The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial IssueVarious
History
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue
Various
African Americans -- Social conditions -- To 1964; Civil rights movements; Martin Luther King, Jr., Day; United States -- History
help,--divided as the loyal States were,--the Rebels might have
succeeded in breaking up the Union, thereby entailing border wars and
troubles of unknown duration and incalculable calamity. All this and
more is true of these loyal negroes. Many daring exploits will be told
to their credit. Impartial history will paint them as men who deserved
well of their country. It will tell how they forded and swam rivers,
with what consummate address they evaded the sharp-eyed Rebel pickets,
how they toiled in the darkness of night through the tangled marshes
of briers and thorns, barefooted and weary, running the risk of losing
their lives, to warn our generals of Rebel schemes to surprise and
destroy our loyal army. It will tell how these poor people, whose rights
we still despised, behaved to our wounded soldiers, when found cold,
hungry, and bleeding on the deserted battle-field; how they assisted our
escaping prisoners from Andersonville, Belle Isle, Castle Thunder,
and elsewhere, sharing with them their wretched crusts, and otherwise
affording them aid and comfort; how they promptly responded to the
trumpet call for their services, fighting against a foe that denied them
the rights of civilized warfare, and for a government which was without
the courage to assert those rights and avenge their violation in
their behalf; with what gallantry they flung themselves upon Rebel
fortifications, meeting death as fearlessly as any other troops in the
service. But upon none of these things is reliance placed. These facts
speak to the better dispositions of the human heart; but they seem of
little weight with the opponents of impartial suffrage.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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