This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War

This chapter opens with a return to religious themes—specifically, the question of the fate of the soul. The author includes statistics about the extent of religiosity practiced by Americans in the Civil-War era. Religious practice was popular and widespread, she writes: “Nearly four times as many attended church every Sunday in 1860 as voted in that year’s critical presidential election” (2686-87).

Yet as the author points out, questions about the veracity or the sanctity of the Bible were not uncommon. The slavery issue created a sharp divide in scriptural interpretation. For many devout Christians, these scriptural divisions proved troubling. Elsewhere, the primary scientific challenge to long-held creation traditions was the set of arguments put forward by Charles Darwin, Thomas Henry Huxley, and others that humans evolved from more primitive species. Such ideas challenged the popular belief that every word in the Bible was true.

Another reality that challenged many people’s beliefs was the sheer number of people dying at the hands of their fellow countrymen. The belief that a good Christian living a good life would have a good afterlife made it easier to accept the idea that he or she could have a Good Death. Therefore, it was easier to risk one’s life on the field of battle. As Faust puts it, “Confidence in immortality could encourage soldiers to risk annihilation” (2735). Civil War soldiers could face death with bravery because they believed Heaven awaited them. This idea powered the belief system of people who saw death as a release from suffering and the beginning of religious ecstasy.: The author writes, “Death as termination of life simply did not exist” (2785-86).

Many survivors believed they would reunite with their lost loved ones in Heaven. This belief in a connection between the living and the dead led to an increase in the popularity of attempts to contact the deceased via séances. Mary Lincoln, Abraham Lincoln’s wife, tried many times to reconnect with Willie, her dead son. Supposedly, Lincoln attended a few of the séances that Mary organized at the White House. Spiritualism, as it was termed, grew across the country, leading to a national convention in 1864.

Given that their side lost the war, Southerners had to confront both the secular and spiritual reality of their defeat. The inherent question was whether or not God had forsaken the South by allowing them to lose the war. Regardless of the answer, church attendance in the South grew after the war. In response to the end of slavery, many in the South adopted a pseudo-historical ideology known as the Lost Cause of the Confederacy, which framed the Civil War as a fight for states’ rights and Southern heritage, as opposed to slavery. This belief that their cause was just helped perpetuate White supremacy for decades.

Faust spends the rest of the chapter examining the reactions of famous authors to the war. Among those authors are Ambrose Bierce, Emily Dickinson, Herman Melville, and Mark Twain. Each chronicled the war in his or her own way, and the author includes excerpts from their works to illustrate this point.