7 - “Cumberer of the Earth”: Suffering and Suicide among the Faithful in the Civil War South

Summary

The most famous suicide of the American Civil War was undoubtedly that of Edmund Ruffin, fire-eating secessionist from Virginia whose actions bookended the Civil War. Having satisfactorily fulfilled his duties as father and countryman, and no longer able to contribute to his own or anyone else's support, Ruffin had become "merely a cumberer of the earth, and a useless consumer of its fruits". Religious proselytization on the subject of suicide proved effective and greatly influenced popular ideas about the sinfulness and immorality of self-murder. White Southerners' religious convictions were put to the test on multiple fronts as a result of the Civil War. The psychological crisis that grew in the wake of war enveloped thousands of Southerners, many of whom manifested symptoms of mental illness, including suicidal behavior, during and after the war. Newspaper obituaries of suicidal deaths after the war similarly reflect a softening of harsh attitudes on suicide.