Lincoln said himself that the north would not have won the war had it not been for the USCT regiments "filling out" the Union Army.

I thank he was more honest in that statement than he is given credit for being. Most people seem to take the statement as only a compliment.

What I found interesting in looking at The Frederick Douglas website was a letter from Douglas to Lincoln, one of the very few correspondance between he and Lincoln, The subject of the letter was what was to happen or how were the slaves to be freed if the Union did not win a complete victory over the Confederacy.

The really interesting thing about this letter was that it was date August 1864. By August 1864 most modern day Historians will tell you that the war was almost over by that date. For some reason Douglas did not seem to think that the war was about to end with a northern victory.

The only reasons that I can think of as to why Douglas had this opinion was either that he did not have a full understanding of the Military situation with Grant around Richmond. Or that Grants inability to break Lee'd defences combined with the growing northern war weariness and the upcoming elections of 1864 cast a shadow over Douglas' expectations.

Personally I think it was the latter that prompted Douglas to write Lincoln about this matter. Which makes me think that things were not rosey on the Northern Home front in the late summer of 1864.