Update: Bruce Levine emailed the following to me: “Of course — as would (should?) be clear to anyone who hears or reads the text of my short talk — my point was that facts like the ones I cited are today misconstrued as proof for the preposterous claim that the Confederate army included thousands of [...]
black Confederates
It looks like an elite unit of black Confederate soldiers was indeed trained during the war. Enjoy. In all seriousness, if you want to follow a very interesting line of inquiry that may result in a legitimate black Confederate soldier I urge you to check out this discussion thread. Kate Holleron is researching her great-great [...]
As many of you know I am in the beginning stages of a book-length project on the subject of black Confederates. While much of my blogging has centered on countering the nonsense coming out of certain camps concerning numbers and vague references to “loyalty” and “reconciliation” my real interest in this subject is firmly grounded [...]
Those of you who are sincerely interested in the subject of how the Confederacy utilized its large black population during the war should begin with this presentation by Professor Bruce Levine from the recent Virginia Sesquicentennial Conference at Norfolk State University. The approach of throwing out random accounts without any analysis/interpretation gets us nowhere. We [...]
Why is it that the best evidence for the existence of black Confederate soldiers is typically pulled from Union accounts? Why is the evidence from Confederate soldiers so sketchy on this topic? As I’ve said before, I’ve read literally hundreds of accounts by Confederate soldiers during the summer of 1864 and in the wake of [...]
Update: My request has been passed on to Dr. Robertson by the Virginia Sesquicentennial Commission. Update #2: Thanks to Tom Perry for providing the following link, which includes an interview with Robertson in a Virginia newspaper: The claim is rejected by most historians, including local history expert James Robertson. “It’s blatantly false.” Robertson is a [...]
There is something deeply disturbing about opinion pieces such as this one by Walter Williams. You would think that someone with a scholarly bent would take one step back and ask whether he is really making a contribution to this debate. He criticizes those who have pointed out the mistakes in the 4th grade history [...]
[Hat-tip to Brooks Simpson] This morning I reported that Hampton historian, Veronica Davis, filed a lawsuit against the publisher of the 4th grade history textbook with the black Confederate reference to prevent them from editing the questionable passages. At first, I thought that this was a reasonable request calling on all parties not to jump [...]
