Pauline Johnson, 83, at the Harriet Tubman Home in Auburn, N.Y., says she didn't learn she was the great-grandniece of the Underground Railroad conductor until she was 25.
EnlargeCloseBy Gary Walts for USA TODAYPauline Johnson, 83, at the Harriet Tubman Home in Auburn, N.Y., says she didn't learn she was the great-grandniece of the Underground Railroad conductor until she was 25.
"It's our war. All the blood fell on our soil," says Lloyd Garrison, 79, great-great-grandson of the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison. He says the war even has a contagious, old-time glamour. The great-great-grandson of the abolitionist's ideological opponent, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, agrees. "Americans are fascinated by the individuals who fought," says Bertram Hayes-Davis, 62. "They want to know more about what these people did, who they were and what they went through."CIVIL WAR: More stories, videos, profilesToday, descendants such as Garrison and Hayes-Davis underscore our link to a struggle that shaped the nation as much as the arrival of the Mayflower or the victory at Yorktown. The Civil War ended slavery, strengthened the federal republic and allowed settlement of the West; it pioneered an industrial style of "total war," which included mass production of weapons and the systematic destruction of Southern agriculture; it killed about 620,000 combatants — nearly as many Americans as all the other wars the country has fought combined.Like many other Americans, descendants of the war's great figures have discovered and grown into their Civil War legacies. They raise issues that still divide us: Why was the war fought? What did it achieve? Was Davis a traitor? Was Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant a drunk?COMMEMORATION PLANS: Civil War 150th anniversaryTRACING ROOTS: Web, professionals make great genealogy toolsView the Original article
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