Pouring over hundreds of letters from Civil War soldiers, Chandra Manning noticed a pattern.

In the midst of writing home about the weather and their gastric difficulties, the soldiers spoke frequently about their views on slavery, the assistant professor of history says.

“What’s important is how they thought about slavery, how the war changed that over time and how their ideas changed the war,” she says.

Manning pursued her curiosity about the subject and published her book, “What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War” (Alfred A. Knopf, 2007), which presents an account of what slavery meant to Union and Confederate soldiers. It further examines why troops on both sides identified slavery as the root of the war and zones in on what that meant for the war and the nation.

“The war is about slavery, but no one explained why [it was about slavery] to the people who fought it,” she says. “We understand why [the war was about slavery] to slaveholders and the Confederate cause, but not to nonslaveholding soldiers. This book explains why.”

Her book is “one of the most penetrating studies of how Civil War soldiers, themselves, thought about slavery,” says colleague Adam Rothman, associate professor of history.

This is important, he says, because of the widespread belief among both scholars and the general public that Civil War soldiers didn’t think about slavery at all.

“The book shows that’s just wrong,” Rothman says, “They thought about slavery deeply and in fairly striking ways.”

Using soldiers’ letters, diaries and regimental newspapers, Manning finds that after interacting with local slaves, Union soldiers called for emancipation ahead of civilians, political leaders and officers in 1861, a full year before the Emancipation Proclamation.

Manning’s interest in 19th-century U.S. history began when she was a child, reading books with her grandmother. She recalls watching her favorite TV show, “Little House on the Prairie,” and her personal interest in the time period being piqued even further. However, she didn’t realize her desire for teaching until much later.

While studying for her master’s degree in Ireland she helped teach a discussion section on U.S. history.
“I loved hearing somebody say, ‘I never thought about it that way before.’ Making it fresh, important and interesting to a group of students just became very exciting.”

Manning also says that teaching students about the importance of seeking evidence in the field of history was of chief interest to her.

“We don’t just get to make stuff up,” she says. “Drawing conclusions is an individual process and reasonable people disagree, but those conclusions need to be based on something.”

Her students recognize the imperative use of facts while studying history, and have a palpable sense of Manning’s passion for the subject.

Chris Miller (C’09), says Manning clearly cares about the material she teaches and that she conveys her love for history to her students.
Miller, who assists Manning with research on Civil War contraband camps and the route of slaves after the war, says the study of history is critical for understanding today’s world.

“The ideals so alive back then are surprisingly still alive today,” he says. “Understanding how issues develop over time gives us better understanding of where we are today and gives you better perspective.”

Manning argues that study of the 19th century is fundamentally important because the time period reshaped ideas that continue to affect us today.

“In the 19th century, the U.S. makes a transformation from a rural, agrarian republic into an urban, industrial society,” she says. “That transformation affected everything: gender, middle class, the relationship between home and work. It affected the most basic values people have.”

She illustrates that evolution in a popular class called Baseball and American Society. A lifelong Red Sox fan, Manning uses baseball as the lens to examine how Americans responded to the transformation of their society from the 1840s to the 1950s. She shows how the rules of the game evolved alongside changes in society by addressing topics such as Baseball, the Great Depression and the Negro Leagues; Gender and Baseball During World War II; The Postwar Era: Civil Rights and Demographic Shifts; and Integration of the Major Leagues.

“If you’re coming from a culture that defined what it means to be a man by physical labor and strength, what happens when those aren’t part of what people do anymore?” she asks. “The game of baseball has all kinds of rule battles early on that have to do with continuing to stake a claim to masculine identity even though the workday no longer involves physical labor.”

Rothman says Manning’s ability to teach a class focused on baseball while conveying important messages about history is what makes her a good professor.

“She is able to teach a class like the baseball class, which is a very popular, interesting and fun class, but also a really serious class,” he says. “She’s trying to get across some very important points about the history of the U.S. through baseball and that can be a tough balance.”

With an eye toward the future, Manning plans to continue her study of Civil War soldiers, including a planned project about the state of Wisconsin during the war. She also plans to take a deeper look at the ways Union soldiers interacted with slaves and how that changed their views on race and equality.

“I want to get the issue of slavery back into the popular understanding of the Civil War,” she says. “It shaped the war for everybody. It’s a national, and not a Southern question. It’s central to the war, and it’s central to U.S. history.”

Source: Blue & Gray