Independence Day celebrations return to a nation undivided. For white Southerners, many impoverished in the wake of their Confederacy’s defeat, the day is the darkest July 4th ever as free blacks and U.S. soldiers parade through Southern cities and the Emancipation Proclamation is read alongside the Declaration of Independence. Evidencing little to no regard for…
Tensions between Southern white citizens and freedmen show no signs of abating. From Virginia to Texas, a tug of war is unfolding between Northern (American) Baptists who are aiding freedmen, and Southern Baptists who resent the meddling of Northerners. Today in Natchez, Mississippi, four black deacons of the Wall Street Baptist Church petition U.S. President…
Following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, many friends and acquaintances of the late president remembered him with great admiration and fondness. Stories associated with Lincoln were often repeated, tales that in the months and years to come were recorded for posterity in numerous books about the president who had saved the Union. One such story,…