Chapter 1: Remnants of the Confederacy
Today is a sunny day with clear blue skies. It is a rare good day and suitable for an outing. However, the thick smoke and rumbling sound of the steam train make this idea seem inappropriate.
With the sound of a loud whistle, the train slowly stopped. Sheffield, whose eyes were dull and who had been in a trance, came back to his senses and interrupted his fantasy for the umpteenth time. Was he dreaming?
"Young master, why don't you get off the bus and take a walk when the bus stops?" asked a sturdy man opposite Sheffield.
"We're almost home, why are you still walking around? Please go downstairs and buy a newspaper." As one of the few entertainment activities in this era, he has developed the habit of reading newspapers over the past sixteen years, even though he did not have this habit in his previous life.
The train's arrival was just an episode. As people came and went, the familiar whistle sounded again, and the train slowly started. Under the cover of the whistle, Sheffield, who was already holding a newspaper, looked at the headline and asked, "Am I dreaming?"
In Sheffield's not-so-long life, he had asked himself this question many times, and now the headline in the newspaper made him ask himself again. The front page of the newspaper paid attention to the recent Brazilian civil war. Why didn't he remember such an event in his previous life? Moreover, it was now 1895.
Even the United States where he was now was different from the beacon country in his imagination. For example, his current destination, Arlington, was very famous. Sheffield knew that the Arlington National Cemetery was located in Washington, D.C. in the northern United States. It was the final resting place of American soldiers.
But next to his house, there is also a military cemetery with the same name, where the soldiers of the Confederate Army during the Civil War are buried. He can guarantee that this cemetery in Texas in his previous life absolutely did not exist.
Historically, Texas did not shine in the Civil War, let alone the emergence of a Texas Legion. But this legion did appear, and its commander was his grandfather in this life, Edward Sheffield.
Even if Sheffield was slow, sixteen years was enough time to figure out where the historical roots of this paradox were. The roots were his so-called grandfather, a guy who grew cotton in Louisiana in his early years.
Sheffield had never met this time-traveling senior, who had been injured in the Civil War and died after the war. The current head of the Sheffield family is his grandmother Annabelle.
Thinking of this family grandmother who was always serious and dressed in black, Sheffield secretly swallowed his anger. This grandmother was a tough character who was not easy to deal with. She was stubborn, too stubborn.
After getting off the train, Sheffield found the carriage waiting outside the station without any guidance. The Sheffield family's carriage was easy to find. Two giant Shire horses, which were rare in the world, were in front of the carriage. He didn't know why they used such giant horses to pull the carriage. It seemed that such horses were used for plowing fields.
However, in a place like Texas where big is beautiful, it played an extraordinary role and attracted the attention of tourists. The Shire horse is the largest horse breed in the world. It originated in the British Isles and was an important tool for early British agriculture, industry, transportation, and transport. This horse can pull up to five tons of weight.
As for the carriage that Sheffield was riding in, the two horses were about two meters tall at the shoulders, and their huge bodies were like small hills. There was fine horse hair growing on their wrists, which looked very cool. Many passers-by couldn't help but take a second look.
This kind of wait-and-see attitude also extended to the driver, who was a black man, less than 20 years old. Facing such gazes, he not only did not dodge, but took it calmly. He was completely different from most black people who were afraid of white people.
"Martin, have you been waiting for a long time?" Sheffield greeted the black youth very skillfully, but every time he saw this young man, he felt a little out of place. Before the Civil War, the names of the black people sold to the United States were naturally given by their owners, and the black ancestor in front of him was also given by his master. However, his grandfather obviously had a bad taste. Three generations of this black family were named Martin Luther King, which was quite black humor.
The black humor goes far beyond this. The young man's father was a mayor, and he became the only black mayor in the United States a hundred years in advance. Even if you look for him in all the cities in the United States, he is still the only one.
After the Civil War, this was the most resolute decision made by his grandfather. Of course, this operation was not isolated. Martin's relatives were in a country called Liberia. Long before the Civil War, there was a movement to repatriate black freemen in the United States. Many blacks were repatriated to Liberia. This history is very clear.
After the Civil War, the Sheffield family quickly took over the then-small immigrants, quickly replaced the original minority with their own blacks, and took control of the United States' spokesperson in Africa. They even changed the Liberian star-spangled flag to a cross flag similar to the Confederate States.
It sounds simple, but to be able to accomplish such a thing in this era, there must be many unknown details. It is definitely not easy, which also reflects the strength of the Sheffield family during the Civil War.
After doing this, Edward ended his life, which he now concluded was a life of constant obstacles to the United States. This directly led to the current Sheffield, which looked very strange looking at the human lighthouse.
How different is the current United States of America from the same period in history because of the extra two years of the Civil War? Is it stronger or weaker? How much weaker? Because he has never left Texas, it is impossible to judge. However, as an important part of the losers of the Southern Confederacy, the Sheffield family was not liquidated, which shows that the Northern Federation at that time really had no spare energy to pursue it.
But Sheffield could still see the difference in Texas. In addition to setting up a black experiment of self-government, which was actually a variant of racial segregation. The carriage carrying Sheffield just passed a church. Churches are very common, and it is normal for Texans to be conservative, but this church is Orthodox.
Before the Civil War, Texas had only tens of thousands of residents, and the Lone Star Republic of Austin and Houston had only these people until Edward Sheffield moved from New Orleans, Louisiana. This has to mention the grandmother Annabelle who is now in power in the Sheffield family. She used the power of the whole family to buy and sell people from various European countries to support her husband's immigration work.
This has resulted in nearly one-third of Texas' current population being Eastern Europeans. Due to environmental reasons, Eastern Europeans have never seen Africans and naturally tended to stand on the side of the South in the Civil War.
Of course, all these operations cannot be separated from a basic condition: money! Annabelle's family is actually in the transportation industry. Before the Civil War, New Orleans, the center of the South, had a huge fleet traveling back and forth across the Atlantic. Human trafficking is an old business, but it has shifted from Africa to Europe.
It didn't take long for the carriage to arrive at a square. In the center of the square were two flagpoles with two flags standing side by side. They were the flag of the Republic of Texas and the Southern Cross flag of the Confederate States of America.
I generally don’t read the book review section when I write a novel. Da Jin Taizai has a book called Yunshang 1992 who is the leader, but I never thanked him until I found out about it after I finished the book. Thanks to the leader of Yunshang 1992.
(End of this chapter)
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