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WHEN secESSIONISTS FIRED ON FORT SUMTER, South Carolina, on April 12, 1861, they loosed a volley that would have profound repercussions on the American way of life. Those shots set off a chain of events that culminated not only in the end of slavery but also in African Americans becoming white southerners' legal equals. Even before Congress officially transformed their legal status, however, many African Americans sought change by their own hands. As the Civil War progressed and the Union army pressed farther into the South, thousands of slaves flocked to the advancing tide of freedom. As elsewhere, African Americans in Arkansas saw the army as liberators and jumped at the chance to wear the Union blue and spread the mantle of freedom to their brethren. Except for the atrocities at Poison Spring, relatively little has been written about the experiences of black soldiers in Arkansas, however.
The first known instances of black men joining the Union army in mass occurred in 1862, when Gens. David Hunter and Benjamin Butler started enrolling African Americans in South Carolina and New Orleans, respectively. About the same time, Brig. Gen. James H. Lane began enlisting black troops in Kansas. These actions were taken without official approval from Washington. Then, on New Year's Day 1863, President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation took effect, which, in addition to freeing (at least in word) slaves in areas under Confederate control, contemplated the enrollment of African Americans into the armed services of the United States. Lincoln's action was a shrewd political move for a variety of reasons, but, perhaps most importantly, it effectively paved the way for the federal government to utilize a largely untapped source of manpower for the war effort. Increasing casualties and a seeming lack of progress had begun to dampen enthusiasm for the war, and, as a result, enlistments dropped off significantly. With the government's blessing, thousands of free and formerly enslaved black men began mustering into United States service in 1863. In a sign of just how dedicated the government had become to the idea of arming African Americans, the Lincoln administration dispatched the army's adjutant general, Brig. Gen. Lorenzo Thomas, to the Mississippi Valley in March 1863 with orders to organize black regiments and recruit white officers for...