The Spirit Divided: Memoirs of Civil War Chaplains-The Confederacy / Edition 1

by John W Brinsfield Jr

Overview

In this anthology of Civil War memoirs, we get a clearer impression of some of the chaplains who served during that Great Conflict. Chaplains were among the most omnipresent observers on the battlefield, and some wrote extensively about their experiences. Eighty-seven of the 3,695 chaplains who served in both armies wrote regimental histories or published personal memoirs, not counting a multitude of letters and more than 300 official reports. Yet, there has never been an extensive collection of memoirs from chaplains of both the Confederate and Union armies presented together. In this groundbreaking work, many of the Confederate chaplains write that they opposed secession and submitted to it only when war was inevitable. Moreover, some of the ministers who became chaplains were active in ministry to black slaves. They spoke out against the neglect and abuse of those held in bondage both before and during the war. For example, Reverend John L. Girardeau formed a large mission church for slaves in Charleston, South Carolina, before the war; Reverend Isaac Tichenor criticized the abuses of the slave system before the Alabama Legislature in 1863; and Chaplain Charles Oliver preached to black laborers in the Army of Northern Virginia in 1864 with the thought that more needed to be done for them. While these efforts may appear trivial in the face of the enormity of the entire slave system, they do reflect that a social conscience was not completely lacking among the Southern chaplains. From the battlefield to the pulpit, Confederate chaplains were surprising and complex individuals. For the first time, explore this aspect of the great struggle in each chaplain’s own words.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780865549647
Publisher:	Mercer University Press
Publication date:	03/27/2006
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	6.34(w) x 9.26(h) x 1.13(d)

About the Author

Dr. John Wesley Brinsfield is the Chaplain Corps historian at the Army Chaplain School, Ft. Jackson, South Carolina. He has degrees from Vanderbilt, Emory, Yale, and Drew universities and was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow at Mansfield College, Oxford. He is the author or co-author of seven books and more than twenty journal and newspaper articles.

Table of Contents

Preface IX

Acknowledgments XIII

Introduction: A Troubling Summons 1

Chapter 1. Reporting for Duty: Memoirs, 1860–1862 9

“I would preserve the Union,” Letters of Professor James P. Boyce of

the Southern Baptist Seminary, Greenville, South Carolina

“I am now en route for Richmond,” Letters of Chaplain James M.

Campbell, 1st Georgia Infantry Regiment

“I was elected chaplain,” Chaplain Charles T. Quintard, 1st Tennessee

Infantry Regiment

“I left my little church,” Chaplain George G. Smith, Phillips Georgia

Legion

Chapter 2. Ministry in the Camps: Memoirs, 1863–1864 36

“Why am I here?” Chaplain William F. F. Broaddus, Post Chaplain at

Charlottesville, Virginia

“Trying It On,” Reminiscences of Chaplain Charles Holt Dobbs, 12th

Mississippi Infantry Regiment

Chapter 3. Ministry on Campaigns: Memoirs, 1862–1864 95

“Letter to Attorney General T. H. Watts,” Chaplain I. T. Tichenor,

17th Alabama Infantry Regiment

“Reminiscences of the Battle of Shiloh,” Chaplain I. T. Tichenor.

Chancellorsville and Gettysburg: the diary of Chaplain Francis Milton

Kennedy, 28th North Carolina Infantry Regiment

Field Hospital at Chancellorsville, Father James B. Sheeran, 14th

Louisiana Infantry Regiment

Spotsylvania, 1864, the journal of Chaplain Charles James Oliver,

Cabell’s Artillery Battalion

The Fall of Atlanta, Chaplain Thomas Deavenport, 3rd Tennessee

Infantry Regiment

Chapter 4. Ministries of Revival and Encouragement:

Memoirs, 1862–1863 183

“Revivals in the Lower Valley,” Chaplain J. William Jones, 13th

Virginia Infantry Regiment

“By the aid of the Spirit they preached with power,” Letter from

Chaplain Asa M. Marshall, 12th Georgia Infantry Regiment

“The Lord poured out His Spirit,” Letter from Chaplain John J.

Hyman, 49th Georgia Infantry Regiment

“Stonewall Jackson and the Revival of Religion,” Chaplain Robert L.

Dabney, 18th Virginia Infantry Regiment and Jackson’s Staff

“Fast-Day Sermon,” 21 August 1863, First Baptist Church,

Montgomery. Rev. I. T. Tichenor

Chapter 5. Ministry at the End: Memoirs, 1864–1865 223

“We are building shanties,” Letter from Rev. Atticus G. Haygood,

formerly chaplain of the 15th Georgia Infantry Regiment

“Have you burned all our towns?” The Reverend James D. Anthony and

General Sherman in Sandersville

“Lee Had Surrendered!” Chaplain A. D. Betts, 30th and 17th North

Carolina Infantry Regiments

“The sound of the last cannon has died,” Chaplain Thomas W. Caskey,

Meridian, Mississippi

Chapter 6. Building a New South: Memoirs, 1871–1880 254

“Hold Your Ground!” Address at Magnolia Cemetery in Charleston.

Rev. John L. Girardeau, Former Chaplain of the 23rd South Carolina

Infantry Regiment

“The New South,” A Thanksgiving Sermon, Atticus G. Haygood,

President of Emory College

Bibliography 295

Index 301