Famous Quotes - Tags - Civil War

  • ... what a strange time it was! Who knew his neighbor? Who was a traitor and who a patriot? The... More
  • ... women of the North, I ask you to rise up with earnest, honest purpose, and go forward in the... More
  • Among the interesting thing in camp are the boys. You recollect the boy in Captain McIlrath’s... More
  • Another serious reverse. [Gen. Ambrose] Burnside’s repulse at Fredericksburg.... Now remains... More
  • Any officer fit for duty who at this crisis would abandon his post to electioneer for a seat in... More
  • As usual with me I had some narrow escapes. While galloping rapidly, my fine large black horse... More
  • Civil dissension is a viperous worm
    That gnaws the bowels of the commonwealth. More
  • Civil strife is as much a greater evil than a concerted war effort as war itself is worse than... More
  • Deep-seated are the wounds of civil brawls. More
  • Disunion and civil war are at hand; and yet I fear disunion and war less than compromise. We can... More
  • Every good cause gained a victory when the Union troops were triumphant. Our final victory was... More
  • General [George] Crook gave me a very agreeable present this afternoon—a pair of his old... More
  • General [John] Pope is impulsive and hasty, but energetic, and, what is of most importance,... More
  • I am asked if I would not be gratified if my friends would procure me promotion to a... More
  • I am gradually drifting to the opinion that this Rebellion can only be crushed finally by either... More
  • I am happy to be through with the war. More
  • I am less disposed to think of a West Point education as requisite for this business than I was... More
  • I care not by what measure you end the war. If you allow one single germ, one single seed of... More
  • I don’t know how long it has been since my ear has been free from the roll of a drum. It is the... More
  • I have agreed to go into the service for the war ... [feeling] that this was a just and necessary... More
  • I marched in with the men afoot; a gallant show they made as they marched up High Street to the... More
  • I never enjoyed any business or mode of life as much as I do this. I really feel badly when I... More
  • I now have next to no hope of a restoration of the old Union.... If it is the settled and final... More
  • I remember the scenes of battle in which we stood together. I remember especially that broad and... More
  • I was at work that morning. Someone came riding like mad
    Over the bridge and up the... More
  • If any of my men kill prisoners, I’ll kill them. More
  • If in time, as in place, there were degrees of high and low, I verily believe that the highest of... More
  • If the Union is now dissolved it does not prove that the experiment of popular government is a... More
  • It is a life-and-death conflict between all those grand, universal, man-respecting principles... More
  • It was a marvel, an enigma in abolition latitudes, that the slaves did not rise en-masse, at the... More
  • It was the most ungrateful and unjust act ever perpetrated by a republic upon a class of citizens... More
  • Just as I gave the command to charge I felt a stunning blow and found a musket ball had struck my... More
  • Must swear off from swearing. Bad habit. More
  • My country is bleeding, my people are perishing around me. But I feel as a South Carolinian, I am... More
  • Nearly all the bands are mustered out of service; ours therefore is a novelty. We marched a few... More
  • Nobody in this army thinks of giving up to Rebels their fugitive slaves. Union men might perhaps... More
  • Now boys, remember you are the Twenty-third, and give them hell. In these woods the Rebels... More
  • One of the most interesting and affecting things [on a difficult return march from a raid into... More
  • Perhaps the happiest moment of my life was then, when I saw that our line didn’t break and that... More
  • Since I came to Virginia in July, I have not shaved; for weeks at a time I have slept in all... More
  • Surely tis by faith we are upheld thro such trials—justice will be meted in time to those who... More
  • The band waked me with a serenade. How they improve! A fine band and what a life in a regiment!... More
  • The bold enterprises are the successful ones. Take counsel of hopes rather than of fears to win... More
  • The cloud was so dark that it needed all the bright lights that could be turned upon it. But for... More
  • The death of William Tecumseh Sherman, which took place to-day at his residence in the city of... More
  • The enemy are no match for us in a fair fight.... The young men ... of the upper class are... More
  • The Forefathers’ day—Pilgrim day. We are at the same high call here today—freedom, freedom... More
  • The nation is in a death-struggle. It must either become one vast slaveocracy of petty tyrants,... More
  • The Sound of battle fell upon my ear & heart all day yesterday—even after dark the... More
  • The Southern States are uneasy at the prospect of [Abraham] Lincoln’s election today. The ultra... More
  • The survivors of some of them are here to-day, and whatever else has come to us in life, whether... More
  • The utter helplessness of a conquered people is perhaps the most tragic feature of a civil war or... More
  • Then we have difficulties between soldiers, very slight and easily disposed of; but troubles... More
  • There are good points about all such wars. People forget self. The virtues of magnanimity,... More
  • There are those who would keep us slipping back into the darkness of division, into the snake pit... More
  • These semi-traitors [Union generals who were not hostile to slavery] must be watched.—Let us be... More
  • Two more contrabands yesterday. These runaways are bright fellows. As a body they are superior to... More
  • We all felt that the men about us were making history, and that we were looking at heroes, if we... More
  • We got our new rifled muskets this morning. They are mostly old muskets, many of them used,... More
  • We had an inspection today of the brigade. The Twenty-third was pronounced the crack regiment in... More
  • We have dancing ... from soon after sundown until a few minutes after nine o’clock....... More
  • We now talk of our killed and wounded. There is however a very happy feeling. Those who escape... More
  • We saw the lightning and that was the guns; and then we heard the thunder and that was the big... More
  • We went on, feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, clothing the soldier, binding up his... More
  • What armies and how much of war I have seen, what thousands of marching troops, what fields of... More
  • When the weather is bad as it was yesterday, everybody, almost everybody, feels cross and gloomy.... More
  • When white men were willing to put their own offspring in the kitchen and corn field and allowed... More
  • While I am in favor of the Government promptly enforcing the laws for the present, defending the... More
  • You use the phrase “brutal Rebels.” Don’t be cheated in that way. There are enough... More
  • [Gen. William S.] “Rosecrans [at Chicamauga] has been badly beaten!”... How these blows... More
  • [John] Brough’s majority is “glorious to behold.” It is worth a big victory in the field.... More

Lookup any word on eNotes with our dictionary. Highlight the word and press SHIFT + D for a definition, or SHIFT + T for a synonym.