Here is Ben Stein's last question. And I'll wrap it up in my next blog.

10.


But most of all-and closely connected to this last point-how could all of the men and women who participated in the war have been so amazingly brave?

How could they have carried such heavy loads, under such grueling conditions, slept in the rain, slept in the snow, marched right into massed rifle fire and certain death? How could they face death from belly wounds, in agony, maddened with thirst? How could they have undergone surgery with primitive anesthesia or none at all? How could the Army of Northern Virginia, starving, under-clothed, bled white by Grant, still have fought so gloriously in a lost cause at Petersburg? How could the Union soldiers have crossed those pontoon bridges at Fredericksburg under intense rifle fire and then attacked the fortified Confederates time after time? How could Pickett’s men have marched across that horrible open field into the jaws of death, keeping good order, doing their utmost as all of their friends and comrades fell and died around them?