JEFFERSON DAVIS'S NEW YORK CITY

Green, a former history professor, explores the long relationship between New York City and the South in this nonfiction work.

“In a sense,” opens the author, “the South and New York City grew up together.” While contemporary sensibilities suggest the two regions are culturally worlds apart, Green offers a convincing case of how “the South of King Cotton and New York as King Commerce” had a mutually dependent relationship throughout the 19th century. While the sordid history of Southern slavery is well known, the author reminds readers of the integral role New York played in the vile trade: “Dixie depended on New York,” the book argues, for the loans, insurance, shipping services, and supplies “needed to make their plantations run.” Even during the Civil War, the author notes, New York was a major hub of illegal arms smuggling for the Confederacy, and its mayor-turned-congressman Fernando Wood (who represented the city from the 1850s to the 1880s) was a “pro-South, pro-slavery, intensely racist politician” who opposed both Abraham Lincoln and the 13th Amendment. While the story of the North’s complicity in slavery has been documented before, the strength of this book lies in its exploration of the post–Civil War relationship between Confederates and New York. Many Confederate officers had forged social relationships with New York merchants before the conflict, and when the war ended, thousands of Confederates moved to the Northern metropolis. Jefferson Davis’ own wife and daughter moved to New York following his death, as did his private secretary, Burton Norvell Harrison, who worked for the city’s first Rapid Transit Commission. So prevalent were former Confederates in the Big Apple that they founded their own social clubs, including a chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, which remains active today. Green, whose diverse careers include working both in advertising in New York City and as a history professor in the South, has a firm grasp on the historical context of both regions and successfully blends academic rigor with an engaging writing style.

A compelling history of New York City’s Southern ties.