The Washington Post
September 30, 1997
The Louisiana Regiments
It should be noted that the Civil War's celebrated Massachusetts
54th Regiment was not the first African American infantry unit in the Union
Army. (Style, Sep. 17). Not fully organized until May 13,1863, the 54th
was pre-dated by other bodies of black troops raised independently the
spring, summer, and fall of 1862 in Kansas and in the Federally- occupied
areas of South Carolina and Louisiana.
Although there had been earlier skirmishes in which black soldiers performed well, it was the valorous performance of the Louisiana Native Guards at Port Hudson, Louisiana, May 27, 1863, that opened the eyes of white "sneerers"--proving that blacks could and would fight in this war. Made up of free men of mixed racial ancestry from the New Orleans area and runaway slaves from surrounding plantations now free within Union lines, two of the three original Native Guard regiments were the first black troops in the war to experience a battle of any size.
A reported 1,080 men were involved at Port Hudson in May versus 600 from the Massachusetts 54th who stormed Fort Wagner on July 18. Losses for the northern unit greatly outnumbered the Louisiana regiments' casualties but the latter's attack was no less intense, their suffering no less severe--"their conduct was heroic; no troops could be more determined or daring"--stated their commanding general, Nathaniel P. Banks.
Reports reaching northern newspapers weeks after Port Hudson were inaccurate or with exaggerated figures based on accounts from those who did not actually witness the Native Guards' assault. The Massachusetts 54th's brave encounter with the loss of its white colonel, Robert Gould Shaw, was witnessed by a group of correspondents who were actually present at the South Carolina battle. In the belated media coverage of the Louisiana regiments, little was made of the deaths of two officers--black officers--who were representative of a corps of seventy-six commissioned line officers spread among the Native Guard units--the first and largest group of black officers who served in infantry or artillery units in the war.
C. P. Weaver
Oakton
Return
to the Native Guards' home page.