The South at War

By seceding, Southerners brought on themselves a firestorm of unimaginable fury. Monstrous losses on the battlefield nearly bled the Confederacy to death. Southerners on the home front also suffered, even at the hands of their own government. Efforts by the Davis administration in Richmond to centralize power in order to fight the war convinced some men and women that the Confederacy had betrayed them. They charged Richmond with tyranny when it impressed goods and slaves and drafted men into the army. War also meant severe economic deprivation. Shortages and inflation hurt everyone, some more than others. By 1863, unequal suffering meant that planters and yeomen who had stood together began to drift apart. Most disturbing of all, slaves became open participants in the destruction of slavery and the Confederacy.

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VISUAL ACTIVITY John Wallace Comer, C.S.A., with his servant, Burrell Many slaveholders took personal servants with them to war. These slaves cooked, washed, and cleaned for their owners. Owners sometimes dressed their servants in uniforms, as Comer did, which led some observers to conclude erroneously that slaves were members of the Confederate millitary. Alabama Department of Archives and History, Montgomery, Alabama. READING THE IMAGE: How would you describe the expressions on the men’s faces? Similar? Different? CONNECTIONS: What are the possible ramifications of slaveholders bringing “body servants” to war? How were nonslaveholding soldiers, who did their own chores, likely to have responded?