As next year's 150th anniversary of the Civil War approaches, a new focus is being placed on African-American soldiers during the Civil War, a group who not only fought for their country, but also to defeat slavery.
African-Americans were prohibited from serving in the U.S. military for the first two years of the Civil War, but the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 called for them to be enlisted to fight for the Union Army. With that order, more than 180,000 free African-Americans and runaway slaves, including 8,000 from Pennsylvania, formed a force known as the U.S. Colored Troops.
One of the USCT's most respected soldiers was Pittsburgh native Martin Delany, an Abolitionist and the first African-American field officer in the U.S. Army. He attended Jefferson College (now Washington & Jefferson) and was a doctor, a journalist and an outspoken voice against slavery before joining the army.
With leaders like him, the USCT became a critical force for the Union's efforts, comprising 10 percent of the entire Union Army by the time the Civil War ended.
After the Union Army defeated the Confederates in 1865, thousands of these soldiers marched proudly in uniform down the streets of Harrisburg, in what would be known as the Pennsylvania Grand Review. The celebration was held in spite of the more famous Grand Review of Armies in Washington, D.C., which did not allow the USCT to participate.
Nearly 150 years later, the Pennsylvania Grand Review was re-enacted in Harrisburg last weekend, kicking off a series of commemoration events to mark the anniversary of the Civil War in Pennsylvania.
This Veterans Day weekend, Pittsburghers can join the History Center in honoring more than 200 of Western Pennsylvania's USCT buried at Allegheny Cemetery, as part of a wreath-laying ceremony at 1:30 p.m. Sunday in Lawrenceville.
More information is available at www.heinzhistorycenter.org.
First Published: November 12, 2010, 5:00 a.m.