If I had the power, I would build up a wall of fire between

Yankeedom and the Confederate States, there to burn, for ages,

as a monument of the folly, wickedness, and vandalism

of the puritanic race! No, sir! rather than re-unite with

such a people, I would see the Confederate States

desolated with fire and sword.

 

—Governor-elect of Alabama, T.H. Watts

Letter to Ira R. Foster on “Reconstruction”

September 12, 1863