Talk:Joshua Chamberlain

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Can someone find out what illness he had after the minor wound at Gettysburg? I believe Last Full Measure says malaria, but I want to be sure. ugen64 02:45, Dec 12, 2003 (UTC)

  • I was always under the impression that the redeployment of 20th Maine to the Stone Wall was a literary device employed by Michael Shaara in The Killer Angels. Please provide a source for that detail other than the book or the movie.
I have not yet found any information relating to the 20th being relocated to the Union center. As far as my sources, I have yet to see any mention of the V Corps (which was where the 20th Maine was located) being transferred to the center at all. If anyone has any additional information on this, please provide it. --Martin Osterman 02:24, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] last paragraph

I deleted the last paragraph from a long list of excellent edits. It said:

Chamberlain is remembered and honored today as one of the bravest, noblest, and capable officers of the Union army. Many historians believe that, had Chamberlain and his men not held Little Round Top, the Army of the Potomac may well have lost the Battle of Gettysburg, and perhaps the war.

The first sentence is simply over the top. Noblest? Let's keep a NPOV, please. And although the view of holding LRT meant winning the war has popular appeal, there are few reputable military historians who would say so. A brave engagement, but hardly one on which the entire battle or war rested. I could go into a lot of detail as to why, but perhaps you could cite two or three historians (or document "most historians") who have written this. Hal Jespersen 14:29, 20 July 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Wounds

All sources I have seen point to the cause of death as being complications from his wounds recieved at Petersburg. See [1] and [2] -- I don't have any written sources, but I think that Hal or one of our other contributers probably does that will back this one up. --Martin Osterman 12:27, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for sourcing that. I've added that back into the text. // Pathoschild 12:47, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
No problem! I found it to be one of the most interesting Civil War-related facts I'd ever come across... and yes, it did make me do a double-take the first time I read it. Of course, Chamberlain led a very remarkable and interesting life -- but, I think, so did other generals of the day. --Martin Osterman 12:49, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Although I don't think this is all that important, both of those sources merely state 'died of war wounds' and don't specify the actual cause of death. Perhaps someone romanticized his death and others are copying the claim. I checked Pullen's biography by searching on Amazon and found he suffered throughout his life from the wound (which left a "fistula on the base of his penis" and affected his marital life) and from malaria that he contracted during the war. So it is arguable whether his wound directly caused an 84-year-old man to die or whether he died of somwething unstated while complaining about the effects of the wound. Hal Jespersen 15:39, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps this is something that could be researched a bit, then. I do admit that my sources never specified what the actual cause of death was... which now makes me more interested than before. --Martin Osterman 16:47, 7 December 2005

(UTC)

For what it's worth to you guys, the book Twentieth Maine says he was shot through both directions of his hips, shattering his pelvis, and causing bowel complications, and that is what he is supposed to have died of. --S. Gentry, 12 June 2006

[edit] Thanks for recent edits HLJ

Looks great! SimonATL 21:32, 27 April 2006 (UTC) —

Chamberlain's wounds were the subject of an article in the Journal of Urology, March 2000, pp 713-716. A summary of the article appears here: http://medicine.hallowed-grounds.com/october2000.htm

71.16.157.130 21:55, 16 August 2006 (UTC)J. Raeder

Appreciate this, and I have taken the liberty of adding it to the article, with citation. --Dumarest 15:22, 22 October 2006 (UTC) You may have to create an id for J.of U.

The above link to J. of U. article no longer works...well at least for me. Try http://www.jurology.com/article/S0022-5347(05)67789-0/pdf Some stories about JLC may be apocryphal, nevertheless, he was a hell of a man. fokker55

[edit] Redirect

I would like to suggest the addition of a redirect to this article from a search of "Lawrence Chamberlain" because by reading Civil War novels such as Killer Angels, one would search Lawrence Chamberlain, and expect to find this page

Done. Hal Jespersen 15:11, 29 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Gettysburg movie quote

"This is a different kind of army. If you look at history you'll see men fight for pay, or women, or some other kind of loot. They fight for land, or because a king makes them, or just because they like killing. But we're here for something new. This hasn't happened much in the history of the world. We are an army out to set other men free. America should be free ground, from here to the Pacific Ocean. No man has to bow, no man born to royalty. Here we judge you by what you do, not by who your father was. Here you can be something. Here you can build a home. But it's not the land. There's always more land. It's the idea that we all have value, you and me. What we're fighting for, in the end, is each other. Sorry. Didn't mean to preach." -Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain

I was wondering if this a real quote by him. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by SlayerOfChainer (talk • contribs) .

You might try looking over at wikiquote. You can also try a google search on one of the more memorable parts of that quote. My guess is that this isn't a real quote. It doesn't feel like what quotes I have read by Chamberlain, and it feels like language of the 2000s more than of the 1860s. GRBerry 12:45, 16 June 2006 (UTC)


–That part of the movie script was taken nearly word-for-word from the novel, Killer Angels. I don't know if the book's author, Michael Shaara, was quoting Col. Chamberlain directly, although that seems unlikely. Still, Shaara used letters, memoirs and other published materials as the basis for the thoughts and words of the characters (Lee, Longstreet etc) in the book, so it's possible that he may have based his rendering of Col. Chamberlain's speech to the group of reluctant soldiers (if it actually happened) on Col. Chamberlain's or somebody else's recollection of the incident.207.59.159.138 21:32, 16 August 2006 (UTC) J. Raeder

[edit] Confederate Surrender

I think the statement that Chamberlain was "informed that of all the officers in the Federal Army, General Grant had selected Chamberlain to preside over the ceremony of surrender and parole of the Confederate infantry . . . ." is incorrect. By the time of the surrender ceremony the "Official Records" indicate that only the Fifth Corps was at Appomattox, so the pool of officers was reduced, and according the Warner's "Generals in Blue," Chamberlain's division commander, General Bartlett, received the "stacked arms" of the Confederates. Chamberlain said he commanded the "parade." Furthermore Grant didn't mention Chamberlain in his report in the Official Records or in his memoirs. Is there any original source that supports Chamberlain's claim that he was either chosen by Grant or that Grant approved General Griffin's choice? Levelpuddle039 21:10, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I have made some adjustments and added some citations. Feel free to make modifications. Hal Jespersen 00:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)


The text of the surrender differs greatly from the Wiki on the Battle of Appomatox Courthouse (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Appomattox_Courthouse), the text of which follows.

The momentous meaning of this occasion impressed me deeply. I resolved to mark it by some token of recognition, which could be no other than a salute of arms. Well aware of the responsibility assumed, and of the criticisms that would follow, as the sequel proved, nothing of that kind could move me in the least. The act could be defended, if needful, by the suggestion that such a salute was not to the cause for which the flag of the Confederacy stood, but to its going down before the flag of the Union. My main reason, however, was one for which I sought no authority nor asked forgiveness. Before us in proud humiliation stood the embodiment of manhood: men whom neither toils and sufferings, nor the fact of death, nor disaster, nor hopelessness could bend from their resolve; standing before us now, thin, worn, and famished, but erect, and with eyes looking level into ours, waking memories that bound us together as no other bond;—was not such manhood to be welcomed back into a Union so tested and assured?

Instructions had been given; and when the head of each division column comes opposite our group, our bugle sounds the signal and instantly our whole line from right to left, regiment by regiment in succession, gives the soldier's salutation, from the "order arms" to the old "carry"—the marching salute. Gordon at the head of the column, riding with heavy spirit and downcast face, catches the sound of shifting arms, looks up, and, taking the meaning, wheels superbly, making with himself and his horse one uplifted figure, with profound salutation as he drops the point of his sword to the boot toe; then facing to his own command, gives word for his successive brigades to pass us with the same position of the manual,—honor answering honor. On our part not a sound of trumpet more, nor roll of drum; not a cheer, nor word nor whisper of vain-glorying, nor motion of man standing again at the order, but an awed stillness rather, and breath-holding, as if it were the passing of the dead!

– Joshua L. Chamberlain, Passing of the Armies, pp. 260-61

Cathsteve2002 20:42, 5 November 2007 (UTC)