Presents


African Americans
and World War I

In April 1917, the United States entered WWI. Ultimately, over 400,000 African Americans would serve in this conflict, more than double the number that had served in the Civil War. But as the United States mobilized to meet the demands of its first global war, the reception it gave its black soldiers and sailors was every bit as hostile as it had given their grandfathers in the struggle between the Blue and Gray.

The Buffalo Soldiers were exiled to posts in the far West and did not see combat. Black volunteers and draftees, enlisted and officers encountered pervasive and unrelenting racial discrimination, official reluctance to fully train, equip, and use them and black women's attempts to offer their services as nurses were flatly refused.
Photo on left: Pictured with his mother, a member of the 369th Colored Infantry, who was wounded in war.

Limited by shipboard manning quotas and largely relegated to srvice as stwards, messmen, firemen, and coal passers,about 5,000 African American served in the U.S. Army.

Photo left: Capt. Dee Jones, and a sample ID Card printed in English and French. This card was carried by all American soldiers of The expeditionary forces in Europe.

Nevertheless, the majority of blacks rallied to the nation's defense. And even-though the majority of black men were relegated to the Services of Supply, mainly serving as laborers and stevedores, black Americans could still take heart in the sterling exploits of the handful of black combat units like the 369th Infantry Regiment, a National Guard outfit also known as Harlem Hellfighters; they were the first Americans, black or white, to reach the combat zone in France, the first to cross the Rhine River in the offensive against Germany; and, the Harlem Hell-fighters were in continuous combat for 191 days, longer than any other American Unit.

One of the men of the 369th, Sgt. Henry Johnson, became the first American to win the French War Cross, the Croix de Guerre. In May 1918, Johnson and Pvt. Needham Roberts valiantly fought off a vicious attack by a large German raiding party that appears to have numbered over 30 men. They killed at lease four Germans and wounded ten. Johnson is buried at Arlington National Cemetary.

It was this same spirit and valor that allowed Doughboys and sailors to withstand the racist policies of the American military and return to make "America safe for Democracy."






This has been another Sketch in Color, I'm C.R. Gibbs
Copyright 2001


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