Editor, NY Times:
Yet again the Times abetted by Elizabeth Mitchell publishes a Nativist rendition of the New York City draft riots (NYT, 2.18/21). This time citing Herbert Asbury's Nativist Gangs of New York, which some refer to as the Protocols of the Elders of Erin. While there were indeed attacks on blacks during the riots, by far most of the riot dead were white civilians, too many woman and children, gunned down by the army and militia. Concurred with by Pulitzer-Prize historian James McPherson, Adrian Cook provided a detailed casualty list in his scholarly, Armies of the Streets. In fact, the riots were not simply about a draft. The riots were a protest against a draft that was class privileged -- for a price, the rich could buy their way out of the draft. In addition, the protests were incited by rich businessman who wanted to preserve their commercial ties to the South. The extent of the rioting was due to the Lincoln administration stubbornly deciding to hold the draft when the city militia, thousands strong, was still in Pennsylvania after supporting the Union army during the Confederate invasion of 1863. By far most of New York City and its immigrants did not riot. The city's police who battled the mobs and protected the city's black were the riots real heroes. The Times and Ms. Mitchell need to apologize for their transgressions against immigrant New York whose 150,000 soldier and sailors won 200 Medal of Honor during the American Civil War, and the scores of white civilians gunned down by the feckless native-born troops hiding out from the war in New York City's harbor forts.
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Times would not publish this complaint.
