One War, Three Sides?

Every time I drive to and from my parents' house, I pass my town's Memorial Hall. For the first few years my folks lived where they do now, I didn't really pay it much mind. It's about 40'x30', brick, 2 stories, not really anything out of the ordinary, especially to a middle school kid. One day, on my way to the library (2 buildings over) it occurred to me that they built it right off the town green, on the corner of the intersection of the two main roads in the town. Upon further reflection, and after learning about the age of the various buildings surrounding the green, I realized that it was both the largest building of it's age, but also the only one made of brick and granite, even the church being constructed of wood.

One day while waiting for the light, I actually read the text above the entrance. It's weathered text indicates that the hall was built to remember the dead from the town, killed in the Civil War. There are 35 names listed. Tonight, after reading this TNC post I did a bit of digging. The total population of my town in the 1860 census was 1,906. Based on the statewide ratio, the military aged male population was around 360. The town lost 10% of their men between the ages of 15 and 40; they must have had nearly everyone fit for duty serving under arms.

Now, I don't know, and can't know the motivations of the people who lived here over a century ago, but I know that Vermont made slavery unconstitutional in 1777, that there are houses in this very state that I have visited that contained hidden rooms to hide escaped slaves on their way to Canada, that many of the people of the state were active in the abolition movement before the war. So I think that by writing, "3) African-Americans who explicitly sought the destruction of slavery and the end of systemic white supremacy." Ta-Nehisi's implicit exclusion of all whites from the category that wanted to end slavery and systemic white supremacy, he did a disservice to those that fought for the right reasons. After all, The Atlantic itself published The Battle Hymn of the Republic, which originated from the marching tune John Brown's Body. There were certainly some abolitionists serving in the Union ranks.

When I started writing this, I was certain that those men from my town who died died for the right reason. After all, given all that I know about the state and the time period, it's incredibly likely that at least some of those men were abolitionists but then I found the actual text from the side of the Hall, rather than just what my memory was telling me.

"In grateful remembrance of the brave soldiers of Essex who lost their lives in service of their country during the war for the preservation of the Union. 1861-1865"

It was built by their contemporaries in 1871, brick by brick. Men and women who pooled their money to afford to build the grandest building in the town in memory of their fallen friends, fathers, brothers, husbands. Fellow soldiers who marched with them, fought with them, and watched them die. Who am I to argue with them?