Visiting Owens Dawson

Researching the life and times of Q.M. Sgt. Owens Dawson of the Twenty-fifth U.S. Colored Infantry has provided me an opportunity to get to know a man who died fifty-nine years before my birth. I've imagined him waiting on tables in a Philadelphia restaurant before the war, marching to the sound of drum and fife on the drill ground at Camp William Penn, mourning the untimely death of his first wife, traveling to Washington, D.C., to begin a new life, and, in his dotage, chatting up aged veterans at a Grand Army of the Republic reunion.

Today, I visited his grave site at Arlington National Cemetery, located a few miles from my home. I enjoyed a quiet moment to reflect on a life of joy and sorrow, in service of country, for the betterment of our nation.

Little could he have imagined that 105 years after his death that I would be standing at his grave site, snapping pictures of a cool marble slab that marks the spot where his earthly remains lie undisturbed, a silent stone witness to the memory of a man.

"The Men Always Felt This a Grievance"

If there was ever any question that African American soldiers could and would fight, no one bothered to tell Frederick Lyman Hitchcock, an officer in the 132nd Pennsylvania Infantry who suffered two wounds at Fredericksburg and went on to be colonel and commander of the Twenty-fifth U.S. Colored Infantry. After the war he had this to say about the character of the men in the Twenty-fifth:

"I desire to bear testimony to the esprit du corps, and general efficiency of the organization as a regiment, to the competency and general good character of its officers, to the soldierly bearing, fidelity to duty, and patriotism of its men. Having seen active service in the Army of the Potomac, prior to my connection with the Twenty-fifth, I can speak with some degree of assurance. After a proper time had been devoted to its drill, I never for a moment doubted what would be its conduct under fire. It would have done its full duty beyond question. An opportunity to prove this the Government never afforded, and the men always felt this a grievance."

From Bates' History of Pennsylvania Volunteers, Vol. V, pp. 1026-1027.

I admire Hitchcock's confidence in his men, and his clear dissatisfaction for never having been sent to see the elephant with his command.

Slavery: Simple Words, Stark Reminder

"I owned Silas Brown."
— Dr. Cyrus N. Brown, Yazoo City, Miss.

"He was owned before & during the war by Dr. C.N. Brown’s wife, thereby getting the name of Brown."
— Tibby Johnson, wife of Silas Johnson, formerly Silas Brown.

These references to Silas Johnson's early life as a slave appear in his application for a Civil War pension. Both are still in my mind weeks after I read them. These simple declarations provoked an immediate emotional response: Surprise that these individuals acknowledged slavery in such a dispassionate way; sadness for a man deprived of freedom and education during his early life; repulsion and disappointment for a man who participated in the ownership of another human being; a sense of loss for the millions of men and women of color who endured centuries of racism.

All of this feeling charged through my body in an instant. Simple words. Stark reminder.

I was unprepared for the depth of my feeling. I know slavery is a moral wrong and that it is at the center of our greatest national crisis. I learned this from books. Silas Johnson and Dr. C.N. Brown lived it. Their simple, dispassionate acknowledgment of the fact, devoid of feeling, somehow makes it all that more personal for me.

It is experiences like this that drive me to tell the stories of men like Johnson.

Post-Civil War Labor Contracts

The phrase labor contracts instantly brings to mind images of the massive reform movement of the late nineteenth century and the powerful political organizations of the twentieth. My father was an active member of his labor union, which protected his rights as a worker in a scissor manufacturing plant in New Jersey. He served as shop steward at one time.

Transcribing the 1866 agreement between Cyrus N. Brown, owner of the Alterra plantation along the Yazoo Delta in Mississippi, and the freedman who were formerly his slaves, I wondered what impact contracts like this (preserved on rolls and rolls of microfilm at the National Archives) had on the larger efforts of labor reform. Here is the transcribed contract:

Yazoo City Jany 5th 1866

We the undersigned foremen agree to work faithfully & honestly for C.N. Brown for the year 1866 for the following considerations. All field hands are to have one third of the corn & cotton made on this plantation for the year 1866, our employer to furnish teams & farming essentials, good rations & medical attention, half of every Saturday to be given to our own pursuits, with team and farming essentials for the cultivation of our gardens, patches & the sawing of wood. All hands are permitted to raise poultry, & four hogs to each family, to furnish their own corn in rearing & fattening their hogs. The hands will select from their number a foreman or leader to be governed & controlled by him as to hours for working & the time to come in from the field. We the foremen of Alterra plantation do agree to obey & respect the orders of the foreman or leader.
All stock shall be regularly attended to on Saturday & Sunday.

C.N. Brown
Samuel (his X mark) Hustin
Dolley (her X mark) Hustin

From Records of the Field Offices for the State of Mississippi. Bureau of Refugees, Freedman, and Abandoned Lands, 1865-1872. I became aware of these files after finding Freedom's Women: Black Women and Families in Civil War Era Mississippi (Indina University Press, 1999) by Noralee Frankel.

A Most Unusual Photo Album

First Lieutenant Theodore Francis Wright of Dorchester, Mass., was described as a student of a serious turn of mind and a dedicated diarist. In the spring of 1864 he wrote in his journal, "I have for some time been deliberating about leaving college to go to the war, and I have, at last, with the consent of my parents, determined to study for a commission in the colored troops."

Wright (pictured here, standing on the right, in his uniform) received a commission as first lieutenant. He explained his first assignment:

"My assignment to the 108th U. S. Colored Infantry organizing at Louisville, Kentucky, came June 14th, 1864, and I was ordered to report immediately. Attached to 'F' Company, Captain John H. Lee of New York, I spent one month at Louisville, the month of August at Maysville, Ky., aiding the enlistment of negroes; September at Muldraughs Hill, Ky., guarding from guerillas the Louisville and Nashville R. R., enjoying military life exceedingly. About October first the entire regiment, under command of Lieutenant Colonel John J. Bishop of Indiana, started for Rock Island Barracks, Illinois, where we spent the long and very severe winter, guarding rebel prisoners. The men improved scanty moments of leisure to learn to read and write, while I studied over my old classics."

In March 1865, 1st Lt. Wright and his company stepped into a Rock Island photographer's studio. Each man had their carte de visite portrait taken. Wright penned a brief note on the back of each image. On the reverse side of Kendrick Allen's carte, Wright wrote, "Now Serg't and an excellent one, and commands dedication." Allen made the army his career after the war as a Buffalo Soldier. Wright wrote honest appraisals of his men: On the back of the carte de visite of Pvt. Alfred Thompson is written "Second rate man."

Wright placed the entire collection of company cartes into a photograph album and presented it to his mother, Sarah Augusta (Hunt) Wright.

Wright (1845-1907) went on to study theology and earn two degrees from Harvard University. He is best remembered for his contributions as a pastor and author. Yet the photograph album he presented to his mother, filled with brief, honest remembrances of a company of African Americans who fought for freedom, is among the most unique of all Civil War photograph collections. The album is part of the Randolph Linsly Simpson African-American Collection, James Weldon Johnson Collection in the Yale Collection of American Literature, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

Setting Deadlines

One word to describe the first nine months of this book project is discovery: Locating images, securing rights and permissions, searching for primary sources, finding resources, reading articles and books on the African American war experience, sorting lists and databases. In short, getting started on the manuscript journey, traveling down unfamiliar paths, finding some dead ends, but other paths that lead to other paths and roadways.

I have a long way to go yet. However, the roads are starting to feel familiar. For the first time since last year, I have a sense of how long it will take to get there. My estimates:

By the end of 2009
75 images secured
10 profiles researched and written

By the end of 2010
95 images secured
60 profiles researched and written

By June 2011
Manuscript complete

Fall 2012
Book published

It will be interesting to find out how accurate my estimates compare to reality. Time will tell. This may seem like a fruitless exercise to some, but it helps me to know that a plan of sorts is formed.