- The Patriotist is pleased to be able to offer this
little fact sheet on Black men who served proudly in the armed forces of
the Confederate States of America. While most of the media chooses to
ignore the deeds and accomplishments of minorities when those deeds and
accomplishments don't fit the stereotypical mold, we gladly fill in the
gap by giving this issue its due. Thanks to http://www.patriotist.com/
Col. Michael Kelly of the 37th Texas Cavalry for providing the bulk of
the information presented here. More facts will be added to this page as
they become available. --LG
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- "The Forgotten Black Confederate Soldier"
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- What we have been taught and come to believe has been
edited, expurgated, abridged, censored and just plain rewritten for more
than 140 years.
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- The words of Irish-born Confederate Major General
Patrick Cleburne from his January, 1864, letter which proposed the mass
emancipation and enlistment of Black Southerners into the Confederate
Army express profoundly accurate prophecy:
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- Every man should endeavor to understand the meaning of
subjugation before it is too late...It means the history of this heroic
struggle will be written by the enemy; that our youth will be trained by
Northern schoolteachers; will learn from Northern school books their
version of the war; will be impressed by the influences of history and
education to regard our gallant dead as traitors, and our maimed
veterans as fit objects for derision...The conqueror's policy is to
divide the conquered into factions and stir up animosity among them...
....It is said slavery is all we are fighting for, and if we give it up
we give up all. Even if this were true, which we deny, slavery is not
all our enemies are fighting for. It is merely the pretense to establish
sectional superiority and a more centralized form of government, and to
deprive us of our rights and liberties.
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- In 2000 the $37 Million movie Ride With the Devil was
suppressed in distribution and offered in only 200 theaters for a
limited three-day engagement despite the fact that it was directed by
Oscar-winning director Ang Lee and had received many excellent reviews.
It was suppressed by its distributor, USA Films, because it factually
portrayed a Black Confederate guerrilla fighting with Confederate
Bushwhackers in the Kansas-Missouri operations. The video release of the
movie was delayed for two months to allow removal of the image of the
Black Confederate from the cover art. The character was based faithfully
on Free Black John Noland who rode with Quantrill as a scout and
spy.
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- Black Southerners fought alongside white, Hispanic,
Indian, Jewish and thousands of foreign-born Southerners. They fought as
documented by Union sources:
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- Frederick Douglass, Douglass' Monthly, IV [Sept.
1861,] pp 516 - "there are at the present moment many colored men in the
Confederate Army - as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders,
and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down loyal troops, and do
all that soldiers may do to destroy the Federal government...There were
such soldiers at Manassas and they are probably there still." "Negroes
in the Confederate Army," Journal of Negro History, Charles Wesle, Vol.
4, #3, [1919,] 244-245 - "Seventy free blacks enlisted in the
Confederate Army in Lynchburg, Virginia. Sixteen companies of free men
of color marched through Augusta, Georgia on their way to fight in
Virginia." "The part of Adams' Brigade that the 42nd Indiana was facing
were the 'Louisiana Tigers.' This name was given to Colonel Gibson's
13th Louisiana Infantry, which included five companies of 'Avegno
Zouaves' who still were wearing their once dashing traditional blue
jackets, red caps and red baggy trousers. These five Zouaves companies
were made up of Irish, Dutch, Negroes, Spaniards, Mexicans, and
Italians." - Noe, Kenneth W., Perryville: This Grand Havoc of Battle.
The University of Kentucky Press, Lexington, KY, 2001. [page 270] From
James G. Bates' letter to his father reprinted in the 1 May 1863
"Winchester [Indiana] Journal" [the 13th IVI ["Hoosier Regiment"] was
involved in operations around the Suffolk, Virginia area in April-May
1863 ] - "I can assure you [Father,] of a certainty, that the rebels
have negro soldiers in their army. One of their best sharp shooters, and
the boldest of them all here is a negro. He dug himself a rifle pit last
night [16 April 1863] just across the river and has been annoying our
pickets opposite him very much to-day. You can see him plain enough with
the naked eye, occasionally, to make sure that he is a "wooly-head," and
with a spy-glass there is no mistaking him." The 85th Indiana Volunteer
Infantry reported to the Indianapolis Daily Evening Gazette that on 5
March 1863: "During the fight the [artillery] battery in charge of the
85th Indiana [Volunteer Infantry] was attacked by [*in italics*] two
rebel negro regiments. [*end italics*]." After the action at Missionary
Ridge, Commissary Sergeant William F. Ruby forwarded a casualty list
written in camp at Ringgold, Georgia about 29 November 1863, to William
S. Lingle for publication. Ruby's letter was partially reprinted in the
Lafayette Daily Courier for 8 December 1863: "Ruby says among the rebel
dead on the [Missionary] Ridge he saw a number of negroes in the
Confederate uniform." Federal Official Records, Series I, Vol XVI Part
I, pg. 805: "There were also quite a number of negroes attached to the
Texas and Georgia troops, who were armed and equipped, and took part in
the several engagements with my forces during the day." Federal Official
Records Series 1, Volume 15, Part 1, Pages 137-138: "Pickets were thrown
out that night, and Captain Hennessy, Company E, of the Ninth
Connecticut, having been sent out with his company, captured a colored
rebel scout, well mounted, who had been sent out to watch our
movements." Federal Official Records, Series I, Vol. XLIX, Part II, pg.
253 - April 6, 1865: "The rebels [Forrest] are recruiting negro troops
at Enterprise, Miss., and the negroes are all enrolled in the State."
Federal Official Records, Series I, Vol. XIV, pg. 24, second paragraph -
"It is also difficult to state the force of the enemy, but it could not
have been less than from 600 to 800. There were six companies of mounted
riflemen, besides infantry, among which were a considerable number of
colored men." - referring to Confederate forces opposing him at
Pocotaligo, SC., Colonel B. C. Christ, 50th Pennsylvania Volunteer
Infantry, official report of May 30, 1862 "Sargt said war is close to
being over. saw several negros fighting for those rebels." - From the
diary of James Miles, 185th N.Y.V.I., entry dated January 8, 1865 Black
Southerners also demonstrated loyalties based not on ownership,
subservience or fear. The Confederate Burial Mound for Camp Morton,
Indiana, at Indianapolis, Indiana, has bronze tablets which list the
nearly 1200 Confederates who died at that camp. Among those names are 26
Black Southerners, seven Hispanic Southerners and six Indiaan
Southerners. At a time when those Black Southerners could have walked
into the Camp Commander's office, taken a short oath and signed their
name to walk out the gates free men obliged to no one they chose instead
to stay even unto death. Your understanding of that choice is likely
nonexistent.
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- Union soldiers robbed, raped and murdered Free Black
and slave Southerners they had come to "emancipate." Union "recruiters"
hunted, kidnapped and tortured Black Southerners to compel them to serve
in the Union Army. At the Battle of the Crater white Union soldiers
bayoneted retreating Black Union soldiers and the 54th Massachusetts was
intentionally fired upon by Union Maine troops while assaulting Battery
Wagner. The Federal Official Records and memoirs of the USCT document
all of these war crimes.
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- Since the Civil War the United States flag has flown
over a country that has continued attempted genocide against its Native
Peoples with the able help of Black "Buffalo Soldiers," condoned the
slavery of Orientals in California well into the 1880s, fought wars to
maintain dominance over countries whose people were not white, and
imprisoned its own citizens because of the color of their skin as they
did with the Japanese-Americans in California from 1941-1945.
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- It is time that the misrepresentation which has come
to be accepted as "history" is restored to its full measure and the
positive and negative aspects of all parties exposed for the
consideration of all Americans.
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- Use and Enjoy these relevant quotes from
history:
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- "I came here as a friend...let us stand together.
Although we differ in color, we should not differ in sentiment." - LT
Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, CSA, Memphis, Tennessee - July, 1875
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- "There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age,
who will not acknowledge that slavery as an institution is a moral and
political evil. It is idle to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it
is a greater evil to the white than to the colored race." - Col. Robert
E. Lee, USA - December 27, 1856
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- " ...As usual with the enemy, they posted their negro
regiments on their left and in front, where they were slain by hundreds,
and upon retiring left their dead and wounded negroes uncared for,
carrying off only the whites, which accounts for the fact that upon the
first part of the battle-field nearly all the dead found were negroes."
- Federal Official Records, Vol. XXV, Chapter XLVII, pg. 341 - report of
the Confederate Commander, Savannah, April 27, 1864 - Battle of Ocean
Pond [Olustee] - 54th Mass. present
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- [Reporting on the assault on Battery Wagner] "Sergeant
George E. Stephens of Company B described the scene to Captain Emilio:
'Just at the very hottest moment of the struggle, a battalion or
regiment charged up to the moat, halted, and did not attempt to join us,
but from their position commenced to fire upon us. I was one of the men
who shouted from where I stood, 'Don't fire on us. We are the
Fifty-fourth.' I have heard it was a Maine Regiment .'" - "A Brave Black
Regiment: History of the Fifty-Fourth Regiment of Massachusetts
Volunteer Infantry," Luis F. Emilio, Boston: Boston Book Company, 1894;
Reprint, Salem: Ayer Company Publishers, Inc., 1990., 93
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- [Regarding the Battle of the Crater] "George L.
Kilmer, an officer of the Fourteenth New York Heavy Artillery, went into
the crater with the first wave and reported afterward that when the USCT
moved forward to charge the fort, some of white soldiers refused to
follow them. Pandemonium broke out when the black soldiers could not
continue the assault and started to retreat and come back into the
crater. 'Some colored men came into the crater and there they found a
fate worse than death in the charge . . . It has been positively
asserted, that white men [Union] bayoneted blacks who fell back into the
crater.'" - "The Sable Arm." Dudley T. Cornish, New York: Longman, Green
& Co., 1956, p 274
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- The 37th Texas Cavalry
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- We invite you to visit with the 37th Texas Cavalry
[Terrell's,] Confederate States Army, the primary focal point on the Web
for valid research and documentation of the Forgotten
Confederates.
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- We have the largest, most visited Civil War reenactor
web site. With 118 Web Awards to date it is the most honored Civil War
site of any kind. While we stand firmly for history and against those
who misrepresent the South and its history, we are not affiliated with
any heritage or descendant groups.
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- Our ranks include Caucasian, African American,
Hispanic, Native American, Jewish, biracial, and female troopers. We
have Co. C [Dismounted,] in Los Angeles, California, under command of
Captain Edward Aguilar; Co. D [Dismounted,] British Guard, in Hampshire,
England; Co. E [Dismounted,] in Athens, Greece; Co. F [Mounted] in
Tasmania, Australia; Co. G [Dismounted] is forming in North Queensland,
Australia; Co. H is slated to form in Croatia; Co. I is forming in South
Carolina; Co. K is forming in Northern California under the command of
Capt. Mike Rodriguez; and Co. L is forming in Houston, Texas.
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- Through painstaking research and thorough, uncommented
documentation we celebrate the courage, sacrifice, and heritage of ALL
Southerners who had to make agonizing personal choices under impossible
circumstances.
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- colonel@37thtexas.orgColonel
- Michael Kelley, CSA
- Commanding, 37th Texas Cavalry [Terrell's]
- http://www.37thtexas.org
- http://thewargallery.com
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- "We are a band of brothers!"
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- http://www.patriotist.com/black-soldier.htm
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