February 2, 2019 • 27 mins
This episode revisits a 2012 episode from previous hosts Sarah and Deblina. A 1792 law prevented African Americans from taking up arms in the Civil War. As attitudes against blacks serving changed, black regiments were formed. But prejudices remained until the heroism of black soldiers won the attention of the nation.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Happy Saturday everyone. In our recent episodes about so journal Truth,
we talked about her efforts to recruit black soldiers to
fight for the Union during the U. S. Civil War.
Those recruits generally became part of the fifty four Massachusetts
Volunteer Infantry Regiment, and they included so Journal Truth's grandson
as well as two of Frederick Douglas's sons. This is
(00:22):
a subject our show has covered before. Our podcast on
the Massachusetts fifty four is from bac in thanks to
previous hosts Sarah and Deblina. Welcome to Stuff You Missed
in History Class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
(00:46):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Sarah Dowdy and I'm
Deblina Chuck reporting, and probably for the first time since
our three hundred episode, we're going to be talking about
a subject that most of you might know better from
the movie version. It's the Massachusetts Colored Infantry, and if
you've seen the nineteen eight nine film Glory, you know
that the story covers an all African American regiment in
(01:09):
the Civil War and their white colonel Robert gould Shaw,
who's played by a barely out of Ferris Bueller Matthew
Broderick and despite required Hollywood tweaks and changed timelines, I mean,
they've got a self tickets. After all. Glory is considered
one of the best Civil War films, probably because it
had Shelby Foote the author as its historical advisor, and
(01:31):
a really well respected cast Roderick Morgan Freeman. A young
Denzel Washington actually checked out the review of Glory in
the New York Times Articles Archives, and they said he
was clearly on his way to a major screen career. Indeed. Um,
So we're of course going to be talking about some
of the high points featured in the film Glory, the
(01:52):
regiments parade through Boston, their pay refusal, their tragic battle
at Fort Wagner. But we're also going to be talking
about why the fifty four was so remarkable in the
first place, and why it took until eighteen sixty three
for a northern state to raise an all black regiment.
That last fact is especially surprising when you consider African
(02:14):
Americans fought in the Revolutionary War, So why in the
Civil War when their liberty was again at stake, where
blacks not initially allowed to fight. Well, when the war began,
many free blacks wanted to join, but a seventeen ninety
two law prevented them from doing so, And also Northerners
as a whole weren't in favor of it. They believed
(02:34):
African Americans were unsuitable soldiers, cowardly or unintelligent, and they
thought that they weren't equipped to do anything beyond the
hard labor work that was required for war, so grave digging,
hauleen cooking, things like that. And if you listen to
our episode on the Stone or Rebellion, and if you've
heard of other revolts like Nat Turners, it's also easy
(02:55):
to see that there was a fair amount of fear involved.
It seemed a risk almost to outfit an armed black soldiers.
But opinions did start to change over time, partly because
the war dragged on longer than people had expected it too,
and fewer white men were so gung ho to go
enlist anymore. Also, abolitionists started to make promoting black service
(03:17):
a prime wartime goal. Many saw it as the natural
road toward full freedom, that you had to participate in
earning that freedom by fighting, and one of the most
famous abolitionists of the day, the former slave Frederick Douglas
even said quote, once the black man gets upon his person,
the brass letters us A must get on his shoulder
(03:37):
and bullets in his pocket, there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right
to citizenship in the United States. Finally, though some Northern generals,
not all saw enlisting African American troops as a way
to win the war. To end the war, General Grant
considered enlisting black troops as a definitive way to beat
(04:00):
the Confederacy. I mean, it makes sense. Do you have
this huge minority of the population with a very strong
investment in the fight, So why not let them in
and let them have a go at it. So by
July eighteen sixty two, laws did start to change to
allow more black participation. Congress first of all, repealed in
sevento law barring blacks from service. They also passed the
(04:24):
Confiscation Act, which made all slaves of rebel masters free
as soon as they crossed Union lines. And they passed
the Militia Act, which empowered the president to set up
black militias. So within a month, the War Department had
authorized Brigadier General Rufus Saxton, who controlled the Union occupied
area of South Carolina to raise five black regiments with
(04:45):
white officers, and the volunteering was sluggish at first, but
by November the first South Carolina volunteer regiment was mustered
under the command of a Massachusetts abolitionists named Colonel Thomas
Wentworth Higginson. A second regiment it was then formed soon after,
commanded by Colonel James Montgomery, and the first and the
second Carolina regiments quickly proved their worth. They rated Georgia,
(05:08):
Florida and even occupied Jacksonville, and similarly organized groups of
soldiers were soon formed in Kansas and occupied areas of Louisiana,
made up of freedmen and former slaves. So by full
eighteen sixty two there were a few regiments of black
soldiers in action, but so far none had been created
by northern states. Still seemed like a black army was
(05:31):
a ways off. One obstacle, of course, was the border states.
President Lincoln had then quote to arm the Negroes would
turn fifty thousand bayonets from the loyal border states against
US that were for US. But the abolitionists really continued
to press their cause, as did the realities of a
long war you know, you've got to have enough soldiers
(05:52):
to fight the thing. And finally, on January one, eighteen
sixty three, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation into law. And
the proclamation meant that Lincoln could not only remove resources
from their conquered owners and laboring slaves from their conquered owners,
he could use those freedmen to further his own wartime
(06:13):
aims by turning them into soldiers. So African Americans could
now enlist in the army and navy. And the way
Lincoln put it to Grant really kind of sums the
whole thing up. He said, it works doubly weakening the
enemy and strengthening US. So Massachusetts seems like a natural
place to form an all black state regiments since it
had been the heart of the abolition movement for years.
(06:35):
Massachusetts Governor John Andrew, who was an abolitionist himself, believed
ardently that African Americans must play a part in ending
Southern slavery. He really saw it as a moral issue,
like if this happens without their participation, how can we
all go on with that as a as the reality.
That's why he petitioned Secretary of War and when Stanton
(06:57):
for permission to form a state regiment, and was approved
by the end of January, so it was officially on
at that point. His first order of business was, of course,
attracting soldiers. Massachusetts did not have a large African American
population at this time, and according to William C. Casatus
in American History, only one hundred men volunteered in those
(07:18):
first six weeks. So that must have been a major
blow to Andrew, who is so excited about the prospect
of forming a regiment in his state. So he decided
to expand his net go beyond Massachusetts, and with the
help of other abolitionists, he raised five thousand dollars to
set up these recruiting posts across the Northern States, trying
(07:40):
to draw the cream of the crop in basically eventually
attracting one thousand recruits. He soon had enough recruits to
form not only a Massachusetts fifty four, but a Massachusetts
fifty five too, and they was a pretty diverse bunch
as you as you'd figure from these recruiting posts all
over of the North. The fifty four featured men from
(08:03):
twenty four different states, the District of Columbia, the West Indies,
and Africa. Percent of them had been slaves, and some
were pretty high profile guys too too. Of Frederick Douglas's sons,
for instance, enlisted. It was, like I said, kind of
the best of the best, we're attracted to this regiment.
(08:23):
Governor Andrew also promised potential black recruits that this wasn't
a setup and white officers wouldn't be against their own men.
They'd be committed abolitionists with real war experience. I think
the fear was that they would they would pair the
black troops with somebody who either didn't care about them,
you know it was racist, or somebody who just didn't
know what he was doing, and that would certainly speak
(08:45):
to how much you cared about your regiment if you
put them with a poorly trained officer. Well. Governor Andrew's
pick ended up being Captain Robert Gouldshaw, the twenty five
year old son of abolitionist Francis and Sarah Shaw. And
Shaw's father was an extremely wealthy former merchant from Boston
who had retired early to West Roxbury for an academic
life translating literature. And Shaw grew up attending top schools
(09:09):
around New York and Europe and listening as a private
when the war started, and fun loving and hard to
discipline as he was, Shaw really thrived in the army,
where he was eventually commissioned as a second lieutenant and
finally a captain with the second Regiment of the Massachusetts Infantry.
He saw action and was wounded twice, so he had
abolitionist cred on one hand. He also had war experience
(09:32):
on the other hand. And together, when you put those
two together, he seemed like the perfect candidate to leave. Yeah,
just the kind of guy that Governor Andrew was looking for.
But when Shaw was offered the command delivered personally from
the governor to Shaw's father, so he received this this
offer from his own father, he didn't jump at the chance,
and he had a few reasons for doing that. For
(09:54):
one thing, he liked his current gig. He liked being
a captain with the Massachusetts second secon He wasn't thrilled
at the idea of what would undoubtedly be a very
high profile, controversial, and likely unpopular job. You know, a
lot of eyes would be on him. And then, most surprisingly,
he wasn't really that much of an abolitionist. That had
(10:16):
been a major point in his selection but his personal
beliefs weren't as strong as those of his parents, and
surely his friends must have known this. But to the
wider world, his parents reputation basically made his own. They
had joined the American Anti Slavery Society a year after
he was born, and he had grown up playing with
(10:37):
William Lloyd Garrison's kids. But Shaw himself, while anti slavery,
he didn't see that as his prime motivation for fighting.
He was more of a patriot. He felt upset that
the North was being slighted. You know, it wasn't It
wasn't about slavery for him, According to a Russell Duncan
book on Shaw. In one eighteen fifty eight letter, Shaw
(10:58):
actually wrote to his mother, quote, I don't talk and
think slavery all the time. And it's likely that it
was Shaw's mother who finally urged him to accept the offer,
but his letter to his future wife, Annie Haggerty suggests
that he also had glory on his mind as a motivator.
He said, quote, you know how many eminent men consider
a Negro army of the greatest importance to our country
(11:19):
at this time? If it turns out to be so,
how fully repaid the pioneers, and the movement will be
for what they may have to go through. I feel
convinced I shall never regret having taken this step, as
far as I myself am concerned. For while I was undecided,
I felt ashamed of myself, as if I were cowardly.
(11:46):
So whatever his reasons, Shaw did ultimately accept the commission,
and he was promoted to colonel and from mayor. He
oversaw the training of his men at a camp near Boston.
But one important thing to remember here all of the
officers in the unit, not just Shaw. We're white, and
many of them started working with pretty stereotypical views of
(12:08):
their soldiers, and Shaw was certainly included in that. He
would use racial names. When writing home to his parents,
he'd express his surprise at how intelligent his men were,
things that seem a little icky now when you read
them today. But working together did eventually foster a sense
of unity between the soldiers and the officers, especially since
(12:30):
both of them, both the men and the officers, were
under intense scrutiny from white soldiers. For instance, when the
men who had been promised fair pay at recruitment were
only offered ten dollars per month, which was three dollars
less than white soldiers were paid. Shaw wrote to the
governor vowing that the whole regiment, including him, would refuse
(12:52):
payment until it was fair and equal. And we're going
to talk about that pay question a little bit more later.
It's kind of overshadowed by later events that go through,
but it's one of their most important contributions to the war,
and the bravery of both the men and the officers
was also tested long before they even left the training grounds.
(13:12):
Shortly after Muster, the Confederate Congress passed an act stating
that any black soldier or white officer commanding black soldiers
would be summarily executed if caught behind rebble lines. So
that's something that's going to certainly strengthen the ties between
the officers and the men themselves. So the development of
the fifty four, though, as we said, was under intense scrutiny,
(13:35):
but it was also kind of a spectator sport. Almost
about three thousand people ended up visiting them to watch
the training. Frederick Douglas stopped by, not too surprising if
his sons were involved, but all sorts of people came
back to watch their progress. People were interested in it,
invested in it. But by May eighteen sixty three it
was time for the men to to shift out to
(13:58):
get going, and on the eighteenth Governor Andrew himself delivered
the regimental flags to Shaw and they got their first assignment,
which was going to be South Carolina. So unlike those earlier,
earlier troops we mentioned that we're in Kansas or in Louisiana,
they were going to really be in the thick of things.
Their procession to the Boston Harbor included a march through
(14:20):
downtown and review in front of the Governor before they
bordered a ship bound for Port Royal Island, South Carolina,
reporting to the Department of the South for duty. So
what was going on in South Carolina at this time?
There were attacks on Charleston's fortifications mostly but not for
Shaw's men. They were met with the bitter disappointment of
manual labor, which they what this was supposed to not
(14:41):
be about. They showed up and they had to do
some ditch digging. So it seems like they were back
to square one. I go through all this training, all
this pageantry, and just go back to digging ditches. So
the fifty four didn't get to see any action until
June eight, when they joined the troops of Colonel James
Motto Murray and his All African American Second South Carolina Regiment.
(15:04):
Even this, though their first taste of soldiering was pretty
much a disappointment. Shaw and his men, under the command
of Colonel Montgomery, were ordered to plunder and burn this
tiny town in Georgia called Darien. It's a bit north
of Brunswick, and Shawn was deeply disturbed with the order
to burn down this defenseless, pretty unimportant town, and afterward
(15:27):
wrote to his superiors about the incident, knowing that writing
about it talking about it like this could mean disciplinary
action for speaking up. Ultimately, though, the officer who commanded
Montgomery to sack the town was not too long after
relieved of his command by Lincoln, so maybe it was
worth it for for Shaw to speak up. Finally, though,
(15:47):
July six, the fifty four saw the type of action
they had been hoping for all along, Not ditch digging,
not burning down people's homes or businesses, but actual soldiering. Yeah.
They joined white troops on James Island near Charleston, carrying
themselves well and they ensured the safe retreat of the
tenth Connecticut Infantry after surprise Confederate attack. One Connecticut soldier
(16:12):
even wrote home to his mother that the fifty four
had quote fault like heroes. So Shaw's brigade commander, General
George C. Strong had heard about how well the men
had done on James Island and asked Shaw if he
lead an attack on Fort Wagner on Morris Island, one
of the strategic defenses of Charleston's Harbor. So he was
all for this. I mean, this was a great opportunity
(16:33):
for then. Shaw had been angling for this assignment, and
he and his men, as well as Strong, saw it
as a great honor. Yeah, it was an honor to
to lead the attack like this, but not everybody saw
it that way. The division commander, Major General Truman Seymour
only agreed to Strong's request because he saw the fifty
four as disposable. So for him it was it was
(16:55):
not a privilege to give these men the the honor
of leading the attack against the war. They were just
cannon fodder and he would just assume dispose of them first.
The geography of Fort Wagner made the assault especially tricky,
and we're gonna have to explain it a little bit
for the attack itself to make sense. So from afar,
the earthen work fort really looked kind of like sand hills.
(17:17):
But inside there were one thousand, three hundred men from
the North Carolina fifty one and thirty feet and some
South Carolina artillery men. So it's very well defended. And
since it was in the middle of a sandy peninsula,
the fort was only open to direct assault on one side,
which happened to be this tiny little sliver of sand
(17:38):
that was between the surf and the marsh. I mean,
if you've ever been to any of the sea islands,
you can kind of imagine the terrain in the less
developed areas. So this meant that the charge would have
to be led in waves because they only have that
tiny sliver of land to work on, and uh they
could only fit a few men shouldered shoulder on the
(17:58):
shore to run head. So all through the day on
the Union artillery shelled Fort Wagner, you know, hoping to
weaken the defenses a little bit. By early evening, Shaw
and six hundred of his men had grouped themselves into
two wings made of five companies, and they were using
the surface their guide to the fort. But before the charge,
(18:20):
Shaw told them the eyes of thousands will look on
what you do tonight. He handed over his personal effects
to a civilian he had made friends with um, knowing
full well that he was probably not going to come
back from this charge, but using his words for motivation,
they built to a full sprint across the sand and
made it all the way to the fort under heavy fire.
(18:41):
Sergeant Major Lewis Douglas wrote that quote, not a man flinched,
though it was a trying time. A shell would explode
in clear space of twenty ft our men would close
up again. Shaw led the charge until he was shot
dead at the parapet. The flag bear staked the flag
in the parapet, but the men only the fort for
a short time before being forced to retreat, and some
(19:04):
were shot by advancing friendly fire when they did so.
Twenty three year old Sergeant William Carney, by this point
shot in the head, chest, right arm and leg, grabbed
the flag on his way out, delivering it back to
the Union lines, and for this he became the first
of twenty one black men during the war to win
the medal of honor. Other men, of course, couldn't make
that retreat and became prisoners. Maybe they were too wounded
(19:27):
to be able to get out. Sergeant Robert J. Simmons,
for instance, was shot in the arm, taken prisoner, and
died later in a Charleston hospital. And if you've listened
to our earlier episode on the New York Draft riots,
this will really resonate with you. But when storming the fort,
he hadn't known that only three days earlier, New York
Draft riders had attacked his mother and sister there and
(19:50):
beat his seven year old nephew to death. So one
of the probably greatest tragedies of the later waves of
soldiers couldn't hold the fort either, though, you know, it
wasn't just the fifty four trying to trying to take
it overall, one thousand, fifteen Union men were killed, wounded,
or went missing, with two hundred and fifty six of
them from the fifty four, which was the highest regimental
(20:13):
casualty number among the participating regiments. Militarily, the mission was
considered a failure. Area scouting had been subpar. That was
one reason why the FOT hadn't been adequately weakened, and
(20:33):
the men leading the charge of theft four had never
practiced storming of forts. There were a lot of things
working against like obvious flaw too. I mean that they
were able to even make it now seemed surprising when
you know that they haven't been able to practice that.
But the discipline and the bravery of theft was duly noted.
A month after the disaster, Grant wrote to Lincoln emphasizing
(20:57):
how much he now supported the use of black troops,
and according to a Michael J. Barhola article in Civil
War Times, by December of that same year, sixty black
regiments had been formed in the Union Army, and they
weren't regiments of grave diggers or cooks or laborers, but
regiments of soldiers. And by the war's end, about hundred
(21:17):
and eighty thousand black men had fought. Ken Burns documentary
on the Civil War includes an even more startling figure.
Though Blacks made up less than one percent of the
Northern population at the start of the war, by the
end of the war they made up ten percent of
the army. So what ultimately happened to the fifty four
after that fateful battle, Well, this battle pretty much tore
(21:40):
the regiment apart. It wouldn't fight in another major engagement again,
and it took until March eighteen sixty five for Congress
to finally order that the men, who had now been
paid for eighteen months, to be compensated retroactively for their service.
Shaw was buried with his men in a pit at
the side of Fort Wagner as a sign of disrespect.
(22:02):
But when his father learned where he was learned how
he was buried, he said he was pleased that his
son had been buried with his men on the field
where he fell. He even prevented later attempts to relocate
Shaw's body, and so with his family definitely assuring his
legacy with acts like that, it's no surprise Shaw became
kind of a martyred figure after the fact. And if
(22:25):
you take a closer look at his letters, which contain,
as historian Joan Wah puts it, racist and condescending language,
you know it may have affected that reputation a little bit,
but certainly not during the lifetime of his men. I
think that's an important thing to consider. He wasn't um,
he wasn't reduced in their eyes. It seems only two
weeks after the attack on Fort Wagner, one of his
(22:48):
sergeants had written quote, I still feel more eager for
the struggle than I ever yet have, for I now
wish to have revenge for our gallant colonel and the
spilt blood of our captain. We expect plant the stars
and strikes on the city of Charleston. Veterans of the
fifty four quickly began raising money for their colonel's memorial,
hoping to build something on Morris Island. They instead wound
(23:10):
up sponsoring a school for emancipated children in South Carolina,
which was named for Shaw, while Boston abolitionists raised money
for a monument in their city. By eighteen eighty four,
the commission was given to Augusta St. Gaden's, who was
the biggest American sculptor of that day, and he finished
his work in eighteen ninety seven. But while some have
criticized St. Goden's for elevating Shaw above his men on
(23:32):
horseback and for modeling the black soldiers from live subjects
instead of old photos, it's generally considered a brilliant memorial.
Alison Luke's, who's the curator of Sculpture at the National
Gallery of Art calls it quote a knockout. The name St.
Goden's might ring a bell for some of you guys
to we mentioned him, or rather uh David McCullum mentioned
(23:52):
him a bit and our interview with him last year.
Another random side note to Shaw isn't the only family
member with a memorial. His sister Josephine Shaw Lowell, who
was a social reformer, was the first woman to earn
a public memorial in New York City. So there you go. Um.
I thought a lot about this story, and in a
(24:14):
way it is heroic and I can definitely see the
outcome is positive that African Americans are able to fight
when they want to. But the story really kind of
bothered me in a way too. It took such an
epic failure to catch people's attention and change minds, and
that that disturbed me that it took so much, and
(24:37):
the little the other things, the fact that they didn't
get paid. I mean, there's a lot that doesn't quite
sit right. And I think about all the details of
the story well. And another thing to consider, two black
soldiers had already fought admirably at Port Hudson and Milliken's
Bend by this point, but neither event really received much coverage,
so it's almost like it took something this horrible, this
(25:00):
disastrous to catch people's attention, and and yeah, that does
bother me. And I think if you want to learn
a little bit more about the plight or life, depending
on how you look at it, of a black soldier,
there's some great resources that the National Park Service has online,
really fantastic accounts of the history of African Americans in
the military in the Civil War. Another resource I might
(25:23):
recommend is the Massachusetts Historical Society. They have portraits of
many of the men of the fifty four, and I
think one criticism of the story sometimes is that you
have Shaw, He's a well defined figure and very much
tied up with the regiment, but it's harder to get
(25:45):
as detailed personal stories from many of the men of
the regiment. It is, after all, a company of men,
you know, it's it's a large group of people. But
the Massachusetts historicals that society does have portraits, you know,
portraits of the little drummer boys and stuff, who look
like they're in their very early teens at the oldest.
(26:05):
And I think for me that helped put a little
personality behind the men of the regiment and not just Shaw. Yeah,
that's good to know. That's one thing I thought of
too while going through this is that although we did
have a couple of quotes in here from soldiers, but
it would have been nice to know a little bit
more about the individuals who thought. Thank you so much
(26:29):
for joining us on this Saturday. If you have heard
an email address or a Facebook you are l or
something similar over the course of today's episode, since it
is from the archive that might be out of date now,
you can email us at History podcast at how stuff
works dot com, and you can find us all over
social media at missed in History, and you can subscribe
to our show on Apple podcasts, Google podcast, the I
(26:52):
Heart Radio app, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.
For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit
how staff works dot com. M
Happy Saturday everyone. In our recent episodes about so journal Truth,
we talked about her efforts to recruit black soldiers to
fight for the Union during the U. S. Civil War.
Those recruits generally became part of the fifty four Massachusetts
Volunteer Infantry Regiment, and they included so Journal Truth's grandson
as well as two of Frederick Douglas's sons. This is
(00:22):
a subject our show has covered before. Our podcast on
the Massachusetts fifty four is from bac in thanks to
previous hosts Sarah and Deblina. Welcome to Stuff You Missed
in History Class from how Stuff Works dot com. Hello,
(00:46):
and welcome to the podcast. I'm Sarah Dowdy and I'm
Deblina Chuck reporting, and probably for the first time since
our three hundred episode, we're going to be talking about
a subject that most of you might know better from
the movie version. It's the Massachusetts Colored Infantry, and if
you've seen the nineteen eight nine film Glory, you know
that the story covers an all African American regiment in
(01:09):
the Civil War and their white colonel Robert gould Shaw,
who's played by a barely out of Ferris Bueller Matthew
Broderick and despite required Hollywood tweaks and changed timelines, I mean,
they've got a self tickets. After all. Glory is considered
one of the best Civil War films, probably because it
had Shelby Foote the author as its historical advisor, and
(01:31):
a really well respected cast Roderick Morgan Freeman. A young
Denzel Washington actually checked out the review of Glory in
the New York Times Articles Archives, and they said he
was clearly on his way to a major screen career. Indeed. Um,
So we're of course going to be talking about some
of the high points featured in the film Glory, the
(01:52):
regiments parade through Boston, their pay refusal, their tragic battle
at Fort Wagner. But we're also going to be talking
about why the fifty four was so remarkable in the
first place, and why it took until eighteen sixty three
for a northern state to raise an all black regiment.
That last fact is especially surprising when you consider African
(02:14):
Americans fought in the Revolutionary War, So why in the
Civil War when their liberty was again at stake, where
blacks not initially allowed to fight. Well, when the war began,
many free blacks wanted to join, but a seventeen ninety
two law prevented them from doing so, And also Northerners
as a whole weren't in favor of it. They believed
(02:34):
African Americans were unsuitable soldiers, cowardly or unintelligent, and they
thought that they weren't equipped to do anything beyond the
hard labor work that was required for war, so grave digging,
hauleen cooking, things like that. And if you listen to
our episode on the Stone or Rebellion, and if you've
heard of other revolts like Nat Turners, it's also easy
(02:55):
to see that there was a fair amount of fear involved.
It seemed a risk almost to outfit an armed black soldiers.
But opinions did start to change over time, partly because
the war dragged on longer than people had expected it too,
and fewer white men were so gung ho to go
enlist anymore. Also, abolitionists started to make promoting black service
(03:17):
a prime wartime goal. Many saw it as the natural
road toward full freedom, that you had to participate in
earning that freedom by fighting, and one of the most
famous abolitionists of the day, the former slave Frederick Douglas
even said quote, once the black man gets upon his person,
the brass letters us A must get on his shoulder
(03:37):
and bullets in his pocket, there is no power on
earth which can deny that he has earned the right
to citizenship in the United States. Finally, though some Northern generals,
not all saw enlisting African American troops as a way
to win the war. To end the war, General Grant
considered enlisting black troops as a definitive way to beat
(04:00):
the Confederacy. I mean, it makes sense. Do you have
this huge minority of the population with a very strong
investment in the fight, So why not let them in
and let them have a go at it. So by
July eighteen sixty two, laws did start to change to
allow more black participation. Congress first of all, repealed in
sevento law barring blacks from service. They also passed the
(04:24):
Confiscation Act, which made all slaves of rebel masters free
as soon as they crossed Union lines. And they passed
the Militia Act, which empowered the president to set up
black militias. So within a month, the War Department had
authorized Brigadier General Rufus Saxton, who controlled the Union occupied
area of South Carolina to raise five black regiments with
(04:45):
white officers, and the volunteering was sluggish at first, but
by November the first South Carolina volunteer regiment was mustered
under the command of a Massachusetts abolitionists named Colonel Thomas
Wentworth Higginson. A second regiment it was then formed soon after,
commanded by Colonel James Montgomery, and the first and the
second Carolina regiments quickly proved their worth. They rated Georgia,
(05:08):
Florida and even occupied Jacksonville, and similarly organized groups of
soldiers were soon formed in Kansas and occupied areas of Louisiana,
made up of freedmen and former slaves. So by full
eighteen sixty two there were a few regiments of black
soldiers in action, but so far none had been created
by northern states. Still seemed like a black army was
(05:31):
a ways off. One obstacle, of course, was the border states.
President Lincoln had then quote to arm the Negroes would
turn fifty thousand bayonets from the loyal border states against
US that were for US. But the abolitionists really continued
to press their cause, as did the realities of a
long war you know, you've got to have enough soldiers
(05:52):
to fight the thing. And finally, on January one, eighteen
sixty three, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation into law. And
the proclamation meant that Lincoln could not only remove resources
from their conquered owners and laboring slaves from their conquered owners,
he could use those freedmen to further his own wartime
(06:13):
aims by turning them into soldiers. So African Americans could
now enlist in the army and navy. And the way
Lincoln put it to Grant really kind of sums the
whole thing up. He said, it works doubly weakening the
enemy and strengthening US. So Massachusetts seems like a natural
place to form an all black state regiments since it
had been the heart of the abolition movement for years.
(06:35):
Massachusetts Governor John Andrew, who was an abolitionist himself, believed
ardently that African Americans must play a part in ending
Southern slavery. He really saw it as a moral issue,
like if this happens without their participation, how can we
all go on with that as a as the reality.
That's why he petitioned Secretary of War and when Stanton
(06:57):
for permission to form a state regiment, and was approved
by the end of January, so it was officially on
at that point. His first order of business was, of course,
attracting soldiers. Massachusetts did not have a large African American
population at this time, and according to William C. Casatus
in American History, only one hundred men volunteered in those
(07:18):
first six weeks. So that must have been a major
blow to Andrew, who is so excited about the prospect
of forming a regiment in his state. So he decided
to expand his net go beyond Massachusetts, and with the
help of other abolitionists, he raised five thousand dollars to
set up these recruiting posts across the Northern States, trying
(07:40):
to draw the cream of the crop in basically eventually
attracting one thousand recruits. He soon had enough recruits to
form not only a Massachusetts fifty four, but a Massachusetts
fifty five too, and they was a pretty diverse bunch
as you as you'd figure from these recruiting posts all
over of the North. The fifty four featured men from
(08:03):
twenty four different states, the District of Columbia, the West Indies,
and Africa. Percent of them had been slaves, and some
were pretty high profile guys too too. Of Frederick Douglas's sons,
for instance, enlisted. It was, like I said, kind of
the best of the best, we're attracted to this regiment.
(08:23):
Governor Andrew also promised potential black recruits that this wasn't
a setup and white officers wouldn't be against their own men.
They'd be committed abolitionists with real war experience. I think
the fear was that they would they would pair the
black troops with somebody who either didn't care about them,
you know it was racist, or somebody who just didn't
know what he was doing, and that would certainly speak
(08:45):
to how much you cared about your regiment if you
put them with a poorly trained officer. Well. Governor Andrew's
pick ended up being Captain Robert Gouldshaw, the twenty five
year old son of abolitionist Francis and Sarah Shaw. And
Shaw's father was an extremely wealthy former merchant from Boston
who had retired early to West Roxbury for an academic
life translating literature. And Shaw grew up attending top schools
(09:09):
around New York and Europe and listening as a private
when the war started, and fun loving and hard to
discipline as he was, Shaw really thrived in the army,
where he was eventually commissioned as a second lieutenant and
finally a captain with the second Regiment of the Massachusetts Infantry.
He saw action and was wounded twice, so he had
abolitionist cred on one hand. He also had war experience
(09:32):
on the other hand. And together, when you put those
two together, he seemed like the perfect candidate to leave. Yeah,
just the kind of guy that Governor Andrew was looking for.
But when Shaw was offered the command delivered personally from
the governor to Shaw's father, so he received this this
offer from his own father, he didn't jump at the chance,
and he had a few reasons for doing that. For
(09:54):
one thing, he liked his current gig. He liked being
a captain with the Massachusetts second secon He wasn't thrilled
at the idea of what would undoubtedly be a very
high profile, controversial, and likely unpopular job. You know, a
lot of eyes would be on him. And then, most surprisingly,
he wasn't really that much of an abolitionist. That had
(10:16):
been a major point in his selection but his personal
beliefs weren't as strong as those of his parents, and
surely his friends must have known this. But to the
wider world, his parents reputation basically made his own. They
had joined the American Anti Slavery Society a year after
he was born, and he had grown up playing with
(10:37):
William Lloyd Garrison's kids. But Shaw himself, while anti slavery,
he didn't see that as his prime motivation for fighting.
He was more of a patriot. He felt upset that
the North was being slighted. You know, it wasn't It
wasn't about slavery for him, According to a Russell Duncan
book on Shaw. In one eighteen fifty eight letter, Shaw
(10:58):
actually wrote to his mother, quote, I don't talk and
think slavery all the time. And it's likely that it
was Shaw's mother who finally urged him to accept the offer,
but his letter to his future wife, Annie Haggerty suggests
that he also had glory on his mind as a motivator.
He said, quote, you know how many eminent men consider
a Negro army of the greatest importance to our country
(11:19):
at this time? If it turns out to be so,
how fully repaid the pioneers, and the movement will be
for what they may have to go through. I feel
convinced I shall never regret having taken this step, as
far as I myself am concerned. For while I was undecided,
I felt ashamed of myself, as if I were cowardly.
(11:46):
So whatever his reasons, Shaw did ultimately accept the commission,
and he was promoted to colonel and from mayor. He
oversaw the training of his men at a camp near Boston.
But one important thing to remember here all of the
officers in the unit, not just Shaw. We're white, and
many of them started working with pretty stereotypical views of
(12:08):
their soldiers, and Shaw was certainly included in that. He
would use racial names. When writing home to his parents,
he'd express his surprise at how intelligent his men were,
things that seem a little icky now when you read
them today. But working together did eventually foster a sense
of unity between the soldiers and the officers, especially since
(12:30):
both of them, both the men and the officers, were
under intense scrutiny from white soldiers. For instance, when the
men who had been promised fair pay at recruitment were
only offered ten dollars per month, which was three dollars
less than white soldiers were paid. Shaw wrote to the
governor vowing that the whole regiment, including him, would refuse
(12:52):
payment until it was fair and equal. And we're going
to talk about that pay question a little bit more later.
It's kind of overshadowed by later events that go through,
but it's one of their most important contributions to the war,
and the bravery of both the men and the officers
was also tested long before they even left the training grounds.
(13:12):
Shortly after Muster, the Confederate Congress passed an act stating
that any black soldier or white officer commanding black soldiers
would be summarily executed if caught behind rebble lines. So
that's something that's going to certainly strengthen the ties between
the officers and the men themselves. So the development of
the fifty four, though, as we said, was under intense scrutiny,
(13:35):
but it was also kind of a spectator sport. Almost
about three thousand people ended up visiting them to watch
the training. Frederick Douglas stopped by, not too surprising if
his sons were involved, but all sorts of people came
back to watch their progress. People were interested in it,
invested in it. But by May eighteen sixty three it
was time for the men to to shift out to
(13:58):
get going, and on the eighteenth Governor Andrew himself delivered
the regimental flags to Shaw and they got their first assignment,
which was going to be South Carolina. So unlike those earlier,
earlier troops we mentioned that we're in Kansas or in Louisiana,
they were going to really be in the thick of things.
Their procession to the Boston Harbor included a march through
(14:20):
downtown and review in front of the Governor before they
bordered a ship bound for Port Royal Island, South Carolina,
reporting to the Department of the South for duty. So
what was going on in South Carolina at this time?
There were attacks on Charleston's fortifications mostly but not for
Shaw's men. They were met with the bitter disappointment of
manual labor, which they what this was supposed to not
(14:41):
be about. They showed up and they had to do
some ditch digging. So it seems like they were back
to square one. I go through all this training, all
this pageantry, and just go back to digging ditches. So
the fifty four didn't get to see any action until
June eight, when they joined the troops of Colonel James
Motto Murray and his All African American Second South Carolina Regiment.
(15:04):
Even this, though their first taste of soldiering was pretty
much a disappointment. Shaw and his men, under the command
of Colonel Montgomery, were ordered to plunder and burn this
tiny town in Georgia called Darien. It's a bit north
of Brunswick, and Shawn was deeply disturbed with the order
to burn down this defenseless, pretty unimportant town, and afterward
(15:27):
wrote to his superiors about the incident, knowing that writing
about it talking about it like this could mean disciplinary
action for speaking up. Ultimately, though, the officer who commanded
Montgomery to sack the town was not too long after
relieved of his command by Lincoln, so maybe it was
worth it for for Shaw to speak up. Finally, though,
(15:47):
July six, the fifty four saw the type of action
they had been hoping for all along, Not ditch digging,
not burning down people's homes or businesses, but actual soldiering. Yeah.
They joined white troops on James Island near Charleston, carrying
themselves well and they ensured the safe retreat of the
tenth Connecticut Infantry after surprise Confederate attack. One Connecticut soldier
(16:12):
even wrote home to his mother that the fifty four
had quote fault like heroes. So Shaw's brigade commander, General
George C. Strong had heard about how well the men
had done on James Island and asked Shaw if he
lead an attack on Fort Wagner on Morris Island, one
of the strategic defenses of Charleston's Harbor. So he was
all for this. I mean, this was a great opportunity
(16:33):
for then. Shaw had been angling for this assignment, and
he and his men, as well as Strong, saw it
as a great honor. Yeah, it was an honor to
to lead the attack like this, but not everybody saw
it that way. The division commander, Major General Truman Seymour
only agreed to Strong's request because he saw the fifty
four as disposable. So for him it was it was
(16:55):
not a privilege to give these men the the honor
of leading the attack against the war. They were just
cannon fodder and he would just assume dispose of them first.
The geography of Fort Wagner made the assault especially tricky,
and we're gonna have to explain it a little bit
for the attack itself to make sense. So from afar,
the earthen work fort really looked kind of like sand hills.
(17:17):
But inside there were one thousand, three hundred men from
the North Carolina fifty one and thirty feet and some
South Carolina artillery men. So it's very well defended. And
since it was in the middle of a sandy peninsula,
the fort was only open to direct assault on one side,
which happened to be this tiny little sliver of sand
(17:38):
that was between the surf and the marsh. I mean,
if you've ever been to any of the sea islands,
you can kind of imagine the terrain in the less
developed areas. So this meant that the charge would have
to be led in waves because they only have that
tiny sliver of land to work on, and uh they
could only fit a few men shouldered shoulder on the
(17:58):
shore to run head. So all through the day on
the Union artillery shelled Fort Wagner, you know, hoping to
weaken the defenses a little bit. By early evening, Shaw
and six hundred of his men had grouped themselves into
two wings made of five companies, and they were using
the surface their guide to the fort. But before the charge,
(18:20):
Shaw told them the eyes of thousands will look on
what you do tonight. He handed over his personal effects
to a civilian he had made friends with um, knowing
full well that he was probably not going to come
back from this charge, but using his words for motivation,
they built to a full sprint across the sand and
made it all the way to the fort under heavy fire.
(18:41):
Sergeant Major Lewis Douglas wrote that quote, not a man flinched,
though it was a trying time. A shell would explode
in clear space of twenty ft our men would close
up again. Shaw led the charge until he was shot
dead at the parapet. The flag bear staked the flag
in the parapet, but the men only the fort for
a short time before being forced to retreat, and some
(19:04):
were shot by advancing friendly fire when they did so.
Twenty three year old Sergeant William Carney, by this point
shot in the head, chest, right arm and leg, grabbed
the flag on his way out, delivering it back to
the Union lines, and for this he became the first
of twenty one black men during the war to win
the medal of honor. Other men, of course, couldn't make
that retreat and became prisoners. Maybe they were too wounded
(19:27):
to be able to get out. Sergeant Robert J. Simmons,
for instance, was shot in the arm, taken prisoner, and
died later in a Charleston hospital. And if you've listened
to our earlier episode on the New York Draft riots,
this will really resonate with you. But when storming the fort,
he hadn't known that only three days earlier, New York
Draft riders had attacked his mother and sister there and
(19:50):
beat his seven year old nephew to death. So one
of the probably greatest tragedies of the later waves of
soldiers couldn't hold the fort either, though, you know, it
wasn't just the fifty four trying to trying to take
it overall, one thousand, fifteen Union men were killed, wounded,
or went missing, with two hundred and fifty six of
them from the fifty four, which was the highest regimental
(20:13):
casualty number among the participating regiments. Militarily, the mission was
considered a failure. Area scouting had been subpar. That was
one reason why the FOT hadn't been adequately weakened, and
(20:33):
the men leading the charge of theft four had never
practiced storming of forts. There were a lot of things
working against like obvious flaw too. I mean that they
were able to even make it now seemed surprising when
you know that they haven't been able to practice that.
But the discipline and the bravery of theft was duly noted.
A month after the disaster, Grant wrote to Lincoln emphasizing
(20:57):
how much he now supported the use of black troops,
and according to a Michael J. Barhola article in Civil
War Times, by December of that same year, sixty black
regiments had been formed in the Union Army, and they
weren't regiments of grave diggers or cooks or laborers, but
regiments of soldiers. And by the war's end, about hundred
(21:17):
and eighty thousand black men had fought. Ken Burns documentary
on the Civil War includes an even more startling figure.
Though Blacks made up less than one percent of the
Northern population at the start of the war, by the
end of the war they made up ten percent of
the army. So what ultimately happened to the fifty four
after that fateful battle, Well, this battle pretty much tore
(21:40):
the regiment apart. It wouldn't fight in another major engagement again,
and it took until March eighteen sixty five for Congress
to finally order that the men, who had now been
paid for eighteen months, to be compensated retroactively for their service.
Shaw was buried with his men in a pit at
the side of Fort Wagner as a sign of disrespect.
(22:02):
But when his father learned where he was learned how
he was buried, he said he was pleased that his
son had been buried with his men on the field
where he fell. He even prevented later attempts to relocate
Shaw's body, and so with his family definitely assuring his
legacy with acts like that, it's no surprise Shaw became
kind of a martyred figure after the fact. And if
(22:25):
you take a closer look at his letters, which contain,
as historian Joan Wah puts it, racist and condescending language,
you know it may have affected that reputation a little bit,
but certainly not during the lifetime of his men. I
think that's an important thing to consider. He wasn't um,
he wasn't reduced in their eyes. It seems only two
weeks after the attack on Fort Wagner, one of his
(22:48):
sergeants had written quote, I still feel more eager for
the struggle than I ever yet have, for I now
wish to have revenge for our gallant colonel and the
spilt blood of our captain. We expect plant the stars
and strikes on the city of Charleston. Veterans of the
fifty four quickly began raising money for their colonel's memorial,
hoping to build something on Morris Island. They instead wound
(23:10):
up sponsoring a school for emancipated children in South Carolina,
which was named for Shaw, while Boston abolitionists raised money
for a monument in their city. By eighteen eighty four,
the commission was given to Augusta St. Gaden's, who was
the biggest American sculptor of that day, and he finished
his work in eighteen ninety seven. But while some have
criticized St. Goden's for elevating Shaw above his men on
(23:32):
horseback and for modeling the black soldiers from live subjects
instead of old photos, it's generally considered a brilliant memorial.
Alison Luke's, who's the curator of Sculpture at the National
Gallery of Art calls it quote a knockout. The name St.
Goden's might ring a bell for some of you guys
to we mentioned him, or rather uh David McCullum mentioned
(23:52):
him a bit and our interview with him last year.
Another random side note to Shaw isn't the only family
member with a memorial. His sister Josephine Shaw Lowell, who
was a social reformer, was the first woman to earn
a public memorial in New York City. So there you go. Um.
I thought a lot about this story, and in a
(24:14):
way it is heroic and I can definitely see the
outcome is positive that African Americans are able to fight
when they want to. But the story really kind of
bothered me in a way too. It took such an
epic failure to catch people's attention and change minds, and
that that disturbed me that it took so much, and
(24:37):
the little the other things, the fact that they didn't
get paid. I mean, there's a lot that doesn't quite
sit right. And I think about all the details of
the story well. And another thing to consider, two black
soldiers had already fought admirably at Port Hudson and Milliken's
Bend by this point, but neither event really received much coverage,
so it's almost like it took something this horrible, this
(25:00):
disastrous to catch people's attention, and and yeah, that does
bother me. And I think if you want to learn
a little bit more about the plight or life, depending
on how you look at it, of a black soldier,
there's some great resources that the National Park Service has online,
really fantastic accounts of the history of African Americans in
the military in the Civil War. Another resource I might
(25:23):
recommend is the Massachusetts Historical Society. They have portraits of
many of the men of the fifty four, and I
think one criticism of the story sometimes is that you
have Shaw, He's a well defined figure and very much
tied up with the regiment, but it's harder to get
(25:45):
as detailed personal stories from many of the men of
the regiment. It is, after all, a company of men,
you know, it's it's a large group of people. But
the Massachusetts historicals that society does have portraits, you know,
portraits of the little drummer boys and stuff, who look
like they're in their very early teens at the oldest.
(26:05):
And I think for me that helped put a little
personality behind the men of the regiment and not just Shaw. Yeah,
that's good to know. That's one thing I thought of
too while going through this is that although we did
have a couple of quotes in here from soldiers, but
it would have been nice to know a little bit
more about the individuals who thought. Thank you so much
(26:29):
for joining us on this Saturday. If you have heard
an email address or a Facebook you are l or
something similar over the course of today's episode, since it
is from the archive that might be out of date now,
you can email us at History podcast at how stuff
works dot com, and you can find us all over
social media at missed in History, and you can subscribe
to our show on Apple podcasts, Google podcast, the I
(26:52):
Heart Radio app, and wherever else you listen to podcasts.
For more on this and thousands of other topics, visit
how staff works dot com. M
Stuff You Missed in History Class News
Hosts And Creators
Holly Frey
Tracy Wilson
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Intentionally Disturbing
Join me on this podcast as I navigate the murky waters of human behavior, current events, and personal anecdotes through in-depth interviews with incredible people—all served with a generous helping of sarcasm and satire. After years as a forensic and clinical psychologist, I offer a unique interview style and a low tolerance for bullshit, quickly steering conversations toward depth and darkness. I honor the seriousness while also appreciating wit. I’m your guide through the twisted labyrinth of the human psyche, armed with dark humor and biting wit.