The Oct. 20 Washington Post front page carries an article 
(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/19/AR2010101907974.html) 
with the headline and subheadline "In Va., an old front reemerges in battles 
over Civil War history: 4th-grade textbook criticized for asserting that 
thousands of blacks fought for South." The opening paragraph says that this 
assertion is "rejected by most historians but often made by groups seeking 
to play down slavery's role as a cause of the conflict." The reporter quotes 
Carol Sheriff of William and Mary, David Blight of Yale, Ervin Jordan of 
U.Va., and James McPherson of Princeton.

My friends in this forum won't be surprised, and I hope won't mind, that I'm 
adding a note about an irony: The Washington Post -- despite its interest in 
Civil War history debates -- has never done any story at all about 
endangered Fort Monroe, which as the Union's bastion in Confederate Virginia 
saw a good deal of important history, actual history, that was directly 
contrary to what's being criticized as bogus history on today's front page.

Meanwhile, Virginia's leaders are pushing forward with their plan to create 
only a tiny, token national park at Fort Monroe -- a tiny, token national 
park that can then be surrounded by financially unnecessary overdevelopment 
on national historic landmark land, overdevelopment not entirely dissimilar 
in ill effect to casinos at Gettysburg.

Steven T. Corneliussen
Poquoson, Virginia 

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