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Bascially, the Burden of Proof is on those making the claim. So far, I have seen nothing which meets that burden of proof, but I may have to check out the books cited by Dimitri Rostov in his blog, cited by Battalion, above.
__________________ "There must be more historians of the Civil War than there were generals figthing in it... Of the two groups, the historians are the more belligerent." David Donald, Lincoln Reconsidered (1961)
__________________ "There must be more historians of the Civil War than there were generals figthing in it... Of the two groups, the historians are the more belligerent." David Donald, Lincoln Reconsidered (1961)
Well, that looks pretty dismissable. I've never heard of Dimitri Rotov, and he seems to not want to give us any information about his qualifications in the site. Hard to put any weight on what he says.
On the other hand, I have actually met Keith Poulter, and I know other people in the Civil War community who know him and respect his work. He edits a major Civil War magazine. I guess I'll have to go with his opinion, the one that says the whole thing appears to be fiction for the most part.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
Reading it, we can see exactly where the pension numbers Battalion posted are coming from -- and how he is deliberately misusing them.
I've read things by Hollandsworth before. I note that early on in the article we find this paragraph: =====
Black southerners contributed to the Confederate war effort in four ways. First, as slaves, they provided the labor that fueled the southern economy and maintained the production of foodstuffs and other commodities essential to the South’s prosecution of the war. Second, slaves were rented to or impressed by the Confederate government to work on specific projects related to the South’s military infrastructure, such as fortifications, bridges, and railroads. Third, African Americans made up a substantial part of the permanent work force in the Confederacy’s war-related industries, such foundries, munitions factories, and mines. In addition, they drove wagons that transported food and war material produced by these industries to the front. They also provided services to wounded and sick soldiers in Confederate hospitals. Last, a large number of black southerners went to war with the Confederate army as noncombatants serving as personal servants, company cooks, and hostlers. =====
No mention of black Southerners serving as soldiers in there.
Later on he discusses the blacks who applied for Confederate pensions and discusses the source of the data extensively. It is obvious that the numbers here are the ones Battalion is using, or at least the same ones with a lot more detail.
Yet -- surprise! -- Battalion has concealed the parts he doesn't like. Ignored them. Presented the work and numbers completely out of context, and tried to make them support what they deny. For example, we find this:
===== Pension applications for African Americans were different from those used for soldiers or widows in all five states except North Carolina. Applications for servants asked for the applicant’s name, the name of the person he had served during the Civil War, and the dates of his service.43These applications usually asked for the applicant’s age, although South Carolina did not, and Mississippi stopped asking for the applicant’s age in 1922.
All five states except Virginia wanted to know the unit to which the applicant’s master had been assigned.This information, coupled with his master’s name, allowed pension boards to verify the applicant’s service by checking Confederate muster rolls. This step in the approval process was crucial, as contemporary records documenting the service of African Americans were nonexistent. There were no muster rolls for these men, most of whom had no last names at the time of their service.
====
Gee, how about that! These men were slaves who attended their masters in the field, it seems. They were not on Confederate muster rolls (gee again, aren't "soldiers" listed on muster rolls?)
Then we find little goodies like this:
===== The state pension board in Virginia was less interested in the master’s unit than in the nature of the work the black applicant performed. Legislation in the other states, except North Carolina, limited pensions to African Americans who had gone to war as servants to their masters or who had been rented by their masters to cook for Confederate soldiers. ... =====
Gee still more: the pensions were for blacks who had "gone to war as servants to their masters or who had been rented by their masters to cook for Confederate soldiers". Men who were not "armed soldiers", but at best hired help and noncombatants -- with the revenue going to the masters (whatever they might decide to do with it then.)
A little further on, more gee:
===== ... While it is true that many of the slaves who served as black noncombatants may have served willingly, how many—and how willingly—is a matter of speculation. Some African Americans did volunteer. In Virginia, fifteen (eight percent) of the 196 black noncombatants who received pensions after the war were free men of color. Of these, twelve (eighty percent) worked as cooks, a job for which they would have been paid $20 a month, explaining perhaps their motivation to serve.=====
Wow: "volunteers" motivated by money to take jobs as cooks. Doesn't sound like "armed soldiers" to me.
There's quite a bit on the subject of loyalty, too. I have to admit it is an interesting tribute to these slaves and free black men. But there is also this:
===== It is tempting to assume that the loyalty of many black noncombatants was representative of black southerners in general, but this conclusion is not warranted. Black southerners who were recognized in Confederate memoirs, eulogized at Confederate reunions, and eventu-ally awarded Confederate pensions, were selected from a select group. They were a select group in the first place because they were allowed to accompany their masters to the army. Clearly, a slave-owning Confederate soldier who was about to embark on the hazards of active army life would not take a trouble-maker, a slacker, or an unreliable slave with him to war. It is reasonable to assume that black noncombatants were picked to accompany their masters because of the loyalty they had demonstrated long before there was a prospect of war. But this select group was narrowed further by another criterion that was unwritten but applied universally. To receive a Confederate pension, the black pensioner must have remained loyal to his former master’s cause during Reconstruction. ... =====
Anyone interested should go read the article. Thanks again for the cite.
Tim
__________________ "Let us, then, consider all attempts to weaken this Union, by maintaining that each state is separately and individually independent, as a species of political heresy, which can never benefit us, but may bring on us the most serious distresses."
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney of South Carolina, 1740-1824, Revolutionary War soldier, one of the authors of the US Constitution in 1787, speaking at the South Carolina Ratifying Convention in 1788.
Interesting, too, in the article that out of the pension records he finds only three at most and possibly only a single black who served as a soldier. Unusual enough to warrant special mention and it makes clear that these black pensioners were clearly not combat troops - the "exception proved the rule."
__________________ "There must be more historians of the Civil War than there were generals figthing in it... Of the two groups, the historians are the more belligerent." David Donald, Lincoln Reconsidered (1961)
Reading it, we can see exactly where the pension numbers Battalion posted are coming from -- and how he is deliberately misusing them.
I've read things by Hollandsworth before. I note that early on in the article we find this paragraph: ===== Black southerners contributed to the Confederate war effort in four ways. First, as slaves, they provided the labor that fueled the southern economy and maintained the production of foodstuffs and other commodities essential to the South’s prosecution of the war. Second, slaves were rented to or impressed by the Confederate government to work on specific projects related to the South’s military infrastructure, such as fortifications, bridges, and railroads. Third, African Americans made up a substantial part of the permanent work force in the Confederacy’s war-related industries, such foundries, munitions factories, and mines. In addition, they drove wagons that transported food and war material produced by these industries to the front. They also provided services to wounded and sick soldiers in Confederate hospitals. Last, a large number of black southerners went to war with the Confederate army as noncombatants serving as personal servants, company cooks, and hostlers.
=====
No mention of black Southerners serving as soldiers in there.
Later on he discusses the blacks who applied for Confederate pensions and discusses the source of the data extensively. It is obvious that the numbers here are the ones Battalion is using, or at least the same ones with a lot more detail.
Yet -- surprise! -- Battalion has concealed the parts he doesn't like. Ignored them. Presented the work and numbers completely out of context, and tried to make them support what they deny. For example, we find this:
===== Pension applications for African Americans were different from those used for soldiers or widows in all five states except North Carolina. Applications for servants asked for the applicant’s name, the name of the person he had served during the Civil War, and the dates of his service.43These applications usually asked for the applicant’s age, although South Carolina did not, and Mississippi stopped asking for the applicant’s age in 1922.
All five states except Virginia wanted to know the unit to which the applicant’s master had been assigned.This information, coupled with his master’s name, allowed pension boards to verify the applicant’s service by checking Confederate muster rolls. This step in the approval process was crucial, as contemporary records documenting the service of African Americans were nonexistent. There were no muster rolls for these men, most of whom had no last names at the time of their service.
====
Gee, how about that! These men were slaves who attended their masters in the field, it seems. They were not on Confederate muster rolls (gee again, aren't "soldiers" listed on muster rolls?)
Then we find little goodies like this:
===== The state pension board in Virginia was less interested in the master’s unit than in the nature of the work the black applicant performed. Legislation in the other states, except North Carolina, limited pensions to African Americans who had gone to war as servants to their masters or who had been rented by their masters to cook for Confederate soldiers. ...
=====
Gee still more: the pensions were for blacks who had "gone to war as servants to their masters or who had been rented by their masters to cook for Confederate soldiers". Men who were not "armed soldiers", but at best hired help and noncombatants -- with the revenue going to the masters (whatever they might decide to do with it then.)
A little further on, more gee:
===== ... While it is true that many of the slaves who served as black noncombatants may have served willingly, how many—and how willingly—is a matter of speculation. Some African Americans did volunteer. In Virginia, fifteen (eight percent) of the 196 black noncombatants who received pensions after the war were free men of color. Of these, twelve (eighty percent) worked as cooks, a job for which they would have been paid $20 a month, explaining perhaps their motivation to serve.=====
Wow: "volunteers" motivated by money to take jobs as cooks. Doesn't sound like "armed soldiers" to me.
There's quite a bit on the subject of loyalty, too. I have to admit it is an interesting tribute to these slaves and free black men. But there is also this:
===== It is tempting to assume that the loyalty of many black noncombatants was representative of black southerners in general, but this conclusion is not warranted. Black southerners who were recognized in Confederate memoirs, eulogized at Confederate reunions, and eventu-ally awarded Confederate pensions, were selected from a select group. They were a select group in the first place because they were allowed to accompany their masters to the army. Clearly, a slave-owning Confederate soldier who was about to embark on the hazards of active army life would not take a trouble-maker, a slacker, or an unreliable slave with him to war. It is reasonable to assume that black noncombatants were picked to accompany their masters because of the loyalty they had demonstrated long before there was a prospect of war. But this select group was narrowed further by another criterion that was unwritten but applied universally. To receive a Confederate pension, the black pensioner must have remained loyal to his former master’s cause during Reconstruction. ...
=====
Anyone interested should go read the article. Thanks again for the cite.
Tim
Wow...that's a cheery-picked article if I've ever seen one...and I thought that was what you accused others of?
Tsk...tsk...
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
Interesting, too, in the article that out of the pension records he finds only three at most and possibly only a single black who served as a soldier. Unusual enough to warrant special mention and it makes clear that these black pensioners were clearly not combat troops - the "exception proved the rule."
These pensions were only for servants and laborers.
__________________ POWER & MONEY
"Your New-York bankers and merchants are shrewd people, but I never gave them credit for so much sagacity as when they took the Government Loan. It was not merely patriotism, it was a high stroke of policy. It has saved the Government, and what they will regard as equally important, saved them from a great financial disaster."
Timewalker & Trice thank you for several quite useful posts.
Battalion thank you for allowing your consistant playing fast & loose w/ sources to once again be proven beyond a shadow of doubt and to once again put your credibility into question.
If I might suggest you should actually read your sources before you cut and paste snippets from them. Especially when the source can be tracked down and found you are presenting only part of the story. Not to mention the purposeful omision of things that so obviously contradict what you want the source to say. It has long ago become the expectation that you will distort whatever you can to prove your point.
When someone quotes Amazon book reviews... perhaps it is asking too much that they will eventually mature in their abilities.
Battalion; on a personal note I do consider Unionblue a better man than I, a man who has served his country w/ honor and pride. A man who has spent real time actually researching, learning and sharing that knowledge. Instead of looking only at sources that agree w/ his views and sniping at those who disagree w/ him he has listened learned and contributed. He is indeed a better man than either you or I.
Unionblue thank you for your courtesy, civility and most of all your service.
__________________
Shane Christen
American Legion Post 352
SUVCW Camp Abernethy# 48
Lifetime NRA member
3rd MN VI
For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. Eccl 1:18
Wow...that's a cheery-picked article if I've ever seen one...and I thought that was what you accused others of? No, looks to me like he is showing what you purposefully omitted.
Tsk...tsk...
Tsk... tsk... indeed. Second time in a short while you've been busted.
__________________
Shane Christen
American Legion Post 352
SUVCW Camp Abernethy# 48
Lifetime NRA member
3rd MN VI
For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow. Eccl 1:18
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