When Will This Cruel War Be Over? Read online

  Militarily, the South’s only goal was to repel what they considered the invasion from the North. They had the advantage of fighting on familiar terrain and the benefit of local support. However, this meant that Southern civilians suffered greatly as the war ravaged their land and destroyed their way of life. The Union Navy’s blockade of the coastline resulted in constant shortages of food, clothing, and medical supplies.

  Almost every Southern family lost at least one family member during the war.

  On the first day of January, 1863, President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, which stated that all slaves in the Confederate States were now free. This did not have much practical effect, since the South was not about to pay attention to a document issued by the enemy. But it did have great political impact because it officially declared that the war was being fought to put an end to slavery as well as to preserve the Union.

  By 1864 the Confederate army, commanded by General Robert E. Lee, had been weakened by battle losses. General Ulysses S. Grant, who commanded the Union armies, pressed his advantage, attacking Lee in Virginia. Their ensuing battles resulted in massive casualties on both sides. Still, a decisive victory eluded a determined Grant, and Lee maneuvered successfully and continued to rally his troops to fight on.

  Hoping to increase the pressure on Southern soldiers and civilians, Grant sent General William T. Sherman’s one hundred thousand-man army eastward to Atlanta, Georgia. After seizing Atlanta and leaving it in flames, Sherman began his “March to the Sea.” His men burned and destroyed nearly everything in their path as they advanced relentlessly to Savannah, up into North Carolina and on to Virginia to join Grant.

  In Virginia, Grant’s siege of Petersburg eventually forced the evacuation of Richmond, the Confederate capital. Lee had no choice but to face the military reality that the Southern cause was lost. He surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, on April 9, 1865.

  Tragically, only five days later, President Lincoln was assassinated. He never saw the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery forever, signed into law.

  A typical Southern plantation home.

  Slave quarters.

  The fashions of the 1860s were very ornate. Dressmakers often copied Parisian designs they found in illustrated magazines such as these. Southern girls and women wore fanciful silk-and-satin dresses with crinolines (to maintain the full skirt) to balls and other social gatherings.

  Girls wore specially designed costumes with narrower skirts for horseback riding. They sat sidesaddle, which was considered more ladylike.

  The title page from the first edition of Jane Eyre. One of the most popular English writers of the nineteenth century, Charlotte Brontë was also read in America during the Civil War. She published under the pseudonym Currer Bell — a man’s name — because at that time in history, critics and readers often dismissed women’s writing as inconsequential.

  Photographer Alexander Gardner captures a scene of daily life.

  Abraham Lincoln was president of the United States from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. His primary concern was the preservation of the Union. Before his inauguration, he said there would be “no bloodshed unless it is forced upon the government.”

  The second draft of the Gettysburg Address written in Lincoln’s own hand. Beginning with the famous words, “Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” it is only about two hundred seventy words long and captures the reasons the war was being fought.

  Thousands of boys who fought in the Civil War were between the ages of twelve and sixteen. Many of them recorded their experiences in journals and diaries.

  The Civil War was the first American war to be documented with photography. When pictures of the dead at Antietam Battlefield, like the one shown here, first arrived at Mathew Brady’s New York City studio, The New York Times reported, “Mr. Brady has done something to bring home to us the terrible reality and earnestness of war. If he has not brought bodies and laid them on our dooryards and along the streets, he has done something very like it….”

  Telegraph battery wagons such as this one near Petersburg, Virginia, made it possible for journalists to report on the war. It was not uncommon for people to learn about the deaths of loved ones from the newspapers.

  Weeping Sad and Lonely (When This Cruel War Is Over)

  Words by Charles C. Sawyer. Music by Henry Tucker.

  CHORUS

  Weeping sad and lonely,

  Hopes and fears how vain!

  (Yet praying,)

  When this cruel war is over,

  Praying that we meet again!

  VERSE 2.

  When the summer breeze

  is sighing

  Mournfully along;

  Or when autumn leaves

  are falling,

  Sadly breathes the song.

  Oft in dreams I see thee lying

  On the battle plain,

  Lonely, wounded, even dying,

  Calling but in vain. (Chorus)

  VERSE 3.

  If amid the din of battle,

  Nobly you should fall,

  Far away from those

  who love you,

  None to hear you call,

  Who would whisper

  words of comfort,

  Who would soothe your pain?

  Ah! the many cruel fancies

  Ever in my brain. (Chorus)

  VERSE 4.

  But our country called you, darling,

  Angels cheer your way;

  While our nation’s sons are fighting,

  We can only pray.

  Nobly strike for God and liberty,

  Let all nations see,

  How we love the starry banner,

  Emblem of the free. (Chorus)

  Though this song originated as a Union lament, the sorrow expressed in the lyrics was felt by people on both sides. The South soon adopted it and altered it to say, “Oh! how proud you stood before me / In your suit of gray, / when you vowed to me and country / Ne’er to go astray.”

  Modern map of the continental United States, showing the approximate location of Gordonsville. This map also shows which were Union states and which were Confederate.

  This detail of the South indicates the important battles of the Civil War.

  About the Author

  Barry Denenberg is an acclaimed nonfiction writer whose main interest is American history. Writing for the Dear America series was compelling to him because, “It allowed me to write history from the perspective of those who experienced it. Not the history made by politicians, but the history made by ordinary people during extraordinary times. History from the bottom up, not the top down.” Denenberg immersed himself in a wealth of material, concentrating on the diaries and letters of the time, sources not generally available to middle-grade readers.

  “The Civil War was a pivotal event in the history of the United States. It was the only war where Americans fought each other. Because the military activity took place overwhelmingly in the South, I decided to tell the story from the Southern perspective, a perspective that asks the question — as moving today as it was then — What is it like to have your world torn apart while war rages at your doorstep?” Setting the diary in Gordonsville, a small town in Virginia, enabled him to show the grave effects of the war on ordinary civilians.

  “While doing the research for When Will This Cruel War Be Over?“ he says, “I found I could, after a while, almost feel what it was like to be Emma Simpson. It is that experience that I hope comes through in her diary.”

  Mr. Denenberg’s nonfiction books include An American Hero: The True Story of Charles A. Lindbergh; Voices from Vietnam, a Booklist Editor’s Choice Book and an ALA Best Book for Young Adults; The True Story of J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI, a Junior Library Guild Selection; All Shook Up: The Life and Death of Elvis Presley; and Nelson Mandela: “
No Easy Walk to Freedom,” all published by Scholastic. When Will This Cruel War Be Over? was his first work of fiction for middle-grade readers. He lives in Bedford, New York, with his wife, Jean, and their daughter, Emma.

  Acknowledgments

  The author would like to thank the editorial, production, and design staffs at Scholastic for their painstaking efforts on his behalf. In particular, Tracy Mack, whose caring shines through on every page.

  Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to use the following:

  Cover portrait by Tim O’Brien.

  Cover background: Grant’s Great Campaign — Steven’s Battery at Cold Harbor, Library of Congress.

  The Old Westover House by Edward Lamson Henry, 1869, oil on paperboard, 11 1/4 x 14 5/8 inches, accession number 00.11, Gift of the American Art Association, The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

  Slave cabins, Library of Congress.

  Ladies’ fashion, winter 1866, North Wind Picture Archives, Alfred, Maine.

  Horseback riders. Wood cut, ibid.

  Title page of Jane Eyre, published by Smith, Elder and Co., Cornhill, 1847, London. From the Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations.

  The house of Mrs. Lee in Pleasant Valley, Maryland, Gardner’s Photographic Sketch Book of the Civil War, Dover Publications, Inc., Mineola, New York.

  Abraham Lincoln, photographed by Matthew B. Brady, from Mr. Lincoln’s Camera Man: Matthew B. Brady, ibid.

  The Gettysburg Address, Library of Congress.

  Edwin Francis Jennison, private in a Georgia infantry regiment, ibid.

  Dead soldiers in front of Dunker Church at Antietam, ibid.

  U.S. telegraph battery wagon, ibid.

  Music and lyrics to “Weeping Sad and Lonely (When This Cruel War Is Over),” from Songs of the Civil War, Dover Publications, Inc., Mineola, New York.

  Map by Jim McMahon.

  Map by Heather Saunders.

  Other books in the Dear America series

  Copyright

  While the events described and some of the characters in this book may be based on actual historical events and real people, Emma Simpson is a fictional character, created by the author, and her diary and its epilogue are works of fiction.

  Copyright © 1996 by Barry Denenberg

  Cover design by Elizabeth B. Parisi

  Cover portrait by Tim O’Brien, © 2011 Scholastic Inc.

  Cover background: Library of Congress

  All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC, DEAR AMERICA, and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the earlier hardcover edition as follows: Denenberg, Barry. When will this cruel war be over? : the Civil War diary of Emma Simpson, Gordonsville, Virginia, 1864 / by Barry Denenberg. p. cm. — (Dear America; 1) Summary: The diary of a fictional fourteen-year-old girl living in Virginia, in which she describes the hardships endured by her family and friends during one year of the Civil War. ISBN 0-590-22862-5 (alk. paper) 1. United States. — History — Civil War, 1861–1865 —Juvenile fiction. [1. United States. — History — Civil War, 1861–1865 — Fiction. 2. Diaries — Fiction. 3. Virginia — Fiction.] I. Title. II. Series. PZ7.D4135Wh 1996 [Fic] — dc20 95-25540 CIP AC

  This edition first printing, April 2011

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  eISBN 978-0-545-41502-6