Chris Nelson
Home Guard
Thu Feb 22 10:51:24 2001


My only knowledge of the Home Guard is from the acclaimed novel COLD MOUNTAIN, which portrays these men (at least in VA and the Carolinas)as local militia (with only a veneer of legality)charged with rounding up deserters as well as protecting the home front from Union invaders. In the novel, as I recall, they were little more than self-constituted vigilantes who were more apt to rob and kill deserters than turn them in. Of course, unlike the kind-hearted hero modeled on Ulysses, I imagine many, if not most, deserters were blackguards and deserved what they got. In any event, I don't envy those left behind by the men who marched off to fight. It's an interesting aspect of the war that needs more examination. . . .

• home guards — Alan J. Pitts, Thu Feb 22 15:55