Edward Waldo Emerson, in commemorating Harvard graduate Charles Russell Lowell, killed at the Battle of Cedar Creek in 1864, explained, “He fought because the war was of a character which left no choice to a man of his condition.” The young men who answered President Lincoln’s call, Emerson maintained, did not volunteer for “mere adventure or glory-seeking.” Rather, they rose to defend “the free
... [Show full abstract] institutions” of the republic “from wreck.”...