THE NEGRO IN THE AMERICAN REBELLION
_His Heroism and His Fidelity_
By William Wells Brown
_Author of “Sketches of Places and People Abroad,” “The Black Man,” Etc_
Lee & Shepard, 149 Washington Street
1867
PREFACE.
Feeling anxious to preserve for future reference an account of the part
which the Negro took in suppressing the Slaveholders’ Rebellion, I have
been induced to write this work. In doing so, it occurred to me that a
sketch of the condition of the race previous to the commencement of the
war would not be uninteresting to the reader.
For the information concerning the services which the blacks rendered
to the Government in the Revolutionary War, I am indebted to the late
George Livermore, Esq., whose “Historical Research” is the ablest work
ever published on the early history of the negroes of this country.
In collecting facts connected with the Rebellion, I have availed myself
of the most reliable information that could be obtained from newspaper
correspondents, as well as from those who were on the battle-field. To
officers and privates of several of the colored regiments I am under
many obligations for detailed accounts of engagements.
No doubt, errors in fact and in judgment will be discovered, which I
shall be ready to acknowledge, and correct in subsequent editions. The
work might have been swelled to double its present size; but I did not
feel bound to introduce an account of every little skirmish in which
colored men were engaged.
I waited patiently, before beginning this work, with the hope that
some one more competent would take the subject in hand; but, up to the
present, it has not been done, although many books have been written
upon the Rebellion.
WILLIAM WELLS BROWN.
Cambridgeport, Mass., Jan. 1, 1867.
THE NEGRO IN THE AMERICAN REBELLION
CHAPTER I--BLACKS IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR AND IN 1812.
_The First Cargo of Slaves landed in the Colonies in 1620.--Slave
Representation in Congress.--Opposition to the Slave-Trade.--Crispus
Attucks, the First Victim of the Revolutionary War.--Bancroft’s
Testimony.--Capture of Gen. Prescott.--Colored Men in the War of
1812.--Gen. Andrew Jackson on Negro Soldiers._
I now undertake to write a history of the part which the colored men
took in the great American Rebellion. Previous to entering upon that
subject, however, I may be pardoned for bringing before the reader the
condition of the blacks previous to the breaking out of the war.
The Declaration of American Independence, made July 4, 1776, had
scarcely been enunciated, and an organization of the government
commenced, ere the people found themselves surrounded by new and trying
difficulties, which, for a time, threatened to wreck the ship of state.
The forty-five slaves landed on the banks of the James River, in the
colony of Virginia, from the coast of Africa, in 1620, had multiplied
to several thousands, and were influencing the political, social,
and religious institution’s of the country. Brought into the colonies
against their will; made the “hewers of wood and the drawers of
water;” considered, in the light of law and public opinion, as mere
chattels,--things to be bought and sold at the will of the owner; driven
to their unrequited toil by unfeeling men, picked for the purpose from
the lowest and most degraded of the uneducated whites, whose moral,
social, and political degradation, by slavery, was equal to that of the
slave,--the condition of the negro was indeed a sad one.
The history of this people, full of sorrow, blood, and tears, is full
also of instruction for mankind. God has so ordered it that one class
shall not degrade another, without becoming themselves contaminated. So
with slavery in America. The institution bred in the master insulting
arrogance, deteriorating sloth, pampered the loathsome lust it inflamed,
until licentious luxury sapped the strength and rottened the virtue of
the slave-owners of the South. Never were the institutions of a people,
or the principles of liberty, put to such a severe test as those of
the American Republic. The convention to frame the Constitution for
the government of the United States had not organized before the
slave-masters began to press the claims of their system upon the
delegates. They wanted their property represented in the national
Congress, and undue guarantees thrown around it; they wanted the African
slave-trade made lawful, and their victims returned if they should
attempt to escape; they begged that an article might be inserted in the
Constitution, making it the duty of the General Government to put down
the slaves if they should imitate their masters in striking a blow
for freedom. They seemed afraid of the very evil they were clinging so
closely to. “Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all.”
In all this early difficulty, South Carolina took the lead against
humanity, her delegates ever showing themselves the foes of freedom.
Both in the Federal Convention to frame the Constitution, and in the
State Conventions to ratify the same, it was admitted that the blacks
had fought bravely against the British, and in favor of the American
Republic; for the fact that a black man (Crispus Attucks) was the first
to give his life at the commencement of the Revolution was still fresh
in their minds. Eighteen years previous to the breaking out of the war,
Attucks was held as a slave by Mr. ‘William Brown of Framingham, Mass.,
and from whom he escaped about that time, taking up his residence in
Boston. The Boston Massacre, March 5, 1770, may be regarded as the first
act in the great drama of the American Revolution. “From that moment,”
said Daniel Webster, “we may date the severance of the British Empire.”
The presence of the British soldiers in King Street excited the
patriotic indignation of the people. The whole community was stirred,
and sage counsellors were deliberating and writing and talking about the
public grievances. But it was not for “the wise and prudent” to be the
first to _act_ against the encroachments of arbitrary power. “A
motley rabble of saucy boys? negroes and mulattoes, Irish Teagues,
and outlandish Jack tars” (as John Adams described them in his pica in
defence of the soldiers) could not restrain their emotion, or stop to
inquire if what they _must do_ was according to the letter of any law.
Led by Crispus Attucks, the mulatto slave, and shouting, “The way to get
rid of these soldiers is to attack the main guard; strike at the root;
this is the nest,” with more valor than discretion, they rushed to King
Street, and were fired upon by Capt. Preston’s Company. Crispins Attucks
was the first to fall: he and Samuel Gray and Jonas Caldwell were killed
on the spot. Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr were mortally wounded.
The excitement which followed was intense. The bells of the town were
rung. An impromptu town meeting was held, and an immense assembly was
gathered.
Three days after, on the 8th, a public funeral of the martyrs took
place. The shops in Boston were closed; and all the bells of Boston and
the neighboring towns were rung. It is said that a greater number of
persons assembled on this occasion than were ever before gathered on
this continent for a similar purpose. The body of Crispus Attucks, the
mulatto slave, had been placed in Faneuil Hall, with that of Caldwell,
both being strangers in the city. Maverick was buried from his mother’s
house, in Union Street; and Gray from his brother’s, in Royal Exchange
Lane. The four hearses formed a junction in King Street; and there the
procession marched in columns six deep, with a long file of
coaches belonging to the most distinguished citizens, to the Middle
Burying-ground, where the four victims were deposited in one grave, over
which a stone was placed with this inscription:--
“Long as in Freedom’s cause the wise contend,
Dear to your country shall your fame extend;
While to the world the lettered stone shall tell
Where Caldwell, Attucks, Gray, and Maverick fell.”
The anniversary of this event was publicly commemorated in Boston, by
an oration and other exercises, every year until after our national
independence was achieved, when the Fourth of July was substituted for
the Fifth of March, as the more proper day for a general celebration.
Not only was the event commemorated, but the martyrs who then gave up
their lives were remembered and honored.
For half a century after the close of the war, the name of Crispus
Attucks was honorably mentioned by the most noted men of the country
who were not blinded by foolish prejudice. At the battle of Bunker Hill,
Peter Salem, a negro, distinguished himself by shooting Major Pitcairn,
who, in the midst of the battle, having passed the storm of fire
without, mounting the redoubt, and waving his sword, cried to the
“rebels” to surrender. The fall of Pitcairn ended the battle in favor of
liberty.
A single passage from Mr. Bancroft’s history will give a succinct
and clear account of the condition of the army, in respect to colored
soldiers, at the time of the battle of Bunker Hill:--
“Nor should history forget to record, that, as in the army at Cambridge,
so also in this gallant band, the free negroes of the colony had their
representatives. For the right of free negroes to bear arms in the
public defence was, at that day, as little disputed in New England as
their other rights. They took their place, not in a separate corps,
but in the ranks with the white man; and their names may be read on the
pension-rolls of the country, side by side with those of other soldiers
of the Revolution.”--_Bancroft’s History of the United States_, vol.
vii. p. 421.
The capture of Major-Gen. Prescott, of the British army, on the 9th of
July, 1777, was an occasion of great joy throughout the country. Prince,
the valiant negro who seized that officer, ought always to be remembered
with honor for his important service. The exploit was much commended at
the time, as its results were highly important; and Col. Barton, very
properly, received from Congress the compliment of a sword for his
ingenuity and bravery. It seems, however, that it took more than one
head to plan and to execute the undertaking. The following account of
the capture is historical:--.
“They landed about five miles from Newport, and three-quarters of a
mile from the house, which they approached cautiously, avoiding the main
guard, which was at some distance. _The colonel went foremost, with a
stout, active negro close behind him, and another at a small distance:
the rest followed so as to be near, but not seen._
“A single sentinel at the door saw and hailed the colonel: he answered
by exclaiming against, and inquiring for, rebel prisoners, but kept
slowly advancing. The sentinel again challenged him, and required the
countersign. He said he had not the countersign, but amused the sentry
by talking about rebel prisoners, and still advancing till he came
within reach of the bayonet, which, he presenting, the colonel suddenly
struck aside, and seized him. He was immediately secured, and ordered
to be silent on pain of instant death. _Meanwhile, the rest of the men
surrounding the house, the negro, with his head, at the second stroke,
forced a passage into it, and then into the landlord’s apartment. The
landlord at first refused to give the necessary intelligence; but, on
the prospect of present death, he pointed to the general’s chamber,
which being instantly opened by the negro’s head, the colonel, calling
the general by name, told him he was a prisoner.”--Pennsylvania
Evening Post_, Aug. 7, 1777 (in Frank Moore’s “Diary of the American
Revolution,” vol. i. p. 468).
There is abundant evidence of the fidelity and bravery of the colored
patriots of Rhode Island during the whole war. Before they had been
formed into a separate regiment, they had fought valiantly with the
white soldiers at Red Bank and elsewhere. Their conduct at the “Battle
of’ Rhode Island,” on the 29th of August, 1778, entitles them to
perpetual honor. That battle has been pronounced by military authorities
to have been one of the best-fought battles of the Revolutionary War.
Its success was owing, in a great degree, to the good fighting of the
negro soldiers. Mr. Arnold, in his “History of Rhode Island,” thus
closes his account of it:--
“A third time the enemy, with desperate courage and increased strength,
attempted to assail the redoubt, and would have carried it, but for
the timely aid of two Continental battalions despatched by Sullivan to
support his almost exhausted troops. It was in repelling these furious
onsets, that the newly raised black regiment, under Col. Greene,
distinguished itself by deeds of desperate valor. Posted behind a
thicket in the valley, they three times drove back the Hessians, who
charged repeatedly down the hill to dislodge them: and so determined
were the enemy in these successive charges, that, the day after the
battle, the Hessian colonel, upon whom this duty had devolved, applied
to exchange his command, and go to New York, because he dared not lead
his regiment again to battle, lest his men should shoot him for having
caused them so much loss.”--_Arnold’s History of Rhode Island_, vol. ii.
pp. 427, 428.
Three years later, these soldiers are thus mentioned by the Marquis de
Chastellux:--
“The 5th [of January, 1781] I did not set out till eleven, although I
had thirty miles’ journey to Lebanon. At the passage to the ferry, I met
with a detachment of the Rhode-Island regiment,--the same corps we had
with us all the last summer; but they have since been recruited and
clothed. The greatest part of them are negroes or mulattoes: they
are strong, robust men; and those I have seen had a very good
appearance.”--_Chastellux’s Travels_, vol. i. p. 454; London, 1789.
When Col. Greene was surprised and murdered, near Points Bridge, New
York, on the 14th of May, 1781, his colored soldiers heroically defended
him till they were cut to pieces; and the enemy reached him over the
dead bodies of his faithful negroes.
That large numbers of negroes were enrolled in the army, and served
faithfully as soldiers during the whole period of the war of the
Revolution, may be regarded as a well-established historical fact. And
it should be borne in mind, that the enlistment was not confined, by any
means, to those who had before enjoyed the privileges of free citizens.
Very many slaves were offered to, and received by, the army, on the
condition that they were to be emancipated, either at the time of
enlisting, or when they had served out the term of their enlistment. The
inconsistency of keeping in slavery any person who had taken up arms for
the defence of our national liberty had led to the passing of an order
forbidding “slaves,” as such, to be received as soldiers.
That colored men were equally serviceable in the last war with Great
Britain is true, as the following historical document will show:--
GENERAL JACKSON’S PROCLAMATION TO THE NEGROES.
_Headquarters, Seventh Military District, Mobile, Sept. 21, 1814_.
To the Free Colored Inhabitants of Louisiana.
Through a mistaken policy, you have heretofore been deprived of a
participation in the glorious struggle for national rights in which our
country is engaged. This no longer shall exist.
As sons of freedom, you are now called upon to defend our most
inestimable blessing. As Americans, your country looks with confidence
to her adopted children for a valorous support, as a faithful return
for the advantages enjoyed under her mild and equitable government. As
fathers, husbands, and brothers, you are summoned to rally around the
standard of the Eagle to defend all which is dear in existence.
Your country, although calling for your exertions, does not wish you
to engage in her cause without amply remunerating you for the services
rendered. Your intelligent minds are not to be led away by false
representations. Your love of honor would cause you to despise the man
who should attempt to deceive you. In the sincerity of a soldier, and
the language of truth, I address you.
To every noble-hearted, generous freeman of color, volunteering to serve
during the present contest with Great Britain, and no longer, there will
be paid the same bounty, in money and lands, now received by the white
soldiers of the United States; viz., one hundred and twenty dollars in
money, and one hundred and sixty acres of land. The non-commissioned
officers and privates will also be entitled to the same monthly pay, and
daily rations, and clothes, furnished to any American soldier.
On enrolling yourselves in companies, the Major-General Commanding will
select officers for your government from your white fellow-citizens.
Your non-commissioned officers will be appointed from among yourselves.
Due regard will be paid to the feelings of freemen and soldiers. You
will not, by being associated with white men in the same corps, be
exposed to improper comparisons or unjust sarcasm. As a distinct,
independent battalion or regiment, pursuing the path of glory, you will,
undivided, receive the applause and gratitude of your countrymen.
To assure you of the sincerity of my intentions, and my anxiety to
engage your invaluable services to our country, I have communicated my
wishes to the Governor of Louisiana, who is fully informed as to the
manner of enrollment, and will give you every necessary information on
the subject of this address.
ANDREW JACKSON,
_Major-General Commanding._
[Niles’s Register, vol. vii. p. 205.]
Three months later, Gen. Jackson addressed the same troops as follows:--
“To the Men of Color. Soldiers! From the shores of Mobile I collected
you to arms. I invited you to share in the perils and to divide the
glory of your white countrymen. I expected much from you; for I was not
uninformed of those qualities which must render you so formidable to an
invading foe. I knew that you could endure hunger and thirst, and all
the hardships of war. I knew that you loved the land of your nativity,
and that, like ourselves, you had to defend all that is most dear to
man. But you surpass my hopes. I have found in you, united to these
qualities, that noble enthusiasm which impels to great deeds.
“Soldiers! The President of the United States shall be informed of your
conduct on the present occasion; and the voice of the Representatives
of the American nation shall applaud your valor, as your general now
praises your ardor. The enemy is near. His sails cover the lakes. But
the brave are united; and, if he finds us contending with ourselves, it
will be for the prize of valor, and fame its noblest reward.”--_Niles’s
Register,_ vol. vii. pp. 345, 346.
Black men served in the navy with great credit to themselves, receiving
the commendation of Com. Perry and other brave officers.
_Extract of a Letter from Nathaniel Shaler, Commander of the
private-armed Schooner Gen. Tompkins, to his Agent in New York,
dated_,--
“At Sea, Jan. 1, 1813.
“Before I could get our light sails in, and almost before I could
turn round, I was under the guns, not of a transport, but of a large
_frigate!_ and not more than a quarter of a mile from her.... Her first
broadside killed two men, and wounded six others....
“My officers conducted themselves in a way that would have done honor to
a more permanent service....
“The name of one of my poor fellows who was killed ought to be registered
in the book of fame, and remembered with reverence as long as bravery is
considered a virtue. He was a black man, by the name of John Johnson.
A twenty-four pound shot struck him in the hip, and took away all the
lower part of his body. In this state, the poor brave fellow lay on the
deck, and several times exclaimed to his shipmates, ‘_Fire away, my boy:
no haul a color down._’ The other was also a black man, by the name of
John Davis, and was struck in much the same way. He fell near me, and
several times requested to be thrown overboard, saying he was only in
the way of others.
“When America has such tars, she has little to fear from the tyrants of
the ocean.”--_Niles’s Weekly Register, Saturday_, Feb. 26, 1814.