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

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Our regiment was at the time stationed as follows: Headquarters, four
companies and the band at Fort Missoula; two companies at Fort
Harrison, near Helena, and two companies at Fort Assinniboine, all in
Montana. The arrangements contemplated moving the regiment in two
sections, one composed of the Missoula troops to go over the Northern
Pacific Railroad, the other of the Fort Harrison and Fort Assinniboine
troops to go over the Great Northern Railroad, all to arrive in St.
Paul about the same time.

On the 10th of April, Easter Sunday, the battalion at Fort Missoula
marched out of post quite early in the morning, and at Bitter Root
Station took the cars for their long journey. Officers and men were
all furnished sleeping accommodations on the train. Arriving in the
city of Missoula, for the gratification of the citizens and perhaps to
avoid strain on the bridge crossing the Missoula River, the men were
disembarked from the train and marched through the principal streets
to the depot, the citizens generally turning out to see them off. Many
were the compliments paid officers and men by the good people of
Missoula, none perhaps more pleasing than that furnished by a written
testimonial to the regret experienced at the departure of the
regiment, signed by all the ministers of the city.

As the Twenty-fifth was the first regiment to move in the preparation
for war, its progress from Montana to Chickamauga was a marked event,
attracting the attention of both the daily and illustrated press. All
along the route they were greeted with enthusiastic crowds, who fully
believed the war with Spain had begun. In St. Paul, in Chicago, in
Terre Haute, in Nashville, and in Chattanooga the crowds assembled to
greet the black regulars who were first to bear forward the Starry
Banner of Union and Freedom against a foreign foe. What could be more
significant, or more fitting, than that these black soldiers, drilled
up to the highest standard of modern warfare, cool, brave and
confident, themselves a proof of American liberty, should be called
first to the front in a war against oppression? Their martial tread
and fearless bearing proclaimed what the better genius of our great
government meant for all men dwelling beneath the protection of its
honored flag.

As the Twenty-fifth Infantry was the first regiment to leave its
station, so six companies of it were first to go into camp on the
historic grounds of Chickamauga. Two companies were separated from the
regiment at Chattanooga and forwarded to Key West where they took
station under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel A.S. Daggett. The
remaining six companies, under command of Colonel A.S. Burt, were
conducted by General Boynton to a choice spot on the grounds, where
they pitched camp, their tents being the first erected in that
mobilization of troops which preceded the Cuban invasion, and theirs
being really the first camp of the war.

Soon came the Ninth Cavalry, the Tenth Cavalry and the Twenty-fourth
Infantry. While these were assembling there arrived on the ground also
many white regiments, cavalry, artillery and infantry, and it was
pleasing to see the fraternity that prevailed among black and white
regulars. This was especially noticeable between the Twenty-fifth and
Twelfth. In brigading the regiments no attention whatever was paid to
the race or color of the men. The black infantry regiments were placed
in two brigades, and the black cavalry likewise, and they can be
followed through the fortunes of the war in the official records by
their regimental numbers. During their stay in Chickamauga, and at Key
West and Tampa, the Southern newspapers indulged in considerable
malicious abuse of colored soldiers, and some people of this section
made complaints of their conduct, but the previous good character of
the regiments and the violent tone of the accusations, taken together
with the well-known prejudices of the Southern people, prevented their
complaints from having very great weight. The black soldiers held
their place in the army chosen for the invasion of Cuba, and for that
purpose were soon ordered to assemble in Tampa.

From the 10th of April, when the war movement began with the march of
the Twenty-fifth Infantry out of its Montana stations, until June
14th, when the Army of Invasion cleared Tampa for Cuba--not quite two
months--the whole energy of the War Department had been employed in
preparing the army for the work before it. The beginning of the war is
officially given as April 21st, from which time onward it was declared
a state of war existed between Spain and the United States, but
warlike movements on our side were begun fully ten days earlier, and
begun with a grim definiteness that presaged much more than a practice
march or spring manoeuver.

After arriving at Chickamauga all heavy baggage was shipped away for
storage, and all officers and men were required to reduce their field
equipage to the minimum; the object being to have the least possible
amount of luggage, in order that the greatest possible amount of
fighting material might be carried. Even with all this preparation
going on some officers were indulging the hope that the troops might
remain in camps, perfecting themselves in drill, until September, or
October, before they should be called upon to embark for Cuba. This,
however, was not to be, and it is perhaps well that it was not, as the
suffering and mortality in the home camps were almost equal to that
endured by the troops in Cuba. The suffering at home, also, seemed
more disheartening, because it appeared to be useless, and could not
be charged to any important changes in conditions or climate. It was
perhaps in the interest of humanity that this war, waged for
humanity's sake, should have been pushed forward from its first step
to its last, with the greatest possible dispatch, and that just enough
men on our side were sent to the front, and no more. It is still a
good saying that all is well that ends well.

The Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, the place
where our troops assembled on their march to Cuba, beautiful by
nature, especially in the full season of spring when the black
soldiers arrived there, and adorned also by art, has, next to
Gettysburg, the most prominent place among the historic battle-fields
of the Civil War. As a park it was established by an act of Congress
approved August 19, 1890, and contains seven thousand acres of rolling
land, partly cleared and partly covered with oak and pine timber.
Beautiful broad roads wind their way to all parts of the ground, along
which are placed large tablets recording the events of those dreadful
days in the autumn of 1863, when Americans faced Americans in bloody,
determined strife. Monuments, judiciously placed, speak with a mute
eloquence to the passer-by and tell of the valor displayed by some
regiment or battery, or point to the spot where some lofty hero gave
up his life. The whole park is a monument, however, and its definite
purpose is to preserve and suitably mark "for historical and
professional military study the fields of some of the most remarkable
manoeuvres and most brilliant fighting in the War of the Rebellion."
The battles commemorated by this great park are those of Chickamauga,
fought on September 19-20, and the battles around Chattanooga,
November 23-25, 1863. The battle of Chickamauga was fought by the Army
of the Cumberland, commanded by Major-General W.S. Rosecrans, on the
Union side, and the Army of Tennessee, commanded by General Braxton
Bragg, on the side of the Confederates. The total effective strength
of the Union forces in this battle was little less than 60,000 men,
that of the Confederates about 70,000. The total Union loss was 16,179
men, a number about equal to the army led by Shatter against Santiago.
Of the number reported as lost, 1,656 were killed, or as many as were
lost in killed, wounded and missing in the Cuban campaign. The
Confederate losses were 17,804, 2,389 being killed, making on both
sides a total killed of 4,045, equivalent to the entire voting
population of a city of over twenty thousand inhabitants. General
Grant, who commanded the Union forces in the battles around
Chattanooga, thus sums up the results: "In this battle the Union army
numbered in round figures about 60,000 men; we lost 752 killed, 4,713
wounded and 350 captured or missing. The rebel loss was much greater
in the aggregate, as we captured and sent North to be rationed there
over 6,100 prisoners. Forty pieces of artillery, over seven thousand
stand of small arms, many caissons, artillery wagons and baggage
wagons fell into our hands. The probabilities are that our loss in
killed was the heavier as we were the attacking party. The enemy
reported his loss in killed at 361, but as he reported his missing at
4,146, while we held over 6,000 of them as prisoners, and there must
have been hundreds, if not thousands, who deserted, but little
reliance can be placed upon this report."

In the battle of Chickamauga, when "four-fifths of the Union Army had
crumbled into wild confusion," and Rosecrans was intent only on saving
the fragments, General Thomas, who had commanded the Federal left
during the two days' conflict, and had borne the brunt of the fight,
still held his position. To him General James A. Garfield reported.
General Gordon Granger, without orders, brought up the reserves, and
Thomas, replacing his lines, held the ground until nightfall, when he
was joined by Sheridan. Bragg won and held the field, but Thomas
effectually blocked his way to Chattanooga, securing to himself
immediately the title of the "Rock of Chickamauga." His wonderful
resolution stayed the tide of a victory dearly bought and actually
won, and prevented the victors from grasping the object for which they
had fought. In honor of this stubborn valor, and in recognition of
this high expression of American tenacity, the camp established in
Chickamauga Park by the assembling army was called Camp George H.
Thomas.

The stay of the colored regulars at Camp George H. Thomas was short,
but it was long enough for certain newspapers of Chattanooga to give
expression to their dislike to negro troops in general and to those in
their proximity especially. The Washington Post, also, ever faithful
to its unsavory trust, lent its influence to this work of defamation.
The leading papers, however, both of Chattanooga and the South
generally, spoke out in rather conciliatory and patronizing tones, and
"sought to restrain the people of their section from compromising
their brilliant display of patriotism by contemptuous flings at the
nation's true and tried soldiers.

The 24th Infantry and the 9th Cavalry soon left for Tampa, Florida,
whither they were followed by the 10th Cavalry and the 25th Infantry,
thus bringing the entire colored element of the army together to
prepare for embarkation. The work done at Tampa is thus described
officially by Lieutenant-Colonel Daggett in general orders addressed
to the 25th Infantry, which he at that time commanded. On August 11th,
with headquarters near Santiago, after the great battles had been
fought and won, he thus reviewed the work of the regiment: "Gathered
from three different stations, many of you strangers to each other,
you assembled as a regiment for the first time in more than
twenty-eight years, on May 7, 1898, at Tampa, Florida. There you
endeavored to solidify and prepare yourselves, as far as the
oppressive weather would permit, for the work that appeared to be
before you." What is here said of the 25th might have been said with
equal propriety of all the regular troops assembled at Tampa.

In the meantime events were ripening with great rapidity. The historic
"first gun" had been fired, and the United States made the first naval
capture of the war on April 22, the coast trader Buena Ventura having
surrendered to the American gunboat Nashville. On the same day the
blockade of Cuban ports was declared and on the day following a call
was issued for 125,000 volunteers. On May 20th the news that a Spanish
fleet under command of Admiral Cervera had arrived at Santiago was
officially confirmed, and a speedy movement to Cuba was determined
upon.

Almost the entire Regular Army with several volunteer regiments were
organized into an Army of Invasion and placed under the command of
Major-General W.R. Shafter with orders to prepare immediately for
embarkation, and on the 7th and 10th of June this army went on board
the transports. For seven days the troops lay cooped up on the vessels
awaiting orders to sail, a rumor having gained circulation that
certain Spanish gunboats were hovering around in Cuban waters awaiting
to swoop down upon the crowded transports. While the Army of Invasion
was sweltering in the ships lying at anchor off Port Tampa, a small
body of American marines made a landing at Guantanamo, and on June
12th fought the first battle between Americans and Spaniards on Cuban
soil. In this first battle four Americans were killed. The next day,
June 13th, General Shafter's army containing the four colored
regiments, excepting those left behind to guard property, sailed for
Cuba.[13]

The whole number of men and officers in the expedition, including
those that came on transports from Mobile, amounted to about seventeen
thousand men, loaded on twenty-seven transports. The colored regiments
were assigned to brigades as follows: The Ninth Cavalry was joined
with the Third and Sixth Cavalry and placed under command of Colonel
Carrol; the Tenth Cavalry was joined with the Rough Riders and First
Regular Cavalry and fell under the command of General Young; the
Twenty-fourth Infantry was joined with the Ninth and Thirteenth
Infantry and the brigade placed under command of Colonel Worth and
assigned to the division commanded by General Kent, who, until his
promotion as Brigadier-General of Volunteers, had been Colonel of the
Twenty-fourth; the Twenty-fifth Infantry was joined with the First and
Fourth Infantry and the brigade placed under command of Colonel Evans
Miles, who had formerly been Major of the Twenty-fifth. All of the
colored regiments were thus happily placed so that they should be in
pleasant soldierly competition with the very best troops the country
ever put in the field, and this arrangement at the start proves how
strongly the black regular had entrenched himself in the confidence of
our great commanders.

Thus sailed from Port Tampa the major part of our little army of
trained and seasoned soldiers, representative of the skill and daring
of the nation.[14] In physique, almost every man was an athlete, and
while but few had seen actual war beyond an occasional skirmish with
Indians, all excepting the few volunteers, had passed through a long
process of training in the various details of marching, camping and
fighting in their annual exercises in minor tactics. For the first
time in history the nation is going abroad, by its army, to occupy the
territory of a foreign foe, in a contest with a trans-Atlantic power.
The unsuccessful invasions of Canada during the Revolutionary War and
the War of 1812 can hardly be brought in comparison with this movement
over sea. The departure of Decatur with his nine ships of war to the
Barbary States had in view only the establishment of proper civil
relations between those petty, half-civilized countries and the United
States. The sailing of General Shafter's army was only one movement in
a comprehensive war against the Kingdom of Spain. More than a month
earlier Commodore Dewey, acting under orders, had destroyed a fleet of
eleven war ships in the Philippines. The purpose of the war was to
relieve the Cubans from an inhumane warfare with their mother country,
and to restore to that unhappy island a stable government in harmony
with the ideas of liberty and justice.

Up to the breaking out of the Spanish War the American policy with
respect to Europe had been one of isolation. Some efforts had been
made to consolidate the sentiment of the Western world, but it had
never been successful. The fraternity of the American Republics and
the attempted construction of a Pan-American policy had been thus far
unfulfilled dreams. Canada was much nearer to the United States,
geographically and socially, than even Mexico, although the latter is
a republic. England, in Europe, was nearer than Brazil. The day came
in 1898, when the United States could no longer remain in political
seclusion nor bury herself in an impossible federation. Washington's
advice against becoming involved in European affairs, as well as the
direct corrollary of the Monroe Doctrine, were to be laid aside and
the United States was to speak out to the world. The business of a
European nation had become our business; in the face of all the world
we resolved to invade her territory in the interest of humanity; to
face about upon our own traditions and dare the opinions and arms of
the trans-Atlantic world by openly launching upon the new policy of
armed intervention in another's quarrel.

While the troops were mobilizing at Tampa preparatory to embarking for
Cuba the question came up as to why there were no colored men in the
artillery arm of the service, and the answer given by a Regular Army
officer was, that the Negro had not brains enough for the management
of heavy guns. It was a trifling assertion, of course, but at this
period of the Negro's history it must not be allowed to pass
unnoticed. We know that white men of all races and nationalities can
serve big guns, and if the Negro cannot, it must be because of some
marked difference between him and them. The officer said it was a
difference in "brains," i.e., a mental difference. Just how the
problem of aiming and firing a big gun differs from that of aiming and
firing small arms is not so easily explained. In both, the questions
of velocity, gravitation, wind and resistance are to be considered and
these are largely settled by mechanism, the adjustment of which is
readily learned; hence the assumption that a Negro cannot learn it is
purely gratuitous. Several of the best rifle shots known on this
continent are Negroes; and it was a Negro who summerized the whole
philosophy of rifle shooting in the statement that it all consists in
knowing _where_ to aim, and _how_ to pull--in knowing just what value
to assign to gravitation, drift of the bullet and force of the wind,
and then in being able to pull the trigger of the piece without
disturbing the aim thus judiciously determined. This includes all
there is in the final science and art of firing a rifle. If the Negro
can thus master the revolver, the carbine and the rifle, why may he
not master the field piece or siege gun?

But an ounce of fact in such things is worth more than many volumes of
idle speculation, and it is remarkable that facts so recent, so
numerous, and so near at hand, should escape the notice of those who
question the Negro's ability to serve the artillery organizations.
Negro artillery, both light and heavy, fought in fifteen battles in
the Civil War with average effectiveness; and some of those who fought
against them must either admit the value of the Negro artilleryman or
acknowledge their own inefficiency. General Fitz-Hugh Lee failed to
capture a Negro battery after making most vigorous attempts to that
end. This attempt to raise a doubt as to the Negro's ability to serve
in the artillery arm is akin to, and less excusable, than that other
groundless assertion, that Negro officers cannot command troops, an
assertion which in this country amounts to saying that the United
States cannot command its army. Both of these assertions have been
emphatically answered in fact, the former as shown above, and the
latter as will be shown later in this volume. These assertions are
only temporary covers, behind which discomfitted and retreating
prejudice is able to make a brief stand, while the black hero of five
hundred battle-fields, marches proudly by, disdaining to lower his gun
to fire a shot on a foe so unworthy. When the Second Massachusetts
Volunteers sent up their hearty cheers of welcome to the gallant old
Twenty-fifth, as that solid column fresh from El Caney swung past its
camp, I remarked to Sergeant Harris, of the Twenty-fifth: "Those men
think you are soldiers." "They know we are soldiers," was his reply.
When the people of this country, like the members of that
Massachusetts regiment, come to know that its black men in uniform are
soldiers, plain soldiers, with the same interests and feelings as
other soldiers, of as much value to the government and entitled from
it to the same attention and rewards, then a great step toward the
solution of the prodigious problem now confronting us will have been
taken.

* * * * *

Note.--"I had often heard that the physique of the men of
our regular army was very remarkable, but the first time I
saw any large body of them, which was at Tampa, they
surpassed my highest expectations. It is not, however, to be
wondered at that, for every recruit who is accepted, on the
average thirty-four are rejected, and that, of course, the
men who present themselves to the recruiting officer already
represent a physical 'elite'; but it was very pleasant to
see and be assured, as I was at Tampa, by the evidences of
my own eyes and the tape measure, that there is not a guard
regiment of either the Russian, German or English army, of
whose remarkable physique we have heard so much, that can
compare physically, not with the best of our men, but simply
with the average of the men of our regular army."--Bonsal.

FOOTNOTES:

[9] The army has been reorganized since. See Register.

[10] "My experience in this direction since the war is beyond that of
any officer of my rank in the army. For ten years I had the honor of
being lieutenant-colonel of the Ninth Cavalry, and during most of that
service I commanded garrisons composed in part of the Ninth Cavalry
and other organizations of cavalry and infantry. I have always found
the colored race represented in the army obedient, intelligent and
zealous in the discharge of duty, brave in battle, easily disciplined,
and most efficient in the care of their horses, arms and equipments.
The non-commissioned officers have habitually shown the qualities for
control in their position which marked them as faithful and sensible
in the discharge of their duties. I take pleasure in bearing witness
as above in the interest of the race you represent." WESLEY MERRITT.

[11] See chapter on Colored Officers.

[12] Young is now captain in the Ninth Cavalry.--T.G.S.

[13] The colored regulars were embarked on the following named ships:
The 9th Cavalry on the Miami, in company with the 6th Infantry; the
10th Cavalry on the Leona, in company with the 1st Cavalry; the 24th
Infantry on the City of Washington, in company with one battalion of
the 21st Infantry; the 25th infantry on board the Concho, in company
with the 4th Infantry.

[14] See Note, at the close of this chapter.

CHAPTER IV.

BRIEF SKETCH OF SPANISH HISTORY.

The following brief sketch of Spain, its era of greatness, the causes
leading thereto, and the reasons for its rapid decline, will be of
interest to the reader at this point in the narrative, as it will
bring into view the other side of the impending conflict:

Spain, the first in rank among the second-rate powers of Europe, by
reason of her possessions in the West Indies, especially Cuba, may be
regarded as quite a near neighbor, and because of her connection with
the discovery and settlement of the continent, as well as the
commanding part she at one time played in the world's politics, her
history cannot but awaken within the breasts of Americans a most
lively interest.

As a geographical and political fact, Spain dates from the earliest
times, and the Spanish people gather within themselves the blood and
the traditions of the three great continents of the Old World--Europe,
Asia and Africa--united to produce the mighty Spaniard of the 15th and
16th centuries. It would be an interesting subject for the
anthropologist to trace the construction of that people who are so
often spoken of as possessing the pure blood of Castile, and as the
facts should be brought to view, another proud fiction would dissipate
in thin air, as we should see the Spaniard arising to take his place
among the most mixed of mankind.

The Spain that we are considering now is the Spain that gradually
emerged from a chaos of conflicting elements into the unity of a
Christian nation. The dismal war between creeds gave way to the
greater conflict between religions, when Cross and Crescent contended
for supremacy, and this too had passed. The four stalwart Christian
provinces of Leon, Castile, Aragon and Navarre had become the four
pillars of support to a national throne and Ferdinand and Isabella
were reigning. Spain has now apparently passed the narrows and is
crossing the bar with prow set toward the open sea. She ends her war
with the Moors at the same time that England ends her wars of the
Roses, and the battle of Bosworth's field may be classed with the
capitulation of Granada. Both nations confront a future of about equal
promise and may be rated as on equal footing, as this new era of the
world opens to view.

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