Reid Mitchell provides two main theses in The Vacant Chair, a discussion of the Civil War based on diaries, personal recollections, letters and other primary sources. One is that the experience represented the coming of age for volunteers who entered the war as boys and came out men, and the other is that the domestic sphere (i.e. family) provided the basis by which people thought about the war. While MitchellÆs arguments are convincing, they are undermined by the fact that he presents them in an idealized, unrealistically homogenous environment that does not represent the diversity of Northern soldiers. From reading The Vacant Chair only, one would be led to believe that every company of soldiers consisted of white relatives or friends who all knew each other or of each other and were from the same town. One would also think that every one of them came from an ideal domestic sphere.
Reid makes a plausible case for his belief that the Civil War experience was a rite of passage for those who served in it. So, too, his argument that the family provided a basis for how people thought about the war and was a soldierÆs driving motive is sound. Despite the validity of his theses, ReidÆs depiction of the Civil War and Northern soldiers is misleading. For in his description of particular events and recollections from primary sources, the entire Union army appears white-washed. It seems white-washed because the events and recollections chosen by Reid make it seem that everyone who served in the war did so with a group of their relatives or associates from the same town. We see an example of this when Reid (1993) provides an excerpt of a letter from one Illinois soldier: ôWhat should a man do when his brother is lying exhausted on the battlefield of Shiloh while his company is rushing on? Is he first a sergeant of a sibling?ö (12).
ReidÆs portrait of the Civil War soldiers dr
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