“…As I said before we are on the eve of another fight and I am very busy and have just snatched a moment to write you. I must necessarily be brief. Should I fall in the next fight killed or wounded I hope to fall with my face to the foe.” A letter from Sgt Major Lewis Henry Douglass (oldest son of Fredreick Douglass) written after the Second Battle of Fort Wagner.
A couple of years ago I joined a Facebook group called South Carolina History A to Z. Which more accurately have been called SC History 1850-1870 since it mostly focused on the Civil War.
I forget how the thread started, but it was on black soldiers and their role in the War. Most people downplayed the role of black soldiers. One person commented that his grandfather told him they were told their uniforms would stop bullets. I am an official old coot and my great, great grandfather fought in the Civil War so I am not sure how his grandfather knew this, but it would seem to have come from the Ghost Dance movement among Native tribes that told followers that their shirts would protect them from bullets. Sadly, the Wounded Knee Massacre proved that theory wrong.
Back to task, I responded that far from black troops being told their uniforms would protect them, they were warned that if captured by Confederate troops they would not be accorded the status of prisoners of war but executed or sold into slavery. I found myself promptly kicked out of the group.
Black troops were an important resource for the Union Army. But early in the war the army did not accept blacks wanting to enlist, fearing that Kentucky, Maryland and Missouri would secede. But as the war continued on various Union generals took it on their own authority to create black units. Eventually black troops were officially recognized in Washington.
By the end of the war 179,000 (10% of the Union Army) black troops had enlisted, of those half were from free states and half from Southern states. 40,000 died in the war.
In addition, another 19,000 blacks served in the Union navy. After the Civil War the Navy wouldn’t allow blacks to serve in the navy except in the mess until 1942.
Abolitionist Frederick Douglass advocated for black troops and called for blacks to enlist. he believed that, as soldiers, men of color could gain self-respect, self-defense skills and an undeniable justification for the rights of citizenship.
Two of Douglass’s sons enlisted in the 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment. The second regiment to be organized in the North.
The second battle of Fort Wagner, outside Charleston, SC was fought on n July 18, 1863. The 54th volunteered to lead the attack on the fort. In spite of heavy casualties, the troops reached the parapet but were forced back in heavy hand to hand combat with the larger Confederate force.
The 54th withdrew in good order, even after the death of its commander, Col. Shaw, and took up defensive positions to support the planned next wave, which never happened. After the battle 315 soldiers remained from an original 600.
Sergeant William Harvey Carney
was awarded the Medal of Honor for grabbing the U.S. flag as the flag bearer fell. He carried the flag to the enemy ramparts, wounded he refused to pass the flag on to anyone except someone from the 54th. He proclaimed “Boys, the old flag never touched the ground! His actions were the first by a black soldier to result in the Medal of Honor, but he didn’t receive the medal until 1900 and a number of other black soldiers had received the medal by that time.
The 54th Massachusetts and the Second Battle of Fort Wagner (U.S. National Park Service) (nps.gov)
William H. Carney | Biography, American Civil War, 54th Regiment, & Medal of Honor | Britannica