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leaving him for dead; rogues attack and rob him. If war is hell,
leaving it is no picnic, either.
Ada suffers too. Her father dies and she sets the slaves
free. A southern lady, she knows nothing about farming and
goes hungry. A plucky female farmhand (Renée Zellweger)
appears at the farm and sets it aright.
The movie reaches a climax when Inman staggers up
Cold Mountain—and into the arms of Ada. He is closely pur-
sued by ruffians in the Home Guard, a local militia on the
lookout for deserters, who shoot him dead.
Can any of this be regarded as history?
There was a man named Inman, the brother of author
Frazier’s great-great-grandfather. The real Inman had been
wounded in the neck at Petersburg, deserted, and was killed
in a gunfight with the Home Guard near Cold Mountain. But
the known facts of Inman’s story, Frazier explained,“could be
scrawled on the back of the envelope.” Frazier made up
everything else, doubtless inspired by Homer’s Odyssey,
another story of a soldier’s return home from war.
But if much of the story is the product of Frazier’s imagina-
tion, it nevertheless illuminates several historically significant
themes.Cold Mountainexamines the psychological effects of
the loss of morale in the South, which many historians now
regard as the best explanation for its defeat. (See Debating the
Past,“Were Reconstruction Governments Corrupt?” p. 413.)
Official statistics indicate that some 200,000 Union soldiers and
104,000 Confederates deserted. Many more simply walked
unarmed into enemy camps and were arrested as “captured.”
When Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox, his army had
dwindled to 28,000 men; another 3,800 were reported as
deserted and another 14,000 as captured.
The problem of desertion was especially acute in the
mountain region of North Carolina, where support for seces-
sion had never been strong. In late 1863 and early 1864 the
legislature of North Carolina passed laws penalizing sheriffs
who failed to assist in capturing deserters and draft dodgers;
it also created the Home Guard, local militias composed of
men exempt from conscription, and charged them with the
task of rounding up deserters. By early 1865, Lee was com-
plaining that entire units were deserting; he especially
regretted that “the greatest number of desertions have
occurred among the North Carolina troops.”
The movie accurately pinpoints the geography of
desertion—North Carolina. But was its psychological expla-
nation equally valid? Did southern women, like Ada,
encourage their menfolk to desert?
The historical evidence is ambivalent.
On the one hand, the Confederacy made a concerted
effort to enlist the support of white women. The South’s sur-
prisingly strong economic performance suggests that plenty
of women, like Ada, learned how to manage farms andC
old Mountain(2004), a movie based on Charles Frazier’s
novel, is a love story set during the Civil War. But this is an
unusual love story. The lovers are seldom together; and the
hero is a deserter.
Inman (Jude Law), a schoolteacher, and Ada (Nicole
Kidman), the well-born daughter of a minister, meet in a
town in western North Carolina in the shadows of Cold
Mountain. They speak on several occasions, look searchingly
at each other, and exchange a single resolute kiss. Then
Inman enlists in the Confederate army. They send each other
letters, many of which never arrive. They yearn for each other
without knowing much about each other. In a world made
ugly by war, they need something beautiful to love. Each
cherishes photographs of the other.
Inman is wounded in the neck during the siege of
Petersburg. While convalescing in a hospital, he receives a
letter from Ada:“If you are fighting, stop fighting... If you are
marching, stop marching. Come back to me.” He nods grimly
and decides to desert. He sneaks out of the hospital and
begins his long trek back to Cold Mountain.
The journey is an ordeal. He suffers from cold and
hunger. Confederate soldiers chase, capture, and shoot him,
RE-VIEWING THE PAST
Cold Mountain
Nicole Kidman as Ada in Cold Mountain.