A lot of modern day Sons of Confederate Veterans would be in for a shock if they could actually talk to their ancestor "Private Johnny Reb"
This was after all the 1860's , a lot of Private Johnny Rebs were subsistence farmers , owned no slaves , didn't care about the politics of the time & sure as hell didn't want to leave their farms to go off & fight in some war.
For Johnny to go off & fight meant that he left his wife & children on a hardscrabble farm that they could not work , with starvation a real possibility.
Johnny had no illusions about fighting for someone else's "noble cause" but he was faced with a couple not so good choices. 1. Go to war & leave the family to their own devices. 2. Stay home & be hunted by several different factions.
It amazes me that some of the young modern day Sheltons fly the Confederate flag considering what happened to their ancestors at the hands of Confederate soldiers in Shelton Laurel NC
