The Rule of the Major Generals

Emotion; it's sometimes hard to show, especially through text. Without emotion reading would be boring, bland, and unsatisfactory. To add emotion to a piece of writing you need to use these literary devices: Imagery, pathos, symbolism, and irony. The book "Generals die in bed" by Charles Yale Harrison uses these devices to make you feel such emotion for the soldiers that at points it can be a tear jearker.

“upon the King’s return from oxford there appeared nothing, but dejection of mind , discontent, and secret mutiny in the army.” (a historian from the 1800s described the King’s army).

Another source which supports the interpretation that British generals were incompetent is source B1. John Laffin worked as a tour guide in Australia. His parents both served witht he Australians in Gallipoli and France as nursing cops. Even though he didn’t have a history degree, he was a military historian who earned his living taking people on battlefield tours. He researched the war from the soldier’s viewpoint and wrote a successful history book titled “British Butchers and Bunglers of World War One” – a very emotive polemic title - which released to the public in 2003. The book aims to expose the guilt of ‘uncaring and stupid’ generals. The passage from the book says that Haig and other stupid generals must be blamed for ‘wilful blunders and wicked butchery’ and that there can never be forgiveness for their ‘sheer incompetence’. This source lacks reliability as it has been written in confidence with other sources he has researched online. Laffin only presents one side of the argument and doesn’t discuss the situation in Verdun. The passage of the book was written in 2003 – 80 years later from World War 1. However, his job as a tour guide in battlefields gives him an advantage over other historians. This source is supported by other historians (B8 an B1) and soldiers (B2). This interpretation is contradicted by sources like (B14).

With the state of relations between King and parliament at an all-time low, the last thing needed was more criticism to an already weakened king, who had just agreed to the Triennial act of 1641 which meant parliament would be called at least every three years. Despite this, Pym and his supporters presented the Grand Remonstrance; a list of 160 grievances and misdeeds of Charles. This in itself was something proposed by Pym and was almost mocking Charles with his “divine right of kings” ideal now appearing obsolete. This may have proved a last straw for Charles, who would have been building a great sense of anger with Parliament and more specifically with Pym.

The comparison or contrast of two generals in a history taught that both men had their own value even they lost or victory. Both generals in the history were very firm and refused did not want to give up. As a great fighter, both commit to fight until their last chance or the end of their lives. For example, even general Lee knew he was helpless, but he still fought until the end. However, by the end of the war, both parties decided to reunion. Also, to come up with possible peacefulness, those two generals learned how to compromise with one another. Because they were similar at that point, both great men brought American together throughout the history.

After the end of the civil war, officers of the New Model Army, formed by Cromwell, decided to put Charles on trial. Parliament voted to negotiate with the King in order to come to a peace agreement, but that was met with a fierce rebuke from Cromwell and his army. In order to kill any hope for the King and to prevent any kind of compromise between the King and Parliament, one hundred and eighty members of Parliament were excluded, and forty five were imprisoned for showing resistance. This act of purging was described simply as a coup d'état. (23 Laughland) If the king is truly guilty and hated by his people, Cromwell wouldn’t have needed to perform this despicable action of arresting and barring Parliament members from their seats. At this point, the authority of Parliament that was supported by the Roundheads, over the King’s, has lost all its legality. Parliament became a military tool in the hand of Cromwell and his army. In addition to this, Cromwell’s son-in-law, Henry Ireton, was the one who submitted a request to prosecute the King, which was naturally accepted by the one third of the Parliament left. A court with the name of ‘High Court of Justice’ was formed to be responsible for the King’s trial. (103-104 TURCHETTI)

In England, from about 1400 to 1700 there was a constant struggle between Parliament and the ruling monarch. During that time, there were six documents that tried to weaken or challenge the power of the monarch. One of these documents was the Petition of Right. The Petition of Right, although it did not last, challenged Charles I by stating that he could not levy taxes without Parliament’s approval, not declare martial law, not to quarter soldiers in private homes while during peacetime, and could not imprison someone without a valid charge. Another document is the Grand Remonstrance. The Grand Remonstrance was a list of grievances against Charles I. This lead to Parliament asking for control of the army. Although it was brutally denied, it

On January 21, 1824 around midnight in Clarksburg, Virginia, now West Virginia, one of the South’s greatest Generals during the American Civil War was born. This was Thomas Johnathan Jackson, also known as Stonewall Jackson. He was the third born out of four siblings. His parents were Julia Beckwith Neale and Johnathan Jackson (Stonewall Jackson). Jackson’s childhood was very rough. When he was two, his father and older sister died of typhoid fever within the same year. The death of his father caused his mother to be widowed and left with little money and many debts. To support her, now three, children, she sewed and taught. Not only that, in order for her to fix the financial issues, she was forced to sell their property and home. In

The generals of the American Civil War, Robert E. Lee, Ulysses Grant, William Sherman and James Longstreet, reign in infamy as the pivotal generals that shaped the outcome of the war and military history. Although the generals contributed to the war in various ways, but Ulysses Grant stands above his peers in generalship, because of the Grant’s resilience, unpredictability and strategic mastery. Grant is followed in generalship by Lee, Sherman, and Longstreet in respective order.

Oliver Cromwell is – and has always been – one of the most controversial characters in British and Irish history. There are few people in Great Britain and Ireland today who have not yet heard of Oliver Cromwell and either loathe him or see him as a hero. Yet, the world is not black and white and so is the truth about Cromwell. In order to understand his role in both countries as a whole, one has to look at the perspective of both nations, Cromwell’s beliefs and his motives.

Civil supremacy over the military has been uniquely Anglo-American premise since the Revolutionary War. Prior to 1776, a “rage militare” or “passion of arms” swept the American colony; colonists found a new vogue for all things military and it created an environment that could have supported a military dictatorship. George Washington, as congressionally appointed head of the Continental Army could have accepted or sought after dictatorial powers, but he did not due to his beliefs. George Washington did not become a military dictator because of his strongly held belief in the supremacy of civil control over the military, which was formulated through mistakes made as young military officer, his experiences as a legislator in the Virginia House of Bourgeois and Continental Congress, and was reinforced as he served as the Commander and Chief of the Continental Army.

“It is comparatively simple to select the generals after a display of their military qualities on the battlefield. The difficulty is when we must choose them prior to employment in active operations. . . . The most important factor of all is character, which involves integrity, unselfish and devoted purpose, a sturdiness of bearing when everything goes wrong and all are critical, and a willingness to sacrifice self in the interest of the common good.” – General George C. Marshall, 1944

If a general can be trusted and is part of the team, Soldiers will have more confidence in challenging moments. As all troops believes on a leader’s intent, the collective trust will be stronger within the Soldiers. This was reflected when BG Gavin’s Soldiers did not like the idea of withdrawing from the

Cromwell also believed that the failure of the Western Design to the West Indies was a sign of God's displeasure at England's progress, and that a godly reform of the nation's morals was urgently required. During August and September 1655, Cromwell worked with John Lambert, John Disbrowe and Sir Gilbert Pickering to finalise arrangements for the new system ‘the rule of major generals’. The Major-Generals were formally commissioned on 11 October 1655 and proclaimed on 31 October. The country was divided into 12 regions, each governed by a Major-General who was answerable only to the Lord Protector. While the Major-Generals were successful in law enforcement and in curbing security threats to the Protectorate their attempts at reforming the nation's morals varied from region to region according to the zeal of individual officers, but had no lasting effects. Cromwell himself was aware of the unpopularity of military government and seems to have given tacit support to those who opposed its renewal. The system was abandoned early in 1657 under a new constitution: the Humble Petition and Advice.

Generals are the classes everyone takes in college, but are they actually helpful? Some students say no. This is usually because they already have their major picked out. Then there are the undecided students who just want to continue schooling until they figure out what they want to do. Either way, generals are an important part of college education whether or not you have your major picked out.