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I see that this group publishes another questionable book: Defending Farrakhan: The Campaign to Free The Real Children of Israel and is associated with Farrakan's Final Call.
One of my favorite Jewish Confederates has a connection with my city Philadelphia. He was Sir Moses Ezekiel.
Moses Ezekiel was born in Richmond, Virginia into a large family. He was a military cadet at the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington and studied under Thomas Jonathan Jackson who became famous as General "Stonewall" Jackson when the War broke out. Ezekiel showed a great deal of valor and courage in the battle of New Market and also was one of the Confederates defending Richmond near the end of the war. Although he was gung-ho for the Southern Cause, his parents and many family members were not as enthusiastic for Secession. In fact, his own grandparents were originally from Philadelphia.
After the war, Ezekiel became friendly with former General Robert E. Lee who was now the president of Washington College (now Washington & Lee University). Although a recent graduate of the VMI, he showed Lee his drawings and clay sculptures. Lee encouraged him to pursue a career in fine art because the young man showed real talent in that field.
Ezekiel studied art and moved to Rome and opened a sculpture studio. He became very successful and admired. The King of Italy, Vittorio Emanuel III knighted him. He was commissioned to create a lifesize statue of his former teacher and mentor Stonewall Jackson on the lawn of the West Virginia State Capitol in Charleston, another one of Thomas Jefferson in front of the University of Virginia and another one of Edgar Allen Poe in Baltimore. In 1876 the great Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia was held and Ezekiel was commissioned by the Jewish organization B'nai B'rith to create a monumental sculpture on the theme of "religious tolerance." That statue was recently re-located to the front entrance of the new National Museum of American Jewish History on Independence Mall hardy a block away from Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell Pavilion.
Ezekiel received many commissions from both Southern and Jewish organizations. He monument to fallen Confederate heroes in Arlington National Cemetery is one of his best known works, commissioned by the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC). Although many of his statues of Jews were historical figures such as Judas Maccabeus and Baruch Spinoza, he also sculpted the highly esteemed Rabbi Isaac Meyer Wise from life.
Yulee did not publically reveal himself to be Jewish until after the end of his political career. When he held office, he referred to himself as "Moroccan".
From what I understand there was little antisemitism in the USA prior to the Civil War, when both sides blamed "the Jews" as being responsible for the deeds of the other side. More Jews fought for the North than for the South but as revealed in this thread some fought for the South.
In a different thread in a different forum, a Jewish poster claimed that the Jews of Charleston after the Civil War largely assimilated into the general population and their descendants ceased to identify as Jews.
According to Israeli redneck gets his Confederate stripes, Arieh O'Sullivan, a veteran Israeli journalist and proud Southerner who flies the Confederate flag from his jeep, was inducted this week into the Sons of Confederate Veterans.
. He was commissioned to create a lifesize statue of his former teacher and mentor Stonewall Jackson on the lawn of the West Virginia .
I was not familiar with Moses Ezekiel and enjoyed your report. I would question one aspect of the above, that is the description of Jackson as Ezekiel's "mentor."
While Stonewall Jackson instilled a great deal of pride in his troops, it was not an ability one would have predicted based on his days as an instructor at VMI.
Nicknamed "Tom Fool" by the cadets, Jackson was a famously dull and uninspiring teacher, one who prepared his lecture before hand and read it to the class in a nap inducing monotone.
Since Ezekiel continued as a cadet into 1864, he never served under Jackson in the field, and thus his only exposure to the future hero would have been as an instructor. Jackson was no one's mentor at VMI.
Further, Jackson was also a religious fanatic, a Christian religious fanatic. I would have guessed that he was not perceived as mentor material by the Jewish Ezekiel
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Sir Moses Ezekiel
