The Killer Angels: Thursday, July 2, 1863: Chapter 2 Summary & Analysis

As Chamberlain walks among his men, he thinks that “all his life he had been a detached man, but … [now] he had joined not only the army but the race, not only the country but mankind.” He has found his true calling.

Chamberlain daydreams about his wife and the South she loves: “Strange hot land of courtly manners and sudden violence … a well-bred, well-mannered, highly educated man challenging you to a duel.” Just then, Kilrain appears with the news that he has found an injured black man.

The black man is very large, dark-skinned, well-muscled, and raggedly dressed. He has a bullet wound just under his ribs. Chamberlain has not seen many black people before and is “fascinated.” He realizes there is nothing inscrutable about the man’s face, as he had first thought; the man is simply exhausted. The man speaks almost no English.

As the black man eats and waits for a doctor, Chamberlain is shocked by his own hesitation to touch him— “a flutter of unmistakable revulsion” he had never suspected was there. He feels ashamed. Looking on, Kilrain says, “And this is what [the war is] all about.”

Tom arrives, chuckling over his conversation with some Rebel prisoners. When asked about their motives for fighting, the men claimed they weren’t fighting for slavery, but for their “rights.” Yet they could not specify what “rights” they were defending. Meanwhile, a surgeon has arrived and is examining the black man, who appears more frightened than ever.

Chamberlain feels “a slow deep flow of sympathy” for the black man and wonders how much the man understands of what is happening around him. How much could he know “of borders and states’ rights and the Constitution and Dred Scott? … And yet he was truly what it was all about.” The reason for the war feels “brutally clear” to Chamberlain.

Chamberlain wishes he had time to think, but they will soon be moving into battle. As the doctor finishes his treatment, he reveals what he was able to learn from the black man. Apparently, the ex-slave had gotten lost and wandered into Gettysburg seeking directions, only to be shot by a woman there. He has only been in the country for a few weeks and wishes to go home. Chamberlain doesn’t know what to do. He instructs the doctor to bandage the man well and send him off with food—but which way is “home”? Chamberlain bids the former slave goodbye, feeling foolish and angry.

The regiment forms and begins to advance across the Pennsylvania fields through the heat of the day. When they stop to rest, Meade sends back a message which Chamberlain is to read to the troops. The order mentions that any man who fails to do his duty will be punished by instant death. Chamberlain is embarrassed, thinking it a “damn fool order, [the] mind of West Point at work.” He does not believe that men can be threatened into this kind of fight; they must be led—by him.

As they wait, Chamberlain asks Kilrain what he thinks of “Negroes.” Kilrain broods and finally says that one cannot judge an entire race of people; one must take people one at a time. He has met some blacks who have earned his respect. Chamberlain says that he has never believed there is any difference between the races. A black man has “the divine spark” in his eye the same as a white man does.

Chamberlain recalls some visitors from the South whom he had met before the war, a minister and a professor. The minister had asserted that “a Negro was not a man,” and that Chamberlain would never understand this unless he lived among them. Chamberlain had left the room in anger, unable to understand how someone could enslave another man and then quote the Bible.

The professor had apologized to Chamberlain for offending him in his own home, though he could not apologize for his views, as they were honestly held. Finally, he had asked Chamberlain, “My young friend, what if it is you who are wrong?” Chamberlain remembers feeling for the first time that he would be willing to kill for his views, and at the same time to wonder if he was completely right. The man’s question still haunts him from time to time.

They sit in silence for a while. Kilrain finally says that he sees a great difference between them, which he can’t help but admire: Chamberlain is an idealist. Kilrain does not believe that there is any such thing as a “divine spark” or intrinsic equality. Rather, he is fighting for “the right to prove I’m a better man than many.”

Kilrain goes on to explain his personal philosophy and motive for fighting: “There’s many a man worse than me, and some better, but I don’t think race or country matters a damn. What matters is justice … damn all gentlemen.” He further believes that the only aristocracy is in the mind, and each person must be judged on an individual basis, never on the basis of one’s class or lineage.

Kilrain tells Chamberlain that the “strange and beautiful” thing about him is that he actually believes in humanity, whereas when he has gained Kilrain’s experience of the world, he will realize that good people are far rarer than he thinks. Chamberlain points out that what black people have suffered in America is terrible. Kilrain agrees but argues that a freed black man is not necessarily superior to many a white man who fought to free him.

Kilrain continues to argue that the point of the war is that “we have a country here where the past cannot keep a good man in chains,” and that it is the aristocracy he is after—“all that lovely, plumed, stinking chivalry.” The two ponder what will become of the country if the Union loses the war. They continue to wait for orders to move. Chamberlain takes comfort in knowing that he is not wrong, that he is fighting for the right side.