AP Gets it Wrong about Virginia History Getting it Wrong
By Andrew Schwartz | Wednesday, September 28th, 2011 | HistoryIn 2010, there was a nationwide controversy regarding a sentence in a newly approved 4th Grade Virginia History textbook. This controversy has been revived by the Associated Press upon the final approval of the corrected version. In the original book by Joy Masoff, she asserted that “thousands of Southern blacks fought in the Confederate ranks, including two black battalions under the command of Stonewall Jackson.”
This statement was somewhat easy to disprove, and her sources in this matter were dubious, to say the least.
But what part of the statement is false? Is it that thousands of blacks served in the Confederate Army? Or is it that there were two black battalions under the command of Stonewall Jackson?
The Associated Press, in an article on Sept. 22, 2011, would have the reader believe the error lies in the first clause of Masoff’s sentence, claiming the book was “riddled with factual, grammatical and typographical errors. One contained a claim that thousands of black people fought on behalf of the Confederacy.”
However, this part of Masoff’s assertion was true enough. It was the second part, about there being two black battalions under Jackson’s command, that was factually inaccurate.
Ervin L. Jordan Jr. conducted exhaustive research on this issue in 1995, and published his findings under the title Black Confederates and Afro-Yankees in Civil War Virginia (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1995). In this book, he claims that over 180,000 blacks in Virginia alone provided logistical support for the Confederate Army. He also argues, quite compellingly, that these were not always forced conscriptions, but were rather voluntary. There were even about 300 black Confederates in Virginia who received a pension for their service—not just a lifetime pension, but an inheritable pension, one that only ceased entirely in the 1950s.
How many black soldiers actually fired upon enemy troops? This question is still unanswerable; but we do know that the Confederacy was in dire straits toward the end of the war, and officially commissioned the recruiting of black soldiers for the specific purpose of fighting in their own units. Surely, as troop numbers dwindled, commanders would be more willing to use and arm even their logistical support; and there is plenty of evidence—even from Fredrick Douglass—to support this claim. (In the advent of this textbook controversy, Walter Williams published a fantastic piece, as always, on the matter, and shows some of this evidence.)
While news media outlets allowed and promoted the claim that Masoff’s textbook was “misleading,” they have themselves misled their readers by implying that the statement that blacks fought for the Confederacy is false.
This is not meant to defend Ms. Masoff’s errors. By academic standards, her research was shoddy. But it was a 4th-grade textbook; the same years we learn that George Washington chopped down a cherry tree and confessed it to his father, claiming “I cannot tell a lie.” Indeed, there were other errors in Masoff’s book that hardly received a second look, until recently. It seems the only reason the black-Confederate-soldiers error received so much notice was because it does not fit into the modern historiographic narrative. If the Confederates used blacks as soldiers, and if these blacks fought voluntarily, what does that say about their loyalty and motives? While a heroic narrative could be formed out of these black Confederates—one that demonstrates their willingness to defy federal intrusion into their locality—the modern press would rather portray the situation of African Americans in the South as catholically abhorrent, and the North as their canonical saviors. Or, in other words, that the centralization of power is superior to devolved authority.
But while this mindset will disparage a history of blacks that violates its expectations, they will just as quickly praise falsities in African American history, even those contained in texts used in Virginia colleges–such as that Crispus Attucks was the first martyr of the American Revolution…
[Citations available upon request: andrewschwartz@live.com (Disclaimer: I am not a Civil War historian, and have not had the pleasure of reading the primary sources that Messrs. Jordan and Williams have. My arguments, except for that of Crispus Attucks, are based on their and others' research, not my own.)]
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About the author
Andrew Schwartz is a historian from Old Dominion University, where, despite his conservative arguments in liberal academia, he graduated Summa Cum Laude. His focus as a historian is on Colonial and Revolutionary American political, legal and intellectual history. His focus on politics is rational conservatism. He can also be found at AmericanThinker.com.
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7 Responses to "AP Gets it Wrong about Virginia History Getting it Wrong"
AS says While a heroic narrative could be formed out of these black Confederates—one that demonstrates their willingness to defy federal intrusion into their locality… ”
I thought the point conservatives had in promoting historical accuracy in textbooks was precisely the removal of constructed ideological narratives that leftists love to use instead of history.
I can think of various, mainly personal, reasons why slaves or freed slaves might fight on behalf of a local Confederate unit, but in the absence of a properly done survey how would it be known they did it as Tenth Amendment advocates?
As you said, “construed ideological narratives that leftists love to use INSTEAD of history.”
There is absolutely nothing wrong with a narrative, even if it portrays an ideology, as long as it is historically accurate.
As for your final question, there are many accounts of blacks fighting for their state, or, as you say, the Tenth Amdt. Please see Jordan’s work cited in the article.
Despite the scholarship done by Jordan, most of the information he presented, if not all, has been discredited. The fact is, we really will never know if there were any black volunteers serving in the Confederate ranks without permission – as they were expressly forbidden in combat roles.
This area of scholarship has been heavily debated over the last few years and the general consensus is that while blacks were present with the Confederate army, few, if any, were volunteers and few, if any, were combat soldiers.
http://cwmemory.com/2011/03/03/ervin-jordans-black-confederates/
I am willing to accept that Mr. Jordan’s claims have been discredited, but not from a personal blog. I don’t doubt that Kevin Levin knows more about the Civil War than I do, but I do doubt that he knows more about this subject than Dr. Jordan. If I could find an academic journal that refuted Jordan’s claims, that would help; however, I could find none.
I did find this, however:
Christopher Phillips, review of “Black Confederates and Afro-Yankees in Civil War Virginia,” in Journal of Southern History, 63 no. 2 (May 1997), 415-416.
This is an example of watchdog journalism in practice. On the subject of watchdog journalism, Bob Gibson, Executive Director of the University of Virginia’s Sorensen Institute for Political Leadership, recently said: “If we don’t have a watchdog function, then we have a lapdog function, and that doesn’t serve the voter very well. We need journalism that goes out and challenges what is being given reporters as the facts. We need to look behind the facts and find out where they’re coming from, and what the interests are of the people who are giving us those facts. Local government and state government and the federal government today are even more than ever in the news business themselves. They are putting out news as if it was the entire package and expecting people to buy it and I think Americans have to be a little bit skeptical and have to look behind where those governments are putting out facts.” (Gibson appeared on the Charlottesville, VA, politics interview program Politics Matters with host and producer Jan Madeleine Paynter discussing journalism http://bit.ly/pm-gibson)
While I am no fan of Kevin Levin’s, he has been prolific on the subject. Take a look around the site and you will find more than your fair share of senior, well credentialed civil war historians who accept his scholarship on the subject.
Just a couple points:
1. As far as I know Walter Williams has never conducted research into this subject. His articles include nothing more than the same short list of references (Douglass, Steiner, etc) that tell us next to nothing.
2. Jordan’s book is well worth reading, though I disagree with some of his reading of the evidence. That’s not controversial given that historians almost always disagree about such things. More disturbing, however, is the way in which his scholarship has been used by a select few to promote this myth. This weekend I will be on a panel with Jordan to discuss this subject in Richmond. You can read the panel description as well as Jordan’s abstract here: http://cwmemory.com/2011/05/28/black-confederates-at-the-asalh/
Thanks
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