16th Massachusetts Regiment

Transcription

Just one month after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, Massachusetts Governor, John A. Andrew, officially began recruitment for the 54th Regiment Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry unit on February 9th, 1863. This was one of the first organized units compromised of African Americans, but a white officer, Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, led the unit. Frederick Douglass' two sons, Lewis and Charles were the first to enlist, along with William Carney, and James Henry Gooding. The 54th Regiment was poorly received amongst both the north and south. Many feared that after enlistment, black men would organize a rebellion throughout the north and south, inciting a race war. In a proclamation issued on December 23, 1862, the President of the Confederacy, Jefferson Davis, fueled these fears by accusing President Lincoln of encouraging blacks to revolt, stating, "African slaves have not only been excited to insurrection by every license and encouragement but numbers of them have actually been armed for a servile war" (Proclamation by the Confederate President). In his proclamation Davis threatened the penalty of re-enslavement to black soldiers and death to white officers captured by the confederacy. With little support and few hopes the 54th Regiment began training at Camp Meigs in Readville, Massachusetts. The Regiment was promised to receive 13 dollars and a clothing allowance, equal to that of white soldiers, however this was not done. Under the Militia Act of July 1862 black soldiers could only serve as laborers or militiamen, entitled to a maximum of ten dollars and rations. Out of protest and principle the regiment refused pay for 18 months. In a letter from Corporal James Henry Gooding to President Abraham Lincoln, Gooding challenged this issue, writing, "Now the main question is. Are we Soldiers, or are we LABOURERS. We are fully armed, and equipped, have done all the various Duties, pertaining to a Soldiers life, have conducted ourselves, to the complete satisfaction of General Officers, who, were if any, prejudiced against us, but who now accord us all the encouragement, and honour due us: have shared the perils, and Labour, of Reducing the first stronghold, that flaunted a Traitor Flag: and more, Mr. President" (Newkirk 231). When the regiment reached capacity, in May 1863, the full regiment, of 1,100 black soldiers, was ordered to Hilton Head, South Carolina. Under Colonel James Montgomery, the Regiments first action was to loot and burn the nearly abandon town of Darien, Georgia. Both the regiment and Colonel Shaw reluctantly completed such a menial and shameful task. Colonel Shaw wrote to his wife, Annie, on June 9, 1863, "I told him, I did not want the responsibility of it, and he was only too happy to take it all on his shoulders; so the pretty little place was burnt to the ground...One of my companies assisted in it, because he ordered them out and I had to obey" (Duncan 342). Opponents of the regiment immediately criticized the raid on Darien and slandered the reputation of the 54th regiment. On July 8, 1863, the 54th regiment was called to James Island, South Carolina to aid in the assault and capture of Charleston. In their first battle, on July 16th, the Union army was wholly outnumbered and the 54th regiment lost 14 troops. Two days later on July 18th, during the famous battle of Fort Wagner the unit charged the confederate troops and engaged in hand-to-hand combat, suffering several hundred casualties. Among the casualties was First Sergeant Robert J. Simmons who died after being captured by confederate troops. Although this was a significant defeat for the unit, the 54th regiment was used as a model for other all-black units and significantly bolstered black recruitment within the Union. Their heroism also helped to diffuse the tension surrounding black enlistment that led to the New York Draft Riots in July 1863. The 54th Regiment would later participate in the Battle of Olustee, the Battle of Honey Hill, and the Battle of Boykin's Mill. In a letter from Lewis Douglass, who survived the Battle of Fort Wagner, to Helen Amelia Loguen, he writes, "This regiment has established its reputation as a fighting regiment not a man flinched, though it was a trying time. Men fell all around me...Remember if I die I die in a good cause. I wish we had a hundred thousand colored troops we would put an end to this war" (Haskins 91).