[BroJoeK]

Mollypitcher1: " rarely mentioned that high numbers of blacks fought for the south.
High numbers of blacks protected their former owners during and after the war.
These are facts the Yankees never accept.
If all slave owners...the contention of Yankees.....were so horrible, why was such love and loyalty exhibited by so many blacks for their former “owners.” "

Certainly many blacks served the Confederate army -- cooking, cleaning, carrying water & firewood, setting up camps, moving, digging entrenchments, clearing roads, etc., etc.
We even have occasional reports of, seemingly, servants reloading their masters' weapons...
But despite several recommendations, there were no Confederate black units trained and used in combat.

By stark contrast, the Union Army had 175 colored regiments (178,000 troops, about 10% of the Union Army) trained, with many used in combat.
Some served with special distinction and suffered high rates of casualties.
Losses from all causes came to nearly 70,000.
About half of Union colored troops were escaped slaves, the other half freed African Americans.
The largest numbers of US Colored Troops came from Louisiana, Kentucky and Tennessee.

So, obviously, not all the Confederacy's slaves were dancing with joy just to be slaves!

[central_va]

During the “recent unpleasantness” there were three areas of the war effort where the CSA was almost on or indeed on par with the USA. Those areas were the cavalry, medical care, and ammunition. Without slaves none of those three areas would have been anywhere near as good as they were for the CSA.