Furthermore, the South could have waged this type of war. The people were certainly were no WORSE off than the Palestinians and perhaps they had more cause to do so given the documented suffering inflicted especially upon non-combatants in the South by the armies of the Union which did not happen to the Palestinians at the hands of the Israelis.

If Lee had given the word, there were many if not most Confederate officers and men who would have continued to wage war using the same tactics as the various ‘irregular’ commands had used throughout the South DURING the war. Certainly, Mosby’s famous 43rd was at the apex of its strength at the time of Appomattox, something that made it more difficult for Mosby to deal with the problems of the fall of Lee’s army and Richmond and his position vis a vie the Yankees. As well, Jefferson Davis who had fled the Capitol and was still at large had already called for the South to initiate this type of resistance to the occupying forces of the conqueror rather than just accept defeat, occupation and colonization. Finally, in a contemporary newspaper account, a reporter claimed that Davis had made Mosby a Brigadier General and ordered him to take command not only of all remaining troops in Virginia that had not laid down their arms, but of all civilians willing to engage in a ‘black flag’ strategy against the occupiers. Frankly, one has to wonder just how long the citizens of the ‘victorious Union’ would have been willing to continue to spill the blood of their men in the attempt to force ‘reunion’ on the eleven states of the Confederacy! On the other hand, it would have been far more difficult to adopt the policy of genocide (as was articulated by General Sherman) towards white Southerners that was inflicted on the Plains Indians simply BECAUSE they were white.

The scars of the conflict as it happened still remain and are still remembered with no great fondness by many in the South. How much worse would the situation have been if the type of warfare we see in the Middle East (and earlier in places like Ireland and colonial Africa) had been waged by the eleven states of the Confederacy after Appomattox? It may be that this nation owes Robert E. Lee a larger debt than it is willing to admit because of his refusal to adopt a strategy of guerrilla warfare against the occupiers. However, parenthetically, it is fortunate that Lee did not know what ‘reconstruction’ would bring to the South. As it was, he is quoted as saying shortly before his death that if he HAD known what was going to happen to Virginia and the South at the hands of the occupying forces, he and his men would have fought to the death before surrendering at Appomattox (see below) – and wouldn’t that have been a nice bit of history to appear in the books!

“Governor, if I had foreseen the use those people designed to make of their victory, there would have been no surrender at Appomattox Courthouse; no sir, not by me. Had I foreseen these results of subjugation, I would have preferred to die at Appomattox with my brave men, my sword in my right hand.”

General Lee to Governor Stockdale at the Greenbrier, White Sulpher Springs, Summer 1870

Chris, thanks for pointing that out. I knew that, but I’d completely forgotten about it, and just didn’t associate the two episodes. You’re correct, though.

Eric