Plan B Forum

This week marks the 150th anniversary of the start of the American Civil War.

Events commemorating the anniversary include a reenactment of the Confederate bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston, S.C., on April 12, 1861, which finally propelled the United States into its bloody civil war after years of posturing between the Northern and Southern states.

The observance in Charleston harbor is being described as a "somber commemoration" of the war, the Associated Press reports. The ceremony was in jeopardy last week when a shutdown of the federal government loomed, but was able to go on when a federal budget deal was struck by politicians in Washington D.C. Friday.

The canon bombardment recreation follows concerts that were held at the site on Monday commemorating the start of the Civil War. The conflict eventually left an estimated 600,000 Americans dead.

The Fort Sumter attack came after Northern and Southern states could not agree on the role of state's rights and the issue of slavery. According to the Associated Press, Confederate soldiers launched its attack on the island fort after a Union garrison refused to give up the post. The battle lasted two days before Union forces surrendered.

The Civil War raged on until 1865 when the Confederacy finally surrendered to the Union at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia.

The US is commemorating the 150th anniversary of the country's most destructive conflict, the Civil War. In Charleston in the state of South Carolina, where the war erupted, the BBC's Paul Adams says Americans remain divided over the roots of the conflict to this day.

On a patch of open ground near Charleston, the US Civil War came vividly, noisily to life on a rainy Sunday in late March.

Re-enactors played out the 1864 Battle of Bloody Bridge, a victory for Southern, or Confederate, forces over Northern, or Union, troops.

The show was colourful and educational, too.

But here in the cradle of the Civil War, with its sesquicentennial just around the corner, this is a piece of painful history which continues to rankle



BBC article

WASHINGTON:

Trying to bring a Civil War history lesson to life, a teacher turned her classroom into a slave auction.

Jessica Boyle ordered black and mixed-race students to one side of the room. Then, the white students took turns buying them.

Complaints from parents began shortly after the lesson, and the principal at Sewells Point Elementary School, Mary Wrushen, wrote to parents last week that Ms Boyle had gone too far.

''The lesson [for children aged nine and 10] could have been thought through more carefully, as to not offend her students or put them in an uncomfortable situation,'' Ms Wrushen wrote.

Lessons on the Civil War have long been among the most sensitive topics in Virginia classrooms, many located near the grounds of the Confederacy's bloodiest battles. And the role that slavery played in the conflict's origins has been particularly controversial.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/anger-after ... 1dcp1.html

The Civil War raged on until 1865 when the Confederacy finally surrendered to the Union at the Appomattox Court House in Virginia.

There's a big Bull Run re-enactment scheduled

Lord Jim wrote:

There's a big Bull Run re-enactment scheduled

Are you referring to First Manassas ?

That heroic battle, where the dastardly perpetrators of The War Of Northern Aggression were sent packing?