Ghosts of the Confederacy: Defeat, the Lost Cause and the Emergence of the New South, 1865-1913

by Gaines M. Foster

After Lee and Grant met at Appomatox Court House in 1865 to sign the document ending the long and bloody Civil War, the South at last had to face defeat as the dream of a Confederate nation melted into the Lost Cause. Through an examination of memoirs, personal papers, and postwar Confederate rituals such as memorial day observances, monument unveilings, and veterans' reunions, Ghosts of the Confederacy probes into how white southerners adjusted to and interpreted their defeat and explores the cultural implications of a central event in American history. Foster argues that, contrary to southern folklore, southerners actually accepted their loss, rapidly embraced both reunion and a New South, and helped to foster sectional reconciliation and an emerging social order. He traces southerners' fascination with the Lost Cause--showing that it was rooted as much in social tensions resulting from rapid change as it was in the legacy of defeat--and demonstrates that the public
celebration of the war helped to make the South a deferential and conservative society. Although the ghosts of the Confederacy still haunted the New South, Foster concludes that they did little to shape behavior in it--white southerners, in celebrating the war, ultimately trivialized its memory, reduced its cultural power, and failed to derive any special wisdom from defeat.

Genres: History, Civil War, American History, American Civil War, Nonfiction, American

306 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

Reviews

[Cherisse]

Interesting and informative, this work says much about the shifting, decreasing, and resurging meanings of the Confederacy and the "Lost Cause" over time. Although Foster's work covers the years 1865 to 1913, you can definitely draw parallels between that time period and some Americans' recent calls for secession following President Obama's reelection.

[Tyler · Rating 4 out of 5]

During my days as an Auburn graduate student, I bought this book for an essay I was writing on the Civil War in American memory. In reappraising it now, I find the book to be a thoughtful explanation of how and why southerners remembered the war during the half century that followed General Lee's surrender. Author Gaines Foster states that in reflecting on the conflict, southerners considered their cause just and legal. They believed that Confederate armies fought primarily for constitutional rights and not for slavery. They hailed the martial spirit of Confederate soldiers and believed that these soldiers had only lost because they had been confronted by overwhelming numbers on the other side. At the same time, though, southerners accepted that their dream of an independent republic was no more and that they would have to seek reconciliation with the Union. Foster makes an especially thought provoking observation when he reflects on why southerners remembered the war in this way. He argues that they created monuments and joined organizations related to the war because they wanted to preserve a sense of community that would help them deal with the social changes of the late nineteenth century. During a time when the southern U.S. was developing more industries and being integrated into the national economy more than ever before, southerners worried that their peers were becoming too obsessed with personal profit. Thus southerners "relished the memory of their self-sacrifice during the war, when money meant little and the common good almost everything," in Foster's words. Although the writing is a bit dry, Foster makes an intriguing argument about the memory of the war and what southerners gained from employing it, despite their defeat.

[Monte Lamb · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an academic book on how the South dealt with their defeat in the Civil War. It goes through each period and how the people changed their attitudes on the war. There was generally a transition from spite for the North to cooperation while developing a rationalized meaning to the war, how it began, and why they lost. Slavery was not accepted as the reason for the war. Robert E. Lee was deified and the South only lost to superior resources and manpower. The book tells the story but it is really dry in style with more footnotes than I have ever experienced in a book. This book is not for popular reading, but better suited for the classroom.

[Christopher Moore · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book really helped me on my Southern Redemption Period paper for my Civil War & Reconstruction class this semester. It goes over extensively about the Lost Cause mentality from the years of Reconstruction up to the start of World War One.

[Maddie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for comprehensive exams

[Catherine Hutinett]

Reading for comps, a great look at the state of public memory studies in the 1980s, but better works exist now (Karen Cox, Nina Silber)

[NDH · Rating 4 out of 5]

There’s a very good book in there, maybe 3 or 4, and I suspect that a little more vigorous editorial oversight would have improved this one tremendously. At the same time, this one is very good, history the way it’s supposed to be written—with copious footnotes(1)—and not too much in the way of authorial eccentricities, some of which seem to raise their bizarre heads with some frequency. I’m thinking in particular of the author’s periodic descent into what might be called psycho babble, although perhaps the temptation to psychoanalyze the long-dead is irresistible. Those old veterans’ overwhelming need to be reassured of their masculinity strikes me as somewhat lacking in explanatory power, while Varina Ann Davis’ kissing a furled confederate flag to reassure them of their manhood seems a bit…Freudian. Sometimes a flag is just a flag, not a banana.
Be that as it may, I also think the book would benefit by a clear definition of what the New South is, or was. I have some impressions, but from 1913 to 2023 is a long time, and the term needs some boundaries.

I first tried reading this book in the late 80s, not long after it came out, and as best I can tell, I gave up after two chapters. In rereading today, I can say that those first two chapters were the worst. From there to the end it gets better. Very good actually, and has spawned in me an interest in exploring several topics that I realize I don’t know enough about. (What the hell was the Spanish-American War all about anyway?)
I also wonder about things such as similarities between the post-civil war South and German (or Japanese) society in the aftermath of defeat. Has anyone written such a book? And how did the South avoid the path taken by Germany after WWI, when 15 years after (ie 1933) it had a madman leading it, hellbent on giving war another go? I can’t imagine the South doing something similar in, say, 1880.
Finally, the last chapter…a lot of names of long-forgotten academics arguing. It didn’t really grab my attention, while there’s the whole Southern Agrarian movement in literature out of Vanderbilt in the 20s and 30s that begs for attention. Maybe there’s another book to be written, or for me to seek out.
Still this is good history. Foster has waded through more obscure original source material than anyone should ever have to. The use of anecdotes to illustrate a point always bothers me a bit (since I don’t know what anecdotes were ignored as being inconsistent with the preferred narrative), while the use of obscure statistics always makes me wonder if there aren’t other statistics that could equally well disprove the preferred narrative.
It’s a dilemma.
Last thought: maybe it’s time for a new revised edition of this book with a lengthy foreword by the author addressing the current movement to topple statues around the country.
The book was stimulating and thought-provoking, as you can see.

(1) However, footnote 37 in chapter 10, which references “Negara; The Theatre State in 19th Century Bali,” has me mystified.

[Rae · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read for a class. I found this book interesting historically but the writing was annoying. I felt like the author repeated himself, saying the same thing in three different ways in three different paragraphs. He also seemed to have a difficult time taking a position and sticking with it. He was wishy washy. It wore me down. I only finished it because I had to...

[Straw · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really dry writing style; however, there were some important points made about the enshrinement of Confederate legend by that generation. If only we had the numbers and Longstreet had been a timely gentleman.

[Sean Chick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dry and I do not agree with the overall conclusion, that the Lost Cause is not all that important, but Foster does not mince words and his interpretations are challenging and thoughtful.