History of Negro Soldiers in the Spanish-American War, and Other Items of InterestJohnson, Edward A. (Edward Austin)
History
History of Negro Soldiers in the Spanish-American War, and Other Items of Interest
Johnson, Edward A. (Edward Austin)
Spanish-American War, 1898 -- Participation, African American
enough to convince the most incredulous "Doubting Thomases."
[Illustration: CONVENT AT CAVITË, WHERE AGUINALDO WAS PROCLAIMED
PRESIDENT OF THE PHILIPPINE REPUBLIC (JUNE, 1898).]
The greater portion of the American people have confidence in the
Negro soldier. This confidence is not misplaced--the American
government can, in the South, organize an army of Negro soldiers that
will defy the combined forces of any nation of Europe. The Negro can
fight in any climate, and does not succumb to the hardships of camp
life. He makes a model soldier and is well nigh invincible.
The Negro race has a right to be proud of the achievements of the
colored troopers in the late Spanish-American war. They were the
representatives of the whole race in that conflict; had they failed it
would have been a calamity charged up to the whole race. The race's
enemies would have used it with great effect. They did not fail, but
did their duty nobly--a thousand hurrahs for the colored troopers of
the Spanish-American war!!
In considering their successful achievements, however, it is well to
remember that there were some things the Negro had to forget while
facing Spanish bullets. The Negro soldier in bracing himself for that
conflict must needs forget the cruelties that daily go on against his
brethren under that same flag he faces death to defend; he must forget
that when he returns to his own land he will be met not as a citizen,
but as a serf in that part of it, at least, where the majority of
his people live; he must forget that if he wishes to visit his aged
parents who may perhaps live in some of the Southern States, he must
go in a "Jim Crow" car; and if he wants a meal on the way, he could
only get it in the kitchen, as to insist on having it in the dining
room with other travelers, would subject him to mob violence; he must
forget that the flag he fought to defend in Cuba does not protect him
nor his family at home; he must forget the murder of Frazier B. Baker,
who was shot down in cold blood, together with his infant babe in its
mother's arms, and the mother and another child wounded, at Lake City,
S.C., for no other offense than attempting to perform the duties of
Postmaster at that place--a position given him by President McKinley;
he must forget also the shooting of Loftin, the colored Postmaster at
Hagansville, Ga., who was guilty of no crime, but being a Negro and
holding, at that place, the Postoffice, a position given him by the
government; he must forget the Wilmington MASSACRE in which some forty
or fifty colored people were shot down by men who had organized
to take the government of the city in charge by force of the
Winchester--where two lawyers and a half dozen or more colored men of
business, together with such of their white friends as were thought
necessary to get rid of, were banished from the city by a mob, and
their lives threatened in the event of their return--all because they
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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