The Red Badge of Courage is a realistic fictional account of a Union soldier from the American Civil War. His story begins with the young soldier living at home with his mother on a farm and hearing great sensationalized stories of battle and war. His mom did not approve of him signing up, but he goes through with it anyway.
For the first months of him being deployed he lives a boring life on a camp with his regiment basically just attempting to keep warm and comfortable. For a long time he is disappointed with this life, but one might rumors spread that they are going into battle the next morning. Instead of being excited, he finds himself questioning if he would run from a fight.
He struggles with this fear and talks to a friend of his “the tall soldier” who reassures him temporarily. The next morning they realize the rumors were not true, but he is not relieved because for the next few days he questions if he would be brave enough to fight. He comes to the conclusion that the only way to prove himself is to test himself properly, in battle.
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After a short conversation between a horseman and a colonel, his regiment begins to march into battle. He manages to sit and fight through the first wave of rebel soldiers, but when a second wave comes in he panics and deserts the fight. He soon learns that running was the wrong choice because his regiment managed to hold the rebel soldiers off.
He becomes deeply angry with himself for being a coward. After ending up in a line of injured soldiers he finds his friend “the tall soldier” and he starts to help him down the road. His friend is greatly injured and ends up dying right in front of him. After being questioned about his injury (which he didn’t have) by “the tattered soldier” he hops a fence and runs away. He soon sees a large group of soldiers running for there lives and he grabs one to question him.
The soldier he grabbed smacks him in the head with his gun and leaves him badly injured. A very kind man finds him and leads him back to his camp. When he arrives he claims he was shot in the head and everyone believes him because of his injury.
His friend who used to be a loud and confident man was now greatly humbled by the battle and they have a conversation about what happened. Before he can really reflect on the previous nights events he finds himself marching with his regiment to the next battle. Overwhelmed with anger and fear he ends up doing extremely well in this next battle and is considered a “war devil”.
He and his friend go to find water for the group and are not successful, but they overhear a conversation about sending the regiment into another battle that they are not expected to come back from. This forces him to realize the true nature of war and that in the end he is only a number, who is not thought of as a real human.
When they return to the regiment they quickly spread the word to the other soldiers. They are marched to the next battle and him and his friend once again do very well and risk there lives to keep the flag up, but when coming back from it the regiment is heavily criticized and it appears that they did it all for nothing.
He and his friend are recognized for there performance and this greatly inflates his confidence. In the next fight they push up on a fence that rebel soldiers are hidden behind. They are soon successful and steal the rebel flag out of a dying soldiers hand, the final shot is fired and the fight is over. At the end of this he is finally able to reflect on the past two days events, his view on life and war is greatly changed forever.
Red badge of courage is a very good book and a reasonably accurate source. The book’s depiction of the people’s view on desertion and cowardice is very accurate. Sadly before the realization that PTSD is a real issue, there was no sympathy for these soldiers.
At the time you were as a soldier expected to just sit in place and be shot at for a while until you die or the fight ends. These soldiers were pressured by there peers into staying no matter the cost, and the reward for this is being looked at as a hero.
The sensationalization of the war that encouraged him to join in the first place is also accurate, not only in the civil war but in every war ever. Young men wish to have purpose and they feel like they can prove themselves and be a real life hero on the battlefield, most of these people have no clue what there actually signing up for.
The depiction of his allies is pretty solid, war brings people together and this book shows that well.
You see the slow transition in these characters when faced with battle. Your views on life in general can be totally flipped upside down within minutes when faced with the levels of fear and loss experienced in war. An obvious example of this is one the youth looks back on his home life incredibly fondly despite hating it when he had it, your appreciation for life is greatly increased when you truly believe your going to die.
Another example of this strong character development is in his friend who was once loud and aggressive, but is quickly humbled after his first battle. You also see how quickly a hatred can be developed for an enemy that you don’t personally know at all when your pinned against each other in war.
The battles are also reasonably depicted. The Civil War is obviously pre trench warfare because the only weapons used at the time are single shot rifles. The two sides basically just stood in front of each other and started shooting until one side gave up or was totally killed. The treatment for wounds was accurate for the time. When the youth was “shot” in the head they just kinda put a towel on it, they didn’t sterilize the wound or even worry about the potential for a concussion they just let him go to sleep immediately after.
