The Massachusetts 54th

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The Massachusetts54th
By Brian Beeco and Nick DiGuilio
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• The Massachusetts 54th was one of the first
  official all Black regiments in the United States
  armed forces.
• This infantry unit fought during the Civil War.
  Black soldiers did fight during the Revolutionary
  War and the War of 1812 but they were never
  organized into a formal military unit.

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After the signing of the Emancipation
Proclamation and the demand for new recruits, the
Lincoln administration agreed to enlist black
men. Only white men, however, could serve as
officers.
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• The regiment, organized in March 1863 by the
  Governor of Massachusetts, John A. Andrew, and
  was commanded by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw.
• Colonel Shaw was hand-picked by Gov. Andrew
  himself. Shaw was the 25 year old son of very
  wealthy abolitionist parents.

Colonel Robert Gould Shaw
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• Soldiers were recruited by white abolitionists
  (including Shaw's parents). By the middle of May,
  over a thousand black men from 24 states (15
  northern, five southern, and four Border States)
  had been accepted into the Massachusetts 54th
• Two of the recruits were sons of famed
  abolitionist Frederick Douglass
• The 54th left Boston to fight for the Union on
  May 28, 1863

Frederick Douglass
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• The regiment gained international fame on July
  18, 1863, when it spearheaded an assault on Fort
  Wagner near Charleston, South Carolina. Of the
  six hundred men that stormed Fort Wagner, one
  hundred and sixteen were killed. Another hundred
  and fifty-six were wounded or captured.

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• Colonel Shaw was also killed. He was buried in a
  common grave alongside 74 of his men.
• Although the Union was not able to take and hold
  the fort, the 54th was widely acclaimed for its
  valor, and the event helped encourage the further
  enlistment and mobilization of African-American
  troops.

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• The Fifty-fourth continued to serve throughout
  the remainder of the war. They fought at Olustee,
  Florida Honey Hill, South Carolina and finally
  at Boykin's Mills, South Carolina.

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Salary Conflict

• The black soldiers were supposed be treated
  equally to the white, but unfortunately that
  wasnt happening.
• When enlisted they were supposed to receive 13 a
  month, plus food and clothing. But they were only
  receiving 10 a month and 3 was coming out for
  clothing.

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• Outraged by the obvious injustice, the men of the
  54th Infantry refused to accept their pay, an act
  instigated by Colonel Shaw.
• On 15 June 1864, Massachusetts Senator Wilsons
  proposal passed and black soldiers finally
  received the pay they deserved. In addition to
  providing for the new wages, the act also allowed
  that any black soldier who had enlisted in the
  army after 19 April 1861 was to be paid the
  difference of what they had made and what they
  should have made.

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Legacy

• Decades later, Sergeant William Harvey Carney,
  who grabbed the US flag as the flag bearer fell
  and carried the flag to the enemy ramparts and
  back during the attack, became the first
  African-American soldier to be awarded the Medal
  of Honor.

Sergeant William Harvey Carney
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• The 54ths refusal of lesser pay and their
  heroics at Fort Wagner paved the way for equal
  treatment to all enlisted black soldiers during
  their time, as well as the more than 180,000
  black soldiers that enlisted from 186365 as a
  direct result of the 54th's performance and
  publicity.

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• The regiment's survivors received their discharge
  papers on September 1, 1865. Almost immediately
  the black community in Boston launched a drive to
  erect a memorial to the 54th. It would be more
  than 30 years before the memorial was completed.
  It took 12 years for the great American sculptor
  Augustus Saint-Gaudens complete the memorial. It
  was unveiled on Memorial Day 1897.

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The names of the five white officers killed in
battle were inscribed on the back of the
monument. It was only in 1981 that the names of
the black soldiers killed in action were added.
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The End
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