Abraham Lincoln statues

[David Lockmiller]

(12-30-2020 05:16 PM)Mylye2222 Wrote:  On the Lincoln Boston statue.

The main issue isn't Abe himself, it's the black man's posture below him. We over there understand it's a representation of what happened when Lincoln visited Richmond after its fall. Former enslaved men and women were so happy to meet him that some kneeled before him, to this Lincoln asked them to go back on their feets and said they'd better kneel before God for their freedom. By this he showed he was not their master, only their Chief Executive.

But, unfortunately the New Left lacks culture. For someone who don't know and believe the Richmond account, the plain sight of a black man knelt before a white head of state seems offensive.

I emphasize with the point of wiew, although I think they should get some reading first to contextualize.

It took more than President Abraham Lincoln to win freedom for America's slaves, much more:

Returning promptly to Washington, Grant established his headquarters with the Army of the Potomac, at Culpepper, and for about a month actively pushed his military preparations.

He seems at first to have been impressed with a dread that the President might wish to influence or control his plans. But the few interviews between them removed the suspicion and all doubt on this point vanished, when, on the last day of April, Mr. Lincoln sent him the following explicit letter:

"Not expecting to see you again before the spring campaign opens, I wish to express in this way my entire satisfaction with what you have done up to this time, so far as I understand it. The particulars of your plan I neither know nor seek to know. You are vigilant and self-reliant; and, pleased with this, I wish not to obtrude any constraints or restraints upon you. While I am very anxious that any great disaster or capture of our men in great numbers shall be avoided, I know these points are less likely to escape your attention than they would be mine. If there is anything wanting which is within my power to give, do not fail to let me know it. And now, with a brave army and a just cause, may God sustain you."

Grant's immediate reply confessed the groundlessness of his apprehensions:

"From my first entrance into the volunteer service of the country to the present day, I have never had cause of complaint, have never expressed or implied a complaint against the administration, or the Secretary of War, for throwing any embarrassment in the way of my vigorously prosecuting what appeared to me my duty. Indeed, since the promotion which placed me in command of all the armies, and in view of the great responsibility and importance of success, I have been astonished at the readiness with which everything asked for has been yielded, without even an explanation being asked. Should my success be less than I desire and expect, the least I can say is, the fault is not with you."

The Union army under Grant, one hundred and twenty-two thousand strong, on April 30, was encamped north of the Rapidan River. The Confederate army under Lee, numbering sixty-two thousand, lay south of that stream. Nearly three years before, these opposing armies had fought their first battle of Bull Run, only a comparatively short distance north of where they now confronted each other. Campaign and battle between them had surged far to the north and to the south, but neither could as yet claim over the other any considerable gain of ground or of final advantage in the conflict. Broadly speaking, relative advance and retreat, as well as relative loss and gain of battle-fields substantially balanced each other.

Severe as had been their struggles in the past, a more arduous trial of strength was before them. Grant had two to one in numbers; Lee the advantage of a defensive campaign. He could retire toward cumulative reserves, and into prepared fortifications; knew almost by heart every road, hill, and forest of Virginia; had for his friendly scout every white inhabitant. Perhaps his greatest element of strength lay in the conscious pride of the Confederate army that through all fluctuations of success and failure, it had for three years effectually barred the way of the Army of the Potomac to Richmond. But to offset this there now menaced it what was before absent in every encounter, the grim, unflinching will of the new Union commander.

General Grant devised no plan of complicated strategy for the problem before him, but proposed to solve it by plain, hard, persistent fighting. He would endeavor to crush the army of Lee before it could reach Richmond or unite with the army of Johnston; or, failing in that, he would shut it up in that stronghold and reduce it by a siege. With this in view, he instructed Meade at the very outset: "Lee's army will be your objective point. Where Lee goes, there you will go, also."

Everything being ready, on the night of May 4, 1864, Meade threw five bridges across the Rapidan, and before the following night the whole Union army, with its trains, was across the stream moving southward by the left flank, past the right flank of the Confederates.


Emily, I very much like your phrasing: "By this he showed he was not their master, only their Chief Executive."