re: History Debate: Ulysses S. Grant vs. Robert E. Lee

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It's a ridiculous book, and I'm sorry, but if someone reads it and feels that it's great and gives you a real history of how things were and why, you're better of not talking to them.

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[soapbox]

90% of people will unequivocally state that history is written by the victors and many of those seem to accept that as the cold hard truth when it comes to the Civil War.

That war was complicated, very complicated. The idea of slavery was used to rally the north under a moral cause midway through the war.

The Civil War was ultimately about what every war is about: power and control. Saying it was "because of slavery" is the nice moral summation historians have plugged over and over for the simpletons.

[/soap box]

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The south was right. About everything. There can be no deviation from that point. Whatever the south did, it did in reaction to a negative northern action. The slaves were treated well; the badness of slavery is overstated.

It cherry picks quotes from the Slave Narratives and uses them to make slavery seem almost like a happy, fun place where idiotic blacks loved their massa and didn't want to be free.

It's a ridiculous book,

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And they really go with the Slaves were happy stuff? Just like the 'only 5% of Southerners owned slaves' they are being mislead with those Slave Narratives. Most of those ex slaves were 80-90 ish year olds & the vast majority Children during slavery by the time the Narratives were collected(1936-38).

The Slave Narratives were collected by the WPA between 1936-1938. If the Slave was born around 1855 they were 10 years old or less by the time of the 13th amendmendent/End of War.(Many were free way before 1865). In 1936 they would be 81 or older recollecting 70 plus year old childhood memories.

Even if they were born as early as 1850 & the vast majority in the narratives weren't the oldest would have been 14 & under during slavery & survived to the ripe old age of about 90.


These Slave Narratives are interesting documents ,but in reality the 70 plus year old recollections of Childhood. Most weren't sexually nor physically mature so most avoided the sexual abuse/violence/back breaking labor (for the most part) of adults.


They mostly coudn't remember most of it & the memories were of playing with other kids(slaves & Owner children), getting sweets from the big house, menial tasks around the Plantation,etc..... With Vague memories of the War, Troops coming through town(especially Colored ones stood out), but there memories of slavery /understanding of the War was limited.

The Narratives would have been far more worthwhile had they been collected 70 years earlier (1870 or so) when there were actual adult slaves still alive & memories fresh(Douglass, Northup for example).