A Liberal Dose, Oct. 28, 2021 "Sparta's Black Union Troops Deserve Honor"

 

A Liberal Dose

October 28, 2021

Troy D. Smith

“Sparta’s Black Union Troops Deserve Honor”

 

This past Saturday (October 23), the city of Franklin unveiled on their town square a statue of a black Union soldier. Roughly 180,000 black men served in the Union Army after the Emancipation Proclamation, most of them former slaves. There were more from Tennessee, by the way, than from any other state. Some of those black troops were at the Battle of Franklin (November 30, 1864), and even more were at the Battle of Nashville two weeks later. They performed so admirably under fire that they were singled out for praise by the Union commander, General George Thomas.

And some of the black troops in those battles were from White County.

African American soldiers were placed in segregated regiments, with white commanders, that were collectively known as USCT (United States Colored Troops). One such regiment, the 14^th United States Colored Infantry (USCI), was formed in November of 1863 in Gallatin. The regiment was commanded by Colonel Thomas Jefferson Morgan, an abolitionist from Ohio who would later serve as Commissioner of Indian Affairs. Upon formation, they were initially assigned to Chattanooga to work on the city’s fortifications.

In March of 1864 Morgan received orders to finish filling his regiment via a recruiting expedition to the Caney Fork and Calfkiller Rivers -Sparta, in other words. Morgan’s second-in-command, Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Corbin, led a contingent of the 14^th to Sparta, where he reported to the Union headquarters of Colonel William Brickly Stokes, commanding the 5^th Tennessee (Union) Cavalry. Stokes had placed his headquarters at Sparta Methodist Church (now Sparta First United Methodist Church, on Church Street), tearing out the flooring of the sanctuary and turning it into a stable. Stokes noted in a report on March 28 that “Lieutenant-Colonel Corbin is here with a portion of the Fourteenth Regiment, U. S. Colored Troops, and is recruiting very rapidly.” While the recruiting was going on, Stokes used some of the black troops in pursuit of local guerrillas.

120 new troops were signed up on the expedition. Those who were physically fit for combat were inducted into the 14^th; those too old or too young to fight were inducted into the 44^th USCI, and would spend the war doing garrison duty in Chattanooga. Why was Corbin specifically sent to Sparta? There were some slaves in White County -1145 in the 1860 census -who would have been freed (if they had not already run away and freed themselves) upon occupation of the area by Federals. That number put White County at #4 of the 14 Upper Cumberland counties for slaves. However, that census also recorded 162 free blacks in the county. That is a much smaller number than the slave population, but was still the largest free black population of any county at the time between Nashville and Knoxville. The new recruits included both free blacks and former slaves. Some of them probably came from surrounding counties, but considering the population data it is likely that the majority were from White County. David Anderson was a slave on a cotton farm in the southern part of the county (one of the few in the area); he had married a free black woman from Rock Island, Mary Rickman, whose family had been free since the 1700s. Anderson, his brothers, and his free-born brother-in-law Joseph Rickman all joined the 14^th. So did J. W. Grant, a teenaged slave who would one day be dean of the law school at Central Tennessee College.

These men were not mentioned in any of the county histories, or on any of the military memorials in town -largely because their service was forgotten after the war. I believe that needs to change, the sooner the better. They risked (and some gave) their lives for their country, their families, and their freedom. We need to start calling for some kind of memorial for them right here, in their home county. It is way past due.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

A complete list of Liberal Dose columns can be found HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE