UnExpected Outcomes (7)

The Conclusion of the American Civil War

Confederate General Robert E. Lee's Surrender at Appomattox (1865)

"Then he (Grant) looked toward Lee, and his eyes seemed to be resting on the handsome sword that hung at that officer's side. He said afterward that this set him to thinking that it would be an unnecessary humiliation to require officers to surrender their swords, and a great hardship to deprive them of their personal baggage and horses, and after a short pause he wrote the sentence: 'This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage.'" — Surrender at Appomattox, 1865, EyeWitness to History (1997). ¹

General R. E. Lee, Commanding C.S.A. APPOMATTOX Ct H., Va., April 9th, 1865 General; In accordance with the substance of my letter to you of the 8th inst., I propose to receive the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia on the following terms, to wit: Rolls of all officers and men to be made in duplicate, one copy to be given to an officer to be designated by me, the other to be retained by such officer or officers as you may designate. The officers to give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly [exchanged], and each company or regimental commander to sign a like parole for the men of their commands. The arms, artillery, and public property to be parked, and stacked, and turned over to the officers appointed by me to receive them. This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage. This done, each officer and man will be allowed to return to his home, not to be disturbed by the United States authorities so long as they observe their paroles, and the laws in force where they may reside. Very respectfully, U.S. Grant, Lieutenant-General 2

Head-Quarters, Army of Northern Virginia, April 9th, 1865 I received your letter of this date containing the terms of the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia as proposed by you. As they are substantially the same as those expressed in your letter of the 8th inst., they are accepted. I will proceed to designate the proper officers to carry the stipulations into effect. R. E. Lee, General 3

It Took Seven (7) Months To Complete The Surrender Of The South

"There is nothing left for me to do but to see Grant, and I would rather die a thousand deaths." — Confederate General Robert E. Lee, "General Lee — Jefferson Davis," from the Maddox Family, Southern Maddox's. ⁴

After the fall of Richmond, Virginia and desperate to reach Lynchburg, Virginia, some 27,000 Confederate soldiers, wounded, entirely surrounded and facing starvation, tried to escape the Union's blockade and failed. On Sunday, April 9th, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at the Appomattox Courthouse. According to the historical record, General Lee's surrender was only the beginning of the end for the American Civil War.

The American Civil War Surrender Timeline

1. Surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia (April 9th, 1865)

2. Surrender of Gen. St. John Richardson Liddell's troops (April 9th, 1865)

3. Assassination of United States President Abraham Lincoln (April 14th, 1865)

4. Union Capture of Columbus, Georgia (Easter Sunday, April 16th, 1865)

5. Disbanding of Mosby's Raiders (April 21st, 1865)

6. Surrender of Gen. Joseph E. Johnston and his various armies (April 26th, 1865)

7. Surrender of the Confederate departments of Alabama, Mississippi and East Louisiana regiments (May 4th, 1865)

8. Surrender of the Confederate District of the Gulf (May 5th, 1865)

9. Capture of Confederate President Jefferson Finis Davis (May 10th, 1865)

10. Surrender of the Confederate Department of Florida and South Georgia (May 10th, 1865)

11. Surrender of Thompson's Brigade (May 11th, 1865)

12. Surrender of Confederate forces of North Georgia (May 12th, 1865)

13. Disbandment after the Battle at Palmito Ranch (May 13th, 1865)

14. Surrender of Edmund Kirby Smith (May 26th, 1865)

15. Surrender of Cherokee Chief Stand Watie (June 23rd, 1865)

16. Surrender of CSS Shenandoah (November 6th, 1865)

On Monday, August 20th, 1866, ninety (90) years before I was born to the very day, President Andrew Johnson, the 17th President of the United States (1865-1869), formally declared the end of the American Civil War. ⁵ Finally, after five (5) bloody years and over 600,000 deaths, the American Civil war was over. ⁶

Capturing the Confederate President Did Not End The War

"My own convictions as to negro slavery are strong. It has its evils and abuses...We recognize the negro as God and God's Book and God's Laws, in nature, tell us to recognize him — our inferior, fitted expressly for servitude … You cannot transform the negro into anything one-tenth as useful or as good as what slavery enables them to be." — Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America (Monday, February 18th, 1861 — Thursday, May 11th, 1865), Vice President Alexander Stephens, Preceded By: Office instituted, Succeeded By: Office abolished ⁷

The capture of Confederate States of America's President, Jefferson Davis did not end the war. Within days after the capture of President Davis, the surrender of Confederate Department of Florida and South Georgia, Thompson's Brigade, the Confederate forces of North Georgia, the disbandment after the Battle at Palmito Ranch and the Trans-Mississippi Department needed to and did take place. In the case of Cherokee Chief Stand Watie and the CSS Shenandoah, months passed and fighting continued before word of the war's end reached them. It was not until Thursday, August 2nd, 1865 that Captain Waddell of the CSS Shenandoah learned from the British Barracouta of the surrender of Confederate Generals Joseph E. Johnston and Kirby Smith, the capture of President Jefferson Davis and understood the Civil War had indeed ended. ⁸ Even after the surrender of the CSS Shanendoah on Monday, November 6th, 1865 in Liverpool, the war raged on in the hearts and minds of the people. Even now it is difficult to know if the North and the South ever forgave one another. ⁹

"With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations." — President Abraham Lincoln, the conclusion of Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address Saturday, March 4th, 1865 ¹⁰

It's Not Over Until We Bind Up The Nation's Wounds

"Our deficits are driven not just by over-spending, but because our whole society is sick and in decline. Until we begin curing some of these social issues, fiscal solutions alone cannot save us." — Dennis Howard ¹¹

In light of America's moral collapse, I am staggered at the time, talent and treasure invested in the efforts of both the Democrats and the Republicans to maintain or regain the White House. Does it matter who is the President of the United States of America? Yes. The significance of this election brings the 1860 Presidential election to my mind. Is the cost of quality healthcare too high to be accessible to all Americans? Yes. Is taxpayer funded abortion on demand healthcare? No. Is the national debt too high and the efforts to balance the budget too low? Yes. Is the lack of conservative fiscal policies the underlying root cause of our problems? No.

Dennis Howard, president of the Movement for a Better America puts it this way.

"Fifty-five (55) million abortions have cost us at least $45 trillion in lost GDP, shrinking the economy by sharply reducing demand and by cutting the human resources every economy needs to grow. That's also a 30% hit on the under-45 generation. When you ask whatever happened to the youth market, that's it. Add in the cost of all the other social issues — high divorce rates, single parent homes, children born out of wedlock, 1.6 million people in state and federal prisons, epidemics of drug addiction and STDs, high drop out rates from school, plus the decline in the American work ethic — and you have the real drivers of our economic decline. It's time the economic conservatives realized that they are not going to fix the problem simply by cutting taxes and spending. Our deficits are driven not just by over-spending, but because our whole society is sick and in decline. Until we begin curing some of these social issues, fiscal solutions alone cannot save us." — Dennis Howard ¹²

In my opinion, a root cause analysis (RCA) of our decline as a country blessed by God will reveal our departure from biblically based precepts. If "righteousness exalts a nation" and if "sin is a disgrace to any people" (Proverbs 14:34) ¹³ then for America to survive she must follow the biblical blueprint and build a moral foundation "precept upon precept" and even then "line upon line" (Isaiah 28:10). ¹⁴ Because there is such a thing as too late (Jeremiah 13:16). ¹⁵ Because life matters (John 10:10) and only works well one way (John 14:6). ¹⁶ Because our God is a just God (Isaiah 45:21). ¹⁷ It's past time we stop pursuing personal agendas, recognize that our amoral praetorian policies are at the heart of our problems and work boldly as the "Body of Christ" to "bind up the nation's wounds."

This assignment does not start in the White House.

It starts in our house.

Brothers, we really need to talk.

Reference(s):
01. "Surrender at Appomattox, 1865," EyeWitness to History (1997) (http://bit.ly/c0TfzB).
02. U.S. Grant, "The American Conflict: A history of the Great Rebellion in the United States of America (1860-1865). It's causes, incidents, and moral and political phases, with the drift and progress of American opinion respecting Human Slavery from 1776 to the close of the War for the Union." by Horace Greeley (http://bit.ly/JTEHoj).
03. Ibid.
04. Confederate General Robert E. Lee, from the Maddox Family, Southern Maddox's. The Maddox family descends from Wales and many thousands living in the United States can trace their roots to the earliest colonial times — to Maryland and Virginia in the seventeenth century. (http://bit.ly/HYzm1b).
05. Presidential proclamation ending the war, Wikipedia (http://bit.ly/HXAk1g).
06. Burke Davis, "The Civil War, Strange and Fascinating Facts" (http://bit.ly/4EbpLO).
07. Kenneth C. Davis, Don't Know Much About the Civil War: Everything You Need to Know About America's Greatest Conflict But Never Learned (New York: Avon Books, 1996), p. 156. After 1856, Jefferson Davis reiterated in most of his public speeches that he was "tired" of apologies for "our institution." "African slavery, as it exists in the United States, is a moral, a social, and a political blessing." (http://bit.ly/J7b5s9).
08. The Surrender of CSS Shenandoah, Wikipedia (http://bit.ly/IgVAMs).
09. Post-Civil War Conditions, United States History, "The South harbored deep feelings of hatred toward the North, but lacked an effective forum for venting those feelings. Tensions were heightened by the actions of the 'scalawags and carpetbaggers." Efforts to regulate relationships between the newly freed slaves and their former masters were made in the black codes." (http://bit.ly/8Q267o). See also Scalawags and Carpetbaggers, United States History (http://bit.ly/cSyFmu).
10. Abraham Lincoln, Second Inaugural Address; endorsed by Lincoln, April10, 1865, March 4, 1865; Series 3, General Correspondence, 1837-1897; The Abraham Lincoln Papers at the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division (Washington, DC: American Memory Project, [2000-02]), (http://1.usa.gov/hkm1No).
11. Dennis M. Howard, Founder and President of The Movement for a Better America, Inc., "Where do we go from here?", New Life, April 2012, Volume 1, No.2 (http://bit.ly/I2P5KQ).
12. Ibid.
13. Proverbs 14:34 Bible.cc provides a parallel, verse by verse view of 8 translations (http://bit.ly/36CvK).
14. Isaiah 28:10 Bible.cc provides a parallel, verse by verse view of 8 translations (http://bit.ly/I1wUqI).
15. Jeremiah 13:16 Bible.cc provides a parallel, verse by verse view of 8 translations (http://bit.ly/IflEIu).
16. John 14:6 Bible.cc provides a parallel, verse by verse view of 8 translations (http://bit.ly/yk2Fo).
17. Isaiah 45:21 Bible.cc provides a parallel, verse by verse view of 8 translations (http://bit.ly/I2noXI).