James Longstreet and the Lost Cause
The Post-War Attacks on Robert E. Lee's Old War Horse
Jul 30, 2009 William L. Wunder
After the Civil War, the Radical Republicans in Congress wanted to make sure black rights were protected and that the old Confederate regime didn't reclaim local power. They passed the Reconstruction Acts in 1867 which established five military districts in the south and required southern states to adopt new constitutions that provided black suffrage and citizenship. Southern reaction was intensely negative.
Republicans and Reconstruction
One way that negativity was channelled was through the Lost Cause movement. Its philosophy held that southern society was superior to the north in morals and culture. The only reason it lost the Civil War was because of the north's advantage in numbers of soldiers and material, and some instances of Confederate incompetence. When the hatred of Republicans and Reconstruction was added, General Longstreet became the Lost Cause's perfect scapegoat.
Longstreet, in the cotton business in New Orleans in 1867, wrote letters to the local newspaper urging southerners to submit and "comply with the requirements of the recent Congressional legislation." He also concluded that the best chance to preserve the south was to cooperate with Republicans in order to control the black vote. Longstreet was villified by southerners and was forced to flee New Orleans. He was further reviled when he publicly endorsed Ulysses S. Grant for president in 1868.
After Grant became president, he named Longstreet surveyor of customs in New Orleans. Longstreet became embroiled in Louisiana politics and was commander of the state militia and police in New Orleans when he confronted the Crescent City White League on September 14, 1873. The White League, a Democratic organization made up of former Confederate soldiers, conducted an armed attack in New Orleans and chased away Longstreet's men, which included black militia. Federal troops later restored order.
Gettysburg
Not only did southerners attack Longstreet politically, they attacked him historically. Jubal Early, a leader of the Southern Historical Society, which was mostly made up of Virginia Confederate officers, began the assault with a speech in 1872. He exonerated Lee of mistakes at the battle of Gettysburg, at odds with Longstreet's criticisms of Lee in an 1865 newspaper interview. Early shifted the blame to the non-Virginian Longstreet, who did not attack promptly on the second day and led the failed Pickett's Charge on the third day.
Lee's nephew, Fitzhugh Lee, concurred, "His disobedience of orders in failing to march at once with his command then present, many believe, lost to Lee the battle of Gettysburg. With a corps commander who knew the value of time, obeyed orders with promptness and without argument, Lee's movement on Meade's left could have commenced at seven or eight o'clock a.m..."
Concerning Pickett's Charge, Walter Taylor, of Lee's staff, insisted that Lee intended to use all three divisions of Longstreet's corps. Longstreet unaccountably held two of his divisions back to protect his already secured right flank. Taylor doubted Lee would send George Pickett's division virtually alone in the charge.
Longstreet defended himself through a series of magazine articles and a memoir. These failed to turn the tide of opinion against him. Longstreet's political naiveness, thinking southerners would take to his views, made him vulnerable to attacks on his war record. The Lost Cause wanted the "Marble Man" Robert E. Lee to be perfect, therefore some other high ranking officer had to be the fall guy.
Sources:
Gallagher, Gary W. ed, The Third Day at Gettysburg and Beyond, University of North Carolina Press: Chapel Hill, 1994.
Lee, Fitzhugh, General Lee: A Biography of Robert E. Lee, Da Capo: New York, 1994.
Wert, Jeffry D., General James Longstreet: The Confederacy's Most Controversial Soldier, Simon and Schuster: New York, 1993.
James Longstreet, after the Civil War
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