A recurring question in Chandra Manning’s What This Cruel War Was Over is “why did the common soldier take up arms and fight in the war?” Manning purposes that the reason common men took up arms was to either defend or abolish the southern institution of slavery. I am not convinced that soldiers took up arms specifically for this reason, but that the were compelled by some inner sense of Patriotism or “Right.”
Manning establishes her argument through the use of many primary sources including letters written by soldiers in both the Union and Confederate armies. Manning writes that the union soldiers were bound by the common belief that slavery was a morally corrupt institution of the South that needed to be abolished. On page 49 Manning writes about how this belief of the Union soldiers was cemented through interactions with slaves and experiencing the atrocities of slavery first hand. It is to be noted that Manning identifies a change in the beliefs of the Union soldiers about how blacks should be treated. In the beginning of the war she states that the Union soldiers fought to preserve the morals of society and to simply free blacks, while near the end of the war the Union soldiers were fighting for something closer to equality for the Slaves.
One argument of Manning’s that I did not totally agree with was one of her reasons why Southern Soldiers fought. I was not convinced by the argument that Southerners fought to preserve their social standing. While I believe that Influential Southerners did support the war for economic reasons and the risk of losing property, I am not convinced that this is why the common Southern soldier fought. I do not feel that any non-slaveholding Southern man felt like he was any less of a man after the slaves were freed. I believe that this explanation is not complete. I believe that Southern men fought because they believed it was their duty to protect their homes and communities.
Manning’s argument that the common man fought the Civil War over Slavery is not enough for me. I believe that a man stands up and fights to defend what he believes is right. While slavery may have contributed, I believe that the reason men on both sides fought was for their communities. Both sides had much to lose in the Civil War, to merely write off why men fought, as over slavery is doing a disservice to the soldiers who fought and died in the Civil war. I can assure you that once the Minie balls began flying the common soldier was thinking of his loved ones back home not the slaves on a rich man’s plantation.
Ross, I do think you’re right that if all Manning said was that “the common man fought the Civil War over Slavery,” that wouldn’t be a very satisfying answer. It would be an oversimplification. But is that all Manning says? She agrees with you that defending their homes and communities was important to Southern men (and presumably to Union men, too?). But the sources she uncovered suggested that they often, if not always or in every case, saw defending slavery as an essential part of defending their homes and communities. As Stephanie and Adam both point out in different ways, for the soldiers Manning looked at, defending homes and defending slavery were not necessarily incompatible.
Now, it is possible to argue that for Southern soldiers, defending their homes and families from attack by Union soldiers was most important to them and trumped all other motivations. But if you take that position, then you also have to explain why Southern men continued to fight even when they were disillusioned about the protection that the CSA government was providing for their families and even when they feared that being away in battle was exposing the homefront to danger. By looking at the sources themselves, Manning argues that Confederate persistence, even in the face of disillusionment and worries about their families, can be traced to their belief that after 1863, a Union victory threatened their families by promising to abolish slavery permanently.
That argument may not be foolproof, of course; there may be good reasons to disagree with it. Alex, for example, has some criticisms of Manning’s source base. One thing that makes his criticism strong is that he points directly to the evidence and raising questions about it, instead of arguing primarily from what it seems like soldiers would be motivated by.