Strength for the Fight
Author: Bernard C. Nalty
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Published: 1989
Total Pages: 436
ISBN-13: 002922411X
DOWNLOAD EBOOKSurveys the history of blacks in the armed forces from the 1600s to the 1980s.
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Blacks and the Military
Author: Martin Binkin
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Published: 2011-02-01
Total Pages: 212
ISBN-13: 9780815705666
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFor much of the nation's history, the participation of blacks in the armed forces was approximately in line with their proportion in the total population. This changed during the 1970s: by 1980 one of every three Army Gls and one of every five marines were black. The reaction has been mixed. Many Americans look with approval on the growth of black participation in military service, since it often affords young blacks educational, social, and financial opportunities that constitute a bridge to a better life not otherwise available to them. But for other Americans, the opportunities are outweighed by the disproportionate imposition of the burden of defense on a segment of the population that has not enjoyed a fair share of the benefits that society confers. From this perspective, the likelihood that blacks would suffer at least a third-and perhaps a half-of the combat fatalities in the initial stages of conflict is considered immoral, unethical, or otherwise contrary to the precepts of democratic institutions. Some also worry that military forces with such a high fraction of blacks entail risks to U.S. national security. A socially unrepresentative force, it is argued, may lack the cohesion considered vital to combat effectiveness. Others fear that such a force would be unreliable if it were deployed in situations that would test the allegiance of its minority members. And some have even expressed concern that a large proportion of blacks may raise questions about the status of U.S fighting forces, as judged by the American public, the nation's allies, and its adversaries. The authors of this book examine evidence on both sides of the issue in an effort to bring objective scrutiny to bear on questions that for many years have been loaded with emotion and subjective reaction. They also discuss the implications for the military's racial composition of demographic, economic, and technological trends and the possible effects of returning to some form of conscription.
Taps For A Jim Crow Army
Author: Christy McGuire
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Published: 2014-07-11
Total Pages: 321
ISBN-13: 0813148995
DOWNLOAD EBOOKMany black soldiers serving in the U.S. Army during World War II hoped that they might make permanent gains as a result of their military service and their willingness to defend their country. They were soon disabused of such illusions. Taps for a Jim Crow Army is a powerful collection of letters written by black soldiers in the 1940s to various government and nongovernment officials. The soldiers expressed their disillusionment, rage, and anguish over the discrimination and segregation they experienced in the Army. Most black troops were denied entry into army specialist schools; black officers were not allowed to command white officers; black soldiers were served poorer food and were forced to ride Jim Crow military buses into town and to sit in Jim Crow base movie theaters. In the South, German POWs could use the same latrines as white American soldiers, but blacks could not. The original foreword by Benjamin Quarles, professor emeritus of history at Morgan State University, and a new foreword by Bernard C. Nalty, the chief historian in the Office of Air Force History, offer rich insights into the world of these soldiers.
Duty beyond the Battlefield
Author: Le'Trice D. Donaldson
Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press
Published: 2020-01-31
Total Pages: 217
ISBN-13: 0809337592
DOWNLOAD EBOOKIn a bold departure from previous scholarship, Le’Trice D. Donaldson locates the often overlooked era between the Civil War and the end of World War I as the beginning of black soldiers’ involvement in the long struggle for civil rights. Donaldson traces the evolution of these soldiers as they used their military service to challenge white notions of an African American second-class citizenry and forged a new identity as freedom fighters willing to demand the rights of full citizenship and manhood. Through extensive research, Donaldson not only illuminates this evolution but also interrogates the association between masculinity and citizenship and the ways in which performing manhood through military service influenced how these men struggled for racial uplift. Following the Buffalo soldier units and two regular army infantry units from the frontier and the Mexican border to Mexico, Cuba, and the Philippines, Donaldson investigates how these locations and the wars therein provide windows into how the soldiers’ struggles influenced black life and status within the United States. Continuing to probe the idea of what it meant to be a military race man—a man concerned with the uplift of the black race who followed the philosophy of progress—Donaldson contrasts the histories of officers Henry Flipper and Charles Young, two soldiers who saw their roles and responsibilities as black military officers very differently. Duty beyond the Battlefield demonstrates that from the 1870s to 1920s military race men laid the foundation for the “New Negro” movement and the rise of Black Nationalism that influenced the future leaders of the twentieth century Civil Rights movement.
Black Soldiers in Blue
Author: John David Smith
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Published: 2005-10-12
Total Pages: 478
ISBN-13: 0807875996
DOWNLOAD EBOOKInspired and informed by the latest research in African American, military, and social history, the fourteen original essays in this book tell the stories of the African American soldiers who fought for the Union cause. An introductory essay surveys the history of the U.S. Colored Troops (USCT) from emancipation to the end of the Civil War. Seven essays focus on the role of the USCT in combat, chronicling the contributions of African Americans who fought at Port Hudson, Milliken's Bend, Olustee, Fort Pillow, Petersburg, Saltville, and Nashville. Other essays explore the recruitment of black troops in the Mississippi Valley; the U.S. Colored Cavalry; the military leadership of Colonels Thomas Higginson, James Montgomery, and Robert Shaw; African American chaplain Henry McNeal Turner; the black troops who occupied postwar Charleston; and the experiences of USCT veterans in postwar North Carolina. Collectively, these essays probe the broad military, political, and social significance of black soldiers' armed service, enriching our understanding of the Civil War and African American life during and after the conflict. The contributors are Anne J. Bailey, Arthur W. Bergeron Jr., John Cimprich, Lawrence Lee Hewitt, Richard Lowe, Thomas D. Mays, Michael T. Meier, Edwin S. Redkey, Richard Reid, William Glenn Robertson, John David Smith, Noah Andre Trudeau, Keith Wilson, and Robert J. Zalimas Jr.
Torchbearers of Democracy
Author: Chad L. Williams
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Published: 2010-09-20
Total Pages: 469
ISBN-13: 0807899356
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFor the 380,000 African American soldiers who fought in World War I, Woodrow Wilson's charge to make the world "safe for democracy" carried life-or-death meaning. Chad L. Williams reveals the central role of African American soldiers in the global conflict and how they, along with race activists and ordinary citizens, committed to fighting for democracy at home and beyond. Using a diverse range of sources, Torchbearers of Democracy reclaims the legacy of African American soldiers and veterans and connects their history to issues such as the obligations of citizenship, combat and labor, diaspora and internationalism, homecoming and racial violence, "New Negro" militancy, and African American memories of the war.
Black History in the Last Frontier
Author: Ian C. Hartman
Publisher:
Published: 2020
Total Pages: 208
ISBN-13: 9780996583787
DOWNLOAD EBOOKContagions of Empire
Author: Khary Oronde Polk
Publisher: UNC Press Books
Published: 2020-04-17
Total Pages: 289
ISBN-13: 1469655519
DOWNLOAD EBOOKFrom 1898 onward, the expansion of American militarism and empire abroad increasingly relied on black labor, even as policy remained inflected both by scientific racism and by fears of contagion. Black men and women were mobilized for service in the Spanish-Cuban-American War under the War Department's belief that southern blacks carried an immunity against tropical diseases. Later, in World Wars I and II, black troops were stigmatized as members of a contagious "venereal race" and were subjected to experimental medical treatments meant to curtail their sexual desires. By turns feared as contagious and at other times valued for their immunity, black men and women played an important part in the U.S. military's conscription of racial, gender, and sexual difference, even as they exercised their embattled agency at home and abroad. By following the scientific, medical, and cultural history of African American enlistment through the archive of American militarism, this book traces the black subjects and agents of empire as they came into contact with a world globalized by warfare.
African Americans and the Pacific War, 1941–1945
Author: Chris Dixon
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2018-09-20
Total Pages: 305
ISBN-13: 1107112699
DOWNLOAD EBOOKDixon provides the first comprehensive study of African American military and social experiences during the Pacific War.
African Americans In The Revolutionary War
Author: Lt. Col. (Ret.) Michael Lee Lanning
Publisher: Citadel Press
Published: 2021-11-29
Total Pages: 257
ISBN-13: 0806541695
DOWNLOAD EBOOK“A thorough, long-overdue study of Black Americans’ contributions during the War of Independence. . . . An important piece of American and African American history.” —Kirkus Reviews In this enlightening and informative work, military historian Lt. Col. Michael Lee Lanning (ret.) reveals the little-known, critical, and heroic role African Americans played in the American Revolution, serving in integrated units—a situation that would not exist again until the Korean War—more than 150 years later . . . At first, neither George Washington nor the Continental Congress approved of enlisting African Americans in the new army. Nevertheless, Black men—both slave and free—filled the ranks and served in all of the early battles. Black sailors also saw action in every major naval battle of the Revolution, including members of John Paul Jones’s crew aboard the Bonhomme Richard. At least thirteen Black Americans served in the newly formed U.S. Marine Corps during the war. Bravery among African Americans was commonplace, as recognized by their commanders and state governments, and their bravery is recorded here in the stories of citizen Crispus Attucks at the Boston Massacre; militiaman Price Esterbrook at Lexington Green; soldier Salem Poor at Bunker Hill; and marine John Martin aboard the brig Reprisal. As interest in colonial history enjoys renewed popularity due to works like Hamilton, and the issues of prejudice and discrimination remain at the forefront of our times, African Americans in the Revolutionary War offers an invaluable perspective on a crucial topic that touches the lives of Americans of every color and background.
