The subject of Black Confederates is a divisive one that often comes up in surprising ways:
Gregory Perry, of Monroe, who learned recently that an ancestor was awarded a pension for Confederate service, says it’s hard to reconcile that fact with what he knows firsthand about being a black man in the South.
“I grew up in the era of Malcolm X and militancy, and would never have considered something like this possible,” said Perry, 46, reflecting on the life of his great-great-grandfather, Aaron Perry.
North Carolina is recounting her Civil War dead, and revising the number downward.
North Carolina’s long-standing death count was 40,275.
A comparison of Howard’s new estimate with higher figures coming from a Virginia recount of Civil War dead suggests North Carolina may not have had the highest toll after all.
The point isn’t to lessen North Carolina’s role in history, but to get an accurate count and honor the dead, says Howard, who’s doing the count as part of North Carolina’s commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the Civil War.
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