Disloyalty In The Confederacy

"Until recently, many historians, as well as people in general, have commonly accepted the idea that every man, woman, and child in the South stood loyally behind Jefferson Davis and the Stars and Bars in support of the Confederacy. Despite the fact that out of a population of about eight million whites, six hundred thousand offered their services to the Confederacy in 1861, and also the fact that the staunch, unswerving loyalty of Southerners during the war will continue to rouse admiration, there was, in 1861, a small number, which by 1865 had increased to a potent minority, that did nothing to aid the Confederacy and much to injure it. While many showed their disaffection only by refusing to fight, many others organized not only for self-protection but also for the destruction of the Confederacy. Before the end of the war, there was much disaffection in every state, and many of the disloyal had formed into bands—in some states into well organized, active societies, with signs, oaths, grips, and passwords. In the present study, an attempt has been made to discover the causes for this movement, the classes that participated in it, and the purpose and work of the organizations.

“Disloyalty in the Confederacy definitely puts to rout the belief, once common, that ‘every man, woman and child stood behind Jefferson Davis and the Stars and Bars in support of the Confederacy.’ —New York Times Book Review

“This is the sort of book necessary to balance accounts of the Southern Confederacy. Heretofore, the impression has been too often left that the South fought as a unit with a common purpose.”—Journal of Southern History