Two Miserable Presidents by Steve Sheinkin Read Free Book Online

war, if there had to be a war, and if the Southern men had not been willing to go, I reckon they would have been made to go by the women.”
    â€œI wish that women could fight,” added eighteen-year-old Lucy Breckinridge of Virginia. “I would gladly shoulder my pistol and shoot some Yankees if it were allowable.”
    The same wave of patriotic excitement swept through Northern towns, where eager volunteers paraded before cheering crowds. As a group of Massachusetts soldiers marched out of town on their way to Washington, family members ran out to give the boys last-minute gifts.

    â€œOur mothers—God bless them!—had brought us something good to eat—pies, cakes, doughnuts, and jellies … . Our young ladies, (sisters, of course) brought us … needles, pins, thread, buttons, and scissors.”

    Warren Goss
    Warren Goss remembered that one mother actually handed her son an umbrella. Not only was this really embarrassing for the son, but it gives us an idea of how young and inexperienced these men were. Imagine a soldier bringing an umbrella into battle!
    Lee Makes His Choice
    I n an upstairs room in his Virginia home, fifty-four-year-old Colonel Robert E. Lee was pacing back and forth, trying to make up his mind. On the one hand, Lee opposed secession and slavery. And he loved the U.S. Army, in which he had served his entire adult life. On the other hand, he felt he could never fight against his home state of Virginia.
    All over the country, people were facing the same question: Are you for the Union or the Confederacy? This question split many families in two, with some family members marching north and others heading south. The Kentucky senator John Crittenden watched one of his sons become a general in the Union army and the other become a general in the Confederate army. And how do you think Abe Lincoln felt when he heard that four of his wife’s brothers were fighting for the South!
    Even the United States Army was ripped in two. Soldiers who had spent years serving together now had to choose sides in the Civil War. There were plenty of teary farewell scenes as lifelong friends shook hands and hugged … then marched off to fight against each other.
    Robert E. Lee finally decided to resign from the U.S. Army. He walked downstairs and said sadly to his wife, “Well, Mary, the question is settled. Here is my letter of resignation.”
    He gave the letter to a very disappointed General Winfield Scott, commander of the U.S. Army. Scott had been hoping Lee would take command of Union forces—he called Lee the very best soldier I ever saw in the field.”
    â€œI could take no part in an invasion of the Southern states,” Lee told Scott.

    â€œYou have made the greatest mistake of your life,” Scott replied. “But I feared it would be so.”
    Then Lee had to write another difficult letter—this one to his sister, a supporter of the Union. “You must think as kindly of me as you can,” he wrote to her.

    â€œWith all my devotion to the Union, and the feeling of loyalty and duty of an American citizen, I have not been able to make up my mind to raise my hand against my relatives, my children, my home.”
    Robert E. Lee
    The Confederate government offered Lee command of Virginia’s military forces. Lee took the job. On the train to Richmond, he looked out the window and saw crowds of people joyfully celebrating Virginia’s secession. This only made him more depressed. It seemed to Lee like the whole country was going crazy.
    Now What, Lincoln?
    A braham Lincoln wasn’t thrilled with current events either.
    From the White House lawn, Lincoln could look across the
Potomac River and see Confederate flags flying in Virginia. A Virginia newspaper boasted that Lincoln lived in constant fear of being captured. “Old Abe has his legs in perfect readiness to run,” the paper claimed. “He does not so much as take off his