Across the cloudless sky of this era of unexampled commercial, artistic and social sphere[92] the war cloud crept with ominous grimness. It burst and drenched the State with blood. Louisiana made ready to stand with the South. On the 23d of November, 1861, there had been a grand review of the Confederate troops stationed in New Orleans. An associated press despatch announced that the line was seven miles long. The feature of the review, however, was one regiment composed of fourteen hundred free colored men. The state militia was reorganized entirely for whites but Governor Moore ordered the men of color into the army. Another grand review followed the next spring. The _New Orleans Picayune_ made the following comment. "We must also pay a deserved compliment to the companies of free colored men, all very well drilled and comfortably uniformed. Most of these companies, quite unaided by the administration, have supplied themselves with arms without regard to cost or trouble."[93] On the same day, one of these colored companies was presented with a flag, and every evidence of public approbation was manifested. These men of color in New Orleans were the only organized body of Negro soldiery on the Confederate side during the Civil War. They were accepted as part of the State militia forming three regiments and two batteries of artillery. In the report of the Select Commission on the New Orleans Riots, Charles W. Gibbons testified that when the war broke out, the Confederacy called on all free people to do something for the seceding States, and if they did not a committee was appointed to look after them, to rob, kill, and despoil their property. Gibbons himself was advised by a policeman to enlist on the Confederate side or be lynched. This accounts for the seeming disloyalty of these free men of color.[94] The first victories of the South made their leaders overconfident thereafter and the colored troops were dismissed.