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Why the Confederacy Lost Throughout history many historians have tried to put their finger on the exact reason for the Confederacy losing the war. Some historians blame the head of the confederacy Jefferson Davis, however others believe that it was the shear numbers of the Northern army that won out. Yet others have blamed almost every general that the Confederacy had, according to James M. McPherson: Among them Robert E. Lee himself for mismanagement, overconfidence, …

…To understand why the South lost, in the end, we must turn from large generalizations that imply inevitability and study instead the contingency that hung over each military campaign, each battle, each election, each decision during the war. When we comprehend what happened in these events, how it happened, why it happened, and what its consequences were, then we will be on our way toward answering the question: why did the Confederacy lose the war?(42)