 CHAPTER IX NEGRO'S SPIRITUALS The war brought to some of us, besides its direct experiences, many a strange fulfilment of dreams of other days. For instance, the present writer had been a faithful student of Scottish ballads, and had always envied Sir Walter the delight of tracing them out amid their own heather, and of writing them down piecemeal from the lips of aged crones. It was a strange enjoyment, therefore, to be suddenly brought into the midst of a kindred world of unwritten songs, as simple and indigenous as the border minstrelry, more uniformly plaintive, almost always more quaint, and often as essentially poetic. The interest was rather increased by the fact that I had for many years heard of this class of songs under the name of Negro's spirituals, and had even heard some of them sung by friends from South Carolina. I could now gather on their own soil these strange plants, which I had before seen as in museums alone. True the individual songs rarely coincided, but there was a line here, a chorus there, just enough to fix the class, but this was unmistakable. It was not strange that they differed, for the range seemed almost endless, and South Carolina, Georgia and Florida seemed to have nothing but the generic character in common, until all were mingled into a united stock of camp melodies. Often in the starlit evening I have returned from some lonely ride by the swift river or on the plover haunted marins, and entering the camp have silently approached some glimmering fire round which the dusky figures moved in the rhythmical barbaric dance the Negroes call a shout, chanting, often harshly, but always in the most perfect time with some monotonous refrain. Sitting down in the darkness, as best I could, perhaps with my hand in the safe covert of my pocket, the words of the song. I have afterwards carried it to my tent, like some captured bird or insect, and then, after examination, put it by. Or summoning one of the men at some period of leisure, Corbett, Robble Sutton, for instance, whose iron memory held all the details of a song as if it were a ford or a forest, I have completed the new specimen by supplying the absent parts. The music I could only retain by ear, and though the most common strains were often repeated, enough to fix the impression, there were others that occurred only once or twice. The words will be here given, as nearly as possible in the original dialect, and if the spelling seems sometimes inconsistent or the misspelling insufficient, it is because I could get no nearer. I wish to avoid what seems to me the only error of Lau's big low papers in respect to dialect. The occasional use of an extreme misspelling, which merely confuses the eye without taking us any closer to the peculiarity of the sound. The favourite song sung in camp was the following, sung with no accompaniment, but the measured clapping of hands and the chatter of many feet. It was sung perhaps twice as often as any other. This was partly due to the fact that it properly consisted of a chorus alone, with which the verses of other songs might be combined at random. 1. Hold Your Light Hold your light, brother Robert. Hold your light. Hold your light on Cain and Shaw. What make all Satan for follow me so? Satan ain't got nothing to do with me. Hold your light. Hold your light. Hold your light on Cain and Shaw. This would be sung for half an hour at a time, perhaps each person present being named in turn. It seemed the simplest primitive type of spiritual. The next in popularity was almost as elementary, and, like this, named successively each one of the circle. It was, however, much more resounding and convivial in its music. 2. Bound To Go Jordan River I'm Bound To Go, Bound To Go, Bound To Go. Jordan River I'm Bound To Go, and Bidham Fare ye well. My brother Robert I'm Bound To Go, Bound To Go. My sister Lucy I'm Bound To Go, Bound To Go. Sometimes it was Tinkham, think them, Fare ye well. The ye was so detached that I thought at first it was very or very well. Another picturesque song, which seemed immensely popular, was at first very bewildering to me. I could make out the first words of the chorus and called it the Romandar, being reminded of some Romantic song which I had formally heard. That association quite fell in with the Orientalism of the New Tenth Life. 3. Rumindar Oh my mother is gone. My mother is gone. My mother is gone into heaven, my lord. I can't stay behind. There's Rumindar, Rumindar, Rumindar in the heaven, my lord. I can't stay behind. Can't stay behind, my dear. I can't stay behind. Oh my father is gone. Oh the angels are gone. Oh I's been on de-road, I's been on de-road. I's been on de-road into heaven, my lord. I can't stay behind. Oh Rumindar, Rumindar, Rumindar in the heaven, my lord. I can't stay behind. By this time every man within hearing from oldest to youngest would be wriggling and shuffling, as if through some magic pipers' bewitchment, for even those who at first affected contemptuous indifference would be drawn into the vortex ere long. Next to these in popularity ranked a class of songs belonging emphatically to the church militant, and available for camp purposes with very little strain upon their symbolism. This for instance had a true companion in arms' heartiness about it, not impaired by the feminine invocation at the end. 4. Hail Mary. One more valiant soldier here. One more valiant soldier here. One more valiant soldier here. To help me bear de-cross. Oh hail Mary hail. Hail Mary hail. Hail Mary hail. To help me bear de-cross. I fancied that the original reading might have been soul instead of soldier, with some other syllable inserted to fill out the meter, and that the hail Mary might denote a Roman Catholic origin, as I had several men from St. Augustine who held in a dim way to that faith. It was a very ringing song, though not so grandly jubilant as the next, which was really impressive as the singers peeled it out when marching or rowing or embarking. 5. My army cross over. My army cross over. My army cross over. O'Fero's army drowned it. My army cross over. Will cross the mighty river, my army cross over. Will cross the river Jordan, my army cross over. Will cross the danger water, my army cross over. Will cross the mighty Mayo. My army cross over, thrice. O'Fero's army drowned it, my army cross over. I could get no explanation of the mighty Mayo, except that one of the old men thought it meant the river of death. As it is an African word in the Cameroon dialect, Mawa signifies to die. The next also has a military ring about it, and the first line is well matched by the music. The rest is a conglomerate, and one or two lines show a more northern origin. Dunn is a Virginia Sibyleth, quite distinct from the Bean which replaces it in South Carolina, yet one of their best choruses without any fixed words was Debell Dunn ringing, for which improper South Carolina dialect would be substituted Debell Binner ringing. This refrain may have gone south with our army. 6. Ride in, kind saviour. Ride in, kind saviour. No man can hinder me, O Jesus is a mighty man, no man. We're marching through Virginia fields, no man. O Satan is a busy man. No man. And he has his sword and shield. No man. O old Sissesh, Dunn come and gone. No man can hinder me. Sometimes they substituted Binder me, which was more spicy to the ear and more in keeping with the usual head over heels arrangement of their pronouns. Almost all of their songs were thoroughly religious in their tone, however quaint then the expression, and we're in a minor key, both as to words and music. The attitude is always the same, and as a commentary on life of the race is infinitely pathetic. Nothing but patience for this life, nothing but triumph in the next. Sometimes the present predominates, sometimes the future, but the combination is always implied. In the following, for instance, we hear simply the patience. 7. Brother, keep your lamp trimming and a burning. Keep your lamp trimming and a burning. Keep your lamp trimming and a burning. For this world most Dunn, so keep your lamp. This world most Dunn. But in the next, the final reward of patience is proclaimed as plaintively. 8. I want to go home. There's no rain to wet you. Oh yes, I want to go home. There's no sun to burn you. Oh yes, I want to go home. Oh push along believers. Oh yes. There's no hard trials. Oh yes. There's no whips or cracking. Oh yes. My brother on the wayside. Oh yes. Oh push along my brother. Oh yes. Where there's no stormy weather. Oh yes. There's no tribulation. Oh yes. And the next was a boat song and timed well with the tug of the oar. 9. The coming day. I want to go to Canaan. I want to go to Canaan. I want to go to Canaan to meet him at the coming day. Oh remember let me go to Canaan thrice. To meet him. Oh brother let me go to Canaan thrice. To meet him. Oh brother you oh remember to meet him at the coming day. The following begins with the startling affirmation, yet the last line quite out does the first. This too was a capital boat song. 10. One more river. O Jordan bank was a great old bank, there ain't but one more river to cross. We have some valiant soldier here, there ain't. O Jordan stream will never run dry, there ain't. There's a hill on my left, and he catch on my right, there ain't but one more river to cross. I could get no explanation for this last riddle, except that mean if you go on the left, go to Struction, and if you go on the right, go to God for sure. In other, more spiritual conflict is implied, as in this next. 11. O dying lamb. I want to go where Moses trod, O die dying lamb, for Moses gone to depromised land, O die dying lamb, to drink from springs that never run dry, O. Cry, O my lord, O, before I'll stay in hell one day, O. I'm in hopes to pray my sins away, O, cry, O my lord, O. Brother Moses promised for B-dar too, O, to drink from streams that never run dry, O die dying lamb. In the next the conflict is at its height, and the lurid imagery of the apocalypse is brought to bear. This book, with the books of Moses, constituted their Bible. All that lay between, even the narratives of the life of Jesus, they hardly cared to read or to hear. 12. Down in the valley. We'll run and never tire. We'll run and never tire. We'll run and never tire. Jesus sets poor sinners free. Way down in the valley. Who will rise and go with me? You've heard talk of Jesus, who set poor sinners free. Delightning and deflashing. Delightning and deflashing. Delightning and deflashing. Jesus set poor sinners free. I can't stand the fire, thrice. Jesus set poor sinners free. The green trees are flaming, thrice. Jesus set poor sinners free. Way down in the valley. Who will rise and go with me? You've heard talk of Jesus, who set poor sinners free. D-Valley and D-Lonesome Valley were familiar words in their religious experience. To descend into that region implied the same process with the anxious seat of the camp meeting. When a young girl was supposed to enter it, she bound a handkerchief by a peculiar knot over her head and made it a point of honor not to change a single garment till the day of her baptism, so that she was sure of being in physical readiness for the cleansing rite, whatever her spiritual mood might be. More than once in noticing a damsel thus mystically cachieved, I have asked some dusky attendant its meaning, and have received the unfailing answer framed with a usual indifference to the genders of pronouns. He in D-Lonesome Valley, sir. The next gives the same dramatic conflict, while its detached and impersonal refrain give it strikingly the character of the Scotch and Scandinavian ballads. 13. Cry Holy. Cry Holy, Holy. Look at D-People that is born of God. And I run down D-Valley and I run down to pray. Says look at D-People that is born of God. When I get da, Cap and Satan was da. Says look at. Says young man, young man. There's no use for pray, says look at. For Jesus is dead, and God gone away, says look at. And I made him out a liar, and I went my way, says look at. Sing holy, holy. O Mary was a woman, and he had a one son, says look at. And the Jews and the Romans had him hung, says look at. Cry Holy, Holy. And I tell you sinner, you had better had pray, says look at. For hell is a dark and dismal place, says look at. And I tell you sinner, and I wouldn't go da, says look at. Cry Holy, Holy. Here is an infinitely quaint description of the length of the heavenly road. 14. Over the Crossing. When does my old mother, been a wagon at the hill so long? It's about time she'll cross over. Get home byme be. Keep praying I do believe. We're a long time wagon over the crossing. Keep praying I do believe. We'll get home to heaven byme be. Hear dat mournful thunder, roll from door to door, calling home God's children. Get home byme be. Little children I do believe. We're a long time. Little children I do believe. We'll get home. See dat fork lightning, flash from tree to tree, calling home God's children. Get home byme be. True believer I do believe. We're a long time. O brothers I do believe. We'll get home to heaven byme be. One of the most singular pictures of future joys, and with fine flavour of hospitality about it was this. 15. Walk'em easy. O walk'em easy roundy heaven, walk'em easy roundy heaven, walk'em easy roundy heaven, dat all de people may join de band, walk'em easy roundy heaven, thrice, o shout glory till'em join dat band. The chorus was usually the greater part of the song, and often came in paradoxically thus. 15. O yes Lord. O must I be like de foolish mans, O yes Lord. We'll build de house on de sandy hill, O yes Lord. I'll build my house on Zion hill, O yes Lord. No wind nor rain can blow me down, O yes Lord. The next is very graceful and lyrical, and with more variety of rhythm than usual. 17. Bow lo' Mary, Bow lo' Mary, Bow lo' Martha, for Jesus come and lock de door, and carry de keys away, sail, sail over yonder, and view de promised land, for Jesus come. Weep o' Mary, Bow lo' Martha, for Jesus come, sail, sail my true believer, sail, sail over yonder, Mary bow lo' Martha bow lo' for Jesus come and lock de door, and carry de keys away. But all of the spirituals, that which surprised me the most, I think, perhaps because it was that in which external nature furnished the images most directly, was this. With all my experience of their ideal ways of speech, I was startled when I came on such a flower of poetry in that dark soil. 18. I know moonrise, I know moonrise, I know starrise, lay this body down, I walk in the moonlight, I walk in the starlight, to lay this body down, I walk in the graveyard, I walk through the graveyard, to lay this body down, I'll lie in the grave and stretch out my arms, lay this body down, I go to the judgment in the evening of the day, when I lay this body down, and my soul and your soul will meet in the day when I lay this body down. 19. I'll lie in the grave and stretch out my arms. Never it seems to me since man first lived and suffered was his infinite longing for peace uttered more plaintively than in that line. The next one is of the wildest and most striking of the whole series. There is a mystical effect and a passionate striving throughout the whole. The scriptural struggle between Jacob and the angel, which is only dimly expressed in the words, seems all uttered in the music. I think it impressed my imagination more powerfully than any of the other songs. 19. Wrestling Jacob Oh wrestling Jacob, Jacob days are breaking, I will not let thee go. Oh wrestling Jacob, Jacob days are breaking, He will not let me go. Oh I hold my brother with a trembling hand, I would not let him go. I hold my sister with a trembling hand, I would not let her go. Oh Jacob do hang from a trembling limb, He would not let him go. Oh Jacob do hang from a trembling limb, The Lord will bless my soul. Oh wrestling Jacob, Jacob Of occasional hymns, properly so-called, I notice but one, a funeral hymn for an infant, which is sung plaintively over and over without variety of words. 20. The Baby Gone Home The little baby gone home, The little baby gone home, The little baby gone along, For to climb up Jacob's ladder, And I wish I'd been da, I wish I'd been da, I wish I'd been da, my Lord. Still to climb up Jacob's ladder. Still simpler is this, which is yet quite sweet and touching. 21. Jesus with us He have been with us Jesus, He still with us Jesus, He still with us Jesus, Be with us to the end. The next seemed to be a favourite about Christmas time, when mediations on de-rolling year were frequent among them. 22. Lord, remember me. Oh do Lord, remember me. Oh do Lord, remember me. Oh do remember me, until the year roll around. Do Lord, remember me. If you want to die like Jesus died, lay in de-grave, you would fold your arms and close your eyes, and die with a free good will. For death is a simple ting, and he go from door to door, and he knock down some, and he cripple op some, and he leave some here to pray. Oh do Lord, remember me. Oh do Lord, remember me. My old father's gone till de year roll round. Do Lord, remember me. The next was sung in such an operatic and rollicking way that it was quite hard to fancy at a religious performance, which however it was. I heard it but once. 23. Early in the morning. I met little Rosa early in de-morning. O Jerusalem, early in de-morning. And I ask her how do you do my data? O Jerusalem, early in de-morning. I meet my mother early in de-morning, O Jerusalem. And I ask her, how do you do my mother? O Jerusalem. I meet my brother Robert early in de-morning, O Jerusalem. and I ask him, how do you do, my sonny? Oh, Jerusalem. I meet Titi Wessa in the morning. Oh, Jerusalem. And I ask her, how do you do, my data? Oh, Jerusalem. Tita Wessa means Sister Luizia. In songs of this class the name of every person present successively appears. Their best marching song, the one which was invaluable to lift their feet along as they expressed it, was the following. There was a kind of spring and lill to it, quite indescribable by words. 24. Go in the wilderness. Jesus call you, go in the wilderness. Go in the wilderness. Go in the wilderness. Jesus call you, go in the wilderness. To wait upon the Lord. Go wait upon the Lord. Go wait upon the Lord. Go wait upon the Lord, my God. He take away the sins of the world. Jesus awaiting, go in the wilderness. Go. All dem chillin, go in the wilderness. To wait upon the Lord. The next one was one of those which I had heard in Boyish days brought north from Charleston. But the chorus alone was identical. The words were mainly different and those here given are quite enough. 25. Blow your trumpet, Gabriel. Oh, blow your trumpet, Gabriel. Blow your trumpet louder. And I want that trumpet to blow me home to my new Jerusalem. The prettiest thing that ever I'd done was to serve the Lord when I was young. So blow your trumpet, Gabriel. Oh, Satan is a liar, and he conjure too. And if you don't mind, he'll conjure you. So blow your trumpet, Gabriel. Oh, I was lost in the wilderness. King Jesus hand me decandle down. So blow your trumpet, Gabriel. The following contains one of those odd transformations of proper names with which their scriptural citations were often enriched. It rivals their text. Paul may plant and may polish with water, which I have elsewhere quoted and in which the saint of Apollos would hardly have recognized himself. 26. In the morning. In the morning. Chillin', yes, my Lord. Don't you hear the trumpet sound? If I had a died when I was young, I never would had derace for run. Don't you hear the trumpet sound? Oh, Sam and Peter was fishing in Dissie, and they dropped inet and follow my Lord. Don't you hear the trumpet sound? There's a silver spade for to dig my grave and a golden chain for to let me down. Don't you hear the trumpet sound? In the morning. In the morning. Chillin', yes, my Lord. Don't you hear the trumpet sound? These golden and silver fancies remind me of one of King of Spain's daughters in Mother Goose and the golden apple and the silver pear, which are doubtless themselves but the vestiges of some simple early composition like this. The next has a humbler and more domestic style of fancy. 27. Fare ye well. My true believers, fair ye well, fair ye well, fair ye well, fair ye well by de-grace of God for I'm going home. Massa Jesus give me a little broom for to sweep my heart clean and I will try by de-grace of God to win my way home. Among the songs not available for marching, but requiring concentrated enthusiasm of the camp was The Ship of Zion, of which they had three wholly distinct versions, all quite exuberant and tumultuous. 28. The Ship of Zion. Come along, come along, and let us go home. O glory hallelujah, distiel ship of Zion, hallelujah, hallelujah, distiel ship of Zion, hallelujah. She has landed many a thousand. She can land as many more. O glory hallelujah. Do you think she will be able for to take us all home? O glory hallelujah. You can tell him I'm a coming, hallelujah, hallelujah. You can tell him I'm a coming, hallelujah. Come along, come along. 29. The Ship of Zion, second version. Distie good ol' ship of Zion, distie good ol' ship of Zion, distie good ol' ship of Zion, and she's making 4D promised land. She have angels 4D sailors, and she's, and how you know day's angels, and she's, good lord shall I be one, and she's. That ship is out of sailing, sailing, sailing, and she's, she's a sailing mighty steady steady steady, and she's, she'll neither real nor totter totter totter, and she's, she's a sailing away cold Jordan Jordan Jordan, and she's, King Jesus is decaptain captain captain, and she's making 4D promised land. 30. The Ship of Zion, third version. DeGospel ship is sailing, Hosan, San. Oh Jesus is decaptain, Hosan, San. The angels are the sailors, Hosan, San. Oh is your bundle ready, Hosan, San. Oh have you got your ticket, Hosan, San. This abbreviated chorus is given with unspeakable unction. The three just given are modifications of an old camp meeting melody, and the same may be true of the three following, although I cannot find them in the Methodist hymn books. Each however has its characteristic modifications, which make it well worth giving. In the second verse of this next for instance, Saviour evidently has become soldier. 31. Sweet Music. Sweet music in heaven, just beginning for to roll. Don't you love God? Glory, hallelujah. Yes, late I heard my soldier say, Come heavy soul, I am Deway. Don't you love God? Glory, hallelujah. I'll go and tell to sinners round what a Saviour I have found. Don't you love God? Glory, hallelujah. My grief, my burden long has been, because I was not cease from sin. Don't you love God? Glory, hallelujah. 32. Good News. Oh, good news, oh, good news. The angels brought the tidings down, just coming from Detrone. As grief from out my soul shall fly, just coming from Detrone. I'll shout salvation when I die. Good news, oh, good news, just coming from Detrone. Lord, I want to go to heaven when I die. Good news, oh, good news. The white folks call us a noisy crew. Good news, oh, good news, but this I know we are happy too, just coming from Detrone. 33. The Heavenly Road. You may talk of my name as much as you please and carry my name abroad, but I really do believe I'm a child of God as I walk in the Heavenly Road. Oh, won't you go with me, Thrice, for to keep our garments clean. Oh, Satan is a mighty busy old man, unroll rocks in my way, but Jesus is my bosom friend, unroll them out of Deway. Oh, won't you go with me, Thrice, for to keep our garments clean. Come, my brother, if you never did pray, I hope you may pray tonight, for I really believe in a child of God as I walk in the Heavenly Road. Oh, won't you? Some of the songs had played an historic part during the war, for singing the next, for instance, the Negroes had been put in jail in Georgetown, SC, at the outbreak of the rebellion. Will soon be free was too dangerous an assertion, and though the chant was an old one, it was no doubt sung with a redoubled emphasis during the new events. De Lorde will call us home was evidently thought to be a symbolic verse, for as a drummer boy explained to me, showing all his white teeth as he sat in the moonlight by the door of my tent, they think De Lorde mean for, say, De Yankees. 34. Will soon be free. Will soon be free. Will soon be free. Will soon be free. When De Lorde will call us home. My brother, how long? My brother, how long? My brother, how long? For we done suffering here. It won't be long, thrice. For De Lorde will call us home. Will walk De Myry Road, thrice. Where pleasure never dies. Will walk De Golden Street, thrice. Where pleasure never dies. My brother, how long, thrice? For we done suffering here. Will soon be free, thrice. When Jesus sets me free. Will fight for liberty, thrice. When De Lorde will call us home. The suspicion in this case was unfounded, but they had another song to which the rebellion had actually given rise. This was composed by nobody new whom, though it was the most recent, doubtless of all these spirituals, and had been sung in secret to avoid detection. It is certainly plaintiff enough. The peck of corn and the pint of salt were slavery's rations. 35. Many thousand go. No more peck o' corn for me. No more, no more. No more peck o' corn for me. Many thousand go. No more drivers lash for me, twice. No more. No more pint, assault for me, twice. No more. No more hundred lash for me, twice. No more. No more mistress call for me. No more, no more. No more mistress call for me. Many thousand go. Even of this last composition, however, we have only an approximate date and know nothing of the mode of composition. Alan Ramsey says of the Scotch songs that no matter who made them, they were soon attributed to the minister of the parish whence they sprang. And I always wondered about these, whether they had a conscious and definite origin in some leading mind, or whether they grew by gradual accretion in an almost unconscious way. On this point I could get no information, though I asked many questions, until at last one day when I was being rode across the Beaufort to Lady's Island, I found myself with delight on the actual trail of a song. One of the oarsmen, a brisk young fellow, not a soldier, on being asked for his theory of the matter, dropped out a coy confession. Some good spirituals, he said, are just out of curiosity. I've been a razor-sing myself once. My dream was fulfilled, and I had traced out not the poem alone, but the poet. I implored him to proceed. Once we boys, he said, went for totes and rice, and do nigger driver, he keep a call in on us, and I say, oldy old nigger driver. Then another said, fussing my mammy told me was nothing so bad as nigger driver. Then I made a sing, just put in a word, and then another word. Then he began singing, and the men, after listening a moment, joined in the chorus, as if it were an old acquaintance, though they evidently had never heard it before. I saw how easily the new sing took root among them. 36. The Driver O D L nigger driver, o guine away, fussing my mammy tell me, o guine away, tell me about D nigger driver, o guine away, nigger driver's second devil, o guine away, best ting for D, he driver, o guine away, knock he down and spoil D labour, o guine away. 37. It will be observed that although this song is quite secular in its character, yet its author called it a spiritual. I heard but two songs among them at any time to which they would not, perhaps, have given this generic name. One of these consisted simply in the endless repetition and the manner of certain college songs of the mysterious line, Rainfall and Wet Becky Lawton. But who Becky Lawton was and why she should or should not be wet and whether the dryness was a reward or a penalty, none could say. I got the impression that in either case the event was posthumous and that there was some tradition of grass not growing over the grave of a sinner, but even this was vague and all else vaguer. The other song I heard but once, on a morning when a squad of men came in from picket duty and chanted it in the most rousing way. It had been a stormy and comfortless night and the picket station was very exposed. It still rained in the morning when I strolled to the edge of the camp looking out for the men and wondering how they had stood it. Presently they came striding along the road at a great pace, with their shining rubber blankets worn as cloaks around them, the rain streaming from these and from their equally shining faces, which were almost all upon the broad grin as they peeled out this remarkable ditty. Hangman Johnny. Oh they call me hangman Johnny. Oh ho, oh ho, but I never hang nobody. Oh hang boys hang. Oh they call me hangman Johnny. Oh ho, oh ho, but we'll all hang together. Oh hang boys hang. My presence apparently checked the performance of another verse, beginning Debuckra list for money. Apparently in reference to the controversy about the pay question, then just beginning, and to the more mercenary aims they attributed to the white soldiers. But Hangman Johnny remained always a myth as inscrutable as Becky Lawton. As they learned all their songs by ear, they often strayed into wholly new versions which sometimes became popular and entirely banished the others. This was amusingly the case, for instance, with one phrase in the popular camp song of Marching Along, which was entirely new to them until our quartermaster taught it to them at my request. The words, good on the armour, were to them a stumbling block and no wonder until some ingenious he has substituted, guide on the army, which was at once accepted and became universal. Will guide on the army and be marching along is now the established version on the sea islands. These quaint religious songs were to the men more than a source of relaxation. They were a stimulus to courage and a tie to heaven. I never overheard in camp a profane or vulgar song, with the trifling exceptions given, all had a religious motive, while the most secular melody could not have been more exciting. A few youths from Savannah, who were comparatively men of the world, had learned some of the Ethiopian minstrels it is imported from the North. These took no hold upon the mass, and on the other hand they sang reluctantly, even on Sunday, the long and short metres of the hymn books always gladly yielding to the more potent excitement of their own spirituals. But these they could sing themselves, as had their fathers before them, out of the contemplation of their own low estate into the sublime scenery of the apocalypse. I remember that this minor keyed pathos used to seem to me almost too sad to dwell upon, while slavery seemed destined to last for generations. But now that their patience had had its perfect work, history cannot afford to lose this portion of its record. There is no parallel instance of an oppressed race thus sustained by religious sentiment alone. These songs are but the vocal expression of the simplicity of their faith and the sublimity of their long resignation. Chapter 10 of Army Life in a Black Regiment This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by FNH Army Life in a Black Regiment by Thomas Wentworth Higginson Chapter 10 Life at Camp Shore The Edisto expedition cost me the health and strength of several years. I could say long after, in the words of one of the men, I've been a sickly person ever since the expeditious. Justice to a strong constitution and good habits compels me, however, to say that up to the time of my injury I was almost the only officer in the regiment who had not once been off duty from illness. But at last I had to yield, and went north for a month. We heard much said during the war of wounded officers who stayed unreasonably long at home. I think there were more instances of those who went back too soon. Such at least was my case. On returning to the regiment I found a great accumulation of unfinished business. Every member of the field and staff was prostrated by illness or absent on detailed service. Two companies had been sent to Hilton Head on fatigue duty and kept there unexpectedly long. And there was a visible demoralisation among the rest, especially from the fact that their pay had just been cut down in violation of the express pledges of the government. A few weeks of steady sway made all right again, and during those weeks I felt a perfect exhilaration of health, followed by a month or two of complete prostration when the work was done. This passing I returned to duty, buoyed up again by the fallacious hope that the winter months would set me right again. We had a new camp on Port Royal Island, very pleasantly situated just out of Beaufort. It stretched nearly to the edge of a shelving bluff fringed with pines and overlooking the river, below the buff was a hard, narrow beach where one might gallop a mile and bathe at the farther end. We could look up and down the curving stream and watch the few vessels that came and went. Our first encampment had been lower down the same river, and we felt at home. The new camp was named Camp Shaw, in honour of the noble young officer who had lately fallen at Fort Wagner under circumstances which had endeared him to all the men. As it happened, I had never seen him, nor was my regiment ever placed within immediate reach of the 54th Massachusetts. This I always regretted, feeling very desirous to compare the military qualities of the northern and southern blacks. As it was, the southern regiments with which the Massachusetts troops were brigaded were hardly a fair specimen of their kind having been raised chiefly by drafting, and for this and for other causes being afflicted with perpetual discontent and desertion. We had of course looked forward with great interest to the arrival of these new coloured regiments, and I had ridden in from the picket station to see the 54th. Apart from the peculiarity of its material, it was fresh from my own state, and I had relatives and acquaintances among its officers. Governor Andrew, who had formed it, was an old friend, and had begged me on departure from Massachusetts to keep him informed as to our experiment. I had good reason to believe that my reports had helped to prepare the way for this new battalion, and I had sent him at his request some hints as to its formation. Boston, February 5th 1863 to Colonel T. W. Higginson, commanding 1st Regiment S. C. Voles Port Royal, Id. S. C. Colonel, I am under obligations to you for your very interesting letter of January the 19th, which I considered to be too important in its testimony to the efficiency of coloured troops to be allowed to remain hidden on my files. I therefore placed some portions of it in the hands of the Hon. Stephen M. Weld of Jamaica Plain for publication, and you will find enclosed the newspaper slip from the Journal of February 3rd in which it appeared. During a recent visit at Washington, I have obtained permission from the Department of War to enlist coloured troops as part of the Massachusetts Quota, and I am about to begin to organise a coloured infantry regiment to be numbered the 54th Massachusetts Volunteers. I shall be greatly obliged by any suggestions which your experience may afford concerning it, and I am determined that it shall serve as a model in the high character of its officers and through discipline of its men, for all subsequent corps of the like material. Please present to Gen. Saxton the assurances of my respectful regard. I have the honour to be respectfully and obediently yours, John A. Andrew, Governor of Massachusetts. In the streets of Beauford, I had met Colonel Shaw riding with his lieutenant colonel and successor, Edward Hallowell, and had gone back with them to share their first meal in camp. I should have known Shaw anywhere by his resemblance to his kindred, nor did it take long to perceive that he shared their habitual truthfulness and courage. Moreover, he and Hallowell had already got beyond the common places of inexperience in regard to coloured troops, and for a long time, asked only sensible questions. For instance, he admitted the mere matter of courage to be settled, as regarded to the coloured troops, and his whole solitude bore on this point. Would they do as well in line of battle as they had already done in the irregular service, and on picket, and on guard duty? Of this I had, of course, no doubt, nor I think had he, though I remember his saying something about the possibility of putting them between two fires in case of need and so cutting off their retreat. I should never have thought of such a project, but I could not have expected him to trust them as I did until he had been exactly under fire with them. That doubtless removed all his anxieties, if he really had any. This interview had occurred on the Fourth of June. Shaw and his regiment had very soon been ordered to Georgia, then to Morris Island. Fort Wagner had been assaulted, and he had been killed. Most of the men knew about the circumstances of his death, and many of them had subscribed towards a monument for him, a project which originated with General Saxton, and which was finally embodied in the Shaw Schoolhouse at Charleston. So it gave us all pleasure to name this camp for him, as its predecessor had been named for General Saxton. The new camp was soon brought into good order. The men had great ingenuity in building screens and shelters of light poles filled in with gray moss from the live oaks. The officers had vestibules built in this way before all their tents. The cooking places were walled round in the same fashion, and some of the wide company streets had sheltered sidewalks down the whole line of tents. The sergeant on duty at the entrance of the camp had a similar bower, and the architecture culminated in a praise house for school and prayer meetings, some 30 feet in diameter. As for chimneys and flooring, they were provided with that magic and invisible facility which marks the second year of a regiment's life. That officer is happy who, besides the constitutional love of adventure, has also a love for the details of camp life and likes to bring them to perfection. Nothing but a hen with her chickens about her can symbolise the content I felt on getting my scattered companies together after some temporary separation on picket or fatigue duty. Then we went to work upon the nest. The only way to keep a camp in order is to set about everything as if you expected to stay there forever. If you stay, you get the comfort of it, if ordered away in 24 hours, you forget all wasted labour in the excitement of departure. Thus viewed, a camp is a sort of model farm or bit of landscape gardening. There is always some small improvement to be made, a trench, a well, more shade against the sun, and increased vigilance in sweeping. Then it is pleasant to take care of the men, to see them happy, to hear them purr. Then the duties of inspection and drill, suspended during the active service, resume their importance with a month or two of quiet. It really costs unceasing labour to keep a regiment in perfect condition and ready for service. The work is made up of minute and endless details, like a bird pruning her feathers or cats licking her kittens into the proper toilet. Here are 800 men, every one of whom, every Sunday morning at farthest, must be perfectly presented in all personal properties. He must exhibit himself provided with every article of clothing, buttons, shoe strings, hooks and eyes, company letter, regimental number, rifle, bayonet, bayonet scabbard, cap pouch, cartridge box, cartridge box belt, cartridge box, belt plate, gunsling, canteen, haversack, knapsack, packed according to rule, 40 cartridges, 40 percussion caps, and every one of these articles polish to the highest brightness or blackness as the case may be, and moreover, hung or slung or tied or carried in precisely the correct manner. What a vast and formidable housekeeping is here, my patriotic sisters. Consider too that every corner of the camp is to be kept absolutely clean and ready for exhibition at the shortest notice. Hospitals, stables, guardhouse, cookhouses, company tents must all be brought to perfection, and every square inch of this farm of four acres must look as smooth as an English lawn twice a day. All this besides the discipline and the drill and the regimental and the company books, which must be kept rigid account of all details. Consider all this and then wonder no more that officers and men rejoice in being ordered on active service, where a few strokes of the pen will dispose of all this multiplicity of trappings as expended in action or lost in service. For one, the longer I remained in service, the better I appreciated the good sense of most of the regular army niceties. True, these things must all vanish when the time of action comes, but it is these things that have prepared you for action. Of course, if you dwell on them only, military life becomes millenary life alone. King Lake says that the Russian Grand Duke Constantine, contemplating his beautiful toy regiments, said that he dreaded war, for he knew that it would spoil the troops. The simple fact is that a soldier is like the weapon he carries. Service implies soiling, but you must have it clean in advance that when soiled it may be of some use. The men had that year a Christmas present which they enjoyed to the utmost, furnishing the detail every other day for provost guard duty in Beaufort. It was the only military service which they had ever shared within the town, and it moreover gave a sense of self-respect to be keeping the peace of their own streets. I enjoyed seeing them put on duty these mornings. There was such a twinkle of delight in their eyes though their features were removable. As the reliefs went round posting the guard under charge of a corporal, one could watch the black sentinels successively dropped and the whites picked up, gradually changing the complexion, like Lord somebody's black stockings, which became white stockings, till at last there were only a squad of white soldiers obeying the support arms, forward, march of a black corporal. Then, when once posted, they glorified in their office, you may be sure. Discipline had grown rather free and easy in the town about that time, and it is said that the guardhouse never was so full with human memory as after their first door of duty. I remember hearing that one young reprobate, son of a leading northern philanthropist in those parts, was much aggrieved at being taken to the lock-up, merely because he was found drunk in the streets. Why, said he, the white corporals always showed me the way home. And I can testify that after an evening party some weeks later, I heard with pleasure the officers asking eagerly for the counter-sign. Who has the counter-sign, said they, the darkies are on guard tonight, and we must look out for our lives. Even after a Christmas party at General Saxton's, the guard at the door very properly refused to let the ambulance be brought round to the stable for the ladies, because the driver had not the counter-sign. One of the sergeants of the guard on one of these occasions made to one who questioned his authority an answer that could hardly have been improved. The questioner had just been arrested for some offence. Know what that mean, said the indignant sergeant pointing to the chevrons on his own sleeve? That mean government. Volumes could not have said more, and the victim collapsed. The thing soon settled itself, and nobody remembered to notice whether the face beside the musket of a sentinel were white or black. It meant government, all the same. The men were also indulged with several raids on the mainland under the direction of Captain J. E. Bryant of the Eighth Main, the most experienced scout in that region, who was endeavouring to raise by enlistment a regiment of coloured troops. On one occasion Capt. Whitney and Heasley, with their companies, penetrated nearly to Polkata Ligo, capturing some pickets and bringing away all the slaves of a plantation, the latter operation being entirely under the charge of Sergeant Harry Williams Company K, without the presence of any white man. The whole command was attacked on the return by a rebel force, which turned out to be what was called in those regions a dog company, consisting of mounted riflemen with half a dozen trained bloodhounds. The men met these dogs with their bayonets, killed four or five of their old tormentors with great relish, and brought away the carcass of one. I had the creature skinned and sent the skinned to New York to be stuffed and mounted, meaning to exhibit it at the Sanitary Commission Fair in Boston, but it spoiled on the passage. These quadruped allies were not originally intended as dogs of war, but simply to detect fugitive slaves, and the men were delighted at this confirmation of their tales of dog companies which some of the officers had always disbelieved. Capt. Bryant, during his scouting adventures, had learned to outwit these bloodhounds and used his skill in eluding escape during another expedition of the same kind. He was sent, with Captain Metcalfe's company, far up the Kumbaye River to cut the telegraphic wires and intercept dispatches. Our adventurous chaplain and a telegraphic operator went with the party. They ascended the river, cut the wires, and read the dispatches for an hour or two. Unfortunately the attacked wire was too conspicuously hung and was seen by a passenger on the railway line in passing. The train was stopped and a swift stampede followed, a squad of cavalry was sent in pursuit, and our chaplain with Lieutenant Osborne of Bryant's projected regiment were captured, also one private, the first of our men who had ever been taken prisoner. In spite of an agreement at Washington to the contrary, our chaplain was held as a prisoner of war, the only spiritual advisor in uniform so far as I know, who had that honor. I do not know, but his reverence would have agreed with Scott's pirate lieutenant that it was better to live as plain Jack Bunce than die as Frederick Altamond, but I am very sure that he would have rather have been kept prisoner to the close of the war as a combatant than have been released on parole as a non-resistant. After his return I remember he gave the most animated accounts of the whole adventure, of which he had enjoyed every instant from the first entrance on the enemy's soil to the final capture. I suppose we would all like to tap the telegraphic wires anywhere and read our neighbor's messages if we could only throw round this process the dignity of a sacred cause. This was what our good chaplain had done with the same conscientious zest with which he had conducted his Sunday foraging in Florida, but he told me that nothing so impressed him was on the whole trip as the sudden transformation in the Black soldier who had taken prisoner with him. The chaplain at once adopted the policy natural to him of talking boldly and even defiantly to his captors and commanding instead of beseeching. He pursued the same policy always and gained by it, he thought. But the Negro adopted the diametrically opposite policy, also congenial to his crushed race. All the force seemed to go out of him and he surrendered himself like a tortoise to be kicked and trodden upon at will. This manly, well-trained soldier at once became a slave again, asked no questions and, if any were asked, made meek and conciliatory answers. He did not know nor did any of us know whether he would be treated as a prisoner of war or shot or sent to a rice plantation. He simply acted according to the traditions of his race as did the chaplain on his side. In the end the soldier's cunning was vindicated by the result. He escaped and rejoined us in six months while the chaplain was imprisoned for a year. The men came back very much exhausted from this expedition and those who were in the chaplain squad narrowly escaped with their lives. One brave fellow had actually not a morsel to eat for four days and then could keep nothing on his stomach for two more, so that his life was despaired of and yet he brought all his equipment safe into camp. Some of these men had led such wandering lives in woods and swamps that to hunt them was like hunting an otter. Shiness and concealment had grown to be their second nature. After these little episodes came two months of peace. We were clean, comfortable, quiet and consequently discontented. It was therefore with eagerness that we listened to a rumor of a new Florida expedition in which we might possibly take a hand. End of Chapter 10. Recording by FNH. Visit www.printandplay.co.uk Chapter 11 of Army Life in a Black Regiment This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by FNH. Army Life in a Black Regiment by Thomas Wentworth Higginson Chapter 11. Florida Again Let me revert once more to my diary for a specimen of the sharp changes and sudden disappointments that may come to troops in service. But for a case or two of valoroid in the regiment we should have taken part in the Battle of Ulusty and should have had, as was reported, the right of the line. At any rate we should have shared the hard knocks and the glory which were distributed pretty freely to the colour troops then and there. The diary will give better than can any continuous narrative our ups and downs of expectation in those days. Campshore, Beaufort SC, February 7, 1864 Great are the uncertainties of military orders. Since our recall from Jacksonville we have had no such surprises as came to us on Wednesday night. It was our third day of a new tour of duty at the Pickett Station. We had just got nicely settled, men well tented with good flaws and in high spirits, officers out to out stations all happy, Mrs. Blank coming to stay with her husband, and we at headquarters just in order, house cleaned, moss garlands up, camellias and jesemines in the wash tin basins, baby in bliss. Our usual run of visitors had just set in. Two Beaufort captains and a surgeon had just risen from a late dinner after a flag of truce. General Saxton and his wife had driven away but an hour or two before. We were all sitting about busy, with a great fire blazing. Mrs. D had just remarked triumphantly, last time I had but a mouthful here, and now I shall be here three weeks, when? Indropped like a bombshell, a dispatch announcing that we were to be relieved by the 8th main the next morning, as General Gilmore had sent an order that we should be ready for departure from Beaufort at any moment. Conjectures, orders packing, sending couriers to out stations were the employments of the evening. The men received the news with cheers and we all came in next morning. February 11, 1864 For three days we have watched the river, and every little steamboat that comes up for coal brings out spyglasses and conjectures, and Dars de Forf knew Hampshire, for when that comes, it is said, we go. Meanwhile we hear stirring news from Florida, and the men are very impatient to be off. It is remarkable how much more thoroughly they look at the things as soldiers than last year, and how much lesser has homebound men, the South Carolinans, I mean, for of course the Floridians would naturally wish to go to Florida. But in every way I see the gradual change in them, sometimes with a sigh as parents watch their children growing up and miss the droll speeches from the confiding ignorance of childhood. Sometimes it comes over me with a pang that they are growing more like white men, less naive and less grotesque. Still I think there is enough of it to last and that their joyous buoyancy at least will hold out while life does. As for our destination, our greatest fear is of finding ourselves posted at Hilton Head and going no farther. As a dashing Irish officer remarked the other day, if we are ordered away anywhere I hope it will be either to go to Florida or else stay here. Sublime uncertainties again. After being ordered in from Pickett under marching orders, after the subsequent ten days of uncertainty, after watching every steamboat that came up the river to see if the fourth New Hampshire was on board, at last the regiment came. Then followed another break, there was no transportation to take us. At last a boat was notified. Then General Saxton, as anxious to keep us as was the regiment to go, played his last card in a small pox, telegraphing to department headquarters that we had it dangerously in the regiment. Notebook. All very alloyed, light at that and besides we always have it. Then the order came to leave behind the sick and those who had been peculiarly exposed and embarked the rest the next day. Great was the Jubilee, the men were up I verily believe by three in the morning and by eight the whole camp was demolished or put in wagons and we were on our way. The soldiers of the fourth New Hampshire swarmed in, every board was swept away by them, there had been a time when coloured boards, if I may delicately so express myself, were repudiated by white soldiers, but that epoch had long since passed. I gave my new tent frame, even the latch, to Colonel Bell, Ditto Lieutenant Colonel and to Lieutenant Colonel. Down we marched the men singing John Brown and marching along and guine into wilderness, women in tears and smiles lined the way. We halted opposite the dear generals, we cheered, he speeched, I speeched, we all embraced symbolically and cheered some more. Then we went to work at the wharf, vast wagon loads of tents, rations, ordnance and what not disappeared in the capacious moor of the Delaware. In the midst of it all came riding down General Saxton with a dispatch from Hilton Head. If you think the amount of smallpox in the first South Carolina volunteer sufficient, the order will be countermanded. What shall I say, quote the guilty general, perceiving how preposterously too late the negotiation was reopened. Say, sir, quoth I? Say that we are on board already and the smallpox left behind. Say we had only thirteen cases, chiefly veruloid, and ten almost well. Our blood was up with the tremendous morning's work done, and rather than turn back, we felt ready to hold down Major General Gilmore, commanding department, and all his staff upon the wharf, and vaccinate them by main force. So General Saxton rode away, and we worked away. Just as the last wagon load but one was being transferred to the omnivorous depths of the Delaware, which I should think would have been filled ten times over with what we had put into it, down rode the general with a fiendish joy in his bright eyes and held out a paper, one of the familiar rescripts from headquarters. The marching orders of the first South Carolina volunteers are hereby countermanded. Major Trowbridge said I, will you give my compliments to Lieutenant Hooper, somewhere in the hold of that steamer, and direct him to set his men at work to bring out every individual article which they have carried in. And I sat down on a pile of boards. You will return to your old camping-ground, Colonel, said the general placidly. Now he added with some serene satisfaction. We will have some brigade drills. Brigade drills? Since Mr Pickwick, with his heartless tomato sauce and warming pans, there had been nothing so aggravating as to try and to solace us, who were as good as on board the ship and underway. Nay, in imagination, as far up as St. John's as Politka at least, with brigade drills. It was very kind and flattering in him to wish to keep us, but unhappily, we had made up our minds to go. Never did officer ride at the head of a battalion of more woe-begone, spiritless wretches than I led back from Beaufort that day. When I marched down to D'Landing, said one of the men afterwards, my knapsack full of feathers. Coming back, he led. And the lead instead of the feathers rested on the heart of everyone. As if the disappointment itself were not sufficient, we had to return to our pretty camp, accustomed to its drawing-room order, to find it a desert. Every board gone from the floors, the screens torn down from the poles, all the little conveniences scattered, and, to crown it all, a cold breeze such as we had not known since New Year's Day, blowing across the camp and flooding everything with dust. I sincerely hope the regiment would never behave after a defeat, as they behaved then. Every man seemed crushed, officers and soldiers alike. When they broke ranks, they went and lay down like sheep where their tents used to be, or wandered disconsolately about, looking for their stray belongings. The scene was so infinitely dolorous that it gradually put me in the highest spirits. The ludicrousness of the whole affair was so complete, there was nothing to do but laugh. The horrible dust blew till every officer had some black spot on his nose, which paralysed Pethos. Of course, the only way was to set them all to work as soon as possible, and work them we did. I at the camp and the Major at the Wharf, loading and unloading wagons and just reversing all which the morning had done. The new Hampshire men were very considerate and gave back most of what they had taken, though many of our men were really too delicate or proud to ask, or even take what they had once given to the soldiers or to the coloured people. I had no such delicacy about my tent frame, and by night things had resumed something of their old aspect, and cheerfulness was restored in part. Yet long after this I found one first sergeant absolutely in tears, a Florida man. Most of those kindred were up the St. John's. It was very natural that the men from that region should feel thus bitterly, but it shows how much of a habit of soldiers they have all acquired, that the South Carolina men, who were leaving the neighbourhood of their families for an indefinite time, were just as eager to go, and not one deserted, though they knew of it for a week beforehand. No doubt my precarious health makes it now easier for me personally to remain here, easier on reflection at least, than for the others. At the same time Florida is fascinating, and offers not only adventure, but the command of a brigade. Certainly, at the last moment there was not a sacrifice I would not have made, rather than wrench myself and the others away from the expedition. We are of course, thrown back into the old uncertainty, and if the smallpox subsides, and it is really diminishing decidedly, we may yet come in at the wrong end of the Florida affair. February 19. Not a bit of it. This morning the general had ridden up radiant, has seen General Gilmore, who has decided not to order us to Florida at all, nor withdraw any of this garrison. Moreover, he says that all which is intended in Florida, is done, that there will be no advance to Tallahassee, and General Seymour will establish a camp of instruction in Jacksonville. Well, if that is all, it is a lucky escape. We little dreamed that on that very day the march toward Olisty was beginning, the battle took place next day, and I add one more extract to show how the news reached Beaufort. February 23, 1864. There was the sound of revelry by night at a ball in Beaufort last night, in a new large building beautifully decorated. All of the collective flags of the garrison hung round and over us, as if the stars and stripes were devised for an ornament alone. The array of uniforms was such that a civilian became a distinguished object, much more a lady. All would have gone according to the proverbial marriage-ball I suppose. Had there not been a slight palpable shadow over all of us from hearing vague stories of a lost battle in Florida, and from the thought that perhaps the very ambulances in which we rode to the ball were as only until the wounded or the dead might tenant them. General Gilmore only came, I supposed, to put a good face upon the matter. He went away soon, and General Saxton went. Then came a rumour that the cosmopolitan had actually arrived with wounded, but still the dance went on. There was nothing un-feeling about it, one gets used to things, when suddenly in the midst of the lances there came a perfect hush. The music ceasing, a few surgeons went hastily to and fro, as if conscience-stricken, I should think they might have been. Then there waved a mighty shadow in, as in Eulen's Black Night, and as we all stood wandering we were aware of General Saxton, who strode hastily down the hall his pale face very resolute, and looking almost sick with anxiety. He had just been on board the steamer. There were two hundred and fifty wounded men just arrived, and the ball must end. Not that there was anything for us to do, but the revel was mis-timed, and must be ended. It was wicked to be dancing, with such a scene of suffering nearby. Of course the ball was instantly broken up, though with some murmurings and some longings of appetite on the part of some towards the wasted supper. Later I went on board the boat. Among the long lines of wounded, black and white intermingled, there was the wonderful quiet which usually prevails on such occasions. Not a sub, nor a groan, except from those undergoing removal. It is not self-control, but chiefly the shock to the system produced by severe wounds, especially gunshot wounds, and which usually keeps the patient stiller at first than at any time later. A company from my regiment waited on the wharf, in their accustomed dusky silence, and I longed to ask them what they thought of our Florida disappointment now. In view of what they saw, did they still wish we had been there? I confess that in the presence of all that human suffering, I could not wish it, but I would not have suggested any such thought to them. I found our kind-hearted ladies, Mrs. Chamberlain and Mrs. Dewhurst, on board the steamer, but there was nothing for them to do, and we walked back to the camp in the radiant moonlight. Mrs. Chamberlain, more than ever strengthened in her blushing woman's philosophy, I don't care who wins the laurels, provided we don't. February 29. But for a few trivial cases of veruloid, we should certainly have been in that disastrous fight. We were confidently expected for several days at Jacksonville, and the commanding general told Colonel Hallowell that we, being the oldest coloured regiment, would have the right of the line. This was certainly to miss danger and glory very closely. End of Chapter 11. Recording by FNH. Visit www.bookranger.co.uk Chapter 12. Of Army Life in a Black Regiment. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by FNH. Army Life in a Black Regiment by Thomas Wentworth Higginson. Chapter 12. The Negro as a Soldier. There was in our regiment a very young recruit named Sam Roberts, of whom Trowbridge used to tell this story. Early in the war, Trowbridge had once sent to Amelia Island with a squad of men under direction of Commodore Goldsborough to remove the Negroes from the island. As the officers stood on the beach, talking to some of the older freedmen, they saw this urchin peeping at them from front and rear in a scrutinizing way, for which his father at last called him to account as thus. Hi, Sammy, what are you doing, child? Daddy, said the inquisitive youth, don't you know Massa Tellis the Yankee hab tail? I don't see no tail, Daddy. There were many who went to Port Royal during the war, in civil or military position, whose previous impressions of the colored race were about as intelligent as Sam's view of themselves. But, for once, I had always so much to do with fugitive slaves, and had studied the whole subject with such interest, that I found not much to learn or unlearn as to this one point. Their courage I had seen before tested, their docile and lovable qualities I had known, and the only real surprise that experience brought me was in finding them so little demoralized. I had not allowed for the extreme remoteness and seclusion of their lives, especially among the sea islands. Many of them had literally spent their whole existence on some lonely island or remote plantation, where the master never came, and the overseer only once or twice a week. With these exceptions such persons had never seen a white face, and of the excitements of sins or larger communities they had not a conception. My friend Colonel Hallowell of the 54th Massachusetts, told me that he had among his men some of the worst reprobates of northern cities. While I had some men who were unprincipled and troublesome, there was not one whom I would have called a hardened villain. I was constantly expecting to find male torpsies, with no notions of good and plenty of evil, but I never found one. Among the most ignorant there was often a childlike absence of vices, which was rather to be classed as inexperienced than as innocent, but which had some of the advantages of both. Apart from this they were very much like other men, General Saxton examining with some impatience a long list of questions from some philanthropic commission at the north, respecting the traits and habits of the freedmen, bade some staff officer answer all of them in two words, intensely human. We all admitted that it was a striking and comprehensive description. For instance, as to courage. So far as I have seen the mass of men are naturally courageous, up to a certain point. A man seldom runs away from danger which he ought to face, unless others run. Each is apt to keep with the mass, and coloured soldiers have more than usual of this gregariousness. In almost every regiment, black or white, there are a score or two of men who are naturally daring, who really hunger after dangerous adventures, and are happiest when allowed to seek them. Every commander gradually finds out who these men are, and habitually uses them. Certainly I had such, and I remember with delight their bearing, their coolness, and their dash. Some of them were negroes, some mulettos. One of them would have passed for white, with brown hair and blue eyes, while others were so black you could hardly see their features. These picked men varied in other respects, too. Some were neat and well-drilled soldiers, while others were slovenly, heedless fellows. The despair of their officers at inspection, their pride on a raid. They were natural scouts and rangers of the regiment. They had the two o'clock in the morning courage which Napoleon thought so rare. The mass of the regiment rose to the same level under excitement, and were more excitable, I think, than whites, but neither more or less courageous. Perhaps the best proof of a good average of courage among them was in the readiness they always showed for any special enterprise. I do not remember ever to have had the slightest difficulty in obtaining volunteers, but rather in keeping down the number. The previous pages include many illustrations of this, as well as of their endurance of pain and discomfort. For instance, one of my lieutenants, a very daring Irishman, who would serve for eight years as a Sergeant of Regular Artillery in Texas, Utah and South Carolina, said he had never been engaged in anything so risky as our raid up the St. Mary's. But in truth it seems to me a mere absurdity to deliberately argue the question of courage as applied to men among whom I waked and slept day and night for so many months together. As well as, might he, who has been wandering for years upon the desert with a Bedouin escort, discussed the courage of the men whose tents had been his shelter and whose spears his guard. We, their officers, did not go there to teach lessons, but to receive them. There were more than a hundred men in the ranks who had voluntarily met more dangers in their escape from slavery than any of my young captains had occurred in all their lives. There was a family named Wilson, I remember, of which we had several representatives. Three or four brothers had planned an escape from the interior to our lines. They finally decided that the younger should stay and take care of the old mother. The rest, with their sister and her children, came in a dugout down one of the rivers. They were fired upon again and again by the pickets along the banks, until finally every man on board was wounded, and still they got safely through. When the bullets began to fly about them, the woman shed tears, and a little girl of nine said to her, Don't cry, mother, Jesus will help you. And then the child began praying as the wounded men still urged the boat along. This the mother told me, but I had previously heard it from an officer who was on the gunboat that picked them up, a big rough man whose voice fairly broke as he described their appearance. He said that the mother and child had been hid for their nine months in the woods before attempting their escape, and the child would speak to no one. Indeed, she hardly would when she came to our camp. She was almost white, and this officer wished to adopt her, but the mother said, I would do anything but for that una. This being a sort of Indian formation of the second person plural, such as they sometimes use. This same officer afterwards saw a reward offered for this family in a savannah paper. I used to think that I should not care to read Uncle Tom's cabin in our camp. It would have seemed tame. Any group of men in a tent would have had more exciting tales to tell. I needed no fiction when I had my Fanny Wright, for instance, daily passing to and fro before my tent with a shy little girl clinging to her skirts. Fanny was a modest little mulatto woman, a soldier's wife and a company laundress. She had escaped from the mainland in a boat, with that child and another. Her baby was shot dead in her arms, and she reached our lines with one child safe on earth and the other in heaven. I never found it needful to give any elementary instructions encouraged to Fanny's husband, you may be sure. There was another family of brothers in the regiment named Miller. Their grandmother, a fine old-looking woman, nearly seventy I should think, but erect as a pine tree, used sometimes to come and visit them. She and her husband had once tried to escape from a plantation near savannah. They had failed, and had been brought back. Her husband had received five hundred lashes, and while the white men on the plantation were viewing the punishment, she was collecting her children and grandchildren to the number of twenty-two in a neighbouring marsh, preparatory to another attempt that night. They found a flat boat which had been rejected as unsea-worthy, got on board, still under the old woman's orders, and drifted forty miles down the river to our lines. Trowbridge happened to be on board the gum boat which picked them up, and he said that when the flat touched the side of the vessel, the grandmother rose to a full height with her youngest grandchild in her arms and said only, my God, are we free? By one of those coincidences of which life is full, her husband escaped also after his punishment, and was taken up by the same gum boat. I hardly need point out that my young lieutenants did not have to teach the principles of courage to this woman's grandchildren. I often ask myself why it was that with this capacity of daring and endurance they had not kept the land in a perpetual flame of insurrection? Why, especially since the opening of the war, they had kept so still? The answer was to be found in the peculiar temperament of their races, in their religious faith, and in the habit of patience that centuries had fortified. The shrewd men all said substantially the same thing. What was the use of insurrection where everything was against them? They had no knowledge, no money, no arms, no drill, no organisation, above all, no mutual confidence. It was the tradition among them that all insurrections were always betrayed by somebody. They had no mountain passes to defend like the maroons in Jamaica, no impenetrable swamps like the maroons in Suriname. Where they had these, even on a small scale, they had used them, as in certain swamps around Savannah and in the Everglades of Florida, where they united with the Indians and would stand fire so I was told by General Saxton who had fought them there when the Indians would retreat. It always seemed to me that had I been a slave my life would have been one long scheme of insurrection. But I learned to respect the patient's self-control of those who had waited till the course of events should open a better way. When it came they accepted it. Insurrection on their part would at once have divided the northern sentiment, and a large part of our army would have joined with the southern army to hunt them down. By their waiting till we needed them, their freedom was secured. Two things chiefly surprised me in their feeling towards their former masters, the absence of affection and the absence of revenge. I expected to find a good deal of the patriarchal feeling. It always seemed to me a very ill-applied emotion as connected with the facts and laws of American slavery. Still I expected to find it. I suppose that my men and their families and visitors may have had as much of it as the mass of freed slaves, but certainly they had not a particle. I never could cajole one of them in his most discontented moment into regretting old master time for a single instant. I never heard one speak of the masters except as natural enemies. Yet they were perfectly discriminating as to individuals, many of them claimed to have had very kind owners, and some expressed great gratitude to them for particular favours received. It was not the individuals, but the ownership of which they complained. That they saw to be wrong, which no special kindness could write. On this, as on all points connected with slavery, they understood the matter as clearly as Garrison or Phillips the wisest philosophy could teach them nothing as to that, nor could any false philosophy befog them. After all, personal experience is the best logician. Certainly this indifference did not proceed from any want of personal affection, for they were the most affectionate people among whom I had ever lived. They attached themselves to every officer who deserved love, and to some who did not, and if they failed to show it to their masters it proved the wrongfulness of the mastery. On the other hand they rarely showed one gleam of revenge, and I shall never forget the self-control with which one of our best sergeants pointed out to me at Jacksonville, the very place where one of his brothers had been hanged by the whites for leading a party of fugitive slaves. He spoke of it as a historical matter, without any bearing on the present issue. But side by side with this faculty of patience, there was a certain tropical element in the men, a sort of fiery ecstasy when aroused, which seemed to link them by blood to the French Turcos, and made them really resemble their natural enemies, the Celts, far more than the Anglo-Saxon temperament. To balance this, there were great individual resources when alone. A sort of Indian wildiness and subtlety of resource. Their gregariousness and love of drill made them more easy to keep in hand than white American troops, who rather liked to straggle or to go in little squads looking out for themselves without being bothered with officers, the blacks prefer organization. The point of inferiority that I always feared, though I never had occasion to prove it, was that they might show less fiber, less tough and dogged resistance than whites during a prolonged trial, a long disastrous march for instance or the hopeless defence of a besieged town. I should not be afraid of their muting or running away, but of their drooping and dying. It might not turn out so, but I mention it for the sake of fairness and to avoid overstating the merits of these troops. As to the simple general fact of courage and reliability, I think no officer in our camp ever thought of there being any difference between black and white, and certainly the opinions of these officers, who for years risked their lives every moment on the fidelity of their men, were worth more than those of all the world beside. No doubt there were reasons why this particular war was an especially favourable test for the colored soldiers. They had more to fight for than the whites. Besides the flag and the union, they had home, wife and child. They fought with ropes round their necks, and when the orders were issued that officers of colored troops should be put to death on capture, they took a grim satisfaction. It helped their spirit to core immensely. With us, at least, there was to be no play soldier. Though they had begun with a slight feeling of inferiority to the white troops, this compliment substituted a peculiar sense of self-respect, and even when the new colored regiments began to arrive from the north, my men still pointed out this difference, that in case of ultimate defeat, the northern troops black or white would go home, while the first South Carolina must fight it out or be re-enslaved. This was one thing that made the St. John's River so attractive to them, and even to me. It was so much nearer the Everglades. I used seriously to ponder, during the darker periods of the war, whether I might not end my days as an outlaw, a leader of maroons. Meanwhile I used to try and make some capital for the northern troops, in their estimate, by pointing out that it was a disinterested thing in these men from the free states to come down here and fight, that the slaves might be free. But they wrapped keenly to reply, that many of the white soldiers disavowed this object, and said that it was not the object of the war, nor even likely to be its end. Some of them even repeated Mr. Sheward's unfortunate words to Mr. Adams, which some general had been heard to quote. So on the whole I took nothing by the motion, as was apt to be the case with those who spoke a good word of our government in those facilitating and half pro-slavery days. At any rate this ungenerous discouragement had this good effect, that it touched their pride, they would deserve justice even if they did not obtain it. This pride was afterwards severely tested during the disgraceful period when the party of repudiation in Congress temporarily deprived them of their promised pay. In my regiment the men never mutinied, nor even threatened to mutiny. They seemed to make it a matter of honour to do their part, even if the government proved a defaulter. But one third of them, including the best men in the regiment, quietly refused to take a dollar's pay at the reduced price. We give our soldier into de-government-gunnel, they said, but we won't splice ourselves so much to take D7 dollar. They even made a contemptuous ballad of which I once caught a snatch. Ten dollar a month, tree abdact for clothing, go to Washington, fight for Lincoln's data. This Lincoln's daughter stood for the goodness of liberty it would seem. They would be true to her, but they would not take the half-pay. This was contrary to my advice and that of their officers. But now I think it was wise. Nothing less than this would have called the attention of the American people to this outrageous fraud. The same slow forecast had often marked their action in other ways. One of our ableist sergeants, Henry McIntyre, who had earned $2.50 per day as a master carpenter in Florida and paid $1.50 to his master, told me that he had deliberately refrained from learning to read because that knowledge exposed the slaves to so much more watching and suspicion. This man and a few others had built on contract the greater part of the town of Mykonopy in Florida and was a thriving man when his accustomed discretion failed for once and he lost all. He named his child William Lincoln and it brought upon him such suspicion that he had to make his escape. I cannot conceive what people of the North mean by speaking of Negroes as a bestial or brutal race, except in some insensibility to animal pain I never knew of an act in my regiment which I should call brutal. In reading Kay's condition of the English peasantry I was constantly struck with the unlikeliness of my men to those they're indescribed. This could not proceed from my prejudices as an abolitionist, for they would have led me the other way and indeed I had once written a little essay to show the brutalizing influences of slavery. I learned to think that we abolitionists had underrated the suffering produced by slavery among the Negroes but had overrated the demoralization or rather we did not know how the religious temperament of the Negroes had checked the demoralization. Yet again it must be admitted that this temperament born of sorrow and oppression is far more marked in the slave than in the native African. Theorize as we may there was certainly in our camp an average tone of propriety which visitors noticed and which was not created but only preserved by discipline. I was always struck not merely by the courtesy of the men but also by a certain sober decency of language. If a man had to report to me any disagreeable fact for instance he was sure to do it with gravity and decorum and not blurt it out in an offensive way. And it certainly was a significant fact that the ladies of our camp when we were so fortunate as to have guests the young wives especially of the adjutant and quartermaster used to go among the tents when the men were off duty in order to hear their big pupils read and spell without the slightest fear of annoyance. I do not mean direct annoyance or insult for no man who valued his life would have ventured that in presence of others but I mean the annoyance of accidentally seeing or hearing improprieties not intended for them. They both declared that they would not have moved about with anything like the same freedom in any white camp they had entered and it always roused their indignation to hear the negro race called brutal or depraved. This came partly from natural good manners partly from the habit of deference partly from ignorance of the refined and ingenious evil which is learned in large towns but a large part came from their strongly religious temperament their comparative their comparative freedom from swearing for instance and abstinence which I fear military life did not strengthen was partly a matter of principle once I heard one of them say to another in a transport of indignation ha ha ha boy suppose I know be a Christian I cuss you soul which was certainly drawing pretty hard upon the bridle cuss however was a generic term for all manner of evil speaking they would say he cuss me fool or he cuss me coward as if the essence of propriety were in harsh and angry speech which I take to be good ethics but certainly if Uncle Toby could have recruited his army in Flanders from our ranks the swearing would have ceased to be historic it used to seem to me that never since Cromwell's time had there been soldiers in whom the religious element had such a place a religious army a gospel army with their frequent phrases in their prayer meetings there was always a mingling often quite enough of the warlike and the pious of each one of us was a praying man said Corporal Thomas Long in a sermon it appears to me that we could fight as well with prayers as with bullets for the Lord has said that if you have faith even a grain of mustard seed cut into four parts you can say to the sycamore tree arise and it will come up though Corporal Long may have got a little perplexed in his botany his faith proved itself by works free volunteered and went many miles on a solitary scouting expedition into the enemy's country in florida and got back safe after I had given him up for lost the extremes of religious enthusiasm I did not venture to encourage for I could not do it honestly neither did I discourage them but simply treated them with respect and let them have their way so long as it did not interfere with the discipline in general they promoted it the mischievous little drummer boys whose scrapes and quarrels were the torment of my existence might be seen kneeling together in their tents to say their prayers at night and I could hope that their slumbers were blessed by some spirit of peace such as certainly did not rule over their waking the most reckless and daring fellows in the regiment were perfect fatalists in their confidence that God would watch over them and that if they died it would be because it was their time that had come this almost excessive faith and their love of freedom and of their families all cooperated with their pride as soldiers to make them do their duty I could not have spared any of these incentives those of our officers who were personally the least influenced by such considerations still saw the need of encouraging them among the men I am bound to say that this strongly devotional turn was not always accompanied by the practical virtues but neither was it strikingly divorced from them a few men I remember who belonged to the ancient order of hypocrites but not many old Jim Cushman was our favorite representative scamp he used to vex his righteous soul over the admission of the unregenerate to prayer meetings and went off once shaking his head and muttering too much goat shout with the sheep but he who objected to this profane admixture used to get our mess funds far more hopelessly mixed with his own when he went out to buy chickens and I remember that on being asked by our major in that semi-ethiopian dialect into which we sometimes slid how much wife you got Jim the veteran replied with a sort of penitence for lost opportunities only about four sir another man of somewhat similar quality went among us by the name of Henry Ward Beecher from a remarkable resemblance in face and figure to that sturdy divine I always felt a sort of admiration for this worthy because of the thoroughness with which he outwitted me and the sublime impudence in which he culminated he got a series of passes from me every week or two to go and see his wife on a neighbouring plantation and finally when this resource seemed exhausted he came boldly for one more pass that he might go and be married we used to quote him a good deal also as a sample of a certain Shakespearean boldness of personification in which the men sometimes indulged once I remember his captain had given him a fouling piece to clean Henry Ward had left it in the captain's tent and the latter finding it had transferred the job to someone else then came a confession in this precise form with many dignified gesticulations cap and I took that gun I put that bun into cap and tent then I look and a gun not dar then conscience say cap and must have give that gun to somebody else for clean then I say conscience you must reason correct compare Lancelot gobos soliloquy in the two gentlemen of Arona still I maintain that as a whole the men were remarkably free from inconvenient vices there was no more lying and stealing than in the average white regiments the surgeon was not much troubled by shamming sickness and there were not a great many complaints of theft there was less quarrelling than among white soldiers and scarcely ever an instance of drunkenness perhaps the influence of their officers had something to do with this for not a ration of whiskey was ever issued to the men nor did I ever touch it while in the army nor approve a requisition for any of the officers without which it could not easily be obtained in this respect our surgeons fortunately agreed with me and we never had reason to regret it I believe the use of ardent spirits to be as useless and injurious in the army as on board ship and among the colored troops especially who had never been accustomed to it I think that it did only harm the point of greatest laxity in their moral habits the want of a high standard of chastity was not one which affected the camp life to any great extent and it therefore came less under my observation but I found my relief that whatever their deficiency in this respect he was modified by the general quality of their temperament and indicated rather a softening and a relaxation than a hardening and brutalizing of their moral natures any insult or violence in this direction was a thing unknown I never heard of an instance it was not uncommon for the men to have two or three wives in different plantations the second or remota partner being called a broad wife i.e wife abroad but the whole tendency was towards marriage and this state of things was only regarded as a bequest from massa time I knew a great deal about their marriages for they often consulted me and took my counsel as lovers are want to do that is when it pleased their fancy sometimes they would consult their captains first and then to come to me in despairing appeal Captain Scrobie Trowbridge he advised me to come and marry this lady because she has seven children what for use Captain Scrobie can't love for me I must love for myself and I love he I remember that on this occasion he stood by a most unattractive woman jet black with an old pink muslin dress torn white cotton gloves and a very flowery bonnet that must have descended through generations of tawny mistresses I felt myself compelled to reaffirm the decision of the inferior court the result was unusual they were married the next day and I believe that she proved an excellent wife though she had seven children whose father was also in the regiment if she did not I know many others who did and certainly I have never seen more faithful or happy marriages than among that people the question was often asked whether the southern slaves or the northern free blacks made the best soldiers it was a compliment to both classes that each officer usually preferred those whom he had personally commanded I preferred those who had been slaves for their greater desatility and affectionateness for the powerful stimulus which their new freedom gave and for the fact that they were fighting in a manner for their own homes and firesides every one of these considerations afforded a special aid to discipline and cemented a peculiar tie of sympathy between them and their officers they seemed like clansmen and had a more confiding and filial relation to us than seemed to me to exist in the northern colored regiments so far as the mere habits of slavery went they were a poor preparation for military duty inexperienced officers often assumed that because these men had been slaves before enlistment they would bear to be treated as such afterwards experience proved the contrary the more strongly we marked the difference between the slave and the soldier the better for the regiment one half of military duty lies in obedience the other half in self-respect a soldier without self-respect is worthless consequently there were no regiments in which it was so important to observe the courtesies and proprieties of military life as in these I had to caution the officers to be more than usually particular in returning the salutations of the men to be very careful in their dealings with those on picket or guard duty and on no account to omit the titles of the non-commissioned officers so in dealing out punishments we had carefully to avoid all that was brutal and arbitrary all that savored of the overseer any such dealing found them as obstinate and contemptuous as was topsy when miss aphelia undertook to chastiser a system of light punishments rigidly administered according to the prescribed military forms had more weight with them than any amount of angry severity to make them feel as remote as possible from the plantation this was essential by adhering to this and constantly appealing to their pride as soldiers and their sense of duty we were able to maintain a high standard of discipline so at least the inspecting officers said and to get rid almost entirely of the more degrading class of punishments standing on barrels tying up by the thumbs and the ball and chain in all ways we had to educate their self-respect for instance at first they disliked to obey their own non-commissioned officers i don't want him to play the white man over me was a sincere objection they had been so impressed with the sense of inferiority that the distinction extended to the very principles of honor i ain't got colored man principles said corporal london simmons indignantly defending himself from some charge before me i's got white german principles i's do my best if cap and tell me to take a man supposed to be man as big as a house i clam hold on him till i die inception i'm sick but it was plain that this feeling was a bequest of slavery which military life would wear off we impressed it upon them that they did not obey their officers because they were white but because they were their officers just as the captain must obey me and i the general that we were all subject to military law and protected by it in turn then we taught them to take pride in having good material for non-commissioned officers among themselves and in obeying them on my arrival there was one white first sergeant and it was a question whether to appoint others this i prevented but left that one hoping the men themselves would at last petition for his removal which at length they did he was at once detailed on other duty the picturesqueness of the regiments suffered for he was very tall and fair and i like to see him step forward in the center when the line of first sergeants came together at dress parade but it was a help to discipline to eliminate the Saxon for it recognized a principal afterwards i had excellent battalion drills without a single white officer by way of experiment putting each company under a sergeant and going through the most difficult movements such as division of columns and oblique squares and as to actual discipline it is doing no injustice to the line officers at the regiment to say that none of them received from the men more implicit obedience than color sergeant rivers i should have tried to obtain commissions for him and several others before i left the regiment had their literary education been sufficient and such an attempt was finally made by Lieutenant Colonel trailbridge my successor in immediate command but it proved unsuccessful it always seemed to me an insult to those brave men to have novices put over their heads on the ground of color alone and the men felt it more keenly as they remained longer in service there were more than 700 enlisted men in the regiment when mustered out after more than three years service the ranks had been kept full by enlistment but there were only 14 line officers instead of the full 30 the men who should have filled those vacancies were doing duty as sergeants in the ranks in what respect were the colored troops a source of disappointment to me in one respect only that of health their health improved indeed as they grew more familiar with military life but i think that neither their physical nor moral temperament gave them that toughness that obstinate purpose of living which sustains the more materialistic Anglo-Saxon they had not to be sure the same predominant diseases suffering in the pulmonary not in the digestive organs but they suffered a good deal they felt malaria less but they were more easily choked by dust and made ill by dampness on the other hand they submitted more readily to sanitary measures than whites and with efficient officers were more easily kept clean they were injured throughout the army by an undue share of fatigue duty which is not only exhausting but demoralizing to a soldier by the unsuitableness of the rations which gave them salt meat instead of rice and hominy and by the lack of good medical attendance their childlike constitutions peculiarly needed prompt and efficient surgical care but almost all the colored troops were enlisted late in the war when it was hard to get good surgeons for any regiments and especially for these in this respect i had nothing to complain of since there were no surgeons in the army for whom i would have exchanged my own and this late arrival on the scene affected not only the medical supervision of the colored troops but their opportunity for a career it is not my province to write their history nor to vindicate them nor to follow them upon those larger fields compared with which the adventures of my regiment appear but a partisan warfare yet this at least may be said the operations on the south Atlantic coast which long seemed merely a subordinate and incidental part of the great contest proved to be one of the final pivots on which it turned now all admit that the fate of the confederacy was decided by sherman's march to the sea port royal was the objective point to which he marched and he found the department of the south when he reached it held almost exclusively by colored troops next to the merit of those who made the march was that of those who held the open door that service will always remain among the laurels of the black regiments end of chapter 12 recording by fnh visit www.bookranger.co.uk chapter 13 of army life in a black regiment this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by fnh army life in a black regiment by thomas wentworth higginson chapter 13 conclusion my personal forebodings proved to be correct and so were the threats of the surgeons in may 1864 i went home invalided was compelled to resign in october from the same cause and never saw the first south carolina again nor did anyone else see it under that appellation for about that time its name was changed to the 33rd united states colored troops a most vague and heartless baptism as the man in the story says it was one of those instances of injudicious sacrifice of a spirit decor which was so frequent in our army all the pride of my men was centered in defus south the very words were a recognition of the loyal south as against the disloyal to make the matter worse it had been originally designed to apply the new numbering only to the new regiments and so the early numbers were all taken up before the older regiments came in the governors of states by a special effort saved their colored troops from this shagrin but we found here as more than once before the disadvantage of having no governor to stand by us it's a far cry to lock eye said the highland proverb we knew to our cost that it was a far cry to washington in those days unless an officer left his duty and stayed there all the time in june 1864 the regiment was ordered to foley island and remained there and on coals island till the siege of charleston was done it took part in the battle of honey hill and in the capture of a fort on james island of which corporal robert venros wrote triumphantly in a letter when we took the pieces we found that we recapped our own pieces that we lost on the wilktown river river and thank the lord did not lose but seven men out of our regiment in february 1865 the regiment was ordered to charleston to do provost and guard duty in march to savannah in june to hamburg and akon in september to charleston and its neighborhood and was finally mustered out of service after being detained beyond its three years so great was the scarcity of troops on the night of february 1866 with dramatic fitness this muster out took place at fort wagna above the graves of shore and his men i given the appendix the farewell address of lieutenant colonel trailbridge who commanded the regiment from the time i left it brevet brigadier general wt benet one of the 102nd united states colored troops who was assigned to the command never actually held it being always in charge of a brigade the officers and men are scattered far and wide one of our captains was a member of the south carolina constitutional convention and is now state treasurer three of our sergeants were in that convention including sergeant prince rivers and he and sergeant henry hain are still members of the state legislature both in that state and in florida the former members of the regiment are generally prospering so far as i can hear the increased self-respect of army life fitted them to the duties of civil life it is not in nature that the jealousy of race should die out in this generation but i trust they will not see the fulfillment of corporal simon crams prediction simon was one of the shrewdest old fellows in the regiment and he said to me once as he was jogging out of bow fort behind me on the shell road i's going to lead the south colonel when the war is over i's made up my mind at these years seshes will never be civilized in my time the only member of the regiment whom i have seen since leaving it is a young man cirrus wiggins who was brought off from the mainland in a dugout in broad day before the very eyes of the rebel pickets by captain james s rogers of my regiment it was one of the most daring acts i ever saw and as it happened under my own observation i was glad when the captain took home with him captive of his bow and spear to be educated under his eye in massachusetts cirrus has done credit to his friends and will be satisfied with nothing short of a college training at howard university i have letters from the men very quaint in handwriting and spelling but he is the only one whom i have seen sometime i hope to revisit those scenes and she'll feel no doubt like a bewildered rip van winkle who once wore a uniform we who served with the black troops have this peculiar satisfaction that whatever dignity or sacredness the memories of the war may have to others they have more to us in that contest all the ordinary ties of patriotism were the same of course to us as to the rest they had no motifs which we had not as they have now no memories which are not also ours but the peculiar privilege of associating with an outcast race of training it to fend its rights and to perform its duties this was our special mead the facilitating policy of the government sometimes filled other officers with doubt and shame until the negro had justice they were but defending the liberty with one hand and crushing it with the other from this inconsistency we were free whatever the government did we at least were working in the right direction if this was not recognized on our side of the lines we knew that it was admitted on the other fighting with ropes around our necks denied the ordinary curtesies of war till we ourselves compelled then concession we could at least turn this out lorry into a compliment we had touched the pivot of the war whether this vast and dusky mass should prove the weakness of the nation or its strength we must depend in great measure we knew upon our efforts till the blacks were armed there was no guarantee of their freedom it was their demeanor underarms that shamed the nation into recognizing them as men end of chapter 13 recording by fnh visit www.bookranger.co.uk