In an otherwise detailed and historically accurate rendering of the meeting between Generals Ulysses S. Grant and Robert E. Lee in Wilbur McClean's parlor near Appomattox Courthouse to discuss the surrender of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia 150 years ago today, author/historian Shelby Foote advances the generally accepted notion that the event marked the end of the Civil War. But why do we mark April 9 as the end of the war?  The Daily Beast article is excerpted from Foote's three-volume masterpiece, The Civil War: A Narrative, which is part of the answer.  A "narrative" usually contains a beginning, a middle, and an end.  But the Civil War's ending was a messy affair, as there were more than 14,000 casualties on both sides before the last Confederate army surrendered on July 24. That casualty figure is from an exhaustive study performed by historian Darroch Greer for the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in...(Read Full Post)