Slavery in Minnesota: A lesson you won't learn in the public schools

Fort Snelling, A Bastion of Slavery in Territorial Minnesota

Recently, I was taken to task by a reader of this blog who signed his name Billy Yank. It was in response to a post in which I stated that Minnesota did not make slavery illegal until 1858 - just three years before they raised an army to invade the Confederate States of America.

In his note, Billy Yank said "You do understand that Minnesota came into the Union in 1858 and that is why they did not 'abolish' slavery until then right?" The Yank went on to call my post a "gross ignorance and understanding of real history."

This response is typical of so many semi literate people who know only a smattering of history, yet have an arrogant, condescending attitude toward Confederate defenders , like myself, who are actually far more knowledgeable than they. Such Yankee apologists are to be pitied. They are simply regurgitating the politically correct half truths they have heard, having never fully investigated the facts for themselves.

Since Billy Yank didn't even bother to sign his real name, my first inclination was to ignore him. On second thought, let me enlighten Billy Yank just a wee bit. I'd like to take him with me to Historic Fort Snelling, an 1820's military outpost around which the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul have developed. When the fort was built it was a lonely station in the wilderness, on the far northwestern frontier of United States Territory. Not many people lived there then, but even among that small population there were a number of slaves.

Today, Fort Snelling is a Minnesota Historical Site. When I visited there, in the spring of 2008, the park interpreters boasted that the 1st Minnesota, which was mustered into service there, was the first state volunteer regiment formally tendered to the Federal government in response to Abraham Lincoln's call for 300,000 troops to crush the South in 1861. The modern folks at Fort Snelling imply strongly, and very erroneously, that the noble Minnesotans marched South to free the slaves. Actually, at the time Lincoln called them into service. he was still promising never to interfere with slavery - not even in the northern states where it was still being practiced. His goal was to "save the Union," and particularly to save the Union's primary source of revenue, which was excessive and unjust tariffs that targeted the South.

In Early History Events, The Publishing Society of Minnesota, 1908, it is noted, "In 1826 negro slavery was practically general throughout the United States. At Fort Snelling there were quite a number of slaves of both sexes. Major Taliaferro, had inherited several black bondmen and bondwomen and he hired them to the officers of the garrison."

The historical account goes into much more detail with the actual names of numerous slaves and slave holders at Fort Snelling. Slavery reached further into Minnesota than just the fort. A Dr. Wiliamson, who established his mission station at Kaposia, near St. Paul, had a negro slave, James Thompson by name, for the use of the mission. Another slave holder in Minnesota was Alexis Bailly, a prominent mixed blood trader. Alexis Bailly not only owned slaves but he also served in the territorial legislature. It looks like he would have known the law.

The best known Negro slave in Minnesota during this period was Dred Scott, key player in what has been called the most important Supreme Court case in the United States prior to the War Between the States. In the 1857 Dred Scott case. the high court ruled that slaves were property and therefore could be taken legally to any part of the United States. Dred Scott was originally brought to Fort Snelling in 1836 by his owner, Dr. John Emerson, an army surgeon. Scott later married at Fort Snelling to a slave named Harriet Robinson, owned by Major Taliaferro. According to the major, Scott "was united with my servant girl which I gave him."

Another very enlightening historical document is The Negro in Minnesota, 1800 - 1865, by Dr. Earl Spangler of the Manitoba Historical Society. Dr. Spanger confirms all of the above facts and gives many more. His scholarly work also documents the attitudes of early Minnesotans toward the handful of free blacks who lived within the territory. In one example he quotes an 1859 article from a southern Minnesota newspaper which states that there was not one Negro in its town and probably not in the whole county. The paper editorialized, "It is often remarked by visitors that we are peculiarly blessed in this respect." In 1861, as the Minnesota soldiers were marching South, another Minnesota paper reported an "ebony-skinned vagrant" in town, calling him a "black disgrace" who should be in jail. One week later the same paper commented that "Hell is paved with the skulls of such fiends in human shape."

So much for the myth of the noble, enlightened Northerner of the 1800s.

It is not the scope of this blog to give an exhaustive history of slavery in Minnesota and the Northwest Territories, but hopefully this short post will prompt Billy Yank to dig a little deeper into the historical record before showing his ignorance in the future.

-

My wife, Karen, with two Union reenactors at Fort Snelling, Minnesota

-

During our visit to Fort Snelling in May, 2008. Karen and I had a great time chatting with these two very friendly and hospitable Union reenactors.

The Confederate Blanket and the Chandelier

The Historic Grand Army of the Republic Hall in Litchfield, Minnesota, is the only one of its kind remaining in the state and one of only three in the United States. The Grand Army of the Republic was an organization of men who were veterans of the Union army who fought in the War Between the States, 1861-1865.

Today the old hall still stands much as it did well over a century ago. It is now used as a museum to preserve relics and records of America's tragic and unnecessary conflict, often misnamed the Civil War. Being a history buff, and a descendent of several Confederate veterans, I have long had a special interest in the War Between the States, so I enjoyed visiting this historic old hall and exploring many of the exhibits.

When the nice lady at the GAR Museum learned that I was of Confederate descent, she took me over to see their small case with a display of Confederate items. In it was obsolete Confederate currency, a saber which was like those used by both Union and Confederate soldiers, and a very interesting wool Confederate Blanket.

The blanket was brought back to Minnesota after the war by a Union Soldier, Sargent Marty, who was in the First Minnesota Volunteers. As Sargent Marty lay wounded on the battlefield at Gettysburg, an unknown Southern soldier came and covered the enemy soldier with his own blanket. Marty survived the War and brought the blanket back to Minnesota, where it was preserved for generations by his family, before being donated to the museum.

Another very interesting artifact in the Grand Army of the Republic Museum is the ornate chandelier which hangs over the old meeting hall.

There are two stories of the origin of the chandelier. One is that it was originally from a bordello in New Orleans, Louisiana. The other is that it was brought back to Minnesota from the South as a part of the "spoils of war." Perhaps both stories are true.

The War Between the States, was fought mostly on Southern soil by Northern aggressors. When Union soldiers captured a town or even a farm in the Confederate states it was very common for them to steal every item of value and destroy that which they could not carry away. Such plunder was clearly criminal according to the established rules of war, and a vile and evil act according to every standard of human decency. Yet the rape of the south was overlooked or even encouraged by Northern generals such as Sheridan, Sherman and Grant. Because the North won the war, such despicable actions were never punished.

Here is but one quote from a Union invader of Louisiana from the "Official Records: War of the Rebellion" published by the United States Government after their subjugation of the South: "No squad of men ... can live anywhere we have been. The people have neither seed, corn, nor bread, or mills to grind the corn if they had it, as I burned them wherever found.... I have taken from these people the mules with which they would raise a crop the coming year, and burned every surplus grain of corn...."

General William T. Sherman wrote from Vicksburg on January 31, 1864: "The Government of the United States has ... any and all rights which they choose to enforce in war - to take their lives, their homes, their lands, their everything ...."

The chandelier, which is a symbol of these heinious atrocities against innocent civilians, hangs in the GAR museum in Litchfield to their shame, and they don't even seem to realize it.

Story and photos by J. Stephen Conn