Did most American soldiers understand why they were fighting the American Civil war?
Posted by LocaCapone@reddit | AskAnAmerican | View on Reddit | 283 comments
Or were they essentially tricked into fighting a rich man's war?
*** I'm sorry if this isn't allowed, I've tried posting in history and no stupid questions and my post gets deleted - i'm not trying to have discussion on modern politics; I am looking at it from the perspective that it was the last war on American soil & has been described as "brother vs. brother, cousin vs. cousin"
(Also please don't comment if your answer has anything to do with any presidential candidate from the last 2 decades .... i'm looking for an objective perspective on the soldiers' mentality of the war)
The_Awful-Truth@reddit
This was one of the reasons for the Emancipation Proclamation. Fighting to preserve the union was an abstraction that wasn't particularly inspiring, particularly after horrific battles like Shiloh and Fredericksburg. Fighting to free millions of imprisoned people was an easier sell.
AdPsychological790@reddit
No it wasn't. In fact Lincoln tried to make it not about freedom or Emancipation. The reason for the war was the Southern states wanted the US to be slave territory from coast to coast. Lincoln himself said he was okay with the status quo IF the South would stop its expansionist desires. Slavery was starting to hinder everything: its agrarian focus was a hinderance to industrial development. To settle the entire future US, they needed Europeans to keep immigrating. But who would immigrate if they had to compete against unpaid slave labor? It's not dumb luck non-English, non-protestant immigrants stuck to the non-slave states. With long growing seasons, ample water, relatively great weather amd tame terrain, places like Alabama and Tennessee should've had oodles of Scandanavians, Germans, and Italians. Instead they went to the likes of North Dakota, Minnesota, amd Illinois.
The_Awful-Truth@reddit
Lincoln gave very different justifications over the course of the war. In his inaugural address he cast it purely as a fight for national unity, not about slavery at all. But he gradually shifted to making it a crusade against slavery, being pulled along by the "logic events", exactly as Frederick Douglass predicted from (in fact before) the beginning:
"The American people and the Government at Washington may refuse to recognize it for a time; but the “inexorable logic of events” will force it upon them in the end; that the war now being waged in this land is a war for and against slavery; and that it can never be effectually put down till one or the other of these vital forces is completely destroyed."
– Frederick Douglass, May 1861
AdPsychological790@reddit
Exactly. The national unity was being destroyed by the desire to expand slavery. Specifically, representatives from slave states would vote along pro-slavery lines, so if slave states were to outnumber non-slave states they'd have the majority on everything. And they would outnumber because they were able to count slaves as part of the population.
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
It was not easier to sell anti slavery. Lots of northern feared all the ex slaves would undercut the job market.
LeResist@reddit
Honestly as an African American, it's kinda insulting you think this was a "rich man's war" and not a fight for basic human rights
ReadinII@reddit
The results of a war aren’t always the cause of the war nor are they necessarily the reason people fight.
Recognizing the basic human rights of 4 million Americans was a happy result of the war, but it wasn’t the reason the Union started the war. It is quite a shame for America, but the South seceded to preserve slavery and the North invaded to regain control of the South. Only one side of the war had slavery as its motivation and that side was the South.
As for the “rich man’s war”, that was clearly the case in the South as it was the rich who benefited from slavery.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Honestly, as an American, it's kind of insulting that you think any war is immune from being a rich man's war. There was a lot of blood, brother on brother in the Civil War. I think it's interesting that you think it's perfectly understandable that a man would kill his own brother over the federal legality of slavery.
LeResist@reddit
Clearly I'm not the only one who disagrees with you cause most of the comments don't think this was a rich man's war. Saying it's a rich man's war completely erases why they were fighting in the first place.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
You're looking for an argument I'm not making.
Weightmonster@reddit
IDK. That’s start a poll…
jvc1011@reddit
They definitely had reasons to fight. All soldiers do.
The Civil War wasn’t a “rich man’s war.” It was a war that had been coming since the founding of the Republic, and we’d compromised our way out of for almost a century. There comes a point when that’s not an available route anymore.
kateinoly@reddit
Poor people didn't own slaves
ColossusOfChoads@reddit
Some poor folks had a stake in it. Working as an overseer or slavecatcher was a step up from being a poor dirt farmer. And many envisioned themselves owning land and slaves one day, out west if not back home. California joining the US a a free state was one of the catalysts; they wanted to extend the Mason-Dixon line all the way to the Pacific, and some minor battles were fought in the Southwest.
kateinoly@reddit
Overseers weren't poor people.
TrapperJon@reddit
But they could rent them.
kateinoly@reddit
Not without money
TrapperJon@reddit
On credit based off the crops the slaves helped raise.
kateinoly@reddit
Poor people didn't have slaves, on credit or otherwise.
TrapperJon@reddit
Lol... whatever
StupidLemonEater@reddit
And they didn't have to compete with them in the labor market.
NomadLexicon@reddit
Sure they did, that was actually one of the biggest complaints of white laborers and tradesmen in the antebellum South. Slaves were used to break strikes and suppress wages.
DrBlankslate@reddit
And they could aspire to become the people who did own them. It’s not that different from people today who aspire to be millionaires or billionaires. It was a goal in the South.
Standard-Nebula1204@reddit
Poor southern whites very much associated the slave system with broader southern culture, and by virtue of being free they were closer to the top of the hierarchy than the bottom.
kateinoly@reddit
Sure. They didn't own slaves.
kateinoly@reddit
Sure. They didn't own slaves.
Spongedog5@reddit
Poor white people understood that without slavery they might have to do the work that the slaves did.
ReadinII@reddit
A lot of them did similar work anyway, but without the guaranteed income and free healthcare.
For the poor man, slaves were competition who undercut their wages.
They of course didn’t want to be slaves. But slavery didn’t benefit them.
jvc1011@reddit
Slaves did not get income, and only occasionally health care.
ReadinII@reddit
Ugh, you’re right about income. I was thinking that they had their basic material needs met and I summarized it to income which is obviously incorrect.
As for healthcare, you have to remember that for slave owners, slaves were an investment, particularly after the slave trade was outlawed and replacements couldn’t be imported. It was imported to maintain them in good working condition.
jvc1011@reddit
I know that slaves were an investment. Yet many slave owners held a slave’s life cheap. They weren’t all getting the doctor in for their slaves. Maybe some were, but it was hardly a guarantee.
And importation went on illegally.
NomadLexicon@reddit
They were often used for more dangerous work because a dead or injured slave was a massive financial loss for a slave owner, but a dead free laborer could be replaced immediately.
There was a growing outmigration of white laborers from the South to the north and west before the war specifically because slave labor suppressed their wages and monopolized the agricultural economy.
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
Poor people didn’t, but a lot of middle class southerners had a few. When I was kid, I was taught “only a tiny percentage of ultra rich southerners owned slaves.”
Turns out that was untrue.
kateinoly@reddit
25% isn't a lot.
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
It’s a lot more than I was led to believe as a kid, was my only point. And included a lot of people who weren’t plantation owners
captaincheem@reddit
Slaves is what triggered it but the main underlying cause was state rights vs federal power. We made it about slaves to feel better about all the bloodshed, but at the end of the day it was about federal vs state power
kateinoly@reddit
I also went to high school in the South and was taught that "state's rights" was the cause of the war. All you have to do is read the articles of seccession. It was always about slavery.
kavihasya@reddit
You’ve got that backwards.
The South wasn’t broadly ideologically committed to states rights. That is, they wanted Federal Marshals to go into free states to kidnap former slaves. That hardly respects the free states’ rights.
They also wanted to keep their own states’ right to own slaves.
So the consistency is for whatever position is pro-slavery. Not an ideological position on federal v state power. For that, where you sit is where you stand.
Applesauce1998@reddit
You don’t need to own slaves to believe in and fight for the institution of slavery
kateinoly@reddit
?
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
It was more then just slaves. It was 2 very different societies and the economies clashing
kateinoly@reddit
Lol.
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
Slavery was the primary reason those societies and economies were so different.
SouthernExpatriate@reddit
They still got conscripted to fight for people that did
kateinoly@reddit
That doesn't mean they understood why they were fighting.
Bawstahn123@reddit
Very good point.
It's downplayed to an extent in the modern day, but there was almost a break between the Northern colonies/states and the Southern colonies/states over the matter of slavery during the American Revolution. The Northerners regretfully put the issue aside once the Southerners threatened to pull support and go back to the Brits.
IowaKidd97@reddit
I think you could argue it was a right woman’s war for the south, but not so much for the North.
_hammitt@reddit
The Confederate War and The Union War by Gary Gallagher are great resources for this, as he really tries to study the mentality of average soldiers. Northern/Union soldiers generally saw themselves as fighting for Union, and the preservation of the Union. Confederates had a number of reasons - protecting the home from what they saw as arbitrary power from the federal government was a part of it, but also protection of the existing order and hierarchy. There were draft riots and resistance in both halves of the country, but ultimately the South had a little more trouble convincing poor men to fight for it.
ColossusOfChoads@reddit
Some of those poor men slipped across the lines to go Union, mostly in Appalachia. My great-something grandfather in eastern TN did just that. Not to mention WV breaking off from VA. They had little to no stake in the slave-based economy.
Odd-Help-4293@reddit
Yeah. Also, almost every Southern state and territory had folks who went north to volunteer for the Union, because they opposed the Confederate cause. And not just escaped slaves, though they certainly did volunteer in large numbers. The reverse was... much less common.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
This is very interesting. I did not know this.
Odd-Help-4293@reddit
West Virginia also exists as a state because they seceded from Virginia to stay in the union. And IIRC there was a county in Alabama or Mississippi that basically did the same thing.
naetaejabroni@reddit
There were also Southerners who opposed secession that did not leave the south.
Odd-Help-4293@reddit
That's true. There was a partisan resistance movement that sabotaged the Confederacy from within.
HomeWasGood@reddit
There are no statues but if you go to Caves Cove in East Tennessee, there's a lot of historical information at the graves of people who opposed slavery on religious grounds.
And Confederate troops actually raided the area several times due to suspicions that its inhabitants were pro Union or helping the Union in some way (which they probably were).
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Do you think union soldiers were fighting with organic heart? Or do you think propaganda was heavily at play in recruiting union soldiers?
Or do you think propaganda played an equal role on both aides?
GingerMarquis@reddit
It was my understanding that my ancestors fought for the Union because they lived in free states and there was a sense of obligation to go fight for our country. I can’t say for sure because this is family legend passed down through the generations.
FemboyEngineer@reddit
It was a deeply ideological fight, and both sides were pretty open about that.
IFixYerKids@reddit
That's why I laugh when people try to argue about what the Civil War was fought over. Like, read the letters, the soldiers on both sides will gladly tell you why they were fighting.
GermanPayroll@reddit
There is some nuance. At the time people were really strong into state rights, like someone would consider themselves a Virginian more than an American. A lot of people fought for their states, or their survival, as much as they fought about slavery.
Dorianscale@reddit
The states right to do what exactly?
cbrooks97@reddit
Self-govern, essentially. "Show me in the Constitution where the federal government has the power to ..." is still a common argument.
MyUsername2459@reddit
Nobody said they couldn't self govern, but when that self governance includes treating human beings as properly. . .the right of a person to be a person instead of property is rather more important than the right of legislators to make whatever laws they want.
Even to this day, crowing about "States rights" pretty much always means "we want to discriminate and persecute people, and we have a sovereign right to be evil."
Whenever I hear people defend anything with the idea of "States rights" I look for the stars and bars or the swastika, because they usually aren't too far out of sight.
cbrooks97@reddit
I don't know if this is hyperbole or typical liberal character assassination of those who disagree with them. It is true you don't hear liberals talking about "states rights" much -- they believe in a strong central government. They would have been anti-Federalists.
That doesn't equal "all conservatives are racists".
MyUsername2459@reddit
You know someone doesn't know what they're talking about with regards to politics when they call anyone that disagrees with them "liberal".
Liberalism is a very specific center-right political philosophy, not a blanket term for "everyone we don't like".
cbrooks97@reddit
When compared to socialism, maybe. Otherwise, no.
devilbunny@reddit
Enslaving people was usually it, but it had a lot of echos in how the federal government related to the states.
Getting rid of slavery was good. Getting rid of states' rights changed the country. Good or bad, I'm really not sure. But that was the death of states' rights. It's something that should exist without this enormous negativity: states are states, they should have a lot of autonomy. But you say "states' rights" and you are automatically shuffled off to "wannabe KKK". They fucked the whole thing.
pjcrusader@reddit
There are a few cases I remember from reading a union soldier’s writing about having asked a few confederate soldiers why they were fighting and they answered because you’re down here. On the whole it was absolutely about slavery but there was surely a sizable contingent of rank and file confederate soldiers that it was really just about defending their states.
On the whole I land on saying we weren’t nearly as harsh as we should have been during reconstruction and should have had Sherman continue burning.
GumboDiplomacy@reddit
Unfortunately he had to make his way out West to start the widespread slaughter of buffalo in support of our genocide of the Plains tribes.
pjcrusader@reddit
True. America has always been America.
kirkaracha@reddit
The South was just fine with the federal Fugitive Slave Acts, which let federal marshals to into free states, capture escaped slaves, and return them to slavery, despite the free states' personal liberty laws.
Tricky_Big_8774@reddit
Same reason Texas fought a rebellion against the Spanish...
BlueGrottoMaillot@reddit
Their right to own human beings.
FrontAd9873@reddit
This is like saying the Iraq War was nuanced because many American service members join up to get out of the hood or to get money for college.
A soldier's reasons for fighting are usually different than the reason the war broke out in the first place, though they sometimes overlap. I mean, even war aims change after the outbreak of war, as the Civil War demonstrates.
Rhomya@reddit
That’s not entirely accurate.
One of the outcomes of the Civil War not talked about enough is the drastic increase of power that the federal government assumed over the states.
The US before the Civil war was ideologically much more like the EU views themselves now. Germans see themselves as German first, and then part of the EU second. Pre-Civil War, someone from Tennessee would have thought of themselves as Tennesseean first, and the American second, which is a stark change from today, where they are American first, Tennesseean second.
FrontAd9873@reddit
Sorry, what part of what I said was inaccurate?
Rhomya@reddit
Your first paragraph. I don’t particularly see that as an adequate comparison.
FrontAd9873@reddit
What is the relevance of the point your making about identity to that comparison? I’m just saying soldiers join armies for different reasons than countries go to war, though they sometimes overlap.
Cacafuego@reddit
I think that's an important perspective to bring to OP's question. Did American soldiers understand what they were fighting for in Iraq? Some of them fought because that's what they had signed up to do, it was a paycheck, it came with college benefits. So, yes, those soldiers understood exactly why they were fighting, regardless of the causes of the war. Same with the Civil War.
Bawstahn123@reddit
Then maybe they shouldn't have fucking shot first, eh?
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
“Their state’s survival?”
Why would anyone from Tennessee or Georgia think the “survival” of their state was in jeopardy?
ReadinII@reddit
Because their states were being invaded?
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
If we’re talking specifically about soldiers who joined AFTER the confederacy proactively seceded and started shooting, and if we replace “survival” with “defend their home state” then I’d agree with that motivation for many soldiers.
But the survival talk began before the war, and even when invaded it was clear the north wanted all the confederate states to survive, just as members of the union. “Survival” always referred to their way of life, which revolved around slavery.
cometshoney@reddit
Southern states' economies were driven by slavery. They couldn't imagine the states' economies surviving without that labor. Plus, they really didn't want Yankees telling them what to do or how to live, even though most of the men in the Confederate Army didn't own their own land, much less other humans, but the hope there was to eventually be able to own both. The Union was destroying those dreams. After all, success was measured by how many acres and how many human beings you owned.
The_Saddest_Boner@reddit
100%. That’s what I was getting at lol I was just being a bit of a jerk about it
No-Conversation1940@reddit
West Virginia broke off entirely, East Tennessee nearly did. Slavery wasn't workable for them, they're deep in the hills, it isn't possible to have huge plantations because the land is so uneven, rocky, and unsuitable for growing cotton.
Legally_a_Tool@reddit
Because the Southern economy was dependent on slavery to produce the cash crops they exported to European markets. That is really what they mean “state’s [economic] survival.”
Melancholy_Rainbows@reddit
I’m not a historian, but if any of them believed that the answer is most likely “because they were lied to.” People are pretty susceptible to propaganda and fearmongering.
Mysteryman64@reddit
There really isn't. They were massive hypocrites who wanted to cement slavery. If they really gave a damn about states rights, then they wouldn't have pressed for the Fugitive Slave Act as hard as they did.
Go read all the various articles of seccession written by all the members of the CSA. Tell me how long it takes for them to start mentioning slavery.
Go read the CSA's constitution and see what it has to say about it's member states choosing to overturn slavery in the future if they decide that's what they want.
GermanPayroll@reddit
Who is “they”? There’s a massive difference between the political upper class of the Confederacy and the boots on the ground, many of which, signed up because it was a paycheck or simply because they thought it would defend their home/family.
Mysteryman64@reddit
Political and intellectual thought leaders of the CSA.
GermanPayroll@reddit
But the questions isn’t about them. It’s about the foot soldiers.
Mysteryman64@reddit
And the foot soldiers listened to the words of who?
ReadinII@reddit
From everything I have read, the “states rights” appeals were really just an excuse for defending slavery. They somehow didn’t matter for the Fugitive Slave Act, for example. That is to say, the South didn’t actually believe in states rights, they saw it as a tool of convenience for defending slavery.
You can compare it to how modern left leaning pundits loved to tell us that “the Constitution says what the Supreme Court says it says” until recent years when the Court started making decisions the left disagreed with.
Spongedog5@reddit
I think it's less about slavery and states rights being separate issues and instead them being combined into the same issue.
It's wrong to say that is was only about slavery and not about states rights because they weren't fighting when it each state was allowed to prescribe their own laws about slavery. They started fighting because that no-slave mandate was going to be imposed on them by the federal government. It's not like slave owners in Florida wanted to go to war to impose slavery on Pennsylvania or whatever, which is more what you would see if the war was only over slavery.
At the same time, it isn't like the states were completely independent, and they already had handed over a handful of rights to the federal government. There are other ways that the federal government could've taken power over the state governments that would not have resulted in a civil war. So it is obvious that they cared enough about slavery specifically that they were willing to fight to protect it when they weren't willing to do so for other rights.
It is about states rights in the sense that slave owning states didn't care about imposing slavery anywhere else, they just wanted the ability to keep the institution. But it is about slavery specifically because they wouldn't have gone to fight over every other right they had against the federal government. You can't split them up.
Of course, the Southerners also did own slaves and were racist, so it's fair to criticize them along those lines. And they certainly did fight to protect slavery for themselves. But a nuanced view of the civil war demands that you view it as more complicated than some zealous crusade for slavery.
kirklennon@reddit
You're conflating two separate things. A primary loyalty to their individual state over country is different from fighting for state's rights. The former is more of a "my state, right or wrong" mentality, while the latter is a more legal/moralistic question.
The "state's rights" argument wasn't in any way notable at the time (and was completely contradictory to the Fugative Slave Act). It was an excuse pushed decades later by civil rights opponents.
ballrus_walsack@reddit
Sure... States rights to allow people to own other people.
LeResist@reddit
Dude it's states rights to own slaves. In the confederate states' declaration of secession they explicitly mention slavery as their driving motive
MyUsername2459@reddit
I always find it amusing when Confederate sympathizers drag out the "States rights" argument.
I always respond with the Cornerstone Speech, where the Vice President of the CSA says the entire point of the Confederacy was to present slavery and white supremacy. The actual VP of the CSA, saying in 1861 at its founding, that the Confederacy was founded entirely on the concept of perpetually enforcing servitude of black people to white people.
I've actually had Confederate defenders online try to argue that he didn't know what he was talking about and wasn't authorized to speak on behalf of the CSA. . .that the Vice President, who was a founder of the CSA, it's #2 person, and was giving a speech he hoped would go down in history as the big "why we did it" speech. . .was somehow wrong, but random folks on the Internet shouting "States Rights!!!" are right instead.
Figgler@reddit
If I remember correctly what you’re saying was actually spelled out explicitly in the constitution of the CSA as well.
G00dSh0tJans0n@reddit
That is true, and many were motivated by ideology. A lot were also conscripted including a lot of those too poor to pay for someone else to go in their place, and "fresh off the boat" immigrants. There were the NYC draft riots which lead to the deaths of up to 120 people.
Bawstahn123@reddit
Interesting semi-related Revolutionary War fact: the Continental Army had a similar percentage of African-American members, and the Continental Army was in fact the most racially-integrated American military force until official de-segregation in the 1940s.
Far too many movies and other examples of media about the Revolutionary War portray it as some lily-white affair. One of the militiamen wounded at Lexington was Black, Native Americans fought at Bunker Hill, the 1st Rhode Island held the line at Newport, the Stockbridge Militia were critical for Scouting and reconnaissance roles in the early war.
Their stories deserve to be told, but sadly I'm unsure if that would go over well in the modern day.
11twofour@reddit
Do you happen to know what that would be percentage wise? I'd think the free Black population of the North would have been under 10% at that time.
Standard-Nebula1204@reddit
The vast majority of black soldiers were what became known as ‘contrabands,’ captured from confederate camps, or else they ‘self emancipated’ by fleeing and joining up at a union recruiting station. Most were not freedmen at the start of the war.
eyetracker@reddit
Most were from the south and recently freed. There was resistance to making black units until after the Empancipation Proclamation in 1863. New Orleans was captured quite early in the war, while other territories were contested but had periods where people could escape. Plus all the non-soldier freedmen like those that followed Sherman around.
G00dSh0tJans0n@reddit
Not sure but here’s the source for that number:
By the end of the Civil War, roughly 179,000 black men (10% of the Union Army) served as soldiers in the U.S. Army and another 19,000 served in the Navy. https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/blacks-civil-war
No-Conversation1940@reddit
I grew up in a border region of a border state, and the 1860 election results county by county there are very funny in a mildly dark way.
The only candidate who didn't receive substantial votes was Lincoln - the threat of southern secession was taken seriously. Again, border region of a border state, so if fighting broke out, out there it would be neighbor vs neighbor, and it was, and resentments lingered long after the war and often led to violence.
health__insurance@reddit
Jesus, Tiktok communists are even trying to erase slavery from the US Civil War now? The left is so irreparably broken.
spam__likely@reddit
the fuck you are talking about?
health__insurance@reddit
Hey buddy, the Civil War was about slavery. Anyone pushing "the Civil War was ackshually about something else" is pushing some very evil propaganda at you.
spam__likely@reddit
lol...buddy... I am not disputing that part.
health__insurance@reddit
Ok. You might need to go grab your caretaker to help you understand this next part.
OP heard this very evil propaganda and is wondering if it's true. You acknowledge that it's not true.
Now here's where your caretaker can help you.
OP heard this evil propaganda somewhere. And it wasn't from the political right. Think about how this connects to my original point.
spam__likely@reddit
LMAO
LeResist@reddit
Why would you assume OP is on the left? You're making an assumption based off nothing info
health__insurance@reddit
OP may or may not be on the left, but erasing slavery from the Civil War because muh rich man is classic far left claptrap.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
You can talk about slavery all day.
I was specifically asking about individual soldiers intentions. If you think that many individual Union soldiers went to war to protect black men..... forgive me for having skepticism.
People are allowed to ask questions. If a question from a stranger on reddit is "erasing racism" ... you have a much bigger problem on your hNds
LeResist@reddit
Yeah I'm pretty sure the right is the side that's known for being racist but ok
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Yeah i'm definitely not a leftist as my primary partisan lean is an emphasis on states' rights but let that person rant & rave
That type of narrative is never fruitful & I was specifically seeking out answers from objectively enlightened people.
Kellaniax@reddit
They meant that the confederacy was enlisting people to fight for rich people, since only rich people owned slaves.
Also, how do you know OP is a communist or even a leftist?
health__insurance@reddit
OP wrote "American soldiers", not "Confederate soldiers" for one.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Why the hell would that make me a leftist?
anneofgraygardens@reddit
oh you know those leftists, always trying to whitewash racism.
Suitable_Tomorrow_71@reddit
People have been trying to whitewash the Civil War being about states' rights at least since I was a kid, probably longer than that. I remember learning in 2nd grade that the Confederacy was fighting for states' rights. What SOMEHOW got left out was the fact that the right they were concerned with was the right to keep other human beings as property.
anneofgraygardens@reddit
This is called the lost cause. It's right-wing progaganda that has been around since pretty much as soon as the war ended.
health__insurance@reddit
Yes.
The far right wants to erase slavery from the Civil War by using "states rights" or other hogwash. The far left wants to erase slavery from the Civil War by using "muh rich people" or other hogwash.
albertnormandy@reddit
This a very tricky question.
The average northern soldier did not enlist to end slavery. Lincoln had to tiptoe around making a war of abolition for fear of alienating his soldiers. He fired Fremont because he tried to go rogue on abolition. They fought to put down the secessionists.
The average southern soldier did not enlist just for the fun of it. They were worried about a northern invasion, destroying farms and infrastructure as well as starting a slave revolt.
DagothUr_MD@reddit
Didn't Lincoln give a whole inaugural speech about how every drop of blood drawn by the lash would be repaid in kind with blood spilled by saber (or something like that). Doesn't sound very tip-toe to me
213737isPrime@reddit
Racism was pretty endemic in the North too. Just maybe less so than in the South.
albertnormandy@reddit
The North didn’t have millions of slaves to figure out what to do with either. Even after the war the North struggled to figure it out. They were the dog that caught the car.
spam__likely@reddit
Well, we finally figured it out now! Call them all DEI hires no matter how successful,or welfare quens, and send them to prison in droves.
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
The big fear was all the ex slaves would flood the job market.
Otherwise-OhWell@reddit
It's really complicated.
Battle Cry of Freedom by James McPereson is the best book I've read about the ACW and it does touch on the shifting motives and morale of the soldiers on each side, quite a bit.
IndomitableAnyBeth@reddit
I only really know about deeply divided states, not "most soldiers". During the Civil War, East Tennessee was under occupation by the state militia. An ancestor of mine lived in Cades Cove in a Tennessee county that borders North Carolina. Raids were common. Confederates attacked the town to kill or capture all the men of fighting age. Mine kin was captured but escaped a few days later to join a regiment in the North. He knew the war was about slavery, whether it should exist and whether it should give anywhere the right to secede. Story is he wanted to run away north to fight earlier (probably more over secession and the border raids than anything else), but his father asked him to stay and help feed the family. He fought because the other side took him away from home and killed a good percentage of those remaining in his town. He couldn't go home, he wouldn't fight for the Confederacy, and you do whatever you can not to die in jail... so he escaped and joined the other side quick as could be.
Purbl_Dergn@reddit
It wasn't a rich man's war, it was deeply ideological. Yes we had the draft riots and you could pay your way out of the draft but we all know exactly what it was about. There's reams of history you can look at if you put your mind to it and really want to know the nitty gritty. Asking online on a reddit thread is not exactly the best place to come for actual history.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
I understand what you're saying, but there simply aren't many history books that uses the same modern day Laymans terms that the Internet uses. I don't think there's anything wrong with asking the Internet, so long as you use discernment.
Purbl_Dergn@reddit
Yeah that's a fair assessment, we used to get a good dose of education on it in school but I haven't been in a classroom since 2009. Just be aware that there are plenty of people that posit things as fact when they are not on here.
Arleare13@reddit
I think somewhere like r/AskHistorians might be more appropriate for this.
I don't know, was a fight over slavery and the preservation of the country a "rich man's war?"
SimpleAd1604@reddit
Shelby Foote said (in Ken Burns’ Civil War) that if you asked a southern soldier why they were fighting, the answer was, “because you’re down here.”
Odd-Help-4293@reddit
Which is a ridiculous thing for the side that started it to say
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
Would they have started it if the north was willing to let them leave
Little_Whippie@reddit
The slavers fired the first shots
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
Cuz the northerners were totally fine with them leaving
Odd-Help-4293@reddit
The South left months before they launched an attack on Fort Sumter.
Bawstahn123@reddit
Shelby Foote was also a suspected Neo-Confederate, so take his glazing of the Confederacy/Confederates with a jaundiced eye
kirkaracha@reddit
Including Antietam and Gettysburg?
Available_Resist_945@reddit
I cannot recommend that series enough. It should be required viewing for all AP History classes
FrontAd9873@reddit
A fight over slavery is a fight over the interests of the rich, since rich people were the ones who owned Slaves, no?
Arleare13@reddit
I think I said exactly that, didn't I?
FrontAd9873@reddit
You said "maybe." I guess I was just agreeing with and saying "yeah, definitely!"
flp_ndrox@reddit
It became a "poor man's fight" when you could hire a substitute if you got drafted. One of the reasons y'all had riots about it in NYC at the time.
TheBlazingFire123@reddit
In what world was it a rich man’s war?
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Many wars can be seen as a rich man's war, in theory. Especially from the modern American perspective. :)
tacobellgittcard@reddit
US politics were super regional back then. Being a southerner or a northerner was a way bigger deal. I mean look at the 1860 election results. Split right down the middle
TheBlazingFire123@reddit
I mean some were drafted
Tommy_Wisseau_burner@reddit
That’s not why people fought in the civil war, or “fighting for rich people” is not the reason the civil war was started or fought over
FrontAd9873@reddit
The Civil War was fought because of slavery. Slave owners were the individuals most invested in maintaining slavery. Slave owners were rich. Of course, Confederates were not Americans, but if you overlook that minor detail, it is fair to say that (some) American soldiers in the Civil War were fighting for (in the interests of) rich people.
Is there something wrong with this analysis?
You can make other arguments for how Union soldiers were fighting "for" rich people but the connections (IMO) would be more tenuous.
albertnormandy@reddit
According to Lincoln confederates were never not Americans.
FrontAd9873@reddit
I’m aware
Kellaniax@reddit
The confederates were absolutely fighting for rich people, since they were the only ones who owned slaves. Americans were fighting to preserve the Union and eventually to end slavery.
sweet_hedgehog_23@reddit
About 1 in 3 households in Southern states owned slaves. While it may not be the majority, it also was not a small segment of the population that had a vested interest in slavery.
Kellaniax@reddit
Most people weren't landowners in that time or now, and most soldiers were poor. It was absolutely a situation of the poor being propagandized by the rich to fight for them.
sweet_hedgehog_23@reddit
About 65% of American households live in owner occupied houses now, and with over 83% of those being detached homes that would indicate that the majority of households are "landowners". Although that isn't really relevant. One did not have to be a landowner to own a slave and only considering the heads of households or large land owners is misleading about how pervasive slavery was in the South. Even if one didn't own a slave one could also rent one from a slave owner and therefore would benefit from slavery.
One study found that around 1 in 4 of the 1861 volunteers in the future Army of Northern Virginia lived in households that owned slaves. Even if a soldier didn't personally own slaves that doesn't mean they didn't support the cause of slavery or that the didn't aspire or dream of one day owning a slave.
EntrepreneurNo4138@reddit
Confederates were NOT the only slave owners. Go back to your history books. It’s not that simple.
judgingA-holes@reddit
I was also wondering where the "fighting for rich people" came from....
shelwood46@reddit
I guess maybe on one side, but that side had explicitly declared they were not Americans.
Tommy_Wisseau_burner@reddit
The idea of nationality is a lot different today than pre civil war. People identified with their states more than the US. The concept of “American” was there, but wasn’t nearly as universal as today, hence the idea of states rights vs federal government
shelwood46@reddit
The CSA seceded. Those states publicly declared they were no longer part of the United States of America. They were not Americans at that point. I know current people with history going back to then want to say they were still Americans, but they literally said they were not, and made war *on* America. It's convenient to rewrite history since they lost and ended up rejoining, but what happened happened.
kirkaracha@reddit
To respect their wishes, I usually say the Civil War was between the Confederates and the Americans.
Subject_Stand_7901@reddit
You can read it from the POV that The South was fighting to maintain the institution of slavery, which mostly benefitted wealthy land owners. This is an interesting article on it (though it's a bit old) apparently Slavery was so profitable that in created more millionaires per capita in the Mississippi valley than anywhere else in the nation. https://www.history.com/articles/slavery-profitable-southern-economy
gravelpi@reddit
Kinda. Something like 5% of households owned slaves, presumably most of those affluent enough to afford it. It's not hard to imagine poor whites fighting in the war received little benefit from slavery.
But no one was confused what the war was about.
AdPsychological790@reddit
Actually more recent studies suggest it was up to 20-25 % owned slaves. Not to mention people who made money as past of the system: mill owners. Blacksmiths who made chains. People who gave room and board to slave transporters. People who rented slaves from slave owners, etc
gravelpi@reddit
I saw the Duke one. That one got to \~5%, but then extrapolated that out to 30% by assuming there were that was the head of household and they had \~6 people in the house that benefited from the slaves. Valid, although if we're talking about fighting only that head of household and of-age sons would have been on the hook to go fight.
sweet_hedgehog_23@reddit
From what I have found in most of the Confederate states it was between 25 and 50% of households/families that owned slaves in 1850. The 5% number is the heads of household that are listed as slave holders, but that number doesn't take into account the spouses or children in those households that benefited from slavery.
CalmRip@reddit
If you haven't yet done a Google search, look for "US civil war conscription" and "paid proxies" within the results.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Reading up on Civil War conscription and paid proxies is my next plan of action lol. I wasn't familiar with those concepts before this post.
ButterscotchJade2025@reddit
Could ask this of any war ever fought by anyone.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Yes & my build-up for the question was thinking about how many soldiers we send to foreign soils that are hardly talked about in America. I was wondering if it was different for Civil War soldiers fighting on domestic soil
gakash@reddit
There's no "right" answer. The truth is people fought for different reasons.
In the South, some people fought to preserve Slavery.
Some people fought because at the time people identify more with the state than the country, it's still true like this today for a lot of people. If someone asks me where I'm from I'm probably saying New York, not United States.
Some thought it was gonna be quick and wanted glory and adventure.
Some were conscripted
Some were slaves and had no choice.
--------------------------
In the North, much the same thing happened.
Some people fought to end Slavery.
Some people fought to preserve the Union.
Some people thought it was gonna be quick and wanted glory and adventure.
Some were conscripted (Especially newly arrived immigrants who often went fresh off the boat into the Union Army)
=====================
While Soliders intentions varied by the soldier what's not up for debate is WHY the war was being fought. The south made it very clear in their articles of secession that it was to preserve slavery. This states rights mumbo jumbo is something you'll find all over but that was a campaign from former confederates and their descendents to try and make the war about something more noble than slavery as opinions turned to how disgusting it was half the country fought for slaves. It's called the Lost Cause campaign, it has been effective propaganda but It is in fact, wrong.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
The nuance of it all kind of is what led me to this question.
I'm also a New Yorker, and I think that's why I have a hard time wrapping my head around a bunch of New Yorkers going to Virginia to fight for their land.
I can see some northerners going to war over slavery, I just find it curious that they had an entire army of northerners, especially given that racism wasn't necessarily absent from the north in the years that followed
gakash@reddit
A couple more things to keep in mind, Slavery, for many, was a moral argument rather than a political one. Morals are tied to Religion, less so now, but back then almost completely. A lot of people in the North were against Slavery not becaused they believed black people to be equal but because they believed Slavery was wrong in the eyes of God.
I have no doubt that some viewed fighting for abolition as more of a Crusade than anything else.
Another reason was the South shot first. The confederacy attacked fort sumter. Keep in mind that it wasn't like these animosities between North and South were new. They had been developing over the last 40 years at this point.
And you're absolutely right, the north isn't some magically racism free zone.
In the beginning, the war was treated like a joke. The first battle (Bull Run, AKA Manassas) had SPECTATORS. It's nickname is the "picnic battle" Literally people came out to watch it from the sidelines. A LOT of people joined cuz war was glorious and this war was gonna be a joke and over before it began. A sobering realization was made that day I'm afraid.
leonchase@reddit
I wish I could answer this definitively. I had several direct ancestors who fought on the Union side, in several major battles, and if I could time travel, my two biggest questions would be, "How much did you know about what was going on? And what did you feel like you were fighting for?"
I can tell you that I was able to find a photo online of an original recruitment poster from one of my relative's regiments in Indiana. It's interesting that there is nothing in it about slavery or preservation of the Union. It's all about how the Southern rebels are advancing through Kentucky, and your town (and by association, family) could be next. So basically, good old immediate fear tactics. But I would love to know how the men who signed up actually felt about it all.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Yeah, I've had ancestors who fought in the war - presumably Union bc they were New Yorkers - but this was never a story that was passed down, in the way these stories seemed to be passed down in families who descended from Confederate soldiers.
It seems like Southerners are more well-versed in why their ancestors fought vs Northerners
baddspellar@reddit
Everyone who joins the military in wartime has a reason.
*All* secession statements declared preservation of slavery as a fundamental reason. But most southerners were not slaveholders, and the secession statements offered enough other grievances to stir almost anyone to enlist. See https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/declaration-causes-seceding-states for examples. Northerners were primarily enlisting to preserve the union, but I'm sure there were plenty of other personal reasons. I suspect many of the black regiments had volunteers whose primary motivation was abolition of slavery.
Was it a "rich man's war"? I don't think that's a fair characterization. It was started by politicians and other in power, and powerful people tend to have money. But it's normally the powerful who start wars anyway, because they can.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
As an American, I use the term "rich man's war," because we're often involved in & fight wars that don't actually affect the average American on an emotional level.
I wasn't trying to indicate that it was a rich man's war and I'm sorry if that's how it came across. I was literally asking if that's what it was or if soldiers were genuinely passionate about their reasons for fighting.
ReadinII@reddit
They understood why they were fighting but at least in the South they were tricked into fighting a rich man’s war.
The reason southerners fought was a mixed of defending slavery and repelling invasion, but repelling invasion is obviously going to be your primary reason for fighting when your homeland is invaded.
But why was their homeland invaded? Indirectly because the rich people wanted to keep their slaves and secede seceded for that purpose. The South seceded to defend slavery. The North invaded to recapture the territories that had seceded. The soldiers fought because the North invaded.
The rich people’s secession to keep their slaves expectedly left to the war that the poor soldiers fought in to defend their homes.
For the North it was a lot clearer. Soldiers knew they were fighting to recapture a former part of their country that had seceded. There were a few Northerners who had a more noble goal of ending slavery, but as Lincoln made clear the North’s primary purpose for invading was simply to re-assert control over the South and the soldiers knew and largely agreed with that goal.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Going to war to defend your territory is something that I can understand a soldier being passionate about. Going to war because you want your government to have another guy's territory just seems like a harder sell.
I can't make sense of the Union Army convincing that many soldiers to go to war because a different part of the country was doing their own thing.
Were northerners really that passionate about ending slavery? It's beautiful in theory but it doesn't seem wholly believable due to continued racism in the north post-slavery. (But i'm not a historian)
ReadinII@reddit
No. A few radicals were. But while slavery didn’t enjoy popular support in the North it wasn’t an important issue to most people.
Just like the South came up with states rights as a later justification for the secession, the North came up with slavery as later justification for the invasion. Ending slavery was a fortunate product of the invasion, but it wasn’t the reason for the invasion.
It’s an easier sell when the other guy’s territory was very recently part of your own. Even after 80 or 130 years (depending on whether you count the 4 years from 1945 to 1949) the sale can still be done though. Look at the widespread support in the PRC for conquering Taiwan in the name of China.
But you are right that it wasn’t always an easy sell. Another commenter mentioned the draft riots in New York by recent immigrants.
And a draft was necessary even at a time when most Americans knew very little of war and certainly didn’t have it on their TV screens. And there were a lot of desertions.
inbigtreble30@reddit
I always recommend r/AskHistorians for in-depth questions like this, especially if you are tired of wading through political and jokey responses on other subs.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Thank you! I think I tried to find this but I typed in "AskAHistorian" and the group didn't have enough members. That is the subreddit I wanted to post on lol
DrGerbal@reddit
It was a rich man’s war over slavery. But all confederate soldiers were not fighting to preserve slavery. They were fighting for their home. I’m against the confederacy, against the idea of flying the flag because of what it overall stood for. But the soldiers that died were not bad. Just doing what they thought was right. But we’re just pawns in a rich man’s game
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
What does that mean "fighting for their home"? In what way was the Union threatening their home?
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
Dude are you serious? The Union looted and burned extensive swathes of the south, and were waging an offensive war.
kateinoly@reddit
Are you serious?
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
I've actually studied the history beyond elementary school and reddit comments. If you have an actual counter arguement beyond "fort sumter" please share it.
Little_Whippie@reddit
You don't need a counter argument beyond Sumter because Sumter was the start of the war, when the slavers and traitors opened fire on a Union owned fort
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
The South Carolina militia, not the Confederate army opened fire on the fort, and that was after weeks of demands and negotiations. Lincoln made the decision to militarily invade the entire south in response, in fact, this was what prompted four more states to secede.
kateinoly@reddit
And the other states seceded and joined the way. War is a bitch.
Little_Whippie@reddit
The South Carolina militia was aligned with the traitor movement, and they opened fire without provocation on a union fort. Lincoln invaded to crush the rebellion which started the war so they could continue to own human beings, as he was right to do
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
I'm not debating that Lincoln was right to start the war, but I'm glad we can both agree it was more complicated than just "Fort Sumter" :)
Little_Whippie@reddit
Lincoln responded to the Confederates starting the war
NomadLexicon@reddit
Confederate recruitment and preventing desertion became more difficult, not easier in the later stages of the war after Northern troops began moving beyond the border states and campaigning through large swathes of Southern territory. Sherman’s March to the Sea didn’t inspire Southern patriotism so much as break confederate morale.
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
After the war already started. I'm talking about before.
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
Thats debatable, and most confederate soldiers did not join until *after* the war started
Little_Whippie@reddit
It's not debatable, the traitors started the war
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
Reddit understanding of history.
Little_Whippie@reddit
College actually, explain how I’m wrong
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
So they started the war with zero soldiers? Again, it seems like you're dodging the question. Why would these men go to war in the first place against the Union to "fight for their home"?
RoyalWabwy0430@reddit
Do you know what "most" means? Is English your primary language?
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
OK. The soldiers who joined at the very beginning, in what way were they "fighting for their homes"?
albertnormandy@reddit
Everywhere the Union army went they destroyed infrastructure and raided farms for supplies. Courthouses all over the south were torched, erasing irreplaceable records of all types.
EntrepreneurNo4138@reddit
Sherman tore the South apart. He did exactly what they feared. That’s why the poor fought to keep what little they had.
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
Yes, that's how war works. I'm talking about why they joined the war to begin with.
albertnormandy@reddit
Because they knew those things would happen…?
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
"Let's start a war that will cause the destruction of our homes, then we'll go fight for our homes."
That does not explain anything.
albertnormandy@reddit
I thought you were asking in good faith but now I see you’re not. Not interested in an internet zinger battle. Goodbye.
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
You didn't answer in good faith in the first place. Perhaps because you know perfectly well they weren't "fighting for their homes", they were fighting to uphold the system of slavery. Even if they didn't own slaves themselves, it was aspirational and they hoped to someday be able to own them themselves.
albertnormandy@reddit
That’s a huge assumption to make. But if it helps you boil complex issues down into simple comic book themes of good and evil who am I to judge?
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
It's not an assumption. You can read the Declaration of Causes and see exactly why the war was declared in the first place. It's explicit.
albertnormandy@reddit
Nowhere in those causes does it say “We southerners are a hivemind and literally all of us aspire to own slaves and therefore every action we take is towards that end”
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
When you go to war and are willing to give your life for a cause, it's reasonable to assume that you do, in fact, believe in that cause.
albertnormandy@reddit
Like I said, comic book world.
Forsaken_Distance777@reddit
Georgia still hates general Sherman for burning his way to Atlanta. That happened to everyone no matter what they supported.
yourlittlebirdie@reddit
The March to the Sea was in 1864, three years after the start of the war.
How did the Union threaten the South before the war began? No one seems able to answer this question.
Forsaken_Distance777@reddit
Well aside from the fact they were all worried that Lincoln would end slavery (which only directly impacted a small percentage but being socially better off than slaves was vital for the self- image of the poorest white people) the most legitimate reason that I see was that Lincoln wasn't even on the ballot in all the Southern states. He won no southern states. He still won.
That's a pretty clear sign that the balance of power was gone and that the interests of the north would carry the day. The south was lacking in political power.
Granted the main reason they were concerned about that was because they'd been fighting over the expansion of slavery for decades at this point but even if that were off the table being shown that you lack a significant political voice like that is dangerous.
AdPsychological790@reddit
Sounds like an excuse the kremlin would give per Ukraine. "Those damnded Ukrainians are killing our precious Russian sons who are just protecting Russian land..."
LeResist@reddit
No they were all bad. It doesn't matter why you joined the confederate army. Ar the end of the day they still sacrificed their LIFE to preserve slavery. My question to you, do you think members of ISIS who joined the cause because of financial reasons instead of violent reasons are not bad? By your logic they are just a pawn of a rich man's game so they are innocent
Avery_Thorn@reddit
While there is a strong narrative about loyalty to the state that they were from, it is a little bit dangerous to say that the average rank and file didn't care about slavery. While there is a lot of writing after the war about loyalty to a lost cause and a lost way of life, the letters from the soldiers earlier in the war are about "preserving the way of life" and "maintaining the natural order".
It is hard to tell how much of it is justification after the fact for a cause that they are embarrassed to have supported, a polite lie told to allow reunification and reintegration, versus the actual reasons in the moment.
SeaworthinessIll4478@reddit
Maybe not all, but don't you think a lot of poor whites were willing to fight to preserve the institution of slavery as an underclass of society that they could hold themselves above? Wouldn't everything whites did in the 100 years after the war suggest this?
mysecondaccountanon@reddit
They were "fighting for their home..."'s ability to have slavery. Like c'mon. The Confederates (and their armies) explicitly fought to preserve the institution of slavery. Have you ever read any of the Ordinances of Secession? And many of the soldiers did seemingly know exactly what they were fighting for if you read their letters (A good resource for this is James McPherson's What They Fought For, 1861-1865, review here).
FrontAd9873@reddit
I think you mean
dangleicious13@reddit
~1/3 of the Confederate soldiers were from slave owning families.
PinkyTheChicagoCat@reddit
There’s a good book about this “what this cruel war was fought over” easy read and insightful.
My takeaway- it was nuanced, but the overarching reason was slavery, but not always.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Thank you for the book! Saving it now
jessek@reddit
From the Battle Hymn of the Republic: “As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free”
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Well, i gotta admit, that is beautiful
Dbgb4@reddit
You wish for an objective perspective, yet you start with "tricked fighting a rich man's war", which is definitely not an objective perspective.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Many wars are a rich man's war. That is the objective perspective. I was simply asking if this was also a rich man's war. Obviously from a place of ignorance, hence the question.
datsyukianleeks@reddit
In a sense every war is a rich man's war and those who fight are all just fodder. But that aside, this was a very ideological war. If you look at events that preceded the war out in the newly added plains states and western territories, specifically those that centered on the bleeding Kansas period, you can see this was a grassroots fight at its core. And in the border states where most of the fighting happened, it likely was brother vs brother, cousin vs cousin. However as the fight went on and death tolls mounted, conscription of newly arrived immigrants right off the docks in New York was a real thing that happened. You can see this and the fallout depicted (rather bombastically and hyperbolically) in the Scorcese film gangs of New York. You can also bet that in the south it wasn't the landed gentry doing the fighting, so there was a lot of propagandizing needed to brainwash people into thinking the fight was about something other than slavery. The impacts of this are still clearly apparent today within southern society (and some...special - for lack of a better word - rural northerners).
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
I didn't realize many northern soldiers were results of conscription. That makes a lot of sense. That is very sad.
I've spent my whole life telling people I've never seen Gangs of NY (as a new yorker lol) & I'm really pressed to watch it now
nowthatswhat@reddit
Suppose someone told you that someone else was coming to invade you, they were going to march through your home, eat your food, burn your land, etc. wouldn’t that alone be enough to get a lot of people to fight for you? Reasons and politics aside, that’s literally what was happening and what it looked like to many people in the south. So whether or not this was a fight for slaves you didn’t own, or some rich man’s politics you didn’t care about, many people would be perfectly willing to protect their home.
LocaCapone@reddit (OP)
Yeah, that makes sense. How about the Union soldiers & people further north who were essentially leaving their homes to fight?
nowthatswhat@reddit
A lot volunteered for the same reason, at the beginning of the war it was a bit less clear who would invade who.
FirefighterRude9219@reddit
Yes, for them it was all about whiskey. They knew that winning meant more whiskey. Simple but effective.
Particular-Cloud6659@reddit
It wasnt really a rich man's war for the North.
Sure, some people got wealthy from cotton but industries were pretty diverse up here.
It went drom 90% farmers, and then those farmers often had a side gig. Farm and make shoes, or blacksmith, or run a lodging house.
Those farmers started companies in all different industries.
People in the North had been pretty anti-slavery for a century.
We also had lots of new immigrants in the north who really couldnt care less about slavery. They'd just showed up from Ireland and all of a sudden had to go to war.
But there totally were young fathers that wrote home and said, I dont want to give my life for some Negro in Virginia.
In the South - yes. Poor White's did better after the war, but even saying aloud you were anti-slavery down there was dangerous. There had been anti-North propaganda for like 4 decades. It was important to discredit abolitionists and their crusades.
NomadLexicon@reddit
I agree that recent Irish immigrants were, very generally speaking, much more ambivalent about slavery. That said, the biggest immigrant group in the Union Army (Germans) were hostile to slavery and had been critical in securing Lincoln’s election victory in 1860. Even among those who settled in the South, German immigrants sided with the Union and resisted conscription.
bucketnebula@reddit
I wouldn't classify the Civil War as a "Rich man's fight". It was at least partially funded by wealthy landowners in the Confederate side of things, but the individual soldiers likely felt the same, and felt that their personal justification for the war was worth dying for. Civil wars aren't typically something wealthy people seek out.
As far as the ideology of each soldier, I'm sure some massive propaganda was present on both sides, and local leaders would've tried painting the other side as bad guys.
Maybe just my northern take, but if a group of people were fighting my family for the right to own a human, you're God damn right I'd take up arms to stamp that shit out.
TaxRiteOff@reddit
In the south, yes.
In the north their was a lot of conscription and mercenaries.
kirkaracha@reddit
What This Cruel War Was Over: Soldiers, Slavery, and the Civil War
Joel_feila@reddit
Oh man this is not an easy answer.
If you can watch the whole series "checkmate Lincolnites" on YouTube. It will take hours but it does cover what soldiers belived and why they fought.
Tldw
For the north they often fought "to preserve the union" but their abolishists in the north that fought against slavery. And this ratio di change as the war went on
For the south. Well even the non slave owners still fought for slavery. Partly because if the because white supremacy was god's will or some other religious reason. Secondly for the economic reason of freed slaves would be competition for jobs.
I could literally go on n for pages and pages on both sides. But bpth sdes had strong beliefs and some of those were based on economy and other on relgion. Were the slave owners fighting to keep slaves, yes. Were regular confederates fight for the slave owners, yes. Was it purely a case of poor people fighting for the rich men, yesn't.
Kali-of-Amino@reddit
Southerner here. Many poor Southerners fought for their position on the social hierarchy. They thought it wasn't so bad being poor as long as slaves had less. During the Civil Rights Movement I saw their descendants literally frothing at the mouth for the same reason.
OldChairmanMiao@reddit
If you owned a slave, you were already on your way out of the working class. For many in the agrarian South, this was the best road out of having to do physical labor every day - so many dreamed of it, even if they never achieved it. Unlike the North, they didn't have the same opportunities to own capital other than slaves.
Like many people now, they were sold on a dream - whether realistic or not.
EmploymentEmpty5871@reddit
Wow, it's too bad they no longer teach history in school. For some families it was brother against brother, it was not uncommon for some family members to end up to be on opposite sides. Go study up on your history, visit the battle sights, read the letters that were written. You will learn way more than you ever will on this site.
geekteam6@reddit
There's a whole acclaimed book collecting letters by Union soldiers, tracking their growing moral awareness of slavery and making it the focus of why they fought:
Bluemonogi@reddit
I had ancestors who fought in the Civil War on the Union side. I didn’t know them but I think the reasoning behind the war was common knowledge. They were not tricked into fighting. I don’t think of the Civil War as a rich mans war.
I_Hate_Reddit_56@reddit
It was a poor man's war. Rich people paid poor people to take their draft spot
DeFiClark@reddit
If you mean, did individual soldiers have a sense of why they were fighting, then yes.
But that doesn’t mean that some weren’t tricked or conscripted into fighting.
Ken Burns’ landmark series The Civil War does a great job of quoting numerous soldiers’ letters and journals which reveal the wide range of motivations why soldiers enlisted.
Reasons ranged from abolitionist sentiment and preservation of the Union on the Northern side, to states’ rights, preservation of southern society with its white supremacy and the institution of slavery, and defense of home and family. Both sides, a sense of duty and honor also motivated soldiers.
None of these are an either/or thing; most soldiers’ reminiscences make it clear that that most had multiple reasons for fighting.
Affectionate-Lab2557@reddit
While a lot of people use it as an excuse to glorify the confederacy, the Civil War had a lot more reasons behind it than just slavery. Not every union soldier fought to free the slaves, some fought because they wanted to preserve the union. Not every confederate soldier fought to preserve slavery, some fought because they believed the north held too much power. Many men on both sides fought simply out of a sense of duty to their home state.
Yes, the Civil War was primarily caused by the North and South differing on slavery. Yes, some rich men paid lower class men to take their place. No, neither of these were the only reasons people fought.
SMSaltKing@reddit
Very much so
Slavery was a big issue for decades before the war. Any concept that the average Southern soldier was there without knowing what the cause was is pure lost cause-ism.
Sure, there can be a case made for state loyalty but that doesn't change the fact that the states left the union in defense of slavery.
albertnormandy@reddit
I think everyone knew that slavery was central to the war. That doesn’t mean every southerner woke up and decided “I am going to go fight for slavery today”.
SMSaltKing@reddit
That's not what I said.
I said the cause of the war was slavery, Southern soldiers were very aware of this. They may have signed up for states rights but they were very aware that the cause of succession was slavery.
albertnormandy@reddit
A lot of them signed up to protect their homes from looting and pillaging from Union Army. If you’re a poor southerner litigating the causes of the Civil War seem irrelevant when the only choice you have is to enlist and fight or let your home be burned.
wpotman@reddit
Sure: everyone at the time knew they were fighting over slavery and it's associated way of life. People have tried hard to obscure that since it ended (and not every soldier cared about the slavery issue) but there was a lot of enthusiasm for the war among soldiers...especially on the southern side.
Offi95@reddit
Rebels were very aware of the “rich man’s war, poor man’s fight” narrative. The argument is made that the vast majority didn’t personally own the slaves or plantations, and therefore their reasoning to fight was to protect from a “foreign invader” of their State….but much of their motivation to fight was based on their support for slavery and protecting it by their subhuman treatment of an “inferior race”
Conversely, the Union had a wider variety of motivation to fight that coalesced towards the end of the war. Initially men fought to preserve the Union…the belief that the Union was “indissoluble” and many were upset that it was changing to a war for the liberation of slaves instead. Irish men rioted in the streets of Manhattan for 3 days and lynched black people indiscriminately in protest to the drafting of poor Irish men (whom could not pay for a substitute) to fight in a bloody war for the liberation of slaves. The Irish hated black people who were competing with them for the low wage jobs in NYC, and forcing conscription to a conflict that was considered a stalemate was enough to stir the pot.
shthappens03250322@reddit
If you’re talking about trigger pullers, in many cases they were conscripted or volunteered out of fear of inevitable conscription.
Confederates soldiers in particular had a variety of reasons they were fighting. Rarely did you hear some poor trigger puller say, “I’m fighting so rich guys can own people.” The war was sold to them as an invasion. Remember, most of the war was fought in southern territory. Some thought they were defending their home, some were paid stand-ins, and some wanted adventure.
Enlisted men in any war have a variety of reasons they are there. Often it isn’t necessarily the reasons the war is happening.
YOUTUBEFREEKYOYO@reddit
I highly recommend checking out Atun-shei Films on YouTube, hes got a ton of great videos on the civil war, as well as other things. The series is recommended the most is "Checkmate, Lincolnites!" Which is a great way to answer a ton of questions about the war, and some modern reflections and arguments about subjects relating to it. It is told through skits, with an over arching story of sorts, so if that's not your thing, you may not like it. But it gives great info while making it entertaining. I don't know if your question specifically was answered off the top of my head, but I'm sure other similar questions were asked.
Tom_Slick_Racer@reddit
It is very hard to explain in a post on reddit how people were feeling, the good news is in the 1860s nearly every adult kept a diary and more importantly these have been digitized in their original form you can read the actual writing from a person during the civil war. People shared their thoughts, news about battles etc. You also get the opportunity to read from both sides of the war unfiltered from people who were there.
I'm helping a friend digitize his 3rd great grandmother's diary from Chattanooga TN, in September of 1963, the "Northern Aggressors" had invaded to change their way of life. The family was involved in shipping on the Tennessee River to New Orleans, I have not come up with details on that part of the family yet.
Ill_Illustrator_6097@reddit
Checkout the series "Hell on Wheels." Post civil war about the railroad, freed slaves and blue gray relationships..
MortimerDongle@reddit
Yes. US soldiers were aware they were fighting to preserve the union.
Abolitionist sentiment certainly existed in the US army but would not have been viewed as the primary reason for the war.
Cacafuego@reddit
By "history" do you mean r/askhistorians? This seems like exactly the kind of question they would like, and it's your best shot at a good answer.
My general impression as an American non-historian is that reasons varied from side to side, state to state, and person to person. I can readily see "rich man's war" as a description of the Confederate cause, not necessarily the Union, even though there as well, you had wealthy industrialists dependent on raw goods from the South. While slavery was THE issue, people seem to have described protecting their way of life, protecting their homeland, state's rights, preservation of the union, money, conscription, etc. There were some states, like Kansas, where the violence was so personal and intense that vendetta and hatred were probably common reasons to take up arms.
So, as with any war, there were many interests, many reasons, many ways to influence or compel service. If you think the Civil War was about one issue, that doesn't necessarily invalidate a soldier's personal motives. It doesn't mean they were fed (or that they believed) misinformation, although propaganda was rampant.
storywardenattack@reddit
lol they marched into battle singing “John Brown’s body “. It was pretty well understood.
throwawaydanc3rrr@reddit
Yes, but not the reasons you were taught.
Politics of the day was much more State focused and not Federal on its scope.
The Union was fighting to preserve the Union. It was NOT about ending slavery. It was not until the war dragged on that the North wanted to punish the South, and destroying Slavery-the economic engine of the South- became an ancillary goal.
The Southern soldiers often signed up to fight because their neighbor was attacked, or for glory, or for Virginia.
Billthepony123@reddit
What do you mean by fighting for the rich ?
Repulsive_Ad_656@reddit
Only 6 percent of the two million Northern soldiers were conscripts. Source: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA326566.pdf
kateinoly@reddit
I'd say most of the Confederate soldiers didn't own slaves and were sold some bill of goods about state's rights and black people taking their rights away/raping their women.
Flat-Yellow5675@reddit
North Carolina has UNC. The one most peiole think of is UNC Chapel Hill - very good school, considered a public Ivy. But there is also YNC Greensboro and UNC Charlotte.
Vexonte@reddit
Wars are massive endeavors with several overlapping and contradicting incentives that could convince an individual to join the fight.
Ideology, state or national loyalty, access to meal and money, social advancements, economic interests tied to war outcome, pressgang, not wanting a foreign army to rip through your home town, brining shame on your family if you don't enlist, following someone else onto the battlefield. Alot of immigrants joined to get social acceptance.
Ule24@reddit
There wasn’t much doubt on either side. Motivations were pretty clear.
Chandra_in_Swati@reddit
r/askhistorians had a thread about this around five months ago. It’s got some really great answers:
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/1gi7mcs/were_there_any_confederate_soldiers_who_felt_as/
andmewithoutmytowel@reddit
Look into contemporary accounts of the time. You may be particularly interested in "Blue-Eyed Child of Fortune: The Civil War Letters of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw"
Kellaniax@reddit
Americans were fighting to preserve the Union and the confederates were fighting to preserve slavery.
ButterscotchJade2025@reddit
https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/civil-war-journals-diaries-and-memoirs/ This may help
dazzleox@reddit
It wasn't a "rich man's war"? Do you mean World War 1?
Anyway, my German American immigrant ancestors very much knew why they were fighting. They likely volunteered and were active in abolitionist German language newspaper writing.
Clarenceboddickerfan@reddit
Yes. It was 1860, not 2500 bc. Literacy rates hovered between 70-90% and newspapers were widespread. Everyone knew what it was about.