The 54th Massachusetts earned their reputation
by Kapanash
The 54th Massachusetts earned their reputation
by Kapanash
10 Comments
The 54th Massachusetts earned legendary status at Fort Wagner after continuing the assault under horrific fire. Their performance shattered Confederate and Northern doubts about Black combat troops.
If I had a nickel for every badass non-white Unit the US had that I know of during a time where Racial Tension was high.
I would have 4 Nickels. (The 54th Massachusetts, the Harlem Hellfighters, the Tuskegee Airmen, and the 442nd Infantry Regiement. The first 3 being Black and the 4 th being Japanese American.)
Their commanding officer Robert Gould Shaw was buried along with his man after the Battle of Fort Wager by the Confederate as a sign of disrespect. When Wager was recaptured and the Union army offer Shaw father to re bury him, he declined saying “we would not have his body removed where it lies surrounded by his brave and devoted soldiers.”
Confederates: we should announce that any captured black soldier will be executed & erase any doubt at Fort Pillow
Also Confederates: why are black troops willing to fight to the death?!
African americans in US wars have always been so badass. I could not imagine fighting for a nation that has never valued you. May these men never be forgotten.
Fine ill watch Glory again
These coloreds don’t run.
My college professor years ago said the 54th was ordered to lead the charge because they were black and therefore expendable. I always wondered if that was true
Dubois’ Black Reconstruction frames the civil war like a state sanctioned slave revolt.
Freedman could join the army, free their families still held captive, and some had the opportunity to shoot their former masters.
Enslaved people stopped working and collapsed the Southern economy once they felt protected by Union forces.
The Confederate said that No one would be able to breach Fort Wagner, until the 54th Massachusetts Regiment showed up