January 2017
Civil War News
6
The Source
Northern effort to write a biased history of the war, the society maintained its focus on the original goal as established in New Orleans, “…the collection and preservation of such papers and records as might be valuable in preserving a true history of the causes, events, and results of the late war between the Confederate and the United States.”
By Michael K. Shaffer
Southern Historical Society Papers
Meeting in New Orleans in the spring of 1869, several former Confederate officers laid the foundation for the establishment of the Southern Historical Society. During this first session, Dabney H. Maury, who had orchestrated the meeting, called those assembled to order. Maury, later writing of the concept, which led him to gather the group, recalled: “…I was…surrounded by many comrades of the war…with whom I daily exchanged recollections of that ‘the greatest struggle for separate nationality the world has ever seen,’ and I felt the importance to history and to our posterity of making…a record of the facts then fresh in the memories of the actors….” During a follow-up meeting, an election of officers took place. Reverend B. M. Palmer became president, Braxton Bragg vice-president, and Dr. Joseph Jones secretary and treasurer. Setting membership at the cost of $5, plus a $6 annual subscription fee, the officers identified vice-presidents from each former Confederate state plus the District of Columbia. These representatives would assist in disseminating flyers in their respective regions, in a drive to obtain new members. Many familiar names represented
their respective states, including Robert E. Lee for Virginia, Wade Hampton in South Carolina, John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky, and Georgia’s Alexander Stephens. As with many fledgling organizations, the Southern Historical Society struggled financially, raising only $310 in membership dues during their first year. If the society expected to grow, change appeared in order, and during a meeting in August 1873, the change occurred; significant modification, which would set the stage for the future. Convening in White Sulphur Springs, Virginia, the body adopted a series of new by-laws, firmly establishing Virginia’s control over the society and the eventual publication of the group’s papers. The delegates reached a decision to relocate to Richmond, and adopt legislation requiring all executive officers to reside in Virginia. Jubal Early became president, R.M.T. Hunter vice-president, and George Munford secretary and treasurer. The Southern Historical Society Papers (SHSP), first published in 1876. The resultant editions of the SHSP carried many stories of the exploits of Lee and Jackson, while also providing a platform to discredit others. Fearful of a
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SHSP spine and cover. J. William Jones served as the first editor of the SHSP and worked to ensure all submitted articles adhered to the Society’s goals, as clarified during the August 1873 meeting. Contributions to the archives and library of the Society are respectfully solicited under the following specific divisions: 1. The histories and historical collections of the individual States from the earliest periods to the present time, including travels, journals and maps. 2. Complete files of the newspapers, periodical, literary, scientific and medical journals of the Southern States, from the earliest times to the present day, including especially the period of the recent American Civil War. 3. Geological, topographical, agricultural, manufacturing and commercial reports, illustrating the statistics, climate, soil, resources, products and commerce of the Southern States. 4. Works, speeches, sermons and discourses relating to the recent conflict and political changes. Congressional and State reports during the recent war. 5. Official reports and descriptions, by officers and privates and newspaper correspondents and eye-witnesses, of campaigns, military operations, battles and sieges. 6. Military maps. 7. Reports upon the munitions, arms and equipment, organization, number and losses of the various branches of the Southern armies – infantry, artillery, cavalry, ordnance and commissary and quartermaster departments. 8. Reports of the Adjutant-General of the late Confederate States of America, and of the Adjutant-
Generals of the armies, departments, districts and States, showing the resources of the individual States, the available fighting population, the number, organization and losses of the forces called into actual service. 9. Naval operations of the Confederate States. 10. Operations of the Nitre and Mining Bureau. 11. Commercial operations. 12. Foreign relations, diplomatic correspondence, etc. 13. Currency. 14. Medical statistics and medical reports. 15. Names of all officers, soldiers and sailors in the military and naval service of the Confederate States who were killed in battle or died of disease or wounds. 16. Names of all wounded officers, soldiers, and sailors. The nature of the wounds should be attached to each name, also the loss of one or more limbs should be carefully noted. 17. Published reports and manuscripts relating to civil prisoners held during the war. 18. All matters, published or unpublished, relating to the treatment, diseases, mortality, and exchange of prisoners of war. 19. The conduct of the hostile armies in the Southern States; private and public losses during the war; treatment of citizens by hostile forces. 20. Southern poetry, ballads, songs, photographs of distinguished Confederates, etc.
Page from a SHSP volume. Jones continued in his editorial capacity until retiring in 1887; Robert Alonzo Brock took the helm and shepherded the publication until 1910. James Power Smith, Hamilton J. Eckenrode, Douglas Southall Freeman, and Frank E. Vandiver served as subsequent editors through the final year of publication in 1959. While the SHSP may not have achieved
all the objectives outlined in 1873, the tireless work of many contributors during the span of the SHSP resulted in a collection, which, as noted in the introduction to the Broadfoot reprint, provides “…a gateway into the ranks of the Southern armies. No other single source provides so wide a variety of information on battles, leaders and life in the wartime South.” Researchers can benefit from consulting this collection, as several reports, not found in the Official Records, made their way onto the pages of the SHSP, and the final nine volumes contain the complete “Proceedings of the Confederate Congress.” In 1960, during preparations for the 100th anniversary of the war, the Richmond Civil War Centennial Committee commissioned an indexing project for the SHSP. The work progressed until the death of J. Ambler Johnson – the committee chair – in 1974. Thanks to the efforts of James I. Robertson Jr., and six other historians who continued Johnson’s work, researchers can now navigate through the 52 volumes of the SHSP; a challenging and time-consuming process before the labors of Robertson and company. Along with indexing the series, the team worked to correct errors in the original collection. They rectified several mistakes, especially misspelled names, noting same in the index, for example, “Dill…also see Dell.” In the early 1990s, Broadfoot Publishing Company reprinted the complete 52 volume set of the Southern Historical Society Papers, plus a three-volume index. Visit http://www.broadfootpublishing.com for additional details, and check WorldCat http://www.worldcat.org/ for help in finding the SHSP in your local library. One can also view many of the volumes online at https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/008376679. Next month, we will continue to explore other Civil War source material. Please keep suggestions for future ‘The Source’ columns coming, send them to the e-mail address shown below, and continued good luck in researching the Civil War! Michael K. Shaffer is a Civil War historian, author, lecturer, and instructor, who remains a member of the Society of Civil War Historians, Historians of the Civil War Western Theater, and the Georgia Association of Historians. Readers may contact him at mkscdr11@gmail.com, or to request speaking engagements via his website www. civilwarhistorian.net. Follow Michael on Facebook www. facebook.com/michael.k.shaffer and Twitter @michaelkshaffer.