“Are Freemen less brave than Slaves?”
The impassioned text was adapted from Frederick Douglass’ editorial in the March 1863 issue of Douglass’ Monthly magazine. Once Massachusetts’ Governor John Andrew had the federal government’s permission to raise a corps of “United States Colored Troops,” Douglass spent much of the spring recruiting, counting his owns sons, Charles and Lewis, among those who enlisted in the 54th Regiment. In May 1863, at the request of Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, Douglass traveled through the Union to further its efforts. In Pennsylvania, the effort took on a new urgency in June 1863, as the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia left its encampments and started to move north. References to the 1863 siege of Port Hudson (which began on May 21), the battle of Milliken’s Bend (June 7), and the absence of the Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3) or the 54th Massachusetts regiment’s glorious charge at Fort Wagner (July 18), point to a publication date between mid-June and mid-July of 1863. This might have made its first appearance at a July 6 mass meeting, where Professor E. D. Bassett read the text printed here.
