still shared the stage in terms of fame even here in virginia with people like stonewall jackson, joseph johnston, albert sidney johnston. to a certain extent. and the question was, who was going to sort of be the face of the south after the civil war. well, lee at a group of very dedicated adherents, people like jubal early. jubal early was one of his corps commanders who action is buried here. and through the actions of early and other members of the southern historical society you begin to see the construction of lee as something that was much bigger than just a normal human being. lee, for instance, never lost a battle. he wore himself out weeping the yankees. with all these reasons why lee was perfect and there were other things, there were other things that always dragged him down. it was a tragic situation. gettysburg is another good example of that. for a lot of people who talk about gettysburg, want to know why to lee lose. get lee make a mistake here, get lee make a mistake there? someone once asked george pickett of pickett's charge of what he thought happened. did longstreet make a mi

[laughter] breckinridge got along well with the joseph johnston, the only army commander in the union and the confederacy with whom breckinridge didn't get along and that is a badge of honor in the confederate. so on top of this enormous political prestige that he had from before the war she now have substantial military prestige because he had served so widely and was well regarded by so many of the confederate command. what that meant was with this appointed secretary of war this was a man for a change he put not treated as a clerk he had a greater prestige in the south at that point than did jefferson davis. so when breckinridge spoke davis might not have to do what he advised, but davis was going to have to listen because davis knew. davis was a smart politician. davis knew that breckinridge had an enormous constituency behind him, and what happens from february 1865 to breckinridge's appointed right to the collapse of the government and the capture of davis and the flight of the members of the government is a political story of a from the battle between these two men fought over

mcclellan and joseph e. johnston were doing nothing so capably. living up to their birth rights. in the west, things were happening and they were all bad. suddenly there was someone in virginia who was succeeding. you have seen the compilations, they are everywhere, from the civilian diaries to the soldiers letters, about how the world with had changed when jackson started to succeed. good news had been in miserly short supply and now it was everywhere viewed with more importance than it really deserved from the somewhat secondary theater of the shenandoah valley. down here in richmond, not far from us, where by this point there were federal troops in profusion laying siege, not literally, but besieging the confederate national capital. the soldiers here wrote about it from afar and started to wish that they had jackson instead of their own leaders. here's a fellow in the brigade writing home, middle of may, the news of the gallant achievements has been received enthusiastically. and our commanders here -- this is heading toward one of my light motifs, one my heavy mo f motifs, t

1861, the start of '62, about the continued presence of a significant confederate force under joseph j. johnston nears manassas and centreville. they'd gone into winter camps. they were moving into the neighborhood. they were establishing different camps with saying first texas this way, 15 south carolina that way. and who knows when they might being southerners to get in their mind to just attack washington one night, kill us in our beds! it had to be cleaned out. this nest of vipers at manassas. and then there were the pesky artillery batteries that had been established along the little potomac, 1861 honest ship captains couldn't sail their vessels up and down the potomac without fear of being shot by the pesky rebels. they needed to be cleaned out. and then, of course, the third leg in the stool that concerned so much concern was the ohio and baltimore railroad bringing critically needed supplies across the edge of virginia, northwestern virginia, into maryland. passing by harper's ferry. dissatisfaction with the pace of mcclellan's movements, especially those in the east, were particularly a

the university of oklahoma in columbia we have joseph omert he's an adjunct professor at the university of south carolina and in paris we have diana johnston she is an independent political commentator and author of fool's crusade yugoslavia nato and western delusions all right folks this is cross-eyed that means you can jump in anytime you want if i go to josef first and colombia we have a cease fire right now there's like i said in the introduction there's mixed reviews of it where do we go from here i mean what do we hear is this ceasefire accomplished if not just give both sides more time to arm and i'd like to point out to our viewers that there are western capitals talking about a buffer zone right now to give the opposition their rebels if you want a place to retreat and regroup isn't that just fueling on the next stage of this civil war. well first of all the civil war ceasefire is not complete according to my information at least nine people were killed already today but i don't really believe that this ceasefire will all go for too long you know i wrote in my latest article that ignites remind us all of the cease fire the place i