What a noble sentiment.  “I will go to war in the hope that one day I too can own a fellow human as chattel property.” That right there demonstrates the moral bankruptcy of the South, it is not as if the Christian world had not already acknowledged that slavery is wrong and it was in the process of being abolished elsewhere.  That is another thing I have never understood, and not just in the context of the American South, with serfdom as well.  How do you square Christ's teaching with holding people in bondage for economic gain?  I have never heard a convincing argument for how that fits into Christian philosophy

That is a pretty neat animated map (though the dates are 1000 AD – 2003).  It's too bad they don't give you the years as the maps are changing.  One thing is for sure – Germany is a mess for much of its history.