The Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts was established in early 1863 under the direction of colonel Robert Gould Shaw. Shaw was only twenty six years old when he was put in charge of the regiment. He came from a strong abolitionist family in Boston before the war. Before gaining his position as the colonel of the Fifty-Fourth Massachusetts, Shaw served in the Seventh New York National guard and the Second Massachusetts infantry. In February 1863, Shaw was apointed by Massachusetts govoner John A. Andrew to lead the first all black Union regiment, the Fighting Fifty-Fourth, into the Civil War.
President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1. Within weeks, on January 26, the Secretary of War authorized Governor John Andrew of Massachusetts to raise the first African American corps in the North. Prejudicial beliefs that blacks would lack military discipline and fight badly set a negative attitude, but Andrew, a strong abolitionist, supported enlistment of African Americans.
Recruitment began in Boston on February 9. By February 21, barracks were readied at Camp Meigs in Readville, outside Boston. Massachusetts had only a small black community, so recruits were enlisted from other states including New York, Indiana, Missouri, Ohio, and even Canada. Among the enlisted men were Frederick Douglass’ sons Charles and Lewis.
Reaction from the South to black recruitment was swift. The Confederate Congress issued a proclamation that African Americans captured in uniform would be sold into slavery, and white officers of such troops would be executed. Though not carried out, the threat was a grave challenge to every recruit and officer of the Massachusetts 54th. Among those calling for the authorization of black soldiers in the Civil War was Frederick Douglass, who felt that military service would signal African Americans’ freedom from slavery and citizenship status. Douglass said, “Let the slaves and free colored people be called into service, and formed into a liberating army, to march into the South and raise the banner of emancipation among the slaves….Men of Color, To Arms!”
The Essay on Were Blundering Politicians The Main Political Cause Of The American Civil War
Discuss the view that the main political cause of the American civil war was the leadership failings of a blundering generation It is felt by many that the main cause of the American civil war was the failings of politicians such as Stephen Douglas, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan. They are considered to have made a series of political blunders, such as Douglass handling of the Kansas - ...
Training began as soon as recruits began arriving and continued until the regiment sailed to its first post. On May 12, the 54th reached its full number of 1,000 soldiers. At Colonel Shaw’s insistence his men were issued light blue infantry uniforms instead of the darker blue worn by blacks doing support labor for the army. On May 18, Shaw’s regiment received a request from General David Hunter, commander of the Department of the South, for their regiment to proceed to Beaufort, South Carolina. On May 28 the regiment marched from Readville through Boston and down to the harbor. Their procession through Boston passed Shaw’s family home and the Boston State House amid crowds lining the streets. 1863 June On June 3 one of the companies sailed to Hilton Head, South Carolina. On June 10 some of the 54th troop were forced to loot and burn the small town of Darien, Georgia, of no military import. Shaw protested the burning and the degradation of the high purpose of the regiment.
1863 July Shaw achieved transfer of his troops to another command, insisting upon the importance of black participation in active war theatres. On July 8 the regiment was dispatched to James Island, near Charleston. On July 16, companies of the 54th provided rear-guard support to a company attacked by Confederates trying to recapture the island; they held their line and were cited for bravery. The regiment then went to Morris Island, at the northern end of which stood Fort Wagner.
The Essay on History of Pangkor Island
In past times; this area used to be the center for piracy. The pirates had their home ports in the Pulau Gedung Hills, Gua Lanun (Pirates’ Cave) and Batu Perompak (Pirates’ Rock) on the island of Pangkor. Many ships/boats were taken over and robbed of their goods and products. The Dutch were active here in the times of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). People were especially keeping ...
Fort Wagner was a large earth and sandbag fortification, one of several guarding the strategic harbor of Charleston. Approachable only along a narrow strip of shore and armed with large artillery, the garrison was a massive, seemingly invincible bulwark.
On July 17-18, while the Union navy shelled Fort Wagner from the sea, the men of the 54th traversed from James Island to Cole’s and then Folly Island toward Morris Island. They walked on planks in the mud flats, boarded transport boats from the edge of one island to the other, and, though tired and parched after a night and day of travel, undertook responsibility for an infantry attack on the fort.
The assault was to be at dusk. Shaw positioned himself at the front of his regiment, not behind as was customary. At 3:00 p.m. they marched to within 1,000 yards of the battlement. At 7:45 p.m. the regiment advanced to close range. As they stormed the fort they were met with shelling. Many fell, but the troops kept moving forward and up the fort’s sloped, sandy walls. Shaw was shot as he neared the top of the parapet. He pitched over into the fort, dead. Of the 600 men, 281 were killed, wounded, missing, or taken prisoner.
On July 19, a truce was declared. Shaw was stripped and thrown into a ditch with his soldiers, contrary to ceremonial burials usually provided for officers. Northern newspapers reported on the trench burial. Recruitment in the North was stirred, and Shaw’s parents later rejected an offer to have their son’s body exhumed, writing that they could hope for “no holier place” for it than “…surrounded by his brave and devoted soldiers.” Fort Wagner was abandoned on September 6, 1863. Union troops occupied the fort; Charleston had been exposed. The 54th went on to Florida, distinguishing itself in the battle of Olustee from which several men were taken to the infamous Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia. Among them was Corporal James Henry Gooding, who sent letters published in his hometown newspaper, the New Bedford, Mass. “Mercury” before dying at Andersonville in July of 1864. The 54th also fought at Honey Hill, South Carolina (November 30, 1864) and at Boykins Mills (April 18, 1865).
On September 1, 1865, the regiment received discharge papers and marched past the State House in Boston on the very route they had taken when they departed for war. The Massachusetts 54th had refused pay rather than accept the $10 a month specified by the Militia Act (passed on July 17, 1862) which deducted $3 from black soldiers’ salaries for clothing while also specifying an addition of $3 per month to white soldiers’ pay for a clothing allowance. The prejudicial discrepancy was finally resolved by an act of Congress, which authorized black troops to receive pay equal to their white counterparts. By the end of the Civil War over 175,000 African Americans had volunteered to serve the Union, accounting for 10% of the North’s army and navy.
The Essay on The Fight for Equal Rights Black Soldiers in the Civil War
... soldiers was at Fort Wagner in South Carolina on July 18, 1863. The Massachusetts 54th Regiment, commanded by abolitionist Robert Gould Shaw, ... period was longer, they were given old weapons, their pay was lower, and they had little chance of promotion. ... was ambushed by Confederate forces while trying to attack the strong Confederate fortress on Morris Island. The Massachusetts ...
