Chapter D: Webster Davis (6)

[Note 22: Delivered at the Negro Congress, at the Cotton States and International Exposition, Atlanta Ga., November 11 to November 23, 1895.]

For 1600 years prior to the war between Great Britain and the Colonies, the pages of history bear no record of the Negro as a soldier. Tracing his separate history in the Revolutionary War is a task of much difficulty, for the reason that while individual instances of valor and patriotism abound, there were so few separate bodies of Negro troops that no separate record appears to have been made. The simple fact is that the fathers as a rule enlisted men both for the Army and Navy, just as now it is only continued by the Navy; that is to say, they were assigned wherever needed, without regard to race or color. Varner's Rhode Island Battalion appears to have been the only large aggregation of Negroes in this war, though Connecticut, New York, and New Hampshire each furnished one separate company in addition to individuals scattered through their other organizations, so that ere the close of the war, there were very few brigades, regiments, or companies in which the Negro was not in evidence.

The free Negro appears to have gone in from the beginning without attracting or calling out special comment. Later, as men grew scarcer and necessity more pressing, slaves were taken in also, and then the trouble began. Those who held slaves did not care to lose them in this way. Others who had not did not think it just the thing in a war for avowed freedom to place an actual slave in the ranks to fight. Some did not want the Negro, bonded or free, to take part as a soldier in the struggle. So that in May, 1775, the Massachusetts Committee of Safety voted that thereafter only free men should be enlisted. In July, General Gates issued an order prohibiting further enlistments of Negroes, but saying nothing of those already in the service.

In October a council of war presided over by General Washington, comprising three major-generals and six brigadier-generals, voted unanimously against the enlistment of slaves, and by a decided majority against further enlistments of Negroes. Ten days later in a conference held at Cambridge, Mass., participated in by General Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Lynch, and the deputy governors of Connecticut and Rhode Island, a similar action was taken.

On the 7th November, 1775, Earl Dundore, commanding the force of His Majesty the King, issued a proclamation offering freedom and equal pay to all slaves who would join his armies as soldiers. It did not take the colonists long to find out their mistake, although General Washington, in accordance with the expressed will of his officers and of the Committee of Safety, did on the 17th of November, 1775, issue a proclamation forbidding the further enlistment of Negroes. Less than two months later, that is to say on the 30th of December, 1775, he issued a second proclamation again authorizing the enlistment of free Negroes. He advised Congress of his action, and stated that he would recall it if so directed. But he was not. The splendid service rendered by the Negro and the great and pressing need of men were such, that although the opposition continued from some sections, it was not thereafter strong enough to obtain recognition. So the Negroes went and came, much as other men.

In all the events of the war, from Bunker Hill to Yorktown, they bore an honorable part. The history of the doings of the armies is their history, as in everything they took part and did their share. Their total enlistment was about 3,000 men,--a very fair percentage for the population of that period. I might instance the killing of Major Pitcairn, at Bunker Hill, by Peter Salem, and of Major Montgomery, at Fort Griswold, by Jordan Freeman. The part they took in the capture of Major-General Prescott at Newport; their gallant defense of Colonel Greene, their beloved commander, when he was surprised and murdered at Croton River, May 13, 1781, when it was only after the last of his faithful guards had been shot and cut down that he was reached; or the battle of Rhode Island, when a battalion of 400 Negroes withstood three separate and distinct charges from 1,500 Hessians under Count Donop, and beat them back with such tremendous loss that Count Donop at once applied for an exchange, fearing that his men would kill him, if he went into battle with them again, for having exposed them to such slaughter; and many other instances that are of record. The letter following, written December 5, 1775, explains itself:

"TO THE HONORABLE GENERAL COURT OF THE MASSACHUSETTS BAY:

"The subscribers beg leave to report to your Honorable House (which we do in justice to the character of so brave a man) that under our own observation we declare that a Negro man named Salem Poor, of Colonel Frye's Regiment, Captain Ames' Company, in the late battle at Charleston, behaved like an experienced officer as well as an excellent soldier. To set forth particulars of his conduct would be tedious. We would only beg to say, in the person of this Negro centers a brave and gallant soldier. The reward due to so great and distinguished a character we submit to Congress."

This is a splendid and well-attested tribute to a gallant and worthy Negro. There were many such, but, beyond receiving and reading, no action was taken thereon by Congress. There is no lack of incidents, and the temptation to quote many of them is great, but the time allotted me is too brief for extended mention, and I must bring this branch of my subject to a close. It is in evidence that while so many Negroes were offering their lives a willing sacrifice for the country, in some sections the officers of the Continental forces received their bounty and pay in Negroes, "grown" and "small," instead of "dollars" and "cents." Fighting for _liberty_ and taking pay in _slaves_!

When the war was over the free men returned to meet their same difficulties; the slaves were caught when possible and re-enslaved by their former masters. In Boston a few years later we find a party of black patriots of the Revolution mobbed on Boston Common while celebrating the anniversary of the abolition of the slave-trade.

The captain of a vessel trading along the coast tells of a Negro who had fought in the war and been distinguished for bravery and soldierly conduct. He was reclaimed and re-enslaved by his master after the war, and served him faithfully until old age rendered him useless. The master then brought the poor old slave to this captain and asked him to take him along on his trip and try to sell him. The captain hated to sell a man who had fought for his country, but finally agreed, took the poor old man to Mobile, and sold him for $100 to a man who put him to attending a chicken-coop. His former master continued to draw the old slave's pension as a soldier in the Revolution, until he died.

The War of 1812 was mainly fought upon the water, and in the American Navy at that time the Negro stood in the ratio of about one to six. We find record of complaint by Commodore Perry at the beginning because of the large number of Negroes sent him, but later the highest tribute to their bravery and efficiency. Captain Shaler, of the armed brig _General Thompson_, writing of an engagement between his vessel and a British frigate, says:

"The name of one of my poor fellows who was killed ought to be registered in the book of fame, and remembered as long as bravery is a virtue. He was a black man, by name 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 boys; nor haul a color down!' Another black man, by the name of John Davis, who was struck in much the same manner, repeatedly requested to be thrown overboard, saying that he was only in the way of the others."

I know of nothing finer in history than these incidents of valor and patriotism.

As before, the Negro was not universally welcomed to the ranks of the American Army; but later, continued reverses and a lack of enthusiasm in enlistments made it necessary to seek his aid, and from Mobile, Ala., on September 21, 1814, General Jackson issued a stirring call to the free colored people of Louisiana for aid.

In a remarkably short period, two battalions were raised, under Majors LaCaste and Savary, which did splendid service in the battle of New Orleans. New York enrolled two battalions, and sent them to Sacketts Harbor. Pennsylvania enrolled 2400, and sent them to Gray's Ferry at the capture of Washington, to prepare for the invading column. Another battalion also was raised, armed, equipped, and ready to start to the front, when peace was declared.

In one of the actions of this war, a charging column of the American Army was repulsed and thrown into great disorder. A Negro private named Jeffreys, seeing the disaster, sprang upon a horse, and by heroic effort rallied the troops, led them back upon a second charge, and completely routed the enemy. He was rewarded by General Jackson with the honorary title of Major. Under the laws he could not commission him.

When the war was over, this gallant man returned to his home in Nashville, Tenn., where he lived for years afterward, highly respected by its citizens of all races.

At the age of seventy years, this black hero was obliged, _in self-defense_, to strike a white ruffian, who had assaulted him. Under the laws of the State he was arrested and given nine and thirty lashes on his bare back. It broke his heart, and Major Jeffreys died.

It seems a little singular that in the tremendous struggle between the States in 1861-1865, the South should have been the first to take steps toward the enlistment of Negroes. Yet such is the fact. Two weeks after the fall of Fort Sumter, the _Charleston Mercury_ records the passing through Augusta of several companies of the the 3rd and 4th Georgia Regiment, and of sixteen well-drilled companies _and one Negro company_ from Nashville, Tenn.

_The Memphis Avalanche_ and _The Memphis Appeal_ of May 9, 10, and 11, 1861, gave notice of the appointment by the "Committee of Safety" of a committee of three persons "to organize a volunteer company composed of our patriotic freemen of color of the city of Memphis, for the service of our common defense."

A telegram from New Orleans dated November 23, 1861, notes the review by Governor Moore of over 28,000 troops, and that one regiment comprised "_1,400 colored men_." The _New Orleans Picayune_, referring to a review held February 9, 1862, says: "We must also pay a deserved compliment to the companies of free colored men, all very well drilled and comfortably equipped."

It is a little odd, too, that in the evacuation of New Orleans a little later, in April, 1862, all of the troops succeeded in getting away except the Negroes. They "got left."

It is not in our line to speculate upon what would have been the result of the war had the South kept up this policy, enlisted the freemen, and emancipated the enlisting slaves and their families. The immense addition to their fighting force, the quick recognition of them by Great Britain, to which slavery was the greatest bar, and the fact that the heart of the Negro was with the South but for slavery, and the case stands clear. But the primary successes of the South closed its eyes to its only chance of salvation, while at the same time the eyes of the North were opened.

In 1865, the South saw, and endeavored to remedy, its error. On March 9, 1865, the Confederate Congress passed a bill, recommended by General Lee, authorizing the enlistment of 200,000 Negroes; but it was then too late.

The North came slowly and reluctantly to recognize the Negro as a factor for good in the war. "This is a white man's war," met the Negroes at every step of their first efforts to gain admission to the armies of the Union.

To General David Hunter, more than to any other one man, is due the credit for the successful entry upon the stage of the Negro as a soldier in this war.

In the spring of 1862, he raised and equipped a regiment of Negroes in South Carolina, and when the fact because known in Washington and throughout the country, such a storm was raised about the ears of the Administration that they gracefully stood aside and left the brave general to fight his enemies in the front and rear as best he might. He was quite capable to do both, as it proved.

* * * * *

The beginning of 1863 saw the opening of the doors to the Negro in every direction. General Lorenzo Thomas went in person to the valley of the Mississippi to supervise it there. Massachusetts was authorized to fill its quota with Negroes. The States of Maryland, Missouri, Delaware, and Tennessee were thrown open by order of the War Department, and all slaves enlisting therefrom declared free. Ohio, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and New York joined the band and sent the stalwart black boy in blue to the front singing, "Give us a flag, all free, without a slave." For two years the fierce and determined opposition had kept them out, but now the bars were down and they came pouring in. Some one said, "he cared not who made the laws of a people if he could make their songs." A better exemplification of this would be difficult to find than is the song written by "Miles O'Reilly" (Colonel Halpine), of the old 10th Army Corps. I cannot resist the temptation to quote it here. With General Hunter's letter and this song to quote from, the episode was closed:

"Some say it is a burning shame to make the Naygurs fight,
An' that the trade o' being kilt belongs but to the white;
But as for me, upon me sowl, so liberal are we here,
I'll let Sambo be murthered, in place of meself, on every day of the year.
On every day of the year, boys, and every hour in the day,
The right to be kilt I'll divide wid him, and divil a word I'll say.

In battles' wild commotion I shouldn't at all object
If Sambo's body should stop a ball that was coming for me direct,
An' the prod of a Southern bayonet; so liberal are we here,
I'll resign and let Sambo take it, on every day in the year,
On every day in the year, boys, an' wid none of your nasty pride,
All right in Southern baynet prod, wid Sambo I'll divide.

The men who object to Sambo should take his place and fight,
An' it is betther to have a Naygur's hue, than a liver that's weak an' white,
Though Sambo's black as the ace of spades, his finger a thryger can pull,
An' his eye runs straight on the barrel-sight from under its thatch of wool.
So hear me all, boys, darlin', don't think I'm tipping you chaff,--
The right to be kilt, I'll divide with him, an' give him the largest half."

It took three years of war to place the enlisted Negro upon the same ground as the enlisted white man as to pay and emoluments; _perhaps_ six years of war might have given him shoulder-straps, but the war ended without authorization of law for that step. At first they were received, under an act of Congress that allowed each one, without regard to rank, ten dollars per month, three dollars thereof to be retained for clothing and equipments. I think it was in May, 1864, when the act was passed equalizing the pay, but not opening the doors to promotion.

Under an act of the Confederate Congress, making it a crime punishable with death for any white person to train Negroes or mulattoes to arms, or aid them in any military enterprise, and devoting the Negro caught under arms to the tender mercies of the "present or future laws of the State" in which caught, a large number of _promotions_ were made by the way of a rope and a tree along the first year of the Negro's service. (I can even recall one instance as late as April, 1865, though it had been long before then generally discontinued.)

What the Negro did, how he did it, and where, it would take volumes to properly record, I can however give but briefest mention to a few of the many evidences of his fitness for the duties of the war, and his aid to the cause of the Union.

The first fighting done by organized Negro troops appears to have been done by Company A, 1st South Carolina Negro Regiment, at St. Helena Island, November 3 to 10, 1862, while participating in an expedition along the coast of Georgia and Florida under Lieutenant-Colonel O. T. Beard, of the 48th New York Infantry, who says in his report:

"The colored men fought with astonishing coolness and bravery. I found them all I could desire,--more than I had hoped. They behaved gloriously, and deserve all praise."

The testimony thus inaugurated runs like a cord of gold through the web and woof of the history of the Negro as a soldier from that date to their final charge, the last made at Clover Hill, Va., April 9, 1865.

Necessarily the first actions in which the Negro bore a part commanded most attention. Friends and enemies were looking eagerly to see how they would acquit themselves, and so it comes to pass that the names of Fort Wagner, Olustee, Millikens Bend, Port Hudson, and Fort Pillow are as familiar as Bull Run, Antietam, Shiloh and Gettysburg, and while those first experiences were mostly severe reverses, they were by that very fact splendid exemplifiers of the truth that the Negroes could be relied upon to fight under the most adverse circumstances, against any odds, and could not be discouraged.

Let us glance for a moment at Port Hudson, La., in May, 1863, assaulted by General Banks with a force of which the 1st and 2nd Regiments, Louisiana Native Guards, formed a part. When starting upon their desperate mission, Colonel Stafford of the 1st Regiment, in turning over the regimental colors to the color-guard, made a brief and patriotic address, closing with the words:

"Color-guard: Protect, defend, die for, but do not surrender, these colors." The gallant flag-sergeant, Plancianos, taking them replied: "Colonel: I will bring back these colors to you in honor, or report to God the reason why."

Six times with desperate valor they charged over ground where success was hopeless, a deep bayou between them and the works of the enemy at the point of attack rendering it impossible to reach them, yet strange to say, six times they were ordered forward and six times they went to useless death, until swept back by the blazing breath of shot and shell before which nothing living could stand. Here fell the gallant Captain Cailloux, black as the ace of spades. Refusing to leave the field though his arm had been shattered by a bullet, he returned to the charge until killed by a shell.

A soldier limping painfully to the front was halted and asked where he was going. He replied, "I am shot bad in de leg, and dey want me to go to de hospital, but I guess I can give 'em a little more yet."

The colors came back, but crimsoned with the blood of the gallant Plancianos, who reported to God from that bloody field.

Shall we glance from this to Millikens Bend, La., in January, 1863, garrisoned by the 9th and 11th Louisiana and the 1st Mississippi, all Negroes, and about 160 of the 23rd Iowa (white), about 1100 fighting men in all? Attacked by a force of six Confederate regiments, crushed out of their works by sheer weight of numbers, borne down toward the levee, fighting every step of the way, hand to hand--clubbed musket, bayonets, and swords,--from three A. M. to twelve noon, they fought desperately until a Union gun-boat came to the rescue and shelled the desperate foe back to the woods, with a total loss to the defenders of 437 men,--two-fifths of their strength.

Shall we turn with sadness to Fort Wagner, S. C., in July, 1863, when the 54th Massachusetts won its deathless fame, and its grand young commander, Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, passed into the temple of immortality? After a march of all day, under a burning sun, and all night through a tempest of wind and rain, drenched, exhausted, hungry, they wheeled into line, without a murmur for that awful charge, that dance of death, the struggle against hopeless odds, and the shattered remnants were hurled back as from the mouth of hell, leaving the dead bodies of their young commander and his noble followers to be buried in a common grave. Its total loss was about one-third of its strength.

Here it was that the gallant flag-sergeant, Carney, though grievously wounded, bore back his flag to safety, and fell fainting and exhausted with loss of blood, saying, "Boys, the old flag never touched the ground!" Or another glance, at ill-starred Olustee, where the gallant 8th United States Colored Troops lost 87 killed of its effective fighting force, the largest loss in any one colored regiment in any one action of the war. And so on, by Fort Pillow, which let us pass in merciful silence, and to Honey Hill, S. C., perhaps the last desperate fight in the far south, in which the 32nd, 35th, and 102nd United States Colored Troops and the 54th and 55th Massachusetts Infantry won fresh and fadeless laurels for splendid fighting against hopeless odds and insurmountable difficulties, and then to Nashville, Tenn., with its recorded loss of 84 killed in the effectives of the 13th United States Colored Troops.

These were all brilliant actions, and they covered the actors with, and reflected upon the race, a blaze of glory. But it was in the armies of the James and of the Potomac that the true metal of the Negro as a soldier rang out its clearest notes amid the tremendous diapasons that rolled back and forth between the embattled hosts. Here was war indeed, upon its grandest scale and in all its infinite variety: The tireless march under burning sun, chilling frosts, and driven tempests; the lonely vigil of the picket under starless skies, the rush and roar of countless "hosts to battle driven" in the mad charge and the victorious shout that pursued the fleeing foe; the grim determination that held its line of defenses with set teeth, blood-shot eye, and strained muscle, beating back charge after charge of the foe; the patient labor in trench and mine, on hill and in valley, swamp and jungle, with disease adding its horrors to the decimation of shot and shell.

Here the Negro stood in the full glare of the greatest search-light, part and parcel of the grandest armies ever mustered upon this continent, competing side by side with the best and bravest of the Union Army against the flower of the Confederacy, the best and bravest of Lee's army, and losing nothing in the contrast. Never again while time lasts will the doubt arise as in 1861, "Will the Negro fight?" As a problem, it has been solved; as a question, it has been answered; and as a fact, it is as established as the eternal hills. It was the Negroes who rang up the curtain upon the last act of the bloody tragedy at Petersburg, Va., June 15, 1864, and they who rang it down at Clover Hill, Va., April 9, 1865. They were one of the strong fingers upon the mighty hand that grasped the giant's throat at Petersburg and never flexed until the breath went out at Appomattox. In this period it would take page on page to recount their deeds of valor and their glorious victories.

See them on the 15th of June, 1864, carrying the out-post at Baylor's field in early morning, and all that long, hot, summer day advancing, a few yards at a time, then lying down to escape the fire from the works, but still gradually creeping nearer and nearer, until, just as the sun went down, they swept like a tornado over the works and started upon a race for the city, close at the heels of the flying foe, until mistakenly ordered back. Of this day's experience General Badeau writes: "No worse strain on the nerves of troops is possible, for it is harder to remain quiet under cannon fire, even though comparatively harmless, than to advance against a storm of musketry." General W. F. "Baldy" Smith, speaking of their conduct, says: "No nobler effort has been put forth to-day, and no greater success achieved than that of the colored troops."

* * * * *

Or, again, at the terrible mine explosion of July 30, 1864, on the Petersburg line, and at the fearful slaughter of September 29, 1864, at New Market Heights and Fort Harrison. On this last date in the Fourth United States Colored Troops, out of a color-guard of twelve men, but one came off the field on his own feet. The gallant flag-sergeant, Hilton, the last to fall, cried out as he went down, "Boys, save the colors"; and they were saved.

* * * * *

Some ten or more years later, in Congress, in the midst of a speech advocating the giving of civil rights to the Negro, General Butler said, referring to this incident:

"There, in a space not wider than the clerk's desk, and three hundred yards long, lay the dead bodies of 543 of my colored comrades, slain in the defense of their country, who had laid down their lives to uphold its flag and its honor, as a willing sacrifice. And as I rode along, guiding my horse this way and that, lest he should profane with his hoofs what seemed to me the sacred dead, and as I looked at their bronzed faces upturned in the shining sun, as if in mute appeal against the wrongs of the country for which they had given their lives, and whose flag had been to them a flag of stripes, in which no star of glory had ever shone for them--feeling I had wronged them in the past, and believing what was the future duty of my country to them,--I swore to myself a solemn oath: 'May my right hand forget its cunning, and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, if ever I fail to defend the rights of the men who have given their blood for me and my country this day and for their race forever.' And, God helping me, I will keep that oath."

* * * * *

History further repeats itself in the fact that in every war so far known to this country, the first blood, and, in some cases, the last also, has been shed by the faithful Negro, and this in spite of all the years of bondage and oppression, and of wrongs unspeakable. Under the sun there has nothing been known in the history of any people more marvellous than these facts!

Oh, to the living few,
Comrades, be just, be true.
Hail them as heroes tried,
Fight with them side by side;
Never in field or tent,
Scorn the Black Regiment.

It is but a little thing to ask, they could ask no less: _be just_; but, oh, the shame of it for those who need be asked!

There is no need for panegyric, for sounding phrases or rounded periods. The simple story is eloquent with all that is necessary to make the heart swell with pride. In the hour allotted me to fill, it is possible only to indicate in skeleton the worth of the Negro as a soldier. If this brief sketch should awaken even a few to interest in his achievements, and one be found willing and fitted to write the history that is their due, that writer shall achieve immortality.

AN ADDRESS AT THE UNVEILING OF THE ROBERT GOULD SHAW MONUMENT[23]

BY BOOKER T. WASHINGTON, A. M., LL.D.

[Note 23: An address by Booker T. Washington, A. M., delivered on the occasion of the unveiling of the Robert Gould Shaw Monument, Boston, Mass., May 31, 1897.]

_Mr. Chairman and Fellow Citizens:_

In this presence, and on this sacred and memorable day, in the deeds and death of our hero, we recall the old, old story, ever old yet ever new, that when it was the will of the Father to lift humanity out of wretchedness and bondage, the precious task was delegated to Him who, among ten thousand, was altogether lovely, and was willing to make himself of no reputation that he might save and lift up others.

If that heart could throb and if those lips could speak, what would be the sentiment and words that Robert Gould Shaw would have us feel and speak at this hour? He would not have us dwell long on the mistakes, the injustice, the criticisms of the days

"Of storm and cloud, of doubt and fears,
Across the eternal sky must lower;
Before the glorious noon appears,"

he would have us bind up with his own undying fame and memory and retain by the side of his monument, the name of John A. Andrews, who, with prophetic vision and strong arm, helped to make the existence of the 54th Regiment possible; and that of George L. Stearns, who, with hidden generosity and a great sweet heart, helped to turn the darkest hour into day, and in doing so, freely gave service, fortune, and life itself to the cause which this day commemorates. Nor would he have us forget those brother officers, living and dead, who by their baptism in blood and fire, in defense of union and freedom, gave us an example of the highest and purest patriotism.

To you who fought so valiantly in the ranks, the scarred and scattered remnant of the 54th Regiment, who, with empty sleeve and wanting leg, have honored this occasion with your presence, to you, your commander is not dead. Though Boston erected no monument and history recorded no story, in you and the loyal race which you represent Robert Gould Shaw would have a monument which time could not wear away.

But an occasion like this is too great, too sacred for mere individual eulogy. The individual is the instrument, national virtue the end. That which was 300 years being woven into the warp and woof of our democratic institutions could not be effaced by a single battle, as magnificent as was that battle; that which for three centuries had bound master and slave, yea, North and South, to a body of death, could not be blotted out by four years of war, could not be atoned for by shot and sword, nor by blood and tears.

Not many days ago in the heart of the South, in a large gathering of the people of my race, there were heard from many lips praises and thanksgiving to God for His goodness in setting them free from physical slavery. In the midst of that assembly there arose a Southern white man the former owner of many slaves, gray of hair and with hands which trembled, and from his quivering lips, there came the words; "My friends, you forget in your rejoicing that, in setting you free, God was also good to me and my race in setting us free." But there is a higher and deeper sense in which both races must be free than that represented by the bill of sale. The black man who cannot let love and sympathy go out to the white man is but half free. The white man who would close the shop or factory against a black man seeking an opportunity to earn an honest living is but half free. The white man who retards his own development by opposing a black man is but half free. The full measure of the fruit of Fort Wagner and all that this monument stands for will not be realized until every man covered with a black skin shall, by patience and natural effort, grow to that height in industry, property, intelligence, and moral responsibility, where no man in all our land will be tempted to degrade himself by withholding from his black brother any opportunity which he himself would possess.

Until that time comes this monument will stand for effort, not victory complete. What these heroic souls of the 54th Regiment began, we must complete. It must be completed not in malice, not in narrowness; nor artificial progress, nor in efforts at mere temporary political gain, nor in abuse of another section or race. Standing as I do to-day in the home of Garrison and Phillips and Sumner, my heart goes out to those who wore gray as well as to those clothed in blue; to those who returned defeated, to destitute homes, to face blasted hopes and a shattered political and industrial system. To them there can be no prouder reward for defeat than by a supreme effort to place the Negro on that footing where he will add material, intellectual, and civil strength to every department of State.

This work must be completed in public school, industrial school, and college. The most of it must be completed in the effort of the Negro himself, in his effort to withstand temptation, to economize, to exercise thrift, to disregard the superficial for the real--the shadow for the substance, to be great and yet small, in his effort to be patient in the laying of a firm foundation, so to grow in skill and knowledge that he shall place his services in demand by reason of his intrinsic and superior worth. This is the key that unlocks every door of opportunity, and all others fail. In this battle of peace the rich and poor, the black and white, may have a part.

What lesson has this occasion for the future? What of hope, what of encouragement, what of caution? "Watchman, tell us of the night; what the signs of promise are." If through me, an humble representative, nearly ten millions of my people might be permitted to send a message to Massachusetts, to the survivors of the 54th Regiment, to the committee whose untiring energy has made this memorial possible, to the family who gave their only boy that we might have life more abundantly, that message would be, "Tell them that the sacrifice was not in vain, that up from the depth of ignorance and poverty, we are coming, and if we come through oppression out of the struggle, we are gaining strength. By the way of the school, the well-cultivated field, the skilled hand, the Christian home, we are coming up; that we propose to invite all who will to step up and occupy this position with us. Tell them that we are learning that standing-ground for the race, as for the individual, must be laid in intelligence, industry, thrift, and property, not as an end, but as a means to the highest privileges; that we are learning that neither the conqueror's bullet nor fiat of law could make an ignorant voter an intelligent voter, could make a dependent man an independent man, could give one citizen respect for another, a bank account, a foot of land, or an enlightened fireside. Tell them that, as grateful as we are to artist and patriotism for placing the figures of Shaw and his comrades in physical form of beauty and magnificence, that after all, the real monument, the greater monument, is being slowly but safely builded among the lowly in the South, in the struggles and sacrifices of a race to justify all that has been done and suffered for it."

One of the wishes that lay nearest Colonel Shaw's heart was, that his black troops might be permitted to fight by the side of white soldiers. Have we not lived to see that wish realized, and will it not be further realized in the future? Not at Wagner, not with rifle and bayonet, but on the field of peace, in the battle of industry, in the struggle for good government, in the lifting up of the lowest to the fullest opportunities. In this we shall fight by the side of white men, North and South. And if this be true, as under God's guidance it will, that old flag, that emblem of progress and security, which brave Sergeant Carney never permitted to fall on the ground, will still be borne aloft by Southern soldier and Northern soldier, and, in a more potent and higher sense, we shall all realize that

"The slave's chain and the master's alike are broken;
The one curse of the race held both in tether;
They are rising, all are rising--
The black and the white together."

THE LIMITLESS POSSIBILITIES OF THE NEGRO RACE[24]

By CHARLES W. ANDERSON, of New York

[Note 24: An address delivered before the Tennessee Centennial Exposition, Nashville, Tenn., June 5, 1897.]

_Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen:_

I sometimes feel that we, as a race, do not fully appreciate the importance of industrial education. I feel that the day is near at hand when the physical apparatus of civil education will play a larger part in the progress of the world than it has hitherto done. In other words, I firmly believe that the industrial victories are in the future and not in the past. We have done much and wrought many miracles, but the miracles are but evidences of possible powers rather than the high-tide marks of development. In my mind the possibilities of physical and scientific achievement are limitless, and beyond the compass of human conception. Look at iron alone. See what has been done with it in the last fifty years. See what you are able to do with it here in Tennessee. From it are made things dainty and things dangerous, carriages and cannon, spatula and spade, sword and pen, wheel, axle and rail, as well as screw, file, and saw. It is bound around the hull of ships and lifted into tower and steeple. It is drawn into wire, coiled into springs, woven into gauze, twisted into rope, and sharpened into needles. It is stretched into a web, finer by comparison than the gossamer of the morning along the bed of the ocean, and made to tick out the yesterday of Europe on the to-day of America. All of this variety of use has been made out of the stubbornness of metals by the sovereign touch of industrial and scientific education. There is inexhaustible promise in this development. It has brought, and is still bringing, the two great races closer together. These iron veins and arteries which interlock our cities and confederate our States do much to familiarize each race with the hopes and aspirations of the other, and to weave their histories into one harmonious contexture, as telegraphic messages fly instantaneously across them, and screaming trains rush back and forth like shuttles upon a mighty loom. When our fullest expectations shall have been fulfilled, both races will have the freest opportunity for the development of their varied capabilities, and, through mutual bonds of interest and affection and mutual bonds of sympathy and purpose, will rise the unmatched harmonies of a united people to the imperial accompaniment of two mighty oceans.

It is a peculiar fact that immediately after the abolition of human slavery the country started upon an unparalleled career of prosperity. The West, then almost unexplored, began to develop, and has continued to do so until now it is studded with proud cities, teeming with throbbing life, growing like the grass of the prairies in spring-time, advancing like the steam-engine, baffling distance like the telegraph, and spreading the pulsations of their mighty hearts to the uttermost parts of the world. There they stand with their echoing marts of trade, their stately spires of worship and their magnificent institutions of learning, as free as the encircling air, as independent as the soaring eagle, and more powerful than the Roman Empire when in the plenitude of her power. All of this has been accomplished since the energies of men were unfettered. Thus it may be said that both races started almost simultaneously on their careers to fulfill the destiny of this great country among the countries of the world. And as we started together substantially, we must end together. We started with most unequal equipment, to be sure, and under conditions as far apart as the sky from this pavilion, but we have marched to the same music and in the same direction ever since, with varying fortunes and unequal steps, but with no steps backward, until to-day we are able to recognize in each other and be recognized by all mankind as equals in our attachment to the land, the laws, the institutions, and the flag of our common country.

The responsibility now rests upon you to improve each minute of your lives in fitting yourselves for a wiser, better and worthier discharge of the obligations of American citizenship. You may be constrained to ask, "What shall we do?" or, with Archimedes of old, exclaim "Give me where to stand and I will move the world." Let me advise you to stand where you are. That's the place. Act well your part, and you shall have accomplished all that is expected of you. My friends, a country like ours is not governed by law, or courts of justice, or judges, however wise or puissant. It is governed by public sentiment. Once poison it, and courts are impotent and judges powerless. Therefore we are responsible, each and all of us, according to our talents and influence, for the public sentiment of the day. If it is healthy and just, it is we who have made it so; if it is unhealthy and unjust, it is we who have made it or permitted it to become so. And what is this all-powerful, but imperceptible, entity, this potent influence which controls presidents, cabinets, congresses, courts, judges, juries, the press and--I regret to say it--the pulpit? What is public sentiment or public opinion? It is the multiplied, accumulated opinion of all the people. Every word spoken or written by man or woman goes to make up this great stream of public opinion, just as every drop of dew or water goes to make up that mighty river which divides this imperial continent and turns the spindles of the ten thousand factories which hug its shores. Hence we are all responsible for our contribution to the public opinion of the day, whether our contribution be a raindrop or a Niagara. We are responsible for what we say and what we leave unsaid, for what we do and what we leave undone, for what we write and what is unwritten. We are responsible for the errors we have committed and for those we have taken no part in overthrowing. So, whether we realize it or not, we are consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or unintentionally, directly or indirectly, according to our opportunities and our influence, responsible for the public sentiment which secures or deprives every citizen of his rights and of the opportunity for the highest intellectual and industrial development.

I know that it is sometimes said that we have done very little. Be that as it may. Thirty years is but a brief time compared with the centuries in which Norman, Saxon, and Dane have been fusing into the English race. And yet, we have something to remember when great names are counted, something to show when great deeds are told. At the same time I would not have you sit supinely down and wait for the millennium. Far from it. It is said that all things come to him who waits. That is in part true, but it is only fifty per cent. of the whole truth. All things come to him who waits, if he hustles while he waits.

You will need not only education and character, but you also need level-headedness and accuracy of judgment. Acquire intellectuality, but acquire practicality at the same time. Do not join that large and constantly increasing class in this country to whom nothing is desirable but the impossible. Do not indulge in the pastime of throwing stones at the stars. Learn to be practical, and, whatever you attempt in life, remember to think out a plan and a policy before you begin the work. When you are called upon to go out and do battle, stop and reflect, and see if there is a reasonable probability of your whipping anybody. If the probability is not apparent, I would advise you to decline the glove and reserve your lance for a more "convenient season." Martyrdom is very attractive, especially attractive to vigorous young men, but it "butters no parsnips." Therefore, cultivate prudence as well as valor, and study men as well as books; for you will needs be prepared to meet the living issues of the present; and if you are wise, you will anticipate the possible exigencies of the future. To do this you will want both courage and discretion. Learn the proper value of organization and union, and never cease to remember that an army divided is an army defeated. You will neither be able to help yourself nor hurt the enemy by firing paper bullets. You must organize.

To make steam effective you must bind it up in an engine; to make water serviceable, you must harness it in a mill; to make electricity manageable, you must mask it in a battery; and to make men useful in reformatory or remedial work, you must recruit them into an organization.

And to those present who have not enjoyed the advantages of an education, let me direct a few remarks. You must not believe that you cannot assist in the work of building character for the race. Every man or woman who plays his or her part according to the best lights, who bears a respected name, or bears the proud title of a "good citizen," who is industrious, temperate, upright, law-abiding, and devoted to whatever is lovely and of good report, is unconsciously pleading the cause of the race before the great tribunal of the civilized world.

To all such we can only render the tribute which history accords to those who fight as privates in the battles of human progress, with all the more devotion and fidelity because their names will never be known. Whenever a man earns the respect of the community in which he resides, some part of that respect, some breath of that fragrance is reflected upon the race of which he is a member.

As a race, we have done much, but we must not forget how much more there is still to do. We have already demonstrated the possession of powers, but we must now bring forth the fruits of sustained racial achievement. To some extent we have been given opportunity, but we must not cease to remember that no race can be given relative rank--it must win equality of rating for itself. Hence, we must not only acquire education, but character as well. It is not only necessary that we should speak well, but it is more necessary that we should speak the truth. We must not only acquire that culture which is the golden key that unlocks all doors and unbars all gates, but we must cultivate that straightforwardness of purpose and unconquerable determination which enables a people to face conditions "without fear and without reproach."

And so the last suggestion comes which the hour presents. In the work of race advancement, we need the service and assistance of all true men and women. We must have the co-operation of all sections and all conditions. The cotton-fields of Alabama, the sugar-plantations of Louisiana, and the coal-mines of Tennessee; the great lakes of the North which winter roofs with ice, and from which drips refreshing coolness through the hot summer months, from the fisheries and the factories, from wheat-fields and pine forests, from meadows billowed with golden grain and orchards bending beneath their burdens of golden fruit, this advance movement must receive support. The humble laborer following his plow afield must do his part; the blacksmith at his forge, the lawyer at the bar, the fisherman on the banks, the man of science putting nature to the question, all, without distinction and without exception, must contribute, according to his station and his opportunity, to the hastening of the day when the Negro shall take his place by the side of the other great race of men and form that grand spectacle which Tennyson had in mind when he spoke of "the parliament of man, the federation of the world."

THE PARTY OF FREEDOM AND THE FREEDMEN--A RECIPROCAL DUTY[25]

BY WILLIAM SANDERS SCARBOROUGH, D.D., LL.D

WILLIAM SANDERS SCARBOROUGH, M. A., PH. D., LL.D., _President of Wilberforce University, Ohio. Author of "First Lessons in Greek," the first and only Greek book written by a Negro, largely used as text-book in both white and Negro schools. Author of a large number of classical interpretations, and philological pamphlets._

[Note 25: Address delivered at the Lincoln Day Banquet, Dayton, Ohio, Feb. 11, 1899.]

Slavery has been well called the "perfected curse of the ages." Every civilization, ancient and modern, has experienced its blighting, withering effect, and it has cost thrones to learn the lesson that

"The laws of changeless justice blind
Oppressor and oppressed";

that

"Close as sin and suffering joined,"

these two

"March to Fate--abreast."

Since the world began, freedom has been at war with all that savored of servitude. The sentiment of liberty is innate in every human breast. Freedom of speech and of action--the right of every man to be his own master--has ever been the inestimable privilege sought, the boon most craved. For this guerdon men have fought; for this they have even gladly died.

It was the unquenchable desire for liberty that brought the Pilgrim Fathers to Plymouth Rock. They knew that all that is highest and noblest in the human soul is fostered to its greatest development only under the blazing sunlight of freedom. And it was the same flame burning in the heart of the young nation planted on these Western shores that led to the ratification of the sentiment placed by the hand of Thomas Jefferson in the corner-stone of our American independence: "We hold these truths to be self-evident--that all men are created free and equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Here was heralded to the nation prophetic freedom for all mankind and for all generations.

However, the years of bondage for Africa's sons and daughters in this fair land stretched on over a half century more before the issue was raised. But at last the grasping arms of the gigantic octopus, that was feeding at the nation's heart, reached out too far, and the combat with the monster was begun. Then that laurelled champion and leader of freedom's cause, Charles S. Sumner, laid his hand upon that Declaration of Independence and declared that the nation was "dedicated to liberty and the rights of human nature."

I count it the glory of that gifted humanitarian that he gave his magnificent talents and energies to the organization of a party that could add to its _amor patriae_ the larger, broader, nobler love of freedom for all mankind; and I count it the glory of that party that it stood for

"the voice of a people--uprisen, awake";

that it was "born to make men free."

No matter what name has been inscribed on its banner during its existence of a full half century, the cause that the party of freedom espoused has given its standard-bearer a right to claim that it, and it alone, is the legitimate heir to power in this land where the forefathers sought the liberty the Old World denied. Who dares dispute the claim? Who dares challenge the assertion? Time and events have sanctioned it; age has but strengthened it. And to-day, holding as tenaciously the same principles of truth and justice, the party that, among the parties of this Republic, alone stands as the synonym of freedom is the Republican party.

None dare gainsay it. And, among the growing multitudes in this broad land of ours, none know this better than ten millions of Afro-Americans who but for its strong arm of power might still be suffering from "Man's inhumanity to man."