"What are we fighting for?"

[James B White]

This is an article by that title in a northern paper, picked up by a southern paper (the Richmond Dispatch) early in the war. Short answer: Massachusetts and the black Republicans are fighting to end slavery and not just to save the union, but if the rest of the northerners realized it, the northern army volunteers would lose heart and go home.

Edited to add: It's a typical southern propaganda article emphasizing that Lincoln's war is really to end slavery but northerners won't openly admit it even to each other. Nothing new or exciting in 1860/61, but I think it bears repeating because so many modern southern propaganda articles state the opposite: A good southerner knows the yankee war wasn't really about ending slavery and only deluded yankee "Treasury of Virtue" advocates believe that.

From http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2006.05.0142:article=11

June 11, 1861

"--A correspondent of the Albany (N. Y.) Argus discusses this much mooted question. He says:
'Let Massachusetts, the State that has done more than any other to bring about the present emergency, ask himself the question, whether, in sending her thousands of men, and donating her millions, she is secretly carrying out the past and present teachings of her Sumners, Wilsons, Phillipses, Garrisons and Bankses, or whether she has abandoned the purposes of her life, realizing the folly of the course she has pursued in her abolition crusade upon the South she has for once this one motive in view, the Union, the Constitution, and the protection of the law. Would to God that we could believe that this is her only purpose. If the North be actuated by motives other than these, it will require no prophetic eye to see that a day of reckoning is in store for her. Were it known to-day that it is the purpose of the present Administration — as has been avowed by many of the Republican and Abolition journals of the North--not only to subdue the South, but directly to wrest from them their institutions — I say, could this be known, the great heart of the Northern people would shrink from such a contest, and the overwhelming army that has been raised at the call of thePresident, from every town and hamlet all over the North, would melt away at such a call as dew before the morning sun.' "

 

[leftyhunter]

This is an article by that title in a northern paper, picked up by a southern paper (the Richmond Dispatch) early in the war. Short answer: Massachusetts and the black Republicans are fighting to end slavery and not just to save the union, but if the rest of the northerners realized it, the northern army volunteers would lose heart and go home.

From http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2006.05.0142:article=11

June 11, 1861

"--A correspondent of the Albany (N. Y.) Argus discusses this much mooted question. He says:
'Let Massachusetts, the State that has done more than any other to bring about the present emergency, ask himself the question, whether, in sending her thousands of men, and donating her millions, she is secretly carrying out the past and present teachings of her Sumners, Wilsons, Phillipses, Garrisons and Bankses, or whether she has abandoned the purposes of her life, realizing the folly of the course she has pursued in her abolition crusade upon the South she has for once this one motive in view, the Union, the Constitution, and the protection of the law. Would to God that we could believe that this is her only purpose. If the North be actuated by motives other than these, it will require no prophetic eye to see that a day of reckoning is in store for her. Were it known to-day that it is the purpose of the present Administration — as has been avowed by many of the Republican and Abolition journals of the North--not only to subdue the South, but directly to wrest from them their institutions — I say, could this be known, the great heart of the Northern people would shrink from such a contest, and the overwhelming army that has been raised at the call of thePresident, from every town and hamlet all over the North, would melt away at such a call as dew before the morning sun.' "

Good research! I would argue that the prediction of said journalist was maybe a bit off.
Leftyhunter

 

[James B White]

Good research! I would argue that the prediction of said journalist was maybe a bit off.
Leftyhunter

It's a good question. Given the lapse of a few years, it was certainly off. The rallying cry "I'm not fighting for no ******s" never got much traction, and in fact northern soldiers seemed glad to strip the south of its institution by 1864-1865. In 1861? I dunno. Lincoln and his administration never put it to the test, perhaps wisely so.

 

[leftyhunter]

It's a good question. Given the lapse of a few years, it was certainly off. The rallying cry "I'm not fighting for no ******s" never got much traction, and in fact northern soldiers seemed glad to strip the south of its institution by 1864-1865. In 1861? I dunno. Lincoln and his administration never put it to the test, perhaps wisely so.

I don't have any evidence that the Emancipation Proclamation was a huge factor behind Union desertion. One of my favorite CW books is "A Southern Boy in Blue the memoirs of Marcus Woodcoock 6th Ky USV. The 6th Ky was mostly men from Ky although some has in Woodcocks case where from Tn. After the EP a few men from the 6th Ky and one or two from an In regiment next to them did desert over the EP. There may have of course been others from various regiments. On the other hand the Unionist regiments held together and did their jobs had did regiments that had few ( many Union regiments had a handful or so of Unionists) or any Southern men in them .
Leftyhunter

 

[brass napoleon]

This is an article by that title in a northern paper, picked up by a southern paper (the Richmond Dispatch) early in the war. Short answer: Massachusetts and the black Republicans are fighting to end slavery and not just to save the union, but if the rest of the northerners realized it, the northern army volunteers would lose heart and go home.

Edited to add: It's a typical southern propaganda article emphasizing that Lincoln's war is really to end slavery but northerners won't openly admit it even to each other

It was a common rallying cry of Peace Democrats throughout the North. All the Lincoln Administration had to do was cave in to the demands of the slaveholders, and the Union could be preserved without a drop of blood shed. Lincoln refused. So in that regard it could be said that the Lincoln Administration was fighting to end slavery - or, as Lincoln himself openly admitted, to put slavery "on the course of ultimate extinction".

But the sleight of hand comes when people, then and now, tried to equate that to fighting to free the slaves. That was NOT what the Union was doing in 1861. And it was wise not to do so. In the 1860 election, Lincoln got less than 1% of the vote in Kentucky and less than 3% of the vote in Maryland. Clearly these states weren't interested in ending slavery, either immediately or ultimately. And yet these states were desperately needed to have any chance to win the war. There also was widespread resistance to the concept of fighting to free the slaves in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and probably other Northern states as well. The support of those states was crucial. And if the war was lost, not only was the Union dissolved, but slavery was that much further from being put "on the course of ultimate extinction".

 

[James B White]

The following makes for kind of a wacky companion piece to the above. It was picked up by the same Richmond Va. newspaper a few days earlier, June 5, 1861, Richmond Dispatch, originally supposedly from the New York Tribune--but I have not searched the Tribune to verify if it actually appeared there:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper...2006.05.0137:article=pos=58&highlight=tribune
What Is To Be Done with the Negroes?
"--The New York Tribune says:
"Com. Chauncey has orders to take command of the Saratoga on the coast of Africa. He was the officer who commanded the ship which took the captured slaves back to Africa. No doubt he is ordered to that coast again with a view that he shall negotiate with the Monrovian Government for the reception and disposition of such negroes as may be captured by the Government forces in the prosecution of the war which the rebel States have declared and are now waging against the Government of the United States. Our Government having been forced into hostilities with the seceded and seceding rebels, will be fully justified by the civilized world in 'carrying the war into Africa,' which process will, of course, cause many sons of Africa to fall into the possession of the Government. The question in that case will be how to dispose of them. If there are four millions of African slaves now in the Confederate States, how many will there be by-and-by?"

If I'm reading between the lines correctly, the Tribune seems to be quoted as saying that the Federal army will "carry the war into Africa," meaning it will confiscate slaves, and will have to decide what to do with them. The obvious solution would be to return them to Africa, and that if there are four million slaves now, they will gradually be drained away as they're removed back to Africa.

Southerners might like to read such an article because it shows that anti-slavery people, Greeley and his ilk, don't actually want free blacks living amongst them and they're therefore hippocrits. The Tribune might have innocently proposed the idea as the best solution for blacks and whites, for the same reasons that colonizationists had been proposing it all along.

But I'm not really sure if I'm understanding what's going on--and more importantly, can't guarantee it actually appeared in the Tribune.

But then the next day, it gets even wackier. I have no idea what's going on here. The following article, also supposedly from the Tribune, appeared in the June 6, 1861 Richmond Dispatch:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper...t:2006.05.0138:article=pos=35&highlight=spike
Spiking Negroes
"The New York Tribune has an article recommending that the slaves taken by the abolition soldiers from their masters should be put to hard work in making batteries, and then makes this mysterious proposition:
"'Then, too, if the exigencies of the campaign require so summary a proceeding, these contraband bipeds might be destroyed--as property. For example, when cannons are about to be abandoned to the enemy, a prudent General causes them to be spiked — and so thoroughly spiked as to be forever worthless, as cannon to the foe. So, as to negroes who had served in the Union camp, if our army were compelled to let them fall into the enemy's hands, they must first spike them, as property, so that they would be good for nothing to the foe; and, to make thorough work of it, the negroes must be instructed to tell the rebels, who might try to use them, that they were spiked.'
"Spiking negroes as they spike cannon!--What does the wretch mean? Does he propose to cut off the hands and feet, to maim and mutilate the slaves when they can no longer make use of them? No crime is too horrible for the New York Tribune, and it would not surprise us if this is really what it means."

I have no idea what's going on there. Either Horace Greeley's neck beard was shaved too close and he's become one letter short of a typecase, or he's making some kind of too-subtle joke, or the Richmond Dispatch is just making stuff up and claiming it was in the Tribune, or...

Beats me.

 

[brass napoleon]

I wouldn't take the Richmond Dispatch's word for something as dramatic as this. I'd have to see it in the New York Tribune itself, in context, to even consider it.

 

[unionblue]

The South was fighting for the past.

 

[James B White]

I wouldn't take the Richmond Dispatch's word for something as dramatic as this. I'd have to see it in the New York Tribune itself, in context, to even consider it.

I'm supposed to be busy doing other stuff, but what the heck. Went and looked. (edited to clarify, I only looked for the "spiked" article) It's at GenealogyBank, May 29, 1861 New York Tribune, pg 4. Can't post an image. Can anyone else? It's an article titled "Gen. Butler on Contraband Goods," and seems to be an endorsement of Butler's decision to treat negroes as property, in a tongue-and-cheek way saying see, you call them property, well, now we'll confiscate them as property. The paragraph in question is one of several numbered options, and the whole thing in context seems a bit of humor, centered around puns like confiscated guns might "go off" and confiscated negroes might "go off" rather than stay around and work.

It's too long to type up and I can't figure out how to capture it as an image and post it using this little Kindle, but it would best for everyone to read it and make up their own minds about the tone.

But if it's a joke, and the Richmond paper printed it seriously, did the Richmond editor actually get the joke but decide to pretend the article was serious, in order to deliberately hoax the Richmond readers into thinking the anti-slavery people were nuts? Or did the Richmond paper get it and figure its readers would get it too? Or did the Richmond editor actually not get the joke?

And we think communication is complicated enough in an era when we can use smilies to help!

 

[brass napoleon]

Here it is:

My take: it's all tongue-in-cheek. It's ridiculing the Dred Scott decision that human beings can be property, with no human rights.

 

[James B White]

My take: it's all tongue-in-cheek. It's ridiculing the Dred Scott decision that human beings can be property, with no human rights.

Thank you! Yep, tongue in cheek in the Tribune. Did the Dispatch get the joke, miss it, or miss it on purpose?

 

[brass napoleon]

Thank you! Yep, tongue in cheek in the Tribune. Did the Dispatch get the joke, miss it, or miss it on purpose?

It's hard to say without knowing more about the editor. It kind of appears to me that he actually took the Tribune editorial as serious.

A common ploy of slaveholders to discourage their slaves from heading north was to tell them all kinds of horror stories about how cruelly the Northern and Canadian people would treat them. With all these stories circulating, it appears to me that many slaveholders actually came to believe them themselves. It was all part of the delusion about slavery being the only beneficial solution for the black race. So my guess would be that the editor swallowed it, and then fed it to his readers, so that they could propagate the myth, and give them yet another story to tell their slaves so that they would live in mortal fear of freedom.

 

[James B White]

I tend to agree.

By the way, how did you post the image? I really appreciate that and need to relearn how to do that. On my big computer, I used to stick it in my photos, then upload it, but I don't know how to use this Kindle well enough to do that. Is there an easy way to attach the image directly from GenealogyBank in one step? Or did you find it somewhere else like the Library of Congress site? I tried to look there but the search engine didn't like me and kept erasing my options.

 

[brass napoleon]

I tend to agree.

By the way, how did you post the image? I really appreciate that and need to relearn how to do that. On my big computer, I used to stick it in my photos, then upload it, but I don't know how to use this Kindle well enough to do that. Is there an easy way to attach the image directly from GenealogyBank in one step? Or did you find it somewhere else like the Library of Congress site? I tried to look there but the search engine didn't like me and kept erasing my options.

I got it from the LoC. As far as posting it, it's a bit complex, and I have no idea how you would do it on a tablet. Basically I downloaded the page to my PC, then opened it up in PhotoShop (but any graphics program, including Windows Paint, would probably work), cropped it to just the column I was interested in, then saved it as a new file and uploaded it.

 

[James B White]

I got it from the LoC. As far as posting it, it's a bit complex, and I have no idea how you would do it on a tablet. Basically I downloaded the page to my PC, then opened it up in PhotoShop (but any graphics program, including Windows Paint, would probably work), cropped it to just the column I was interested in, then saved it as a new file and uploaded it.

Sigh. That's pretty much how I used to do it. Okay, at least I'm glad I didn't overlook something obvious. Thank you again for going through those extra steps to do it. I'm pretty much limited to a tablet like Gen. Grant was, and can only post one-step photos like that. I'm even wearing the knit hat, beard and lap robe as we speak, just need to find a cool wicker chair like that. (So how far off-topic can I hijack my own thread, LOL!)

Expired Image Removed

 

[brass napoleon]

Sigh. That's pretty much how I used to do it. Okay, at least I'm glad I didn't overlook something obvious. Thank you again for going through those extra steps to do it. I'm pretty much limited to a tablet like Gen. Grant was, and can only post one-step photos like that. I'm even wearing the knit hat, beard and lap robe as we speak, just need to find a cool wicker chair like that. (So how far off-topic can I hijack my own thread, LOL!)

Expired Image Removed

Well, feel free to call on us whenever we can assist!

 

[James B White]

All right, unhijacking my thread again. This may be a bit of evidence to confirm that nothing Greeley said in the Tribune would be too fanatical-sounding for the Richmond paper to believe, and they would take it seriously rather than see the deliberate humor. It's from the July 13, 1861 same Richmond Dispatch, an article comparing Chase and Greeley. It's at http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:2006.05.0217:article=pos=31 and quite long, but on Greeley it says:

"Greeley is for giving the war an object which will attract to it the sympathics of mankind. Waged for the purpose avowed by Lincoln in his Message, that is to say, merely for upholding and preserving the Federal Government, it is no more nor less than a war of subjugation; and in wars of this sort the sympathics of mankind are always enlisted in behalf of those sought to be crushed. Greeley sees this evident tendency of the public feeling in behalf of the South, and wishes to correct it by his invariable expedient of the ******. Without Uncle Tom, the Northern end of the scale of justice must kick the beam; and Greeley is for throwing in the tremendous avoirdupois of negro emancipation. There is much method in the madness of this truculent fanatic. He knows, too, that the war cannot be made popular with recruits without the allurements of '"booty and beauty,"' and he knows that freeing the slave will excuse and cover a multitude of atrocities in the eye of the easily-gulled world. He would treat theSouthern slaveholder as a monster in human shape; he would hold him up to the world as deserving any fate that the most barbarous soldiery could inflict upon him; and he would thus secure a license for those atrocities by the permission of which he would popularize enlistments at the North. Greeley, in short, is all fanaticism with only the cunning needful to effectuate his political aims."

In other words, they seem to be saying that Greeley has anticipated the Treasury of Virtue argument, and that by casting the war as a battle of good (freeing the slaves) vs. evil (those monsterous slave-owners), any barbarity can be excused if used to defeat such evil monsters.

Needless to say, many southerners, and northerners too, were arguing just the opposite, that northerners would not actually fight to free the slaves even if they felt slavery was morally wrong, but it seems that Greeley was being made to personify all the fanatical nuttiness of the abolitionists, while Chase and Seward and even Lincoln himself were being credited with more careful cunning. So nothing Greeley said could be too over-the-top to be believed.