The New York herald., 1863-11-22
NEW YORK HERALD SUNDAY, NOVEMBER %, 1863

down TO the outbreak Of this war, were self.
supporting in the way Of provisions. These
were Texas and North Carolina. The other
four drew their -four, beef, &C., in immense
quantities, from Tennessee. Kentucky, Texas
and the Northwest. But all those sources of
supply are now cut off, and North Carolina il
impoverished. What. then, will bo the conse-
| qucnces to the black population of Alabama
Georgia and South Carolina, increased by
million Of slaves from other States. and having
to support. besides. the great army of Bragg
and smaller detschments Of troops, equal in all
to one hundred and fifty thousand men, or half
| million ordinary consumers
The rebel Commissary General, in April last,
foreshadowed the starvation OF his confederacy
this winter. and he did not foresec the terrible
pressure which has come upon il. With all
the care and all the abundance Of supplies
possessed by the government, thousands of
slaves or " freedmen" falling into its posses
sion along the Mississippi valley have died
and are dying from destituton and disease, re-
suting from the general chaos and confusion
produced by the war. Plantations, in many
cases, have been laid waste, aad the slaves
have been left behind to shift for themselves or
to perish. In other cases large numbers herded
together, without sufficient sanitary regulations.
have died off as from a pestilence. And all
over the war-wasted districts Of the South these
evils are still vigorously working out their har-
vest of death. What, then, will be the
consequences to the slave population of
Georgia, Alabama and South Carolina, under
the circumstances detailed, should this war
be continued till May next. Possibly a servile
insurrectiOn, involving the determination Of
the blacks; inevitably their decrease by hun
dreds and thousands from lack of subsistence
Let the war be dragged along till May next,
and by July it will probably have inflicted
upon the black population of the whole country
the loss of million of its aggregate OF four
millions of slaves. Nor is it probable that
even then, with the return of peace, the blacks
of the South can be provided for or reorganized
under any system of labor and subsistence in
time to prevent the loss of another million from
the disastrous effects of the war upon this I'M
fortunate race.
Such are the consequences, actual and prob
able, to the poor African from this cruel
Such are the fruits of the baneful agita-
ton of slavery by the fanatics of the North AMI
the lunatic lire-eaters of the South. The work
of abolition philanthropy threatens the de-
struction of the slave race, while the doings of
the conspirators with jeff Davis in behalf Of a
purely slaveholdng confcderacy threaten
the absolute destruction of slavery itself Such
are ever the consequences of violent measures
to anticipate the designs of Providence and the
remedies Of time for the evils of the hour.
In behalf Of the white and the black races,
North and South, we have urged the earnest
prosecution Of the war, in view OF speedy
peace. The abolition faction, meantime, have
been absorbed in the prospective glories of
war of "freedOm,' regardless of its duration.
We would now call upon them to assist in push
ing on the war, looking to the fearful conse-
quences which its prolongation will inevitably
entail not only upon the white race, but upon
| the blacks of the South. In this view, we say
that it would be safer and better to rescue .
remnant even Of Southern slavery than to
hazard the destruction of both races of the
South by reducing the war to an abolition
crusade