Bottom Line
"I've always understood that we went to war on account of the thing we quarreled with the North about. I've never heard of any other cause than slavery."
Colonel
John Singleton Mosby, CSA. His irregular cavalry unit, Mosby's
Rangers, was incorporated into the Confederate Army, the only one so
accepted. He became U. S. Consul to Hong Kong and was a friend of
President Grant after the war.
Later in the war, after
Grant had come east to direct the operations of the Army of the Potomac,
Grant wrote that he regularly took a train to Washington “to confer
with the Secretary of War and the President.” On one of these train
trips back to Virginia, “a heavy cloud of dust was seen to the east of
the road as if made by a body of cavalry.” When the train reached the
next station and stopped, those on board asked the “man at the station”
about this, and “he informed us that Mosby had crossed a few minutes
before at full speed in pursuit of Federal cavalry. Had he seen our
train coming, no doubt he would have let his prisoners escape to capture
the train. I was on a special train, if I remember correctly, without
any guard".
Among many other astonishing things, Mosby
befriended the young George S. Patton and would act out Civil war
engagements with him. Mosby volunteered for the Spanish American war
but was denied a commission by the incompetent War Secretary Russell
Alger, he instead raised and trained horses for the army he once fought
against. President Theodore Roosevelt sent him to deal with land theft
by Colorado rancher barons as a special agent of the Department of
Interior, for whom he dealt with many of the land grabbing outrages so
prevalent at the time. It is now popular with some to call the
Southerners traitors, a modern day lie put about by people who expect
others to do their fighting for them, never mind serving in uniform
themselves. Colonel Mosby had this to say about his service-
"I am not ashamed of having fought on the side of slavery—a soldier
fights for his country—right or wrong—he is not responsible for the
political merits of the course he fights in" and that, "The South was my
country." I do not agree with this, if one's government is party to
treason or evil then the social contract is sundered and all bets are
off. One of America's better naval commanders is renowned for his
epigram, “My country, right or wrong; if right, to be kept right; and if wrong, to be set right.”
When the time comes all patriots will converge on fools and criminals and set this country straight.
'A long time between stops. A long time for something to go wrong'. Convicted murderer, former soldier, and ever alert opportunist Richard B. Riddick, Pitch Black.
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