A Black Patriot and a White Priest: Andre Cailloux and Claude Paschal Maistre in Civil War New Orleans. (Book Reviews).

A Black Patriot and a White Priest: Andre Cailloux and Claude Paschal Maistre in Civil War New Orleans. By Stephen J. Ochs. Conflicting Worlds: New Dimensions of the American Civil War. (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2000. Pp. xxiv, 304. $39.95, ISBN 0-8071-2531-8.)

Although today their names are relatively unknown even in Louisiana, in Civil War-era New Orleans Andre Cailloux and Claude Paschal Maistre were among the most controversial figures of the day. Cailloux, a former slave and prominent figure in Afro-Creole society, led one of the first black regiments in the Union army in a charge against rebel positions at Port Hudson. Maistre, the priest who officiated at Cailloux's funeral, was the only member of the New Orleans Catholic clergy to publicly champion abolition and racial egalitarianism. With New Orleans occupied by northern soldiers and deeply divided along racial, political, and religious lines, the deeds of Cailloux and Maistre provoked passionate arguments. To some, Cailloux and Maistre were dangerous revolutionaries. To others, they were inspiring symbols of radical but much needed change.

Historian Stephen Ochs recreates the lives of these two men, using their stories as "a prism through which to view the complex, often paradoxical interplay of slavery, race, and religion, during American democracy's most violent upheaval" (p. 7). He begins with Cailloux, a charismatic former slave, prosperous artisan, and leading member of New Orleans's Afro-Creole community--the most literate and prosperous free black population in the United States. When the Civil War began, Cailloux and other elite free persons of color organized a regiment known as the Native Guards and offered their services to the Confederacy. By so doing, they hoped to demonstrate their patriotism and thus protect their tenuous position as free blacks in a slave society. Confederate leaders doubted their loyalty, however, and limited their service to training and ceremonial duties. When Union forces captured the city, the members of the Native Guard and other free persons of color did indeed turn against the rebels. Eventually recognizing the revolutionary implications of the war, Cailloux joined thousands of New Orleans blacks who enlisted in the Union army, becoming one of the few African American commissioned officers in the Federal ranks.

Father Maistre cheered Cailloux's conversion to the Union cause. A maverick visionary, Maistre ministered to a biracial congregation and, at considerable personal risk, identified himself with abolitionism and equal fights for African Americans. Although Catholic leaders had long insisted that slaves be allowed to practice Catholicism, receive religious education, marry, and have proper burials, embracing abolition was further than Louisiana's pro-Confederate archbishop, Jean-Marie Odin, was willing to go. Odin thus placed Maistre's parish church under indict and told local Catholics that participating in Maistre's services constituted a grave sin. Undaunted, Maistre ministered to Cailloux's Native Guards, blessed their regimental flags, made his church a haven for contraband slaves who fled to Union lines, and offered thanksgiving for Union victories in his sermons. When Cailloux was killed in the May 1863 assault on entrenched Confederate positions at Port Hudson, Maistre officiated at his funeral. Given extensive coverage by the abolitionist press, the New York Times, and Harper's Weekly, Cailloux's funeral was a massive affair, attended by thousands of African Americans who turned out to pay their respects to a black military hero and to the white priest who embraced their cause.

Stephen Ochs is to be commended for resurrecting the important lives of Cailloux and Maistre. He does so in expert fashion, despite the challenges presented by limitations in the evidentiary record. Because his protagonists left behind only a few letters, no diaries, and no photographs, Ochs instead dug deeply into military records, ecclesiastical archives, municipal tax ledgers, legal documents, and contemporary newspapers. Although at times Ochs's narrative bogs down in the welter of detail that resulted from this extensive research, what ultimately emerges is a fascinating and complex tale of two men who fought for racial justice and paid dearly for their efforts.