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LESSON PLAN: Valor and Misery

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Summary

The full misery had come home to the soldiers now, many of whom were conscripts doing three years of service. "Between drills, we drill, and sometimes stop to eat a little," remarked one soldier. Life in the army camps, interrupted by ugly little luncheons of unappealing biscuit and stinking meat, brought the men's fervor back down to earth.

The shocking number of dead and the astounding number of diseased had created a large demand for nurses and medical care. Almost 350 field hospitals were erected by the Union; in the South the number was 150. Women, whose duties were sometimes as dangerous and frequently as taxing as their patients', volunteered as nurses. Several became heroines in their own right, and their contributions to the war effort remain unforgettable.

Blacks joined the war effort in the North, after being recruited in 1864. As many as 200,000, or ten percent of the Union army, engaged in battle. They fought in defense of their own freedom and that of their brothers and sisters in the South. Their courage was remarkable and their desertion rates below the average. Meanwhile, the war dragged on as the Union struggled to find a competent military leader.


Questions for Discussion

1. Fredericksburg

  • Where was Fredericksburg, and why was the Union army passing through it? (The city was on the way to Richmond, the capital of the Confederacy.) Who had the advantage there? (General Lee. Burnside's river crossing gave Lee time to amass his entire army there.)
  • Why did soldiers advance against an enemy line that seemed unbreakable? How often did soldiers use their bayonets? Explain.
  • Describe the contrast between the scene at Marye's Heights during the day and during the night.

2. Camp Life

  • Describe some of the discomforts many of the soldiers had to face.
  • Why was disease common and sometimes lethal during the war? Describe the conditions in the South that produced such high disease rates.
  • What kinds of food did the men eat? Why did the armies feed their soldiers this kind of food? What might a soldier expect to find living in his food?

3. Women in the War

  • List ways in which the Civil War was also a women's war.
  • With the men "off to war," what new roles did women at home assume? Describe some of the adjustments you think men and women must have made when soldiers returned from the war.
  • What were some of the essential tasks that women helped with in the Civil War?
  • Would you have wanted to be in these women's shoes during the war? Why or why not?

4. African-Americans and the War

  • Why did Frederick Douglass describe blacks as "the pivot" in the war?
  • Describe some of the arguments made for and against enlisting blacks in the Union armies.
  • What reasons did people use to explain why blacks would not make good soldiers.
  • How did blacks feel about fighting for the Union?

5. Hospitals

  • What were women's contributions in field hospitals? What could volunteers do for soldiers during the war?
  • What kinds of patients did hospitals take in?
  • Why did more soldiers die in hospitals than on the battlefield?


Activities

  1. The Civil War was only one of many wars in which women achieved fame. Florence Nightingale became renowned in the same era for her work in the Crimean War; she later helped to found the International Red Cross. Review the segment Women and the War. Divide the class into groups and ask students to brainstorm and discuss ways to honor these women of war. Each group should try to list at least five ideas.

  2. Discuss the work performed by nurses. What kinds of tasks were they responsible for? How did these women exhibit leadership qualities? Have students pair up to write a job description for a Civil War nurse. What skills, talents, interests, etc., might be required of applicants? What other qualities might be useful? You might help students with the project by locating sample job descriptions. Short versions can often be found in local newspapers.

  3. Display students' work on the wall and discuss the results. To conclude, students might write job applications and conduct interviews. Other job descriptions and applications students might write are: spy; engineer; cook; surgeon; photographer.

  4. Over four-hundred women took part in the Civil War, not as nurses, but disguised as (male) soldiers or as spies. Discuss the reasons women were not allowed to serve as soldiers. Is this still true today? Show students the photograph of Francis Clalin dressed as a soldier. Is her disguise convincing? How might a woman spy have gotten information from the enemy? What kinds of information would women spies probably try to get from the enemy? Invite students in the class to stage a dramatization or write journal entries based on the excerpts from the letters.

  5. If you wish to make hardtack for the class, here's a recipe:

    3 cups milk (dry or evaporated milk will do)
    6 tsps brown sugar
    3 tsps salt
    8 cups flour (non-rising, all purpose, white)
    12 tbsp shortening

    Mix all ingredients thoroughly (a huge pan is a help). Roll the dough on lightly floured board to 1/2 inch thickness. Cut the dough into 3-inch squares. Punch 3/8 inch holes in the dough, in a row pattern of 3-2-3. Place squares on a greased cookie sheet. Place the cookie sheet in oven heated to 400 degrees. Cook for 30 minutes

    The hardtack served to soldiers was given many nicknames, among them: "teeth-dullers," "sheet-iron crackers," and "worm castles." It was served in cookie-sized squares sometimes an inch-and-a-half thick. The desiccated vegetable cakes fared no better; "desecrated vegetables" and "baled hay" were the names reserved for them. Do students have nicknames for food served at school?

  6. Tell students that these were the foodstuffs most soldiers lived on throughout the course of the war. What were the advantages of serving this kind of food? Of transporting it? Keeping it fresh? Preparing and cooking it? You might ask students to research the nutritional value of hardtack, vegetable cakes, and other foods such as salt pork or beef, dried beans, corn meal, bacon grease, rice, coffee, salt, vinegar, and sugar.

    Ask students to identify some types of foods today that would meet the criteria demanded by the military: nutritional, unlikely to spoil, and easy to transport.

  7. About 211,000 Union troops were captured during the war; of these, 194,000 were sent to southern prisons. Thirty thousand died. 214,000 Confederates were imprisoned in the north, where 26,000 died. Andersonville prison was a particularly brutal residence for some 30,000 Union captives. Daily rations for the inmates were a teaspoon of salt, three tablespoons of beans, and a half pint of cornmeal. Many Union soldiers died before the camp was deserted by Confederate forces. Divide the class into groups. Explain to the class that prisoners died in camps because their basic needs were ignored. Ask students to work in their groups to create the kinds of standards they think prisons should conform to today.

  8. Was the Civil War the same for "Colored Troops" as for regular soldiers? In what way was the participation of blacks crucial to the Union? Ask students how the country can honor these soldiers today.

  9. While science today is expected to provide cures for many different diseases and illnesses, hygiene practices were still primitive during the time of the Civil War. How did the conditions that prevailed in hospital camps increase the likelihood of illnesses and diseases spreading among soldiers?

  10. Sibley tents were the first to become popular with the armies of the North and South. They were cone-shaped, reached eighteen feet across and twelve feet high. They slept twelve men comfortably but were often home to twenty. The air in these tents became thick with the accumulated and unpleasant odors of camp life. Over time, other types of accommodation were constructed, including log cabins and thatched huts. Take twenty students from the class and place them in an area eighteen feet across (round, not square). What would it be like to sleep for one night in this enclosure? For three years?


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