Life for Blacks-Civil War
Life for African Americans after the Civil War was filled with joy and fear. As being former slaves, some had learned to expect hostility from white people and they did not presume it would instantly disappear. Even though the slaves were free, it was not a just freedom. African Americans faced racial segregation, discrimination, and extremely limited rights. The southern whites wanted to define control of blacks. They thought blacks were predestined to work as agricultural laborers. The black codes were created to give blacks certain rights, but it was under white conditions, so it ultimately hindered former slaves. Blacks' search for independence was a long and seemingly lonely road. Many black people wanted to minimize contact with whites because there was a prejudice against them that would take many years to get over. To avoid contact with overbearing whites who were used to supervising them, blacks abandoned the slave quarters and fanned out to distant corners of the land they worked. Some rural dwellers established small all-black settlements that still exist today along the back roads of the South. Blacks felt they needed to be independent because whites would not welcome them wit
Everywhere, blacks young and old thirsted for homes of their own. Blacks of all ages hungered not only for land but the knowledge in books that only whites were allowed to read. They consisted of black marriages, to sue and be sued in court, blacks having fair trials, and blacks owning land. State-supported schools and orphanages excluded blacks entirely. It represented compensation for generations of travail in bondage. White mobs killed, robbed and raped blacks through out the cities they lived in. With no one to grow the white man's cotton anymore, whites didn't know where to turn. The Freedmen's Bureau founded over four thousand schools. Ex-slaves reached out for valuable things in life that had been denied them. They made their own schools and there they learned something most of us take for granted: how to read. The Klan persecuted blacks who stood up for their rights as laborers or individuals. They burned black churches, houses, and their schools. In addition to a fair employer, what freed men and women most wanted was the ownership of land. Violence against African Americans occurred from the first days of Reconstruction but became far more organized and purposeful after 1867. Northern soldiers, officials, and missionaries of both races did bring education and aid to freedmen but also insisted that they grow cotton.
Common topics in this essay:
Freedmen's Bureau,
South Blacks,
Civil War,
African Americans,
Klux Klan,
civil war,
african americans,
former slaves,
black codes,
fair trials blacks,
freedmen civil war,
freed women,
freedmen's bureau,
trials blacks,
fair trials,
supposedly free,
form slavery,
|
Acceptance Essays
