<P> People loyal to the U.S. federal government and opposed to secession living in the border states ( where slavery was legal in 1861 ) were termed Unionists . Confederates sometimes styled them `` Homemade Yankees '' . However , Southern Unionists were not necessarily northern sympathizers and many of them , although opposing secession , supported the Confederacy once it was a fact . East Tennessee never supported the Confederacy , and Unionists there became powerful state leaders , including governors Andrew Johnson and William G. Brownlow . Likewise , large pockets of eastern Kentucky were Unionist and helped keep the state from seceding . Western Virginia , with few slaves and some industry , was so strongly Unionist that it broke away and formed the new state of West Virginia . </P>
<P> People loyal to the U.S. federal government and opposed to secession living in the border states ( where slavery was legal in 1861 ) were termed Unionists . Confederates sometimes styled them `` Homemade Yankees '' . However , Southern Unionists were not necessarily northern sympathizers and many of them , although opposing secession , supported the Confederacy once it was a fact . East Tennessee never supported the Confederacy , and Unionists there became powerful state leaders , including governors Andrew Johnson and William G. Brownlow . Likewise , large pockets of eastern Kentucky were Unionist and helped keep the state from seceding . Western Virginia , with few slaves and some industry , was so strongly Unionist that it broke away and formed the new state of West Virginia . </P>
were the yankees from the north or south
were the yankees from the north or south
northern sympathizers
northern sympathizers