David Blight Race And Reunion Summary

From the ashes of the Civil War, rose a unified nation still embroiled with one another over memory. David Blight argues in Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory that “Some of the real war, and much of an imagined one, was already getting into the books.” In his argument, Blight demonstrates the distinction between history and memory. For instance, the tendency for publishers to only publish works that depicted the War has heroic rather than reporting on the harsh conditions of the prison camps, had a profound effect on memory. Therefore, as veterans and authors laid down their respective weapons and begin a new, equally fierce battle of words.
As veterans of both the blue and grey replaced bullets with words, a new distinction from history and memory formed. Publishing magazines like Century actively solicited veterans, in particular, officers, to write personal accounts of key battles. However, Century’s editors refused to publish any gruesome pieces depicting battlefield carnage. They strove to further the notion of brotherhood by publishing stories that highlighted shared hardships. By soliciting rank-and-file, officers and high-ranking generals to write for them, the magazine achieved two important goals: a complete soldiers’ account of the war (history) and the spread of reconciliationism (memory). “The Century editors,” Blight
In the memoir, Davis asserted that blacks “increased from a few unprofitable savages to millions of efficient Christian laborers.” Therefore, Jefferson and many other Lost Cause sympathizers, believed that Civil War had nothing to do with slavery and everything to with states’ rights. Jefferson’s quote speaks to the larger argument that slaves supported their old way of life. Blight demonstrates the significance of Southern memory in regards