The myth exists that the Confederate Army was a sea of lily-white Protestant faces with
an occasional black "body servant." The truth is something far different.
The Confederate Army had more than 10,000 Native American soldiers from more than
two-dozen tribes, including Cherokee Brigadier General Stand Watie. There were more than
5000 Hispanic Confederates and some, like Col. Ambrosio Gonzales and Loretta Velazquez,
even came from Cuba. Nearly 3,500 Jewish Confederates lent their service and were among
the last to die for the South. Foreigners from many countries served as officers and
enlisted men, including Filipino soldiers out of New Orleans. The 10th Louisiana
Infantry was known as "Lee's Foreign Legion" and there was an all-Polish cavalry unit.
According to the federal census reports in 1860, 4 million blacks lived in the
southern states at the out break of the war. 261,988 were free men. The great majority
of these blacks remained in the South during the war and supported the Confederacy by
growing food and making war supplies. Black Southerners, slave and free, were servants,
clerks, hospital orderlies, wagon drivers, and engineer labor forces, but were also
chaplains, scouts, foragers, combat soldiers, and feared sharpshooters. Records have
been deliberately altered and facts suppressed by the Federal government but estimates
of black confederates on the battlefield range from 10,000-50,000. They
served willingly and they died in Union P.O.W. camps rather than take the Union oath
of loyalty. Together with Southerners descended from waves of Irish, Scottish, and
German immigrants, the Confederate Army stood as a group of men whose only qualification
was, "Will you fight?"
Links For Further Information:
Jewish Confederates
More Than 10,000 Jews Fought For The Confederacy
Hispanic Confederates
Stealth Fighter
The American Indian And Their Role In The War Between The States
Stand Watie's "Iron Cross" Re-Dedication
Jewish Confederate
Warriors
Confederate Braves
A Lost Cause, But An Honorable One
The Last Order Of The Confederacy
Who Was Sir Moses J. Ezekiel
Bourbon Soldiers
Stand Watie And The
Confederate Indians
Click Here to see printed items featuring Diverse Confederates.
