Even before the USCT units began to recruit, Athens County had a Black company that offered its service to the Union. In May 1861, the “Attucks’ Guards” formed in Albany. The men received a flag made by Albany women, and a local reverend delivered an address to those who gathered.[1] They, along with a similar company in Cleveland, were quick to offer their services in the war. Despite their willingness to fight for the Union and the need for trained soldiers, Attucks’ Guards and similar units were rejected because of their race.[2] When David Tod came into office, John Mercer Langston, an Oberlin College graduate, requested permission to raise Black troops in 1862, but he was refused; Tod told Langston that the Civil War was a “white man’s war”, and he viewed conscription of Black soldiers as a last resort that the Union would have no need to consider. Langston was not deterred, and told Tod “Governor, when you need us, send for us.” The success of recruiting Black regiments for Massachusetts a year later drove Tod to reconsider his position.[3]

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Notes

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1. “A Colored Military Company,” Douglass’ Monthly (Rochester, NY), June 1861. Smithsonian. https://transcription.si.edu/view/12964/ACM-2007.19.13_04.

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2. Lowell D. Black, “The Negro Volunteer Militia Units of the Ohio National Guard, 1870-1954: The Struggle for Military Recognition and Equality in the State of Ohio,” PhD diss. (Ohio State University, 1976) 66-70.

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3. Frank R. Levstick, “The Fifth Regiment, United States Colored Troops, 1863-1865” Northwest Ohio Quarterly 42, no. 2 (fall 1970) 86.

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Image: “Prof. John Langston, Howard University,” Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2017894223/

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