military institutions.Īs a memoir, chapters follow the phases of Seidule’s life. In this regard, the book is unapologetically a clarion call to identify and combat the insidious ways in which the Lost Cause has endured, particularly within U.S. Army soldiers who fought and died to preserve the country from insurrection and free millions from bondage. Moreover, both the myth in general and the idolization of Lee in particular also obscured and belittled the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of U.S. Like thousands, even millions of other people, Seidule had practically deified Lee as a paragon of virtue and honor, a reverence that has served as a crucial component of the myth of the Lost Cause created shortly after the war’s end. Lee, was in fact a constructed image designed to facilitate and promote white racial dominance in the years after the Civil War. Army officer and later Confederate general Robert E. That outrage stems from the revelation that his childhood hero, one-time U.S. The work is an engaging and prescient combination of memoir, history, cultural analysis, and moral outrage. But no others possess Ty Seidule’s unique and personal perspective on this issue, one informed not simply by his expertise as a historian and teacher, but also by his upbringing in the American south followed by his 36-year service as a U.S. Many books consider issues of race and America’s struggle with its legacy of slavery. Lee and Me: A Southerner's Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause Support our show by becoming a premium member!

Our interview with Colonel Seidule focuses on the special challenges he and his team confronted in crafting this text, and the place of the Civil War in the American experience. Lavishly illustrated and featuring well-conceived maps and graphs, The West Point History of the Civil War is served by a fully digitized version, optimized for use on tablet platforms. Unlike most surveys, the new West Point History of the Civil War draws upon some of the best talent in the field of Civil War history, all called together to craft a synthetic text that not only forms the basis of the Military Academy's course on the subject, but also provides a very informative overview for the general public.

We're very fortunate to be joined by the editor of The West Point History of the Civil War (Simon and Schuster, 2014), the Head of the History Department at the United States Military Academy, Colonel Ty Seidule.

Robert e lee and me ty seidule