This thesis studies the issue of unionism in Texas during the era of the Civil War.

The primary purpose of this thesis is to examine the role of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) in the Nigerian civil war, 1967-1970. The working hypothesis of this thesis is that as a result of (1) conservatism of the OAU; (2) Article 3, paragraphs II and III of.the OAU Charter; and (3) the influence of foreign powers on the OAU, the Organization has not been very successful in handling African conflicts. The purposes of this study necessitated researching a wide array of literature on the Organization of African Unity, conflicts in Africa since 1963, and the Nigerian civil war.

In its investigation of social and political violence during the Irish Civil War, this thesis tackles the diverse range of deliberate, frightening and harmful actions—largely neglected by military and political histories of the conflict—that surfaced in local communities in Ireland during 1922–23. Through a three-county study of Limerick, Tipperary and Waterford, in the province of Munster, this thesis examines and explains violence perpetrated alongside and away from armed encounters between the anti-Treaty republican army and Free State forces. It identifies three main categories of violence: arson (the burning of houses, crops and infrastructure), intimidation (including boycott, damage to property, verbal and written threats, animal maiming, cattle driving and land seizure) and violence against the person (bodily damage or death through physical contact or the use of weapons). The thesis charts, where possible, the frequency of the violent act and, in exploring the symbolism and strategies involved in arson, intimidation and violence against the person, identifies two key functions of social and political violence. For one, targeted violence was used, during the Irish Civil War, to regulate community relations: state-sanctioned ethnic cleansing did not take place, but the religious and political minority (Protestants, ex-Servicemen and other British Loyalists) were deliberately persecuted, resulting in their flight from Munster. Land is another powerful motif in the thesis; the second key function of violence was to challenge attitudes towards rural issues and force redistribution outside the official channels. The thesis also places the Irish Civil War in perspective: the prolific bloodshed, sexual violence and gruesome torture witnessed in Central Europe, after World War I, did not become the norm in Ireland. Animals and private property bore the brunt of the severest actions in the three Munster counties. By bringing to light victims’ experiences of violence recorded in largely unexplored compensation claims, this thesis captures the complex questions of loyalty and identity—facing armed actors and officials, as well as civilians—that beset the violent and chaotic establishment of independent Ireland.

Une guerre civile est un conflit violent impliquant un changement socio-politique dramatique qui devient un jalon historique, culturel et littéraire. C’est une période où les processus doubles de la déconstruction et de la reconstruction reformulent les lois, l’histoire et les identités communautaires. Le fait que ces transformations rapides impliquent une souffrance humaine massive est peut-être l’aspect le plus perturbant d’une guerre civile. Cette thèse analyse la façon dont les romans contemporains sur les guerres civiles de l’Espagne et de l’ex-Yougoslavie représentent l’expérience humaine au cours de ces périodes de transformations sociales chaotiques et violentes. A partir d’une étude comparative des œuvres, elle soutient que les romans représentent la condition humaine en se focalisant sur les expériences subjectives des gens ordinaires pendant les conflits, et en reléguant en arrière-plan les évènements politiques et militaires de la guerre civile. / A civil war is a violent conflict of dramatic political and social change that becomes a historical, cultural and literary marker. It is a period when laws, history and identities are reformulated through dual processes of deconstruction and reconstruction. This makes evident the symbolic dimension of civil war violence and accentuates the unstable, precarious and malleable nature of identity constructs, ideologies and history. The fact that these rapid transformations implicate massive human suffering is perhaps what is most unsettling about civil war. A civil war is not only a pivotal moment in a nation’s history but as well on an individual level for those who live through it and have to adapt to the changing systems of values that redefine life during and after the conflict. This thesis examines how contemporary novels dealing with the Spanish Civil War and the Yugoslav conflict reflect on the human experience during these periods of chaotic and violent social transformations. The study presents a comparative analysis of the following works: Camilo José Cela’s San Camilo, 1936, Dževad Karahasan’s Sara i Serafina (Sara and Sefarina), Mercè Rodoreda’s Quanta, quanta guerra… (War, so much war), Velibor Čolić’s Chronique des oubliés (Chronicle of the forgotten), Carmen Martín Gaite’s El cuarto de atrás (The backroom), David Albahari’s Mrak (Darkness), and Javier Cercas’ Soldados de Salmanina (Soldiers of Salamis). Parting from a close study of the texts, the thesis argues that the novels represent the human dimension by focusing on ordinary people’s subjective experiences during the conflict while relegating the political and military events surrounding the civil war to the background. Such representations aspire to redeem the complexities and the significance of individual lives and of a social collective, which the civil war’s physical and symbolic violence dehumanizes, silences and obliterates.

This thesis examines the methods and actions of selected Virginians who chose to adopt irregular tactics in wartime, and focuses on the reasons why they fought that way. The presence of the Cavalier image in Virginia had a direct impact on the military exploits of several cavalry officers in both the Revolutionary War and the American Civil War. The Royalist cavalry during the English Civil War gave rise to the original Cavalier image, but as migrants came to Virginia during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the image became a general term for the Southern planter. This thesis contends that selected Virginia cavalry officers attempted to adhere to an Americanized version of the Cavalier image. They either purposefully embodied aspects of the Cavalier image during their military service, or members of the Southern populace attached the Cavalier image to them in the post-war period. The Cavalier thus served as a military ideal, and some cavalry officers represented a romanticized version of the Southern martial hero. This thesis traces the development of the Cavalier image in Virginia chronologically. It focuses on the origins of the Cavalier image and the role of the Royalist cavalry during the English Civil War. After the Royalist migration, and especially during the American Revolution, Virginians like Henry Lee embodied aspects of the Cavalier image during their military careers. Between the end of the American Revolution and the beginning of the Civil War, some Southern authors perpetuated the image by including Cavalier figures in many of their literary works. In the Civil War, select Virginians who fought for the Confederacy personified the Cavalier hero in the minds of many white Southerners. Despite a Confederate defeat, the Cavalier image persisted in Southern culture in the post-Civil War period and into the twentieth century.

Since the end of the Nigcria-Biafra war in 1970, political and social theorists, journalists, and scholars have discussed the significance of the war and the major players. Yet one perspective is often omitted, and that is the experiences of women and the roles they played during the war. This thesis begins to unearth some of those hidden narratives through the use of in-depth interviews with seven Biafran women who lived during and survived the Nigeria-Biafra war. Their stories about the importance of their ethnic and religious identities, their roles and experiences during the war, their encounters with death and refugees, and their discussions of a generational shift are important parts of some of the unearthed narratives.

From its early days as a slave state, to its secession from the Union, to finally admitting that the south had failed, Texas played a major role in the Confederacy and the Civil War.

No description available.

In October 1863 the United States Army's Rio Grande Expedition left New Orleans, bound for the Texas coast. Reacting to the recent French occupation of Mexico, President Abraham Lincoln believed that the presence of U.S. troops in Texas would dissuade the French from intervening in the American Civil War. The first major objective of this campaign was Brownsville, Texas, a port city on the lower Rio Grande. Its capture would not only serve as a warning to the French in Mexico; it would also disrupt a lucrative Confederate cotton trade across the border. The expedition had a mixed record of achievement. It succeeded in disrupting the cotton trade, but not stopping it. Federal forces installed a military governor, Andrew J. Hamilton, in Brownsville, but his authority extended only to the occupied part of Texas, a strip of land along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. The campaign also created considerable fear among Confederate soldiers and civilians that the ravages of civil war had now come to the Lone Star State. Although short-lived, the panic generated by the Rio Grande Expedition left an indelible mark on the memories of Texans who lived through the campaign. The expedition achieved its greatest success by establishing a permanent Federal presence in Texas as a warning against possible French meddling north of the Rio Grande.

This dissertation is a study of morale in the western Confederacy from early 1864 until the Civil War's end in spring 1865. It examines when and why Confederate morale, military and civilian, changed in three important western states, Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee. Focusing on that time frame allows a thorough examination of the sources, increases the opportunity to produce representative results, and permits an assessment of the lingering question of when and why most Confederates recognized, or admitted, defeat. Most western Confederate men and women struggled for their ultimate goal of southern independence until Federal armies crushed those aspirations on the battlefield. Until the destruction of the Army of Tennessee at Franklin and Nashville, most western Confederates still hoped for victory and believed it at least possible. Until the end they drew inspiration from battlefield developments, but also from their families, communities, comrades in arms, the sacrifices already endured, simple hatred for northerners, and frequently from anxiety for what a Federal victory might mean to their lives. Wartime diaries and letters of western Confederates serve as the principal sources. The dissertation relies on what those men and women wrote about during the war - military, political, social, or otherwise - and evaluates morale throughout the period in question by following primarily a chronological approach that allows the reader to glimpse the story as it developed.