Rochester[, N.Y.] 6 March 1863.

HON GERRIT SMITH:

MY DEAR SIR: I have thought much of your letter to Mr May,¹Samuel J. May. expressing the wish that we should send at least one colored company of soldiers from the state of New York to make part of the regiment now forming at Readville Massachusetts.²Readville was the location of an important training camp for black volunteers in the Union army. It was constructed in early 1863 just outside Boston, Massachusetts. Colonel Robert Gould Shaw was placed in command of the camp, with Norwood Hallowell as his second. The Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry Regiment was the first to muster at Readville, near the end of March; it was among the first black regiments to serve in the Civil War. Governor John A. Andrew, who received authorization from the secretary of war, Edwin M. Stanton, to raise black troops for the unit, initiated the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts on 26 January 1863. Although initial efforts to recruit volunteers proved disappointing, by May the number of black volunteers was so high that the Fifty-fifth Massachusetts was formed to take in the surplus recruits. Albert G. Browne, Sketch of the Official Life of John A. Andrew (New York, 1868), 4, 108; Luis F. Emilio, A Brave Black Regiment: The History of the Fifty-Fourth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, 1863-1865, 2d ed. (1894; New York, 1995), 24; Quarles, Negro in the Civil War, 8-9; idem, Frederick Douglass, 204-06; Cornish, Sable Arm, 106-10, 152-56; ACAB, 5:31. At first I saw some ground for hesitation.³Initial efforts to recruit Massachusetts blacks into the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry proved disappointing because of the small number of black residents in that state—less than 1 percent of the population. In response to the low turnout, Governor John A. Andrew turned to a committee of private citizens, headed by the veteran abolitionist George L. Stearns, to undertake an enlistment campaign for the Fifty-fourth throughout the North and in occupied portions of the Confederacy. As part of his strategy to engage prominent blacks as recruiting agents, Stearns traveled to Rochester, New York, in late February 1863 to persuade Douglass to aid in encouraging enlistment in the Fifty-fourth. Douglass immediately agreed, published a call to arms in his Monthly, and toured upstate New York to enlist recruits. By mid-April, Douglass had enrolled a company of more than one hundred men, including his own sons Charles and Lewis. Gerrit Smith contributed $700 to pay the expenses for raising these men; Douglass bragged to him that “no other company has been raised for less than twice that sum.” By May 1863, as a result of the recruiting agents’ work and of newspaper advertisements for enlistments, more than one thousand blacks from every state in the Union as well as from Canada were enrolled in the regiment. Recruiting efforts continued, permitting Massachusetts to raise a total of three black regiments by the end of the war. Douglass to Gerrit Smith, 14 April 1863, Norcross Papers, MHiS; U.S. Bureau of the Census, Negro Population in the United States, 1790-1915 (1918; New York, 1968), 57; Ira Berlin et al., eds., Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation, 1861-1867; Selected from the Holdings of the National Archives of the United States, ser. 2: The Black Military Experience (New York, 1982), 75-76; Emilio, Brave Black Regiment, 8-14, 24; Douglass Papers, ser 1, 3:585-86; Quarles, Frederick Douglass, 204-06; idem, Negro in the Civil War, 8-9; Cornish, Sable Arm, 107-10. Subsequent reflection and conversation with our friend Mr George L Stearns from Boston have convinced me that your suggestion should be carried out. I have therefore already set myself to the work of raising at least one company in this state for the war to be a part of the first colored regiment of Massachusetts. I have visited Buffalo and obtained seven good men.⁴Reports of Douglass’s recruiting efforts in upstate New York appeared in several newspapers. Nine Buffalo residents joined the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry Regiment in March 1863. These recruits were Thomas Hamilton, Charles Kane, Garnet G. Cezar, John H. Dover, John F. Harrison, George Lucas, John R. Neal, Alexander W. Renkins, and Albert D. Thompson. New Albany Daily Ledger, 18 March 1863; DM, 5:1—2 (April 1863); Massachusetts Soldiers, Sailors, and Marines in the Civil War, 8 vols. (Norwood, Mass, 1932-35), 4:656—714. I spoke here last night and got thirteen.⁵An appeal for recruits appeared in the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle and was reprinted in multiple newspapers. Early Rochester enlistees include Louis and Charles Douglass, Thomas Edward Platnek, Nathan C. Jeffrey, Samuel Robinson, Nathan Sprague, Nathaniel Hurley, Ferdinand Cunningham, James S. Weir, George Madrey, and Warren McEwan. Cleveland Morning Leader, 6 March 1863; Massachusetts Soldiers, 4:656—714. I shall visit Auburn, Syracuse, Ithica, Troy and Albany and other places in the state till I get one hundred men. Charley my youngest son was the first to put his name down as one of the company.⁶Charles R. Douglass. It is a little cruel to say to the black soldier that he shall not rise to be an officer of the United States whatever may be his merits;⁷Initially, both commissioned officer and noncommissioned first sergeant and corporal posts were restricted to whites by order of the War Department. While the restriction on noncommissioned posts was quickly lifted, Secretary Stanton refused to accept the promotion of African American officers unless their appointments were individually authorized by special pieces of legislation and approved by Congress and the president. Black soldiers, however, demanded that the Boards of Examination (the normal procedure for promotion) be opened to them, and in early 1864 the governor of Massachusetts ignored Stanton’s wishes and approved the promotion of a black sergeant in the Fifty-fourth to the rank of lieutenant. By the end of the war, 1 in every 2,000 African American soldiers had been promoted into the officer corps. Even so, the vast majority of such appointments did not take place until after the fighting had stopped; for most of the war, promotion commissions remained off limits to black soldiers. Howard C. Westwood, Black Troops, White Commanders, and Freedmen during the Civil War (Carbondale, IIl., 1992), 28-29; Edwin S. Redkey, ed., A Grand Army of Black Men: Letters from African-American Soldiers in the Union Army, 1861-1865(New York, 1992), 206; Cornish, Sable Arm, 214-15; Jonathan Sutherland, African Americans at War: An Encyclopedia, 2 vols. (Santa Barbara, Calif., 2004), 1:32-35. but I see that though coupled with this disadvantage—colored men should hail the opportunity of getting on the United States uniform as a very great advance. I sent you a few days ago my call upon colored men to inlist.⁸On 2 March 1863, Douglass issued a public call urging black men to enlist in the Union army. He claimed that a war being fought to perpetuate the enslavement of blacks naturally demanded that these blacks join the fight for freedom. He argued that victory won only by white men would not mean as much, and quoted Lord Byron in support: “who would be free themselves must strike the blow.” The state of New York did not issue a call for black soldiers, so Douglass implored blacks to join the “first colored regiment from the north", which was forming in Massachusetts. He closed his appeal by urging blacks to fight and win “the gratitude of our Country—and the best blessings of our posterity through all time.” DM, 5:801 (March 1863); Lib., 13 March 1863. It was published in all the papers here, and is having a good effect. In your letter to Mr May, you say that you will give two hundred dollars towards raising the proposed company.⁹Douglass reported Gerrit Smith’s pledge of $200 to promote the recruitment of a company among New York blacks for the new Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Infantry Regiment. This was money in addition to $500 already committed to the overall recruitment drive for that unit. DM, 5:804 (March 1863). I have already been at at the expense of two journeys to Buffalo and shall be at more before I get a hundred good names on my list. Mr Stearns and I talking over the matter came to the conclusion to apply to you for my expenses in getting up the company within the limits of your your promised two hundred dollars.

I believe I can get up this company so as to hand it over to Governor Andrew’s¹⁰John Albion Andrew (1818-67), governor of Massachusetts, was born in Windham, Maine, and educated at Bowdoin College. After his graduation in 1837, he settled in Boston and was admitted to the Massachusetts bar. Although he was one of the founders of the Free Soil party, Andrew did not hold public office until 1858, when he was elected to the Massachusetts General Court as a Republican. On 19 November 1859, Andrew was chosen to chair and speak at the meeting of John Brown’s sympathizers in Tremont Temple. In 1860 he not only headed his state’s delegation to the Republican National Convention but was also elected governor, a position he held until January 1866. Throughout the Civil War, he was an outspoken advocate of emancipation and a leader in persuading the Lincoln administration to enlist blacks in the Union army. After the Confederate surrender, however, Andrew recommended a conciliatory Reconstruction policy toward Southern whites. Lib.,25 November 1859; Henry Greenleaf Pearson, The Life of John A. Andrew, Governor of Massachusetts, 1561-1865, 2 vols. (Boston, 1904); ACAB, 1:72-73; NCAB, 1:118; DAB, 2:279-81. agents who will take them at the expense of Massachusetts, for less than the sum you promise to contribute. I shall be in Syracuse on Wednesday for the purpose of getting men for this company¹¹Douglass recruited troops at the Syracuse A.M.E.Z. Church on 11 and 26 March 1863. Syracuse Daily Standard, 11, 13 March 1863; NASS, 4 April 1863; Sernett, North Star Country, 240. and in Troy on Thursday, Friday in Albany.¹²Douglass lectured at the Hamilton Street Methodist Church in Albany on Friday, 13 March 1863. Albany Evening Journal, 10 March 1863. I shall go to New York¹³Douglass’s first known recruitment lecture in New York City occurred on 27 April 1863 at the Shiloh Presbyterian Church, which was presided over by the Reverend Henry Highland Garnet. New York World, 29 April 1863.—and at the request of Mr Stearns go to Philadelphia and Stimulate inlistments there.¹⁴On 18 March 1863, Douglass delivered a lecture entitled “The Crisis” at the Bethel A.M.E. Church on Sixth Street in Philadelphia before a meeting presided over by the Reverend Jabez Campbell. DM, 5:828 (April 1863). Returning from Philadelphia I shall revisit the places named and make calls at others in this State for the purpose of accommodating those who wanted time to decide. I have taken nothing from Mr Stearns and rely upon your contribution for my expenses. Should you not think it well