XXI. Blacks in “The Civil War”
While enslaved Blacks were used by Confederates for “building fortifications and in performing various kinds of labor”, there were “over 100,000 Negroes in the Union ranks, and over 50,000 armed and equipped on the fields of battle” by summer of 1863.
“I hope this miserable war will soon close.” — Alexander Keener, in a letter to his wife Ruth, in January of 1864 (as quoted in The Catawbans: Crafters of a North Carolina County 1747–1900 (1995)
Edward Austin Johnson’s chapter on “The War of the Rebellion” focuses on the role of African Americans instead of the history of the conflict itself. Notable changes in the 1894 revision, supervised by Sydney Michael Finger for use in North Carolina public schools, include the name of “that terrible, protracted, and bloody conflict” (Frederick Douglass)—which becomes “The Civil War” in the Finger-supervised revision— and the role of Blacks in the Confederate Army.
While the “signal for war” — secession of the Southern States —is mentioned in the first paragraph of this chapter, the cause of the war is notably absent from both Johnson’s original text for this chapter and the 1894 revision. However, they do address this point clearly elsewhere. For example, their chapter on “Anti-Slavery Agitation” (XIX) begins: “Slavery or No Slavery was the question now before the American people.” The preceding chapter (XVIII) is on “Nat Turner And Others Who ‘Struck’ For Freedom”, and the subsequent one (XX) is a brief (one page) chapter on “Examples of Underground Work.”
As Rev. J. D. Arnold, the “pastor of the Newton Methodist church and a one-armed Confederate soldier”, later put it during his keynote address at an “eloquent tribute” to Robert E. Lee in Newton in 1907: “Slavery was the cause, and sole cause, of the war.” Johnson and Finger, as well as anyone else paying attention at the time, would have understood this uncontested fact about what Frederick Douglass — and some Northern newspapers at the time — actually called the “Slaveholders’ Rebellion.”
XXII. THE CIVIL WAR.T̶h̶e̶ ̶W̶a̶r̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶R̶e̶b̶e̶l̶l̶i̶o̶n̶
ENLISTMENT OF NEGROES.
The Secession of South Carolina and the other Southern States was the signal for war. True to its declaration to do so, this State seceded when Lincoln was inaugurated in 1861. Fort Sumter was fired on by the Confederates and captured. The North was divided on the question of slavery, and the Government at Washington was slow in making any efforts to s̶t̶o̶p̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶r̶e̶b̶e̶l̶l̶i̶o̶n̶ forcibly resist the secession of the Southern States. A few troops were sent into the field with the hope of frightening the South.
The role of Blacks in the conflict and “great prejudice in the North against the Negro’s enlisting to fight for his freedom” are the primary focus of this chapter. As Sarah Shepherd notes, “Johnson did not
see Lincoln as the Great Emancipator but implied that public sentiment in the North and the praises of other military officers made Lincoln changed his mind about African American soldiers. He does not absolve the North.”
Both Johnson and Finger obviously understood that the Emancipation Proclamation was exactly what it said it was: “a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing rebellion.” However, Johnson’s text on the role of Blacks in the Confederate Army is revised in the Finger-supervised revision, as is related text in Chapter XXVIII: The End of the War. As the former Controlling Quartermaster for Confederate forces in North Carolina, the myth of the Black Confederate soldier was apparently a bridge Finger wasn’t willing to cross. While “Johnson played with the narrative of the faithful slave” (Shepherd) in Confederate uniform carrying arms for the Confederacy, the Finger-supervised revision deletes that text and addresses the issue curtly as follows in this chapter:
The Confederates used Negroes in building fortifications and in performing various kinds of labor.w̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶l̶r̶e̶a̶d̶y̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶m̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶N̶e̶g̶r̶o̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶p̶a̶n̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶d̶e̶f̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶R̶i̶c̶h̶m̶o̶n̶d̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶b̶u̶i̶l̶d̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶t̶i̶f̶i̶c̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶s̶.̶ ̶T̶h̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶r̶d̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶u̶r̶t̶h̶ ̶r̶e̶g̶i̶m̶e̶n̶t̶s̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶G̶e̶o̶r̶g̶i̶a̶ ̶s̶h̶o̶w̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶n̶e̶ ̶N̶e̶g̶r̶o̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶p̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶y̶ ̶p̶a̶s̶s̶e̶d̶ ̶t̶h̶r̶o̶u̶g̶h̶ ̶A̶u̶g̶u̶s̶t̶a̶ ̶e̶n̶ ̶r̶o̶u̶t̶e̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶V̶i̶r̶g̶i̶n̶i̶a̶.̶ ̶F̶r̶e̶e̶ ̶N̶e̶g̶r̶o̶e̶s̶ ̶e̶n̶l̶i̶s̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶C̶o̶n̶f̶e̶d̶e̶r̶a̶t̶e̶ ̶s̶i̶d̶e̶ ̶a̶t̶ ̶N̶e̶w̶ ̶O̶r̶l̶e̶a̶n̶s̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶M̶e̶m̶p̶h̶i̶s̶.̶ ̶T̶h̶e̶y̶ ̶w̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶h̶i̶g̶h̶l̶y̶ ̶s̶p̶o̶k̶e̶n̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶S̶o̶u̶t̶h̶e̶r̶n̶ ̶p̶a̶p̶e̶r̶s̶.̶ ̶B̶u̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶N̶o̶r̶t̶h̶ ̶s̶e̶e̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶n̶k̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶p̶u̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶N̶e̶g̶r̶o̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶U̶n̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶b̶l̶u̶e̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶d̶i̶s̶g̶r̶a̶c̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶a̶t̶ ̶u̶n̶i̶f̶o̶r̶m̶.̶
…
As Kevin M. Levin explained in 2021 for the Catawba County Truth & Reconciliation Committe, “this really strange debate” is best illustrated by this iconic photograph of Silas and Andrew Chandler “which can be found on hundreds of websites” that claim today that large numbers of free and enslaved Black men fought as Confederate soldiers. “You are looking at master and slave,” Levin concludes. You can check out Kevin’s 2021 talk or read his book for more information about this myth.
“One of the most important ways in which the SCV and the United Daughters of the Confederacy have defended the integrity of the black Confederate narrative in recent years is the appropriation of what they believe to be evidence of black Confederates offered by prominent African Americans in the past. There is no better example than the frequency of references on websites and in other publications to the famed black abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who early in the war published reports in his own newspaper of armed black men in Confederate ranks. What is often overlooked is that Douglass took these steps as convince the Lincoln administration to accept black men as soldiers in the Union army. Decades after the war, some black leaders such as Booker T. Washington also assuaged concerns about black uplift by reminding the white community of the loyalty of slaves to the Confederate war effort and their former masters. In the hands of neo-Confederates, this evidence confirms their own self-serving conclusions, but the results are no less damaging for countless others who are unable to interpret the evidence within a broader historical context.” — Kevin M. Levin, Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil War’s Most Persistent Myth (2019)
Contents (Revised 1894):
Preface.
I. Introduction. — A shared commitment to debunking the “Curse of Ham” with a few bridges too far to cross.
II. General View of Slavery in the World. — a whole new chapter for the 1894 edition, and it’s a doozey!
III. Beginning of Slavery in the Colonies.
…
XVI. Frederick Douglass. — “̶H̶e̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶m̶u̶c̶h̶ ̶q̶u̶o̶t̶e̶d̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶n̶y̶ ̶l̶i̶v̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶A̶m̶e̶r̶i̶c̶a̶n̶ ̶s̶t̶a̶t̶e̶s̶m̶a̶n̶.̶”̶
…
XX. Examples of Underground Work.
XXI. The Slave Population of 1860.
XXII. The Civil War T̶h̶e̶ ̶W̶a̶r̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶R̶e̶b̶e̶l̶l̶i̶o̶n̶ — what’s in a name?
…
X̶X̶X̶I̶V̶.̶ ̶T̶h̶e̶ ̶F̶r̶e̶e̶ ̶P̶e̶o̶p̶l̶e̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶C̶o̶l̶o̶r̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶N̶o̶r̶t̶h̶ ̶C̶a̶r̶o̶l̶i̶n̶a̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶R̶e̶v̶.̶ ̶J̶o̶h̶n̶ ̶S̶[̶i̶n̶c̶l̶a̶i̶r̶]̶ ̶L̶e̶a̶r̶y̶ — Hmmm, a deleted chapter — was it something John said? Or perhaps something his brother did?
XXXV. Conclusion
Tschüss!
— Wilhelm
