In the world of author Harry
Turtledove there were actually four wars, instead of just one, fought between
the United States of America and the Confederate States of America.
The starting point for
Turtledove’s alternate version of history is Sept. 10, 1862. In our reality, a
Confederate messenger lost Special Order 191, which provided details for Gen.
Robert E. Lee’s invasion plans. After the orders were intercepted by Union
troops, Gen. George McClellan stopped the Army of Northern Virginia at the
Battle of Antietam and the war continued for more than two more years.
In Turtledove’s “How Few
Remain,” the orders are recovered and delivered to Lee. Thus, McClellan is
caught by surprise by the Army of Northern Virginia as it advances towards
Philadelphia and the Battle of Camp Hill on Oct. 1 on the banks of the Susquehanna
River destroying the Army of the Potomac. Lee goes on to capture Philadelphia
earning the Confederate States of America diplomatic recognition from both the
United Kingdom and France. With the end of the War of Secession the Confederate
States are granted independence from the United States on Nov. 4, 1862.
After the war’s conclusion, Kentucky
joins the 11 original Confederate states, and the Confederacy is also given
Indian Territory, which we would call the state of Oklahoma, but in Turtledove’s
scenario it is referred to the state of Sequoyah. The Spanish-owned island of
Cuba is purchased by the Confederate States in the 1870s for $3 million, thus
also becoming a Confederate territory.
Also, President Abraham
Lincoln is defeated in his bid for re-election in 1864 and thus is not
assassinated at Ford’s Theater in April 1865.
In 1881, Republican James G.
Blaine is elected as the first president from his political party since Lincoln.
It is a time of Indian raids into the territory of each country. Tension reaches
it’s high point when Confederate President James “Old Pete” Longstreet
purchases the northwestern provinces of Sonora and Chihuahua from the
financially strapped Maximilian-ruled Mexican Empire for $3 million. That act, giving
the Confederates a Pacific port, Guaymas, precipitated what Turtledove called
the Second Mexican War as the United States declares war on the Confederacy.
Gen. Thomas J. Jackson, old “Stonewall,” general-in-chief of the Confederate
Army, is ready and eager to strike at the Yankees once more. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart
is in the Sonoran Desert defending the new Confederate territories from the
Yankees. Stuart forms an alliance with the Apaches under Geronimo. Eventually,
that alliance falls apart.
Meanwhile, Union cavalry Col. George
Armstrong Custer uses Gatling guns against Kiowa Indians and the Confederate
cavalry in Kansas. During the war, the Mormons in Utah rebel by severing
transcontinental communication and transportation around Salt Lake City. Former
President Lincoln is in Salt Lake City at the time of the rebellion as part of
a nationwide lecture tour on the benefits of socialism as espoused by Karl
Marx. The U.S. military governor, puts down the revolt, and imposes martial law
declaring the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints a political organization
resulting in Mormon leaders being hunted down and executed. Lincoln is also
detained and almost executed by the military.
The attempt by the United
States to invade Virginia is easily thrown back by Gen. Stonewall Jackson. Gen.
William Rosecrans, the commander of the entire U.S. army, casually reveals at
one point that there is no overall strategy for winning the war whatsoever. This
lack of planning leaves the German military observer, Alfred von Schlieffen,
aghast.
The United States next
attempts to launch a massive invasion of Louisville to knock the Confederates
out of Kentucky but it soon becomes a bloody stalemate. The United Kingdom and
France shell the Great Lakes ports; France also shells Los Angeles, while the
British bombard San Francisco and raid the Federal mint, an event reported by
newspaper editor Samuel Langhorne Clemens.
Meanwhile, in the Montana
Territory a young volunteer cavalry colonel, Theodore Roosevelt and Col. George
Armstrong Custer reluctantly work together to rout a British division under the
command of Gen. Charles “Chinese” Gordon after an invasion from Canada.
Finally, facing defeat on
almost all fronts, Republican President James G. Blaine is forced to
capitulate. A Republican is never again elected to the White House. The United
States, learning the importance of strong allies, seeks an alliance with the newly
formed and powerful German Empire.
Turtledove’s next novel “The
Great War: American Front” begins on June
28, 1914, the same day Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo.
World War I breaks out and spreads
to North America, where the pro-German United States under Democratic President
Theodore Roosevelt declares war on Confederate President Woodrow Wilson, which is
allied with Great Britain and France.
The novel ends in the autumn
of 1915, with the beginning of a Marxist black rebellion against the
war-distracted government of the CSA.
Most of the characters in the
books are small-time folks being caught up in the bigger world of a global war.
One main character whose destiny will be intertwined with that of the twentieth
century is an artillery sergeant named Jake Featherston.
This book is followed by “The
Great War: Walk in Hell” and then “The Great War: Breakthroughs.” Eventually,
the United States is victorious with territorial gains that include Kentucky,
portions of Virginia and Sonora, as well as the oil-rich Indian lands known as
the state of Sequoyah.
Jake Featherston’s immediate
superior is Capt. J.E.B. Stuart III, who has a Negro servant who appears to
sympathize with the Marxist black rebellion. Featherston points this out to
investigators, but Stuart hides the servant and then he allows himself to be
killed in battle. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart II, chief of the Confederate Army general
staff, attempts to protect the reputation of his son by blocking the promotion
of Featherston to officer rank for the duration of the war.
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Harry Turtledove |
The next installment of
Turtledove’s version of history is the three-book “American Empire” series.
Following the Great War, the
United States and German Empire are the dominant world powers. Having led the
U.S. to victory, President Theodore Roosevelt looses his third-term bid to the
Socialist candidate Upton Sinclair.
Meanwhile, in a defeated
Confederacy wracked by inflation and despair, the former Confederate Army
sergeant Jake Featherston and his Freedom Party are preaching a message of
hate, blaming the southern aristocracy and the Negro Marxist rebellion for the
Confederacy’s defeat.
As the 1920s draw to a close
the world economy crashes and the Great Depression begins, paving the way for
fanatics and demagogues the world over to seize power.
The “American Empire” series
is followed by the “Settling Accounts” tetralogy, which starts on June 22,
1941, with Confederate President Jake Featherston launching a war with aerial bombing
attacks on all major U.S. cities within reach of the border, followed by an
invasion of Ohio from Kentucky, which is cut in half by Confederate ground and
armored forces led by Confederate Gen. George S. Patton.
Before the war began Featherston
had launched a campaign of genocide against the country’s black population. One
can see parallels with the genocide of the Jews in our timeline. Meanwhile, the
Mormon population of Utah rebels against the United States with support from
the CSA, and proclaims the state of Deseret, forcing the United States to send
troops to try to put down the uprising. And, Japan attacks the Sandwich Islands
(Hawaii), sinking a U.S. carrier and threatening to capture the islands, and
taking Midway Island, resulting in fierce naval and air battles.
Both sides launch air raids on
enemy cities, and Confederate aircraft manage to kill Socialist U.S. President
Al Smith during a raid on Philadelphia, forcing the inexperienced Vice-President
Charlie LaFollette to take office
Later in the war, both sides
are desperately seeking a nuclear bomb, and the Confederates try to stall the
U.S. nuclear program by bombing the U.S. nuclear project site in Washington, to
which the U.S. replies by bombing the Confederate nuclear research site in
Virginia.
The U.S. demands the CSA’s
unconditional surrender: the Confederates refuse and fire two long-range
rockets into Philadelphia. With British aid, the Confederacy produces a fission
bomb and “nukes” the outskirts of Philadelphia. The U.S. responds by dropping
nuclear bombs on Newport News and Charleston. Nuclear bombs also destroy six
cities in Europe, Petrograd, Paris, Hamburg, London, Brighton, and Norwich.
Texas declares independence
from the Confederacy and arrests extermination camp officials. Featherston
attempts to escape to the deep South, but his plane is shot down, and he is
killed by an anti-Confederate guerrilla.
Confederate Vice President Don
Partridge then takes office, and agrees to unconditionally surrender to the
United States. Top Confederate officials are arrested, tried, and most of them
are executed. The Confederates involved in the murder of blacks are also
extradited from Texas, tried for crimes against humanity, and hanged.
The U.S. dissolves the
Confederate government and places the country under indefinite military
occupation. The revolt in Canada is also suppressed, and Texas remains independent
but hosts U.S. troops on its soil.
These series of books show
that Turtledove is the virtual master of alternate reality. He inserts familiar
names from our reality to see if the reader is paying attention. The plot he
weaves is so real you find yourself believing it rather than what really
happened.