By Joel Thurtell
General Grant’s sentry continues his narrative relating the true history of the Civil War:
Hard to believe what a dingblasted dirty trick Facebook pulled on General Grant.
An’ the general don’t even DO Facebook!
Like a lot of people, General Grant signed up fer a Facebook accoun’ before realizin’ what a goshdarn invasion of privacy and outright security risk it posed to the Federal army.
True ’nuff, General Grant had his Facebook account.
He just never used it, no matter how many times General Sherman come up an’ steamrolled him to be his friend on Facebook.
He took out the Facebook account when he started goin’ ta school at West Point.
So what does Facebook turn ‘roun’ an’ do?
Okay, here’s the low-down on General Grant’s name.
His mom an’ dad named him Hiram Ulysses Grant when he was a-born on April 27, 1822.
Hiram Ulysses Grant.
Initials HUG
Not good enough for Facebook. Gotta have a better middle name.
So they dumped “Hiram” an stuck a “S” in the middle for an initial.
S
Didn’ stand fer nothin’, but they had to have that middle initial.
What’s the general gonna do?
Fight Facebook?
He wasn’ even a general then. Just a measly cadet.
Might as well get in a wrasslin’ match with some bounder that buys ink by the barrel.
That’s the big mistake General Sherman made when he pissed off that no accoun’ reporter that poured on the ink sayin’ General Sherman was a nutcase.
Which General Sherman was, kinda, but that’s another story.
Well, time marches on, an’ so does Facebook. They see that the general don’t have a middle name, only that initial S.
The middlee initial that they done give him!
My guess is the whole debakel was thunk up by a Facebook CPU.
Central Processing Unit.
What mortal human would be so dumb or callous as to stick a middle name on a guy what didn’ want it?
Wasn’t good enuff that Facebook stuck him with a middle initial he didn’ want.
They see his name is “Ulysses S Grant.” Can’ have that!
Gotta have that middle name.
Well, his first two initials is U and S.
What’s that stand for?
“United States.”
Why not make his first name “United”?
In their Facebook generosity, they leave him with “Ulysses.”
But the computer mulls it over, “United States, United States,” oh yes, “United States” — “Uncle Sam.”
So Facebook gives General Grant a middle name.
“Sam.”
Not even “Samuel.”
Jus’ plain “Sam.”
Pretty soon at West Point, cadets is callin’ him by his Facebook monicker.
“Sam.”
Like it or lump it, “Sam” was out there.
Oh sure, he coulda complained to Facebook.
What good what that a done?
This is the World Wide Web, folks.
Once a thing is posted, yer not takin’ it back.
That was a big lesson General Grant learned about mindin’ yer p’s an’ q’s.
Ya got somethin’ ya want kep’ private, don’t post it on Facebook.
An’ don’ be sendin’ it out on e-mail, either.
No tellin who’s gonna forward or cc or bcc your innermost thoughts.
‘Course, this is what really sunk the johnny rebs.
People say the South had this big advantage, ’cause more West Point guys joined the Confederacy than went for the Union.
Big deal.
The South had more guys hooked on Facebook, is all.
An’ if it wasn’t Facebook, it was Twitter or LinkedIn.
Might as well put it on malarkey dot com.
Pretty soon, General Grant was sittin’ on a camp stool readin’ General Lee’s e-mails, an’ next day, General Grant’d go out an’ lick them graybacks.
What about them three cigars an’ the battle plans the johnny rebs found?
Oh boy. There’s too much in that one for today. I gotta get back on duty.
Come ‘roun’ tomorrow, an’ I’ll tell ya about them three cigars.
Stay tuned for more authentic history of the impact of social media on the Civil War.
