The newly found freedom for slaves was fleeting and conditional upon the presence of the Union Army who played a duel role of liberator and enforcer. When the Army moved on, Southern plantation owners reverted to old attitudes and practices, and meted out punishments, which were in many ways, harsher, crueler, more brutal and punitive. As for the union Army, their life and death struggle to survive and/or retain the ground that they had …showed first 75 words of 758 total…

…showed last 75 words of 758 total…harsher environment on the plantations and meting out brutal and arbitrary punishments on the slightest provocation of Yankee-induced behavior by their slaves as perceived by the owners and sometimes non-owners such as demonstrated by one newspaper in Alexandria urging "that public examples be made of 'the ungrateful and vindictive scoundrels' who seized their master's property, volunteered information to or acted as guides for the enemy, and 'were seen armed or participated in any active demonstrations'."