FREDERICK DOUGLASS TO THOMAS WEBSTER¹Thomas Webster (1818-94), a leading black Philadelphia businessman, helped organize and chaired the Supervisory Committee for Colored Enlistments (sometimes called the Supervisory Committee on Enlistments for Colored Regiments or the Supervisory Committee on Colored Enlistments) in the summer of 1863. Located at 1210 Chestnut Street, this Philadelphia organization raised funds to recruit black troops and properly equip them while they trained at Camp William Penn. Webster further created the Free Military School for Applicants for the Command of Colored Troops, which trained nearly five hundred officers for the newly organized black Union army regiments. M[oses] Auge, (Norristown, Pa., 1879), 622-23; Berlin,, ser. 2, 408; Quarles, , 187.

Rochester[, N.Y.] 18 Aug[ust] 1863.

THOMAS WEBSTER ESQR.

MY DEAR SIR.

I am obliged by your friendly note. I can hardly hope to see you before leaving or while en route to Vicksburgh—Whither it seems I am to go. I do not yet know by what route my transportation will require me to go—nor upon what conditions, rank, pay or duty. It pleases his excellency the Secy of war to keep me in the dark on all essential points. He only commands me to go. Like King Lewes, he thinks a citizen a person having duties but no rights.²Douglass appears to be referring, specifically, to Louis XI of France, as portrayed in Shakespeare’s . In the play, King “Lewis” concludes his scene by issuing a string of stinging commands to an audience consisting of both English and French courtiers and diplomats. But in describing the king in question as thinking that “a citizen [is] a person having duties but no rights,” Douglass appears to have conflated Louis XI with the absolutist monarch Louis XIV, or possibly even his successors Louis XV or Louis XVI in the years before the outbreak of the French Revolution. , sc. 12, lines 1805-09, 1814-20, 1833-37; John Stauffer, (New York, 2008), 23; Mark Bevir, ed., , 3 vols. (Thousand Oaks, Calif., 2010), 1:2-3. I shall obey however, hoping that all will be well in the end. I only do justice to the feelings of my heart when, I tell you that my humble labors under your management in Philadelphia³George L. Stearns had dispatched Douglass to Philadelphia in June 1863 to recruit volunteers for black regiments. FD to Gerrit Smith 19 June 1863, published earlier in the volume; FD to Edwin M. Stanton, 13 July 1863, published earlier in the volume. were rendered very pleasant by your evident kind appreciation of them and that I should have very gladly continued in your service. I am full of hope for the Country—but deeply anxious for the safety of some who are very near me, and who are now exposed to all the horrors of war. I have pleasant recollections of most of the members of the Committee over which you preside.⁴The Supervisory Committee for Colored Enlistments. Hoping that we shall soon rejoice in the Complete triumph of peace and freedom,

Yours Very truly

FRED’K DOUGLASS

ALS: Dreer Collection of American Statesmen, PHi.