In going through a drawer, I found my old Confederate battle flag I bought about sixty years ago. I think it was probably a woman’s head scarf. I became interested in the Civil War because family legend says I have ancestors who fought on both sides. One story is the rebel was on Lookout Mountain as the other tried climbing it. Both survived the war.

My paternal ancestors never had slaves and neither did the vast majority of men who fought for the Cause. My paternal lineage came from England in the late 1600s. He settled in North Carolina Colony and his grandson fought with Frances Marion (the Swamp Fox) earning him a land pension in Southern Illinois Territory. His grandsons fought on both sides in the Civil War. They had no slaves but one believed in state’s rights and the other sided with the government. Just as we were taught in high school, it was over their interpretation of the federal overreach. Sound familiar?

My best friend’s ancestors lived in the Deep South, didn’t have slaves, and fought for the South. Today we know the economics of slavery was collapsing and would probably have ended in two or three decades. I understand the people whose ancestors were slaves may see the Civil War differently than many of us. My Southern side sees it as a war of aggression against the South by Northern invaders just as an earlier ancestor fought against the British. Both sides fought for their beliefs in a bloody heroic battle with mostly stupid tactics and strategy. We see the northern generals (Some had owned slaves and didn’t believe in freeing them) and southern generals (Many didn’t have slaves) as heroic soldiers fighting for their own country,.

Few of our national heroes weren’t flawed and some where crooks. Judging them with today’s standards is wrong.