He was still, for a time at least, clumsy and
shambly. The understanding of the word of command did not come at once
and his individual action, if by any chance he should be left to act
alone, was, as a rule, less intelligent, less to be depended upon, than
that of the white man. But he stood up straight in the garb of manhood,
looked you fairly in the face, showed by his expression that he was
anxious for the privilege of fighting for freedom and for citizenship,
and in Louisiana, and throughout the whole territory of the War, every
black regiment that came into engagement showed that it could be
depended upon. Before the War was closed, some two hundred thousand
negroes had been brought into the ranks of the Federal army and their
service constituted a very valuable factor in the final outcome of the
campaigns. A battle like that at Milliken's Bend, Mississippi,
inconsiderable in regard to the numbers engaged, was of distinctive
importance in showing what the black man was able and willing to do when
brought under fire for the first time. A coloured regiment made up of
men who only a few weeks before had been plantation hands, had been left
on a point of the river to be picked up by an expected transport. The
regiment was attacked by a Confederate force of double or treble the
number, the Southerners believing that there would be no difficulty in
driving into the river this group of recent slaves.
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