Answer to Question 1
Ideal Answer: The ideal answer should:
1. Identify General Cleburne.
2. Outline Cleburne's recommendations to arm slaves in exchange for their freedom.
3. Explain that his recommendation was ironic because the Confederacy fought to perpetuate slavery and prevent the abolition of slavery by northern whites.
4. Point out that the outcome of the recommendation included President Jefferson Davis stopping the discussion because southern whites did not support it.
5. Note that the desperate Confederate Congress finally authorized the use of black troops in exchange for emancipation and pay but the war ended soon after.
6. Conclude that this experiment in arming black men was symbolic of the contradictions inherent in southern society and the Confederacy in attempting to enslave half of its population.
Answer to Question 2
Ideal Answer: The ideal answer should:
1. Define non-combat roles: liberators, spies, guides, and that many black women combined all three roles.
2. Define slave vs. free contributions: free black women were often nurses; enslaved black women were more often the spies and the guides for the Union.
3. Outline liberators: black women like Harriet Tubman and the details of her role as liberator, spy, and guide.
4. The non-combat roles reveal the challenges of poverty, slavery, racial and gender discrimination, and the lack of literacy.