latrobe she wrote was greatly piqued by such good words and said that it detracted from longstreet's fame. certainly sounds like jealousy to me. and latrobe, who was a mild mannered fellow, surprised her. she added, i was very much taken aback that such a quiet, self-possessed individual should have been startled out of his usual equanimity thus. longstreet himself of course bet three decades after the death pointed out their defects and trying to assail their reputations. the emergence of fool tom jackson as he was known at the vmi with some cause, sort of fellow for whom high schools used to be named, grew expressly from those few days in the spring of 1862. southern newspapers admitted their conversion experiences. they had been making fun of jackson. they had been highlighting his eccentricities. they had been speaking de ricively of him. the richmond daily whig has been explaining how the war should have been run in their view, they knew how to run it in the valley and everywhere else, they had made a lot of fun of jackson and his eccentricities. they had the good grace to spoof

general, longstreet responded, if you put every man now on the other side of the potomac on that field to approach me over the same line and give me plenty of ammunition, i will kill them all before they reach me. and he did. this is what lee did in 1862. he wrote in what would qualify as a christmas letter to his wife, mary, but what a cruel thing is war to separate and destroy families and friends and mar the purist joy and happiness god has granted us in this world. to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors and to devastate the fair face of this beautiful world. i pray that on this day when peace and goodwill are preached to all mankind, that better thoughts will fill our hearts, fill the hearts of our enemy and turn them to peace. the confusion that now exists in their council will thus result in good. we all know that somebody who we all thought would get nominated today proclaimed emancipation, preliminarily -- in a preliminary fashion. on september 22nd, 1862, and just passed our -- or john koskie's deadline january 1 the action document that proclaimed sl

without reorganization, presumably it would have been longstreet and jackson. and every day, every hour of every day as those folks moved through the country roads in western maryland and south central pennsylvania, the options to turn this way or at this for the two corps instead of the three corps as it wound up were limitless. jackson with his drive might have the fought the famous battle at harrisburg or cleveland, ohio, or who knows where. dropping him into gettysburg isn't legitimate. having said that i would have no doubt he would have gone up east cemetery hill and that would have been the end of the battle of gettysburg. could you have dropped him there, which you couldn't have, but that's a good question. >> we have a couple more quick calls before the program resumes at the library of virginia. let's hear from carol in ann arbor, michigan. go ahead. >> and good morning, sir. i wanted to tell you how fascinating this is. i am in ann arbor, michigan. the program is so very interesting for those of us who aren't in your region. we did live in michigan o

not a bad plan, but it was a complex plan and dealing with on-the-job training generals like pete longstreet who managed to get lost with a good segment of the attack force on the 31st of may, it really didn't go long for joe johnston, it took an even nastier turn when he got blown off his horse badly injured. nevertheless the less the 1st of june the confederates continue to make assault but by this time the union force has been reinforced, bull sumner, edwin "bow" sumner comes down the grapevine bridge north of the river and reinforces the federals to the south and you have a pitched battle at what we call seven pines. probably the biggest single effect of this fight was one a lot more confederate soldiers and union soldiers learned about the difficulty of fighting in virginia. it didn't look anything like the paintings they had seen of the area. no. it's messy in virginia. and they learned how difficult it could be. and second and most important, robert edward lee was appointed as commander of the confederate forces defending richmond, and it would be this general lee that would make some

he was more of an offensive commander than a defensive commander in contrast to longstreet. so i'm fairly confident he would have sided with lee on those decisions. >> james mcpherson, we appreciate you joining us this afternoon. we'll wait with all of the rest of our viewers to see if your choice, admiral david farragut is picked as person of the year 1862 and remind our viewers that we have covered a number of events with james mcpherson in the past of his many books and you can find many of those in our video library. thank you for joining us this afternoon. >> thank you for having me. >> we are going to stay live. we'll go back live momentarily to richmond. we'll hear from john mountcastle. he is the next historian to speak and make his case. he is a retired brigadier general and former chief of m l military history for the army. he'll be the fourth out of five historians speaking at the library of virginia in richmond. we'll take you back there live now here on american history tv on c-span3. >> ladies and gentlemen, if you could return to your seats and we'll get start

troops and mcclellan's troops, lee sent jackson with one wing of his army to occupy pope and with longstreet and another wing fell upon him and maybe this was lee's greatest battle, second manassas. almost destroyed pope. this was august 30th, 1862. at that point lee confessed. the army is not properly equipped for an invasion of the enemy's territory. it lacks much of the material of war, is feeble in transportation, the animals being much reduced and the men poorly provided with clothes and in thousands of instances, destitute of shoes. still, we cannot afford to be idle. and though weaker than our opponents in men and material and military equipment, we must endeavor to harass if we cannot make our success -- our complete success is not impossible and we shall endeavor to guard from law. so, he's going to maryland. he writes to davis, and this is lee's relationship. he writes to davis all the time. i will keep you informed. i will keep you informed. and lee and davis -- davis thinks that he and lee are in perfect harmony, when in reality lee is pushing the envelope, deceiving davis, tryin

all we have to do is look at the career of longstreet to understand that pretty well. we're going to stop now. we are going to give the audience a chance. if you have any questions, we would love, love to hear from anything we have talked about, anything you want. but what i would ask you to do, if you would please stand and -- and, give us your name. and then, speak as loud leap lyu can. we have a microphone. >> -- how do we discuss competencies and i would look your individual opinion as to what was the most intelligent tactic, best decision, courageous act from a nongeneral officer. >> before we answer -- maybe it would be a good idea. if any body has a question. if you've would come to the middle aisle. we will form a line. then we won't have to worry about, you know picking and seeing people. just, please come to the, come to the middle here. and, you can see van has a, has a mike there. but if you now would answer the question for the gentleman. or should we talk about microphones. what do you think? >> wiley? >> i will start. essentially, you know one of the tac

thinking he had convinced jefferson davis about this, and that davis was considering sending james longstreet to replace jackson in the valley. that, of course, didn't happen. if it had, long street would be still approaching winchester from the south today slowly i'm pretty sure. dick yewell, almost unbelievably excentric, he called on the 13th of may, ten days before the on fall against front royal, he called him that enenthusiastic fanatic, if a letter. and he said our army has no head at all, though there is room for one or two. he called him that may speaking to another confederate officer a crazy as a march hair, a crazy man. when he received orders he didn't like, he said that this is damn foolishness. his road to damascus experience was actually on the road to republic in this instance and he called aside the colonel from lynchburg who was the man he had talked to before, and he said do you remember when i called jackson and old woman? well, i take it all back. he had been converted. charles s. winerd on the other hand, jackson's very able commander of the stonewall brigade, he suited

all we have to do is look at the career of longstreet to understand that pretty well. we're going to stop now. we are going to give the audience a chance. if you have any questions, we would love, love to hear from you, anything we have talked about, anything you want. but what i would ask you to do, if you would please stand and -- and, give us your name. and then, speak as loudly as you can. we have a microphone. >> the new information that you have access to, we have discussed certain things, i would like your individual opinion as to what was the most, how was your tactic, from a nongeneral officer on the battlefield? >> before we answer, maybe it would be a good idea. if you come to this middle aisle, we will form a line and we won't have to worry about picking and seeing people. just come to the middle here and you can see, van has a mike there. if you would now answer the question. what do you think? >> wiley? >> i will start. essentially, you know, one of the tactical geniuses in my interpretation of the confederate army was pat clayburn. pat clayburn fought at

did longstreet make a mistake? was over, was it over there? there? did pick it respond that he always thought the yankees have something to do with it. which i think it hits the nail right on it, what did you think of picket. lee did make some mistakes, but george me did some things right, too. lee becomes first a regional hero, been a sexual here and eventually got in the 20 century he is being treated by people like woodrow wilson as a national hero, being the very best of a defeated section, the best update lost way of life, and conveniently forget to mention that this way of life was pushing slavery. until you get to the point where people really don't even, they don't even no lee as a human being. and no lee as the legend they know him as the indefensible commend. they no lee as the perfect christian gentleman. whereas the actual human being, robert e. lee, standing in those boots making those mistakes, making those good choices, tends to get lost. i don't think lee himself would recognize himself with some of the legends that have been built up

did longstreet make the mistake in over here, over there? and picket responded he always thought the yankees had something to do with it, which i think hits the nail right on the head, whatever you think of picket. lee did make some mistakes, but george mead did some things right, too. as time goes along lee becomes a regional hero, then a sectional hero, and eventually in the 20th century he is treated by people like woodrow wilson as a national hero, the very best of a defeated section, the very best of a lost way of life. they conveniently forget to mention this way of life was pushing slavery. until you get to the point where people really don't even think -- they don't even know lee as a human being. they know lee as the legend. they know lee as the the invincable commander, the perfect christian gentleman, whereas the actual human being, robert e. lee, standing in those boots, making those mistakes, making good choices, tens to get lost. i don't think lee himself would recognize himself with some of the legends of that have been built