your question about why kids who didn't have slaves, who were being exploited fought so hard, reminded me of when I was in the Philippines, spending time working in dry dock in Subic Bay. I got to know some of the local laborers there and I had spent some time in the facilities that were once a U.S. Naval Base (this was 1999), the surrounding city, the businesses. I saw how prosperous things had been and how much they had lost economically, but then I saw a monument there, the Inang Laya Monument, that depicts the hands of those who voted to end the presence of the United States Navy and Marines, it's a celebration of an end of what came to be seen as an occupation, even though we had in large part saved the Philippines from the Japanese, even though my maternal grandfather kept up a life long friendship with a Filipino solider. And one day I asked one of the workers at the dry dock if he thought the United States Navy leaving Subic Bay and the Philippines altogether was a good thing in light of the negative changes and he said "Yes", it was about pride. And of course we humans have evolved to rally around our tribe, we know (or assume) there's safety, security and all the things we hold dear there, at least that's how it was for most of human and pre-human existence and that's of course what's driving much of the civil strife and conflict we see in the U.S. today in 2020. I think those Confederate kids had pride in the new nation that had formed around them, it was a source of pride and belonging and that's why people still revere the Confederate Battle Flag, that's why I had a junior high P.E. teacher who wore a belt buckle with that flag, inscribed with: "The South Will Rise Again" (and this is in east central Illinois!) in about 1986. It was to repel those foreign invaders from the North, who didn't share the same values, though the differences were certainly magnified and blown out of proportion by lack of understanding and familiarity, by fiery rhetoric in the paper and the talk around the community and I'm sure there was fear of losing, fear of occupation, fear of death, fear for family back home. Anyway, I want to read your book, thanks. :) I'm here because I've been studying my genealogy, my Great Great Great Grandfather, the first of my family name in the U.S., immigrated from Ireland, joined the 33rd Regiment Illinois Infantry Volunteers and fought at Vicksburg. I visited his grave in Lincoln, IL for the first time last week. I wonder what motivated him to fight at 19 years old? He wasn't even born here, but America gave him a home, I know that.

Vicksburg was one key, the other was the other bookend, Port Hudson, on the Louisiana side of the river. Together they kept a large portion of the Miss River open for crossing by the Confederates moving troops and supplies, and most importantly food stuff from the Trans-Mississippi Department (Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas and the Indian Territory (Oklahoma)). Supplies and equipment were coming in slowly from Europe, rifles and such, by way of Port Vera Cruz, Mexico and then overland thru Texas. And, of course the two bookends kept the river closed to Yankee use, including commerce as mentioned in the video. When Vicksburg fell Port Hudson was rendered rather useless, so the Confederates abandoned it, surrendered too. But! curiously, while the river was now "controlled" by Union gunboats, the Confederates all the way to the end of the war as late as May, 1865, were sneaking men and supplies across the river, at night. In one instant they moved a herd of cattle across the river at night, with a Union gunboat anchored only a couple of miles away. Funny story occurred that night and, the next day, part of the hidden history of the war that gets lost in the telling of the big picture.

The average Southerner saw the Plantation system as part of their way of life. And if that way of life was attacked they needed to defend it because it was part of their livelihood. And they honestly believed that to be true even though it was the Plantation system that was concentrating wealth in the South in the hands of plantation/slave owners at the detriment of the average Southerner.

I am a Vicksburg native, I am so proud of my hometown. They held out till the bitter end.