Tim Kent's Civil War tales: Who Cries For The Children?

The above cartoon represents industry devouring children

My last blog saw me going into a diatribe about how horrible Southerners were to own slaves and how terrible it is to have memorials to Southern soldiers (even the ones that owned no slaves). I thought I would touch base on a few facts about the Holier Than Thou Northerners during the War Between the States. If you who don't want to know the truth about America's history you'd better stop reading here. You will of course be offended or pretend none of this is true.

For some reason, everyone is so offended by slavery, yet ignore the fact that northern industries relied on child labor (slavery) during the war. How much did they rely on children? Most numbers suggest up to fifty-five percent. You heard me right, fifty-five percent of the Union's industrial force was made up of children. Who cares, right? After all, those children were mostly poor Irish immigrants and not of a darker complexion.

Now I can hear the northern apologists and liberals crying out that these children weren't owned, but in fact they are wrong. When you make a nickel a day, working seven days a week, and learn at the end of the week you owed the company twice the money you've made since they fed you during one of these sixteen to twenty hour shifts, you may wish you were a Southern slave.

Does the above cartoon remind you of an Auction Block?

The cartoon above is a demonstration of Northern capitalist during the Civil War bidding on children to work in their factory's for little to no pay. Poor children like these were kidnapped off the streets and forced to work. Not only are children required a certain amount of rest for their growing bodies, they are also in dire need of a good diet. In these northern factories, they received little of either. Why would these business owners want children to work for them? That answer is easy. Children are easier to control, just take a leather strap to them if they slack off working, and there is no danger of them going on strike. Plus, it was basically slavery under a different name, but like I said before, who cares about them, they are too light complected. White lives don't matter, remember?

Now you may think they weren't that rough on these children, but you'd be wrong. They were forced to mine for coal, tend to furnaces, and do all types of jobs that are considered dangerous to grown men.

Worse than slavery, child labor has been in existence in this country far before 1776 and did not end when African slavery was abolished in 1865. No, child labor carried on sixty plus years following the Civil War, but it's alright because it was mostly a northern factory thing. The rich got richer and the poor got poorer. Greed, same problem we have in this country today. If you haven't heard of the northern sweatshops during the Civil War, you've been hiding your head in the sand. Nobody ever mentions any of this today, it's all about the African slave.

By 1820, forty percent of northern cotton factories were employed by children between the ages of eight and twelve. This percentage increased to fifty-five percent during the Civil War to keep pace with military needs. All of this is fine right, because the humanitarian Union Army was fighting to free the poor mistreated Africans. Once the war was over guess what those northern factories added to their employment lists? You guessed it, African children. Now I hear everyone beginning to protest, but somehow this has to be the South's fault. The north is sinless in all regards and get the free pass as usual.

Let's briefly take a look at what happened in the country of Cuba in the year 1912. The black race was being taken advantage of by big business owners in Cuba and the United States. The mistreated African's began what was labeled the "Negro Rebellion" against harsh working conditions. Now this same country that invaded the South over concerns for slavery sent 2,789 marines to force these blacks back to work and put down their rebellion for better living conditions. By the time it was all over somewhere between 3000 and 6000 African-Cubans had been killed. Why did the United States side with the Spanish against the Africans? The answer is simple. Follow the dollar in this country. Below I leave you with a few photographs of northern slave labor that lasted until the 1920's.