"Unionists of the
Warrior
Mountains of Alabama"
Compiled by Joel S. Mize
Volumes A & B Available Now
Volume C Release Scheduled 2008
This series will:
Reveal the largely hidden Unionists families of Alabama inundated by the larger, dominant "southern culture" and backlash against dropping of the Reconstruction that favored Unionists with patronage jobs, etc. (Family group sheets provide an anatomy of this larger community - featuring a dozen Alabama counties.)
Discredit the larger national stereotype of the whole South being lock-step Secessionists, slaveholders.
Discredit the false stereotype of the Unionist as ignorant hillbillies, lazy, as fostered in the prejudicial writings by Stanley Hoole, Alabama Civil War Historian.
Show that North Alabamians staffed not only the better-known 1st Alabama Cavalry (USV), but served in over 2-dozen Federal Regiments.
Explore the ties between Unionist loyalty stands and the adoption of Jacksonian views of Manifest Destiny - while, ironically, embracing local isolation.
Show a mixed-blood American Indian "warrior" cultural influence of the Mountaineers that resisted conscription incursions into their mountain/cove domain.
Unveil the secretive Union League (much like the Underground Railroad of the NE), organized by General James Garfield utilizing a network of Alabama Masons and Christian Church in alliance with Primitive-Baptists to spy and provide safe houses for those seeking refugee status in the North, or to join the Union Army.
Demonstrate the wider popular support for the Union cause (upper 1/3 of Alabama solidly voted for delegates to represent them as Cooperationists at the State Constitutional Convention December 1860.
Show the native Alabama Unionists who took the top roles during the reconstruction era.
I know you'll enjoy them as much as I have!
Joel S. Mize, Author
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Plan of Publication:
Geographic Scope by Counties