1. THE ISSUE OF THE USE OF BLACK TROOPS

Initially during the Civil War there was opposition to the use of blacks as soldiers in the Union Army. African-Americans have always been seen through the lens or prism, the distorting lens or prism, of stereotypes. The stereotype was that black people were inferior, like cattle or sheep. Of course, therefore, they could not fight. Of course they lacked the intelligence and discipline to follow orders. And it was believed that white soldiers would refuse to fight if they had to serve with Negroes. Therefore, in 1861 and the first half of 1862, the efforts by blacks to serve in the war were rebuffed.

However events on the ground, in the field, pushed a reluctant Union toward the use of black troops. First, the generals wanted them, to replenish the ranks of white troops being lost in the war. In time sheer military necessity forced the Union to accept black troops.

Lincoln's generals began taking initiative on their own, without official permission or authorization.

In Sept. 1861 the Navy authorized the enlistment of blacks. (Bennett, Before The Mayflower, p. 466-467).

On May 9, 1862 General David Hunter began organizing the First South Carolina Volunteers, who were the first black regiment in the US military. This included free blacks and slaves who had run away to the Union lines.

In August General Jim Lane issued the call to establish the First Kansas Colored Volunteers.

Union forces had invaded Louisiana by sea and won New Orleans. In August 1862, General Benjamin Butler, in New Orleans, enlisted free blacks there. They formed the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Louisiana Native Guards, and the Corps d' Afrique. These actions by Generals Hunter, Lane and Butler had not been authorized by the president or the secretary of war. Lincoln moved slowly on the question of using black soldiers because he was always fearful of antagonizing the loyal Border slave states of Maryland, Kentucky and Missouri, and he did not believe that the North could win the war without the support of these states. In September 1862 Washington officially recognized the First Louisiana Guards. It was the first officially recognized black regiment.

In August 1862 a Confederate army had invaded Kentucky and advanced north toward Cincinnati, Ohio. Panic seized the city.

Out of necessity, Lincoln authorized General Rufus Saxton to arm 5,000 black slaves as troops and impress 50,000 Negro laborers. The Union army impressed blacks to work on building fortifications.

In January 1863 Secretary of War Edwin Stanton authorized Governor John Andrew of Mass. to raise troops, including those of African descent. Frederick Douglass began recruiting soldiers for Andrews. The Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts Volunteers was the first regiment of black troops raised in the North. When Governor Andrew presented the state flag to the regiment, William Lloyd Garrison was there to give his blessing. Frederick Douglass's sons Charles and Lewis served with the Mass. regiments. (Negro-Americans in the Civil War, p. 66).

In Feb. 1864 a new Enrollment Act provided for compensation of $100 to slaveholders in the Union whose slaves were drafted by the military.

And the Enrollment Act of March 3, 1863 provided that ALL able-bodied male citizens were liable for the draft. Previously it had referred to able-bodied white male citizens.

On May 22, 1863 the War Dep. established the Bureau of Colored Troops and began actively recruiting blacks as soldiers.

Later on I will say more about the numbers who served, and pay, and so forth, but for right now I'm going to hold those issues aside.

2. BLACK SOLDIERS IN BATTLE

A) ISLAND MOUND

One of the first engagements by African-American troops was by the First Kansas Colored Volunteers on Oct. 28, 1862. This was the Battle of Island Mound, in Bates County, Missouri. (Bennett, p. 467). It ended in Union victory.

B) JACKSONVILLE, FLA.

On March 10, 1863, two infantry regiments, the First and Second South Carolina Volunteers, captured and occupied Jacksonville, Florida. The First South Carolina Volunteers were commanded by the white abolitionist Thomas Wentworth Higginson, who subsequently wrote down the melodies and words of the songs sung by his troops and published them in 1867.

C) FORT HUDSON

Another engagement occurred in May 1863 at Fort Hudson. It is located above Baton Rouge, in Louisiana, and was controlled by the Confederates. The 1st and 3rd Louisiana Guards spearheaded the assault. Unfortunately the attack of May 27th was not successful. However the attack on Fort Hudson demonstrated the courage, fearlessness and heroism of the black troops. Critics no longer doubted that African-Americans could fight bravely. The fort was located on cliffs 80 feet above the Mississippi River. Some 900 black troops attacked the fort. Six hundred were killed. Meanwhile General Ulysses S. Grant was advancing on Vicksburg, further up the Mississippi River in Mississippi. Fort Hudson and Vicksburg were the last two confederate strongholds on the Miss. River. If the Union could win them, the entire length of the Miss. River would once again be in Union hands. This would split the Confederacy in half, and divide the southeast from the food and cattle of Texas. So Fort Hudson and Vicksburg had great strategic importance. Grant besieged Vicksburg, and the Union forces besieged Fort Hudson. Vicksburg fell on July 4, 1863, while the Union was repulsing Lee at Gettysburg. Fort Hudson fell on July 9, 1963. Eight black regiments participated in the siege of Fort Hudson. (See Bennett, p. 204)
 

D) MILLIKEN'S BEND

Another important engagement involving African-American troops was the Battle of Milliken's Bend, on June 8, 1863. This was 20 miles upstream from Vicksburg, Mississippi. As Grant's army had advanced into Mississippi, the slaves left the plantations to follow the army. Grant formed new regiments of runaway slaves. The fort at Milliken's Bend was garrisoned or protected by three regiments of African-American troops (1,250 troops) and one regiment of white troops (160). The black regiment shad been formed on May 22nd. On June 8 Confederate General Richard Taylor and a division of Texans attacked the fort. In hand to hand combat with bayonets, the union forces repulsed the attack and the Confederates withdrew. The casualties were:

Union 101 killed 285 wounded, 264 captured and wounded

Confed. 44 killed 130 wounded 10 missing

The Union suffered heavier losses. But the Confederates had failed to capture the fort, and had withdrawn. Therefore it was a Union victory. (see Bennett, p. 205)

E) FORT WAGNER, S.C.

Thanks to the movie Glory, the best known engagement by black troops is the Battle of Fort Wagner, near Charleston, SC, on July 18, 1863. The Union attack on the fort was lead by the Massachusetts 54th. The fort was located on a peninsula and could be approached from land only across a narrow neck of shore. The commander of the 54th was a white opponent of slavery, Colonel Robert Shaw. That day the attack, though heroic, was unsuccessful. Shaw was killed, and the Confederates said they "buried him with his niggers." The standard bearer of the 54th was Sergeant William Carney. For his conspicuous bravery he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. He was the first African-American to receive that medal.

F) FORT PILLOW, TENNESSEE

The Southerners were incensed by black troops, and preferred to kill them rather than capture them alive as prisoners of war, even if they surrendered. On August 12, 1864 one of the worst massacres of black troops during the Civil War occurred. This took place at Fort Pillow, Tennessee, 50 miles north of Memphis. Some 557 Union troops were garrisoning the fort. There were 262 African-American soldiers among them. Of that number, 238 were killed, many of them murdered while surrendering. The Confederate general who ordered the massacre was Nathan Bedford Forrest. Late in 1865, he became the founder of the Ku Klux Klan. In a way, the KKK would become the continuation of the War for Southern Independence as a guerilla war, or war by other means.

G) JOHN LAWSON: MOBILE BAY

On a more positive note, in August 1864 the Union navy attacked the Confederates at Mobile Bay, Alabama. A black gunner named John Lawson served on the flagship of Admiral David Farragut, and displayed great courage in the battle. He was awarded a Congressional Medal of Honor.

H) PETERSBURG AND RICHMOND, VA

Thirty-two regiments of black infantrymen and cavalry participated in the siege of Petersburg and Richmond from June 1864 to April 1865. On April 10, 1865, Lee surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse in VA.

3. STATISTICAL SUMMARY

More than 185,000 black soldiers served in the Union army, organized into 166 all-black regiments (145 infantry, 7 cavalry, 12 heavy artillery, 1 light artillery, 1 engineer). Most of these regiments were commanded by white officers, though there were 70 to 100 black officers (Bennett, p. 206). The largest number of black soldiers came from Louisiana, Kentucky and Tennessee. Sixteen black soldiers received Congressional Medals of Honor, and 37,638 black soldiers lost their lives during the war. Some 29,511 blacks were sailors in the Union navy, in fact 1 out of every 4 navy men during the Civil War was African-American. Four black sailors won Congressional Medals of Honor. In addition, more than 200,000 black civilians were in service units, doing manual labor, laundry, cooking, repair, nursing. (Ibid).
 

4. OTHER CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE WAR EFFORT

A) PHYSICIANS

Martin Delany, the nationalist and emigrationist, was a Harvard trained medical doctor. Unfortunately, in those days, white physicians did not like to touch or treat blacks. Delany was commissioned as a major in the infantry. He helped raise two regiments of black troops, the 104th and 105th US Colored Troops (USCT), and served as a medical officer.

Another physician was Alexander Augustana. In fact he was a surgeon, and he left a lucrative medical practice in Toronto, Canada to serve in the Union army with the 7th USCT. He was commissioned as a lieutenant colonel, and was the highest ranking black officer during the Civil War. Initially he was stationed in Baltimore, where he was chief of surgery. But white assistants objected to having to work under the authority of a black man. Black officers received the same pay as black enlisted men. Eventually Augustana did receive officer's pay.

B) NURSES AND SPIES

African-Americans also played roles as nurses and spies. The ubiquitous Harriet Tubman disguised herself as a slave and snuck behind enemy lines to get information. She also served as a nurse on the Sea islands of S.C. Sojourner Truth helped to recruit black soldiers during the war. In October 1864 Lincoln met with her at the White House, and after the war she served as a nurse at the Freedmen's Hospital in Washington, D.C.

Another famous contribution as a spy was made by Mary Elizabeth Bowser of Richmond, VA. She had been the slave of Elizabeth Van Lew. Van Lew was a secret Unionist, who opposed secession. Prior to the war, Van Lew set Mary Elizabeth free. Mary Elizabeth then became a paid servant, and Van Lew saw to it that she was educated. When the war began, and the Confederate capital was moved to Richmond, Van Lew stayed to spy for the Union. Van Lew succeeded in recommending Mary Elizabeth as a "slave" for the family of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. Mary Elizabeth pretended to be illiterate. Using those slave skills, she pretended to be dumb. And while dusting the furniture and so forth she was able to read Jeff Davis's dispatches and orders to his generals and his letters and so on. She was also able to overhear conversations and information about troop movements, and pass it along.

Each day a go-between went to the Van Lew plantation to get eggs and farm products for Mr. Jeff Davis's breakfast, and passed along information from Mary Elizabeth to Ms. Van Lew and vice versa. She passed it on to Union generals, including (eventually) Grant. In this way Mary Elizabeth Bowser could pass on information without ever leaving the Confederate mansion, and so evaded suspicion or detection. These are only some of the ways that African-American women played a vital role in the war effort.

THE ISSUE OF UNEQUAL PAY

In the beginning of the war there was a disparity in pay between blacks and whites. White enlisted men received rations and $13 per month, plus a clothing allowance of $3.50. Black enlistees received rations and $10 a month minus $3 for clothing (which equals $7) [see Trotter, Chap. 10, p. 255, in Volume I; may be a different page number in Vol. II). The disparity in pay could be as much as $9.50 ($16.50 - $7). Some black soldiers who protested against the unequal pay were imprisoned. William Walker of South Carolina was court martialed and shot. . On June 15, 1864 Congress finally equalized the pay, retroactive to Jan. 1, 1864 for all black soldiers who had been free on or before 19 April 1861. The slaves who were set free were called FREEDMEN. The freedmen could take the "Quaker Oath," which allowed freedmen to claim equal pay on the basis of the "law of God" and receive retroactive pay for their actual length of service (see p. 260, in Volume I). Perhaps the important point is that despite the injustice of unequal pay, in the end the Union did the right thing. Sometimes Afro-American soldiers found that they had to fight two battles: one against the military enemy (Confederacy), and one against prejudice on the part of their own allies (North, Union).

AFRO-AMERICANS PARTICIPATED IN THE STRUGGLE FOR THEIR OWN FREEDOM

Well-meaning white people from the North did not just GIVE black people their freedom as a consequence of the Civil War. It was not just some kind of gift. Black people were not just passive recipients. Tens of thousands of Afro-Americans ran away from the plantations to the Union lines. Tens of thousands pushed themselves into the Union Army. Black people participated in the struggle for their own freedom. Freedom is not always given. Sometimes it has to be taken. No one else can walk for you, or breathe for you. One must do some things for oneself.