Posted on 06/15/2002 10:01:26 AM PDT by Ligeia
Edited on 07/12/2004 3:54:43 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
The term "Johnny Reb" evokes an image of a white soldier, Anglo-Saxon and Protestant and from an agrarian background. Many Southern soldiers, however, did not fit this mold. A number of ethnic backgrounds were represented during the conflict.
For example, thousands of black Americans fought as Johnny Rebs. Dr. Lewis Steiner of the U.S. Sanitary Commission observed that while the Confederate army marched through Maryland during the 1862 Sharpsburg (Antietam) campaign, "over 3,000 negroes had arms, rifles, muskets, sabers, bowie knives, dirks, etc. And were manifestly an integral portion of the Southern Confederate Army."
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
If you want on (or off) of my black conservative ping list, please let me know via FREEPmail. (And no, you don't have to be black to be on the list!)
My mother has said that a piece of cloth does not offend her. My father (rdb2) is a Fred Sanford-type dirty old man chasing young women around a tree (knowing he can't do a thing with them if he catches 'em).
In other words, it's not an issue.
Baruch was and is still considered by some to be one of the finest finacial minds that has come along.
RD, thanks for the graphic.
}:-)4
Did Southern Blacks Fight for the Confederacy?
Those units are said to have existed in the South’s main cities, including Mobile. Some historians saw such regiments – if they can be called such – never were officially mustered into the Confederate ranks and therefore did not "serve" in a fashion similar to that of white soldiers.The crux of the controversy may be in applying the modern-day definition of "black" to antebellum free people of color. Historians say those non-whites who volunteered with the Confederacy would not appreciate being referred to as "black."
"More than 80 percent of the free black population in New Orleans in 1860 had European blood in their veins," wrote James Hollandsworth in his book The Louisiana Native Guards: The Black Experience during the Civil War.
"In contrast," he wrote, "fewer than 10 percent of slaves in Louisiana gave evidence of white ancestry. Because skin color and free status were highly correlated, many free blacks identified more closely with Southern whites than with African blacks."
A similar case existed in Mobile. Those with mixed African and European blood formed a special class. Their special status in society elevated them above the black slaves, a circumstance they wanted to protect when the Civil War started, said Sheila Flanagan, assistant director of the Museum of Mobile.
What developed was a color-caste system: The closer one’s skin tone was to white, the higher the status.
For every black that fought for the rebs, there were 10,000 slaves that headed for the Union lines. Over 100,000 of them put on the Union Blue and went hunting rebs.
Have either of you read Dr. Steiner's report in full? If you had you would have seen that two sentances later he notes:
'The fact was patent, and rather, intersting when considered in connection with the horror rebels express at the suggestion of black soldiers being employed for the National defence."
If blacks were soldiers in the confederate army, and not just serving in support roles like the report seems to state, then why would they be so upset at the thought of facing black Union soldiers? Wouldn't they accord them the same respect you claim they showed to their own black soldiers? Unless, of course, there were no black confederate combat soldiers.
Please, check it out for yourself. Dr. Steiner's report is here . The passage I'm talking about is on page 11.
NO. We should not hate Liberals... we should hate Liberalism.
Better that they should turn from their wickedness and live...
Some Blacks, Jews and others had good reasons to fight for the Confederacy and that's all right with me.
Thanks for the ping sir. Many of these brave men fought and some even died for the cause of Southern Independence. There are several monuments in the South testifying to their loyalty and bravery.
Slavery, was and still is today, a heinous subject. But the War wasn't over slavery and these brave men knew that
It is too bad that the period that should define Jewishness--the Biblical golden age--is instead associated with another religion. Let it never be forgotten that Jews practiced slavery (both `avdut `Ivri and `avdut Kena`an), polygyny, concubinage, "genocide" (when commanded by G-d), and holy wars.
The establishment of Israel should have reversed this liberal image of Jewry. Unfortunately, the Jewish State itself is still often resented as a manifestation of "Jewish liberalism" and defended on liberal, enlightenment grounds.
How will the rebuilt Holy Temple be interpreted, I wonder?
LOL!! Well there you go then boys!! There wasn't a slave left in the South!! If we use Mr. Ditto's numbers here and take the smallest possible number EVER SEEN in print, which is these 3000 soldiers, reported on by a yankee doctor I might add, we have 30 MILLION slaves that escaped the Southern 'slaveocracy' as the yank apologists so lovingly put it.
By the numbers available of all possible slaves that means that every single one of them escaped to the North and returned 7 times!! Wow Ditto, with numbers like that it's kind of amazing that anyone had time to fight a war!! Transporting folks back and forth must have put a strain on the nation's infrastructure. Wonder why we never hear about these massive migrations back and forth? Just like a lib, throw out an outrageous number that has no basis in reality and expect it to be taken as the Gospel. That's exactly how the lincoln myth began. The fact is that Black Confederate records are being discovered all the time, either from new documentation found or documentation that has been covered up by the yankee propagandists. lincoln's Tariff War needed a cause by late 1862 with so much unrest in the north so they rallied around the Abolitionist Cause. Slavery was a red herring
It's interesting isn't it? What makes it even more of a coup for the yankees is that some that call on the Confederate cause actually believe it. I just love telling those morons about Judah Benjamin and the fact that the only full Jewish military cemetary outside of Israel is for Confederate soldiers in Richmond, VA
Unfortunately, there's always a Ned Touchstone around to tell these people that Benjamin was "obviously" a mole for the other side.
The Civil War and just whose side one fought on is a very complicated issue. The North was full of copperheads and the South of "tories." My own ancestors were Southern Unionists, which means that my family has been Republican since Lincoln (unlike most Southern Republicans who are converts).
In addition to the slavery issue there was the tariff issue and the issue of fighting against "the Old Flag" (and don't doubt for a minute that that wasn't a powerful pause for thought for many people at the time). Plus, there may be a genuine cultural split. My own upper South ancestors had more in common with New England Puritans than with the strange high church culture of the Deep South. In addition to the slavery issue, the Puritan culture was stark and Calvinistic, being opposed to gambling and alcohol as well as to the alleged loose morals of the slave-holding aristocracy. Although I am now aware that the Bible itself actually permits both slavery and concubinage (not to mention consumption of alcohol!), I still culturally identify with the old 19th Century Republican Evangelical morality. There is still something about Prohibitionism and opposition to state lotteries that touches my puritanical heart.
The men on both sides who died for what they believed in are entitled to respect. No one today should dismiss the Confederate soldiers as proto-Nazis, not should the Union men be derided as "Communists who didn't realize it" (as they are among some neo-Confederates and Southern nationalists).
My history buff hat is off to you, billbears!
"A free black descended from one of George Washington's slaves, now the owner of a small farm near Mt. Vernon, offered twenty-eight acres, one-sixth of his property to be sold at auction to raise money for Virginia's defense.
"More active efforts in Virginia came form other quarters, like the fifty free blacks in Amelia County, and two-hundred more in Petersburg who offered themselves to the government to perform labor or even to fight under white officers. Slaves like a Tennessee barber named Jim donated money from their small savings to help raise companies; a Montgomery slave subscribed $150 of his own to the first call for loans from Secretary of the Treasury Christopher Memminger; not far from Mobile sixty slaves on one plantation practiced drilling every night after a full days' work, expressing their hope to fight the "damned buckram abolitionists" who had caused the crisis that now led to the fear of slave uprisings and the consequent curtailment of their few little freedoms."
-Look Away! William C. Davis
Davis goes on to say their motives and support varied. Some freedmen were in it for the business, using their skills as blacksmiths and masons, to earn money. Others were caught up in the excitement of the times, looking for adventure. Still others realized that although the might be near the bottom of the social order, it was still their state and they ought to defend it. Others had hopes of freedom if their patriotism was displayed during this time of crisis.
There are many good accounts of blacks and Jews in the Confederacy - lots of research is being done. North & South magazine ran a great article "Black Confederates: Myth or Reality?" (vol. 5 no.3) with many good sources and accounts. Enjoy!
Dr. Steiner also said that the officers and men of the Army of Northern Virginia were filthy and repulsive.
More from Dr. Steiner:
"About nine o'clock two seedy-looking individuals rode up Market street as fast as their jaded animals could carry them, Their dress was a dirty, faded, gray, their arms rusty and seemingly uncared for, their general appearance raffish, or vagabondish. They shouted for Jeff. Davis at the intersection of Patrick and Market street, and then riding to the intersection of Church and Market, repeated the same, strange, jubilant shout. No one expressing an opinion, as to the, propriety, or impropriety this proceeding, they countermarched and, trotted down the street. Then followed some fifty or a hundred horsemen, having among them Bradley T.Johnson; soi-disant Colonel C. S. A. These were received with feeble shouts from some secessionist sympathizers. They said, "the time of your deliverance has come." It was plain that the deliverance they meant was from the rule of law and order...."
"A dirtier, filthier, more unsavory set of human beings never strolled through a town—marching it could not be called without doing violence to the word. The distinctions of rank were recognized on the coat collars of officers; but all were alike dirty and repulsive. Their arms were rusty and in an unsoldierly condition. Their uniforms, or rather multiforms, corresponded only in a slight predominance of grey over butternut, and in the prevalence of filth. Faces looked as if they had not been acquainted with water for weeks: hair, shaggy and unkempt, seemed entirely a stranger to the operations of brush or comb. A mottlier group was never herded together. But these were the chivalry—the deliverers of Maryland from Lincoln's oppressive yoke..."
"Outrages were committed on the National flag whenever one fell into the hands of the soldiers. These simply strengthened the Union feeling, and made the men and women of Frederick more attached than ever to the National cause for which their fathers had fought and died. Stauncher, stouter, stronger did Unionists in Frederick grow with each passing hour. We were conquered, not enslaved—humiliated greatly with the thought that rebel feet were pressing on our soil, but not disposed to bow the knee to Baal. An attack on the Examiner Printing Office, being anticipated, a small guard was placed at the door. About nine o'clock, P.M., a rush was made on the guard by some of the Southern soldiers, the door was driven in and the contents of the office thrown into the street. W. G. Ross, Esq., a prominent lawyer of Frederick, called on the Provost-Marshal, who soon arrived with a strong force, suppressed the riot, and, having obliged the rioters to return every thing belonging to the office, put them in the guard-house. During the continuance of this disturbance, the oaths and impre- cations were terrific. Every one in the neighborhood expected that a general attack would be made on the Union houses. Fortunately, a quiet night ensued."
Several young ladies were standing in front of the house of one of our prominent citizens, when a rebel officer rode up and, halting his horse, said, "Ladies, allow me to make you a present. This is a ring made from the bone of a dead Yankee."
A gentleman, near the curb, seized the article before the officer had finished speaking and handed it to the ladies, who quickly answered, "Keep your present for those who appreciate such pres- ents." The only reply of the chivalry was, "Ah! I supposed you were a Southern ladies!" This incident is instructive."
Dr. Steiner thoroughly disapproved of the CSA and its soldiers. On the other hand, he was a proponent of arming blacks in the service of the USA. His comments on blacks n CSA service should be taken in that light.
It should also be noted that there are no other references to armed black CSA soldiers in Lee's disatrous Maryland campaign. The black soldiers Steiner alludes to disappear entirely from the record. Nor was a single black taken POW at Antietam, nor were any black corpses found in CSA uniform on the ground at Antietam.
There is no proof that more than a handful of blacks willinginf fought for the CSA.
Walt
"It's pure fantasy,' contends James McPherson, a Princeton historian and one of the nation's leading Civil War scholars. Adds Edwin Bearss, historian emeritus at the National Park Service: 'It's b.s., wishful thinking.' Robert Krick, author of 10 books on the Confederacy, has studied the records of 150,000 Southern soldiers and found fewer than a dozen were black. 'Of course, if I documented 12, someone would start adding zeros,' he says.
"These and other scholars say claims about black rebels derive from unreliable anecdotes, a blurring of soldiers and laborers, and the rapid spread on the Internet of what Mr. McPherson calls 'pseudohistory.' Thousands of blacks did accompany rebel troops -- as servants, cooks, teamsters and musicians. Most were slaves who served involuntarily; until the final days of the war, the Confederacy staunchly refused to enlist black soldiers.
"Some blacks carried guns for their masters and wore spare or cast-off uniforms, which may help explain eyewitness accounts of blacks units. But any blacks who actually fought did so unofficially, either out of personal loyalty or self-defense, many historians say.
"They also bristle at what they see as the disingenuous twist on political correctness fueling the black Confederate fad. 'It's a search for a multicultural Confederacy, a desperate desire to feel better about your ancestors,' says Leslie Rowland, a University of Maryland historian. 'If you suggest that some blacks supported the South, then you can deny that the Confederacy was about slavery and white supremacy.'
"David Blight, an Amherst College historian, likens the trend to bygone notions about happy plantation darkies.' Confederate groups invited devoted ex-slaves to reunions and even won Senate approval in 1923 for a "mammy" monument in Washington (it was never built). Black Confederates, Mr. Blight says, are a new and more palatable way to 'legitimize the Confederacy.'"
-- Wall Street Journal, May 8, 1997
AND:
"There seems to be no evidence that the Negro soldiers authorized by the Confederate Government (March 13, 1865) ever went into battle. This gives rise to the question as to whether or not any Negroes ever fought in the Confederate ranks. It is possible that some of the free Negro companies organized in Louisiana and Tennessee in the early part of the war took part in local engagements; but evidence seems to the contrary. (Authors note: If they did, their action was not authorized by the Confederate Government.) A company of "Creoles," some of whom had Negro blood, may have been accepted in the Confederate service at Mobile. Secretary Seddon conditioned his authorization of the acceptance of the company on the ability of those "Creoles" to be naturally and properly distinguished from Negroes. If persons with Negro Blood served in Confederate ranks as full-fledged soldiers, the per cent of Negro blood was sufficiently low for them to pass as whites."
(Authors note: Henry Clay Warmoth said that many Louisiana mulattoes were in Confederate service but they were "not registered as Negroes." War Politics and Reconstruction, p. 56)
p. 160-61, SOUTHERN NEGROES, Wiley
AND:
FRIDAY, February 10, 1865.
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
SECOND CONGRESS-SECOND SESSION
EMPLOYMENT OF NEGROES AS SOLDIERS
Mr. Wickham, of Virginia, moved the indefinite postponement of the bill. He was opposed to its going to a select committee. If it went to any committee it should go, in the regular channel, to the Committee on Military Affairs. He wished, however, this question of arming and making soldiers of negroes to be now disposed of, finally and forever. He wished it to be decided whether negroes are to be placed upon an equality by the side of our brave soldiers. They would be compelled to. They would have to camp and bivouac together.
Mr. Wickham said that our brave soldiers, who have fought so long and nobly, would not stand to be thus placed side by side with negro soldiers. He was opposed to such a measure. The day that such a bill passed Congress sounds the death knell of this Confederacy. The very moment an order goes forth from the War Department authorizing the arming and organizing of negro soldiers there was an eternal end to this struggle.-(Voice-That's so.)
The question being ordered upon the rejection of the bill, it was lost-ayes 21, noes 53. As this vote was regarded as a kind of test of the sense of the House upon the policy of putting negroes into the army, we append the ayes and noes-the question being the rejection of this bill authorizing the employment of negroes as soldiers:
Ayes-Messrs. Baldwin, Branch, Cruikshank, De Jarnette, Fuller, Garland, Gholson, Gilmer, Lamkin, J. M. Leach, J. T. Leach, McMullin, Miles, Miller, Ramsey, Sexton, Smith, of Alabama, Smith, of North Carolina, Wickham, Witherspoon, Mr. Speaker.
Noes-Messrs. Akin, Anderson, Barksdale, Batson, Bell, Blandford, Boyce, Bradley, H. W. Bruce, Carroll, Chambers, Chilton, Clark, Clopton, Cluskey, Conrad, Conrow, Darden, Dickinson, Dupre, Ewing, Farrow, Foster, Funsten, Gaither, Goode, Gray, Hartridge, Hatcher, Hilton, Holder, Holliday, Johnston, Keeble, Lyon, Pugh, Read, Rogers, Russell, Simpson, J. M. Smith, W. E. Smith, Snead, Swan, Triplett, Villere, Welsh.
If any number of black soldiers had been serving in the ranks of the CSA armies, how did it escape the notice of Congress?
It also escaped the notice of Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and others:
Page 246, Confederate Veteran, June 1915. Official publication of the United Confederate Veteran, United Daughters of the Confederacy, Sons of Confederate Veterans, and the Confederated Southern Memorial Association.
Gen. Howell Cobb, an unbeliever in this expedient, wrote from Macon, Ga., January 8, 1865: "I think that the proposition is the most pernicious idea that has been suggested since the war began. You cannot make soldiers of slaves or slaves of soldiers. The moment you resort to this your white soldiers are lost to you, and one reason why this proposition is received with favor by some portions of the army is because they hope that when the negro comes in they can retire. You cannot keep white and black troops together, and you cannot trust negroes alone. They won't make soldiers, as they are wanting in every qualification necessary to make one.
[Note General Lee on the negro as a soldier.] Better by far to yield to the demands of England and France and abolish slavery and thereby purchase their aid than to resort to this policy, which would lead to certain ruin and subjugation."
Samuel Clayton, Esq., of Cuthbert, Ga., wrote on January 10, 1865: "All of our male population between sixteen and sixty is in the army. We cannot get men from any other source; they must come from our slaves. Some say that negroes will not fight, but they fought us at Ocean Pond. Honey Hill, and other places. The government takes all of our men and exposes them to death. Why can't they take our property? He who values his property more than independence is a poor, sordid wretch."
General Lee, who clearly saw the inevitable unless his forces were strengthened, wrote on January 11 [1865]: "I should prefer to rely on our white population; but in view of the preparation of our enemy it is our duty to provide for a continuous war, which, I fear, we cannot accomplish with our present resources. It is the avowed intention of the enemy to convert the ablebodied negro into soldiers and emancipate all. His progress will thus add to his numbers and at the same time destroy slavery in a most pernicious manner to the welfare of our people. Whatever may be the effect of our employing negro troops, it cannot be as mischievous as this. If it ends in subverting slavery, it will be accomplished by ourselves, and we can devise the means of alleviating the evil consequences to both races. I think, therefore, that we must decide whether slavery shall be extinguished by our enemies and the slaves used against us or use them ourselves at the risk of the effects which may be produced upon our soldiers' social institutions. My own opinion is that we should employ tl1em without delay. I believe that with proper regulations they can be made efficient soldiers. They possess the physical qualifications in an eminent degree. Long habits of obedience and subordination, coupled with the moral influence which in our country the white man possesses over the black, furnish an excellent foundation for that discipline which is the best guarantee of military efficiency. We can give them an interest by allowing immediate freedom to all who enlist and freedom at the end of the war to their families. We should not expect slaves to fight for prospective freedom when they can secure it at once by going to the enemy, in whose service they will incur no greater risk than in ours. In conclusion, I can only say that whatever is to be done must be attended to at once."
President Davis on February 21 [1865] expressed himself as follows: "It is now becoming daily more evident to all reflecting persons that we are reduced to choosing whether the negroes shall fight for or against us and that all the arguments as to the positive advantage or disadvantage of employing them are beside the question, which is simply one of relative advantage between having their fighting element in our ranks or those of the enemy.":
Would Lee and Davis have had those points of view had there been any number of blacks in ranks? </b The number of blacks who served as soldiers for the CSA was miniscule. It attracted NO official notice and would have been in fact against CSA law until the very end of the rebellion.
Walt
My pleasure.
Between the two of you, we'll eventually be able to get Southern conservatives to abandon the treacherous party of Lincoln just as their fathers abandoned the treacherous democratic socialist party.
Keep posting your hateful lies, boy. You're doing us a world of good.
I have Dr. Steiner's phamphlet.
There is nothing to corroborate his observations.
The armed blacks he mentioned appear nowhere else in the record. Walt
It's no lie to quote Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis as having no apparent knowledge of black CSA soldiers, to say nothing of the so-called CSA congress.
Walt
Cite a lie that I have posted.
Your note is nothing but misinformation worthty of the Nazis or Soviet Union.
Call me 'boy' all you like. I am the man you are not.
Walt
I should warn you that it may not be what you hoped. Shuckmaster featured it prominimently in his website for about two weeks. Then someone who read it must have told him that it was a truthful look at the confederacy and it hasn't been seen there since.
How about your insistence that Confederates were traitors and seditionists? That's a palpable lie right there, and it's the least of the falsehoods you use. Obviously, you're also lying about being a Southerner. Southerners don't object to being called "boy".
ROFLOL! Good for them both.
Not acording to the Constitution.
Every soldier who served the so-called CSA could have been hung under US law.
As you know, President Lincoln, on the last day of his life refused to allow the treason trials for rebels in leadership positions suggested by Secretary of War Stanton.
Walt
KISSIMMEE, Fla. - The keynote speaker on Confederate Memorial Day drives a pickup truck with the Rebelaires blaringon the tape deck. He wears a slouch hat and a rebel-flag tie. His suit is gray. His skin is black. His words make many Civil War scholars see red.
"The history books were written by Yankees and they've seen fit to leave a lot out," Nelson Winbush tells 40 whites in a barn by the Kissimmee rodeo grounds. "Better than 90,000 blacks fought for the South."
As evidence, Mr, Winbush tells of his slave grandfather; Louis Napoleon Nelson, who went to war with his master's sons and went to his grave in 1934 wearing a rebel uniform. Mr, Winbush says scholars have covered up black loyalty to the South rather than upset Nortnern orthodoxy about the Civil War. "Yankees came way down here to free the slaves and found some black dude shooting their a- for keeps," he says.
When most Americans think of Civil War soldiers, the colors that spring to mind are blue and gray, not black. Until the 1989 movie "Glory," there was little recognition of the 200,000 blacks who fought for the North. Now, many Southerners say, it is time to honor another forgotten group: blacks who served the slave holding Confederacy. What makes this revisionism startling is that several of its leading proponents are blacks who regard their research as liberating.
"There's this caricature of all blacks in the South being victimized and supporting the North," says Edward Smith, a black professor and director of American Studies at American University in Washington. "But we are just as complicated as any people. We're three-dimensional. "
Since Mr. Smith began speaking about black Confederates six years ago, the subject has spawned several books, scores of articles and heated debate on the Internet. Some blacks have joined the Sons of Confederate Veterans and donned gray at Civil War re-enactments. Confederate heritage groups have proposed erecting monuments to black rebels and other "Confederates of color," such as Hispanics and American Indians.
Black Confederates have also become fodder in fights over the rebel battle flag, which flies over the South Carolina statehouse and forms part of Georgia's state banner. When New York Gov. George Pataki recently backed calls to boot Georgia's flag from Albany's display of state flags because of its "racist" component, he quickly roused ire. "As many as 50,000 brave young black men were wounded and killed fighting for the South," wrote Charlie Condon. South Carolina's attorney general in a letter. "Your slander of our region and its historic flag is outrageous and offensive.
But what many historians find outrageous and offensive are the claims being made by men like Mr. Condon Though he later revised his estimate to 50,000 blacks who "served in the Confederate Army," Mr. Smith at American University puts the number of black rebels "actually shooting people" at 30,000. Most historians regard this figure as inflated-by almost 30,000.
"It's pure fantasy," contends James McPherson, a Princeton historian and one of the nation's leading Civil War scholars. Adds Edwin Bearss, historian emeritus at the National Park Service: "It's b.s., wishful thinking." Robert Krick, author of 10 books on the Confederacy, has studied the records of 150,000 Southern soldiers and found fewer than a dozen were black. "Of course, if I documented 12. someone would start adding zeros," he says.
Tainted History?
These and other scholars say claims about black rebels derive from unreliable anecdotes, a blurring of soldiers and laborers, and the rapid spread on the Internet of what Mr. McPherson calls ''pseudohistory.'' Thousands of blacks did accompany rebel troops - as servants, cooks, teamsters and musicians. Most were slaves who served involuntarily; until the final days of the war, the Confederacy staunchly refused to enlist black soldiers.
Some blacks carried guns for their masters and wore spare or castoff uniforms, which may help explain eyewitness accounts of blacks units. But any blacks who actually fought did so unofficially, either out of personal loyalty or self-defense, many historians say.
They also bristle at what they see as the disingenuous twist on political correctness fueling the black Confederate fad. "it's a search for a multicultural Confederacy, a desperate desire to feel better about your ancestors," says Leslie Rowland, a University of Maryland historian. "if you suggest that some blacks supported the South, then you can deny that the Confederacy was about slavery and white supremacy."
David Blight, an Amherst College historian, likens the trend to bygone notions about happy "plantation darkies." Confederate groups invited devoted ex-slaves to reunions and even won Senate approval in 1923 for a "mammy" monument in Washington (it was never built). Black Confederates, Mr. Blight says, are a new and more palatable way to "legitimize the Confederacy."
These and other scholars say claims about black rebels derive from unreliable anecdotes, a blurring of soldiers and laborers, and the rapid spread on the Internet of what Mr. McPherson calls ''pseudohistory.'' Thousands of blacks did accompany rebel troops - as servants, cooks, teamsters and musicians. Most were slaves who served involuntarily; until the final days of the war, the Confederacy staunchly refused to enlist black soldiers.
Some blacks carried guns for their masters and wore spare or castoff uniforms, which may help explain eyewitness accounts of blacks units. But any blacks who actually fought did so unofficially, either out of personal loyalty or self-defense. many historians say.
They also bristle at what they see as the disingenuous twist on political correctness fueling the black Confederate fad. "it's a search for a multicultural Confederacy, a desperate desire to feel better about your ancestors," says Leslie Rowland, a University of Maryland historian. "if you suggest that some blacks supported the South, then you can deny that the Confederacy was about slavery and white supremacy."(AND GOD FORBID WE DO THAT!!!! WHY, lincoln WOULD BE OUTED AS THE TYRANT HE WAS)
David Blight, an Amherst College historian, likens the trend to bygone notions about happy "plantation darkies." Confederate groups invited devoted ex-slaves to reunions and even won Senate approval in 1923 for a "mammy" monument in Washington (it was never built). Black Confederates, Mr. Blight says, are a new and more palatable way to "legitimize the Confederacy."
War Against Stereotypes
But defenders of Confederate heritage say they are simply setting the record straight and battling another stereotype: that anyone who cherishes the Confederacy and its symbols is racist. During Black History Month, the Sons of Confederate Veterans posted a "fact sheet" on its Web page stating that thousands of blacks served the Confederacy "because it was their home. and they hoped for the reward of patriotism."
The SCV's lieutenant commander in chief, Patrick Griffin, says black service to the rebel cause reveals "a certain amount of solidarity" between slaves and masters. "Slavery was not a good thing, but it was part of the culture at the time: You had black and white people fighting to preserve their culture."
Groups like the SCV also make a point of citing blacks who have written on the subject, though that isn't always welcomed by the researchers themselves. "Some people use my material very selectively to promote their contemporary agenda," says Ervin Jordan. Jr., a black professor and archivist at the University of Virginia. For instance, the SCV and others often cite Mr. Jordan's estimate in a 1995 book that up to 15% of Virginia slaves supported the South. But they ignore the book's details of slavery's brutality, including an account of Robert E. Lee ordering his slaves whipped, and overlook Mr. Jordan's nuanced analysis of black rebels' motivation.
"These were people looking out for their own self-interest," he says. For instance, the South won many of the war's early battles and blacks plausibly saw it as shrewd to show support for the winning side.
But Mr. Jordan also resents the flak he has taken from liberal academics and fellow blacks who feel he is "airing dirty laundry" and abetting racists by writing about black loyalty to the South. He cites many historic examples of "people fighting in the forces of tbeir oppressors." such as Indians who scouted for the U.S. Army. "I don't think black Confederates should be pushed back in the closet because they're inconvenient or make us uncomfortable," he says.
Easy Fit
Rebel ancestry isn't uncomfortable at all for the black SCV member in Florida, Nelson Winbush. who fondly recalls his grandfather, Mr. Nelson, and his war tales. "He used to say the Yankees were the dumbest damned people you've ever seen," Mr. Winbush says, telling a story about Union men marcbing straight at rebel guns.
Mr. Winbush's trove of mementos includes pension papers and newspaper clippings describing his grandfather as a cook and servant in the Army, He also foraged for the rebels and, Mr, Winbush believes, "fired rifles like everyone else." though he has no proof. Nor does he-think it matters whether blacks filled combat or support roles. "Their lives were at risk: they served," he says.
His grandfather, Mr. Winbush goes on, grew up playing with white boys on the plantation and felt it was only natural to "go along with his pals" to fight Yankees. After the war, he attended 39 Confederate reunions and became a minor celebrity in his native Tennessee. "They all had a spot in their heart for the good old darky. and he loved them devotedly," a Tennessee paper wrote when Mr. Nelson died. Asked about the tone of such reports, Mr, Winbush shrugs. "Those were just the times." he says.
Complicated Times
Times have changed. Mr. Winbush, a retired teacher and assistant principal, once taught many of the men who now belong to his SCV group, which has been renamed in honor of his grandfather. Mr. Winbush's fellow members also welcome his Confederate Memorial Day address, which includes a defense of states' rights and of his grandfather's commander. Nathan Bedford Forrest. an oft-reviled figure who was a slave trader and imperial wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.
"We finally have someone who can give a different point of view and no one can say it's just another ignorant redneck trying to promote racism", says John Carroll, a founding member of the Kissimmee SCV camp.
Mr, Winbush has taken his message to groups across the South and appeared in a pro-Confederate video. He now plans to place a rebel veteran's headstone by his grandfather's grave. "I'm an individual, just like him." he says. driving to Kissimmee's cemetery to adorn rebel graves with battle flags. "People did what they thought was appropriate in that war, black and white, and I'm doing the same now."
He turns up his tape deck as the Rebelaires sing about the feelings of a black Confederate veteran: "You may not believe me, but things was just that way, Black is nothing other than a darker shade of rebel gray."
Mr. Winbush smiles. "That song tells it all," he says.
There you are Walt the whole article, the good and the bad. Of course I know you must have not seen the whole article, else you would have posted it. Goodness forbid you wouldn't try to slide something by like Ditto's 30 million slaves, now would you? So let's see. We've got a black man whose grandfather fought for the South(personal experience) and a yankee doctor among countless other anecdotes and you've got.... oh yeah, Mcpherson and a Park Ranger. That's even < /sarcasm> Something I found interesting from the article
"if you suggest that some blacks supported the South, then you can deny that the Confederacy was about slavery and white supremacy."
AND GOD FORBID WE DO THAT!!!!
I just want to keep it simple, stupid.
Walt
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