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Civil War History - Secession and Politics Was it Slavery, or was it States Rights? Perhaps it was the election of Lincoln? What were the real reasons for Southern Secession and what were the political issues in this time of war? Find your answers here in the Secession and Politics Disussion.

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  #31  
Old 05-16-2008, 12:53 AM
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I think this one is still on some kind of close track, and it is very interesting. So it will stay, untill someone mentions Leftist Blue State Commies.

ole
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  #32  
Old 05-16-2008, 12:55 AM
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You are referring to the contrabands of war, who were now the property of the yankee army?
You are now obliged to provide evidence that they were the property of the Yankee army.

ole
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  #33  
Old 05-16-2008, 02:56 AM
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Originally Posted by Baggage Handler #2 View Post
Sure, prisoners have rights.
As a former Correctional Officer at Tomoka Correctional Institute in Daytona Beach, Florida... a Close Custody facility (which is really nothing more than a maximum security prison with open bay dorms, and actual period Cool Hand Luke Slave Shacks - so it can even be more dangerous than a complete Red Tag Camp! Sergeants were getting knifed on the yard in those days. Not fatally, but like soap bars and batteries thrown at you during recall count, it gets your attention! One of them had to take early retirement... a personal friend of mine... )...

As a former 'boss man' on the 'yard', charged with running chain-gang labor squads, I can give you the run down:

1. SLAVES got better health care due to the vested interest in their recovery. While the PRISONERS get adequate care,
the SLAVES were seen by the master's personal physicians.

2. SLAVES did not fear being abused by the other slaves, like PRISONERS deal with every moment of their lives. I know of no records where they were afraid, except during the yankee invasion (one little negro boy at Avenel was totally scared to death during Hunter's Raid. Mrs. Burwell even let him stay in the Big House, but to no avail... He died screaming PLEASE DON'T LET THE YANKEES GET ME!)

... and no PRISONER is ever NOT AFRAID, unless he is just psychotic. (We did have many of those...).

3. SLAVES were many times part of a family outfit, taking their owners' last names, and they could get passes to and from other plantations. Chain Gang isn't exactly the same thing...

4. SLAVES did have a number of 'rights' which could be charged against the master for mistreatment of his property.

5. SLAVES could get manumission like PRISONERS get parolled, and sometimes for the same reasons: Overcrowding, et cetera. EXILE is of course the legal
method for emancipation with SLAVES, but like teaching them, is not always enforced... and it is ALWAYS the case for PRISONERS. I have driven many of them to the bus station in Daytona Beach, after the mandatory $100.00 trip to K mart for a change of clothes...

These are just a few. There are others.

Beowulf

Lincoln saw SLAVES and PRISONERS as the SAME THING! He is said to have dumped
European prisons into his ranks, as well as having conscripted human property from the Southern slaves he stoled from the South!

Last edited by Beowulf; 05-16-2008 at 03:15 AM.
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  #34  
Old 05-16-2008, 03:07 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ole View Post
You are now obliged to provide evidence that they were the property of the Yankee army.

ole
Certainly, sir!

CHAPTER FIFTEEN:
The Seizure and Conscription of Southern Slaves

Much has been made by modern revisionist historians of the fact that an estimated 186,000 Blacks fought under the United States flag against the South.(1) However, we are seldom, if ever, told the reason for this. According to the William Whiting, "All the property of rebels [is] forfeited to the treasury of the country,"(2) and "slave property [is] subject to the same liability as other property to be appropriated for war purposes."(3) Lincoln's Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, elaborated on this premise: "The population of African descent that cultivate the lands and perform the labor of the rebels constitute a large share of their military strength, and enable the white masters to fill the rebel armies and wage a cruel and murderous war against the people of the Northern States. By reducing the laboring strength of the rebels their military power will be reduced."(4) Consequently, the invading Northern army began to seize Southern slaves and conscript them into service to the United States, often against their will. General Orders No. 17, from the Department of the South headquarters at Hilton Head, South Carolina, stipulated:
[A]ll able-bodied male negroes between the ages of eighteen and fifty within the military lines of the Department of the South who are not, on the day of the date of this order, regularly and permanently employed in the quartermaster and commissary departments, or as the private servants of officers, within the allowance made by the Army Regulations, are hereby drafted into the military service of the United States, to serve as non-commissioned officers and soldiers in the various regiments and brigades now organized, and in process of being organized, by Brig. Gen. Rufus Saxton, specially authorized to raise such troops by orders of the War Department.(5)
After this order had failed to produce the desired results, the following amended order was issued:
In view of the necessities of the military service, the want of recruits to complete the unfilled regiments in this department, the great numbers of unemployed colored men and deserters hiding about to avoid labor or service, and in consideration of the large bounties now paid to volunteers by the Government, General Orders, No. 17, dated headquarters Department of the South, Hilton Head, S.C., March 6, 1863, is hereby amended to read as follows:
All able-bodied colored men between the ages of eighteen and fifty, within the military lines of the Department of the South, who have had an opportunity to enlist voluntarily and refused to do so, shall be drafted into the military service of the United States....
The owners or superintendents of plantations, and all other persons throughout the department not in the military service, are hereby authorized and required to arrest and deliver to the local provost-marshal of the nearest military post all deserters in their employ or loitering about their plantations, and if it be necessary for a guard to make the arrest, it shall be the duty of such person or persons knowing of the whereabouts of any deserter, or person by common reports called a deserter, to report the fact to the nearest military commander, and also to render him all assistance in his power to cause the arrest. Any person found guilty of violating this section shall be severely punished.(6)
These orders adequately account for a large majority of the Black men who bore arms against their former masters, without whom Lincoln declared that he would have to "abandon the war in three weeks."(7) In a 26 February 1864 dispatch from Huntsville, Alabama, General John A. Logan wrote that "a major of colored troops is here with his party capturing negroes, with or without their consent.... [T]hey are being conscripted."(8) On 1 September 1864, Captain Frederick Martin reported from New Berne, North Carolina, "The negroes will not go voluntarily, so I am obliged to force them.... I expect to get a large lot to-morrow."(9) To this report, General Innis N. Palmer added:
The matter of collecting the colored men for laborers has been one of some difficulty, but I hope to send up a respectable force. The matter has been fairly explained to the contrabands, and they have been treated with the utmost consideration, but they will not go willingly. Now, I take it that the state of the country needs their services, and that if they will not go willingly they must be forced to go, and I propose to take all I can find who are in no permanent employment and send them up. I am aware that this may be considered a harsh measure, but at such a time we must not stop at trifles.(10)



Northern Atrocities Against Southern Blacks

Because the invading Northern soldiers had been instructed to view the Southern slaves as "enemy property" to be confiscated and appropriated to the use of the United States Army, it was inevitable that the hatred these men carried in their hearts toward the people of the South would be projected upon their helpless servants. In his address to the Confederate Congress of 7 December 1863, Jefferson Davis stated:
Nor as less unrelenting warfare been waged by these pretended friends of human rights and liberties against the unfortunate negroes. Wherever the enemy have been able to gain access they have forced into the ranks of their army every able-bodied man that they could seize, and have either left the aged, the women, and the children to perish by starvation, or have gathered them into camps where they have been wasted by a frightful mortality. Without clothing or shelter, often without food, incapable without supervision of taking the most ordinary precautions against disease, these helpless dependents, accustomed to have their wants supplied by the foresight of their masters, are being rapidly exterminated wherever brought in contact with the invaders. By the Northern man, on whose deep-rooted prejudices no kindly restraining influence is exercised, they are treated with aversion and neglect. There is little hazard in predicting that in all localities where the enemy have gained a temporary foothold the negroes, who under our care increased six-fold in number since their importation into the colonies by Great Britain, will have been reduced by mortality during the war to no more than one-half their previous number.
Information on this subject is derived not only from our own observation and from the reports of the negroes who succeed in escaping from the enemy, but full confirmation is afforded by statements published in the Northern journals by humane persons engaged in making appeals to the charitable for aid in preventing the ravages of disease, exposure, and starvation among the negro women and children who are crowded into encampments.(17)
Davis' words are easily verified. Indeed, the official records of the war, published by the United States Government, are literally filled with accounts of the robbery, rape, and murder endured by Southern Blacks at the hands of their supposed "liberators." General Orders No. 27, issued on 17 August 1862 under the authority of Major-General David Hunter, stated that "numerous acts of pilfering from the negroes have taken place in the neighborhood of Beufort, committed by men wearing the uniform of the United States."(18) J.T.K. Hayward testified that Northern soldiers were "committing rapes on the negroes and such like things.... and no punishment, or none of any account, has been meted out to them."(19) In the tiny town of Athens, Alabama, Northern soldiers under the command of Colonel John B. Turchin "attempted an indecent outrage on [a] servant girl," and quartered themselves "in the negro huts for weeks, debauching the females." This account also tells of the gang-rape "on the person of a colored girl...."(20) Although Turchin was court-martialled and convicted for these crimes on 7 July 1862, he was promoted by Lincoln only a month later to the rank of Brigadier General.(21)


AMERICA'S CAESAR - The Decline and Fall of Republican Government in the United States of America

Greg Loren Durand

The whole e-book is on line - no cost.

Beowulf

Last edited by Beowulf; 05-16-2008 at 03:28 AM.
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  #35  
Old 05-16-2008, 03:33 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Freddy View Post
Ah, the same old Beowulf is back spouting the same old tired nonsense!

Quote by Beowulf:

"a Federally mangled emancipation, such as is said to have killed off a massive number of negroes through starvation and displacement."

Citation please! You need to back up your false charges with evidence!

At least 140,000 of those freed slaves fought against those nice slave owners you always defend.
See Forged in Battle by Glatthaar.
Gnaw on this bone first...

The expanded version was used to answer Ole, and the full 'hit' of this information, if you are inclined to be so dazzled, is in the e book.


Jefferson Davis stated:
Nor as less unrelenting warfare been waged by these pretended friends of human rights and liberties against the unfortunate negroes. Wherever the enemy have been able to gain access they have forced into the ranks of their army every able-bodied man that they could seize, and have either left the aged, the women, and the children to perish by starvation, or have gathered them into camps where they have been wasted by a frightful mortality. Without clothing or shelter, often without food, incapable without supervision of taking the most ordinary precautions against disease, these helpless dependents, accustomed to have their wants supplied by the foresight of their masters, are being rapidly exterminated wherever brought in contact with the invaders. By the Northern man, on whose deep-rooted prejudices no kindly restraining influence is exercised, they are treated with aversion and neglect.

There is little hazard in predicting that in all localities where the enemy have gained a temporary foothold the negroes, who under our care increased six-fold in number since their importation into the colonies by Great Britain, will have been reduced by mortality during the war to no more than one-half their previous number.

(I remember reading the number one million dead, somewhere, but the Davis estimate is dead on the money...)

Information on this subject is derived not only from our own observation and from the reports of the negroes who succeed in escaping from the enemy, but full confirmation is afforded by statements published in the Northern journals by humane persons engaged in making appeals to the charitable for aid in preventing the ravages of disease, exposure, and starvation among the negro women and children who are crowded into encampments.(17)
Davis' words are easily verified. Indeed, the official records of the war, published by the United States Government, are literally filled with accounts of the robbery, rape, and murder endured by Southern Blacks at the hands of their supposed "liberators."

Last edited by Beowulf; 05-16-2008 at 03:38 AM.
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  #36  
Old 05-16-2008, 03:48 AM
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As we are not talking about left wing blue state buzzards, I'm constrained to let this fly. It's not on topic, but that happens. It does, however, bother me, that we're relying heavily on a thoroughly unreliable work.

However, again, it does bother me that Old Grey Wolf started an interesting thread and that it has been hijacked. It might be nice to get back into that.

ole
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  #37  
Old 05-16-2008, 07:13 AM
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It is unfair to compare slaves and prisoners.
First of all, prisoners put themselves in that position. Slaves were forced. The biggest difference between slaves and prisoners is that prisoners actually deserve the treatment they receive. In my opinion, prisoners today get treated TOO well....but that is another topic.

On topic, a man's sense of duty and honor was only found in that man. North and South, each man had his own reasons for making his mark at the enlistment tables. On a personal note, my g-g-grandfather and all 5 of his brothers enlisted to "protect the soil for which Stauton has prospered."
Their grandfather and his brothers fought during the Revolutionary War, all 7 of them. Even the daughters were married to military men, including Samuel Wallace and Hugh Allen. One of the brothers was Robert Anderson, to which Anderson Co SC is named after today. It is noted in the family records that "the display would be grand should we meet our South Carolina kin on the battlefield."

My point is, I do believe my family enlisted to "uphold the family name" maybe, and some were in politics at the time as well. That is just my father's side. My mother's side I am unsure why they joined. In any case, they felt (like hundreds of thousands on both sides) that their duty and honor outweighed their life and for that, they are commended.
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  #38  
Old 05-16-2008, 08:58 AM
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Default How did duty and honor compel us into this awful war?

You are correct Lilred and since many southrons of Beowulf's persuasion, do not, in fact, know the difference between being a prisoner and being a slave. It is unlikely they know very much about a esoteric (to them) subject, such as duty or honor.
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  #39  
Old 05-16-2008, 11:33 AM
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Originally Posted by OpnDownfall View Post
You are correct Lilred and since many southrons of Beowulf's persuasion, do not, in fact, know the difference between being a prisoner and being a slave. It is unlikely they know very much about a esoteric (to them) subject, such as duty or honor.
I would commend Beowulf's sense of duty and honor. I do not know him personaly, but I sense a connection that extends beyond the confines of the Internet. Perhaps we are long lost brothers or some such. You do your country great credit sir. Thank you.

Allow me to re-direct this thread if you will gentlemen.
Let's talk about duty and honor again.



General John Pope, born 18 March 1822 at Louisville, Kentucky, graduated from the Military Academy in 1842. Fought gallantly at Monterey and Buena Vista during the war with Mexico. Commanded the Army of the Mississippi during the siege of Corinth, winning a promotion to Major General. He headed the newly formed Army of Virginia after the collapse of the Peninsular Campaign.

General Pope met with some difficulties during the Battle of Second Manassas. I wonder if you learned gentlemen would be so kind as to talk about this esteemed character for just a little bit. Let's talk about his performance of duty and the honor he brought to the United States government.
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  #40  
Old 05-16-2008, 12:08 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Lilred View Post
It is unfair to compare slaves and prisoners.
First of all, prisoners put themselves in that position. Slaves were forced. The biggest difference between slaves and prisoners is that prisoners actually deserve the treatment they receive. In my opinion, prisoners today get treated TOO well....but that is another topic.

On topic, a man's sense of duty and honor was only found in that man. North and South, each man had his own reasons for making his mark at the enlistment tables. On a personal note, my g-g-grandfather and all 5 of his brothers enlisted to "protect the soil for which Stauton has prospered."
Their grandfather and his brothers fought during the Revolutionary War, all 7 of them. Even the daughters were married to military men, including Samuel Wallace and Hugh Allen. One of the brothers was Robert Anderson, to which Anderson Co SC is named after today. It is noted in the family records that "the display would be grand should we meet our South Carolina kin on the battlefield."

My point is, I do believe my family enlisted to "uphold the family name" maybe, and some were in politics at the time as well. That is just my father's side. My mother's side I am unsure why they joined. In any case, they felt (like hundreds of thousands on both sides) that their duty and honor outweighed their life and for that, they are commended.
Prisoners... deserve... the treatment... they get?

OOOooohhhkay! Thank you, Ulysses S. Grant!

Beowulf
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