ABSTRACT
Within weeks after Ft. Sumter fell to Confederate General Pierre Gustave T. Beauregard, the call for troops went out to both North and South. Men everywhere were eager to fight for the cause in which they believed, including many free black males of Louisiana, who numbered approximately 8,279 at the start of the war. 1 On 21 April 1861 they took the initiative by posting a bulletin in the New Orleans Picayune:
THE COLORED POPULATION READY FOR THE FRAY— Tomorrow evening the most respectable portion of the colored population of the city will hold a meeting … for the purpose of organizing companies among themselves, and offer their services to the [Southern] Governor.… When the Northerners read the set of resolutions adopted by the committee and published in our paper today, they will not think this the best of the joke. 2
Within a week “the Governor [had] accepted the offer … and the free black population immediately began forming a regiment, as their fathers did in 1814 and ‘15.” 3 In May 1861 Thomas Overton Moore, governor of Louisiana and commander in chief of the militia, began organizing the Home Guards, Louisiana Militia from this population. With the endorsement of State Adjutant and Inspector General Maurice Grivot, Governor Moore decided to commission captains and lieutenants from able-bodied members within the free “Black” population. Grivot later wrote that Governor Moore is “relying implicitly upon the loyalty of the free colored to protect their homes, property, and Southern rights from the pollution of a ruthless invader.” 4