Wait! What? There were Black Confederate Soldiers?

Black History Quiz is a weekly celebration of the contributions and achievements of Africans and the descendants of the diaspora in the United States and around the world. PLEASE SHARE this newsletter and help spread the word about a proud people and their cultures.

This newsletter was originally posted on June 14, 2020. I posted it on Twitter on Valentine’s Day 2021. It has gone viral with people citing it as misinformation and/or cited from biased sources. The crux of the disapproval seems to be that it goes against modern PC Culture. Some have asked me privately to take it down. I will not.

I will leave the information up in hopes that readers will further research the topic themselves. If they do, they will find historians debate this issue ad nauseum. Some say there were an insignificant number of black confederate soldiers whereas others say there were much more. Both sides agree that there were black confederate soldiers, although most were servants. I invite any and all to check out this lecture from Earl Ijames, curator at the NC Museum of History. I think it gives more fodder for the debate that will likely continue long into the future.

I now return you to the newsletter already in progress.

[A] “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)

[B] Easily tens of thousands of blacks served the Confederacy as laborers, teamsters, cooks and even as soldiers. Some estimates indicate 25% of free blacks and 15% of slaves actively supported the South during the war.

[C] Blacks served the South because it was their home, and because they hoped for the reward of patriotism.

[D] Famed bridge engineer and former slave Horace King received naval contracts for building Confederate warships.

[E] A black servant named Sam Ashe killed the first Union officer during the war, abolitionist Major Theodore Winthrop.

[F] John W. Buckner, a black private, was wounded at Ft. Wagner repulsing the U.S. (Colored) 54th Massachusetts Regiment.

[G] George Wallace, a servant who surrendered with General Lee at Appomattox, later served in the Georgia Senate.

[H] Captured black cook Dick Poplar suffered cruelty by Yankee Negro guards at Pt. Lookout, MD for being a “Jeff Davis man.”

All the above statements are true! The photos (above the sponsors links) are from “19th Century Photographs of United Confederate Veterans Reunions with Black Confederates” where more pictures of Black Confederate Soldiers are available. (Wow!)