Sixteen Unknown Confederate Dead in Pikeville, Tennessee

In the remote, beautiful Sequatchie Valley of East Tennessee, about 50 miles north of Chattanooga, are the graves of sixteen unknown Confederate dead. The headstones, pictured here, can be found in the Pikeville City Cemetery, Bledsoe County. Since I live near Pikeville, I have had opportunity to ask several local people about these 16 Confederate soldiers. It is very rare to find a local person who even knows that the tombstones exist, and I have never yet found a person who seems to know much about them. It is so unfortunate that so many American people are oblivious to their their own history.

In the book "Bledsoe County, Tennessee: A History," written by Pikeville native Elizabeth Parham Robnett in 1993, I learned this about the monument:

"According to tradition, General Nathan Bedford Forrest and his troops were in Pikeville for a brief rest while passing through the valley. During their brief stay sixteen of his men die and were buried in the Pikeville City Cemetery. Their graves may been seen there today; marked, "16 Unknown Confederate Soldiers. The site of their camp was on the hill near the Lafayette Academy. Tradition also tells that General Forrest was a guest in the home of Judge Frazier, whose home was near the academy."

Similar grave markers can be found in obscure, old cemeteries throughout the South - sober reminders of a past which we forget at our own peril.

Photo by J. Stephen Conn

Give the Confederate Flag a Break

The Stars-and-Bars is a diversion in the nation's fight for racial harmony

By Jamie O'Neil
San Francisco Chronicle

One Sunday morning shortly after the Civil War ended, Robert E. Lee attended church in Richmond, Va. On that morning, a black man shocked the congregation by making his way to the communion rail where he knelt to take communion. In that time, in that place, this simply was not done. The congregation held back. The church took on the silence that descends at moments of extreme discomfort. No one else came forward to join the black man. The minister was clearly embarrassed, unable to decide how to proceed.

And then Robert E. Lee, defeated defender of those Southern states newly returned to the larger union, came forward and knelt beside the black man to participate in the key sacrament of his faith. Following Lee's example, other members of the congregation slowly began to make their way toward the communion rail to kneel together with a former slave and their former military commander.

Two rare acts of moral courage on a long-ago Sunday morning down in Dixie, one black, one white.

I was reminded of this story by a brief skirmish over the Confederate flag that arose at Thursday night's debate among the Democratic presidential candidates in South Carolina. It wasn't the first time. Back during the 2004 Democratic presidential primary when former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean said he wanted to reach out to American Southerners who drive pickup trucks with Confederate flag stickers on their bumpers. He caught hell for saying so. Al Sharpton, whose wit and passion are often admirable, said: "If I were to say that I wanted to be the candidate for guys with swastikas, I would be asked to leave the race." It was a disingenuous remark by a man who sometimes slips back into the rhetoric of automatic outrage.

Missouri Rep. Dick Gephardt chimed in, too, taking his own lick at the front-runner. "I will be," he said, "the candidate for guys with American flags in their pickup trucks." The Democratic Party, according to some, no longer has room for poor white trash, or for those who fly a flag Sharpton would equate with the swastika.

Sharpton and Jesse Jackson were once more in full moral dudgeon this month, fulminating about the impossibly overwrought Don Imus affair, a national upheaval of automatic outrage of the kind we seem programmed to experience about three times a year. I won't bother repeating the words Imus uttered that got him fired and got everyone else all fired up, but suffice it to say, those words -- as offensive as they were -- are surely no worse than stuff routinely flowing through the talk radio sewer, or being blasted from booming automobile speakers playing rap and hip-hop to thoughtless youth.

Imus got busted for trying to be hip. Hipness, especially for a man of Imus' vintage, often originated in the black community. For nearly a century now, the language that determines what's hip, slick and cool comes from the 'hood (case in point), and Imus was tapping into that, as he has done for years, trying to look cool by wrapping his thin lips around language that was, most demonstrably, not his own.

And yes, he also has been known to wink and nod at those in his audience he knew were racists because ignorance is part of the demographic of any drive-time blatherfest. But the hypocrisy attendant to his condemnation was the real story there, as people crowded onto the national stage to proclaim their moral superiority, flash their creds as defenders of tolerance, and throw around the B.S. we always seem to trot out when one of these episodes snatches the media's wandering attention -- all the "healing" and "dialogue" stuff that must spin through the cycle before we load up new dirty laundry for its little tumble.

And so it goes, in the words of recently departed Kurt Vonnegut, a wry commentator on human folly in all its guises whose leavening humor and wisdom will be sorely missed in a nation fairly bereft of both qualities. And nowhere is that wisdom and humor needed more than in our bogged-down-in-B.S. attitudes toward race, wherein we continue to countenance unequal schools and a vast disparity in opportunity while arguing about words and old flags.

Some of my forebears fought under the Confederate banner that is, once more, causing a tempest in a tea cup as Rudy Giuliani tries to figure out what he thinks about that symbol in the context of his bid to head up the Republican ticket in '08. As a nation, we have bigger fish to fry, but this one keeps flopping back into the boat, and so presidential wannabes all have to kill it and cook it up, and see if their recipe will be swallowed by the pundits and the electorate.

Although I had ancestors who fought under the Stars and Bars, I've yet to find one of them who owned slaves. I suppose I could take offense at people who would make my great-great-great uncles into the equivalent of the Nazis that my more modern uncles fought against in Normandy, but I'm inclined to let it go. It's just political grandstanding, and whichever way these political winds blow will have no bearing on the daily lives of Democratic voters, black or white.

The vast majority of soldiers who fought for the South owned no slaves, and most of them were fighting not for slavery, but for the principle of state's rights, an issue that is still the focus of much controversy. Between 60,000 and 90,000 black men, both free and slave, also served under the banner of the Stars and Bars.

One such soldier, a free black man from Louisiana wrote: "The free colored population love their home, their property, their own slaves and recognize no other country than Louisiana, and are ready to shed their blood for her defense. They have no sympathy for Abolitionism; no love for the North, but they have plenty for Louisiana. They will fight for her in 1861 as they fought in 1814-15."

And Nathan Bedford Forrest, Confederate hero and later founder of the Ku Klux Klan, had both slaves and black freemen serving in units under his command. Of them, he wrote: "These boys stayed with me ... and better Confederates did not live." Nazis, all, those boys.

By our standards, black Confederates were misguided, or scoundrels, or the victims of coercion, but there they are, historically, southerners and Americans, too, people of color, most of them poor, who fought beneath that much-hated banner.

And, it should be remembered that the Union flag, the Stars and Stripes, flew over the entire nation before 1861, and that flag, too, symbolized a slave-holding nation. That flag, plus a few stars, is the flag we still salute at ball games and at parades.

Other flags throughout the world are likewise sullied with histories of slavery. The first slaves in the Americas were offloaded from ships that flew the Union Jack, but slave ships also carried Dutch, Spanish, Portuguese, Danish and French banners. Slave trading was the basis of various Islamic economies before boundaries were drawn, states established and flags designed, but those countries, too, carry a heritage of slavery, and some, like Somalia and Sudan, still practice it. If flags symbolize all the acts done under them, perhaps all flags should come down because none is without stain.

People's sensitivities should be respected, of course, and I'm sure that there are many black people who are affronted by the sight of the Confederate flag. Nonetheless, a recent survey disclosed that most young black people associated the flag with "The Dukes of Hazzard," a cartoonish TV show many of them had grown up with. Such is our national ignorance of history that the flag does not carry much historical significance for young people of either color, most of whom cannot name the century in which the Civil War was fought.

Any country music concert you might attend will be festooned with that flag, either in the parking lot, or in the apparel of those attending, whether the group appearing is Alabama, Willie Nelson, Toby Keith or the Dixie Chicks. Does that mean that all those people are professing a belief in the rightness of slavery? Are they all racists?

I once saw a young white mother wearing a Stars and Bars blouse at such a concert, escorted there by the black father of their two scampering children. Which member of that couple was missing the point? Which parent was unclear on the concept?

Maybe neither. Maybe there has been a paradigm shift since the 1960s. Just check out Montel Williams, Maury Povich or "The Jerry Springer Show" if you want to see where the races are currently coming together most commonly. For those people, the flag doesn't symbolize slavery, but a heritage of defiance, a fierce regional pride, and a thumbing of the nose to those who persist in looking down at people like them with unearned superiority.

As it happens, my family lived in a trailer park way back in the piney woods of Florida during part of the time I was growing up. There were some, no doubt, who thought of us as poor white trash. But my parents were lifelong Democrats, hardworking blue collar people, and their adherence to the Democratic Party had everything to do with their knowledge that the interests of working people had always been better tended by Democrats than by Republicans.

There was a time when the Democratic Party didn't sneer at people like my parents. Because of that sneering, lots of people like them have left the party over the last 40 years, most voting against their own best interests rather than join forces with people who look down at them. Howard Dean was right when he sought to win them back.

Robert E. Lee fought in the interest of a bad cause, but he, too, was an American, as noble as any who has ever drawn breath, or knelt down to pray. The character of a man like Robert E. Lee would put to shame millions of faux patriots who have, since his time, wrapped themselves in the banner he fought against. A man like Robert E. Lee would put to shame a whole lot of self-righteous liberals and dim-witted rappers when it comes to defending human dignity.

Though the Confederate flag remains an easy target for politicians looking to take cheap shots, the heritage represented by that flag is far from simple. Though it retains negative power, there surely is not a soul left on the planet who waves that flag in support of slavery. Voters whose ancestors gave their lives under that banner should not be written off by the party that has, historically, best defended their interests.

But this discussion will all come around again, in three months or six months, when someone says something that invites us all to feel superior and allows us to engage once more in the ritual of empty rhetoric that is our continuing national dialogue on race.

***

Jaime O'Neill, a retired community college teacher who lives near Chico, is a frequent contributor to Insight.

See the original story here: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2007/04/29/INGTUPDSFR1.DTL

Black Southerners in Confederate Gray

Black Confederate Soliders - Library of Congress Photo

The Murfreesboro Post

By Shirley Farris Jones

Note: The writer gratefully acknowledges Zack Malpass, Murfreesboro SCV Camp 33, for so generously sharing his extensive research, and to Dr. George Smith, for providing both research and viewpoint.

February marks the beginning of Black History Month – a remembrance of important people and events of African American origin that began in 1926.

There have been many major contributions to our nation and to our society by black Americans some that have changed history – and are continuing to do so today. One area that has never received the recognition it deserved and has even been over-looked to a certain degree was that of black Southerners who fought for the Confederacy.

One would have to ask, “Why haven’t we heard more about them?”

Ed Bearss, National Park Service Historian Emeritus, made the following statement: “I don’t want to call it a conspiracy to ignore the role of Blacks, both above and below the Mason-Dixon line, but it was definitely a tendency that began around 1910.”

And, Historian Erwin L. Jordan, Jr., calls it a “cover-up” which started back in 1865. He writes, “During my research on pension applications, I came across instances where black men stated they were soldiers, but you can plainly see where ‘soldier’ is crossed out and ‘body servant’ or ‘teamster’ inserted.”

Another black historian, Roland Young says that “he is not surprised that blacks fought ... some, if not most, would support their country, and that by doing so they were demonstrating that it was possible to hate the system of slavery and love one’s country.”

This same principle was exhibited by African Americans who fought for the colonies during the American Revolution, despite the fact that the British offered them freedom if they would fight for them. Peter Jennings, an early settler of Rutherford County, was one of more than 5,000 black soldiers who fought for the colonies in the war for Independence. In 1830 Jennings was listed as having built a house on the corner of Vine and Church streets, which was also his bakery shop. There is a marker in the old City Cemetery commemorating his services in the Revolutionary War, but the exact place of his burial is not known.

It has been estimated that more than 65,000 Southern blacks served in some form or fashion in the Confederate ranks, and more than 13,000 of these “saw the elephant,” a term used to describe meeting the enemy in combat. These black Confederates included both slaves and free men. The Confederate Congress did not approve blacks to be officially enlisted as soldiers, except as musicians, until late in the war. But in the ranks it was a different story. Many Confederate officers, ignoring the mandates of politicians, enlisted blacks with the simple criteria, “Will you fight?” According to historian, Ervin Jordan, “biracial units were frequently organized by both local and state militia commanders in response to immediate threats by Union troops.”

As of February 1865, there were 1,150 black seamen who served in the Confederate Navy. One of these was among the last Confederates to surrender, aboard the CSS Shenandoah in England, six months after the war ended.

However, Dr. George Smith has done extensive research on this subject as well and based upon both Union and Confederate documents included in the Official War Records, it is his opinion that “Since it was illegal for Blacks, either free or slave, to carry and bear arms, it is extraordinarily hard to believe there were 65,000 Blacks serving in Confederate ranks, with over 13,000 seeing combat. Closer to 100,000 freemen and slaves were impressed under the numerous impressments acts. All the impressments acts clearly delineated slaves were to be used as teamsters, laborers, hospital orderlies, cooks, etc.”

As the war was nearing its final days, the Confederacy took progressive measures to build back its ranks with the creation of the Confederate Colored Troops, copied after the segregated northern colored troops, but this idea came too late for any measure of success. CSA Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne, at the height of his military career and recognizing the plight of the South’s dwindling supply of able-bodied men, made a bold proposal in late 1863 to “drill and arm as many as 300,000 black slaves.” Included in this proposal was the idea to not only free the blacks who volunteered, but their wives and children as well.

Cleburne was quite disappointed that his idea was not more readily embraced. However, in 1864, President Jefferson Davis, in an attempt to gain official recognition of the Confederacy by Britain and France, did approve a plan that proposed the emancipation of slaves. But what actually passed on March 13, 1865 was General Orders No. 14 which stated: “SEC. 2, that the General-in-Chief be authorized to organize the said slaves into companies, battalions, regiments, and brigades, under such rules and regulations as the Secretary of War may prescribe, and to be commanded by such officers as the President may appoint. ... that nothing in this act shall be construed to authorize a change in the relation which the said slaves shall bear toward their owners, except by consent of the owners and of the states in which they may reside, and in pursuance of the laws thereof.” This occurred just one month before the end of the war and by this point, there was no time, no munitions, no supplies, no uniforms, no nothing, for it to ever come to fruition. It is unclear whether the wages would go to the slaves or to the owners.

Contrary to what a lot of people believe, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which went into effect in January of 1863, stated that only those slaves held “within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States” would be freed and those slaves in states “not in rebellion” were not affected.

Free black men served the Confederacy as soldiers, teamsters, musicians, and cooks. They earned the same pay for their service as did white Confederate privates, which, in the Union Army, was not the case. They also earned the wrath of their fellow black men of the North. Ex-slave Frederick Douglas commented: “There are at the present moment, many colored men in the Confederate Army doing duty not only as cooks, servants and laborers, but as real soldiers, having muskets on their shoulders and bullets in their pockets, ready to shoot down ... and do all that soldiers may do to destroy the Federal Government.”

Horace Greeley, observing the differences between the two warring armies, commented: “For more than two years, Negroes have been extensively employed in belligerent operations by the Confederacy. They have been embodied and drilled as rebel soldiers and had paraded with white troops at a time when this would not have been tolerated in the armies of the Union.”

Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, who was a slave trader before the war, had both slaves and free men serving in units under his command. After the war, Forrest said of the black men who served under him, “These boys stayed with me ... and better Confederates did not live.” And, in an address given by Col. William Sanford, at the Confederate Veterans Reunion of the 7th Tennessee Cavalry Regiment of Cavalry, Forrest’s Corps, at Columbia on September 22, 1876, Col. Sanford said: “And to you, our colored friends ... we say welcome. We can never forget your faithfulness in the darkest hours of our lives. We tender to you our hearty respect and love, for you never faltered in your duty nor betrayed your trust.”

When Forrest made his raid on Murfreesboro on July 13, 1862, there is documentation regarding the participation of Black Confederates according to Col. Parkhurst’s report (Ninth Michigan Infantry) included in the Federal Official Records. He wrote: “The forces attacking my camp were the First Regiment Texas Rangers, Colonel Wharton, and a battalion of the First Georgia Rangers, Colonel Morrison, and a large number of citizens of Rutherford County, many of whom had recently taken the oath of allegiance to the United States Government. 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.”

Southern generals owned slaves but northern generals owned them as well. Gen. Ulysses Grant’s slaves had to wait for the Thirteenth Amendment for freedom. When asked why he didn’t free his slaves earlier, General Grant replied, “Good help is so hard to come by these days.” In February of 1865, Grant in fact ordered the capture of “all the Negro men ... before the enemy can put them in their ranks.” And Frederick Douglas warned President Lincoln that unless slaves were guaranteed freedom (those in Union controlled areas were still slaves) and land bounties, “They would take up arms for the rebels.”

There's more. For the full story go to: http://www.murfreesboropost.com/news.php?viewStory=9134