Black Patriots were African Americans who sided with the colonists who opposed British rule during the American Revolution. The term Black Patriots includes, but is not limited to, the 5,000 or more African Americans who served in the Continental Army and Patriot militias during the American Revolutionary War. [1]
Their counterparts on the pro-British side were known as Black Loyalists, African Americans who sided with the British during the American revolution. Thousands of American slaves escaped to British lines to take up their offers of freedom in exchange for military service as per Dunmore's Proclamation and the Philipsburg Proclamation.
Crispus Attucks is considered to be the first Black Patriot because he was killed in the Boston Massacre. Attucks was commemorated by his fellow Bostonians as a martyr for freedom. Attucks was a whaler who was believed to be of mixed Native American and African ancestry, born in or around Framingham, Massachusetts. [3] His death in the Boston Massacre is considered to be the first Patriot fatality of the war. [4]
The Bucks of America were an all-Black, Massachusetts Militia company organized in 1775 in Boston. This was the name given to one of two all-black units fighting for independence. There is little known of the campaign history of the Bucks company, or if they ever saw combat. It appears that they operated mainly around Boston. The Bucks of America may have acted primarily as an auxiliary police or security service, in the city, during the war. They most likely did not see action against British forces.[ citation needed ]
After the British started enticing enslaved African Americans to serve or assist their cause in exchange for emancipation, Patriot leaders began to recruit free people of color in New England and other East Coast regions to serve in the Continental Army. They were promised a life of relative luxury and social mobility if they joined the war. Slaves in the American North were trying to escape harsh treatment of their servitude. By joining the war, they believed they would be bettering their lives. Most of the time, Black Patriot soldiers served as individuals in a variety of predominantly white units of the Continental Army.
The 1st Rhode Island Regiment, also known as "Varnum's Continentals", was a Continental Army regiment from Rhode Island. It became well known as the "Black Regiment" because, for a time, it had several companies of African-American soldiers. It is regarded as the first African American military regiment, although its ranks were not exclusively African American. [5]
Captain David Humphreys' All Black, 2nd Company, of the Connecticut Continental Line, served from October 1780-November 1782. On November 27, 1780, Humphrey's Black Company was assigned to the 3rd Connecticut Regiment. On January 1, 1781, the Regiment was merged with the 4th Connecticut Regiment, re-organized into nine companies, and re-designated as the 1st Connecticut Regiment.
William "Billy" Lee was an enslaved valet of George Washington who served in the Continental Army and fought with the general's forces. Lee was considered to be Washington's favorite slave, and was often featured in the background of the general's portraits. [6]
Famed African American, Harvard scholar and professor Henry Louis Gates is descended from John Redman, a free African American who served in the Continental Army. Gates is currently working on a project to find all descendants of Black Patriots, who served in the American Revolutionary Continental Army.
The National Liberty Monument is a proposed national memorial to be located in the capital to honor the more than 5000 enslaved and free persons of African descent who served as soldiers or sailors, or provided civilian assistance during the American Revolutionary War. The memorial is an outgrowth of a failed effort to erect a Black Revolutionary War Patriots Memorial. This was authorized in 1986, but fundraising faltered and the memorial foundation dissolved in 2005.
Congress authorized the National Liberty Monument in January 2013. On September 8, 2014, the United States House of Representatives passed the joint resolution approving the location in the capital of a memorial to commemorate the more than 5,000 slaves and free Black people who fought for independence in the American Revolution. [7] The joint resolution would approve the location of a commemorative work to honor the more than 5000 slaves and free black persons who fought in the American Revolution. [8]
The American Revolution was a rebellion and political revolution in the Thirteen Colonies, which saw colonists initiate a war for independence against the Kingdom of Great Britain. Colonial separatist leaders who had originally sought more autonomy within the British political system as British subjects, assembled to establish a new national government following the recognition of their independence which resulted in the creation of the United States of America.
Crispus Attucks was an American whaler, sailor, and stevedore of African and Native American descent, who is traditionally regarded as the first person killed in the Boston Massacre, and as a result the first American killed in the American Revolution.
United States Colored Troops (USCT) were Union Army regiments during the American Civil War that primarily comprised African Americans, with soldiers from other ethnic groups also serving in USCT units. Established in response to a demand for more units from Union Army commanders, by the end of the war in 1865 USCT regiments, which numbered 175 in total, constituted about one-tenth of the manpower of the army. Approximately 20 percent of USCT soldiers were killed in action or died of disease and other causes, a rate about 35 percent higher than that of white Union troops. Numerous USCT soldiers fought with distinction, with 16 receiving the Medal of Honor. The USCT regiments were precursors to the Buffalo Soldier units which fought in the American Indian Wars.
Salem Poor (1747–1802) was an enslaved African-American man who purchased his freedom in 1769, became a soldier in 1775, and rose to fame as a war hero during the American Revolutionary War, particularly in the Battle of Bunker Hill.
James Armistead Lafayette was an enslaved African American who served the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War under the Marquis de Lafayette, and later received a legislative emancipation. As a double agent, he reported the activities of Benedict Arnold after he had defected to the British, and of Lord Charles Cornwallis during the run-up to the siege of Yorktown. He fed the British false information while disclosing very accurate and detailed accounts to the Americans.
Prince Whipple (1750–1796) was an African American slave and later freedman. He was a soldier and a bodyguard during the American Revolution under his slaveowner General William Whipple of the New Hampshire Militia who formally manumitted him in 1784. Prince is depicted in Emanuel Leutze's painting Washington Crossing the Delaware and Thomas Sully's painting Passage of the Delaware.
Black Loyalists were people of African descent who sided with the Loyalists during the American Revolutionary War. In particular, the term refers to men who escaped enslavement by Patriot masters and served on the Loyalist side because of the Crown's guarantee of freedom.
The 1st Rhode Island Regiment was a regiment in the Continental Army raised in Rhode Island during the American Revolutionary War (1775–83). It was one of the few units in the Continental Army to serve through the entire war, from the siege of Boston to the disbanding of the Continental Army on November 3, 1783.
Seymour Burr (1754/1762–1837) was an enslaved African-American in the Connecticut Colony in the North American British Colonies and United States. Enslaved by the brother of Colonel Aaron Burr, who was also named Seymour, he was known only as Seymour until he escaped and used the surname Burr to enlist in the British Army in the early days of the American Revolution. The British promised the personal freedom of any enslaved African-American who enlisted or escaped to fight against the Continental Army, and Burr longed for freedom. However, he was quickly captured and forcibly returned to his enslaver.
Women in the American Revolution played various roles depending on their social status, race and political views.
Nero Hawley was an African-American soldier who was born into slavery in North Stratford, Connecticut, and later earned his freedom after enlisting in the Continental Army in place of his owner, Daniel Hawley, on April 20, 1777, during the American Revolution. His life is featured in the 1976 book From Valley Forge to Freedom, which also notes other areas of present-day Trumbull, Connecticut associated with Hawley.
Barzillai Lew was an African-American soldier who served with distinction during the American Revolutionary War.
In the American Revolution, gaining freedom was the strongest motive for Black enslaved people who joined the Patriot or British armies. It is estimated that 20,000 African Americans joined the British cause, which promised freedom to enslaved people, as Black Loyalists. Around 9,000 African Americans became Black Patriots.
The Bucks of America was a Patriot Massachusetts Militia company, during the American Revolutionary War, that was composed of African-American soldiers. Few records survive about the unit; most of its history is constructed from eyewitness accounts. No official military records pertaining to the Bucks of America exist or have survived.
William Cooper Nell was an American abolitionist, journalist, publisher, author, and civil servant of Boston, Massachusetts, who worked for the integration of schools and public facilities in the state. Writing for abolitionist newspapers The Liberator and The North Star, he helped publicize the anti-slavery cause. He published the North Star from 1847 to 18xx, moving temporarily to Rochester, New York.
The Ethiopian Regiment, better known as Lord Dunmore's Ethiopian Regiment, was a British colonial military unit organized during the American Revolution by the Earl of Dunmore, last Royal Governor of Virginia. Composed of former slaves who had escaped from Patriot masters, it was led by British officers and sergeants. The regiment was disbanded in 1776, though many of its soldiers probably went on to serve in other Black Loyalist units.
Toby Gilmore was born in coastal West Africa as Shibodee Turrey Wurry, the son of a local chieftain. He was kidnapped at the age of sixteen by slave traders. Later he would regain his freedom by enlisting in the Continental Army during the American Revolution.
The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution, With Sketches of Several Distinguished Colored Persons: To Which is Added a Brief Survey of the Conditions and Prospects of Colored Americans, or, in brief, The Colored Patriots of the American Revolution, is an American history book written by William Cooper Nell, with an introduction by Harriet Beecher Stowe. It was published in 1855 by Robert F. Wallcut. It focuses on African-American soldiers during the American Revolution and the War of 1812. It details "the services of the Colored Patriots of the revolution".
Silas Royal (1740s–1826), originally known as SilasVarnum and sometimes written as Ryal Varnum, was an enslaved person and black patriot in the Revolutionary War. Though bought as an infant slave for the Varnum family, he was eventually set free and fought in the Continental Army and as an American privateer.
Rev. James Robinson (1753–1868) was born on the Eastern Shore of Maryland into bondage on March 21, 1753. His enslaver was Francis De Shields. Robinson served under the General Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette and would become a significant African American soldier in the American Revolutionary War.