"Incredible ... Anyone interested in the hardship, frustration,
and courage of soldiers at war will be enthralled by this book." --
James G. Hollandsworth, author of The Louisiana Native Guards
Until now, Union army colonel Nathan W. Daniels has been a
forgotten man with a forgotten regiment. The white commanding
officer of the 2nd Louisiana Native Guard Volunteers, a black
regiment, he was removed with his men from mainland military
activity and confined to obscure duty on Ship Island, ten miles off
the coast of Mississippi. However, as Daniels' intriguing diary
documents, despite an unrenowned existence that has earned them
little attention from historians, the 2nd Native Guards represent a
pioneering stage in the history of black troops at war.
The story of the Louisiana Native Guards is essentially the
story of the first black commissioned officers in the Civil War.
Ordered by General Benjamin F. Butler, the promotion of seventy-six
educated, free blacks was an experimental step taken during the
early days of black enlistment. However, within one year, nearly
all the officers, including their white colonels, were forced out
or had resigned in frustration.
Daniels lived the tale of these removals and confided his
thoughts to his diary, a rare surviving narrative from someone of
his rank and position. Woven through daily entries of routine life
on the military post are his comments about his responsibilities
and frustrations of being caught between the black and white
military worlds of the day. He vividly recalls a fierce skirmish on
the mainland at East Pascagoula, Mississippi, in which his black
troops, having fought superbly, suffered most of their casualties
from apparently intentional "friendly" fire from the Union gunboat
Jackson, sent there to protect them.
In May, 1863, Daniels was arrested in New Orleans on seemingly
trifling charges related to his duty on Ship Island. He continued
his diary in the Federally occupied city, giving fascinating
details of life there and chronicling his slow torture in the
machinery of the military bureaucracy. He eventually separated from
the army under circumstances that remain curious.
The diary also provides never-before-published pictures from
wartime Ship Island, including photographs of members of Daniels'
regiment, visiting ship captains, and Major Francis E. Dumas -- the
highest-ranking black officer to see combat during the war. A
superb resource in and of themselves, these photographs will
fascinate Civil War enthusiasts.
The first published personal narrative by a regimental commander
of free black troops, Thank God My Regiment an African One offers a
unique glimpse into the daily lives of white leaders of the
earliest black soldiers. It is a significant contribution to the
ongoing documentation of the experience of black troops in the
Civil War.
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