THE NEGRO IN THE AMERICAN REBELLION _His Heroism and His Fidelity_ By William Wells Brown _Author of “Sketches of Places and People Abroad,” “The Black Man,” Etc_ Lee & Shepard, 149 Washington Street 1867 PREFACE. Feeling anxious to preserve for future reference an account of the part which the Negro took in suppressing the Slaveholders’ Rebellion, I have been induced to write this work. In doing so, it occurred to me that a sketch of the condition of the race previous to the commencement of the war would not be uninteresting to the reader. For the information concerning the services which the blacks rendered to the Government in the Revolutionary War, I am indebted to the late George Livermore, Esq., whose “Historical Research” is the ablest work ever published on the early history of the negroes of this country. In collecting facts connected with the Rebellion, I have availed myself of the most reliable information that could be obtained from newspaper correspondents, as well as from those who were on the battle-field. To officers and privates of several of the colored regiments I am under many obligations for detailed accounts of engagements. No doubt, errors in fact and in judgment will be discovered, which I shall be ready to acknowledge, and correct in subsequent editions. The work might have been swelled to double its present size; but I did not feel bound to introduce an account of every little skirmish in which colored men were engaged. I waited patiently, before beginning this work, with the hope that some one more competent would take the subject in hand; but, up to the present, it has not been done, although many books have been written upon the Rebellion. WILLIAM WELLS BROWN. Cambridgeport, Mass., Jan. 1, 1867. THE NEGRO IN THE AMERICAN REBELLION CHAPTER I--BLACKS IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR AND IN 1812. _The First Cargo of Slaves landed in the Colonies in 1620.--Slave Representation in Congress.--Opposition to the Slave-Trade.--Crispus Attucks, the First Victim of the Revolutionary War.--Bancroft’s Testimony.--Capture of Gen. Prescott.--Colored Men in the War of 1812.--Gen. Andrew Jackson on Negro Soldiers._ I now undertake to write a history of the part which the colored men took in the great American Rebellion. Previous to entering upon that subject, however, I may be pardoned for bringing before the reader the condition of the blacks previous to the breaking out of the war. The Declaration of American Independence, made July 4, 1776, had scarcely been enunciated, and an organization of the government commenced, ere the people found themselves surrounded by new and trying difficulties, which, for a time, threatened to wreck the ship of state.