REBEL WITH A CAUSE

 

Eric Erickson and Mike Cannon standing in front of my rebel battle flag in Turkey

I can't remember exactly when or how I became interested in the Civil War. Maybe it was the articles and pictures of the Civil War in the World Book Encyclopedias that my parents bought for us in 1957. They were our Google of the 1950's. Or the day that my mother picked me up from school and just the two of us went to see a movie called the Horse Soldiers with John Wayne and William Holden. Two of my favorite movie stars. The Horse Soldiers was Hollywood's version of an actual Union cavalry raid during the Vicksburg campaign. Although Hollywood many times puts it' spin on history or embellishes the story a movie can inspire a child's imagination to be the catalyst for their desire to learn more about a particular historical event or person from history. When I was in Mrs. Hearn's sixth grade class at Charlotte Park elementary she assigned a class project. We were asked to create a project on any subject that interested us. After completion of our projects we would take pictures of them and they would be sent to a 6th grade class in South America. Mother bought a sheet of plywood for me and I placed it on two saw horses in the back of our classroom. Over time I created a Civil War battlefield using dirt and my Civil War play set that I got for Christmas that year. 

  When Debbie and I were dating we went to the Belle Meade theater to see Gone With The Wind. The movie had been re-released many times since it's original premiere in 1939 but this was my first time to see it. I was in awe and I have seen the movie countless times since. A movie that the New York Times has suggested should be banned. I will never forget the scene at the Atlanta railroad yard when Scarlett Ohara is walking through a sea of wounded Confederate soldiers. The scene slowly expands to reveal a tattered Confederate flag waving in the breeze while an inspiring rendition of Dixie is playing in the background. Although I now believe that movie is a great example of the Lost Cause Myth that scene usually brought tears to my eyes and made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. I decided then and there that I wanted a Confederate flag. Like Confederate flags and statues I am against banning the movie. Even though it depicts an unrealistic view of the South and slavery the acting is great and a great human interest story. I am against banning most things because people should be able to decide for themselves what is good or bad for them. I own two copies of the Gone With The Wind movie and I still enjoy watching the movie from time to time. I also own a VHS copy of Birth Of A Nation  The movie was based on a book called the Clansman, which I also have a copy of, written by the reverend Thomas Dixon Jr. who was a good friend of Woodrow Wilson. The Clansman glorified the Klan and gave a distorted view of the South after the Civil War. The famous movie director, D.W. Griffith, made a movie in 1915 called the Clansman. The title was later changed The Birth Of A Nation. This movie was the first ever to be shown in the White House. It depicted Blacks as villains and rapists. The Black characters in the movie were played by white actors in black face. Wilson loved it and said "It is like writing history with lightning, and my only regret is that it is all so terribly true." Because of the popularity of this movie the Ku Klux Klan was reborn on top of Stone Mountain Georgia with the burning of a fiery cross. This was on Thanksgiving night 1915. The burning cross could be seen for miles. I don't own this material because I agree with the contents any more than if I owned a copy of Mein Kampf. This material gives us a view into the minds of Democrats and their thinking at that time. If more people had read Mein Kampf and taken it seriously in the 1920's and 30' maybe we could have avoided World War II. When Debbie and I were married on June 21st 1968 a few weeks later we spent a weekend in Atlanta and Chattanooga on our honeymoon. The Army of Northern Virginia under Robert E. Lee flew a square version of the flag early in the war but the Army of Tennessee mainly used regimental flags but not the Confederate battle flag. While at Six Flags Over Georgia I found a 3x6 Confederate battle flag in a souvenir shop. I have since learned that the version that I bought, and that most people see today, is the Confederate naval ensign that was flown from Confederate warships and wasn't used as a battle flag until the Army of Tennessee adapted it in 1864 after General Joseph E. Johnston took command of the Army of Tennessee.

  On August 5th 1968 I was inducted into the Air Force. After basic training I received orders for Kingsley Field Oregon in Klamath Falls. Like an idiot I sold my car so I would have enough money to take Debbie to Oregon with me. She was pregnant and starting to show. If I had been smart I would have driven my car to Oregon and lived in the barracks until I could have saved enough money to send for her later. I didn't want to be away from her that long however. We boarded a Greyhound bus and endured a tortuous three day trip to Oregon. When we arrived our ankles were swollen to twice their size. We were as broke as a young married couple could be. After checking into a cheap motel Debbie immediately started to cry from homesickness. She would cry a lot over the next six months. We eventually found a place at Shasta View Apartments. It was akin to living in the projects. The two of us walked everywhere we went. I was an Air Force Security Policeman and the base was about ten miles away. At first I would walk to work hoping that some kind soul would offer me a ride. Sometimes they did and sometimes they didn't. After a month or two I was able to find an old 1955 Pontiac. It would break down about as much as it would run. In April Debbie gave birth to my son Robbie. Luckily my car was running and I was able to get her to the hospital that morning. There was an Airman in my unit named Ceronie Robinson who happened to be black. He was from Atlanta Georgia and Ceronie, along with his wife Pauline and little girl lived at a modest but nice string of apartments. They were owned by a kindly rancher in Klamath Falls. Ceronie encouraged me into moving there which was a good decision for us. We were much happier and formed friendships with not only Ceronie and his wife but several other military couples. This is where we would live until I left for Turkey in April 1970. For much of this period I was pretty much without a car. My Pontiac was always broken down. Ceronie and I were on the same Security Flight and he was kind enough to give me a ride to work. His car was reliable but it was old. Everything was working but the horn.

One day on our way home from work we were stopped by two Oregon State Troopers. Ceronie was driving the speed limit and he wasn't driving erratically. A Trooper asked to see his license and Ceronie wanted to know why he was being pulled over. The officer never answered him but said that he wanted to inspect the car. We stepped out of the car while the officer searched the car. He checked the turn signals, emergency flashers, headlights, back-up lights and the horn. The Trooper gave him a ticket for the horn. They may have been following normal procedure but I have always felt that Ceronie was pulled over because he was black. Usually when a black person screams racism I am skeptical but this is something I witnessed for myself. Another day we were on a 72 hour break. Ceronie was looking for a used car and he asked me to go along. He noticed a car sitting in a front yard of a house with a For Sale sign on it. As he walked up to the car a man ran out of the house and angrily grabbed the sign. " In an unfriendly voice he told Ceronie that the car was not for sale and walked back into the house. These experiences in the military opened my eyes to the fact that racism was not confined to one region of the country. There were racists everywhere.

The Robinson family

 I arrived in Istanbul Turkey after midnight on June 1st 1970. The flight from New York had been a long and harrowing experience. The 747 Jumbo jet had just come on line earlier that month. I never expected to fly on one until I saw that big ole plane sitting on the ramp. About an hour out of JFK I was awakened out of a deep sleep by an explosion in the number four engine. The pilot turned the big plane around and after dumping fuel to reduce the chances of fire in the event of a crash, we made an uneventful emergency landing in New York. After repairing the plane and a long layover we had a routine nine hour flight to Heathrow airport in London. Because my Pan Am connection was interrupted I flew a Turkish DC9 nonstop to Istanbul. Disembarking from the plane reminded me of a scene from a movie. The terminal was old and dingy but even at that hour it was a hub of activity and jammed packed. There was a overpowering smell that I have never smelled before or since. As I walked toward customs a gang of shabbily dressed men and boys crowded around me speaking Turkish. I had no idea what they were saying. One boy grabbed my duffel bag, moved it a few feet, and set it down. He then held his hand out and in English he said fifty cents. Fearful of refusing I handed him the money. In this strange environment I was pretty nervous and feeling lost. It was about this time that I spotted two black airmen about my age standing near a pillar. I made a beeline over to them and they were as happy to see me as I was to see them. I didn't care about skin color because they represented America and home. The airmen were going to Incirlik AFB which was where I was headed. We decided to travel together for added safety. All through the morning hours we tried to get a flight to Ankara but kept getting bumped. After daylight we either walked, rode taxi's, or buses all over Istanbul trying to find the American consulate. Around dusk we were able to board an Air Force C-130 headed for Ankara. When we arrived there it was the same problem all over again. We couldn't get a seat to Adana where Incirlik AFB was located. Late that night we met a white MSgt and a white Captain in the terminal. Both were from Ohio and they were also going to Incirlik. For the sake of increasing our numbers we decided to hang together. There was a hotel across the street from the American Embassy which had broken windows from an anti-American riot earlier that day. After checking in we decided to walk to a nearby bar where I ordered a coke. In Turkey they would bring a bottled drink to you already opened.

  

 We walked back to the hotel and as I placed my foot on the stairs leading to our rooms my head started spinning. I had to lean against the wall to keep from falling. A wave of panic swept over me wondering if someone had spiked my drink? The hotel only had two rooms available and both rooms had one small bed in each. The two Airmen walked into one room and I turned to follow them. The MSgt grabbed me by the arm. Both he and the Captain tried to talk me into staying with them. They asked me why I didn't want to stay with them. I was pretty naive about things then and it took me a minute to realize what they were getting at. I told them that we had been together since arriving in Turkey and I felt that since I was closer to them in rank and age I should stay with them. The MSgt kept shifting his eyes in the direction of their room. The more he talked a light bulb popped on in my head. They didn't want me to sleep with them because they were black. That made more determined than ever to stay with the airmen. I turned away, walked into our room, shut the door and climbed into bed right between them. My head was still spinning and I felt like I was walking on mattresses and all I wanted to do was sleep. I ended up feeling this way for about three or four days. The next morning at breakfast the two white guys were giving me the cold shoulder. They told us that they had decided to go their own way. Again, this experience reinforced the lesson I learned in Oregon. I was the stereotypical Southerner that was expected to be a bigot. Racism at that time knew no boundaries in America although it was just more open in the South.

 

 Again, we spent all day looking for a flight out of Ankara. Late that afternoon we finally found seats on a Turkish Airways F-27 turboprop to Incirlik. After spending a few days processing in at Incirlik I ran into my friend Mike Cannon and we left for our base at Erhac in eastern Turkey. I ate a big breakfast that morning in the chow hall and was still very dizzy. We flew to Erhac in a C-131 which was one of the bumpiest rides that I ever endured on an airplane. I developed the worst case of air sickness that I ever endured and between the dizziness and nausea I was a physical wreck by the time we arrived at Erhac. After landing there to my surprise I became a flight chief. For about a month I was a flight chief because the Security Police Squadron was short on staff sergeants. During this time I was assigned to a two man room with my assistant flight chief. My Confederate flag was at the bottom of my duffel bag and after unpacking I hung it on the wall over my bunk. There was a black guy from Memphis with the last name of Rogers and he walked into my room and spotted my flag. Rogers asked me if I was a rebel and I said no, I was just proud of being from the South.  He turned and walked out of the room. A month later two new SSgt's arrived in the detachment and I became an assistant to a black SSgt whose name I can't remember now. He was an odd duck. As his assistant I should have had the best posts but instead he was putting me on the worst posts. Then I noticed that he was disrespecting me when he made out the duty roster. He would list everyone by their rank but my name on the roster was always last and it was just Segroves. I endured this treatment for a few weeks but I was resolved to do something about it.

 

First picture after landing at Tuslog Detatchment 93 
Left to right Airman Carter, unknown, Mike Cannon and Airman Rogers

 On a midnight shift after guard mount we were being posted in the alert area. When our truck arrived I waited for everyone else to leave the vehicle so I could talk to my flight chief in private. It was just him and me. After stepping out of the passenger side I looked him straight in the eyes and in a firm but quiet voice told him that I didn't know what his problem was with me but starting tomorrow I expected to be treated with the respect accorded my position. My rank and my proper name had better be on the duty roster. If not I would go to the NCOIC or Non Commissioned Officer In Charge of security. I was armed with an M-16 and a pistol. He was also armed. This man came unglued and cursed me out. He used every profane word in the book and had pure hatred in his eyes. As I walked through the main gate shack to my post he was following and still screaming at me. The Turkish guards looked at us like we were crazy. He was so mad that I thought he was going to shoot me but I walked straight ahead to my post. My gate shack was the size of a telephone booth and as I sat down he was standing over me and spewing out pure hatred. I never said another word after I left the truck. Finally after what seemed an eternity he turned and stormed off. I called our dispatcher and told him to call our NCOIC of Security, who was TSgt Wright and wake him up. When sergeant Wright called me I told him how I was being treated. The next day Wright moved me to another flight and I became the assistant to another SSgt, who was also black. His name was John Miliken. He was very fair with me and we became good friends. SSgt Miliken and SSgt Charles, who was my sergeant at Kingsley Field Oregon were both black and were the best sergeants that I ever had in the Air Force. Charles and Miliken were like a father to me.

  

 I couldn't understand why this sergeant had treated me so badly. One day I was talking to a friend and he said he said Greg think about it. You have a rebel flag on your wall. I seriously had not considered this. For a few days I debated taking it down but I knew in my heart that I wasn't a racist. When I analyzed my past I knew that I was not a perfect person but I had never used a racist slur or mistreated anyone of color in my life. I was virtually raised around black people. I had played with black children and regardless of a black persons station in life, or anyone for that matter, I always treated everyone with  respect whether they were white or black. So I stood my ground. The flag would stay on my wall. As the months drug by in Turkey I saw a softening in the attitude of the black sergeant that had mistreated me. Over time I believe that he came to realize that I wasn't what he thought I was. He was judging a book by it's cover. Doing the very thing that had probably happened to him many times. By the time he left Turkey we were on speaking terms again. 

 

 I had learned that bigotry can be a two way street. This experience taught me a lifelong lesson. Be true to yourself. If you think you are right don't be afraid to stand your ground. That is one reason that I have a tremendous appetite for learning. Knowledge is power and no one can take that away from me. It gives me an inner security and strength to confidently take on ignorant and narrow minded people. It hurts to be judged unfairly or to be mislabeled. This is why so many fair minded people back down to leftist bullying. Nobody wants to be called a racist. Being called a racist is a method of silencing free speech. As Constitutional conservatives we must be prepared to be called racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, transphobic, Islamophobic and every other label that the left can come up with. Yet we must strive not to be those things in reality. I have found that the people calling you names are usually guilty of the very thing that they accuse you of being. Or when they are backed into a corner by the facts they resort to name calling because that is all they have left to fall back on. This happened to me recently. Political correctness and wokeness are just a tactic for shutting down debate. Nobody owns me or my mind because I am a free thinker. Over the years since my experience in Turkey I have studied the Civil War and Reconstruction in depth. My views on the war have changed dramatically. Especially so in the last five years or so. I am still very proud to be from the South and I love the Southern people. All Southern people, white and black. I am not a Southern apologist, however; or a believer in the Lost Cause Myth of the Civil War. The Civil War would not have happened if not for slavery and the Democrat party was the party of slavery in both the North and the South. Leftist historians love to make the war into a North vs. South thing. This makes it easier for them to distort history. They can sweep the Democrat parties history under the rug and separate themselves from their past. It was not a North vs. South thing but a Democrat vs. Republican thing. 

 

 I was a Democrat at the time I was stationed in Turkey and I have since realized that the Democrat Party was the party of Indian removal, slavery, segregation, lynching, concentration camps for Americans of Japanese descent during WW2. That they started the Civil War and are responsible for the deaths of 750,000 men & women. They are also greatly responsible for the break-up of the black and white family because of their welfare programs during the War on Poverty. There were more fathers living with their children under slavery than live with them today because of leftist welfare policies. Their policies have contributed to the deaths of millions of children of all races through abortion. Their hero Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood was a virulent racist who wanted to exterminate the black race. The placement of abortion clinics primarily in urban areas is no accident. Additionally their policies have contributed to the deaths of thousands of blacks in our inner cities through violence because the inner cities are the new plantations. The Democrats do not care about their modern slaves in the inner cities anymore than they cared about their slaves on the antebellum plantations. In the 1980's Ronald Reagan and a stronger Christian faith was the reason I left the Democrat Party and I have never looked back.  I have also learned as far as I can tell right now I have more ancestors that fought for the Union than fought for the Confederacy or the Democrat party. I am very proud to be related to those who fought for the Union and against slavery. One day I found an old book in my in-laws bookcase that was published around 1930. It was called the Fiery Epic and it opened my eyes to the plight of not only black people under slavery but the plight of white people. Slavery made it very difficult for white people to compete against free labor. I had always been aware of the plight of the slave but never thought about how slavery was a drain on everyone but the wealthy elitist Democrats. Although blacks and whites had more in common than they realized the white leaders in the South used racial fear and prejudice to cause division. Just as they do today. Their policies have always caused nothing but pain and suffering for everyone.

 

 What we are seeing today in regard to the assault on the Confederate flag and other Confederate symbols is a type of cultural cleansing that we have seen in Communist and Muslim countries. Personally, I would never fly the Confederate flag today or own one again other than for historic reasons because it represents the Democrat party and racism. There are good people out there like me a few years ago who still believe in it because they have never educated themselves to what it really stands for.  For me it was heritage and Southern pride thing but again the reality is that the flag represents the Democrat party. I still believe in a persons right to fly it or any flag for that matter. I cringe, however; when I see it flying at a Trump rally or when Conservatives fly it. I am not for removing Confederate statues either. The Democrats placed them there in the first place and we should never forget that. As Trump said and he has turned out to be right, if we get on that slippery slope one day they will remove statues of real Americans heroes like George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Fredrick Douglass, which they did during the BLM riots of 2020. There is plenty of space for the left to honor their heroes like Karl Marx, Joseph Stalin, V.I. Lenin, Mao Tse Tung, Antonio Gramsci, Herbert Marcuse and Margaret Sanger without having to tear down historical statues that remind us of the good and bad aspects of our history. For example the Antifa, BLM mob tore down a statue of Edward Ward Carmack in front of the state capital in Nashville. Carmack was a virulent racist and prominent Tennessee Democrat politician during the late 19th and early 20th century. He was gunned down in a shootout at the corner of present day Union St.and 7th Ave.in Nashville. Carmack fought against the efforts of anti lynching crusader Ida Wells and was largely responsible for her having to leave Tennessee due to death threats. Now if there is someone who did not deserve a statue it would be him but he was a Democrat hero. As long as I can remember I would see that statue and I would wonder who in the heck was Edward Ward Carmack. Finally, about 20 years ago my curiosity got the best of me and I read up on him. This is how I found out what a low life he was. If that statue hadn't been there I wouldn't know anything about Carmack. The city of Richmond has taken down all of their Confederate statues including the one of Robert E. Lee. He was never affiliated with any political party but many people North and South consider him to be one of our greatest generals. In my view he was not a great general. He developed the wrong strategy to win the war. It was a strategy that cost the South dearly in casualties that they could not afford and he did not care what happened outside of the state of Virginia. His greatness though was what he accomplished after the war. He did more to help the country heal after the war than most people and for that alone I think he needs to be recognized. There are many people that don't deserve a statue or a street named after them. Or a bridge or a building but removing statues and changing names is wrong. The Democrats are simply trying to remove their own racist history.

 

 The Democrats have divided our country today in the same way they did in 1860. We are just as polarized today and I believe another civil war could be in our future. The big difference is that the Southern Democrats then were not militarily and economically prepared to take on the industrial power of the North. If a civil war happened today the patriot cause would be up against an established Democrat regime that holds most of the power today, especially in the unelected administrative state. Although the Democrat party lost that war in 1865 they won the peace and basically re-enslaved their black population for the next hundred years and exploited poor whites. Their interpretation of that war became the excepted version over time. The Lost Cause Myth. In other words they preached that the war was not about slavery but states rights and the Southern Democrats could not win due to being so outnumbered not only in terms of population but because of the industrial output of the North. Of course they could have won if they had used a winning strategy like Washington in the American Revolution but poor strategy such as that utilized by Robert E. Lee had more to do with them losing the war than anything else. The winners of a war usually write the history but somehow the losing Southern Democrats view of things prevailed until recent years. 

 

 Lincoln, like Trump, was an outsider. His political experience was not extensive. He had been in the Illinois legislature and served just one term in the U.S. Congress. Although he tried to reassure the Democrats in 1860 that he would not bother their slaves they did not trust him and as Democrats do they lied about him. Like Trump they said that he would be a tyrant and destroy the Union. He was called a Black Republican, abolitionist and many other derogatory names. It is safe to say that Lincoln and Trump were the most despised presidents while they were in office. Lincoln understood the Constitution and knew that he did not have the power to end slavery. He was an anti slavery man which was different from an abolitionist. An abolitionist wanted to end slavery by any means necessary, even if it meant the destruction of the Union. They were considered to be very radical and hated by a large segment of the population. An anti-slavery person hated slavery on moral and practical grounds but they weren't willing to abolish slavery if it meant destroying the Union. The Union came first. Most Republicans could be classified as anti-slavery. Abolitionists were a loud and vocal minority in the Republicans party. All Republicans were united in their opposition to to the expansion of slavery. The Democrat party in the North and South were united in their racist attitudes toward black people. Although most Northern states had abolished slavery the Democrats were not fond of blacks. In some Midwestern states like Illinois free blacks were banned from moving there before the Civil War. In the 1860 election the Democrats split into the Northern and Southern wing. Historians call the Southern Democrats the pro slavery party but both wings were pro slavery. They split over ideology. The Northern Democrats were in favor of Stephen Douglas's push for "Popular Sovereignty" which was to allow the new territories to decide whether or not they wanted to be free or slave. The Southern wing of the Democrat party wanted to return to the old Missouri Compromise which would make the new Southwest territories acquired after our victory in the Mexican War open to becoming slave states. The Northern Democrats, were always sympathetic to the Southern wing of their party. Historians have emphasized how Lee hoped to win a major victory on Northern soil during the Antietam campaign in order to influence Britain or France to ally itself with the Confederacy. They ignore the fact that Lee was hoping to impact the Northern midterm elections in order for the Democrats to win control of Congress and negotiate a settlement which would allow the South to keep their slaves. There were the Democrat Copperheads in the North who were always trying to undermine the Northern war effort. When the Democrats pushed for a settlement late in the war the major stumbling blocks to a peace treaty was that they wanted to leave slavery intact. This was unacceptable to Lincoln and most Republicans since the Southern Democrat Confederacy was facing defeat. 

 

The Southern Democrats started the Civil War because they could not accept the outcome of the 1860 election. This is the same thing that happened in the 2016 election. Because they could not accept defeat they began an all out war on Donald Trump, anyone associated with him, and especially on us, the American people for having the audacity to vote for him. Yes, the issues are different in many ways today but very similar in others. The the powerful Southern Democrat elites were protecting the plantation system that ensured their power wealth and status. Today they are protecting the modern plantations that they control in the big Democrat managed cities, Indian reservations and Hispanic barrios. The big house today is not on any big Southern plantation but now the White House is the big house. Their overseer class is made up of all races and ethnicities that have bought into the big Democrat lie.

A racist anti Lincoln Democrat pamphlet

 Yes, I am a rebel today but not the kind of rebel that Rogers thought I was so many years ago. I am the kind of rebel that believes in common sense values. That believes in the Bible, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. That there is a difference between boys and girls and that there are only 2 sexes. Unbelievably this kind of thinking used to be mainstream. Today you are a radical right winger or a so called MAGA supporter if you believe this way. Basic biology and self evident truth are no longer excepted by the Fascist left. I admire courage and I do believe that the courage displayed by the common Confederate soldier is worthy of honor. The Democrat regime called the Confederacy that they were mislead to fight for is not worthy of honor. If I had a magic wand and could eradicate the Democrat party I believe this country could still be saved but we will be a nation in decline as long as they control the media, social media, the bureaucracy, the judicial system, the government, the border and our culture. Their history is a dark blot on this nations past. Fortunately they weren't around at our founding. They will be around at our destruction unless we can find a way to stop them and if it happens they will be the author and finisher of our destruction.