African Americans serving in the military

Part 2 of 2

While the policy of segregation in the military did not change, pressure brought to bear by the Double V movement and other civil rights groups forced the Army to increase the number and size of its segregated black combat units. In addition, African Americans became eligible for Officer Candidate Schools, where they trained and were housed with white candidates. When commissioned, however, the new black officers were assigned to black units and denied use of officers’ clubs at their posts.

The Army Air Corps felt that it could not train black pilots at any of its many existing training centers, so it went to the expense of building a new center for black pilots at Tuskegee, Ala. The pilots trained there became known as the Tuskegee Airmen. One of its most famous squadrons was the 99th Fighter Group lead by Lt. Col. Benjamin Davis, the man who had endured four years of silent treatment at West Point. The 99th had an outstanding combat record in the North African and Italian campaigns. Years later, Davis retired as a four-star general.

Two black infantry divisions, the 92nd and the 93rd, were activated in 1942. The 92nd was sent to Italy, where it underwent a complete re-activation before playing a combat role in the Po Valley campaigns. The 93rd went to the Pacific theater. The Army generals there decided to use the division not in combat, but largely as port stevedores. Black artillery, tank and tank destroyer battalions fought with distinction in France and Germany.

In 1944, the Army faced the problem of finding infantry replacements for the divisions fighting in Europe and began combing its rear echelon service troops for training and use as infantry. The commanding officer of the rear echelon and service troops, Lt. Gen. J.C.H. Lee (troops said his initials stood for Jesus Christ Himself) asked for volunteers in the black units under his command to receive training and serve as infantry.

Lee promised that these volunteers would individually serve side-by-side with white riflemen in the front-line divisions. But Lt. Gen. Walter P. Smith, chief of staff at SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces), pointed out to Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower that this would be contrary to War Department segregation policy. Gen. Eisenhower changed Lee’s directive so that black volunteers would be trained as platoons and assigned to divisions not as individuals but as units.

Despite this change, 4,562 black soldiers volunteered to give up the security of their rear-echelon duty for the hazards, discomfort and danger of infantry service under enemy fire. Many of these volunteers took reduction in rank spurred largely by the belief they could not be denied and would help extend the full mantle of citizenship denied to them and so many others.

These black infantry volunteers fighting in previously all-white divisions performed well and earned praise from their division commanders. But once the war ended, they were detached from the divisions and the white soldiers they had fought and bled with and were sent back to their old service units.

The service of the Tuskegee Airmen, the black infantry volunteers and the million other blacks who served in the military during World War II did not end the racism that denied them their full citizenship rights. But their service played an instrumental part in the decision of President Harry S. Truman, who, against the advice of many of his military advisors, issued on July 26, 1948, Executive Order 9981 calling on the armed forces to provide equal opportunity for black servicemen. Truman’s executive order did not automatically end segregation in the military, but it, coupled with a strong civil-rights movement, provided the foundation for today’s integrated armed forces. 

Wartime service in the military is often harsh. For the black soldiers serving in the mass armies raised during the first and second World Wars, such service was doubly harsh, because they had to fight both the nation’s enemies and the racial prejudice that placed them in segregated units commanded by white officers.

Forrest C. Palmer is a retired journalist and newspaper publisher. He is a World War II veteran and a serious student of military and World War II history. He started his newspaper career in 1951 as a reporter for The Waterbury Republican.