Why Texans Fought in the Civil War

7. CONCLUSION

R 163 7 Conclusion Dear Home, I am going to leave you Maybe not to come again. I am going far to defend you Against a foe of wretched fame. Pleasant home, I hate to leave you, My support, my seeming life, My proudest spot, and only pleasure, For you I’ll fight the bloody strife. If life should leave me while in battle, Then O! Friends you need not weep, Peace will be my future nature— As it is with those that sleep. Weep not for me then sweet Mother, Then I’ll have a home afar— Then you will have a son in peace, And not, as now, a son in war. D. C. Nance, 12th Texas Cavalry I N the summer of 1860, J. P. Johnson, a fourteen-year-old Texan, looked into the sky along with thousands of others and saw “the big comet” that “lighted up the earth, almost equal to the moon.” Emotions overflowed across the country, stirring “a good deal of excitement.” Was this an omen for the years to come? “There was a great deal of superstition then, and every one believed it a fore-warning to every one. Then the war fever broke out, and lasted through out the winter.” The prophecy came true in the spring, and Johnson joined the 1st Texas Partisan Rangers when he came of age.1 The Civil War took its toll on all Americans. Death touched every family; destruction of the South’s roads, bridges, buildings, and homes created economic and physical hardship on its people, and emancipation forced Southerners to pay the price for the sin of slavery through the loss of wealth and the realization that the social structure of the South and the United States would never be the same. Texans, to an extent, experienced this transformation of their region and had to suffer the stigma of defeat, forcing the soldiers to reevaluate their 164 Chapter 7 participation in such a terrifying ordeal. Unlike those of other Southern states, Texas homes remained untouched by Union armies and their families relatively intact. Texans did feel defeat; obviously the Union won and the men did not return home as victors. But they did fulfill their main goal of defending their communities in the Lone Star State, granting them a degree of success. Though historians such as Barry Crouch and Carl Moneyhon have examined the immediate aftereffects of the Civil War on the Texas population, their conclusions vary, ranging from Crouch’s conclusion that Texans were defiant during Reconstruction since the war never reached their doorstep to Moneyhon’s that Texans did feel defeated at the conclusion of war but quickly renewed their lives as best they could. Despite these conclusions, Texans celebrated their contribution to the war, especially the fact that the Lone Star State remained largely unspoiled by Union invasion. A strong expression of this fact came in 1876 during the centennial celebration of the United States. During the revelry, states dedicated monuments and artworks commemorating an important event, person, or aspect of their histories during the years between 1776 and 1876. Despite the rich history of Texas from Spanish times, the Texas Revolution, and the frontier, the Lone Star State commissioned a painting of Brig. Gen. Thomas Green in his Confederate uniform.Today this seems an odd choice, for several reasons. First, Texans would expect a painting of the Alamo or one of the founding fathers— Stephen F. Austin or Sam Houston. Second, if the Civil war was the focus, one might expect a representation of the most famed Texan unit in the Civil War, Hood’s Texas Brigade. Why not choose an officer from Hood’s Texas Brigade or Terry’s Texas Rangers or other famed Texans such as Benjamin McCulloch or Albert Sidney Johnston? The answer is simple enough: Green participated in and thus is a physical representation of most of the major events in Texas history: the Texas Revolution, the Mexican-American War, battles of the Texas Rangers, and most notably the Civil War. Of all the Texans serving in the latter conflict, Green remained behind and tried to expand the borders of the state in the New Mexico Campaign as colonel of the 5th Texas Mounted Rifles, he became the savior of Galveston, and he made the ultimate sacrifice in the defense of the Lone Star State during the Red River Campaign. Essentially, Green was present at all the major threats to the Lone Star State. Instead of...