Arkansas Peace Society was a Unionist organization in the state of Arkansas during the American Civil War.
Most Arkansans supported secession, but some, especially in the northern part of the state, remained loyal to the United States. They founded the Arkansas Peace Society in order to protect themselves from forced enlistment and impressment. The organization was destroyed by state troops, but the resistance against the Confederacy remained strong during the whole war. In spite of the state having the third smallest white population in the Confederacy, more white Arkansans enlisted in the Union Army than in any other seceded state, except Tennessee. [1] [2]
References
Further reading
- Johnston, J. J. (2018). Mountain Feds: Arkansas Unionists and the Peace Society. Little Rock: Butler Center Books, 2018.
- Warren, Luther E. Yellar Rag Boys: The Arkansas Peace Society of 1861 and Other Events in Northern Arkansas, 1861 to 1865. Marshall, AR: Sandra L. Weaver, 1993.
- Worley, Ted R. “The Arkansas Peace Society of 1861: A Study in Mountain Unionism.” Journal of Southern History 24 (November 1958): 445–456.
- Worley, Ted R., ed. “Documents Relating to the Arkansas Peace Society of 1861.” Arkansas Historical Quarterly 17 (Spring 1958): 82–111.