In school, I loved reading about history and social studies. I grew up in California, so much of what I read about the Civil War made me think that this was a conflict far away from where I lived. I didn’t really understand the significance of the events and the eventual outcome. I’ve lived in the South for many years now, and as you might imagine, I have a vastly different view of the events that many people here still refer to as the “War of Northern Aggression.”
I’ve visited several battlefields like Gettysburg (where this photo of Lincoln greets visitors), Appomattox, Chickamauga, Manassas, and others. Each visit to these locations brings the Civil War to life for me. Suddenly, it isn’t represented by a page in a school history book, but rather where tens of thousands of people just like me died for a cause they really believed in. I stood on the very land they all fought for.
Living in the State of Tennessee as I do, I have learned some fascinating facts about what happened here during the Civil War. While Tennessee was the last state to secede from the Union to become a part of the Confederacy, it was also the first Confederate State to be readmitted to the Union in 1866. Before Tennessee’s secession from the Union, people in Scott County (about 60 miles from where I live) voted to secede from the state. They formed the “Free and Independent State of Scott,” which lasted until the end of the conflict. Now that took guts, and I didn’t even know it happened.
Are we there yet? 