Replies

They're coming. They always do.

It occurs to me that they have precious little to work with in the article from which this thread emanates. It gives little support for their position, so I can fully understand why they would not want to participate in a discussion in which the high ground has already been seized from them prior to the start of the battle.

A prominent "Black" conservative flatly stating that the war was not started to free the slaves is a very hard piece of information for them to do anything with.

It does not provide any support for what they wish to believe, so it is just easier to avoid confronting it.

They cannot attack him as a "Confederate sympathizer" or a "Lost Causer" or any of the things they say about others who point out the same fact. Walter Williams is above reproach in his honesty and integrity, and would not have said such a thing unless he believed it to be correct.

Again, what can they do with that? How can they argue the point?

central_va: "They're coming. They always do."

DiogenesLamp: "It occurs to me that they have precious little to work with in the article from which this thread emanates.
It gives little support for their position..."

You guys are waaaay toooo funny!
You should go into stand-up comedy together, a lot of people would pay good money to hear you crack your jokes.

This thread is a perfect example.

;-)

To all:

First of all, nobody here except pro-Confederates disputes actual facts of history.
On the subject of black slaves serving their masters in the Confederate army, there is no dispute -- zero, zip -- about that.
Of course some did.

But how many, really?

Well, first we have to remember, the total number, everyone included, of whites in the Confederate Army approached one million.

According to this source, the number of blacks who shouldered arms for the Confederacy was circa 5,000 max 10,000 -- that is from one half of one percent to perhaps 1%.
Black slave laborers -- setting up camps, cooking, washing, building roads & fortifications, driving supply wagons, etc. -- numbered maybe another 50,000.

This at a time when total black slaves numbered about four million, of whom at least one million were military age men.
So fewer than 1% of the Confederate Army were black troops, and fewer than 1% of military age slaves served as Confederate soldiers.
To my knowledge, no all-black Confederate units actually fought against Union forces.

"But unless readers think that black Confederates were truly enamored of the South's cause,

Stauffer related the case of John Parker, a slave forced to build Confederate barricades and later to join the crew of a cannon firing grapeshot at Union troops at the First Battle of Bull Run.
All the while, recalled Parker, he worried about dying, prayed for a Union victory, and dreamed of escaping to the other side.

'His case can be seen as representative,' said Stauffer. 'Masters put guns to (the heads of slaves) to make them shoot Yankees.' "

At the same time, nearly 180,000 freed-blacks (about 10% of total Union forces and half from Confederate states) volunteered as paid soldiers in the Union Army, in 175 regiments, usually as rear garrison guards, but sometimes fighting -- notably in the Crater at Petersburg, Fort Wagner & Nashville.
At Fort Pillow, around 300 US colored troops were massacred by Confederates under Nathan Bedford Forrest.

"The 41st USCT regiment was among those present at the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox."
Eighteen Union colored troops won the Congressional Medal of Honor:

Source for data on Union colored troops.:

US Colored troops at Fort Lincoln (Washington DC), November 1865:

Sgt. Major Christian Fleetwood, Medal of Honor recipient: