As far as the Brits were concerned they were more than willing to trade arms for cotton throughout the entire course of the war. As for racism the CSA had several infantry regiments composed of volunteer black soldiers, and many Cherokee Indians served in the southern army as well. My great great grandfather was in the 10th Alabama, Army of Northern Virginia, was 100% Cherokee, and served shoulder to shoulder with the white Confederate soldiers, he left no impression of any racism exhibited towards him by any of his fellow comrades in arms. After being captured at Gettysburg, he was sent to Delaware Prison, and held there for several months untill he galvanized and was attached to the 1st Conneticut Cavalry where he endured much racial bias that was so bad that after about a year in the Union Army he finally deserted with a horse and full accourterments and finished the war fighting for the South. When Sherman marched from Atlanta to Savannah in the winter of 64, his army cut a swath of destruction through Georgia 60 miles wide, burning every structure, destroying all foodstocks, killing all farm animals, many Southern women were brutally raped, tortured, and murdered by his undisciplined troops. The South didn't really begin to recover economically from the War Between the States untill the 1920's, and then it suffered the worst of the Great Depression with modern estimates that run into the millions that died of needless sickness and starvation during that era. The 30th Infantry Division was used by the Brits in WWI to break through the Hindenburg Line in Flanders and it was formed with men all from Tennessee. Patton used the 80th Infantry Div. as the tip of his spearpoint drive into the heart of Nazi Germany in WWII, and that division was composed of all Southern boys drafted from Appalachia. The majority of our modern Special Forces troops are from the South, and I won't even mention college football, but we definately make better than average soldiers and atheletes, and our Southern women are famed worldwide for their beauty. So, yeah, there is a huge divide between a true Southerner and people from other regions of the country who perceive us as clinging to our traditions and past heritage. I'm Southern, and all my male ancestors served in the CSA, some paying the ultimate price for what they believed in. It took overwhelming odds in manpower and industrial production to drive us down, but we remain a damned proud people, because man on man we flat out kicked ass! HOORAH FOR DIXIE!!! Now, put that in your carpetbagging pipe and smoke it.:beatdeadhorse5:
I recently read 'Three Months in the Southern States' by Colonel James Fremantle, a British army officer who went over during the Civil War as a kind of unofficial observer. He travelled through the South and met many Confederate officers and generally formed a very positive impression of the Confederate Army. Even though his journey came to its climax when he watched the Battle of Gettsysburg, he predicted an almost certain victory for the South. Fremantle was aware that Britain would not recognize the Confederacy or come in on the side of the South, but it's pretty clear that he developed a great admiration for what he saw in terms of the spirit of the Confederates. It's an interesting read for anyone with an interest in the CW, and maybe in particular to Brits with an interest. Fremantle thought that the Southern Gentleman was simply a transplanted English Gentleman. In that I think he was both right and wrong. I myself have a certain admiration for the Confederates, as I do for some on the Union side. I find in general and with some exceptions that the personalities on the side of the South are more interesting than their Union counterparts. I feel the issue of States rights had some justification, but I also think slavery was a terrible abuse which had to end. The facts seem to me to be that the North used the slavery issue as a tactic in the war. I don't think all out abolition was the reason they took up arms. So the slaves got freed, and waited another 100 years to get their civil rights. And to me as an outsider it appears that America is still a divided nation, and perhaps some of the old issues still remain as fault lines in American culture.
