Shame of the Yankees - America's Worst Anti-Jewish Action [Civil War thread]

This year, the second day of Chanukah will coincide with the 144th anniversary of the worst official act of anti-Semitism in American history.

On December 17, 1862, in the midst of the Civil War, Union general Ulysses S. Grant issued his infamous "General Order # 11," expelling all Jews "as a class" from his conquered territories within 24 hours. Henry Halleck, the Union general-in-chief, wired Grant in support of his action, saying that neither he nor President Lincoln were opposed "to your expelling traitors and Jew peddlers."

A few months earlier, on August 11, General William Tecumseh Sherman had warned in a letter to the adjutant general of the Union Army that "the country will swarm with dishonest Jews" if continued trade in cotton were encouraged. And Grant also issued orders in November 1862 banning travel in general, by "the Israelites especially," because they were "such an intolerable nuisance," and railroad conductors were told that "no Jews are to be permitted to travel on the railroad."

As a result of Grant's expulsion order, Jewish families were forced out of their homes in Paducah, Kentucky, and Holly Springs and Oxford, Mississippi – and a few were sent to prison. When some Jewish victims protested to President Lincoln, Attorney General Edward Bates advised the president that he was indifferent to such objections.

Lincoln rescinded Grant's odious order, but not before Jewish families in the area had been humiliated, terrified, and jailed, and some stripped of their possessions.

Captain Philip Trounstine of the Ohio Volunteer Cavalry, being unable in good conscience to round up and expel his fellow Jews, resigned his army commission, saying he could "no longer bear the taunts and malice of his fellow officers brought on by that order."

The officials responsible for the United States government's most vicious anti-Jewish actions ever were never dismissed, admonished or, apparently, even officially criticized for the religious persecution they inflicted on innocent citizens.

The exact reason for Grant's decree remains uncertain. As author and military historian Mel Young points out in his book Where They Lie, Grant's own family was involved in cotton speculation (as well as owning slaves), so perhaps he considered Jewish traders to be competition. And the language spoken by the many Dutch and German-speaking peddlers and merchants in the area was probably confused with Yiddish and many were mistakenly taken to be Jewish.

But most likely the underlying reason for the order was the prejudice against and hatred of Jews so widely felt among the Union forces.

Such bigotry is described in detail by Robert Rosen in his authoritative work The Jewish Confederates; by Bertram Korn in his classic American Jewry and the Civil War; and by other historians of the era. They recount how Jews in Union-occupied areas, such as New Orleans and Memphis, were singled out by Union forces for vicious abuse and vilification.

In New Orleans, the ruling general, Benjamin "Beast" Butler, harshly vilifiedJews and was quoted by a Jewish newspaper as saying he could "suck the blood of every Jew, and will detain every Jew as long as he can." An Associated Press reporter from the North wrote that "The Jews in New Orleans and all the South ought to be exterminated. They run the blockade, and are always to be found at the bottom of every new villainy."

Of Memphis, whose Mississippi River port was a center of illegal cotton trading, the Chicago Tribune reported in July 1862: "The Israelites have come down upon the city like locusts. Every boat brings in a load of the hooked-nose fraternity."

Rosen writes at length about the blatant and widespread anti-Semitism throughout the North, with even The New York Times castigating the anti-war Democratic Party for having a chairman who was "the agent of foreign Jew bankers."

New Englanders were especially hateful, and one leading abolitionist minister, Theodore Parker, called Jews "lecherous," and said that their intellects were "sadly pinched in those narrow foreheads" and that they "did sometimes kill a Christian baby at the Passover."

Meanwhile, in the South, Jews were playing a prominent role in the Confederate government and armed forces, and "were used to being treated as equals," as Rosen puts it, an acceptance they had enjoyed for a century and a half.

Dale and Theodore Rosengarten, in A Portion of the People: Three Hundred Years of Southern Jewish Life, observe that in 1800 Charleston had more Jews than any city in North America, and many were respected citizens, office holders, and successful entrepreneurs. Some referred to the city as "our Jerusalem" and Myer Moses, my maternal family patriarch, in 1806 called his hometown "this land of milk and honey." And so it seemed.

Some 3,000 or more Jews fought for the South, practically every male of military age. Many carried with them to the front the famous soldiers' prayer written by Richmond rabbi Max Michelbacher, who after secession had issued a widely-published benediction comparing Southerners to "the Children of Israel crossing the Red Sea."

Many Jewish Confederates distinguished themselves by showing, along with their Christian comrades, amazing courage, dedication and valor, and enduring incredible hardships against overwhelming and often hopeless odds.

The Confederacy's secretary of war (he would later become secretary of state) was Judah P. Benjamin, and the top Confederate commander, General Robert E. Lee, was renowned for making every effort to accommodate his Jewish soldiers on their holidays.

Some find it peculiar that a people once held in slavery by the Egyptians, and who celebrate their liberation every year at Passover, would fight for a nation dedicated to maintaining that institution. But while slavery is usually emphasized, falsely, as the cause of the war, Confederate soldiers felt they were fighting for their homeland and their families, against an invading army that was trying, with great success, to kill them and their comrades, burn their homes, and destroy their cities.

Anyone with family who fought to defend the South, as over two dozen members of my extended family did, cannot help but appreciate the dire circumstances our ancestors encountered.

Near the end of the War Between the States, as I grew up hearing it called, my great grandfather, Andrew Jackson Moses, participated in a dangerous mission as hopeless as it was valiant. The date was April 9, 1865, the same day Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox. Having run away from school at 16 to become a Confederate scout, Jack rode out as part of a hastily formed local militia to defend his hometown of Sumter, South Carolina.

Approaching rapidly were the 2,700 men of Potter's Raiders, a unit attached to Sherman's army that had just burned Columbia and most everything else in its path, and Sumter expected similar treatment.

Along wih a few other teenagers, old men, invalids, and wounded from the local hospital, Sumter's 158 ragtag defenders were able to hold off Potter's battle-seasoned veterans for over an hour and a half at the cost of a dozen lives.

Jack got away with a price on his head, and Sumter was not burned after all. But some buildings were, and there are documented instances of murder, rape, and arson by the Yankees, including the torching of our family's 196 bales of cotton.

Meanwhile, on that same day, Jack's eldest brother, Lt. Joshua Lazarus Moses, who'd been wounded in the war's first real battle, First Manassas (Bull Run), was defending Mobile in the last infantry battle of the war. With his forces outnumbered 12 to one, Josh was commanding an artillery battalion that, before being overrun, fired the last shots in defense of Mobile.

Refusing to lay down his arms, he was killed in a battle at Fort Blakely a few hours after Lee, unbeknownst to them, had surrendered. In that battle, one of Josh's brothers, Perry, was wounded, and another brother, Horace, was captured while laying land mines.

The fifth brother, Isaac Harby Moses, having served with distinction in combat in the legendary Wade Hampton's cavalry, rode home from North Carolina after the Battle of Bentonville, the last major battle of the war, where he had commanded his company after all the officers had been killed or wounded. His mother proudly observed in her memoirs that he never surrendered to the enemy forces.

He was among those who fired the first shots of the war when his company of Citadel cadets opened up on the Union ship, Star of the West, which was attempting to resupply the besieged Fort Sumter in January 1861, three months before the war officially began.

The Moses brothers' uncle, Major Raphael J. Moses, from Columbus, Georgia, is credited with being the father of Georgia's peach industry. He was General James Longstreet's chief commissary officer and was responsible for supplying and feeding up to 50,000 men (including porters and other non-combatants).

Their commander, Robert E. Lee, had forbidden Moses from entering private homes in search of supplies during raids into Union territory, even when food and other provisions were in painfully short supply. And he always paid for what he took from farms and businesses, albeit in Confederate tender – often enduring, in good humor, harsh verbal abuse from the local women.

Interestingly, Moses ended up attending the last meeting and carrying out the last order of the Confederate government, which was to deliver the remnant of the Confederate treasury ($40,000 in gold and silver bullion) to help feed, supply and provide medical help to the defeated Confederate soldiers in hospitals and straggling home after the war – weary, hungry, often sick or wounded, shoeless, and in tattered uniforms. With the help of a small group of determined armed guards, he successfully carried out the order from President Jefferson Davis, despite repeated attempts by mobs to forcibly take the bullion.

Major Moses's three sons also served the Confederacy. One of them, Albert Moses Luria, was killed in 1862 at age 19 after courageously throwing a live Union artillery shell out of his fortification before it exploded, thereby saving the lives of many of his compatriots. He was the first Jewish Confederate killed in the war; his cousin Josh, killed at Mobile, the last.

Moses had always been intensely proud of his Jewish heritage, having named one son Luria after an ancestor who was court physician to Spain's Queen Isabella. Another son he named Nunez, after Dr. Samuel Nunez, the court physician in Lisbon who fled religious persecution in Portugal and arrived from England in July 1733 with some 41 other Jews on a tiny, storm-tossed ship. As one of the first Jews in Georgia, Nunez is credited with having saved the colony in Savannah from perishing from malaria or some ther kind of tropical fever.

After the war, Raphael Moses was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives and named chairman of the Judiciary Committee. One of his best known writings, reproduced countless times in books and articles, is a lengthy, open letter he wrote in 1878 to a political opponent who'd attacked him for being "a Jew."

This was a rare deviation from the general acceptance the South showed toward its Jews, and Moses hit back hard.

"Had your overburdened heart sought relief in some exhibition of unmeasured gratitude, had you a wealth of gifts and selected from your abundance your richest offering to lay at my feet," he wrote, "you could not have honored me more highly, nor distinguished me more gratefully than by proclaiming me a Jew."

One cannot help but respect the dignity and gentlemanly policies of Lee and Moses, and the courage of the greatly outnumbered, out-supplied but rarely outfought Confederate soldiers.

In stark contrast and in violation of the then-prevailing rules of warfare, the troops of Union generals Grant, Sherman, and Sheridan burned and looted homes, farms, courthouses, libraries, businesses, and entire cities full of defenseless civilians (including my hometown of Atlanta) as part of official Union policy not simply to defeat but to utterly destroy the South.

And before, during, and after the war, this Union army (led by many of the same generals, including Grant, Sherman, Sheridan, and Custer) used the same and even worse tactics to massacre Native Americans in what we euphemistically call the Indian Wars. It would be more accurate to call it mass murder – a virtual genocide – of Native Americans, including helpless old men, women, and children in their villages.

The valor of the Jewish Confederates and the other Southern soldiers and the blatant anti-Semitism so prevalent in the North form a nearly forgotten chapter of American history. It is, seemingly, an embarrassment to many Jewish historians – and hardly politically correct – in this day of constantly reiterated demonization of the Confederacy and worshipful reverence for Lincoln and his brutal generals.

But the anniversary of Grant's little-remembered Nazi-like decree and his other atrocities should serve to remind us what the Southern soldiers and civilians were up against. Perhaps it will help people understand why native Southerners, including many Jewish families, revere their ancestors' courage and, despite the controversy it causes in certain "enlightened" circles, still take much pride in this heritage.

Lewis Regenstein, a native Atlantan, is a writer and author. He can be reached at Regenstein@mindspring.com.

Back in Lincoln's day, the Republican-controlled Congress went on a protectionist frenzy for DECADES prior to the Civil War.

1. The Republican party had only existed for 6 years prior to the Civil War.

2. The Democrat Party controlled congress for 3 solid decades prior to 1860.

3. The Whig party died because of their continuing concession to the South over slavery, not because of a stance on protective tariffs. Before it's demise, the Whigs had just as much support in the South as they did in the North. In fact, the Southern Whigs were more likely to represent the wealthy Slave owning south than Democrats who were more of a populist party.

4. The South was far from unified on the issue of tariffs. Virginia and Louisiana, for instance, both supported high protective tariffs on tobacco and sugar respectively since both could be had cheaper in the Caribbean than in their states.

I wonder the same thing, but I think the anger had been building since the 1830's, and the South was just ready to try something different.

Anger at what? The Slave Power got just about every thing they wanted during those 30 years. They controlled both houses of congress. They controlled the White House for all but 4 years. They controlled the Supreme court with a majority of pro-slavery southerners for all of those years. They got all the legislation they asked for from the Missouri compromise through the Fugitive Slave Act, the Kansas Nebraska Act and the Dred Scott decision that overturned not only the Missouri compromise but also the Northwest Ordinance, and the only concession they made during that time was to agree to closing the Slave Pens and Auctions within the City of Washington (actually in the shadow of the Capital building itself.)

I agree there was anger, but it was not anger based on anything that the Federal Government or the Northern States had done to them. It was a manufactured anger at even being criticized for their "peculiar institution". It was not enough for them that most of the people of the North simply turned a blind-eye at slavery. What they were demanding was that all people agree with them that slavery was a positive good and for the people of the North to follow their lead and forbid criticism of slavery in any way.

Excuse me typo, the tariff frenzy was in the decades AFTER the Civil War. Even I'm not Superman and it's been a while since I debated this. It's great to warm up on it again though But really, from about 1861 on, they hit this country with massive tax and spend programs so unfair, that one half didn't want to be a party of the nation any more and seceded under the same auspices that formed the nation in the first place.

But my point still stands because the writing was on the wall well before the Civil War when secession was threatened by northern states over taxes and by at least one southern state over, if memory serves, what became known as the Tariff of Abomonations (whatever it's name I do know it was a tariff that was wisely repealed). Remember, before it had a name the GOP was WAS the Whigs, it didn't just appear out of nowhere. The individuals voting for ever-encroaching taxation, huge federal expenditures, and against free-trade were the founders of the Republican Party (READ: Whigs and Northern Democrats). The Republicans were simply Whigs who changed the name of their name to reflect republicanism, which in those days meant "virtue" over "commerce" (sound familiar? This is the Democrats of today's class warfare line).

The closest this country ever came to free trade was prior the rise of power of these individuals. Here's economist Frank Taussig in "The Tariff History of the United States (1931):

[by 1857] the level of duties on the whole linie of manufactured articles was brought down to the lowest point which had been reached in this country since 1815. It is not likely that we shall see, for a great many years to come, a nearer approach to the free-trade ideal.

This was a trend in Europe as well with the repeal of the Corn Laws and lowering of tariffs in France. However, Taussig goes on to explain how the Republican-controlled Congress reversed that trend then raised them for the next several decades:

In the next regular session, in December 1861, a still further INCREASE of duties was made. From that time until 1865 no session, indeed, hardly a month of any session, passed in which some increase on imports WAS NOT MADE.

So everything was ducky and prosperous up until the rise of the Republicans (pro-tax and spend Whigs and Northern Democrats) who wanted to fleece the South to pay for govt projects in the North.

This is so obvious!

Yeah, but Lincoln was the one who promised no "invasion" in his fist inaugural address and then sent battleships into the South, so in effect Lincoln kickstarted the shooting.

Here are the words of a brave senator we all need to remember even if history at large has forgotten him. Representative Clement L. Vallandigham of Ohio had this to say on the floor of the House of Representatives on July 10, 1861:

"[One of the] last and worst acts of a Congress...which it ought not to have done...was the passage of an obscure, ill-considered, ill-digested, and unstatesmanlike high protective tariff act, commonly known as the Morrill Tariff.

Juast about the same time, too, the Confederate Cognress...adopted our old tariff of 1857...fixing their rate of duties at five, fifteen, and twenty percent lower than ours. The result was...trade and commerce...begand to look to the South.

The city of New York, the great commercial emporium of the Union, and the North-west, the chief granary of the Union, began to clamor now, louidly, for a repeal of the pernicious and ruinous tariff. Threatened thus with the loss of both political power and wealth, or the repeal of the tariff, and, at last, of both, New England and Pennsylvania...demanded, now, coercion and civil war, with all its horros as the price of preserving either from destruction...The subjegation of the South, and the closing up of her ports-first, by force, in war, and afterward, by tariff laws, in peace, was deliberately resolved upon by the East."

These call-it-like-is (READ: this is a war of brother against brother over taxation) words from a first-rate class act NORTHERN senator caused Lincoln to have this gentleman arrested without warrant, imprisoned without being charged, and deported.

Let's remember Vallandigham as an American hero for a moment.

From that time until 1865 no session, indeed, hardly a month of any session, passed in which some increase on imports WAS NOT MADE.

Typical Lost Causer selective quoting. How about the rest of that paragraph, where he says:

We are concerned here only with the change in the tariff; yet it must be borne in mind that (p. 161) these changes were only a part of the great financial measures which the war called out. Indeed, it is impossible to understand the meaning of the changes which were made in the tariff without a knowledge of the other legislation that accompanied it, and more especially of the extended system of internal taxation which was adopted at the same time. To go through the various acts for levying internal taxes and imposing duties on imports is not necessary in order to make clear the character and bearing of the legislation of the war. It will be enough to describe those that are typical and important. The great acts of 1862 and 1864 are typical of the whole course of the war measures; and the latter is of particular importance, because it became the foundation of the existing tariff system.
It was not until 1862 that the country began to appreciate how great must be the efforts necessary to suppress the Rebellion, and that Congress set to work in earnest to provide the means for that purpose.

So, according to Taussig, the further increases in the tariff before 1865 were not some protectionist scheme, not some nefarious plan for building northern internal improvement on the backs of the south, but a measure to pay for an expensive war. And just how is it that increases to the tariff made during the war were somehow going to make the south pay? The south wasn't paying anything at the time.

And the decades after the war didn't see any drastic increase in tariffs. According to Taussig, what they saw instead was a slow decrease. Not fast enough to please Taussig, of course, but a decrease nonetheless. in 1876, for example, the tariff was reduced by 10% on average, and by as much as half on certain items (like salt). Other items were exempted from the tariff altogether.

Ahem: "In Congress, the party passed major legislation to promote rapid modernization, including a national banking system, high tariffs, an income tax, many excise taxes, paper money issued without backing ("greenbacks"), a huge national debt, homestead laws, and aid to education and agriculture."

From 1877-1890:

As the Northern post-bellum economy boomed with heavy and light industry, railroads, mines, and fast-growing cities, as well as prosperous agriculture, the Republicans took credit and promoted policies to keep the fast growth going. They supported big business generally, hard money (i.e. the gold standard), high tariffs, and high pensions for Union veterans. By 1890, however, the Republicans had agreed to the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and the Interstate Commerce Commission in response to complaints from owners of small businesses and farmers. The high McKinley Tariff of 1890 hurt the party and the Democrats swept to a landslide in the off-year elections, even defeating McKinley himself.

SOURCE - Wikipedia

They were the TAX AND SPEND PARTY FOLKS! The party didn't split over the issue until around Teddy Roosevelt!

Let's remember Vallandigham as an American hero for a moment.

I remember Vallandigham as a Copperhead defeatist traitor, whose call to make peace with the south helped Lincoln defeat McClellan (who named him as his intended Secretary of War) in the 1864 presidental election and got him trounced in his race for governor of Ohio in the same year (more proof that your alleged vociferous northern opposition to the war is another falsehood).

Hardly selective quoting and what you post from him just adds injury to insult (i.e. the South will pay for the war). Lincoln ran on the Morrill Tariff and the sent said if would secede if he got elected and it did. Additionally, my previous post more than drove the point home that the GOP was OVERWHELMINGLY the tax and spend party all the way up and into the 20th century. For God's sake, they lost Congress to the Democrats because of their stance on huge tariffs.

Just because they raised them througout the Civil War (to pay for their war no less) doesn't detract from the fact that they ran on raising them BEFORE the war and continued to so LONG AFTER THE WAR.

Let's remember Vallandigham as an American hero for a moment.

LOL. He was a man neither the North or South wanted. He ended up going to Canada. And he was about as much of a patriot as Cindy Shehan(sp?)is today.

Let me ask you this. Say tomorrow, Castro were able to cut off our sea lanes into GTMO and told the Marines there the to pack up and get the hell off Cuban soil. The base commander sends a message that they are running out of food and water.

You're the Commander in Chief. What do you do about it?

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