11th Hour of 11th Day of 11th Month

11th HOUR OF 11TH DAY OF 11TH MONTH, ##WWICentennial — Sunday, Nov. 11, marks 100 years since World War I came to an end. This so-called “War to End All Wars” resulted in more than 37 MILLION casualties worldwide, according to the military history website Fold 3. About 2.3 million black men in the U.S. registered for the draft and about 370,000 ultimately served.

From Chad L. Williams’ 2010 book, Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers in the World War I Era, comes this glimpse of what these men faced: ”Military officials attempted to replicate the practices, customs, and hierarchies of white supremacy as closely as possible in the army. A combination of biological racism and historical fears of armed black men shaped army policy and the decision to consign the majority of African American draftees to labor and service units. For black soldiers and officers in the Ninety-second and Ninety-third Divisions, the two all-black combat units, the army went to great lengths to reinforce their marginalized role in the American Expeditionary Forces and larger Allied war effort.”

Many of my kinsmen served, but visages such as theirs are rarely highlighted in national commemorations. It is for us to recall them and SAY THEIR NAMES. ##WWICentennial

Fold 3 offers an account of the end of the war. (See below.)

The end of the war that President Wilson vowed would “make the world safe for democracy,” served to unleash hatred against black Americans. The summer of 1919 was called “The Red Summer.” As the Equal Justice Initiative explains: “Red Summer refers to a series of approximately 25 anti-black riots that erupted in major cities throughout the nation in 1919, including Houston, Texas; East St. Louis and Chicago, Illinois; Washington, D.C.; Omaha, Nebraska; Elaine, Arkansas; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Charleston, South Carolina." There were thousands of casualties, including blacks in uniform. Read more at: Targeting Black Veterans: Lynching in America

Submitted by E.R. Shipp, November 10, 2018 to The Black Heritage of Rockdale County Facebook page.