This is a FAMILY fight, so I have to defend myself.

Mark, a fellow Southerner, says:

“…there were exactly eleven states in the Union, the same number as the Old Confederacy.”

Minor point here, but dammit man — you’ve done it to Missouri again! There were 13 states in the confederacy, which is why both the Stars and Bars and Southern Cross flags hold 13 stars — one for each admitted state into the Confederacy. In revisionist history, the liberals who control our public schools and universities have tried to re-write Confederate history — and you, Bob, are parroting one of their most amusing tales.

Need I remind you that when Missouri refused to send troops to aid Lincoln in his “unconstitutional, and revolutionary in its object, inhuman, and diabolical” quest to INVADE the southern states (as Missouri Govroner Clayburn Jackson wrote to Lincoln when said former tyrant requested Missouri join the murderous forces of the Union). In fact, on October 30, 1861 the Missouri legislature voted to seccede, and Missouri, my beloved home state, was then accepted into the Confederacy OFFICIALLY on November 28, 1861.

And, to counter any argument claiming illegitamacy, need I remind you, Bob, that Governor Clayborn Jackson was the “duly elected” governor of Missouri — and upon entering the Confederacy the entire “duly elected” legislature was run out of Missouri at gunpoint by Union soldiers and a puppet regime was put in place by one of Lincoln’s henchmen, General Lyon. And of course, for the next four years Missouri Confederate soldiers, upon capture, were hanged or shot as traitors and not given P.O.W. status — which made us fight all the harder.

So there — pffff!!!

Comment by Mark

MY REPLY:

Mark, I used a literary device, poetic license.

“Poetic license” means a USEFUL bald-faced lie.

Look at what I wrote. If I had said “thirteen states” the entire argument would have fallen on its face.

I am NOT being disloyal to our Confederates in Missouri. Our flag claims Missouri.

But today any state outside of the what is called The Old Confederacy is not a Southern state, it is a “border” state.”

In fact, the most vehemnetly anti-Southern publication in America, National Review, labelled TENNESSE “a border state” twice before I stopped that. William Buckly’s sister actually corrected them in answering me.

In fact, Buckley himself recently quoted me as saying that the present National review term, “the south,” is just plain bad English. I pointed out that Hawaii and Puerto Rico are more southern in a geographical sense than the South is.

In fact, if you include Southern California, the uncapitalized “south” consists at least one-third of people the writer does not mean when he talks about the segregated “south.”

Here’s the kicker: In “Notes and Asides” Buckley AGREED with me. The uncapitalized version of “the south” is just plain wrong.

But the Buckleys don’t control the magazine any more.

Mowery does.

And Mowery HATES the South.

As a memeber of the family, I applaud your giving me hell for your Missouri Confederates.

You are not the only ones with reason to complain. After Fort Sumter the Maryland legislature met to decide which side to take. Lincold had them arrested.

He also had the NEW JERSEY legislature arrested!

A LOT of people realized that Lincoln was fighting against America, not just the South.

During the Battle of Gettysburg, one Confederate soldier was killed right on the farm where he had been born and raised.

In Pennsylvania.

Copperhead, Border Stater, Southerner, I will never fold our flag or spit on the grave of one of those who fought for America against Lincoln.

And there will always be someone who won’t fold the flag on spit on MY grave.

Many families die out.

Ours never will.