My maternal grandmother, daughter of a Missouri Confederate soldier lived with my family (in southeast Texas) in the late 1930s-40s (until her death in 1947). There's no question that she spoiled me, her youngest grandson, quite outragiously, but I do remember being most strongly corrected by her when I came home from school talking about the "Civil War." She let me know rather quickly that any good southern boy should refer the the late unplesentness as "the War Between the States!"

She failed to mention (and it wasn't until after her death when I visited family in Missouri in the early 50s) that I learned her beloved husband, my "Grandpaw Shoemaker" came from a strongly pro-Union family. Such was the situation on the "bloody border" of Missouri-Kansas in the St. Joe MO area of that state.

Even today, I still have an urge to look over my shoulder to be sure that Cora Wilson Shoemaker isn't frowning down at me from her staunch Methodist Episcopal Church, South, heaven when I make the social error of voicing the words, "Civil War" in a conversation.