From Where We Sit




Blessed

     Reading American Civil War diaries, one is struck by a vast contradiction: the misery and difficulty of day-to-day life, and the upbeat, almost optimistic nature of those engaged in that struggle for survival.

      America in the mid 1860s had almost none of the conveniences, or social infrastructure that provide health, wealth, and happiness today. There were few labor or employment laws to protect the weak and vulnerable— they came several generations later. America was a caste system almost as rigid as Europe's, so minorities and ethnics often toiled at the bottom of the economic ladder. The economy was agriculturally based (especially in the South) where both the quantity and quality of land was determined by privilege. This, in part, explains why land give-a-ways in the West drew so many people. It was one of the few instances where the have-nots could actually make a vertical move up the socio-economic ladder. And even this form of progress often occurred at the expense of the hapless indigenous population.

     Medical science was primitive. None of the wonder drugs or surgical procedures that we take for granted had been developed. Battleground injuries often could not be treated effectively; hence, a mind-boggling number of amputations took place during the Civil War. The slang term “sawbones” for a doctor arose during this period. If hostile engagements didn't get you, disease often did. Typhus, malaria, dysentary, scurvy (caused by malnutrition) all took their toll. Pneumonia was as common as a cold and starvation was not uncommon—most of these maladies resulted in a slow, painful death. The lifespan was half what it is today. This is one of the reasons America lost 2% of its population during the period of 1860-1865. This would translate into 6,000,000 people today.

      Modern conveniences that we take for granted today were way in the future back then—no cars, planes, no telephone, no television or radio; naturally, no computers. No tools for listening to music, like cassettes, ipods—that's one of the reasons the troops were always singing, that and boredom. There were no effective means to preserve food. Canning and “salting” were used but the cans often had lead in them and created a health hazard, and preserving in salt was not always effective in hot weather—bacon fat would melt and stain knapsacks and uniforms. The railroad was in use at the time, but the limited rolling stock was often monopolized by the military. Common transportation consisted of walking or riding on horseback over rutted, unpaved roads. About the only plus in this bleak picture was a noticeable lack of what we would consider air pollution.

     Yet, these people were often, inexplicably, positive. They wrote inspiring letters and diaries, in surprisingly elegant prose for uneducated people, extolling the beauties of life and the wonders of nature—the soldiers' descriptions of the Pennsylvania countryside were infused with an almost panegyrical quality. Granted, spirtualism and religious values were a more central part of that period's society, but it can not only be a perceived presence of a god which enabled these people to rise above such grim reality. It was a firm conviction that life was not random or simply instinct-driven, that life had a purpose beyond the mere mortal pursuits of enrichment and temporal pleasure. This belief pushed these people to reach beyond themselves to a greater good, to be more “other directed” than we often are today. It is notable that a great amount of correspondence was concerned with comforting family and friends, people who were, for the most part, living in far more comfortable circumstances than the writers.

     This subordination of self is indicative of altruistic love; it is the understanding that some people and priorities in the world are more important than you, and it is by extension, a description of God's love. It is the quality exemplified in the blind and deaf Helen Keller who observed, “life is a great adventure or it is nothing.” It is the quality exemplified in Anne Frank who felt, even as she was suffering an agonizing death in a Nazi internment camp, that “despite everything, I believe people are really good at heart.” It is the quality which recognizes human beings, despite everything, as both blessed and redeemable.




January, 2006
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