T. G. Steward - The Colored Regulars in the United States Army

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When the battalion arrived in the South the white citizens were not at
all favorably disposed toward colored soldiers, and it must be said
that the reception was not cordial. But by their orderly conduct and
soldierly behavior the men soon won the respect of all, and the
battalion was well treated before it left. November 28-29 Major Philip
Reade, Inspector General First Division, Second Army Corps, inspected
the Ninth Battalion, beginning his duties in that brigade with this
inspection. He complimented the battalion for its work both from a
practical and theoretical standpoint. Coming to the Fourteenth
Pennsylvania he required them to go through certain movements in the
extended order drill which not being done entirely to his
satisfaction, he sent his orderly to the commanding officer of the
Ninth Battalion, requesting him to have his command on the drill
ground at once. The battalion fell in and marched to the ground and
when presented to the Inspector orders were given for it to go through
with certain movements in the extended order drill in the presence of
the Pennsylvania regiment. This done, the Inspector dismissed the
battalion, highly complimenting Major Young on the efficiency of his
command. Just after the visit of the Inspector General, General S.B.M.
Young, commanding the Second Army Corps, visited Camp Marion. Orders
were sent to Major Young one morning to have his battalion fall in at
once, as the General desired to have them drill. By his command the
battalion went through the setting-up exercises and battalion drill in
close and extended order. The General was so well pleased with the
drill that the battalion was exempted from all work during the
remainder of the day.

The battalion was ordered to be mustered out January 29, 1899.
Lieutenant Geo. W. Van Deusen, First Artillery, who was detailed to
muster out the command, hardly spent fifteen minutes in the camp.
Major Young had been detailed Assistant Commissary of Musters and
signed all discharges for the Ninth Battalion, except for the field
and staff, which were signed by Lieutenant Van Deusen. The companies
left for their respective cities the same night they were paid. Major
Bullis was the paymaster.

FOOTNOTES:

[25] See "Outline History of the Ninth (Separate) Battalion Ohio
Volunteer Infantry," by the Battalion Adjutant, Lieutenant Nelson
Ballard, following the close of this chapter.

CHAPTER XII.

COLORED OFFICERS.

By Captain Frank R. Steward, A.B., LL.B., Harvard,
Forty-ninth U.S. Volunteer Infantry--Appendix.

Of all the avenues open to American citizenship the commissioned ranks
of the army and navy have been the stubbornest to yield to the newly
enfranchised. Colored men have filled almost every kind of public
office or trust save the Chief Magistracy. They have been members of
both Houses of Congress, and are employed in all the executive
branches of the Government, but no Negro has as yet succeeded in
invading the commissioned force of the navy, and his advance in the
army has been exceedingly slight. Since the war, as has been related,
but three Negroes have been graduated from the National Military
Academy at West Point; of these one was speedily crowded out of the
service; another reached the grade of First Lieutenant and died
untimely; the third, First Lieutenant Charles Young, late Major of the
9th Ohio Battalion, U.S. Volunteers, together with four colored
Chaplains, constitute the sole colored commissioned force of our
Regular Army.

Although Negroes fought in large numbers in both the Revolution and
the War of 1812, there is no instance of any Negro attaining or
exercising the rank of commissioned officer. It is a curious bit of
history, however, that in the Civil War those who were fighting to
keep colored men enslaved were the first to commission colored
officers. In Louisiana but a few days after the outbreak of the war,
the free colored population of New Orleans organized a military
organization, called the "Native Guard," which was accepted into the
service of the State and its officers were duly commissioned by the
Governor.[26]

These Negro soldiers were the first to welcome General Butler when he
entered New Orleans, and the fact of the organization of the "Native
Guard" by the Confederates was used by General Butler as the basis for
the organization of three colored regiments of "Native Guards," all
the line officers of which were colored men. Governor Pinchback, who
was a captain in one of these regiments, tells the fate of these early
colored officers.

"There were," he writes, "in New Orleans some colored soldiers known
as 'Native Guards' before the arrival of the Federal soldiers, but I
do not know much about them. It was a knowledge of this fact that
induced General Butler, then in command of the Department of the Gulf,
to organize three regiments of colored soldiers, viz: The First,
Second and Third Regiments of Native Guards.

"The First Regiment of Louisiana Native Guards, Colonel Stafford
commanding, with all the field officers white, and a full complement
of line officers (30) colored, was mustered into service at New
Orleans September 27, 1862, for three years. Soon after General Banks
took command of the department and changed the designation of the
regiment to First Infantry, Corps d'Afrique. April 4th, 1864, it was
changed again to Seventy-third United States Colored Infantry.

[Transcriber's Note: This footnote appeared in the text
without a footnote anchor:

"On the 23d of November, 1861, there was a grand review of
the Confederate troops stationed at New Orleans. An
Associated Press despatch announced that the line was seven
miles long. The feature of the review, however, was one
regiment of fourteen hundred free colored men. Another grand
review followed the next spring, and on the appearance of
rebel negroes a local paper made the following comment:

"'We must also pay a deserved compliment to the companies of
free colored men, all very well drilled and comfortably
uniformed. Most of these companies, quite unaided by the
administration, have supplied themselves with arms without
regard to cost or trouble. On the same day one of these
negro companies was presented with a flag, and every
evidence of public approbation was manifest.'"

(Williams's Negro Troops in the Rebellion, pp. 83-4)]

"The Second Louisiana Native Guards, with Colonel N.W. Daniels and
Lieutenant-Colonel Hall, white, and Major Francis E. Dumas, colored,
and all the line officers colored except one Second Lieutenant, was
mustered into service for three years, October 12, 1862. General Banks
changed its designation to Second Infantry Corps d'Afrique, June 6,
1863, and April 6, 1864, it was changed to Second United States
Colored Troops. Finally it was consolidated with the Ninety-first as
the Seventy-fourth Colored Infantry, and mustered out October 11,
1865.

"The Third Regiment of Louisiana Native Guards, with Colonel Nelson
and all field officers white, and all line officers (30) colored, was
mustered into service at New Orleans for three years, November 24,
1862. Its designation went through the same changes as the others at
the same dates, and it was mustered out November 25, 1865, as the
Seventy-fifth Colored Infantry.

"Soon after the organization of the Third Regiment, trouble for the
colored officers began, and the department began a systematic effort
to get rid of them. A board of examiners was appointed and all COLORED
officers of the Third Regiment were ordered before it. They refused to
obey the order and tendered their resignations in a body. The
resignations were accepted and that was the beginning of the end. Like
action with the same results followed in the First and Second
Regiments, and colored officers were soon seen no more. All were
driven out of the service except three or four who were never ordered
to appear before the examining board. Among these was your humble
servant. I was then Captain of Company A, Second Regiment, but I soon
tired of my isolation and resigned."

Later on in the war, with the general enlistment of colored soldiers,
a number of colored chaplains and some surgeons were commissioned.
Towards the close of the war several colored line officers and a field
officer or two were appointed. The State of Massachusetts was foremost
in according this recognition to colored soldiers. But these later
appointments came, in most cases, after the fighting was all over, and
gave few opportunities to command. At the close of the war, with the
muster out of troops the colored officers disappeared and upon the
reorganization of the army, despite the brilliant record of the
colored soldiers, no Negro was given a commission of any sort.

The outbreak of the Spanish War brought the question of colored
officers prominently to the front. The colored people began at once to
demand that officers of their own race be commissioned to command
colored volunteers. They were not to be deluded by any extravagant
praise of their past heroic services, which veiled a determination to
ignore their just claims. So firmly did they adhere to their demands
that but one volunteer regiment of colored troops, the Third Alabama,
could be induced to enter the service with none of its officers
colored. But the concessions obtained were always at the expense of
continuous and persistent effort, and in the teeth of a very active
and at times extremely violent opposition. We know already the kind of
opposition the Eighth Illinois, the Twenty-third Kansas, and the Third
North Carolina Regiments, officered entirely by colored men,
encountered. It was this opposition, as we have seen, which confined
colored officers to positions below the grade of captain in the four
immune regiments. From a like cause, we know also, distinguished
non-commissioned officers of the four regular regiments of colored
troops were allowed promotion only to Lieutenantcies in the immune
regiments, and upon the muster out of those organizations, were
compelled, if they desired to continue soldiering, to resume their
places as enlisted men.

There is some explanation for this opposition in the nature of the
distinction which military rank confers. Military rank and naval rank
constitute the only real distinction among us. Our officers of the
army and navy, and of the army more than of the navy, because the
former officers are more constantly within the country, make up the
sole separate class of our population. We have no established
nobility. Wealth confers no privilege which men are bound to observe.
The respect paid to men who attain eminence in science and learning
goes only as far as they are known. The titles of the professions are
matters of courtesy and customs only. Our judges and legislators, our
governors and mayors, are still our "fellow citizens," and the dignity
they enjoy is but an honorary one. The highest office within our gift
offers no exception. At the close of his term, even an ex-President,
"that melancholy product of our system," must resume his place among
his fellow citizens, to sink, not infrequently, into obscurity. But
fifty thousand soldiers must stand attention to the merest second
lieutenant! His rank is a _fact_. The life tenure, the necessities of
military discipline and administration, weld army officers into a
distinct class and make our military system the sole but necessary
relic of personal government. Any class with special privileges is
necessarily conservative.

The intimate association of "officer" and "gentleman," a legacy of
feudal days, is not without significance. An officer must also be a
gentleman, and "conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman" is
erected into an offence punishable by dismissal from the service. The
word "gentleman" has got far away from the strict significance of its
French parent. De Tocqueville has made us see the process of this
development. Passing over to England, with the changing conditions,
"gentleman" was used to describe persons lower and lower in the social
scale, until, when it crossed to this country, its significance became
lost in an indiscriminate application to all citizens[27]. A flavor of
its caste significance still remains in the traditional "high sense of
honor" characteristic of our military service. It was a distant step
for a slave and freedman to become an officer and gentleman.

While the above reflections may be some explanations _in fact_ for the
opposition to the commissioning of Negroes, there was no one with
hardihood enough to bring them forward. Such notions might form the
groundwork of a prejudice, but they could not become the reason of a
policy. It is an instinctive tribute to the good sense of the American
people that the opponents of colored officers were compelled to find
reasons of another kind for their antagonism.

The one formula heard always in the campaign against colored officers
was: Negroes cannot command. This formula was sent forth with every
kind of variation, from the fierce fulminations of the hostile
Southern press, to the more apologetic and philosophical discussions
of our Northern secular and religious journals. To be sure, every now
and then, there were exhibitions of impatience against the doctrine.
Not a few newspapers had little tolerance for the nonsense. Some
former commanders of Negro soldiers in the Civil War, notably, General
T.J. Morgan, spoke out in their behalf. The brilliant career of the
black regulars in Cuba broke the spell for a time, but the re-action
speedily set in. In short it became fastened pretty completely in the
popular mind as a bit of demonstrated truth that Negroes could not
make officers; that colored soldiers would neither follow nor obey
officers of their own race.

This formula had of course to ignore an entire epoch of history. It
could take no account of that lurid program wrought in the Antilles a
century ago--a rising mob of rebel slaves, transformed into an
invincible army of tumultuous blacks, under the guidance of the
immortal Toussaint, overcoming the trained armies of three Continental
powers, Spain, England and France, and audaciously projecting a black
republic into the family of nations, a program at once a marvel and a
terror to the civilized world.

Not alone in Hayti, but throughout the States of Central and South
America have Negroes exercised military command, both in the struggles
of these states for independence, and in their national armies
established after independence. At least one soldier of Negro blood,
General Dumas, father of the great novelist, arose to the rank of
General of Division in the French Army and served under Napoleon. In
our day we have seen General Dodds, another soldier of Negro blood,
returning from a successful campaign in Africa, acclaimed throughout
France, his immense popularity threatening Paris with a renewal of the
hysterical days of Boulanger. Finally, we need not be told that at the
very head and front of the Cuban Rebellion were Negroes of every hue,
exercising every kind of command up to the very highest. We need but
recall the lamented Maceo, the Negro chieftain, whose tragic end
brought sorrow and dismay to all of Cuba. With an army thronging with
blacks and mulattoes, these Cuban chieftains, black, mulatto and
white, prolonged such an harassing warfare as to compel the
intervention of the United States. At the end of this recital, which
could well have been extended with greater particularity, if it were
thought needful, we are bound to conclude that the arbitrary formula
relied upon by the opponents of colored officers was never constructed
to fit such an obstinate set of facts.

The prolonged struggle which culminated in permitting the Negro's
general enlistment in our Civil War had only to be repeated to secure
for him the full pay of a soldier, the right to be treated as a
prisoner of war, and to relieve him of the monopoly of fatigue and
garrison duty. He was too overjoyed with the boon of fighting for the
liberation of his race to make much contention about who was to lead
him. With meagre exception, his exclusive business in that war was to
carry a gun. Yet repeatedly Negro soldiers evinced high capacity for
command. Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson draws a glowing portrait
of Sergeant Prince Rivers, Color-Sergeant of the First South Carolina
Volunteers, a regiment of slaves, organized late in 1862. The
Color-Sergeant was provost-Sergeant also, and had entire charge of the
prisoners and of the daily policing of the camp.

"He is a man of distinguished appearance and in old times was the
crack coachman of Beaufort. * * * They tell me that he was once
allowed to present a petition to the Governor of South Carolina in
behalf of slaves, for the redress of certain grievances, and that a
placard, offering two thousand dollars for his re-capture is still to
be seen by the wayside between here and Charleston. He was a sergeant
in the old 'Hunter Regiment,' and was taken by General Hunter to New
York last spring, where the chevrons on his arm brought a mob upon him
in Broadway, whom he kept off till the police interfered. There is not
a white officer in this regiment who has more administrative ability,
or more absolute authority over the men; they do not love him, but his
mere presence has controlling power over them. He writes well enough
to prepare for me a daily report of his duties in the camp; if his
education reached a higher point I see no reason why he should not
command the Army of the Potomac. He is jet-black, or rather, I should
say, wine-black, his complexion, like that of others of my darkest
men, having a sort of rich, clear depth, without a trace of sootiness,
and to my eye very handsome. His features are tolerably regular, and
full of command, and his figure superior to that of any of our white
officers, being six feet high, perfectly proportioned, and of
apparently inexhaustable strength and activity. His gait is like a
panther's; I never saw such a tread. No anti-slavery novel has
described a man of such marked ability. He makes Toussaint perfectly
intelligible, and if there should ever be a black monarchy in South
Carolina he will be its king."[28]

Excepting the Louisiana Native Guards, the First South Carolina
Volunteers was the first regiment of colored troops to be mustered
into the service in the Civil War. The regiment was made up entirely
of slaves, with scarcely a mulatto among them. The first day of
freedom for these men was passed in uniform and with a gun. Among
these Negroes, just wrested from slavery, their scholarly commander,
Colonel Higginson, could find many whom he judged well fitted by
nature to command.

"Afterwards I had excellent battalion drills," he writes, "without a
single white officer, by way of experiment, putting each company under
a sergeant, and going through the most difficult movements, such as
division columns and oblique squares. And as to actual discipline, it
is doing no injustice to the line-officers of the regiment to say that
none of them received from the men more implicit obedience than
Color-Sergeant Rivers. * * * It always seemed to me an insult to those
brave men to have novices put over their heads, on the ground of color
alone, and the men felt it the more keenly as they remained longer in
the service. There were more than seven hundred enlisted men in the
regiment, when mustered out after more than three years' service. The
ranks had been kept full by enlistment, but there were only fourteen
line-officers instead of the full thirty. The men who should have
filled these vacancies were doing duty as sergeants in the ranks."[29]

Numerous expeditions were constantly on foot in the Department of the
South, having for their object the liberation of slaves still held to
service in neighborhoods remote from the Union camps, or to capture
supplies and munitions of war. Frequently these expeditions came in
conflict with armed bodies of rebels and hot engagements would ensue,
resulting in considerable loss of life. Colored soldiers were
particularly serviceable for this work because of their intimate
knowledge of the country and their zeal for the rescue of their
enslaved brethren.

One of these expeditions, composed of thirty colored soldiers and
scouts, commanded by Sergeant-Major Henry James, Third United States
Colored Troops, left Jacksonville, Florida, early in March, 1865, to
penetrate into the interior through Marion county. They destroyed
considerable property in the use of the rebel government, burned the
bridge across the Oclawaha River, and started on their return with
ninety-one Negroes whom they had rescued from slavery, four white
prisoners, some wagons and a large number of horses and mules. They
were attacked by a rebel band of more than fifty cavalry. The colored
soldiers commanded by one of their own number, defeated and drove off
the rebels, inflicting upon them the heavy loss of thirty men. After a
long and rapid march they arrived at St. Augustine, Florida, with a
loss of but two killed and four wounded, the expedition covering in
all five days. These colored soldiers and their colored commander were
thanked in orders by Major-General Q.A. Gilmore, commanding the
department, who was moved to declare that "this expedition, planned
and executed by colored men, under the command of a colored
non-commissioned officer, reflects credit upon the brave participants
and their leader," and "he holds up their conduct to their comrades in
arms as an example worthy of emulation."[30]

It was no uncommon occurrence throughout the Civil War for colored
non-commissioned officers to be thrown into command of their companies
by the killing or wounding of their superior officers. On many a field
of battle this happened and these colored non-commissioned officers
showed the same ability to take the initiative and accept the
responsibility, and conducted their commands just as bravely and
unfalteringly as did their successors on the firing line at La Guasima
and El Caney, or in the charge up San Juan Hill.

In the battle of New Market Heights, fought on the 29th of September,
1864, as part of a comprehensive effort to turn Lee's left flank, the
great heroism of the black soldiers, and the terrible slaughter among
them, impressed their commander, the late Major-General Butler, to his
dying day, and made him the stout champion of their rights for the
rest of his life. In that battle, to quote from the orders putting on
record the "gallant deeds of the officers and soldiers of the Army of
the James":--

"Milton M. Holland, Sergeant-Major Fifth United States
Colored Troops, commanding Company C; James H. Bronson,
First Sergeant, commanding Company D; Robert Pinn, First
Sergeant, commanding Company I, wounded; Powhatan Beaty,
First Sergeant, commanding Company G, Fifth United States
Colored Troops--all these gallant colored soldiers were left
in command, all their company officers being killed or
wounded, and led them gallantly and meritoriously through
the day. For these services they have most honorable
mention, and the commanding general will cause a special
medal to be struck in honor of these gallant soldiers."

"First Sergeant Edward Ratcliff, Company C, Thirty-eighth
United States Colored Troops, thrown into command of his
company by the death of the officer commanding, was the
first enlisted man in the enemy's works, leading his company
with great gallantry for which he has a medal."

"Sergeant Samuel Gilchrist, Company K, Thirty-sixth United
States Colored Troops, showed great bravery and gallantry in
commanding his company after his officers were killed. He
has a medal for gallantry."[31]

"Honorable mention" and "medals" were the sole reward open to the
brave Negro soldiers of that day.

Not alone in camp and garrison, in charge of expeditions, or as
non-commissioned officers thrown into command of their companies on
the field of battle have Negro soldiers displayed unquestioned
capacity for command, but as commissioned officers they commanded in
camp and in battle, showing marked efficiency and conspicuous
gallantry. The colored officers of the First and Second Regiments of
Louisiana Native Guards, whose history has been detailed earlier in
this chapter,[32] were retained in the service long enough to command
their troops in bloody combat with the enemy. It will be remembered
that of the Second Regiment of Louisiana Native Guards only the
Colonel and Lieutenant-Colonel were white, the Major, F.E. Dumas, and
all the line officers, as in the case of the First Regiment of
Louisiana Native Guards, being colored. On April 9, 1863, Colonel N.U.
Daniels, who commanded the Second Regiment of Louisiana Native Guards,
with a detachment of two hundred men of his regiment, under their
colored officers, engaged and repulsed a considerable body of rebel
infantry and cavalry at Pascagoula, Mississippi. The engagement lasted
from 10 A.M. until 2 P.M. and was remarkable for the steadiness,
tenacity and bravery of these black troops in this, their first
battle, where they succeeded in defeating and beating off an enemy
five times their number. The official report by the Colonel commanding
declared: "Great credit is due to the troops engaged for their
unflinching bravery and steadiness under this, their first fire,
exchanging volley after volley with the coolness of veterans, and for
their determined tenacity in maintaining their position, and taking
advantage of every success that their courage and valor gave them; and
also to their officers, who were cool and determined throughout the
action, fighting their commands against five times their number, and
confident throughout of success. * * *

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