How can witnessing events such as that in Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge change the world-view of a culture?

Fantastic short-story, one of my all time favorites....... I'm not sure what you mean by world-view here. The Civil War had two conflicting world-views; one supported slavery, the other didn't. This was a bloody, wasteful war that almost destroyed a nation, but the short-story supplies is with a civilian view; it shows up what happened to people who were not directly involved in the conflict and the way that even in the end they reached out for their hopes and dreams.