The Appalachian Chronicles: Shades of Gray

by Seneca Fox

  Chapter XIX

  9:35 pm

  I tried to stay away from the Virginia 1202nd as I approached the Confederate camp. I didn’t want to hear any fun-loving jeers as I made my way into the “inner sanctum.” I was nervous enough. I didn’t need any help from the men of the 1202nd.

  Reenactors surrounded a large fire burning inside the circle of tents. Their shadows flickered eerily on the yellow canvas, which danced in a breeze that was swirling about the camp. I was relieved to see men standing, as well as sitting; I would be fairly inconspicuous when I walked up.

  I heard someone play a chord on a banjo. Everyone sitting and standing around the fire was watching a man tune his stringed instrument. He played a couple more chords and twisted one of the pegs. I did not want to stand around and listen to a bunch of out-of-tune men sing “Dixie” and other Southern favorites, but I also realized that under these circumstances I might go unnoticed as an outsider so I decided to stay. The banjo player twisted the pegs again and I heard him exclaim, “Oh crap”.

  “What’s wrong?” someone asked.

  “Broke a string. I’ve got more in my tent.” The banjo player stood up and said, “I’ll be right back,” before he hurried away.

  I started to count the men, but gave up because too many of them were moving around from place to place within the camp. There were at least thirty. Most were dressed in gray uniforms, like the one I was wearing. A few, however, were dressed in tan pants and white shirts; they looked like planters. Others were wearing various combinations of gray, soldiers’ uniforms and planters’ clothing. Many had on caps or hats. Some of the men fit the hardcore profile with their raw, bony faces and ragged beards; others fit the more typical profile of the overweight middle-aged American male. Their faces were intense as they talked with each other while they waited for the banjo player to return.

  I was slowly walking around the campfire when someone suddenly shouted, “When and where was the first shot fired during the War Between the States?”

  That’s easy, I thought, from the battery of Charleston soon after Lincoln took office – April something.

  “January 9th, 1861 when four cadets from the Citadel fired at the Yankee steamer – the Star of the West.”

  “That’s right,” replied the man who had asked the question.

  But that couldn’t be right, I thought; that was before Lincoln took office.

  Then another question, “Name three major reasons for the War of Southern Independence.”

  “A need to stop Northern expansionism, generations of unresolved conflict between Celtic immigrants in the South and English immigrants in the North, and total disregard among the Yankees in power for the rights and sovereignty of the Southern states.”

  “Good answer.”

  I considered the answer and realized that there was no direct mention of slavery and only an implied acknowledgement of the political struggle that surrounded slavery. And, I thought, when has the Civil War ever been referred to as the “War of Southern Independence”? These men were espousing a history with which I was not familiar. Reg had called them neo-Confederates; I wondered if the hyphenated words neo-historian applied as well.

  While standing there, listening to the reenactors shout out strange interpretations of history, I noticed that two men had entered and left the large tent and that a third was now inside. There were two other men standing outside. One must have been a guard – each time someone entered or left he saluted and closed the flap that served as a door. The other man, who was engaged in conversation with the guard, looked familiar. He was wearing a soldier’s uniform without a cap and looked like the man who gave Max and me a ride down from the mountain. Realizing that it could be Zeb, I wondered how Anna might react when I told her I had seen him – inside the inner sanctum. The formality of the scene and the presence of Zeb stirred my curiosity about who might be inside the tent.

  The questions and the same strange answers continued. One reenactor shouted, “Did Lincoln save the Union?”

  Another answered back, “No, the Union is now an artifact of a previously dominant Northern nation. Even today the South endures expansionist Northern ideals.”

  “Did slavery cause the war?”

  “No, a hostile antislavery movement caused the war.”

  “Good answer,” shouted a group of men.

  “Good answer,” I repeated in amazement. I had to wonder if according to these men the proslavery movement was anti-hostile. Every answer seemed correct enough to be defensible; in fact, I imagined that these dedicated neo-Confederates spent innumerable hours sorting through vast archives to support their positions. I was not surprised at these men’s differing perspective; instead, I was uneasy with the question of why. Why did they go to such lengths to justify their beliefs? What would a black man or woman listening to this peculiar interpretation of facts think – especially if he or she was a descendent of slaves?

  I was also frightened by what I was hearing. These men had the right to assemble and to interpret history any way they wanted. And as long as they were not seriously challenged, I was certain they would continue to do so. But what if someone challenged their interpretation of the facts? The concept of what was meant by the Cause was sinking in.

  So I stood there listening to a strange interaction between seemingly intelligent men hoping someone would unwittingly answer my questions. I stood there until the banjo player returned and put a new string on his instrument. He played a few chords and I decided to leave the “inner sanctum”.1

  When I turned around I bumped into a reenactor who said, “Where you going hardcore?”

  “To relieve myself,” I said, hoping to make a quick exit.

  “To the woods with you then, no porta-privy.” I smiled at the man’s remark and sighed in relief. But then he looked at me curiously, as though he did not recognize me, and asked, “What brings you here?”

  I looked at him blankly and replied, “Excuse me?”

  “I haven’t seen you here before. Tell me, why are you here?”

  I said the first thing that came to my mind. “I’m with the Virginia 1202nd.”

  The reenactor laughed and squared off in front of me. I assumed his laughter was intended as a comment about his view of the Virginia 1202nd. “Why are you here?” I asked boldly.

  “You could say that I’m here to help clear up history,” he said.

  “To clear up history?”

  “Yeah, Civil War history. Oh, I used to be like you and your friends over there in the Virginia 1202nd; but I wised up after while. You guys don’t take reenacting seriously enough. The guys in here, they understand.”

  “Understand?”

  “Yeah. They know that once the liberals started writing history books and textbooks everyone started believing that the Civil War was all about freeing slaves. People get it in their heads that that’s what it was about and they start feeling sorry for blacks. Next thing you know all the other liberals want to give blacks everything. Thanks to them – the liberals, that is – we get things like welfare and affirmative action quotas. They think blacks and other minorities can’t make it in the world without help from the government. You know what they say – the system was set up by white men, therefore it must favor white men. Now I ask you, what the hell-kinda logic is that? Next thing you know, the liberals are going to vote in favor of reparations. That’d be a hoot – paying people back wages cause their ancestors were slaves. You know, there are attorneys out there specializing in reparations. Some have filed civil suits against companies that were in existence before the Civil War. Claim they have evidence that those companies profited from slave trade. Lotta good it’s gonna do those slaves – they might deserve reparations, but their great, great, great grandchildren don’t. Now I ain’t got nothing against blacks, most of them, that is. They got as much right as I do to a job and a decent home. But I can’t see them or any other minorities being given special privileges. And those that holler about dis
crimination. Give them a chance and they’ll turn the tables.”

  “Turn the tables?”

  The man ignored my comment and continued, “When you get down to it, what concerns me most is how the Civil War has been interpreted. It had nothing to do with slavery, it was about sovereignty – how’s that for irony. The more people understand that it was about sovereignty, the more they can see how all the change that’s come to the South didn’t happen because it was the way Southerners wanted it. No, it was about Yankees thinking their way of living was a better way – like some kind of industrialized, authoritarian state. Answer me this, would you rather have a factory or a farm in your backyard?”

  “Huh?”

  “Would you rather have a farm or a factory in your backyard?”

  “Ah, a farm; I guess. Providing they limit the use of fertilizers and pesticides.” I said, half-joking, half-serious; but the man kept on talking.

  “Well, if the Yankees had left things alone, there would be more farms and less factories. Life would move at a slower pace, there’d be less pollution, less stress-related disease and less greed. I ain’t saying the Yankees today are to blame, but I am saying that the people of the South deserve more respect. For the real people of the South, the Civil War was about sovereignty – we were fighting for respect and the freedom to decide for ourselves how we should live.”

  I nodded and forced an expression of understanding. “So, do you think the war would have happened even if slavery had not existed?”

  “As long as the difference between the way people in the South and people in the North lived were so profound – yes, it would have eventually happened. Might even happen again. Don’t misunderstand me, but there are a lot of issues that people of the South feel differently about than people elsewhere. Like prayer in school, saying “under God” when we say the ‘Pledge of Allegiance’. My way of thinking is that if the people of one state want to say “under God” why should the people of another state care. Look,” he said as if he had grown weary of trying to explain himself, “I’m just here trying to set the record straight – that’s all.”

  “You and a lot of other people,” I said. I didn’t mention that I had heard the same comment on the opposite side of the battlefield. “Hey,” I said, wanting to ask another question. “Have you ever thought what it would be like if the South did rise again? Would the states in the South hang Confederate flags above the Stars and Stripes? Would people be free to move about within the United States? Would the United States still exist? I mean, I just can’t imagine what kind of changes would take place.”

  “I’ll tell you what would happen. There’d be a glorious revival of state’s rights. States would demand that the federal government collect fewer taxes or return more tax revenues to them and not spend so much money on ill-fated liberal causes. Just look at the proportion of minorities who hold federal government positions; its way out of wack with the distribution of minorities in our population. The federal government is the business of minorities, paid for by the tax dollars of the hard working middle class. The only good thing about it is that it’s not welfare.” The talkative man paused, as if he was collecting his thoughts. “The states,” he continued, “would have more freedom to spend those monies at their discretion. There would be a reduction in federal mandates. And, while I don’t think you’d see Old Glory flying beneath the Southern Cross, you’d see the Confederate flags flying at the state capitols and governor’s mansions – a symbol of state sovereignty. That’s what the people of the South want.”

  “So the pendulum would start to swing back in the other direction?” I asked.

  “In a way, yes. You could say that.”

  “And how far would it swing?”

  “Oh, the states would be reasonable about it.”

  “I see.”

  I wanted to ask more questions, but was distracted by the thought that I was moving along some kind of continuum. Before today, I was hardly aware that reenacting existed. In only a few hours, however, I had visited with Thomas, a spectator, whose association with reenacting was secondary to his son’s involvement and sutlers who capitalized on the reenactor’s desire for information, authenticity and symbols important to their identities. From there, I visited a variety of reenactors; some appeared to be primarily interested in honoring their heritage while others, like the man standing in front of me, seemed driven to explain the way we live today is an undesirable byproduct of the outcome of the Civil War. As these thoughts spun around in my mind I decided to leave the inner sanctum. I said to the man, “Look, thanks for your insights. I’d like to talk more, but nature calls.”

  “Hardcore,” he commanded. “There’s one more thing. Until people understand what the Civil War was really about we don’t have a chance of getting things back to the way they should be. Think about that.”

  “I will,” I said loud enough for the man to hear.

  There was one more place I planned to go. I wanted to slip in behind the large tent and eavesdrop on the conversation inside, but between the sound of the banjo and all the reenactors singing I decided to wait until the noise subsided.