"Free State of Jones"

[rug]

21. Thanks for posting that.

Last edited Mon Jul 4, 2016, 07:23 AM - Edit history (1)

I was surprised that this movie even acknowledged the class aspect of the Civil War. The Confederacy was rotten from top to bottom, explicitly benefiting only the wealthy whose wealth and means of production were land and human beings. The scenes of the Confederate quartermasters seizing the corn and pigs of white farmers to fuel its racist army were eye-opening.

It sounds like Blow was describing the movie Glory

The director did not take this movie lightly:

There is evidence that Newt Knight came from a family that opposed the slavocracy on ideological as well as economic grounds. His father had turned down the gift of a slave when he got married, and his declining the economic advantage is telling. Other relatives directly refer to the family’s ideological opposition to slavery. 4.1 Like many yeoman farmers, Newt resented a war in which he felt he was fighting to make the rich richer. 4.2

As the war continued, class divisions were exacerbated and became increasingly hard to ignore. Even the common soldier was known to express anger at the planter class and the cotton economy of the slavocracy. In the film, Newt sarcastically goads Sumrall when he claims they are fighting for honor: “Well, that’s good, Will, 'cause I’d sure hate to be fighting for cotton.” It was hardly a rare sentiment. 4.3

Threatened with the draft, Newt served in the Confederate Army but refused to fight. As he said “I didn’t want to fight. I told 'em I’d help nurse sick soldiers if they wanted.”

http://freestateofjones.info/