<But Southerners, who had blacks among them in greater number, lived in greater horror of having them freed en masse>
But their greatest horror was realized when the north unjustly and illegally invaded, and subsequently subjugated, the South.
Of course, not everyone was horrified about freed slaves:
THE EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION:
Whereas on the 22nd day of September, A.D. 1862, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit:
"That on the 1st day of January, A.D. 1863, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free...
Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana (except the parishes of St. Bernard, Palquemines, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Terrebone, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the city of New Orleans), Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkeley, Accomac, Northhampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Anne, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth), and which excepted parts are for the present left precisely as if this proclamation were not issued."
NOTE - Slavery was NOT abolished in one Confederate (Tennessee) and four Union states (Maryland, Delaware. Kentucky, West Virginia, and Missouri).
And some were not even worried about what would happen to the slaves after they were freed:
"When asked by Confederate Vice President Alexander Stepehens at the 1865 Hampton Roads 'peace' conference what would become of the freedmen without property or education, Lincoln sarcastically recited the words to a popular minstrel song, 'root, hog or die.'"
Don't turn your back on the plaque. |
