This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1905 edition. Excerpt: ... chapter xxvii looking back--forty years after At the close of the war, the men who did the active work were tired and indifferent to its magnitude, its spectacular features, and its results--The great majority thought only of getting back to their families and industrial pursuits--A comprehensive and critical view of the war by its participants impossible--It can be done now more logically than ever before--But two hundred years from now the large-brained historian will do it from a disinterested study of the facts--The best equipped critic at the time was perhaps Von Moltke--Yet he could not comprehend all the factors that made up the delay and want of skill in our Civil War--A constitutional republican form of government incompatible with the best military efficiency--A description of one of the real common soldiers who were efficient in putting down the rebellion--Extract from a German writer upon the aptitude and method of the American soldier--The world applauded Germany for the skill and dispatch in winning in the Franco-Prussian War, but not at the objects accomplished--On the contrary, the common people everywhere applauded the triumph of the Union army here at the objects accomplished, not at the skill and dispatch with which it was done--The decisive battles of the war were Grant's campaign, began in the Wilderness, May 4, 1864, and ending at Appomattox; and the Atlanta campaign, ending at Nashville in December, 1864. It is curious to study the psychology of the Civil War. The indifference with which our men turned their backs on the great events then closing in 1865, is a marvel in human affairs. It was a result of republican institutions, with their lessons of simplicity and equality controlling the habits and principles of...