It was 150 years ago today

[MajGenl.Meade]

Oh I'm going to miss being in the US of A over the next 5 years. There's a big Bull Run re-enactment scheduled and all kinds of wonderful events to mark tthis seminal event in US history. Rush out now to your nearest National Park - well not now perhaps but at an appropriate time.

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.

[Gob]

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

Edited to add;

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

[rubato]

Being put into uncomfortable situations is a necessary part of education. If a lesson about slavery does NOT make a child uncomfortable then someone is lying.


"Education must be subversive if it is to be meaningful." Bertrand Russell


yrs,
rubato

[Big RR]

I agree rubato, but then I think maybe the white students are the ones who should be made uncomfortable and forced to realize how offensive slavery is; I'd bet most of the black and mixed race students already recognized that an didn't need to be the ones auctioned off to the white "masters" (some of whom probably had their "white supremacy" beliefs validated). It's kind of as pointless as dividing a class where the jewish students are victimized by the students of aryan dissent.

[Sue U]

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

"Until 1865?" Hahahahahahaha. As Faulkner said, the past isn't dead; it isn't even past. Take a look at the 1986 film Sherman's March. The American Civil War never ended and is still being played out today, although for the most part it's less shooty.

[MajGenl.Meade]

Whoa! I forgot to give props to Yuri G - 50 years ago, same day, popular for missiles I guess.

[Lord Jim]

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?

[Scooter]

I guess since in the end you rebs got you asses so completely kicked, you have a need to revel in the pointless "victories" you enjoyed along the way.

[MajGenl.Meade]

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?

D'ya notice my name and rank? Bull Run I sez and Bull run it iz.

[Big RR]

Since when do the losers of a battle get naming rights?

[Sean]

They brought parasols and picnic boxes
Dressed like they's hunting foxes
But could no more fight than fly
They thought at Bull Run they'd put us down
But that ain't quite what they found
Now here's the reason why

We're just Southern boys, raising hell right now
We're just Southern boys, doing well right now

They got many more men than us
They got the arms but not the guts
They ain't the kind to win
We whipped 'em bad at Ball's Bluff
At Wilson's Creek - treated 'em rough
Pretty soon they'll give in

We're just Southern boys, raising hell right now
We're just Southern boys, doing well right now

Sweet spirit of Dixie - just drives us along
Like the Mississippi flows - the Southland rolls on and on

We got horsemen like you've never seen
Gunmen that shoot so mean
Farm boys with fists of steel
We've got the finest generals ever known
Jackson stands like a wall of stone
We won't beg and kneel

We're just Southern boys, raising hell right now
We're just Southern boys, doing well right now