A Short History of Reconstruction [Updated Edition]

by Eric Foner

Regions like East Tennessee and western North Carolina and individual counties in the hill country of other states would embrace the Republican party after the Civil War and remain strongholds well into the twentieth century. Their loyalty first to the Union and then to Republicanism did not, however, imply abolitionist sentiment during the war (although they were perfectly willing to see slavery sacrificed to preserve the Union) or a commitment to the rights of blacks thereafter. Upcountry Unionism, Northern reporter Sidney Andrews explained in the fall of 1865, rested above all on “hatred of those who went into the Rebellion” and of “a certain ruling class” that had brought upon the region the devastating impact of the Civil War.