Let's go with another episode of the History on Plug podcast.

As a popular narrative of Civil War history goes,

the war was won when courageous Yankees triumphed over the South.

Or those who are more sympathetic to the Confederacy would say that brute industrialization

of the North made victory of the South impossible based surely on numbers and weapons.

But an aspect of the war that's remained little known for 160 years is the Alabama Union soldiers

who played a decisive role in the Civil War only to be scrubbed from the history books.

That's right, there were a group of people from the Deep South who fought for the North.

One such group was the first Alabama cavalry formed in

1862. It went on raids that destroyed Confederate communications. It also marched with Sherman's

forces across the south and Sherman's marched to the sea. They aided the fall of Vicksburg

and the burning of Atlanta. In today's rebroadcast episode of speaking to Howell Raines, author of

Silent Cavalry, how Union Soldiers from Alabama

helped Sherman burn Atlanta and then got written out of history. He argues that William to

Combs to Sherman's decisive efforts to burn Atlanta was facilitated by an unsung regiment of over

2,000 yeoman farmers and former slaves from Alabama, including at least one member of Rain's own

family. We look at why they've been forgotten,

how they don't fit into a lot of conventional narratives about the Civil War, how Southern society

was varied, and a Virginia planter would have sympathies of the Confederacy that perhaps an

Appalachian farmer would it? Now we can have a new understanding of the Civil War in the process.

Hope we enjoy this discussion. And one more thing before we get started with this episode,

a quick break for a word from our sponsors. Do you ever struggle with your prayer life? Maybe you

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