Books with title Army Life in a Black Regiment

Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a Unitarian minister, was a fervent member of New England's abolitionist movement, an active participant in the Underground Railroad, and part of a group that supplied material aid to John Brown before his ill-fated raid on Harpers Ferry. When the Civil War broke out, Higginson was commissioned as a colonel of the black troops training in the Sea Islands off the coast of the Carolinas.

"Army Life in a Black Regiment" is an account by Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a colonel of the 1st South Carolina Volunteers, the first federally authorized black regiment, in which he described his Civil War experiences. Higginson's account is particularly important owing to the fact that he contributed to the preservation of Negro spirituals by copying dialect verses and music he heard sung around the regiment's campfires.

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

"Army Life in a Black Regiment has some claim to be the best written narrative to come from the Union [side] during the Civil War. Higginson's picture of the battle which was the origin of "praise the Lord and pass the ammunition" and his reading of the Emancipation Proclamation to the black regiment are unsurpassed for eloquence." — historian Henry Steele CommagerOriginally a series of essays, this important volume was written by a Union colonel from New England, in charge of African-American troops training on the Sea Islands off the coast of the Carolinas. A lively and detailed wartime diary, the book offers a refreshing portrait of life in the Union Army from an officer's point of view, recording opinions of other commanders and capturing the raw humor that develops among the men in combat. Higginson's descriptions of the soldiers, routines of camp life, and southern landscapes are unforgettable, as is the account of his near escape from a cannon ball. An unusual historical document intended to introduce new generations of readers to an American past that should not be forgotten, Army Life in a Black Regiment will be invaluable to students of Black History and the American Civil War.

Thomas Wentworth Higginson was an American Unitarian minister, author, abolitionist, and soldier. He was active in the American Abolitionism movement during the 1840s and 1850s, identifying himself with disunion and militant abolitionism. During the Civil War, he served as colonel of the 1st South Carolina Volunteers, the first federally authorized African-American regiment, from 1862-1864. Following the war, Higginson devoted much of the rest of his life to fighting for the rights of freed slaves, women and other disenfranchised peoples.

"Army Life in a Black Regiment has some claim to be the best written narrative to come from the Union [side] during the Civil War. Higginson's picture of the battle which was the origin of "praise the Lord and pass the ammunition" and his reading of the Emancipation Proclamation to the black regiment are unsurpassed for eloquence." — historian Henry Steele CommagerOriginally a series of essays, this important volume was written by a Union colonel from New England, in charge of African-American troops training on the Sea Islands off the coast of the Carolinas. A lively and detailed wartime diary, the book offers a refreshing portrait of life in the Union Army from an officer's point of view, recording opinions of other commanders and capturing the raw humor that develops among the men in combat. Higginson's descriptions of the soldiers, routines of camp life, and southern landscapes are unforgettable, as is the account of his near escape from a cannon ball. An unusual historical document intended to introduce new generations of readers to an American past that should not be forgotten, Army Life in a Black Regiment will be invaluable to students of Black History and the American Civil War.

"One of the great source documents in human history, but one of our greatest Americans. . . . Thrilling reading." ? Tillie OlsenIn 1862 military necessity enabled Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton to pry from a hesitant President Lincoln the authority to enlist black troops in the Union army. The pioneer regiment of ex-slaves was to secure the beachhead tenously held at Beaufort, off the South Carolina coast. Within a year, Lincoln was to hail the enlistment of black soldiers, which he had earlier resisted as "revolutionary," as the "heaviest blow yet dealt the rebellion." The abolition of slavery, unthinkable in 1861, was to be inevitable by 1863. The commanding officer chosen for the First South Carolina Volunteers was Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a militant human rights activist, writer and lecturer, and former Unitarian minister. "In all the land," writes the historian Ray Allen Billington, they "could have found no one better for this assignment." Higginson was an excellent strategist and administrator who combined firmness with warmth and charm. Closely watched in the nation's press by both friends and foes of the undertaking, he soon shaped a first-class regiment. Army Life in a Black Regiment is Colonel Higginson's stirring account of his two years at Camp Saxton, recording the immediate effect of a decision that proved crucial to our survival as a nation and that ultimately shaped constitutional history. It is both a literary masterpiece and a unique historical document.