Comments on: Is the Richard Kirkland Story True?

By: Ken Noe

Ken Noe — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 23:12:53 +0000

Oops, I meant to say that Freeman “admitted in a private letter that he had been unfair to Longstreet and hoped to rectify it.” Sorry.

By: Kevin Levin

Kevin Levin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:34:36 +0000

Hi Ken,

Thanks for reminding me of this. There are also plenty of legitimate questions that can be asked about specific points of interpretation in his Lee biography that can be made. The one that stands out for me is his insistence that resigning from the U.S. army was the “decision he was born to make.” It ignores the fact that Lee’s own family was split on secession and that any number of his West Point colleagues from the South chose not to resign. The only way Freeman could make such a claim is if he ignored Southern Unionists and even fellow Virginians such as George Thomas.

By: Ken Noe

Ken Noe — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 15:10:10 +0000

I admire Freeman’s work as well, but we’ve known for years that he suppressed a Lee letter because he (wrongly) believed that it revealed Lee’s murder of a settler early in his career, and he wanted to protect Lee’s reputation. Likewise, at the end of his life Lee admitted in a private letter that he had been unfair to Longstreet and hoped to rectify it. The man was a fine scholar, but he wasn’t perfect.

By: Kevin Levin

Kevin Levin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:40:30 +0000

Like I said, I appreciate you taking the time to comment.

By: Eric Schafer

Eric Schafer — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:30:43 +0000

You’ve missed the point. I didn’t say that just because Freeman said it, it’s true; I said that because Freeman was a true historian and all the evidence shows he did a marvelous job of sorting fact from fiction, if he discerned the Kirkland story was true, it’s true.

Besides, you admitted you don’t know what a true historian is, so I don’t think you can argue any of these points creditably.

By: Kevin Levin

Kevin Levin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:29:14 +0000

Yes, I am aware of this. In fact, I believe Mac Wycoff made that very point. My suggestion is that you write something up that addresses the specific points made by Schaffner. Please don’t make the mistake in assuming that I agree with everything in his guest post. This is not a peer reviewed journal. It’s a blog. At the time I believed it was worth posting to generate a discussion and I still believe this to be the case. Your claims about Freeman’s infallibility as well as the tired and I suspect that your references to “revisionist history” have won you few supporters here.

By: Eric Schafer

Eric Schafer — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:25:15 +0000

Oh, the point was made long ago; you’re just not getting it. They do not present factual evidence discounting the act. For example, claiming, “It wasn’t in the official reports, so it didn’t happen” is not credible. Do you know anything of military matters? Officers never put incidents like Kirkland’s act into military reports…because his act had nothing to do with the battle or how the regiment fought. One’s superiors – military and political – have no interest in one soldier succoring enemies with canteens of water; they want to know what happened in the battle. If I were Kershaw’s superior and he wrote of the Kirkland incident in his battle report I would have it stricken from the record as being inconsequential and irrelevant.

By: Kevin Levin

Kevin Levin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:20:36 +0000

You are still no closer to making your case for the Kirkland story than you were in your last comment. Again, what is to stop me from applying your own approach to critiquing to you? Could it be that you just want the story to be true? And around we go.

By: Eric Schafer

Eric Schafer — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:18:08 +0000

It’s just like these people who are desperately trying to get English Lit PhD’s or make a name for themselves, and they claim that when Huck and Jim are naked on the raft it’s because they’ve just had homosexual relations. No…the storm blew away all their clothes. Or the one who claimed that Jay Gatsby was black. No, he was white, and the evidence for such is all through the book. And so on…

By: Kevin Levin

Kevin Levin — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:17:41 +0000

You are no closer to making your case for the Kirkland story than you were in your last comment.

By: Eric Schafer

Eric Schafer — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:15:56 +0000

I’ve been a journalist for over 30 years and have seen the changes in what motivates people – and how this appears in journalism and new histories – very well, especially over the past 20 years. And what generates a lot of this stuff these days is, “They say this guy did this; I’m going to say he didn’t.” “They say Lee was so great; I’m going to say he wasn’t.” A perfect example is how Shaffner deliberately deceives his readers when he states that Freeman didn’t write about Kirkland, so it couldn’t have happened. This is a lie; he tells us Freeman didn’t write about Kirkland in “Lee” but never states that Freeman devotes two pages to Kirkland in “Lee’s Lieutenants.”

In fact, Shaffner disproves his own argument. To whit, he states, “Freeman didn’t say it happened, so it didn’t,” which means, “If Freeman said it happened, it did.” And because Freeman said it happened in “Lee’s Lieutenants,” Shaffner has just stated that, in fact, it did happen.

By: Eric Schafer

Eric Schafer — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:09:54 +0000

A true historian is one who is educated and trained in the proper methods of research, authentication, verification and who is also so deeply versed in their subject matter that they are judged highly reliable in discerning what is fact or fiction; and they are also able to unearth or judge new material creditably. Just because someone writes a book about history or a historical figure does not make them a true historian – even if they do extensive research. Pryor is a perfect example. I mean, she wrote a book about a man who was a soldier and who was anti-slavery, yet her writing demonstrates she cannot comprehend military matters, and she claims Lee fought for slavery. To make such gross errors disqualifies her as a Lee historian. Incidentally, I’m not surprised she claimed Lee fought for slavery. In our hyper-sensitive, “racism” sensitive, revisionist society, if she claimed Lee didn’t fight for slavery, she’d've been run out of town on a rail by the folks who have no idea what they’re talking about, yet are convinced they are right – and anyone who disagrees is evil.