could it be that you KNOW the answer & are UN-comfortable with telling everyone here???
the CS Marine Corps was ALWAYS desegregated (and about 20% NON-white) from 1861-1865.
the US Marines swore in their FIRST Black Marines in 1943.
80 years surely seems an awfully long time to wait for Black US Marines, don't you think???
free dixie,sw
laughing AT the members of "the DAMNyankee coven".
free dixie,sw
I’m not ignoring your issue. I just don’t think the racial composition of a force that never reached its authorized strength of 1000 men is particularly relevant to a war in which something around 3.5M to 4.0M men fought.
swathead, it's up to you to prove that. The Confederate Marines weren't a large branch. From what I can make out there were never more -- never close to -- a thousand at any given time, so Black faces would really have stood out.
But give us a reference on that.
Slaves were impressed into the Confederate Navy. According to Wikipedia the Naval historian Ivan Musicant wrote that free Black men could enlist in the Confederate Navy with the squadron commanders consent and that slaves could volunteer for the Navy if their masters agreed. How many did so I don't know.
I did find this out about one African-American in the Confederate Navy.
Robert Smalls (1839-1915), the son of plantation slaves, was taken by his master in 1851 to Charleston, S.C., where he worked as a hotel waiter, hack driver, and rigger. Impressed into the Confederate Navy at the outbreak of the war, he was forced to serve as wheelman aboard the armed frigate Planter. On May 13, 1862, he and 12 other slaves seized control of the ship in Charleston harbour and turned it over to a Union naval squadron blockading the city. This exploit brought Smalls great fame throughout the North. [some sources use the name Small]
Smalls went to work as a civilian pilot for the Union Navy on the Keokuk, which was sunk during an attack on Charleston. Rescued, he went on as pilot on the Planter, which was a civilian run ship under contract to the Army. During a Confederate ambush of the Planter, her white captain wanted to surrender, but Smalls locked him in the coal bunker and escaped in spite of heavy fire. He was named the ship's captain for his bravery.
After the war, Smalls rose rapidly in politics, despite his limited education. From 1868 to 1870 he served in the South Carolina House of Representatives and from 1871 to 1874 in the state senate. He was elected to the U.S. Congress (1875-79, 1881-87), where he sponsored a bill requiring equal accommodations for both races in interstate transportation. Smalls spent his last years in Beaufort, S.C. where he served as port collector.
Smalls was a very brave and capable man, indeed. Maybe the way he got into the rebel navy was representative of other "Black Confederates."
Anyway, swattie, I found something out and made a contribution to the discussion. It wasn't that hard and I didn't have to make anything up. Try it some time. It might make you feel better about yourself.