Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for December 15, 2006 CIVIL WAR HISTORY LESSON

The WPSD TV Channel 6 website exposes some skeletons in Paducah's closet...WOW!

Hey...it's about time! They got "rich and famous" for reporting Cairo's sordid past...and present...and...

KY: Jews Forced Out Of Paducah Part Of River City History

Mary Bleier, NewsChannel 6

Paducah, Cairo, and Metropolis are all river cities that are rich in river history and in the heat of the Civil War, one of the most blatant acts of antisemitism happened in Paducah. On December 17, 1862 all Jews were kicked out of Paducah and forced to Cincinnati.

During one of America's bloodiest and longest battles, Union Army General Ulysses S. Grant was not only battling the war, he was also dealing with illegal cotton traders. Even though it was only a handful of Jews who were a part of the ring, Grant accused them all, calling them "traitors and Jew peddlers." He issued "Order Number 11", which forced all Jews in Paducah, parts of Tennessee and Mississippi from their homes. They had twenty-fours or in some cases, only a few hours, to grab their belongings and get on a steamboat headed to Cincinnati. Some families were forced to leave on foot, heading to Illinois or New York.

Retired Paducah history professor and author John E.L.. Robertson says this was one of the most horrendous acts of antisemitism in American history.

"General Hallicks...and General Grant, both of them seemed to assume that Jews could not become Americans, so they were not entitled to protection under the constitution and so he just ordered them expelled as a class," says Robertson.

However Caroline Yaffe, Archivist for the Temple Israel in Paducah, says she's heard some stories of what happened.

"The soldier was instructed to find all the Jews that might still be left and hiding around..." says Yaffe. But she doesn't have any documents in her records because she says that most people in the area don't care about the story or want to remember it.

"They cleared the area out, three or four months later it was over, nobody died or got hurt. How can you make a big deal about that?"

But Professor Robertson says it was a big deal, primarily because of one man who stood up against the government. Just before he was forced out of Paducah, 27-year old Cesar Kaskel fired off a 16-line telegram of protest to President Abraham Lincoln.

"He stood for the rights of all of us to be protected under the law against arbitrary unrest, against denial of right to practice our religion freely," says Robertson.

The General's orders stirred up Jewish and political leaders in Washington and President Lincoln revoked the orders on January 4, 1863.

Robertson says not only did the president's act protect all of our rights under the constitution, it also gave rights for immigrants to become Americans.

After the war, Grant later apologized, saying he never wrote the orders. He said a subordinate wrote them and he signed it without reading it. He was able to carry the Jewish vote later in 1868 when he was elected president.