A Trent Affair What If...

It's called fair use for academic purposes
Let's wait until the appeal in CUP vs Becker before we decide that, though I'm fairly certain even that is limited to "students enrolled at my institution" and not "some guys I met on a website". Don't get me wrong, there's nothing I can do to stop you helping people pirate material: I just thought that someone as keen on peer-reviewed work as you are might have an interest in the continued financial viability of the model.
you brought up Ripley's report in the OR as if the Ordnance Department was the end all and be all of US sources of supply.
Actually, that was you. Remember?
Check the OR, notably BG J.W. Ripley's report for FY 1861-62
You told us to look at the report, and we did, and we saw an awful lot of foreign weapons on there, and questioned whether there might have been any issues trying to get those through the blockade. Then you told us to look at the reports of the adjutants general for Maine and New York. So we looked at New York, and we found an awful lot of muskets in 1861 and an awful lot of foreign rifles in 1862. Then you told us to forget New York and look really really hard at Maine, but by that time we were looking at Massachusetts and New Jersey and Indiana and seeing no reason to challenge the conclusion that the US was scraping the bottom of the barrel for weapons in 1861 and heavily reliant on British and European arms in 1862. It was at that point, I think, that you started moving phantom armies around the map and ignoring awkward questions like "if the news of Britain's response to the Trent made the people of New York take a million dollars a day out of the banks, what's going to happen when war breaks out and paper currency comes in?"
successful mobilizations can be judged by the results they have on the battlefield
Indeed, and the result in 1861 was as I've posted- very little. Oh, I'll grant you that progress was made in 1862: but against a foe with no industry, no manpower, under blockade, which embarked on the war with a grand total of 1,765 .58 rifles, with the North subsequently being forced to call out another 300,000 men and invaded to boot- well, if I was Lincoln I wouldn't have broken out the champagne at that point.
Vive le Quebec Libre en 1862! Tre bon...
Again, your rhetoric crumbles in the face of the facts. The Quebequois had no desire to trade an indifferent British overlord for the rapacious ultra-Protestant capitalists to the South. On the 29th December, the day news of the Union's caving in arrived, the good Catholics of Montreal were hearing a sermon reminding them of the heroes of Chateauguay (their bishop having offered his palace to the troops as accommodation). Quebec seems to have been more interested in Southern chivalry and traditionalism than repelled by their slavery: see Preston Jones, "Civil War, Culture War: French Quebec and the American War between the States", The Catholic Historical Review, vol. 87, no. 1 (Jan, 2001). You'll excuse me if I don't post a copy here for you.
As far as the rest goes, you realize what I suggested you try and write was a summary of the likely British expeditionary force in BNA in 1862, not a putative AEF, right? So with that demonstration as evidence, and after reading your latest "labour", I understand why you'd be reluctant to write something for publication under peer review - enough said.
Oh, I could talk about my academic background and my publication history, but the point of a pseudonymous website is that, in theory, it forces you to play the ball and not the man- though some still find it difficult to leave their egos at the door. However, I never said I wouldn't write you your peer-reviewed history: I just need you to do me a favour first. Nip over to the National Archives and dig out a copy of the Union war plan for Canada in 1862, would you? You know the one- it explains where they were going to find the troops, how they were going to put weapons in their hands, avoid economic collapse from the blockade, persuade those New Yorkers to put the $17,000,000 back in the banks, solve the saltpetre shortage, defeat the Royal Navy, invade Canada and beat the Confederacy. It's the one with the note at the bottom in Lincoln's handwriting saying "Better not, it'll put Harry Harrison out of a job: let's just back down instead."

I'd love to discuss this further, but I think you've well and truly shot your bolt in terms of facts and I'm very much more interested than those than the baseless speculation. If you do come up with any, though, let me know. Otherwise, I look forward to seeing you over in the post-1900 forum arguing that if war had broken out between Britain and America in 1915, all Britain had to do to win was cancel the Loos offensive and dig a few Lee-Metfords out of storage.
 

TFSmith121

Banned
Nope, didn't think you would...

Nope, didn't think you would, Mr. Craufurd.

Oh, well. I'll wait for your journal piece; please link to it when it is published. I am sure it will be worth the wait.

Of course, the Church was not the only place where Quebecois found leadership in the 1860s, was it? Les Rouges, oui? Eleven years earlier - Dorion et Galt etc. See:

“The annexation movement, 1849–50,” ed. A. G. Penny, CHR, V (1924), 23661.

I'm sure you can find it.

But as far as a war plan goes, if the balloon had gone up in 1861-62, the basic strategy wouldn't be much different than what was outlined in JBP Red; the topography and climate certainly hadn't changed much in seven decades.

Nor, for that matter, had it changed from five decades earlier; Scott, Wool, etc had had plenty of time to think about it.


Best,

Tent - JBP Red.jpg
 
Last edited:

frlmerrin

Banned
Dear Messrs Smith and Craufurd,

I was greatly enjoying your frankly poorly structured but wonderfully fact laden debate until it degenerated into a bit of an academic's 'bitch slapping' competition that I found amusing but was of no great value to me in better understaning of what might have happened had the Trent Affair not been solved peacefully.

I have a question for you both as you both seem to value peer review as a tool in the study of history. In the first instance what is the value of peer review in the study of history? In the sciences this is clear but in history I struggle to see the value in it. Similarly I struggle to see why in this day and age when much of the source material is available on the net what the value of reading secondary sources is when one can can read the evidence and make up one's own mind? Lastly and I shall phrase this modestly 'what f^$£*(! use is citation? It used to be a demonstration the author had read the article but with the modern day proliferation of text it just seems to demonstrate that the author can cut and paste a reference.

Appology to OP for venturing off topic.
 
Dear Messrs Smith and Craufurd,

<snip> Lastly and I shall phrase this modestly 'what f^$£*(! use is citation? It used to be a demonstration the author had read the article but with the modern day proliferation of text it just seems to demonstrate that the author can cut and paste a reference.

Appology to OP for venturing off topic.

Thank you (filler)
 
Top