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Is that why some folks today claim the Confederate flag represents their heritage?
Slave owners probably viewed their slaves no different than some today see the Confederate flag. Their heritage was slave owning. An old slave on their plantation might have nursed their father or grandfather. During the Revolutionary War George Washington offered slave owners in Georgia and South Carolina a $1000.00 for each slave they had for the President to use to fight the British and they refused. Without even doing the math that amount of money in the 1770's that would have been a tremendous sum notwithstanding that the slave trade was still active enough that they could have easily replaced them.
It was not about about money but their very identity was built on slave owning. Heritage is such a nebulous thing and its not worth trying to understand why someone would hold on so strongly to something that is clearly indefensible like the Confederate Flag today or slave owning in 1860.
Slave owners probably viewed their slaves no different than some today see the Confederate flag. Their heritage was slave owning. An old slave on their plantation might have nursed their father or grandfather. During the Revolutionary War George Washington offered slave owners in Georgia and South Carolina a $1000.00 for each slave they had for the President to use to fight the British and they refused. Without even doing the math that amount of money in the 1770's that would have been a tremendous sum notwithstanding that the slave trade was still active enough that they could have easily replaced them.
It was not about about money but their very identity was built on slave owning. Heritage is such a nebulous thing and its not worth trying to understand why someone would hold on so strongly to something that is clearly indefensible like the Confederate Flag today or slave owning in 1860.
George Santayana, probably best known for this, "Those who do not remember history, are condemned to repeat it", also wisely observed:
"Loyalty to our ancestors does not include loyalty to their mistakes."
In 1864, after 32 long years in the service of his master, Jourdon Anderson and his wife, Amanda, escaped a life of slavery when Union Army soldiers freed them from the plantation on which they had been working so tirelessly. They grasped the opportunity with vigour, quickly moved to Ohio where Jourdon could find paid work with which to support his growing family, and didn’t look back. Then, a year later, shortly after the end of the Civil War, Jourdon received a desperate letter from Patrick Henry Anderson, the man who used to own him, in which he was asked to return to work on the plantation and rescue his ailing business.
Mr. Jourdon's response:
Quote:
Dayton, Ohio,
August 7, 1865
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee
Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin's to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.
I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, "Them colored people were slaves" down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.
As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor's visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams's Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.
In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.
Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.
We are the only nation that resorted to a civil war in order to abolish slavery. We were also one of the very last to abolish slavery. Was war necessary? Lincolns predecessors managed to paint him into a corner with very few options. "Lincoln didn't start the war, he finished it."
We are the only nation that resorted to a civil war in order to abolish slavery. We were also one of the very last to abolish slavery. Was war necessary? Lincolns predecessors managed to paint him into a corner with very few options. "Lincoln didn't start the war, he finished it."
Indeed he was painted into a corner.
Lincoln made it clear in the beginning of his presidency that he was willing to tolerate slavery where it already existed. What he would not allow was its expansion. Many in the South behaved in an absolutely idiotic way. Lincoln had no power to end slavery on his own--even if he had wanted too. Slaves were property and (as immoral as it was) that property right was entitled to protection under the Constitution. Yet, they could not tolerate the very thought of Lincoln as President. In fact, Lincoln's name was not even allowed to appear on the ballot in most southern states.
What brought about the Civil War was the fact that many southerners couldn't even stand the thought of Lincoln as President. South Carolina became the first state to secede and they did so because the election results of 1860 revealed that Lincoln was elected President. Several other states followed South Carolina and left the Union for the very same reason.
And I think you are alluding to the presidencies of Frank Pierce and James Buchanan. Buchanan in particular created a situation where many southern states believed that they could leave the Union peacefully because he did nothing to protest or stop the secession movement.
On top of all that, Lincoln didn't start the Civil War. Southerners did when they insisted on firing on Fort Sumter.
We are the only nation that resorted to a civil war in order to abolish slavery. We were also one of the very last to abolish slavery. Was war necessary? Lincolns predecessors managed to paint him into a corner with very few options. "Lincoln didn't start the war, he finished it."
This is the problem with "kicking the can down the road." Other cans that were kicked down the road were the rights of now-freed slaves, the problem of North Korea, and now the lack of immigration enforcement.
This is the problem with "kicking the can down the road." Other cans that were kicked down the road were the rights of now-freed slaves, the problem of North Korea, and now the lack of immigration enforcement.
Good points. I harp on lowering taxes/income while increasing expenditures as the ultimate form of irresponsible governance. Now 22 trillion dollars later..........
Slavery made too many enemies. It made Political enemies due to the power slave owners had, religious enemies, economic enemies of un-propertied whites, and people who objected to slavery on moral grounds. I don't think many of them thought Africans, as they were called in those days, were equal to them, but nevertheless they all agreed that slavery must end.
Slavery encouraged criminal ancillary enterprises. It is estimated that around 25% of all the slaves transported across he Atlantic came after it was illegal to do so. As late as 1859 a ship called the Wyandotte captured 1000 Africans off Key West. In the border states like Kansas a young boy of 14 was snatched from his mother by two two men on horseback and in another case a man's wife was stolen from her bed in the night. Why? because they were worth $900-$800 dollars. And these two incidents came as late as 1860. You can imagine what would become of our society today if a bounty of $45,000 or $75,000 was put on every one in our country who was not considered a protected individual.
IMO The Civil War should have been fought in around 1806
IMO The Civil War should have been fought in around 1806
In 1806 there were but 17 states, the original thirteen plus Vermont, Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio.
How do you envision the two sides shaping up? There wasn't a Missouri Compromise as yet dividing the geography of slavery, the concern about balancing free and slave state admissions had yet to become a problem. So...what would be causing a war?
In 1806 there were but 17 states, the original thirteen plus Vermont, Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio.
How do you envision the two sides shaping up? There wasn't a Missouri Compromise as yet dividing the geography of slavery, the concern about balancing free and slave state admissions had yet to become a problem. So...what would be causing a war?
With everything going on at that time it should have been a perfect time to draw a line in the sand. The Embargo act, the industrial revolution, Lewis and Clack and the supposed end of the Atlantic slave trade. Admitting one slave state and one free was unduly pacifying the Slave owners. Slavery was on life support.
I recently watched a pretty good doco by Ken Burns on the civil war. Over the years I've read a bunch of books and seen probably dozens of films and TV shows about the US civil war.
I have never understood the claim that war was about slavery, except in the most oblique sense .I always though it was about power and control. IE "States Rights" , that peculiarly American notion which allowed the States to think of themselves as almost separate countries, in the affairs of which the federal government insisted on meddling.
Please forgive an ignorant foreigner for what are probably simplistic views.
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