At the beginning of the Civil War, Richard Harvey Cain, a student at Wilberforce University in Ohio, was among a group of black students who attempted to join the Union Army in Ohio. Cain was turned down. Below he writes about the events after the first shots were fired at Fort Sumter and the importance of the Massachusetts Fifty-fourth Regiment, the first black troop to be organized in the North during the Civil War.

I shall never forget the thrill that ran through my soul when I thought of the coming consequences of that shot. There were one hundred and fifteen of us students at the University, who, anxious to vindicate the stars and stripes, made up a company and offered our services to the Governor of Ohio; and sir, we were told that this is a white man’s war and that the Negro had nothing to do with it. Sir, we returned, docile, patient, waiting, casting our eyes to the Heavens whence help always comes. We knew that there would come a period in the history of this nation when our strong black arms would be needed. We waited patiently; we waited until Massachusetts, through her noble Governor, sounded the alarm, and we hastened to hear the summons and obey it.

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Letter by Richard Harvey Cain written at the time of the Civil War, quoted in Zak Mettger, Till Victory is Won: Black Soldiers in the Civil War (New York: Puffin Books, 1997), 2.

As the United States grew in population and area in the 1800s, it became increasingly divided by the issues of slavery and state’s rights. While factories in the North were drawing people from farms to towns and cities, at midcentury, the economy in the South remained tied to agriculture. Of the eleven million people living in the South in 1860, nearly four million were slaves, and most worked on farms. Abolitionists wanted to end slavery, but many people in the South believed in the states’ right to decide this issue. Slavery and its spread to the western frontier became two of the most argued issues in the country.

In late 1860, South Carolina seceded from the Union, quickly followed by other southern states. Together they formed the Confederate States of America. When Confederate forces fired on the U.S. Army’s Fort Sumter in South Carolina on April 12, 1861, the Civil War began.

As the war progressed, many black men decided to form their own regiments to fight for the Union. In 1862 Congress agreed to their enlistment and more than 186,000 African-American men signed up. They were not paid as much as white soldiers or were not paid at all, were given poor equipment, and often ran out of supplies. To make matters worse, Confederate soldiers threatened to enslave or kill any black soldiers they captured, and kill their white commanders. Overcoming these hardships, black soldiers proved themselves heroically in battle. They led raids, served as spies and scouts, fought in battles, and faced some of the worst confrontations in the war. They helped win the war for the Union.

The Massachusetts Fifty-fourth Regiment, the first African-American troop in the North, began recruitment in February 1863, one month after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. The recruits came from twenty-four states; one-quarter of them slave states. Among the recruits were barbers, boatmen, laborers, cabinetmakers, a dentist, and a druggist. Some were as young as sixteen. Some were fathers enlisting with sons. Members of the regiment included Frederick Douglass’ two sons, the grandson of abolitionist Sojourner Truth, and William H. Carney, the first African American to win the Medal of Honor. Robert Gould Shaw, the white son of prominent Boston abolitionists, was appointed to command the regiment, as military policy did not allow black men to serve as officers.

On May 28, the largest crowd in Boston’s history assembled to see the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment march off to fight. Two months later, Shaw and one-third of his men died during the Union’s siege at Fort Wagner, one of the forts protecting Charleston, South Carolina, a bastion of the Confederacy. The brave conduct of this regiment inspired black men like Richard Harvey Cain to enlist in the Union forces.

After the battle of Fort Wagner, proposals were made by men of the Fifty-fourth to erect a memorial. Sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens took almost a dozen years to create it. He began with the idea of an equestrian statue of the young Colonel Shaw. The plan evolved into a procession of black soldiers with their leader, moving together toward the goal of emancipation. The monument is cast in very high relief. To make each soldier individualized, Saint-Gaudens created forty heads using live models of different ages. Seen in profile are the mounted Colonel Shaw and rows of soldiers carrying rifles, packs, and canteens, all led by young drummer boys. Above the procession floats an angel holding an olive branch, symbolizing peace, and poppies, symbolizing death.

Discussion Questions:

• What was one of the issues that started the Civil War? Why were abolitionists against slavery?
• Why was the Massachusetts Fifty-fourth Regiment so important?
• Why do you think the relief sculpture includes an angel carrying poppies above the soldiers?
• Richard Harvey Cain’s letter tells of the pride and eagerness one black man had being able to serve in the Civil War. How is this mood also conveyed in the sculpture? (Men standing straight, moving forward, focused expressions.)
• Why do you think black men like Richard Harvey Cain wanted to fight in the Civil War?
• What can you learn about how war was fought in the nineteenth century from Saint-Gaudens’ relief sculpture? How are battles and weapons different today?
• What new information has this sculpture and letter taught you about the nineteenth century?