http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_African_Americans_in_the_American_Civil_War
"The history of African Americans in the American Civil War is marked by 186,097 (7,122 officers, 178,975 enlisted)[1]:12 African Americans comprising 163 units who served in the Union Army during the Civil War, and many more African Americans who served in the Union Navy. Both free African Americans and runaway slaves joined the fight."
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The most widely known battle fought by African Americans was the assault on Fort Wagner, South Carolina, by the 54th Massachusetts Infantry on July 18, 1863. The 54th volunteered to lead the assault on the strongly fortified Confederate positions. The soldiers of the 54th scaled the fort's parapet, and were only driven back after brutal hand-to-hand combat. Despite the defeat, the unit was hailed for its valor which spurred further African-American recruitment, giving the Union a numerical military advantage from a population the Confederacy did not attempt to exploit until the closing days of the war.
African American soldiers participated in every major campaign of 1864–65 except Sherman's Atlanta Campaign in Georgia. The year 1864 was especially eventful for African American troops. On April 12, 1864, at the Battle of Fort Pillow, Tennessee, Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest led his 2,500 men against the Union-held fortification, occupied by 292 black and 285 white soldiers. After driving in the Union pickets and giving the garrison an opportunity to surrender, Forrest's men swarmed into the fort with little difficulty and drove the Federals down the river's bluff into a deadly crossfire. Casualties were high and only sixty-two of the U.S. Colored Troops survived the fight. Many accused the Confederates of perpetrating a massacre of black troops, and the controversy continues today. The battle cry for the Negro soldier east of the Mississippi River became "Remember Fort Pillow!"
Well aware of that. All good information.
CSA refusal to treat recaptured slaves or black POWs in general equally was a major cause of the breakdown of prisoner exchange in the last year of the war and the resulting tragedies at Andersonville and elsewhere.
But only about 40,000 black soldiers died during the war, as opposed to well over 600,000 white soldiers. Which is what I originally said.
That relatively few black soldiers died, especially in combat, is due to early concerns that they wouldn’t be able to fight effectively, and later (often justified) concerns that they shouldn’t be exposed to the greater risk of capture or massacre on the battlefield.
Possibly the greatest opportunity of the war, the Battle of the Crater, was screwed up at least partially because the brass pulled out black regiments specially trained to spearhead the attack for fear that they would be accused of sacrificing black rather than white soldiers, replacing them with untrained and confused white regiments.
“On a side note, and to be completely fair, there were 186,097 blacks on our Union side fighting in the Civil War”
Our? Alot of Johnny Rebs on here you know? haha
Anyway, most Black slaves at the time weren’t particularly violent even though anyone held in bondage certainly had reason to be.
I’m not sure if the Black crime rate was higher, lower or about the same as Whites in the early 20th century. Might be interesting to find out.
Either way, we are where we are now partly because of Black violence being encouraged by the media & a popular culture run ultimately by a few Leftists on either coasts.
Most importantly, it’s the cowardice of White people. We see it not only by American Whites being run over but in Europe too. (Seems to be changing rapidly over there though)
Unless White people start standing up as a group our children will pay an even more bitter price. They are already taught in school that their dispossession of the country their forefathers build is somehow good for them & that they must sit back & allow those of different skin colors to take their opportunities or else get the dreaded “racist” stamped on their forehead.
Accurate but somewhat misleading as written.
Just finished a new book about Gettysburg. Author estimated as many as 20k to 30k slaves accompanied the CSA Army in its invasion of the North.
While they didn't (at least in theory) engage in combat, they filled a great many support roles that in the Union Army were filled by white soldiers. Thus at Gettysburg the actual front-line combat soldiers were a great deal closer to equal numbers than is generally recognized.
Same applied elsewhere throughout the war. One probable and largely unrecognized reason the rebels won so many battles where they were supposedly outnumbered significantly.
While the CSA didn't use blacks directly in combat, their contribution to the war effort was just about as great as if they had been.
What no mention of the blacks that fought on the side of the South?