Jefferson Davis & the ‘guerrilla option’
Davis' April 4 proclamation & partisan fighting
William B. Feis writes in the bookThe Collapse of the Confederacy (edited by Mark Grimsley and Brooks D. Simpson, University of Nebraska Press, 2001) about the possibility the Confederates had as the Union’s conquest of the South was nearly complete to call for guerrilla resistance to US occupation:
Civil War [sic] historians have often reflected on the critical events and decisions of the war that, had they been different, might have resulted in a Confederate victory and ultimately Southern independence. Generations of Southerners have also reveled in this postwar counterfactual debate. As William Faulkner described so eloquently in his novel Intruder in the Dust, at some point in his life every Southern boy has daydreamed about that fateful July afternoon in 1863, just before Maj. Gen. George E. Pickett’s division crossed that deadly field at Gettysburg, and though “This time. Maybe this time….” Standing at the “absolute edge of no return,” wrote Faulkner, the Confederacy chose not to “turn back… and make home” but to sail irrevocably on and either find land or plunge over the world’s roaring rim.” Aside from this famous episode during the Confederacy’s short and violent existence, scholars have identified other crucial crossroads at which the South could have chosen a different path and perhaps altered the war’s outcome. One of the more tantalizing of these was the Confederates’ refusal to resort to a large-scale guerrilla or partisan war as their armies crumbled in 1865.Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America.Instead of surrendering, what if Confederate leaders had dispersed the armies and instructed the officers and men to “take to the hills” and continue fighting as guerrillas? The so-called guerrilla option, the argument runs, was a plausible strategy by which to exhaust the Union armies, undermine Northern support for the war, and eventually realize the dream of Southern independence. Every field, farm, road, and village would become a battleground in a large-scale unconventional war designed to erode the North’s determination to subdue recalcitrant Rebels. And with thousands of men still under arms across the entire Confederacy, the South possessed the capability to prolong the war indefinitely. As one scholar has observed, had the Confederacy opted for guerrilla warfare on a grand scale in April 1865, “the South could have been made virtually indigestible.” More to the point, the authors of one study concluded that the refusal to pursue the guerrilla option may have cost the South its independence.Several historians contend that Confederate president Jefferson Davis was the foremost advocate of this option and that he actually proposed its adoption shortly after the fall of Richmond, when he proclaimed on April 4 that the war had entered “a new phase.” Some have argued that Davis even issued a direct order to Gen. Joseph E. Johnston to disperse his men into partisan bands rather than surrender to Union forces. On the contrary, this essay will demonstrate that Jefferson Davis neither embraced nor advocated the guerrilla option as a means to revive the Confederacy near war’s end. The Confederate president seemingly adhered to the Clausewitzian dictum – that “the political object is the goal, war is the means of reaching it, and means can never be considered in isolation from their purpose” – when he concluded that extensive guerrilla warfare was not an appropriate military strategy with which to achieve the political goal of Southern independence….On April 4 the Confederate president issued a proclamation that exuded an unwavering faith in ultimate victory. In his address he urged all “patriots” to remain steadfast in their support of the cause despite the loss of the Confederate capital, the symbol of Southern defiance for four years. Davis placed the evacuation in a more positive light by emphasizing that, until now, Lee had been forced to “forgo more than one opportunity for promising enterprises” because of his obligation to defend the city. Now freed from that burden, the Army of Northern Virginia could once again fight the war on its own terms. In addition, the president believed that the Federals had staked everything on Richmond’s fall and that its capture “would be the signal for our submission to their rule.” He admonished his countrymen to deny the enemy that satisfaction and to reveal through sheer determination and perseverance the depth’s of the North’s self-deception.Davis then issued what would become one of his more famous – and perhaps most misinterpreted – declaration:“We have now entered upon a new phase of a struggle, the memory of which is to endure for all ages, and to shed ever increasing lustre upon our country. Relieved from the necessity of guarding cities and particular points, important but not vital to our defence with our army free to move from point to point, and strike in detail the detachments and garrisons of the enemy; operating in the interior of our own country, where supplies are more accessible, and where the foe will be far removed from his own base, and cut off from all succor in case of reverse, nothing is now needed to render our triumph certain, but the exhibition of our own unquenchable resolve. Let us but will it, and we are free.”Davis also promised never to relinquish “one foot of soil” in any of the Confederate states. In particular, he vowed to defend Virginia, even though the Federals already occupied much of the state and the Confederate government had been forced to flee toward North Carolina….Jefferson Davis Home and Presidential Library in Biloxi, MS.Nowhere in the April 4 proclamation did Davis specifically request that Southerners “take to the hills” and fight as partisans. If indeed he wanted to inspire the people to rise en masse as guerrillas, and if he thought this was a viable way to achieve independence, why did the normally blunt president fail to urge this solution upon his people in more explicit language? Moreover, if he had settled upon the guerrilla option, what prevented him from publicly warning the North that, unless it ceased hostilities, more misery and death would be inflicted upon its soldiers at the hands of millions of Southern civilians? Instead, in the address Davis spoke primarily of continuing a conventional defense, not about organizing or inciting partisan activity, a strange omission if indeed that was his purpose. He stressed that the Army of Northern Virginia could now maneuver and fight, a statement designed to stir memories of the glory days when Lee and Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson consistently prevailed over numerically superior enemy forces through boldness and initiative. Even in the dark hours after Richmond’s fall, Davis and many other Southerners still believed that Lee and his magnificent army would succeed against the odds….Sharing the feelings of many Southern citizens, Davis had always looked to the noble soldiers in the national armies to achieve Southern independence, not to unsavory and unreliable “bushwhackers.” Shocked by the violence unleashed by and against civilians in “Bleeding Kansas” in the late 1850s, Davis had concluded early on, as Grady McWhiney observed, “that wars should be fought only between organized armies.” Composed of troops from all the Southern states, the Confederate armies – especially the Army of Northern Virginia – represented the soul of the would-be nation as well as symbolized its power and legitimacy. Gary W. Wallagher has argued compellingly that white Southerners saw Lee and his army as the embodiment of the Confederacy and as the “preeminent symbol of the Confederacy struggle for independence and liberty.” Davis would have agreed…. Even after issuing his alleged “guerrilla manifesto” on April 4, Davis continued to stress the importance of maintaining united and organized forces.
10 Responses to Jefferson Davis & the ‘guerrilla option’
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A Little Warm in Dixie Today
Pres. Davis held to an upstanding virtue and he expected it of those under his command and there is no shame in that but unfortunately it cost us.
Southrons have always held a high moral code and it should always be that way but like the old adage says we should learn from the past so that it doesn’t repeat itself.
as far as gods honor look at how he commanded his armies,,, killing thousands of people himself,,, laying siege to cities and causing walls to crumble,, joshua waiting to ambush in the mountains,,, I dont think god would disapprove of tactics that were a lil different than standing there and getting shot straight on.. Mosby and some others were already fighting this way and it was having a positive effect.
I still believe that having high morals is good and right but at the same time, when faced with the loss of something bigger than ourselves especially, a person should take a look at where there standings are.
Isn’t that what forgiveness is for?
I respect Pres Davis and Gen Lee and would follow them even now but I would try to talk them into a little more of a guerilla style, in the bushes type of fighting style. I don’t know but I would think that rural men that lived in the woods hunting, stalking, trapping and whatever else would be a natural for that type of engagement, unlike the city dwellers of the north (i’m sure they had rural people too but not to the extent of the Southland).
The greater cause of Southern Independence should trump a leaders personal convictions, that’s my main concern. I would never condone going to the extremes that the north did, burning, raping, destroying just for the sake of destroying, that is NOT the Southern way and is never acceptable.
If nothing else I will agree to disagree because I dont want to argue or debate a fellow Southerner, I dont believe in that if its at all avoidable.