Item #51-1910 Colored Troops Under General Wild, Liberating Slaves in South Carolina. Harper's Weekly Artist.

Colored Troops Under General Wild, Liberating Slaves in South Carolina

New York: Harper's Weekly, 1864. Wood-engraving. 10.5 x 14.5 inches. Framed and matted.

In this journalistic sketch, a group of African American soldiers liberates a plantation in eastern North Carolina. The troops were the so-called "African Brigade" composed of black recruits from Massachusetts and newly freed contraband slaves from Union-occupied territories of North Carolina. Like all black troops in the Civil War, the African Brigade was led by a white officer, in this case an abolitionist from Massachusetts. Although some Northerners doubted whether freedmen would make effective soldiers, Union officers in the area reported that "recruiting for the African Brigade is progressing lively and enthusiastically...Quite a recruiting fever has seized the freedmen of [New Bern]...Four thousand colored soldiers are counted upon in this [district]." Another officer wrote "One can hardly forget the enthusiasm amongst the negroes of this place..."

eneral Wild raises an army of former slaves who take aim at southern ... The Proclamation, in freeing slaves in the areas under rebellion, sets the stage for General Order No. 143, which instituted the Bureau of Colored Troops to recruit all-black ... To the 1st North Carolina Colored Volunteers and the other. Item #51-1910

Price: $175.00

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