Long time friend of American Renaissance Sam Dickson wrote this response to the above review when it was first published:
Sir — In the May issue there is a very interesting and informative review of Black Slaveowners by Larry Koger. In his review, Mr. Wilson mentions a black slave who escaped from the British during the Revolution to return to this master. This event tends to refute claims that slavery in America was invariably characterized by brutal cruelty.
Southerners who know their real history know that stories such as the one cited by Mr. Wilson are commonplace. One is of special interest for many reasons, including the fact that it marks the close of a disgraceful period in American history. It is a story which, for obvious reasons, has been allowed to be forgotten, but it was fortunately preserved in the WPA guidebook to South Carolina. (I heartily recommend the WPA guidebooks to AR readers. They are one of the few useful things to be produced by the Franklin Roosevelt presidency and are now repositories of much information that would be suppressed by liberals if they could.)
In the closing years of the War Between the States, the North embarked on a policy of seizing Southern hostages as guarantees against civilian resistance to the federal tactic of burning and destroying farms, villages, and cities. Gen. Sherman especially embraced this practice, since his armies were at times spread out over a front 60 miles wide. One can imagine that the Southern farmers of the 1860s were a tough breed, and took umbrage at the burning of their farms, but Sherman executed hostages if his soldiers met civilian resistance. While this seems harsh, and in fact the same policy by the Germans in World War II was rather hypocritically denounced by the United States, civilians who shoot uniformed soldiers are not entitled to be treated as prisoners of war.
As Southern resistance weakened, Sherman carried the policy even further. After burning Columbia, South Carolina, he announced that he would shoot prisoners and hostages even if uniformed soldiers of the Confederate army offered resistance. Gen. Wade Hampton denounced this as sheer murder.
In the last days of the war, as the Northern armies approached the southern border of North Carolina, a Sergeant Woodford of the 46th Ohio plundered a small farm near Pageland, South Carolina. He stole so much of the livestock and property that he could not haul off all his booty, and forced a black slave named Dick Sowell to help him carry it.
Sowell was outraged by the behavior of the Northern soldier. When Woodford stopped to take a nap, the slave picked up a piece of firewood and beat his brains out. He then collected the stolen property and returned it to his master.
When the body of the Federal soldier was found, Sherman decreed that a hostage had to die. He forced Confederate prisoners to draw lots. The unlucky draw fell to cavalryman James H. Miller who was executed by firing squad. His body lies in the Five Forks Cemetery four miles outside of Pageland, beneath a stone engraved “murdered in retaliation.”
Could a more politically incorrect story be written even as fiction? The last Southern hostage to be murdered by abolitionists died as a result of the brave actions of a slave outraged by the cruelty and thievery of a federal soldier. So much for the contemporary rewriting of Civil War history, according to which most black slaves “rose up” to greet their liberators.
Long time friend of American Renaissance Sam Dickson wrote this response to the above review when it was first published:
Sir — In the May issue there is a very interesting and informative review of Black Slaveowners by Larry Koger. In his review, Mr. Wilson mentions a black slave who escaped from the British during the Revolution to return to this master. This event tends to refute claims that slavery in America was invariably characterized by brutal cruelty.
Southerners who know their real history know that stories such as the one cited by Mr. Wilson are commonplace. One is of special interest for many reasons, including the fact that it marks the close of a disgraceful period in American history. It is a story which, for obvious reasons, has been allowed to be forgotten, but it was fortunately preserved in the WPA guidebook to South Carolina. (I heartily recommend the WPA guidebooks to AR readers. They are one of the few useful things to be produced by the Franklin Roosevelt presidency and are now repositories of much information that would be suppressed by liberals if they could.)
In the closing years of the War Between the States, the North embarked on a policy of seizing Southern hostages as guarantees against civilian resistance to the federal tactic of burning and destroying farms, villages, and cities. Gen. Sherman especially embraced this practice, since his armies were at times spread out over a front 60 miles wide. One can imagine that the Southern farmers of the 1860s were a tough breed, and took umbrage at the burning of their farms, but Sherman executed hostages if his soldiers met civilian resistance. While this seems harsh, and in fact the same policy by the Germans in World War II was rather hypocritically denounced by the United States, civilians who shoot uniformed soldiers are not entitled to be treated as prisoners of war.
As Southern resistance weakened, Sherman carried the policy even further. After burning Columbia, South Carolina, he announced that he would shoot prisoners and hostages even if uniformed soldiers of the Confederate army offered resistance. Gen. Wade Hampton denounced this as sheer murder.
In the last days of the war, as the Northern armies approached the southern border of North Carolina, a Sergeant Woodford of the 46th Ohio plundered a small farm near Pageland, South Carolina. He stole so much of the livestock and property that he could not haul off all his booty, and forced a black slave named Dick Sowell to help him carry it.
Sowell was outraged by the behavior of the Northern soldier. When Woodford stopped to take a nap, the slave picked up a piece of firewood and beat his brains out. He then collected the stolen property and returned it to his master.
When the body of the Federal soldier was found, Sherman decreed that a hostage had to die. He forced Confederate prisoners to draw lots. The unlucky draw fell to cavalryman James H. Miller who was executed by firing squad. His body lies in the Five Forks Cemetery four miles outside of Pageland, beneath a stone engraved “murdered in retaliation.”
Could a more politically incorrect story be written even as fiction? The last Southern hostage to be murdered by abolitionists died as a result of the brave actions of a slave outraged by the cruelty and thievery of a federal soldier. So much for the contemporary rewriting of Civil War history, according to which most black slaves “rose up” to greet their liberators.
Sam G. Dickson, Atlanta, Ga.
https://www.amren.com/archi...