page_title: Confederate States Army
section_title: African Americans and the Confederate Army
hierarchical_section_title: Confederate States Army / African Americans and the Confederate Army
caption_attribution_description: English: Harper's Weekly Magazine, November 8, 1862, pp. 712-713., p. 16..
context_page_description: The Confederate States Army, also called the Confederate Army or simply the Southern Army, was the military land force of the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War, fighting against the United States forces in order to uphold white supremacy and the institution of slavery in the Southern states. On February 28, 1861, the Provisional Confederate Congress established a provisional volunteer army and gave control over military operations and authority for mustering state forces and volunteers to the newly chosen Confederate president, Jefferson Davis. Davis was a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy, and colonel of a volunteer regiment during the Mexican–American War. He had also been a United States Senator from Mississippi and U.S. Secretary of War under President Franklin Pierce. On March 1, 1861, on behalf of the Confederate government, Davis assumed control of the military situation at Charleston, South Carolina, where South Carolina state militia besieged Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor, held by a small U.S. Army garrison.
context_section_description: With so many white males conscripted into the army and roughly 40% of its population unfree, the work required to maintain a functioning society in the Confederacy ended up largely on the backs of slaves. Even Georgian governor Joseph E. Brown noted that "the country and the army are mainly dependent upon slave labor for support." African American slave labor was used in a wide variety of logistical support roles for the Confederacy, from infrastructure and mining, to teamster and medical roles such as hospital attendants and nurses.
caption: An 1862 illustration showing Confederates escorting kidnapped African American civilians south into slavery. A similar instance occurred in Pennsylvania when the Army of Northern Virginia invaded it in 1863 to fight the U.S. at Gettysburg.[87][88][89][90]
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