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Conference showcases the African-American experience during the Civil War

By: Ben Bagwell , Staff Writer

The conference, mostly on the Virginia State University campus, is the conclusion of two years of planning by conference sponsors, which include VSU, Pamplin Historical Park, Richard Bland College. the city of Petersburg, the National Park Service, the College of William and Mary, Eastern National and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.

Speakers are coming from across the nation. Planners say more than 4,000 books on the Civil War have appeared in the last four years. But only 2 percent of these books center on the African-American experience. This conference seeks to respond to this oversight by the historical community and to reveal the fullness of the Civil War experience from another viewpoint.

A. Wilson Greene, executive director of the Pamplin Historical Park, says he hopes this conference will be the first of several such national gatherings to consider history.

Dr. Steven Ramold of VSU says, "We may be able to do this every two years on some historical subject."

Ramold says, "I think this conference is a great opportunity in a historical setting like Petersburg. This will bring a lot of attention to the Petersburg area."

William Gould IV, a professor of law at Stanford Law School in California, will give the opening address, telling about his ancestor, William Gould I, who served with the U.S. Navy during the Civil War.

"African Americans were not allowed in the Army from 1792 until 1863, but the Navy was open to black Americans," Gould says.

"My great grandfather joined the Navy in 1862 as part of the North Atlantic Blockading Squad, which sought to stop ships from Europe sending materials to the Confederacy. During 1864 and 1865, he served with the Navy in Europe, still working to stop the goods from reaching the Confederacy.

"The Navy allowed blacks and whites to serve together. When he first joined he was at the lowest level. When promotions were possible he worked his way up. Eventually, he served as a petty officer in food service."

After the Civil War he settled in Massachusetts and he died in 1923, Gould says.

Tim Reid, president of New Millennium Studios in Petersburg, will speak at the conference's closing banquet at Union Station in Petersburg.

The closing day will be devoted to African-American folklore. Reid has been a mainstay in the entertainment industry.

Reanae McNeal, a storytelling artist from California, will be a featured speaker on the afternoon of May 28.

Active in the anti-violence movement, McNeal's lectures include "And She Survived," "The Color of Violence," "Don't Speak My Mother's Name in Vain," and "And Still I Fly."

Dr. Evie Terrono, fine arts teacher at Randolph Macon College, says, "Well respected scholars during the Civil War spoke of the potential of expanding slavery into the western territories. They compared the images of unity with the images of slavery. The rhetoric suggested the South was wrong in enslaving people. Sanitary fairs were held in Union states. These fairs depicted slave life and raised money to benefit soldier homes and other Union interests."

Todd Arrington of the National Park Service in Nebraska will speak on "The Homestead Act and Black Freedom." He says, "Many thousands of African Americans took advantage of homesteading after this act was approved. Some homesteaded lands as far from the South as the Midwest and California." Homesteading became possible in 1863, he says.

Dr. David Blight of Yale University, author of 10 books on the Civil War, will be a featured speaker Friday.

Blight says his talk will focus on two slaves who escaped the South and served as aids in the Union Army. "These are recently discovered slave narratives. They were written by John Washington, who escaped slavery in Fredericksburg in 1862; and Wallace Turnage who escaped slavery in Mobile, Ala., in 1864. Both are emancipation stories."

The program will be divided into three components: the academic conference, the public history program and the folklore program.

The public history component will provide the opportunity to actually see many of the areas discussed in the conference academic papers and to view the cultural assets of central Virginia. This will include Pamplin Park, the Petersburg National Battlefield, the Petersburg Siege Museum, Historic Petersburg and the VSU campus.

Visitors to the conference will sleep at the motels and hotels in the area.

They will have the option of eating meals in the university dining hall or in Tri-Cities restaurants.

The Dinwiddie Board of Supervisors has provided $500 which will pay registration to the conference for 10 Dinwiddie High School students.

Last week, the conference's steering committee planning the sessions announced that all fees for the program portion of the conference will be waived only for Saturday, May 28. The conference banquet is not included in this offering.

These sessions will be held at VSU.

The public is invited to attend Saturday sessions at 10:45 a.m to 12:30 p.m. in Virginia Hall, from 2 to 4 p.m. in Foster Hall and from 4:15 to 5:15 p.m. in Foster Hall.

* Ben Bagwell may be reached at 732-3456, ext. 260.