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... bar called, The Colored Soldier depicts, as well as The Reason Why how African American soldiers fought bravely for the union. I think its horrible especially the line They were good to stop a bullet And to front the fearful fray. (African American Poetry of the Nineteenth Century) This shows how terrible it was on the blacks fighting for the south. It was terrible because the South, or the Union, was fighting to legalize slavery.
They were used and abused as people. It seems they all stand so brave, Im not sure everyone, but in the poems I have read they are all honored and proud to stand up for their rights. Again, in the poem The Colored Soldier they refer to the American flag, which seems to be an aspect throughout my paper. Those are just a few poems that show the feelings and impact, poems had during the war. The exception being Caroline Balls The Jacket of Grey and Henry Timrods Ode, they dealt with the aftermath of the war. Another poem from the Union I would like to touch upon The Dying Soldier by an unknown author.
He or she writes of the American flag like the other poems and of the honor and pride the soldiers and their families felt. But my dear old comrades heart will swell, I know with honest pride, When he thinks that for the grand old flag, His old companion died. (Poetry and Music of the War at web) It shows the relationship between two of the soldiers on the battlefield. There is an infinite amount of pride bestowed upon the soldiers. After the war, themes and topics seemed to change. It was still the ultimate effects of the war, but ordinary life was depicted in a whole new way when soldiers came home, dead or alive. Life was revived after the horrors of the war.
Kate Putnam Osgood, in Driving Home the Cattle tells about a son coming home to his father taking in the cattle. The touching part was the father had thought his son was dead. This is amazing when you think of how great the feelings were between the two of them at that moment. The poem says, For the Southern prisons will sometimes yawn, And the day that comes with cloudy dawn In golden glory at last may wane. There isnt much sense to make of that line but the next verse is extremely touching. The great tears sprang to their meeting eyes; For the heart must speak when the lips are dumb; And under the silent evening skies, Together they followed the cattle home. (The Columbia Book of Civil War Poetry- pg. 423) The way the author explains this I feel the tremendous joy for them.
She talks of the father attending to everyday choirs, Driving Home the Cattle. Here one gets the impression of the fathers loneliness. You started to feel bad and then in the end, you felt the happiness of the moment being described. Osgood uses everyday realism to get her point across, to express the feelings and emotions of the war. This poem is self-consciously spiritual, which is typical for the age of romanticism.
The next poem exaggerates the joys of a soldier returning home a lot more dramatically than Driving Home the Cattle. When Johnny Comes Marching Home, by Patrick Sarsfeild Gilmore is not as appealing as Driving Home the Cattle by Kate Osgood. The emotions felt from reading Driving Home the Cattle were not there when reading When Johnny Came Marching Home. Patrick Gilmore makes the scene very dramatic and he honors the soldiers in a different way than other poems mentioned in my paper. That is because during the war most of the poets tried to express the horrible effects on the people of America. Now that the war is over, life is going on, and people are now mourning, adjusting to, or celebrating the outcome.
In a poem by James Madison Bell, A Poem Entitled the Day and the War; he speaks of the black brigades that were raised both in the North and South. This was the recruitment of black soldiers by the federal government in 1863. He writes this poem in remembrance of the twelve percent of the union army that was African American. This poem shares a similarity with The Colored Soldiers. They both talk of the black brigade and Of the gallant colored soldiers Who fought for Uncle Sam (African American Poetry of the Nineteenth Century pg. 391) as Dunbar puts it in his poem. Both poems talk of the realism in the fact that many blacks were forced into fighting for the South.
As I have gone researched through some of the many poems of the Civil War, I have found a few things in common, many more than differences. Mostly all of the poems express the seriousness of the war and also the horrible effects it had on America, but in the end there are many good aspects of the war. All of the poems honor either the soldiers that fought on the battlefields or slaves that fought in what Ill call the war within the war. The second war being the one between black slaves and slave owners. Most of the poetry of the war was melodramatic in nature. Everything is imbued with the tragic or the heroic.
That is what adds to the romanticism. Bibliography: 1 - American Women Poets of the Nineteenth Century, edited by Cheryl Walker, 1992 by Rutgers, The State University 2 - African-American Poetry of the Nineteenth Century An Anthology, edited by Joan R. Sherman, University of Illinois Press Urban and Chicago 1992 3 - The Poetry of the American Civil War, edited by Lee Steinmetz 1960 Michigan State University Press 4 - Poetry and Music of the War Between the States, created by Kathie Fraser 1983 by Swinging Door Music-BMI at web 5 - The Columbia Book of Civil War Poetry, edited by Richard Marius, Columbia University Press, NY, Chichester, West Sussex 1994
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Research essay sample on African American Poetry Nineteenth Century
