Past armies, and especially the linear armies of the 18th and 19th centuries, tend to look like faceless, heartless blobs thrown into the meat-grinder of battle. As you said, pawns in some aloof general's larger battleplan. I would argue that appearance comes from two interesting relationships:

The first was the relationship between the soldiery and their officers. Many officers, especially those who occupied the higher officer ranks, hailed from the noble families of Europe. Sometimes they bought their rank, other times they used political influence to secure key postings for themselves or family members, others had simply perfected the art of war in the long stretches of leisure time afforded to those of privilege. Especially in the centuries prior to the French Revolution, many nobles believed they were simply better at fighting a war than the common masses, that they were born with an innate mental aptitude towards strategy and tactics. On the other hand then, the common soldiery was a motley bunch of men. They were those who sought adventure, fortune, or simply escape in the ranks of the military. Both land and naval forces were hardly picky about the soldiers they took, and when recruitment quotas failed to fill the ranks, impressment was a common alternative. Those too drunk, stupid, or unlucky enough to escape impressment found themselves unwilling to fight, but unable to flee. Thus, the armies were filled with drunks, thieves, and malcontents. They occupied the lowest rungs of the social ladder, and everybody knew it. Many 17th and 18th century armies were only kept together by the combination of swift and harsh discipline, along with the promise of frequent meals, clothing, and maybe even pay. All in all, it offered an interesting juxtaposition where the common ranks were occupied by the most base and vulgar exhibits of the human race, while the officer corps were occupied by men who traded on prestige, rank, title, and money. Its no wonder the officers couldnt relate to the men!

Second, most generals were taught along certain lines. When they were educated at all, most were taught how to follow and emulate the great campaigns of earlier generals, like Hannibal, Caesar, Marlboro, and Napoleon. For them, battles were abstracted and armies were reduced to faceless masses to be pushed around at the commander's whim. On some level, this treatment is important as it strips away the confusion and mayhem of combat, and renders decisions (and their results) easily visible. However, it also serves to dehumanize combat, and removes the generals from the effects of their decisions.

This all began to change during the American and French Revolutions, which both appealed to the nationalistic tendencies of Americans and Europeans. Rather than armies of coerced criminals, the French in particular built armies of semi-coerced zealots who fought as much for France as they did because they had to. By 1815, nationalist zealotry was more significant a motivating factor soldiers than the money.

Add to this that the French implemented the first modern "draft" of soldiers, the Levee en Masse. Rather than pushing the recruitment volunteers, or the "recruitment" of "volunteers", the Levee simply conscripted men. Civilians were transformed into soldiers in vast brushstrokes. They formed a disparate group of peoples, not all of whom were criminal, stupid, or drunk. Nationalism, individualism, and a cult of militancy became the glue which bound these men together. And these basic concepts are still used even to this day. Many soldiers, even during World War Two, Korea, and Vietnam, all volunteered or accepted their conscriptions as the civic duty of patriots. Thus, by appealing to nationalism armies made heros of their soldiers, and had to treat them as such.

But that being said, I would not take these concepts too far. Today war is more impersonal and calloused than ever before. The battlefields of World War Two were lonely places when compared the those of the Napoleonic Period. And while Napoleon often witnessed the effects of his decisions first hand, many generals today can easily insulate themselves from the horrors of the front. If we examine the eastern front of WW2, for example, many of the division, corps, and army commanders of both sides had first hand experience visiting the combat zones and front lines. However, the higher up generals had little first hand knowledge of the situation. We often bring up how misguided Stalin and Hitler were, how out of touch with reality they sometimes could be, and how insulated their headquarters were. But men like Halder, Guderian, Zhukov, and others could just as easily distance themselves from the horrors of their decisions. Divisions and armies were callously consumed in the charnel house of battle to achieve objectives whose importance was know only to strategic thinkers. These generals, and many like them, did what they felt was correct to achieve victory. Much as the generals of the 18th and 19th centuries, they distanced themselves from the front lines that they might gain a better understanding of the larger campaign. But sometimes this put them out of touch with the common soldier. Commanders were inflexible, and were resolute in the face of "heavy casualties," a euphemism itself which conceals the true reality of its meaning.

I would argue that on the modern battlefield more than ever, a soldiers is a " A figurative pawn[, Whose] duty is to die for [their] country."

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Sources:

David Chandler, The Campaigns of Napoleon

John Ferling, Almost A Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence

David Glantz, When Titans Clashed and other works

John Rigby Hale and J.R. Hale War and Society in Renaissance Europe 1450-1620

William H. McNeill, The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Force, and Society since A.D. 1000

Russell Weigley, The Age of Battles and A Great Civil War

I have several other works on the topic, which I could provide to the inquiring reader. They are not at my finger tips at this moment. For those whod like more recommendations, please request that below.