Catholic Confederates: Faith and Duty in the Civil War South

by Gracjan Kraszewski

How did Southern Catholics, under international religious authority and grounding unlike Southern Protestants, act with regard to political commitments in the recently formed Confederacy? How did they balance being both Catholic and Confederate? How is the Southern Catholic Civil War experience similar or dissimilar to the Southern Protestant Civil War experience? What new insights might this experience provide regarding Civil War religious history, the history of Catholicism in America, 19th-century America, and Southern history in general?


For the majority of Southern Catholics, religion and politics were not a point of tension. Devout Catholics were also devoted Confederates, including nuns who served as nurses; their deep involvement in the Confederate cause as medics confirms the all-encompassing nature of Catholic involvement in the Confederacy, a fact greatly underplayed by scholars of Civil war religion and American Catholicism. Kraszewski argues against an “Americanization” of Catholics in the South and instead coins the term “Confederatization” to describe the process by which Catholics made themselves virtually indistinguishable from their Protestant neighbors.


The religious history of the South has been primarily Protestant. Catholic Confederates simultaneously fills a gap in Civil War religious scholarship and in American Catholic literature by bringing to light the deep impact Catholicism has had on Southern society even in the very heart of the Bible Belt.

Genres: History

312 pages, Hardcover

First published April 28, 2020

Reviews

[Michael Astfalk · Rating 3.5 out of 5]

Catholic Confederates: Faith and Duty in the Civil War South by Gracjan Kraszewski studies the involvement of Catholics in the Southern Confederacy and how the Catholic faith influenced individual Catholic Confederates as well as the diplomatic strategies of the Confederacy at large. The central thesis of Kraszewki's work is that, long before wider Americanization of Catholics in the 20th c., the Catholic Church had already grown deep roots in the American South during the 19th c. as the Church spread from Maryland as well as through the acquisitions of French Louisiana and Spanish Florida, which brought with them their own Catholic culture. The result was an identification of Catholics living in the South with a Southern national identity that they deeply held second only to their faith, a process that Kraszewksi terms "Confederatization". This can be observed through the sympathies and diplomatic actions of Southern bishops, the battlefield chaplaincy of priests, the medical ministry of the Sisters of Charity in the South, and the devotion and service of laymen in the Southern army.

Kraszewski's research is undoubtedly valuable in bringing to light an area of the Civil War that I have not seen detailed elsewhere. Kraszewski's writing is generally engaging and informative, although I did find more typos than I would normally expect from a university publication. For my own studies on the Civil War, I believe the book has bettered my knowledge of Southern diplomacy towards the end of the war as well as how religious belief, particularly Catholic belief, influenced soldiers and politicians in the Confederacy.

There are a few things that I think could have been expanded on. The book mentions Southern values and Southern culture multiple times, but does not explain or expand on what this would have meant for Confederates outside of the issue of slavery. The lives of many of the historical figures can also be hard to piece together and keep track of. I was particularly interested in Henri Garidel and Felix Poche, two soldiers who were devout Catholics, Confederates, and family men, however their stories are interespersed throughout the book and the full narrative of their wartime experiences is never fully laid out. Kraszewski does seem to do a better job with some of the more prominent figures though, such as Father Bannon, Bishop Elder, and Bishop Lynch. I also have to acknowledge here that Kraszewki's stated intention is not to provide biographies of any of these characters. I thought there would be more about Catholic Confederate generals and politicians. Kraszewski mentions P.G.T. Beauregard, Raphael Semmes, Stephen Mallory, James Longstreet (post-war Catholic convert) and Jefferson Davis' Catholic sympathies. None of these leaders are actually extensively examined in the book though.

The book also makes some general statements about military strategy and battle significance in the war that are outside the scope of the book's thesis and are up for debate. For instance, whether Sharpsburg/Antietam constituted a "monumental victory" (militarily I certainly think we can't make this case), where the high tide of Confederate success was at, and what the broader significance of Gettysburg was are all debatable and outside the scope of the book. I also felt sometimes that the "Confederatiztion" term was overused. Overall, the book is worth the read if you are interested in the topic and fleshes out an otherwise neglected area of Civil War literature, although there is still much more here that could be clarified and expanded on in the future.

[Daniel C · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly recommend this book

I found this book scholarly, yet thoroughly readable. As a Southern Catholic, the acceptance of Catholics during the war, versus the attitude upon the rise of the KKK was something I wish was more thoroughly explores, but was probably beyond the scope of this tome. Living in the 2020s, it's interesting to once again, especially in the North, the rise in both anti-Catholocism, anti-semitism, and the vandalizing and destruction of Catholic churches once again rear its ugly head. While there is still frequent negativity on display from Southern Protestant pulpit, our church attendance and conversions to the Catholic faith are exploding. I learned much new history and information from the book and highly recommend it to those interested in history.