to help people relearn history they think they know. that movie poster is known as one of most important black film directors in the late 1930's. >> sunday night at 8:00, historians talk about the process of writing a presidential biography. for our complete american history tv schedule go to c-span.org. >> next on american history tv, author and historian david silkenat looks at the confederate defeat at the end of the civil war and the idea of southern honor. explains howkenat generals, politicians and citizens in the north and south concept of honor and how that perception shape to their decisions during and after the war. this hour-long event was part of the annual summer symposium hosted by the gettysburg college and civil war institute. david currently serves as a

lecturer in american history at the university of edinburgh in scotland. he teaches a wide range of cours es in the u.s. south. after beginning his career as a high school teacher, he in, florida, he earned his phd at the university of north carolina, chapel hill. taught at the university of north carolina state university and there he published his first book, a superb one. " moments of despair, suicide, divorce and debt in civil war era north carolina." the shifting sediments of black and white towards suicide, debt and divorce in the post civil war south. this book received a number of awards. he's got a new book. entitled, "driven from home, north carolina civil war refugees." it should be out in october.

published by the university of north carolina press. so pleased he is here. his son was a scholarship recipient two years ago. heir family very well. we are thrilled you are going to come back. he's going to speak about southern honor and 70 feet. southern honor is tossed around a fair amount. it conjures up the idea of cheating each other. it is a much more complex epic. i'm please that david is here to explore that topic with us. please come up. [applause] mr. silkenat: i want to begin by invitingly infor putting together a tremendous program. i'm looking for to this week probably as much as you are.

i want to thank the the entire staff, especially allison, for helping with the logistics. lee's surrender at union colonel received an unusual mission from general john -- he was traveled down the mississippi from pope's headquarters from st. louis to louisiana and from their travel up the red river to shreveport demandkirby to smith''s surrender using the appomattox terms as a template. month,p took nearly a far longer than he anticipated. insisting upon delivering pope's message in person, sprague was repeatedly delayed before he received permission to enter confederate lines. crossing into rebel territory on via8, he traveled up ratheiver

steamboat sharing the vessel with simon buckner, who had surrendered in 1862 and now served as kirby smith's chief of staff. also on board were several paroled soldiers from lee's army now headed home. sprague hoped that pope's letter would make the smith's path clear. lee has surrendered in april 9. johnson had surrendered on april 26. and general can be had accepted the surrender's of generals cobb, taylor and maury in the ensuing weeks. sprague had known kirby smith and buckner from the old army and expected them to bend to the logic of events. ope's smith read peo message. he refused to respond

immediately, explaining he was scheduled to meet with western confederate governors in marshall, texas, 20 miles west of shreveport. heed sprague to wait while consulted with authorities. before he left, corby smith -- prague saw as'rague benevolent desire to avoid -- "the infliction of needless suffering." when he returned a week later, kirby smith told sprague he could not surrender. in a lengthy memorandum, kirby smith articulated his reasoning. he argued that "my army was menaced only from a distance and it is large and well supplied and extensive country full of resources. and exhaustedorn army at appomattox, his force faced no immediate threat.

considering the different circumstances, the appomattox arms "were not such that soldier could honorably except. an officer can honorably surrender his command when he is resisted to the utmost of his power. given the condition of his army he reasoned that it cannot be said the duty imposed upon me has been fulfilled to the utmost extent required by the laws of honorable warfare." unlike some of his subordinates who harbored fantasies about the trans-mississippi confederacy continuing to fight, kirby smith did not hold unrealistic expectations about the military prospect before him. however, says he was in a stronger military position, le n lee, kirby smith believe he deserves better terms. furthermore, -- the federal government's insistence on the

appomattox terms as they intended to " humiliated people who have defended gallantly." kirby smith proposed immunity from prosecution, a full restoration of political rights and the freedom to leave the country unhindered. less liberal terms would be contrary to the laws which custom has made binding among military men and would engender rebellion. over andthat appears over again in kirby smith's memorandum to sprague is honor. his defeat was inevitable but he wanted to ensure that when defeat came, it came without the necessity of him sacrificing his honor. what i'd like to do today is like a honor shape the contours of the confederacy's final months, how it influenced the transition from wartime to peacetime and how it affects the major questions of reconstruction afterwards. for a man of civil war era, the idea of honor possess levels of

meaning that have now largely disappeared. to them, honor was something be prized, cultivated and fiercely guarded. to read the diaries and correspondence of men in the 840's, you'll see a preoccupation with honor the borders on obsession. for all the importance they attest to honor, however, it can be difficult to appropriate supreme court justice stewart definition of obscenity, they knew honor when they saw it. a few broad generalizations can be made, however. first, honor was primarily about how one was judged by the outside community. the community established instead of - -set of social honorigms a man of must uphold. one could not be a man of honor alone on a desert island. second, honor was interwoven with masculinity. while women could be venerated

for their verdure, only men could have honor. thed, the meaning of honor, precise rules and values that men needed to uphold, very based on geography and social class. for young men attending harvard, for instance, from the 1850's, honor was obtained through self-discipline and restraint. a man of honor was one who was in control of his emotions and the world around him. inversely, poor immigrants new york might demonstrate their honor through their prowess in a tavern brawl or at the gambling tables. some of the most interesting and controversial scholarship on honor in the civil war has looked at the way it which honor functioned in the south. within the context of a slave society, honor took on a

particular valence. when the master slave dynamic functioned as the dominant cultural model for -- metaphor, honor became intertwined with mastery. mastersonor were over their slaves in over their households and masters within their community. to challenge of man's honor was to make them into a slave. because the metaphorical stakes were so high, southern white men responded viscerally to any challenge to their honor. even minor slights required in immediate and bold response. some historians have linked this profound obsession with honor with some of the distinct features of southern society. honor hopes to explain why dueling, which had died out in the rest of the world by 1800, continued in the south decades later. while the duel remain the purview of the planter class, poor white southerners were no

less invested in the culture of honor. like their counterparts, poor whites responded with violence, often in the form of what one historian referred to as rough-and-tumble brawls. the flip side of honor was shame. failing to uphold one's honor had social ramifications. dishonorable men were also size from polite society and effectively socially dead. ostracized from polite society. the greatest fear of planters as they would be unmasked. of honor they had worked a project would crumble and they would become socially marginalized. is from florida where one florida politician feels like he has been insulted by another politician who he claims has not given him the due which is -- he needs as an honorable man. honor helpr came,

drive men into military service in both the north and the south. there was no greater venue than combat to showcase and enhance one's honor. reading soldiers diaries and correspondence before the first battles, their greatest hope was that they would fight honorably and from many their greatest fear was not that they would die on the battlefield that they would behave dishonorably. for northerners and southerners alike, honor extended beyond the individual in concentric circles. they valued independent honor not only on a personal basis, protect also sought to the honor of their families, their community, their state, region, and country. when the war came, soldiers manifested similar affinity when it came to protecting the personal honor as a soldier and the honor of their regiment, their army, and their nation. their preoccupation with honor house to explain why soldiers invested so much emotional energy in material manifestations of their honor, such as regimental flags and

were willing to die to protect them. most outside865, observers concluded the confederate defeat was inevitable. to be sure, many confederate philip hasom jason dubbed diehard rebels maintained confederate victory was just around the corner even went all the evidence seems to suggest otherwise. a sentiment that jefferson davis appear to have shared. the writing onaw the wall, however, they began to calculate how they could and the war without bringing dishonor on themselves and their countrymen. was it possible to be defeated without sacrificing their honor? cognizantncoln was that defeating the confederacy and bringing the war to conclusion required appealing to confederate sense of honor. if they could be persuaded that ending the war was more

honorable, thousands of lives could be saved. when lincoln met with grant and sherman at city point in march, he instructed them to offer generous terms that would not compromise confederate honor. let them surrender and go home, lincoln told him, they will not take up arms again. let them all go, officers and all. let them have their horses with them to plow with. and their guns to shoot crows with. give them the most liberal and honorable of terms. many confederates also believe war a quick end to the would be the best way to protect their honor. foremost among them was breckenridge. defeat wasn 1865, inevitable, breckenridge argued that "the confederacy should not be captured and fragmented, but we should surrender as a government that we may thus maintain the dignity of her

cause and secure the respect of our enemies in the best terms for our soldiers." he recognize that surrender carried some risk, particular for those who might face prosecution for treason. nonetheless, breckenridge maintained "this has been a magnificent epic. let it not terminate in farce." toferson davis refuse consider any outcome short of a complete confederate independence. outs's intransigence grew of a stubborn faith in confederate destiny and his belief that his moral and political obligations to his office precluded surrender when it results in his country's demise. the confederate constitution does not allow him to treat for his own suicide. when it finally came time for confederate to lay down their arms, questions of honor were at the forefront. confederates hoped his surrender in such a way as to minimize any

lasting shame while union officials cognizant of how dearly rebels protected their honor, saw to minimize the dishonor that surrender would entail. conduct look at grant's at appomattox, it is clearly understood helper from the confederates held her honor. and went to great lengths not to offend lee. he one of them to see that defeat did not necessarily mean they were without honor and the reunification could take place without a lasting shame looming over their heads. grant understanding of the role of honor and the army of northern virginia, host to explain why he did not demand he ordered or why his men to halt any celebrations that might embarrass the confederates. in his memoirs, grant noted "when news of the surrender first reached our lines, our men inspired a salute of 100 guns in the honor of the victory. i went word -- sent word to

have it stopped. the confederates were our prisoners and we did not want to exult over their downfall." this illustration is probably the first published illustration of the meeting of lee and grant at appomattox. it is published by carrier and i've -- courier and ives. it appears to be for sale in new york less than a month after the surrender. for those of you who have been to appomattox or who have seen the actual artifacts in the smithsonian or read the surrender recognize that almost everything about this image is wrong. samedidn't sit at the table. that is not what the chair looks like, that is not what the wallpaper looks like. that was not grant's uniform. what i like about this image is i think it tells us something about the way the war ended, or one version of the way the war ended. here are two men sitting at a table having a conversation as. equals.

point at which they are the most unequal. lee's army is broken. grant's army is not. if they walk out of the table without an agreement, bad things are going to happen to lee's army. for this moment, they are meeting as equals. this is a more accurate depiction of what happened, a painting which is now housed at the virginia historical society, painted around 1920. i often show this paid into my students and ask them, especially, these are british who may not know the civil war iconography, who is the victor in this painting? [laughter] if you did not know that grant is the victor you would've thought that lee would walk out of here cheering. i think it says something about what southerners thought about the end of the war.

several decades later. th magnanimous tone expressed by granting other generals may have had unintended consequences. some confederates went home believing that since the honor was intact, they could continue to for claim confederate dollars even after the confederacy ceased to exist. tha surrender did not necessarily mean defeatt. as confederate general richard taylor, son of zachary taylor and jefferson davis's brother-in-law, told the subordinate "you will explained here troops that a surrender will not be the consequence of any defeat but is simply yielding upon the best terms and with the preservation of our military honor to the logic of events." even more disturbingly, alabamians battle noted that appomattox was "not the

surrender of principles that no honorable man could bear, but a surrender which honor was earned ral grantor of the south rescue height unknown before." turning home after the surrender, he establish the whites of nighwhite carnations that predated the klan. appomattox march the beginning of the end for the confederate nation, many rebels left with their commitment to values of white supremacy intact and reinforced. theppomattox and at surrenders that followed at tes,ett place and other si union and confederate generals used a shared vocabulary distinguished between honorable and dishonorable surrender with that had been established at the beginning of the war. major robert anderson was praised as a here at fort sumter for his bravery prior to surrender, only capitulating after suffering from heavy

bombardment and with no prospect for victory. other officer such as david weret, isaac went vilified when they surrender prematurely. this paradigm of the honorable surrender holster kirby smith could not bring himself to surrender under the same terms accepted by robert e. lee. himself in a position where continuing to fight would produce only further effusion of blood. se shows up over and over again in surrender negotiations are kirby smith had not reach that threshold where he could or his men to stack arms. in his comparative study of defeat, wolfgang sleeve andbush, argues that one of the most unusual features of the civil war was how quickly southerners developed a rationale to explain defeat. he notes that most nations usually take a generation before consents of narrative develops

about why and how they lost. but confederates seem to arrive at a common explanation almost as soon as the war is over. observed, o'brien has few cultures are better prepared ideologically for the disaster of war. many explanations have been deposited for this. my personal favorite is that the southern obsession with scotland host explain why narratives honorable defeat came so quickly . go with me. this action make some sense. saw scotland, southerners himself as a distinctive region within a larger political union. iously reading the poetry of robert burns, southerners had a ready vocabulary to describe how one could fight, lose and ye t remain heroic and honorable. that fits the entire narrative of scottish history. mark twain was overstating the case when he claims the civil war would not have happened if

southerners had not read walter scott's novels. the southern obsession with scotland, which is everywhere when you look for it, may help understand how defeat and honor were not irreconcilable. the earliest articulations of a next donation for confederate defeat came in the form of lee's farewell address at appomattox. on the evening of april 9, the same day he surrendered to grant, lee assigned his aide with the task, how to sympathetically explain the surrender and thank the troops for their sacrifice? when by 10:00 a.m. the next morning, he had not yet completed the address, lee sequestered in his personal ambulance until he finished, posting an quarterly outside so as not to be disturbed. when he finished the draft, lee pruned it to 181 words, that would become a sacred texts for

veterans of the army of virginia. he we see an early copy of lee's general order number 9. and later a reproduction, it was reproduced many times in the 150 year since. for their them sacrifice over four long years of war. their defeat had come from any deficiency on their part but from overwhelming numbers and resources. they had fought honorably in their defeated not tarnish their honor one iota. they could return home with their heads held high. conspicuous features of lee's addresses the absence of a scapegoat. unions up your resources with the beginning and end of his iphone nation for defeat. other confederates did seek to place blame. while many committed lee's words

to memory, they tried to forget what general thompson told his men when he surrendered in arkansas. unlike lee's farewell address which was covered by clerks and distribute to commanders, thompson chose to address the troops in person. on june 5, he told 5000 comederate soldiers "i now to surrender you and hope you will make better citizens than you have soldiers." [laughter] thompson claims they had been defeated because they lacked the honor to fight bravely. i know there are gentleman here. damn sneake are some it currently dogs. many of thompson soldiers rejected this claim that they were without honor. and one pleaded with thompson to talk to us like gentlemen, sir. at the outburst, thompson threatened to whip next man to

interruptt him. thompson soldiers left the surrender of feeling embittered that the commander that challenge their honor at the moment of defeat. whether they were praise like lee's troops or blamed like thompson's, confederate soldiers had to return home to confront the material reality of defeat. for these men, their defining experience is everything turned out other than they had hoped. they had gone off to fight believing they would return victorious. the degree to which the return home for some to confront their failure varied. whoo confederac face of defeat, destruction was distributed unevenlyle. some soldiers were lucky enough to return home unscathed, resuming their life with little interruption. many more found the transition to peacetime did not come easily and they could see their failures all around them. some returned home to find that

their farms had been destroyed. emotionallynd disabled veterans had to cope with the fact that their bodies could no longer do what they once did. soldiers who had lost limbs worried they would be unable to work and support their families. thousands more suffering by persistent allen's, chronic diarrhea, dysentery. debilitating conditions that made resuming a normal life extraordinarily difficult if not impossible. others had injuries that were formerible, that cost soldiers to be committed to insane asylums by the droves. as the south experience but one newspaper described as a suicide veterans.mong its to be sure, the trauma of war exacted a heavy price on union and confederate soldiers, but northerners could gain some solace from the fact that their sacrifice has contributed to victory. while former rebels can only

look down at the empty sleeves and be reminded of their defeat. uncertainty.rought confederates had a clear vision of what victory would mean. they knew that they would have their independence, slavery and white supremacy would be maintained. defeat opened up a range of possible futures, many of which former confederates dreaded. when union officials talked in summer of 1865 of making treason odious, what does that mean? would they be and present? -- imprisoned? what they lose their land? what power what they have at the ballot boxes? dishonor with the union make them wear as a consequence of defeat? honor such uncertainty was almost as bad as being on mast. if one could not control the present or future, how can one claim to be a master? some former confederates cannot

live with this looming uncertainty. fairing that what would happen if you were taken into federal hands florida governor john milton killed himself, in april 1865, proclaiming that "deahth would be preferable to reunion." if ever there were someone who was the embodiment of southern honor. ruffin had gone to charleston in 1861 to purchase a paid in the bombardment of fort sumter. ruffin shot himself rather than face the dishonor of living under union occupation, proclaiming in his diary his unmitigated hatred to yankee rule. here we see him in his uniform. you can read where he talks about his unmitigated hatred for yankee rule. this bit about wrapping himself

in the flight probably did not happen but was invented by one of his descendents. wrapping himself in the flag. see ruinsts could only in a future without slavery and independence. while few southerners followed his example, many felt the overwhelming dishonor of defeat. for instance, one virginia soldier upon hearing of le's arrender "if this if true deathblow to our cause and perhaps the whole confederacy. i cannot describe my feelings on this that occasion. this is really awful. what an immense loss of life and property and all for naught. what is to be our future doom?" some of those who felt dishonored by defeat believes that they would only regain their honor through violence. they cannot respond violently against union soldiers, but they could target recently emancipated african americans.

confederate father honor slipping away with every advance made by former slaves. because of the complex way in which honor and white supremacy were intertwined, they interpreted black activism ranging from building their own churches and schools to political mobilizations, as a direct affront to white supremacy and to their honor. fresh from appomattox, julian "rr boasted that he horsewhipped in negro wench because she had publicly insulted and aligned a southern lady." te southerners to not need much justification to prompt violence against african americans, the shame of defeat and the culture of honor provided a framework for racial violence of reconstruction. violence erected in memphis and new orleans. massacres of 1866 and prompted the foundation of the klan, a

terrorist organization committed to defending the honor of the south. the political and social struggles of reconstruction through up prawn white southerners profound sense of dishonor brought upon by defeat. only by violently resisting and rebuilding white supremacy could they hope to restore their honor. rebuilding their honor also lostd form the core of the cause, the mythology that helped them sustain the white south. ie name lost cause came, as imagine most of you know, from an 1866 history written by edward pollard. hado-slavery ideologue, he written a book advocating the reopening of the african-american slave trade, the confederacy the embodiment of his aspirations. although critical of the davis administration, pollard was a

true believer in the righteousness of the confederate cause and was convinced that victory was inevitable. when the it davis administration remainedmond, pollard behind and watched the city burn. according to "the new york times," he raided the union are in by putting on a bold front and talking rather defiantly. when he came to explain confederate defeat in his book, pollard picked up on many of the themes lee suggested in his farewell address. the south has manifested a greater virtue in the late war. the exhibitions of generalship, shivery -- chivalry, and all the noble sentiments that properly belong to the state of war were largely on the confederate side, he said. occurred because of the superiority of union numbers. he also placed blame at the feet of davis. he argued that if he did not dishonor the south.

even though the confederacy was defeated, he honored their men, and their cause had not. the confederates have gone out of this war, pollard observed, with the proud, secret, dangerous consciousness that they are the better men. pollard's pronouncement that defeat did not mean dishonor had long legs. the150 years later, dedication of the unity monument, julian carr who had boasted about whipping an african-american woman after appomattox, delivered a speech entitled peace with honor. he told the audience that no confederate soldier had ever been asked to surrender the principles for which he fought. defeat, he argued, had only brought only honor to the confederacy. we lost, he told him, but we won. thank you. [applause]

pete tells me everybody needs to come to the microphone if they have questions. all right. you notice any discernible difference between the post war reactions of the, -- and's veterans who had thompson's veterans who were insulted? did they carryover into reconstruction? mr. silkenat: i think, you know, it is hard to follow it specifically. lee's status among his soldiers only was elevated after his conduct at appomattox. if you read their accounts of being there and seeing him, they

are overwhelmingly blowing. whereas thompson, as you would imagine, they do not have any nice things to say about him. the the extent to which they carried down to what they did later is difficult to ascertain. that is a good question, though. >> from chicago, illinois. this is a vaguely formed question. forgive me. i worked on at harpers ferry. we get a lot of visitors and we tell them about how the soldiers had surrender, they are paroled. and largely left to their own devices. then eventually exchanged for confederate soldiers. people, they walk away from the story, i guess honor meant a lot more back then than it does now. that is their main take away. i thought this was fascinating talk and thought, i am not sure exactly what i am asking but is there more that visitors should take away about 19th century

honor? mr. silkenat: you are talking about this interesting period in the history of the war in which they have a prisoner exchange system, mid 1862 through mid 1863. the way it worked was essentially after you were captured in battle or at harpers ferry, you would be within 10 days you would be paroled on your honor not to fight again and tony were exchanged for an it will of soldiers on the opposite side. and it appears that 99% of soldiers on both sides of health it. -- uipheald it. when they said, i pledge on my honor i will not fight until i have been exchanged. they actually pushed back sometimes when there offers or said, maybe we want you to fight against native americans in the west. no, we are not going to do that. i think that speech is a way in which soldiers on both sides value their honor.

in fact, that kind of system would work. i cannot think another war in would parole enemy soldiers and say, promise not to fight again. we trust you. i cannot think of another war in which that happens with that number of soldiers. >> david from connecticut. you explained very well the very sensitive nature of lincoln and the north in terms of awareness of the importance of honor and dictating surrender terms to try to not be overly aggressive in that way. could that have been a mistake, do you think, in terms of encouraging later some of this horse whipping and lost cause kind of stuff that followed? mr. silkenat: connor factors are always fun. -- counter factual there always fun. i think the alternative, if you imagine lincoln gone and told

grant and sherman, push for hard terms. that would've made it that much harder for lee to surrender, for johnson to surrender, for these confederates to surrender. in what would've lasted -- the war would've lasted months longer, thousands of lives would've been lost. doing the calculus on what the short-term benefits, long-term effects, it is very hard to do. >> thank you. >> hi. i'm going to follow up on that question there. therefore, peter carmichael without his scarf indicated wish and not talk about issues of inevitability. what you're indicating here is that like it or not, respecting the right of confederates to save face at the end of the war simply promoted a spirit of resistance, and on the other

hand, not to disregard that imperative, what in fact embittered confederates even more. so, this does open up the question of then what kind of war termination strategy would have led to a much more compliant ex-confederate citizenry -- during reconstruction? mr. silkenat: sure. responded,federates if you look at individual soldiers, they responded to surrender at appomattox, they responded in different ways. you look at lee's army in the days before appomattox, some of them, because they determined the war is over and they worried about what happened -- some of saying, i do not want to surrender. i want to join johnson's army and continue to fight. if you look at what happened in smith's part of kirby

army says, even though also surrendering, we are not going to surrender. we will go to mexico and fight for someone in mexico. but they will figure they fight for someone and regain their honor that way. on the other hand, i think many soldiers responded to the end of the war with relief that the war had ended, that they could go home, that this cause was i think many of them realized was that theyths earlier, were able to have a peaceful and relatively easy transition. i'd have a hard time figuring out what lincoln could have done and what grant could have done differently that would have yielded a better result. i think invariably when you are dealing with an end of a war, you have to be very careful about trying to make sure that you are not giving away the victory, you are not making the

rich are worth nothing but on the other hand, especially a civil war when you are trying to unite with the former enemy as citizens, offer ing an open hand is probably the best way to do that. i think that was sort of the essence of lincoln's policy and grant's policy. >> vermont. we've talked about honor and the kkk. terror that they rained on the south. are there any examples of southerners acting in what we would consider an honorable way and defending -- african-american rights? that's a -- i think, if you look at the south after the war, you do have the

figures who decide they're going blackt of challenge freedom any way they can, whether it is to challenge black freedom through enacting black codes or through terrorist organizations like the klan. you have lots of white southerners, former confederates who recognize that the end of the war had some consequences in the best strategy was not to resist emancipation, but to try to figure out a way to embrace it. for more details, i would refer due to parsons news bo book on e klan, which came out a few months ago. which will answer that question for more detailed than i have time for. yes, sir? >> boob from massachusetts. you place tremendous emphasis almost exclusive emphasis on honor as a cause of all the

horrors of racial violence and reaction during reconstruction. i think to me that is kind of over civil fine. -- over civil fine. -- over simplying. mr. silkenat: i agree with you. i was using it as a lens. a multicultural explanation for violence is a more accurate one. >> that is you overlook simple racism and desire for power and everything else. mr. silkenat: i think those things are fundamentally connected. the way in which they suck about honor and race and power, those in the minds of many white southerners in the mid-19th century are so connected ideas that distinguishing them i think is almost impossible. i agree with you that what i am doing here was taking a particular slice to try to

explain some of the features of reconstruction. but we have a whole week to understand reconstruction. yes? >> hi, i'm from california. that last tying off question, you talked about why superiority being tied to honor. was there any difference in poor white southerners versus flatland slaveowners? mr. silkenat: so, one of the ways in which, if you think about the antebellum south, one of the ways in which slave owners appeal to non-slaveowners slaverythem to support as a political institution, they told him, look, you are in some ways equal to us because you are white. as long as there are slaves, they will be the mud sill of society and we as white people will be the dominant political and economic and social race in the south.

u.s. a poo -- you white southerner, you should support slavery even if you do not own slaves yourself. yourif it may not be in economic -- to do so. it helps to explain why for instance so many non- slaveholding whites were eager to fight for the confederacy. i think helped explained much of what happened after the war, too. >> thank you. . from pennsylvania. this question is about the indians who fought for the confederacy. who surrender the last of the confederate forces. he was out west. so, how did the indians, did they have a sense of honor? do you know anything about that? mr. silkenat: so, he, i believe

is a charity? -- cherokee? if you look at what the cherokiee did in the 1830's is to a large extent they had already assimilated into white southern culture. that is to say that the strategy the cherokee embraced considering white settlement in the southwest to try to assimilate to the extent they could, whether that is religiously, in their naming practices, think about the important charity -- cherokee chiefs. a guy named john ross. were land owning slaves. many of the cherokee are slaveowners. that strategy is not work out so well for them, you think about the trail of tears. that they had assimilated far more than most native americans to southern white culture. and i think that is part of the

reason why the confederacy sou ght to -- they are sharing a similar moral framework to other southerners in that respect. >> thank you. >> hi. i'm elizabeth robertson. i'm from north carolina. i personally believe that this idea of southern honor still kind of continues on in the south today. um, and i was wondering if you could answer why and how that continues and what are the positive and negatives of that? mr. silkenat: oh, jeez. [laughter] >> like a short overview at least. mr. silkenat: um, yeah. my expertise is the 19th century, not the 21st. so, i would say that if you're looking for continuity between the south of the 19th century

and the south today, i think with one looks at the amount of violence in the south, the preoccupation with fire arms, i think some of that can be tied, even if only in a tangential way to southern ideas about honor in the 19th century that have survived, thinking about the honor of one's family and these kinds of ideas are still present at least in some parts of the south today. very hesitanti'm to draw any direct connections between events yesterday and events 150 years ago, but i think you touched on something that is probably there. there is some remnants of the southern culture of honor that remains. luckily, there are not that many duels anymore. thank you. >> david rosen from alexandria, virginia. to what extent was the culture of honor shared to the military? sides, seniorh

military leadership came from -- mr. silkenat: one of the things they taught at west point was honor. why nk one of the reasons grant and lee and sherman and all these guys have a common vocabulary about honor is their common military service. if you look at most of the main wereals on both sides trained at west point or trained who basedy academies their curriculum on west point. therefore, i think some of that common experience about what it means to be an officer explains why they're able to share this common vocabulary about when can someone surrender honorably and when can one not surrender honorably. you can imagine this happens all the time if you think about for sumter, you've got andersen insider fort. overgaard, his student, outside

the fort. they are sharing a common military experience, a common expense in the army and athe con expense of west point. that is the huge part of why they're able to speak with the same language. >> hello. i'm from california. do you think that the honor that a soldier, like a lower soldier felt was brought upon that soldier by a high-ranking commander, or do you think it was more based on the individual's ideology? mr. silkenat: so, honor, the way i formulated today is primarily about how one is seen by one's community. and so, i think for an individual soldier, what other soldiers in your regiment thought about you. if they thought you fought bravely, that was a tremendous importance. but recognition from superior ur bravery ort yo

your conduct or your honor i think was very important to soldiers as well. they had a conversation with lee, for instance, they would tell that story over and over for the rest of their lives. think a lot of soldiers felt a great deal of honor and pride in whoever their commanding officer was. soldiers who fought with lee were extraordinarily proud to have fought under lee. soldiers who fought under other generals were somewhat less proud of, depending on who they were. it works in a complex way about how an individual determines how their honors for related. foruonor is for related -- mulated. war with the reintroduction of confederate states in the union, how the competing senses of honor between the north and the south played a role in the politics of the country as a whole? like with the reintroduction of

the confederacy into the congress, how some of these reforms in the reconstruction period came about? mr. silkenat: you say the hardest question for last. ok. so, i think there are debates that are going on in the north about, the beginning of reconstruction and throughout reconstruction about how much they're going to make union victory mean something,, how much they are going to make the badges of dishonor, how much you're going to make those stick on former confederates. when the confederates elect representatives to congress and union --of 1865, the they know we are not going to recognize the union members of congress. how much are you going to make the responsibility for the war rest upon southerners' shoulders. burdenshink about the placed upon white southerners by the 14th amend it and by

military reconstruction, i think some of that is in large part, the outcome of a debate about how much you want to dishonor former confederates and how difficult that is going to make reintroduction, reintegration of the country. thank you. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] coming up this weekend on american history tv on c-span 3, tonight at 8:00 on lectures in history, virginia commonwealth university professor karen ra aider on student instructional films made during the cold war out of fear the u.s. population was falling behind the soviet union in education. and sunday morning on road to the white house, in 1952 and 1948 national conventions. 2 dwight eisenhower

excepted the republican nomination and at a late stevenson received the democratic nomination. in 1948, the first televised conventions where president harry truman accepted his party's nomination. failure touman: the do anything about high prices and the failure to do anything about housing. my duty as president requires that i use every means within my power to get the laws that people need on matters of such importance under the -- and urgency. 6:00, we will take an early look at the new smithsonian's theme of african-american history with his director. the museum opens its doors to the public in september this year. >> we were able to get an amazing collection of movie posters. that's an early oscar michelle movie poster from the 1920's. then this is part of our job is help people relearn history they think they know. that would be posters from spencer williams. he is known as playing in amos