"Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letter, U.S., let him get an eagle on his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pocket, there is no power on earth that can deny that he has earned the right to citizenship."
— Frederick Douglass
One of the lesser known aspects of President Abraham Lincoln's 1863 Emancipation Proclamation was a provision that permitted the military service of African-American soldiers in the Union Army. About 200,000 African-Americans, most of them freed slaves, were able to put on a uniform and carry arms in a war that had evolved from a war to preserve the union into a war to liberate a people.
One of the great ironies of emancipation was that while it liberated slaves in areas where the Union Army and Navy did not control, it preserved the institution in the areas where the federal forces were in command. New York's former Governor William H. Seward, then serving as Lincoln's secretary of state, lamented, "We show our sympathy with slavery by emancipating slaves where we cannot reach them and holding them in bondage where we can set them free."
African-American soldiers comprised about 10 percent of the Union army and contributed much to the Union war effort. About 40,000 African-American soldiers and sailors died in the war — though about 30,000 of these deaths came as a result of sickness and disease. African-Americans units were commanded by white officers but 80 men of color did gain commissions as officers during the war. Sixteen African-Americans were awarded the nation's highest honor, the Congressional Medal of Honor, for their battlefield heroism during the Civil War.
Despite efforts to bring African-Americans into the military, the federal government still practiced policies of blatant discrimination. African-American soldiers were paid $10 per month instead of the $13 earned by white soldiers. Another $3 was deducted from their pay as a clothing fee — a reduction that was not taken from white soldiers. The clothing deduction was ultimately eliminated in June 1864.
African-American soldiers had far more at stake in the war than their white comrades. African-American soldiers who were captured in battle were often treated violently by their Confederate captors. Some were undoubtedly returned to slavery in the South. Even as the Confederate army retreated from defeat at Gettysburg in July 1863, the army took with them freed blacks who had been captured and were transported South into slavery. At battles such as Fort Pillow and Petersburg, captured African-American soldiers were executed by Confederate soldiers.
A letter in the pension files of the National Archives documents the motivation and bold determination of an African-American soldier. Private Samuel Cabble served in the 55th Massachusetts Infantry (Colored) and was a slave before he joined the army. He was 21 when he wrote:
"Dear Wife i have enlisted in the army i am now in the state of Massachusetts but before this letter reaches you i will be in North Carlinia and though great is the present national dificulties yet i look forward to a brighter day When i shall have the opertunity of seeing you in the full enjoyment of fredom i would like to no if you are still in slavery if you are it will not be long before we shall have crushed the system that now opreses you for in the course of three months you shall have your liberty. great is the outpouring of the colered peopl that is now rallying with the hearts of lions against that very curse that has seperated you an me yet we shall meet again and oh what a happy time that will be when this ungodly rebellion shall be put down and the curses of our land is trampled under our feet i am a soldier now and i shall use my utmost endeavor to strike at the rebellion and the heart of this system that so long has kept us in chains remain your own afectionate husband until death."
The legacy of the African-American soldiers who served in the Civil War is one that continues to inspire. What drove them was the pursuit of freedom — an all-or-nothing gamble that balanced the promise of liberation against the inhumanity of slavery. Slavery was an issue that haunted the American experiment in democracy and challenged its legitimacy. The service of a generation of African-American soldiers in the war sought to finally make the rhetoric of freedom and liberty a reality for the entire nation.
Bill Howard is author of "The Civil War Memoir of William T. Levey" recently published by Northshire Press.