Confederate Reckoning

McCurry compares the history of the Confederacy to the rebellion that turned the island of Saint-Domingue, a colony of France, to the Republic of Haiti. Conflict on the island led to enslaved people becoming armed and forming their own armies. At first, they negotiated for their freedom in exchange for a fixed term of military service. By June of 1793, however, a commissioner named Léger Félicité Sonthonax, facing an attempt to overturn his authority, offered emancipation to all enslaved people who fought on his and the First Republic of France’s behalf. Later, he extended the offer to all the wives of the men who were married in a way legally recognized by the First Republic. By 1794, the First Republic enacted the first universal abolition of enslavement in history. Still, Black Haitians had to defend themselves against efforts to re-enslave them. The Confederates were well aware of the parallels between Haiti’s history and their own.

The Confederacy was faced with two challenges involving its Black male population. The first was that the North drastically outnumbered their armed forces. The second was the Emancipation Proclamation, which gave the Confederacy’s large population of Black men a reason to side with the Union.