Monday, April 30, 2012

Red Banks Campaign

 
On 30 April 1864 Began yankee General Nathanael Banks Red River Campaign in Louisiana. It was a complete failure, but Louisiana's governor Henry Watkins Allen, commissioned a report composed of eye-witnesses affidavits. I have seen this book, even used it. At one place the yankees were camped across the river on a Sunday and the people of the town came out to promenade as they did every Sunday. They were civilians, yet they fired on them. But the worst treatment was reserved for slaves, who were encouraged to follow after the Union army and told that the Confederates would kill them when they returned. Once these poor people had left their homes, they were abandoned. Thousands died. The eye-witness reports are horrifying. I had to put the book down, and walk away.

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