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To: central_va
The preceding was BS. There were ZERO zip nada ziltch slave revolts during the Civil War. Seems odd doesn't it?

Depends on how you want to define 'slave revolt'. If we're talking about a Nat Turner, "Let's slaughter all the white folks" rebellion then no, there were none. But there weren't many in the decades prior to the rebellion either. Such uprisings didn't accomplish much and were pretty hard on the slave bystanders as well. But if you're talking about slaves rebelling by voting with their feet then there were hundreds of thousands of 'slave revolts' during the war. If you're talking about slaves becoming fractious then there are also plenty of accounts about slaves becoming "unruly" or "unwilling to accept 'corrections'" (a polite term for whippings) that affected even Jeff Davis and his brother. So slaves appear to have adopted a more non-violent approach to their resistence during the war.

452 posted on 07/10/2013 8:31:28 AM PDT by 0.E.O
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To: 0.E.O

Jeff Davis and other southerners considered the Emancipation Proclamation the most evil deed ever committed because they assumed it would initiate a “servile insurrection” of the Haiti variety.

Yet the slaves chose to do no such thing. Since 90% of the South’s military power was previously engaged, there is very little that could have stopped them had they chosen to massacre white people, at least in the major plantation areas.

But they chose not to, and I think they don’t get nearly enough credit for that choice.


453 posted on 07/10/2013 8:36:13 AM PDT by Sherman Logan
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To: 0.E.O; central_va
Here's a quote from a book, "Confederate Reckoning: Power and Politics in the Civil War South" about what happened on the Jefferson Davis plantation when his brother left:
…the Davis slaves made their move, responding not to the immediate presence of the Union army (which was not yet near), but to the signal that (the departure of) Joseph Davis had sent about the shifting balance of power. No sooner had Joseph pushed off from the dock than the remaining slaves seized control of the two plantations, sacking the Hurricane plantation, destroying the cotton, carrying off every article of value, and refusing to work. They would retain control of the plantation, indeed would refuse to be forced off even later by federal troops, seizing a rough and ready freedom while still on their home plantation.

By the end of May 1862, Jefferson and Varina Davis received a series of lurid accounts of events on Brierfield plantation. “Negroes at Brierfield…said to be in a state of insubordination,” one telegraph read. Charles Mitchell, a nephew-in-law, was even more blunt, offering Davis an account of his slaves' refusal to work or submit to overseers who were still resident on the plantation, or to any attempt to carry them inland.

The issue became another nightmare for the confederate government, as the planter aristocracy insisted that the army be used to keep control of their unruly slaves. Jefferson Davis' brother used his clout to get the confederates to launch a raid on the Hurricane Plantation. After casualties on both sides, the confederates withdrew, the lieutenant in command reporting that nearly all of the former slaves had "newspapers and guns."

454 posted on 07/10/2013 9:03:24 AM PDT by Bubba Ho-Tep ("More weight!"--Giles Corey)
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