All they had to do, as could any Confederate POW, was to take the oath and walk out the door admittedly in Union service but not in battle again as a rule.

You’re speculating on the motives of those men, without offering anything as actual evidence of it. One doesn’t have to look at the PoW very closely to recognize that, North and South, they were a muddled mess. We’ve discussed elsewhere, for example, how several African Americans swept up with Confederate prisoners were stuck inside the walls of Camp Douglas in Chicago for months before the War Department figured out their status and cut them loose. We’ve also seen a case where a very light-skinned slave intentionally “passed” as white and falsely claimed to be a soldier:

in the army he was cook. He was in the siege of Fort Donelson. He was captured there, and went to Camp Douglass [sic.] as a Confederate prisoner. He answered roll call all the time as a white soldier. Being a bright [i.e., light-skinned] mulatto, he was brought to Vicksburg and exchanged with the others, and again went with his young master into service.

The Federal sergeant that called the roll was somewhat suspicious as to “Ham” (as he was called by the boys) being a slave, but he was told that living in Mississippi he was sunburned and that made him dark.

Hannibal was a very intelligent negro [sic.], and knew if he left his master he could go free, but he elected to stay with him among the white men he had been raised with, and preferred to suffer with them.

To be sure, this was written after Hannibal Alexander’s death, and reflects white veterans’ view of the man and his motives. We don’t know what Hannibal Alexander would have thought of this explanation. But even so, there’s nothing here that suggests any particular loyalty to the Confederacy, or to its cause or defense; it’s all framed as personal loyalty to his master and his comrades. Real Confederates chose to see the actions of men like Hannibal Alexander as those of a “faithful slave,” not those of a soldier willingly fighting to defend home and hearth.

Speculation about peoples’ motives, without specific evidence to suggest it, isn’t of a whole lot of use to historians. But just for grins, I’ll throw another one out that I’ve never seen considered by the advocates of black Confederate soldiers: they may well have seen imprisonment as the quickest route home. Well into 1864, prisoners on both sides had good reason to expect that their incarceration would be of relatively short duration, and within a few months they would be duly paroled and exchanged. That’s the way it generally worked for the first three years of the war. It’s entirely reasonable to believe that some men viewed remaining inside the pen as a difficult but temporary situation, one that would result in their being returned South in due course. Contrast that with the great unknown of being pushed out (literally) onto the streets of an unfamiliar Northern city, with no money, no friends, no contacts, barred from returning to the Confederacy for the duration, little prospect of being reunited with one’s family anything soon, and no clear future, and it should not surprise that some would choose to remain in a hard, but presumably temporary, situation.

Finally, you offer this quote:

Sir, you want me to desert, and I ain’t no deserter. Down South, deserters disgrace their families and I am never going to do that.”

I’ve seen that quote splashed all over BCS websites, but never sourced. Can you give me an original citation for that, please?

No one has yet to do a serious statistical study, including Harvard’s John Stauffer. Stauffer pulled his number out of thin air, which he pretty much admitted to me in person.

You ask a number of questions, but your failure to arrive at an answer does not necessarily lead to your preferred conclusion. That is why we do research.

Ironically, perhaps the first monument depicting a Negro soldier is the Confederate monument at Arlington erected in 1914.

That is not a black Confederate soldier depicted on this monument: http://deadconfederates.com/?s=1914+moses+ezekiel This is a perfect example of what happens when one makes a claim without doing any serious research.

Thanks for the kind words re: the blog.

Please understand that I’ve never once denied that no blacks served in the Confederate army. I’m not even so concerned with numbers, though I assume for the obvious reasons that the number is very small given the lack of evidence. The Koger book is supposed to be worth reading, though I have not yet had the time to go through it. Thanks for the comment.

“Black Slave Owners (Free Black Slave Masters in South Carolina, 1790-1860)” by Larry Koger is an interesting and well documented book which may improve someone’s understanding of what some people thought about the subject of slavery during that time period. Although I have no documented facts and figures to submit, I can assure you that a war as large and complex as the US Civil War will include people who fought for any reason including an African American fighting for the Confederacy. (I would expect them to be the exception rather than the rule.)

Marc

Please take the time to read Bruce Levine's _Confederate Emancipation_ (Oxford University Press). It's not long and is one of the few academic studies that addresses the role that blacks played in the Confederate Army, the debate itself that took place in the Confederacy, and the evolution of the myth of black Confederates. Until then this little thread is closed. You've been given every opportunity to provide new information on the subject. Thanks for your understanding.

“There are at the present moment, many colored men in the Confederate Army doing duty…as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders and bullets in their pockets….” Frederick Douglas, former slave & abolitionist (Fall, 1861)

One hundred thirty-three years after the War, an African-American Scholar observed: “When you eliminate the black Confederate soldier, you've eliminated the history of the South…we share a common heritage with white Southerners who recall that era.

Historians have long held that black Southerners, free or slave, did not serve the Confederacy as soldiers, but worked instead as teamsters, laborers, cooks and personal servants. If those black men took up weapons in battle, this official version of history goes, it was because of circumstances and self-defense, not because they believed in the Southern cause. But recent scholarly works–many by African-American academics–have alleged a historical understatement and even a cover-up of blacks' real participation.

Twelve Reasons We Don’t Believe in Black Confederates

Many people reject the evidence that thousands of the South's 3,880,000 blacks, both free men and slaves, labored and fought, willingly, for the Southern Confederacy.

Why do they not believe, given the many accounts in the Official Records, contemporary newspaper reports, photographs, pension application records, and recollections of black Southerners? Here are 11 explanations.

1. It may force us to change what we believe. Changing our beliefs is troublesome and effortful. Most of us have always believed that both the Confederate and Union armies were all white, just like they are shown in the 1994 film Gettysburg.

2. It is not what most others believe. The leading guideline for adult behavior in questionable moral areas, according to the classic work of psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg is “What would people think?” (i.e., “what are other people doing”). We base our behavior—and ideas—on what others are doing, so that we appear “normal.” Since few others believe in black Confederates, we will not either, in order to fit in with the majority.

3. It might contradict a prejudice. Are we ready to accept that a black man could be every bit as brave, and every bit as dedicated, as a white man in combat? Rejecting the claim that blacks fought is consistent with a prejudice against blacks. Perhaps those who reject out of hand the idea of black Confederates are expressing their own prejudice against blacks.

4. It complicates our simple stereotype of blacks vs. whites as separate groups. But in truth, are these groups more alike than different? Maybe seeing them as different groups allows us to perceive differences that are not really there? A more complex perception is of one larger group with many diverse individuals, not of two groups of similar individuals. The simpler perception that fits a black versus white stereotype is consistent with the view that there were no black Confederates.

5. How do we now teach Civil War history in 10 minutes? How do we summarize the reasons for the war in a few sentences, if in fact thousands of black Southerners fired in anger at the Northern troops coming “to free them”? At least one Northern soldier put his frustration at that incident into the Official Record of the War of the Rebellion: “Here I had come South and was fighting to free this man,” the disgusted U.S. major wrote in his diary; “If I had made one false move on my horse, he would have shot my head off” (Barrow et al., 2001, p. 43).

6. It complicates the simple portrayal of the North as Good, driving out the “Wicked Southern Slave master.” How can Northern soldiers serve in the role as Angels of Mercy, if black Confederates shot at them?

7. It weakens support for the claim that the War was About Slavery

8. Many whites disbelieve that there were black Confederates because of “White Guilt.” Many white Americans feel undeserving of their wealth. Certainly, many are undeserving. Some give a small part of their wealth to the poor, and this seems to make them feel better. Others hire the poor to work for them—and then bask in their role as benefactors. Massachusetts writer—and abolitionist– Henry Thoreau saw through this chimera 20 years before the War. He wrote concerning charity towards the poor at the end of the chapter “Economy,” in his masterpiece Walden. Regarding his wealthy friends who “helped” the poor, by paying them to work in their kitchens, Thoreau wrote: “Let them work in their own kitchens.”

One target for giving wealth has traditionally been black causes. A major recipient has been the NAACP, which endorses a movement to shift massive wealth to former slaves. Establishing that some of these slaves supported the Southern States, and that some blacks today, descendants of those slaves, still support the ideals of the Confederacy (and there were other ideals besides slavery), is inconsistent with the fundamental causes of White Guilt.

9. It is inconsistent with the culture of Victimhood. If blacks chose to fight for the South, how can blacks be passive, helpless, unwilling victims? One black liberal dismissed evidence that blacks fought for the Southern Confederacy by referencing the “abused wife syndrome”: An accusation that these poor helpless blacks were victims and unable to act with volition and control over their environment. But what do we say of the blacks captured by Yankees who escaped and returned to their units?— Or of the more than 40 blacks attending the 1890 UCV Reunion, pictured in another essay? One has to believe an “abused wife syndrome” that is powerful indeed, to explain the activities of these black Confederates.

10. It brings up the annoying question: Why did blacks fight? If the reasons blacks fought for the South include the same reasons whites fought for the South, or any of the same reasons that anyone fights for any cause in any war, then we have to look at those fighting black Confederates as deliberative, volitional, reasoning, diverse, individuals, just like the whites we talk about, when we talk about why whites fought for the South. This topic is dealt with as a separate essay.

11. It brings up another annoying question: Why did anyone fight for the North? No one really knows why men go to war to fight. Once they get there, they don't fight for their flag, or their country, or God. They fight for their comrades. Some of the issues involved in the discussion of why men fight are presented in another essay in this series, “Why Did Blacks Fight for the Confederate States of America.”

12. We Want to Believe the War Was About Slavery

Accepting that thousands of blacks fought for the Confederate States of America forces us to rethink the common assumption that the War was “about slavery.” Surely no one would dismiss slavery as an important factor. But to most modern Americans, slavery was the factor, perhaps the only factor. Again, to the extent that we believe that thousands of black Confederates fought for their country, our belief in slavery as the cause of the War is threatened. This need for cognitive balance is examined at length in another essay. To summarize that essay: We ask, “what balances the deaths of 600,000 Americans during the years 1861 to 1865?” We need some reason to balance that great tragedy. What is it?

Getting even for Fort Sumter? No. Settling States Rights issues? No– That answer never seems to explain why so many Americans died. Settling Tariff issues? No– Same shortcoming, plus, few modern Americans can stay awake during any discussion of tariff issues. How about, to Preserve our Great Experiment in Democracy! No– it is hard to sell this idea to modern Americans as the reason that more than half a million Americans died. The argument typically holds that had the Confederacy established itself, then there would have been more secessions, until ultimately we would have had a separate country, or two, in everyone’s back yard.

Finally, the End of slavery: Yes: Now there’s a reason we can celebrate: Slavery is bad; The South had slavery; therefore the South was bad and the Good North fought against the South, and slavery ended. Any child can grasp this argument; try explaining tariff issues to that person. Try explaining States Rights to that person—try explaining the issue of free trade and Northern versus Southern import and export economies—try explaining the diverging cultural bases of the North and the South. You will get a big yawn. Consider Ken Burns’s popular and acclaimed The Civil War—the most popular PBS series in history. To his great credit, Mr. Burns shows the appalling tragedy of 600,000 thousand dead Americans. And running throughout this 11 hour drama is the theme that ending slavery was the reason for these deaths. At one point a black woman historian makes that point explicit: The Union lifted the War to a higher plane, she explains. Clearly, Burns has accepted the idea that the War was “over slavery”—if only to give some sense to the TV audience who might wonder why America fought itself, and to do it in the TV schedule he had to work with.

Ultimately we believe the War was about the Ending of Slavery because that is the only cause that provides the cognitive balance we need.

The great evil of more than 600,000 deaths “balances” in our minds against the great evil of slavery.
“Ending Slavery” provides that cognitive balance for the War of 1861– Never mind that slavery ended everywhere else in the world without bloodshed. Never mind that other factors explain that the North and South became different countries long before 1860. Slavery provides that simple cognitive explanation.

Any evidence that blacks fought for the South is inconsistent with the notion that the War was only about slavery.

References

Adams, Charles. (2000). When in the Course of Human Events: Arguing the Case for Southern Secession. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.

Barrow, C. K., Segars, J. H., & R.B. Rosenburg, R.B. (Eds.) (2001). Black Confederates, Pelican Publishing Company, Gretna.