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Re: A New Light on Gettysburg
In Response To: Re: A New Light on Gettysburg ()

Okay, *this* will be my last word on the subject.

You make an excellent point. When new archaelogical discoveries are made, or when new documents come to light, then of course the accepted history of an event may need to be revised. Even without such discoveries, accepted history sometimes needs to be revised -- take for example "The History of the Great Patriotic War," the official Soviet history of World War II. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, that history is being revised (admitting Soviet involvement in the Katyn Forest massacre, for example). In short, if the history is flawed, it needs to be revised.

The reason I have been belaboring this Stuart thing, Mr. Upton, is not because I think that you have some sinister agenda, but because historical revisionism is a two-edged sword. I cringe whenever some hobby-historian, or worse, some politician, announces that he has a new interpretation of existing historical records. That almost always leads to propaganda, which often finds its way into the classrom, or is used to justify a social engineering program. Such revisionism has changed the Civil War from a war to preserve the Union to a war to free the slaves. The record, of course, makes it clear that freeing the slaves was a *result* of the war, not the *cause* of the war. This revision is not based on new discoveries, but on a reintrepetation (manipulation) of the existing record.

Understand that I do not oppose revision of flawed history. But revisionists should proceed with extreme caution. Once again, I'm not pointing any fingers at you, sir. You seem to be a very thoughtful researcher (with an excellent command of the English language, I might add -- an increasing rarity these days!), but I am old school and not a believer of change for change's sake. If it's broke, fix it; if it ain't, leave it alone.

Best wishes and adios for now.

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