Black Union Soldiers in the Civil War

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McFarland, Oct 3, 2003 - History - 270 pages

This book refutes the historical slander that blacks did not fight for their emancipation from slavery. At first harshly rejected in their attempts to enlist in the Union army, blacks were eventually accepted into the service--often through the efforts of individual generals who, frustrated with bureaucratic inaction in the face of dwindling forces, overrode orders from the secretary of war and the president himself. By the end of the war, black soldiers had numbered over 187,000 and served in 167 regiments. Seventeen were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, the nation's highest award for valor. Theirs was a remarkable achievement whose full story is here told for the first time.

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Contents

1861
7
1862
23
1863
71
1863
115
1864
163
1865
195
E Summary of Union Losses During the Civil War
210
H Black Union Recipients of the Congressional Medal
216
Bibliography
237
Index
247
Copyright

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About the author (2003)

The late Hondon B. Hargrove, of Lansing, Michigan, was widely engaged as a speaker on black military history and was a Buffalo Division artillery officer. He was also the author of Buffalo Soldiers in Italy (2003).

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