ABSTRACT
The struggle for blacks to become and remain commissioned officers was by no means isolated to New Orleans. Reverend Garland H. White, a Methodist minister and the former servant of Robert Toombs, the Georgia politician who aspired to be the Confederate president, was an example. Then residing in London, West Canada, Reverend White wrote Secretary Stanton in May 1862 to offer his services. His parishioners, many of them former slaves who had escaped to Canada, requested he lead them into service as Soldiers. When Stanton failed to respond, White went to Indiana, where he joined and helped raise the 28th Regiment, U.S. Colored Troops. White, an intelligent man, educated in theology at the London Mission, was subsequently (1863) appointed chaplain of the regiment. Chaplain White later requested to be sent to Georgia to help liberate those who had been enslaved with him. 1
