Researching participation of a paternal Haradon clan, in the Civil War Battle of Stones River, I unearthed a first-hand account of hospitalization and burial. The Union Army of the Cumberland and Army of Tennessee, C.S.A., had suffered nearly 25,000 casualties in a clash which heralded the new year of 1863. About 1700 Union & 1300 Confederate soldiers had died in several days of fighting, just west of Murfreesboro, Tennessee.
By an Act of March 1862, the U.S. Congress prohibited Union officers from returning "fugitives" from Confederate service, or returning those who escaped from persons to whom "labor is claimed to be due." The term contraband referenced the first case: that of captured enemy property.
'Contrabands,' 'fugitives,' or self-emancipated; they were used by the U.S. Army in very much the same way Yankee armed services employed forced, slave labor. Many are the incidences where commanders sought to shun responsibility, ejecting refugees incapable of this drudgery from finding haven among their troops. Responses to emancipation among the 100th Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry - in which the Haradons served - ranged from disgruntlement to outright threats to abrogate three-year commitments.
While many social signals were given during recruiting ... when war-boosters back in Illinois telegraphed their belief that this fight was to eliminate slavery ... the primary motivating factor, for many who did enlist in the 100th Illinois, was to preserve union formed of revolutionary resistance to colonial exploitation. Not all had signed on to free slaves. Many Yankees were certainly uncomfortable in a new social order. Not a few were discomforted to find themselves in proximity to free Negroes.
Even though partial emancipation has been fully proclaimed, Patterson is curious as to the lived condition of slaves. He does not inject 'former' when discussing a woman's master.* It's interesting that he thinks readers will find it notable that a runaway slave he interviews "has a decided preference to be free." As if that aspiration is challenging to consider. "They all testify to this," says Patterson, of his informer's contention: "We never had such easy times." Dislocated, freed slaves "fare better now than when the seccesh army was here." Patterson is quartered in a barn; food and even firewood are scarce, even for those with cash.
The correspondent, reporting to the Sandusky, Ohio Daily Commercial Register on 22 January (excerpted in the image, below), is particularly curious about relationships. Some masters "treated their slaves as well as their children," relates Patterson. His interviewee was reluctant to marry when enslaved, however: the man, now a father, avers it would have been far too challenging to invest emotionally, and then "stand by," as a loved one was humiliated and physically abused.
Patterson's unnamed source seems willing to correct misconceptions. The Ohio soldier asserts Confederate military policy, summary execution for Negroes in Union service, "will turn the colored people against them."
"No, it won't," contends his counterpart. "[We are] against them now," says he ... of those who advocate such policy.
"Do you belong to the man of this house?" asks Patterson. In the current tense, as if emancipation has not occurred.
One glimpses a sense of humor as the freedman explains he never has. In his accounting, he asserts his master (likely former Tennessee Bank President, Granville Physic Smith) entered service as Colonel in a Confederate Army. "He run away from me," the subject explains.
The day following, on 1 February, reporting by the Daily Ohio Statesman in Columbus questioned the Proclamation's effect. "It is now just one month since the President's second and great Proclamation of Freedom, as the Abolitionists call it, was issued. By this time, according to radical prophecies uttered before the issuing of the proclamation, the backbone and sinews of the rebellion, which the radicals assure us are the slaves, should have been so broken and weakened that the Confeds would be about giving up the contest in utter despair.” Partisan, Democratic editors employed the term 'black bondman' when referencing an anticipated spike in recruiting: Lincoln's Proclamation “has called neither white not black soldiers into the field; it has not promoted slave insurrections, or excited a single black bondman to strike for freedom.”
“Abolitionists and their followers hang back from the service as much as before, and are trying to force the negroes to do all the fighting for them,” contend 'Copperheads' who are willing that the Union be restored, even if slavery remains intact. "Well, arm the negroes, as many as you can get, and do it quickly, and see what will come of it.” Editors no doubt hope readers will shudder at the thought of Blacks, so recently scarred by whips, finding rank while bearing lethal weapons.
*It's unclear, in the Sandusky reporting, which words are Patterson's and which result from editors. The interviewee, "almost a full-blooded negro," is to have used the term "they" when speaking of colored people. We might conclude the subject would have identified with this group ... and that an author or editor's voice has imposed itself on whatever the informer sought to convey.
Thanks Roger, you have to consider when that article was written in 1863 the Civil War was only two years in. Before it was over in 1865, hundreds of thousands of 'negro slaves' had escaped the plantations and found freedom within Union lines. There are so many people who claim blacks were complacent with their lot and remained on the plantations that I just want to clarify that though some may have returned or stayed many like him ran off. There were so many that even in 1861 very early in the war, the President was already making plans to send them to Haiti.
ReplyDeleteHe writes, "He didn't (columnist) like the idea of the seccesh (corruption of the word secessionist) shooting negroes found in our service. "I think it's bad policy," I (columnist) said. "It will turn the colored people against them." "No it won't," said He (unnamed former slave) "They're against them now." This statement certainly doesn't bespeak of people who were satisfied with their lot.
Also, I struggled with the terminology so it took awhile and I had to look it up for more clarity. Copperheads I understand now, are people who openly opposed the War, possibly some abolitionist. This was a good subject for the 4th of July since so many blacks were still slaves July 4, 1776
Thanks for weighing in, Victori. I've not published it, but I've done a lot of research on the wartime service of Jeremiah Turner (1840-1917). He, in the summer of '64, ran from Kentucky slavery to serve in Company H of the 12th Regiment, Colored Heavy Artillery, United States Colored Troops. I found it interesting that Turner was required to report to his enlistment officers the name of his owner [Squire Turner (1793-1871)]. It’s as if the Union Army had a contingency plan, should it decide to return him following service.
ReplyDeleteThe 12th Heavy Artillery, USCT, was engaged in building barracks and a hospital. It must have been disturbing that Union commanders would periodically run self-emancipated souls, who were women or infirm, away from those facilities. They likely had nowhere else to go; some of them were no doubt family members of soldiers in the USCT.
Family history researchers may falsely equate service in the Union Army with perceptions of inter-racial equality held by their ancestors. I doubt this to be widely true: Northern racism remained unchecked long after Lincoln’s second order of emancipation. (New Jersey was the last state to abolish slavery completely.)
Jeremiah’s legacy of slavery was institutionally reinforced even after the conflict. His post-war, 1866 loan application, to the Freedman’s Bank, listed Squire Turner in the space provided for ‘Master or Mistress.’
One thing I found interesting was that a Squire Turner grandson had long-term affinity for Jeremiah. The men were closely matched in age. In 1910, Charles Squire Turner (1842-1929) provided an affidavit to assist Jeremiah in obtaining a pension for wounds received in the war. “I have known Jerry all my life,” it reads. While Squire Turner was ardently pro-slavery, based on property rights laws he helped through the Kentucky legislature, his grandson referenced ‘Jerry’ in the familiar, and not entirely as property: “… he was bought by my grandfather and remained in our family until the civil war.”
The fact that “My grandfather always said that Jerry was two years older than myself,” gives me pause. The elder Turner owned 27 slaves by 1860: it seems unlikely that he’d know the specific birth date (1 September 1840) for all of them. Six Turner slaves of 1860 were enumerated as ‘mulatto’ … and two males are appropriate for Jeremiah’s age bracket. Charles used the term 'family' three times in the affidavit. These may be Master Squire Turner’s biological children. Despite Charles’ contention of purchase at a young age, he may have understood Jeremiah to be a half-brother, and – valuing kinship – was predisposed to see that Jeremiah received his assistance in filing for a pension.
Bravo Cousin. Love You...Ardis
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