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Ruin Nation: Destruction and the American Civil War by Megan Kate provides an innovative and, in the scope of our class readings, a useful look at the environmental and psychological impact of the Civil War. Nelson argues that the Civil War reshaped the physical landscape and in turn, the cultural landscape of a country that was not ready for such a great war. She examines the impact of both physical and abstract ‘ruination’ in the makeup of the Confederate and Union regional attitudes and psyches. Nelson strength and weakness is her vast and diverse analysis of the ruin of the war. She employs a wide variety of sources including accounts from Northerners, Southerners, slaves, soldiers and civilians. Not only are her sources vast, the themes she studies are as well. She looks at environmental, domestic, urban and bodily destruction. Ultimately Nelson argues that the concept of ruination is a concept that had lasting effects well beyond the Civil War.
Before diving into her arguments, one must understand Nelson’s definition of ‘ruination.’ She first describes ruin as a “material whole that has violently broken into parts; enough of these parts must remain in situ, however, that the observer can recognize what they used to be” (2). In other words the ruin must have some semblance of its former self, at least enough to be recognizable. ‘Ruination’ in short, is the process of something becoming a ruin. In the scope of the Civil War, it was the change from the antebellum whole past, to the fragmented present of the war. Nelson argues that ruins, unlike anything else, capture this “moment of transformation from one time to another, from one material from to another” (3).
Before examining the Civil War, Nelson provides a useful history about American’s fascination with physical remnants of the past. Specifically she looks at the curiosity surrounding the excavated earthworks of the “Mound Builders” who resided in the Mississippi Valley (6). Even American’s before the war understood or at least felt the power that ruins could have on people’s emotions. They used these excavated sites as a way to build and strengthen their national identity at a time when that identity was clearly struggling. Archeologists argued that the mounds were evidence that North American was the “cradle of the human race” (7). Nelson analogizes these mounds to the Pantheon in Greece. It was proof for many Americans that they had a long and glorious past. Not all of this fascination was positive, some ruins of villages, silver mines and missions were sobering reminders of a boom-bust economy, failure in the Southwest and an increasingly weak American character. These two examples are very effective because they setup on of her basic arguments that the war and ‘ruination’ have dualistic power. They can both create and destroy. She shows the war in the framework of a process of destruction and reconstruction.
Nelson’s first chapter may be the most useful one in comparing it to our other readings. She analyzes the effect of urban destruction on not just the South, but the North as well. She points out that the creation of more effective military technologies and changes in federal attitudes towards civilians led to massive destruction in cities (10). Nelson seems more interested in the effect this had on the psyche of the cities inhabitants. This is an innovative approach we may have touched briefly on in class but not to this extent. When we look ant Environmental impact we tend to look at it from how humans impact the environment. We often forget that the environment can affect us as well. Nelson shows how the destruction of cities created discussion on the nature of modern warfare. The ‘ruination’ of cities was an equalizing force in many ways, blurring lines between soldiers and civilians, and giving all types of people the cause to express their fears about the war. For example, the first ruins of Hampton, Virginia prompted a national dialogue on ‘civilized warfare’ and what that term meant (11). Even destruction in the north created rom for discussion. The burning of Chambersburg, Pennsylvania in 1864 created huge debates about the legitimacy of civilian retaliation and taking responsibility for the defense of your city (12).
Nelson then turns her focus from cities to the destruction of the home. She points out how women were inherently connected to the home in the South in the nineteenth century. This was the one place where women had tremendous influence as the moral guides for their children and the preserves of a sacred household. Therefore, the physical destruction of these homes represented a much greater ‘ruination’ of Southern culture that was deliberately done by Union soldiers (66). She shows how the war reconfigured women’s notion of the home through invasions into the sphere. The war redefined the Southern definitions of womanhood and domesticity (70). It destroyed the house physically but it also destroyed as a beacon of morality and escape.
Nelson does not just look at the white planter perspective who saw the union as a villainous, immoral enemy that invaded their most private spheres and threatened their Southern way of life. She looks at accounts from slaves who saw the destruction of the home as a destruction of oppression and as liberation (75). Along with the destruction of the houses came the destruction of the land they were on. Nelson points out that trees were targeted as resources for fuel or shelters (80). While this led to the ruin of many forests, Nelson argues that the ‘ruination’ of these landscapes represented the technological advancement of man. Again, ‘ruination’ deconstructed and reconstructed at the same time.
The most innovative part of this book is when Nelson examines the ‘ruination’ of the body during the war. The dismembered bodies gave visual proof of a new type of warfare and new types of technologies. Photography became more prominent and brought these morbid images to the public (164). She also engages in a discussion of rape during the war. It is difficult to study this subject, as most women would not tell anyone if they were assaulted. Women were not the only ones to feel that their bodies were under attack. Men suffered a massive crisis of masculinity during and after the war. As they returned home they found that their wives were more independent and not confined to the traditional home (170). Many men were injured as well and could not take care of their families like they were used to. Nelson discusses the difference between the permanent physical and emotional scars that emasculated a man versus the governments attempt to anoint soldiers as brave.
Nelson’s conclusion is the most ambitious and as a result, the most troublesome part of her book. The vastness of her research is matched in her conclusion. She argues that a fascination about ruins and historical objects, combined with a failure to confront the ruins of the Civil War developed “a tendency in American culture to consume rather than directly confront the past” (229). She then attempts to link this problem with the consumption-oriented commemoration process today. She cites the designs of the Oklahoma City and September 11th memorials. While this link is thought provoking, it is a big jump to take. I don’t think Nelson provides enough historical evidence to show a direct link between these ideas. The massive jump in time is also problematic. However, in the end this book adds further ways to define the term environment that we have discussed in class. Environment can be a way of life. Southerners had their physical environments destroyed by the war, but also their physiological environment. Women were especially susceptible to this type of ‘ruination’ as they watched their sphere of influence be invaded and destroyed. Environment can have as great an effect on us as we can have on it.