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The Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) was the first organization to promote stories of black Confederate soldiers, beginning in the late 1970s. Evidence shows that the group meant to counter the growing acceptance that slavery was the cause of the Civil War; that emancipation was central to what the war accomplished; and that former slaves and free blacks were instrumental in bringing about the Confederacyβs demise. They hoped to demonstrate that if free and enslaved black men fought in Confederate ranks, the war could not have been fought to abolish slavery.
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Kevin M. Levin (Searching for Black Confederates: The Civil Warβs Most Persistent Myth (Civil War America))