The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1892-09-01
OPPOSED TO THE WAR.
Many Southern People Had to Be Driven 70
the Front.

Many Southern People Had to Be Driven "a
the Front.
EDITOR NATIONAL TRIBUNE: A number of
your correspondents and you editorfally have
commented upon the statement that there wers
only 100000 soldiers In the Confederate armies,
as indicating that the Southern masses did nos
cordially support Davis and the war. When
you bear in mind that North Georgia. East
Tennessee, Virginia Arkansas, Missouri, and
Kentucky furnished about 100000 men to the
Union armies it will be seen the South was far
from unit relative to Secession. You will
also remember that in 1861 Mr.. Davis urged
the Confederate Congress to pass the "conscript
law" showing Individually that all the men Of
the South did not volunteer to fight for the
Confederacy. / have often heard my father
declare he had seen Wings and Douglas Demo-
Gratis brought from North Georgia (natiys
Georgians) bound together by trace chains and
shipped in freight cars to Virginia to be forced
into the ranks. These old-line Wings and
Douglas Democrats were men born and bred
in Georgia, who were reluctant to take up arms
against their neighbors and kinfolks, and yet
loved the old Union of their fathers and the
nag Of Washington. But these drastic methods
and the "conscript law" failed to keep filed
up the Confederate ranks.
In 1864 Mr.. Jefferson Davis made An address
in Macon, Ga, and in his speech he admitted
that it required one-half the officers and mem
enlisted or enrolled In the Confederate armies
for provost duty in the towns and cities in the
rear in order to keep the other half ut the
front.
Upon the question of Union or Disunion
Georgia, by vote of $4,000 to $1,000, elected
Union delegates to the Milledgeville Conven-
ton, and when these delegates, by bare ma
jority of about 20, voted for Secession they vio-
lated and disobeysd the instructions of the
people.
The fact is that after more than 30 years of
agitation by the States Rights leaders and or.
gans of the North, the South, the East and West,
with this object (disunion) in view, less than
ene-third of the voters of the seeding States
could be dragooned into declaring for two rival
republics on this continent. Three hundred
thousand men in the South owned all
the slaves; and even this "conscript lawn
exempted from military service every man
who owned 90 slaves. So the war was not
only brought on by minority, but the armed
assertion and attempted endorsements of Seces-
sion was also left to minority. To use q COM
mon expression down here, lit was rich
mans war and poor mans fight" The great
military leaders of the South were not DEM
ocrats. Gen. Longstreet and such warriors
were nearly all "Old Line Wings" The poll
tieians brought on the war, and then left the
fighting to Union-loving Wings like Longstrses,
who never had any excessive fondness for the
old Southern oligarchy, but under the mis-
taken notion that their first allegiance was due
their States, surrendered their commissions in
the United States army only when their States
had seeded, or tried to do so. Longstreet and
Lee had served faithfully and with credit in
the Indian wars on the frontier and in che
Mexican war, where the former was severely
wounded at Chepultepec, and these two great.
est Generals of the Southern armies first resisted
secession, and only laid down their commissions
when their respective States went out Of the
Union, or attempted to do so.-E A. ANGIER,
Atlanta, Ga.