History Commons^™

Morale Maintenance In World War Ii Us Army Ground Combat Units : European Theater Of Operations, 1944-45, Kevin Kane

Honors Theses

This paper examines how both the Army as an organization and its small unit leaders attempted to maintain the soldiers’ morale in the European Theater of Operations during World War II. Morale was critical to the Allied victory in the war, yet the morale of frontline GIs was often neglected. This occurred with such frequency that many combat soldiers suffered from a new category of wound known as “combat exhaustion.” Through an examination of what influenced combat soldiers’ morale, a clearer understanding of what the Army did well and how it failed to support combat GIs emerges, as does an …

What Lincoln Was Up Against: The Context Of Leadership, Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

Abraham Lincoln faced desperate challenges from the moment he took office until the day he was killed. While Union armies in the field struggled for four years against dismayingly effective Confederate forces, Lincoln fought to keep the North from breaking apart. The task proved unrelenting.

Lincoln's America 2.0, Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

For most people at the time, far from battles or capitals, the Civil War arrived in long gray columns of text. A new system of telegraph stations, railroads, and press organizations spread words with unprecedented speed and in enormous quantity. Reports form the battlefield poured out in brief messages and long torrents, editorials commenting on every event and utterance. Even generals and presidents understood the shape and meaning of the Civil War through print.

Personal Memoirs Of U.S. Grant, And Alternative Accounts Of Lee's Surrender At Appomattox, George R. Goethals

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

It is somewhat troubling that as we try to understand leaders and leadership we are confronted with the problem that our knowledge of central historical events is highly subject to the differing perspectives of various scholars. What can we know? How can we know it?

This chapter considers these questions by examining the implications of a particular variation on the general problem of differing historical perspectives. That is, how do we weigh autobiographical accounts of events by the actors themselves? Is there something distinctive about these accounts, or are they best thought of as just one more rendering of history, …

"Momentous Events In Small Places": The Coming Of The Civil War In Two American Communities, Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

Historians, professional and otherwise, have written thousands of regimental histories, county histories, and town histories of the Civil War years. These studies make the coming of the war concrete and compelling. Inspired by such accounts, it seemed to me that two local portrayals could be even better than one, that exploring communities on both sides of the Mason-Dixon Line as they each confronted the events from the late fifties to the late sixties might make both sides more comprehensible.

The Art Of War : Deconstructing The Monolith Of The World War Ii Poster, Sean Williams

Honors Theses

For most Americans, the introduction to World War II posters, or even the entire field of posters during wartime in general, comes in the form of an elderly, yet bold looking man wearing red, white and blue. He wears a striped hat, and stands with his finger pointed outwards. The message he gives is clear --"I want YOU!" This image has been faithfully reproduced in social studies and history textbooks for years. (Indeed, both generations of my family saw such an image in their school books).

Uncle Sam, though, dapper as he may be, is merely one example of hundreds …

Stalin's Holy War: Religion, Nationalism, And Alliance Politics, 1941–1945 (Book Review), David Brandenberger

History Faculty Publications

The Kremlin tête-à-tête and the iconoclastic revival of the Russian Orthodox Church that followed have long intrigued those writing about ideological change in the USSR under Stalin. Many believe that the concessions to the church were an exigency of war designed to increase the party’s ability to rally support from among even the most reluctant members of Soviet society. Others consider the revival of the church to have been part of a more thoroughgoing Russiªcation of the USSR in the mid- to late 1930s that rehabilitated aspects of the Russian national past for mobilizational purposes well before 1941. In Stalin’s …

Civil War Visitor Center At Tredegar Iron Works (Exhibition Review), Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

Review of exhibition, Civil War Visitor Center at Tredegar Iron Works.

Why Were Chemical Weapons Not Used In World War Ii?, Jeffrey W. Legro

Political Science Faculty Publications

Chemical warfare had played an important enough role in World War I that there was widespread expectation of its use in World War II. Certainly, Germany's army and its chemists had no qualms about adding poison gas to the Third Reich's arsenal. When war began, however, many of the latest chemical warfare agents were not available in deliverable form. The early successes of conventional-war making, combined with an increasing shortage of raw material, led Germany to deemphasize gas warfare even apart from the fear of Allied retaliation that significantly influenced at least the armed forces.

The Elkhart County Guards : Company G, 19th Indiana Volunteer Infantry, Eugene D. Watkins

Master's Theses

In July 1861, 101 farm boys and shopkeepers left northern Indiana to do their part to save the Union. These men, who formed Company G, 19th Indiana Infantry, served with distinction in the famed Iron Brigade. They received their baptism of fire at Brawner's Farm in August 1862. They served for four years, suffering on such battlefields as Antietam, Gettysburg, and the Wilderness. Twenty-five soldiers never returned home as they died during their service. The rest scattered across the country, living out their lives struggling with disabling illnesses and wounds. This study provides a micro-history focusing on a small group …

Confederate Matrons : Women Who Served In Virginia Civil War Hospitals, A. Elise Allison

Honors Theses

In September 1862, the Confederate Congress authorized hospitals to employ white women as chief matrons, assistant matrons, and ward matrons. This paper examines the lives and experiences of matrons who worked in Confederate hospitals in Virginia. It concludes that only ''exceptional" women with the stamina to endure physical and mental hardships were able to defy conventional ideas about their proper role and contribute to the care of Confederate sick and wounded as matrons.

Worrying About The Civil War, Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

There is no animosity in any of these historical or practical interpretations of the Civil War. It is clear that the North fought for purposes entirely good--for Union and the end of slavery--but Confederate soldiers also win respect for their bravery, their devotion, and their struggle against long odds. They seem to have been playing historical roles for which they are not to blame. The reenactors, the books in stores, and the battlefield tours generally avoid talking about the cause of the war, focusing instead on the common bravery and hardships of soldiers North and South.

Living Monuments: Confederate Soldiers' Homes In The New South (Book Review), Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

Review of the book, Living Monuments: Confederate Soldiers' Homes in the New South by R.B Rosenburg. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993.

Embattled Emblem: The Army Of Northern Virginia Battle Flag, 1861 To The Present (Exhibit), Edward L. Ayers

History Faculty Publications

Review of exhibit, Embattled Emblem: The Army of Northern Virginia Battle Flag, 1861 to the Present.

Sayler's Creek : A Battlefield, A Park, Peter Warren Eldredge

Master's Theses

The significance in history of the land area known as Sayler's Creek is derived from the fact that the last major conflict between Union and Confederate forces was fought there on April 6, 1865. The battle has been neglected because it immediately precedes the surrender; however, the engagement does contain valuable historical information.

Quartermaster Airborne Instruction : A History Of The Airborne Courses Of Instruction At The U.S. Army Quartermaster School, Fort Lee, Virginia, From Their Establishment In 1950 To The End Of The Korean War, Thomas Audrey Johnson

Master's Theses

Since the beginning of time, man has looked to the skies for new ideas, but the first recorded recognition of the value of using air­ borne troops belongs to an American. The wily Benjamin Franklin wrote in 1784, after observing the Montgolfer brothers balloon, ''Where is the Prince who can afford to cover his country with troops for its defense as that ten thousand men descending from the clouds might not in many places do an infinite deal of mischief before a force could be brought together to repel them?" The advent of a practical airplane produced a flurry of …