The month of December 1860, was without a doubt one of the more consequential thus far. Aside from the radical policies that were born during the session of that month, and the military intrigues and maneuvering, Lincoln had to deal with foreign problems and a conservative reaction. In the first instance, John Bull seemed ready to join the war in the Confederate side, thus securing the end of the United States. As for the later, an old foe came back to haunt him: none other than Stephen A. Douglas, the Little Giant himself.
Douglas had pledged to support Lincoln in order to preserve the Union; he had never intended to support a Republican war for Abolitionist goals. Lincoln had been careful to keep the war from being seen as that, and thus did everything he could to rally support from the former Democrats, most of whom had now flocked to Douglas’ National Union and were now calling themselves “National Unionists”, “Continentals” (due to fighting for freedom) or “Chesnuts” (see below). Lincoln had commissioned National Unionists as commanders and tried to maintain the war as one for Union alone, but that was not enough, and both Douglas and he knew that it was quickly taking another different, more radical turn.
Douglas could not allow this. His rivalry with Lincoln had by then become legendary. Lincoln always mistrusted Douglas, and always suspected that the former Senator was secretly working to split the Republicans. For his part, Douglas recognized (privately) that Lincoln was “the most difficult and dangerous opponent that I have ever met.” They met for the first-time during Lincoln’s days at the Illinois State Legislature. Afterwards, Lincoln only won a term to Congress, where his only notable contribution was a speech against Polk and the Mexican War that earned him the scold of his constituents and the embarrassing nickname of “Spotty Lincoln” —which Douglas, of course, liked to use. For his part, Douglas went to the Senate and became a statesman of national reputation. Lincoln could not help but feel envious and bitter at times. “With me, the race of ambition has been a failure—a flat failure; with him [Douglas] it has been one of splendid success,” he said once, for instance.
Lincoln and Douglas faced each other for the first time after the debacle of Kansas-Nebraska had killed off the Whig Party and led to the rise of anti-Nebraska coalitions through the Union, including Illinois. Douglas feverishly toured the state, defending the bill; Lincoln followed him, attacking it. In one memorable occasion, Douglas gave a speech before the Legislature. When he had finished, Lincoln rose up from his chair and said that he would give a retort the next day, and invited Douglas to attend and defend himself if he so wished. The next day, Lincoln gave his response, Douglas sitting in the front row. At first, he had planned to not retort, but Lincoln’s remarks so incensed him that he shouted angry replies.
They would face each other in a proper debate in 1856. They held four debates in the 1856 campaign, and ultimately Frémont carried the state. It was then that Douglas stopped seeing Lincoln as a mere nuisance, and recognized him as a true opponent. As for Lincoln, he had often retorted to Douglas in his two years in the Senate, and his suspicions only increased. The Prairie Lawyer especially feared that the Republicans would abandon their ideals and join Douglas and his doctrine of popular sovereignty. When many Republicans portrayed the admission of Kansas a defeat of popular sovereignty instead of as a defeat of freedom, his fears increased. In the 1858 campaign, Lincoln did all he could to prevent Republicans like Horace Greeley from coming over to Douglas’ side. Some had even suggested that the Little Giant was going to join the Republicans, since the Lecompton disaster had destroyed the Democratic party in the North. Of course, at the end Douglas created his own party, but Lincoln still could not bring himself to trust him.
Their legendary eight debates in 1858 have gone down in history, and justly so, for both speakers brilliantly articulated their viewpoints. The difference between Lincoln and Douglas, between the Republican Party and the National Union, became clear: Douglas did not recognize any moral element in politics, and he and his men disregarded the basic humanity of the Negro. Though far from perfect when seen with modern lenses, Lincoln and his Party always upheld the rights of Black Americans, and saw slavery as a moral problem that had to be confronted and resolved. At the end, Lincoln defeated Douglas, who lost his Senate seat. This, no doubt, gave him great satisfaction. It is remarkable that Douglas often praised Lincoln’s intelligence and character at the start of the debates, but Lincoln could never bring himself to compliment Douglas back.
Douglas’ defeat sobered him –in more ways than one. A heavy drinker, Douglas somewhat moderated his abuse of alcohol. Not completely, of course, but it probably saved his life. He did not abandon politics, but continued to tour the West. In an ironic reversal that greatly embittered him, Douglas was now the one following Lincoln and offering replies to his speeches. The National Union had not taken flight as he had hoped. Many Northern Democrats remained loyal to Buchanan and the South, the so called “Danites.” Some of them had allied with Lincoln, even receiving funding from him, all to weaken Douglas. The fact that they preferred the election of a Republican to the reelection of Douglas is a testament to how virulently both groups hated each other. Douglas’ last-ditch effort to reunite the party, and his even more desperate attempt to win the Presidency in 1860, all failed due to the legacy of hate that Lecompton sowed.
But now circumstances had changed. Even among the Negrophobic “Butternuts” of the southernmost counties of the Northwest (many of them descended from Southern settlers), there was little support for treason and rebellion. The anemic National Union returned like a mighty Phoenix, absorbing what remained of the Northern Democracy, and also, worryingly enough, the Unionists of the Border South. Though Douglas was not in Congress to direct it personally, he had enough allies to know everything that was going on. After the burning of Washington, Douglas had travelled to Philadelphia and met with Lincoln, giving his famous declaration that there only were patriots and traitors now. As a good patriot, he pledged to support the war. And also as a good patriot, he stayed in Philadelphia to ensure that it would be a Constitutional, limited war, for he earnestly believed that the Radicals were as dangerous as the rebels.
The National Union thus took shape as an effective political force towards the end of 1861. Its influence was limited thanks to the overwhelming Republican majorities in the Senate and the House. But they could make their voices heard – and they were often very loud. The return of his opponent to politics, after he had believed him defeated, obviously distressed Lincoln. The Chesnuts also had an oversized representation in the Armed forces. Two out of every five soldiers were Chesnuts who loathed the mere idea of a war for abolition, but beyond them there were many influential officers who shared their idea of how the conflict should be conducted. Among them was George B. McClellan, who took a central role in the political maneuvers that took place within the Army of the Susquehanna during those months of winter.
The favorite weapons of the Douglasites remained the same as those used since 1850 at least: appeal to prejudice and negrophobia. They also charged that Lincoln and the Republicans were tyrants hell-bent on “subjugating the free American race just to satisfy their bloody fanaticism.” The National Unionists attacked the Lincoln administration for being engaged “in a radical and unholy crusade” that would bring “pestilence, famine, fratricide, and the death of American liberty” if they were allowed to continue. Lincoln himself was portrayed as a “vulgar and unprepared prairie lawyer . . . the fool of the court, who only speaks in riddles . . . a professional backstabber . . . the greatest friend of the Negro, and the vilest foe of the White man.”
The Radical Republicans, who had gained the nickname of Jacobins, received scathing criticism. “We will not fight to liberate the Negro”, a Chesnut meeting resolved, “our motto will be Freedom to the White Man, and the White Man only.” A newspaper printed a call to action that soon became the rallying message of the National Union. “Against traitors who seek to destroy the nation and radicals who want to tear apart the Constitution, we say: The Union as it was! The Constitution as it is!” Soon enough, in response to the radical actions of the session of December, they added another stanza: “And the Niggers where they are!”
Using another French reference, a young reporter referred to Lincoln as a “Robespierre” and Douglas as a “Danton.” He took that back when a reader informed him that Danton had lost. In any case, Republicans were inspired by the French revolution when it came to nicknaming their opponents. Just like the original Jacobins took their nickname from the place where they met, the National Unionist would be nicknamed after a place. In this case, the name “Chesnuts” became popular, after the affluent Philadelphia neighborhood where Douglas had rented a house. Magnified by Republicans into a “center of sedition”, a “second Richmond” from which Douglas coordinated the opposition, Chesnut was indeed the home of some old-line conservatives who disagreed with the government’s policies.
An example of Chesnut propaganda
The nickname of Chesnuts quickly spread. One reason was because it sounded similar to “Butternut”, the name of the poor yeomen who populated the border areas of the Northwest. Described contemptuously by a Republican as “the perfect example of prejudiced White Trash”, the Butternuts were on average poorer and less educated than the Northern median. They had also been solidly Democratic in allegiance, and after the split of Lecompton they became firm Douglas men. A congressman said that National Unionists were strongest “in the areas where educated men receive scorn and where labor is seen as a degraded practice”, contrasting it with the centers of Radical Republicanism, which usually were populated by New Englanders and were known for their “intelligence and enterprise.”
The extremely strong prejudice of these Northwestern men has resulted puzzling. The area was generally known for its high degree of egalitarianism and opportunity, yet it showed the greatest Negrophobia, something the Chesnuts took advantage of. Eric Foner posits the theory that higher economic mobility alarmed White settlers, many of them of Southern origin, and as a result they found it necessary to deny legal equality to African-Americans. In New England, on the other hand, Blacks could be equal under the law because they represented no threat towards the social system already in place – despite their legal equality, they could never be socially equal. It also seems that White settlers found competition with Black laborers to be degrading, and that they firmly believed that the land of the West and its resources were for Whites only.
Consequently, Chesnut propaganda had great effect in the region. The main line of attack was similar to the rhetoric they had used in 1856 during the President election and 1858 during the debates against Lincoln: abolition would cause millions of freedmen to migrate to the Northwest. “The armies of abolition,” a National Unionist speaker said, “are ready to drive you off your land and invite their thick-lipped and bullet-headed Negro friends to take over your property and to vote alongside you.” Another called on men to “protect your sisters, sweethearts, and daughters! While our gallant soldiers lay down their lives on the altar of freedom, fanatical Black Republican preachers mount an invasion of their own, seeking to sacrifice our women to the hellish lust of the Negro.”
The conservative reaction should not be interpreted as a result of the National Union’s activities. Rather, the reinvigoration of Douglas’s party is a result of this conservative reaction. Nonetheless, the Douglasites and the Danites were not able to fully bury the hatchet on some occasions, and the ghost of Lecompton still haunted the fragile coalition. New York, at least, became a volatile center of agitation because the Buchanan administration and the Democratic split had destroyed the Party machine that had previously controlled the city. Sewardites, anti-Seward Republicans, Danites, and Chesnuts all competed for control, creating a powder-keg of racial tensions, nativist prejudices, and working-class discontent.
New York during the Civil War.
Especially worrying were some seeds of anti-war agitation that would later germinate and transform the National Union into a peace party. For the moment, most Chesnuts still supported the war. As Douglas said “war is the quickest path towards peace”. However, as casualties increased and the war prolonged seemingly without the administration taking action to actually win it, more and more Chesnuts started to feel alienated. A point of contention was the National Union’s belief that the Army served as “the instrument of Lincolnite tyranny.”
This last accusation is due to Lincoln’s controversial actions in Maryland. Even after the Battle of Baltimore, Butler’s heavy-handed rule over the city earned harsh criticism. Though he did not use Black soldiers per the administration’s wishes, he did employ thousands of contrabands reconstructing the city and helping around in army camps. The White resident of Baltimore chaffed at being place under “Nigger rule”, and defied Butler and the Army, raising the Confederate flag, insulting Northern soldiers, or even attacking them physically. It did not help matters that Baltimore had become a destination for fugitive slaves. Butler responded with punitive measures. In one infamous occasion, Union soldiers broke down the door of a private home to take down the Confederate flags the owner had. The Confederate sympathizer (who did
not fight in the rebel ranks as it has been rumored) and his neighbors resisted violently, and in the resulting brawl he lost his life.
The image of Union soldiers breaking into people’s homes and murdering them to “satisfy their wishes of vengeance and their brutal abolitionism” was a strong propaganda coup that greatly favored the National Unionists. “The people of the South are not our enemies, but our compatriots. They are not a conquered people, to be treated with an iron hand, but citizens of our common nation, and they must be treated as such”, trumpeted Chesnut editorials. By portraying the war as a Republican crusade for abolitionism and vengeance, the National Union was able to drain support from the administration, but also, sometimes unwittingly, from the war itself.
Another Chesnut favorite was charging that Lincoln was “shredding the Constitution before the nation’s eyes” with his suspension of habeas corpus. Seward worsened the situation somewhat. Tasked with maintaining order and ensuring domestic security, probably because Lincoln distrusted Cameron, the Secretary of State had organized a corps of specialized agents “whose zeal to ferret out treason brooked no restraint by rules of evidence”. The image of Seward sending people to Fort Lafayette for offenses as small as calling him a humbug was also spread far and wide. After Stanton took over, the situation relaxed slightly, but National Unionists still characterized the state of things as a “reign of lawless despotism.”
Some Chesnuts had already started to openly talk against the war, though their influence was limited. Clement L. Vallandigham, who had lost his House seat in the 1858 Republican wave, returned stronger than ever as a speaker for peace. “This cruel war is nothing else but the Trojan horse of Tyranny”, he thundered. Others agreed with him, saying that “anything is better than a fruitless, hopeless, unnatural civil war.” For the moment these peace men, who would later acquire the name of “copperheads”, were small in number, but they threatened to take a more important role within the Party.
Finally, the National Union also demanded to have a voice in Army affairs. Following the fiasco of the Quaker Guns, Congress created a Joint Committee on the Conduct of War. Dominated by Republicans and decried as a “Jacobin committee” hell-bent on applying the guillotine to any Chesnut general, the Committee became a “powerful engine of criticism not merely of the generals but of their commander-in-chief.”
The unwavering opposition of the National Unionists forced Republicans to close ranks and work together. Personal and factional conflicts threatened to break apart their own coalition in many occasions. Few Republicans were as hostile as Senator Ben Wade, who refused to attend a White House gala because “the Wades, unlike the Lincolns, are aware that we are in a state of civil war, and thus refuse to fête.” But there was a large section of Republicans who wished the Lincoln administration were more energetic in its pursuit of the war, of abolition, or of both.
Nevertheless, the Republicans remained united for the most part. Since the great majority of Northern state governments were Republicans, and the Party had great majorities in both chambers of Congress, Republicans felt it necessary to present a united front to pursuit the war effectively. Two factors helped along: for one, since Lincoln was just 0.2% shy of an outright majority in 1860, Republicans felt like they had a mandate; second, the fact that Douglas led the opposition in such a systematically obstructive way made the Republicans band together because otherwise nothing could be accomplished at all.
Lincoln himself felt that it was “mere nonsense to suppose a minority could rule over the majority.” He was not going to purposely alienate conservatives, and it’s already been described how he tried to court the loyalty and support of former Democrats and Chesnuts. Nonetheless, Lincoln remained a firm Party man, and as such he could invoke party loyalty or patronage to gain support for the administration’s policies. Having won almost 60% of the total Northern vote, Lincoln felt justified in his actions, and it probably reduced his qualms about moving towards the left.
In any case, the National Union remained weak during the last months of 1861 and the first months of 1862. But it could easily grow into a great threat, that could realistically stop the wheels of government and hinder the progress of the war. By marshalling all the opponents of the government into a united front, Douglas created a vehicle of anti-war and anti-Negro agitation that would prove itself to be a formidable opponent of the Lincoln administration.
Another formidable opponent came not from within, but from without: the United Kingdom. To characterize the British as merely foes of the United States during the Civil War would be disingenuous and inaccurate, but the British were not exactly allies. The British government was often willing to entertain Confederate hopes for recognition and turn a blind eye to their propaganda and efforts to purchase arms and commission ships, thus earning the hostility of the Union. The first of these perceived insults was the British declaration of neutrality.
Issued by Queen Victoria, the proclamation resulted so insulting to the Americans because it implicitly recognized the Confederate States as a belligerent power. Under international law, that gave the Confederates the right “to contract loans and purchase arms in neutral nations, and to commission cruisers on the high seas with the power of search and seizure.”
Bitter recriminations followed. The Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Charles Sumner, whom Lincoln often consulted on matters of foreign diplomacy, declared it "the most hateful act of English history since Charles 2nd." The American minister to London, Charles Francis Adams, was more diplomatic when he told Lord Russell, British Secretary of Foreign Affairs, that the American government inferred from the proclamation of neutrality “an intention more or less marked to extend the struggle” between the North and South, and if that were the case, he was bound “to acknowledge in all frankness that I have nothing further left to do in Great Britain.”
Russell, however, answered that the "the question of belligerent rights is one, not of principle, but of fact." In response to another demand by Adams, Russell also said that the British government could not make “a perpetual pledge that we would, under no circumstances, recognize the seceding State. . . . Great Britain must hold herself free to act according to the progress of events and as circumstances might require.” Even if the Union wanted to ignore it, the Confederacy was an actual government with effective control of an army, a navy, and a population. Declarations such as this raised Confederate hopes for recognition and intervention. Lord Russell seemed to encourage them, for he met with Confederate agents on at least two occasions. The Richmond Enquirer said that those meetings constituted "a long and firm [step] in exactly the direction which the people of the Southern States expected,” while John Breckinridge was pleased that “our British friends don’t fall for the monstrous Yankee pretension.”
The possibility of British intervention seemed very real now. Seward reluctantly recognized that “on our part the possibility of foreign intervention, sooner or later, in this domestic disturbance is never absent from the thoughts of this government.” Lincoln has long been portrayed as man who largely deferred to Seward when it came to foreign policy, but he also took an active part in shaping the administration’s response to the threat of British intervention. He sent a memo to Adams saying that “as to the recognition of the so-called Southern Confederacy... [it will not] pass unquestioned by the United States in this case”, and added that Adams should break off diplomatic relations if the British insisted on meeting with “the domestic enemies of this country.”
Seward was more bellicose. Declaring that he’d “give them hell”, he sent a note saying that if Britain recognized the Confederacy "we from that hour, shall cease to be friends and become once more, as we have twice before been forced to be, enemies of Great Britain." The astute Adams softened the message. The son and grandson of previous ministers to Britain, Adams had a reserved personality well-suited to British tastes, for the Britons stereotyped the Americans as vulgar and arrogant. Lord Russell and Adams respected each other, and Adams’s more diplomatic approach seemed to work better. Russell assured the American minister that he wouldn’t met anymore with the Confederates, and that the declaration of neutrality had the only goal of explaining “to British subjects their liabilities in case they should engage in war.”
More than the personalities of Adams and Russell were involved when it came to foreign diplomacy, however. A British MP had advised the Americans that “there is one way to convert us all–Win the battles, and we shall come round at once.” The initial Confederate successes probably convinced many Britons that the Southern Republic would be successful in its pursuit of independence. Believing that “the laws of nature dictate that any effort to subjugate millions of peoples united behind the same goal will be fruitless”, British diplomats and government officials thought a Union victory impossible. The capture of Washington and the months of Union inactivity (mistaken for impotence) that followed helped to reinforce this view.
Later, however, the Union achieved an important victory at Baltimore and minor triumphs in North Carolina. It’s unlikely that these victories were enough to convince the British – after all, Washington remained in enemy hands. But it probably made them think that the war would indeed be a long one, and thus they decided to withhold their judgement for now. Prime Minister Lord Palmerston was unwilling to interfere, saying that "they who in quarrels interpose, will often get a bloody nose." Regarding intervention as contrary to British interests, he declared that their only policy was "to go on as we have begun, and to keep quite clear of the conflict."
Still, some Britons were open to future recognition of the Confederacy, even if Old Pam was unwilling to actually go to war. The fact that they could not promise
not to interfere infuriated the Americans. The British, for their part, were miffed by Seward’s “bullying”, which they regarded as “insolent.” But they were also angered by the “blackmail” that the Southern cotton embargo constituted.
The Confederate government never embargoed cotton, and Breckinridge in fact opposed the measure. Having visited England several times, Breckinridge concluded that such an embargo was more likely to gather the ire of John Bull rather than his good-will. Nonetheless, many Southerners earnestly believed that Britain would bend its knee if they kept the cotton from their markets. "Keep every bale of cotton on the plantation. Don't send a thread to New Orleans or Memphis till England and France have recognized the Confederacy—not one thread," demanded the Memphis Argus. Public opinion in this regard was so strong that the blockade “practically enforced itself.” Breckinridge did take measures to reduce the impact – he bought cotton with government credit and chartered blockade runners to get it to Europe. The measure, however, was not very successful, only managing to cause a negative reaction from his own opposition.
It also made the blockade appear stronger than it really was during the first year of the war. British and French businessmen demanded intervention. "England must break the Blockade, or Her Millions will starve," argued a newspaper. Unfortunately for the Southerners, King Cotton wasn’t as powerful as they thought, and Lord Russell would say that to intervene just for cotton "would be ignominious beyond measure. . . . No English Parliament could do so base a thing." He later clarified the Brtish position in regards to the blockade, stating that "The fact that various ships may have successfully escaped through it . . . will not of itself prevent the blockade from being an effective one by international law" so long as it was enforced by a number of ships "sufficient really to prevent access to [a port] or to create an evident danger of entering or leaving it." King Cotton diplomacy had failed, and soon enough Southerners focused on getting all the cotton they could to Europe, though as Breckinridge bitterly observed “the hour for that has long passed. The blockade is now stronger than ever.”
The greatest crisis of Anglo-American relations was yet to come. After hearing that Breckinridge was sending Confederate agents to Canada, an American Army patrol decided to intervene, vowing to “make John Breck suffer for treason, and John Bull for intervention.” These were not only delusions – Breckinridge was truly sending agents to Canada to help the men who opposed Lincoln with arms and money. He was an avid reader of Northern newspapers, and the reports of the conservative reaction obviously interested him because it had potential to wreck the prosecution of the war. The Confederate agents did not meet much success, mostly because the anti-war movement was yet to gain strength. But it stoked the flame of anti-British and anti-Confederate sentiments.
The group of American soldiers crossed the frontier with Canada in September and took the supposed agents. Later, they would realize than aside from one real Confederate agent they also kidnapped a Canadian citizen. They quickly handed their captives over to Federal authorities, asking them “to be treated as traitors should”. The alarmed Lincoln administration quickly arrested the men, indicting them for violating the Neutrality Act. But the damage was already done.
While some Americans celebrated “taking John Bull by the horns” and threatened “to take the British territories as a punishment for aiding treason”, the British Ministry was furious. “You may stand for this but damned if I will!”, declared Old Pam. Britain seemed ready for war, as troops were mobilized towards Canada, ships were being readied, and an ultimatum was sent. The “American invasion”, a British corresponds told Senator Sumner, was “the maddest act that ever was done, and, unless the [United States] government intend to force us to war, utterly inconceivable.” The British demanded the release of the prisoners, whether they were Canadian or Confederate, a formal apology from the United States, and for all armed patrols to be removed from the Canadian border.
Lincoln believed that the Union could not win if Britain intervened. He wanted to engage in “one war at the time.” As such, he maintained “that the question was easily susceptible of a peaceful solution if England was at all disposed to act justly with us.” But the British public demanded a quick and sincere apology. Thurlow Weed, acting as an unofficial American agent, said that “if the taking of the rebels from under the protection of the British flag was intended, and is avowed, and maintained, it means war.” Jubilant rebels were looking forward to the British “clearing the sea of the American navy in a month; acknowledging the Southern Confederacy; and, by breaking the blockade, letting out cotton, and letting in British manufactures.”
Lincoln and the Cabinet regretfully came to the conclusion that they had no election but to submit to British demands, even if it caused the people to believe that they were “timidly truckling to the power of England.” After hours of discussion, the Cabinet resigned itself and approved to liberate the captured Confederates; issue a proclamation saying that they were not operating under the order of the American government and that they would be “prosecuted for their transgressions against the laws of nations”; and give a formal apology to Britain.
Henry John Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston
British diplomats, who were happy not to interfere “if the present dispute were settled amicably”, accepted the apology, and war was averted. But this “surrender” still represented a humiliation. Fortunately for Lincoln, the people were relieved by the news that there wouldn’t be a war with Britain – George Templeton Strong observed that the settlement was necessary “for the sake of concentrating all our national energies on the trampling out of domestic treason.”
Though war had been averted, the whole episode greatly damaged Anglo-American relations and led to a legacy of bitterness that would continue for many years after the civil war. This surrender to the Union’s foreign foes also provided ammunition to its domestic foes, as the Douglasites were able to portray the administration as weak, indecisive and “a disgrace to the national honor.” Moreover, it also encouraged the rebels – Russell had at least another informal reunion with Confederate agents, while an impotent Adams was unable to carry out his threat of breaking off diplomatic relations in fear of worsening the already delicate situation. As a whole, months of military inaction, political struggles and foreign problems had greatly weakened the government. The victories of Grant in the West restored some enthusiasm to the people and honor to the government, but as a whole it was clear that a big victory in the East was necessary for the administration to be truly secure. Whether McDowell could rise up to the occasion remained to be seen.
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AN: I think this is the longest update thus far. I just wanted to be through, and I really wanted to include both these subjects in the same update. Now we can go back to military affairs. By the way, I don't want to shy away from the horrors of war or the nasty rhetoric of the age. Just remember, those are not my words. Some are quotes taken from my sources; others are supposed to be quotes from the characters within the TL, and as such do not reflect my own personal views. But I don't want to sugarcoat the racism of the Civil War, and will consequently add phrases that may result shocking to some.
