advance began. These troops had never before been in action, and were now to test their mettle. The colored brigade moved forward against the works east of the Franklin pike and nearly parallel to it. As they advanced, what was intended merely as a demonstration was unintentionally converted into an actual assault. Thompson, finding his men rushing forward at the double-quick, gallantly led them to the very slope of the intrenchments. But in their advance across the open field, the continuity of his line was broken by a large fallen tree. As the men separated to pass it, the enemy opened an enfilading fire on the exposed flanks of the gap thus created, with telling effect. Nothing was left, therefore, but to withdraw as soon as possible to the original position. This was done without panic or confusion, after a loss of 467 men from the three regiments composing the brigade. (Vide Hood's "Invasion of Tennessee," "Century" War Articles.)

Colonel Thompson, in his report, as given in vol. ii. Rebellion Record Documents, p. 106, says :

"These troops were here for the first time under such a fire as veterans dread; and yet, side by side with the veterans of Stone River, Mission Ridge, and Atlanta, they assaulted probably the strongest work on the entire line, and, though not successful, they vied with the old warriors in bravery, tenacity, and deeds of noble daring. The loss of the brigade was over twenty-five per cent, and was sustained in less than thirty minutes."

The Fourteenth United States Colored Troops, one of the regiments of the First Brigade of the negro division at Nashville, had previously won a good name at Dalton, Georgia, on the 15th of August, 1864. This regiment had been sent as part of the relief column despatched by General Steedman to the aid of the garrison at Dalton. It held the left during the engagement, and behaved nobly. General Steedman had sent Captain Davis, of his staff, to observe and report upon the conduct of the black

soldiers, who were in perfect line of battle, firing regularly and effectively; and the captain rode back to his general and reported that "The regiment is holding dress-parade over there under fire."

These instances, all well authenticated, should satisfy any one that the negro troops, recruited and organized by the Government to aid in the suppression of the Rebellion, were fully as capable as the troops of other races to perform all the duties of soldiers. If in some respects the inferiors of the white volunteers, and from their long-continued servitude and lack of education naturally inferior to the educated white citizens of the North, yet in other respects they were, from that very inferiority, better fitted to fill the ranks of a regiment as part of that complicated human machine called an army. In physical bravery, steadiness under fire, and discipline to do what was ordered without question, they were certainly, when decently officered, equal to any troops which the Civil War produced, short of those organizations in which the high state of educated intelligence had actually created the spirit which would refuse to criticise, and took a pride in absolute obedience to orders, because the reason had first decided that a soldier never should do anything but obey.

The cases I have cited are but some of the many in which our colored volunteers played a most honorable part, and, though it would not be true to say that they always behaved well, yet the occasions in which they did not do as well as they ought to have done are not proportionately more numerous than those when white soldiers have failed; and I believe there was no occasion on which they were smitten as a body with a panic like that unreasoning panic of the Eleventh Corps at Chancellorsville, or that of the army in general at the first battle of Bull Run.

Finally, the fact that ever since the Rebellion there have been four regiments of negroes, two of cavalry and two of infantry, constantly in the service of the Govern

ment, forming part of the regular army, is perhaps the best answer that can be given to any one who doubts their capacity as soldiers. During all the four years of the war, the regular regiments were considered the choicest troops of the Union, and the greatest praise that could be given to a volunteer regiment was to compare it favorably with a regiment of regulars; yet the standard of intelligence was probably in few volunteer organizations not very much above that of the regulars. I am informed by those who have had full opportunity of judging, and who ought to know, that the negro regiments of the army, since the Rebellion, have borne a creditable, and in many cases a gallant part, in the services which our little army has been called upon to perform, that they serve in conjunction with the white troops without trouble, and that their officers make no objections to commanding them because of the color of their skins. It is safe to say that they will always henceforth be accepted as soldiers, and will continue to form a part of the forces on which the nation depends. In the words of General Duncan, who had known and commanded negroes, and knew their soldierly qualities,

"It is my verdict, and I believe that you will all coincide with me, that the colored troops deserved well of the Republic; and when the artist-historian of the coming age shall seek to represent in enduring marble or bronze the magnificent events of the period of the Great Rebellion, high among the crowning figures of the structure will he uprear a full-armed statue of a negro soldier, and the Muse of History, with truthful pen, shall inscribe at the front of that statue the legend: The colored troops fought nobly.'"

THE UNREMEMBERED SOLDIER.

D

BY WILLIAM SOOY SMITH.

[Read October 13, 1892.]

URING the great war in which we participated, the American people were a nation of "hero-worshippers," glad to sound the praises of the armies that fought, and perhaps still more delighted to heap honors on the heads of those who led them. The heroes of the hour were generally the commanders of armies, or at least of corps. Now and then the commander of a division, or even of a brigade, a regiment, or a company, favored by circumstances, rose to the surface, and was proudly tossed on the waves of popular applause. The people were pleased to bestow honors, and their favorites were no less. pleased to receive them. And this was right, when great services were really rendered, and the honors given fairly

won.

But how often did the soldiers at the front feel indignant at the columns of fulsome falsehood they read in the newspapers that reached them, describing unimportant skirmishes as great battles, and lauding to the skies, for their bravery and skill, officers who perhaps had not even sniffed the smell of "villanous gunpowder," when their handful of men had won the great victory? How often did they know that some straggling newspaper correspondent had found his way to the camp, and been furnished with tent and blanket, poor cigars and worse whiskey; and in the plenitude of his gratitude, with his blood and his imagination heated by his generous entertainment, and wishing to please the boys and their friends at home, and make popular the journal he served, had

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