Arthur Fremantle - Legacy

Legacy

When General Fremantle died in 1901, he had risen to become one of the most senior officers in the British Army, and had held several important posts both in military and civil life, the most obvious of which being his governorship of Malta. Fremantle's talents were most apparent in military-political relations, and as a staff officer.

However, his most lasting achievement is in being the most prominent foreign observer in the Confederacy, and perhaps on both sides, of the entire American Civil War. Although infused with sympathy for the Southern cause, Fremantle's diary is less openly partisan than other accounts by his contemporary observers, such as Fitzgerald Ross and Justus Scheibert. His writings also shed light not only on the military or political aspects of war, but also on the minute details of everyday life in the Confederacy. As he did not originally intend to publish his diaries when initially travelling through the South, Fremantle's account does not seem as though written for an audience, and thus is more frank in revealing his personal beliefs and preferences without becoming overtly evangelical.

Although the book was a bestseller at the time, the ultimate failure of the Confederacy to win its independence led to a sharp decrease in Britain in the appetite for Civil War diaries after 1865, including Fremantle's diary. In 1952, however, historian Walter Lord published a revised edition of Three Months in the Southern States, retitled The Fremantle Diary, which featured an introduction by the editor and detailed references. This became a surprise success, and remains the standard version of Fremantle's account to this day.