Slaves, Sailors, Citizens: African Americans in the Union Navy.

By Steven J. Ramold. (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, c. 2002. Pp. [x], 253. $32.00, ISBN 0-87580-286-9.)

Thanks to the pioneering work of scholars like Leon F. Litwack and Eric Foner, we have long understood the important role free African Americans played in the development of the nation's antebellum economy. Other scholars, such as W. Jeffrey Bolster, have honed this argument more finely by focusing on the role of African Americans in the maritime trades. Steven J. Ramold follows Bolster's example by examining closely the role and treatment of African Americans in the Union navy.

Any survey of photographs portraying crews of Union navy vessels reveals instantly the critical role black sailors played in the war. Black crew members are almost always present in these classic deck photos. While Ramold readily admits that the records are not always precise concerning the race of sailors, he agrees with previous estimates that roughly 16 percent of all the men who went afloat in Mr. Lincoln's navy were African Americans. That figure may be low; however, numbers are not Ramold's principal concern. How, he wants to know, did these men fare in the service? The answer is surprising--they fared well.

While the Union army maneuvered to discourage and prevent blacks from joining the ranks, the navy behaved differently. Under the direction of Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, the Navy Department recruited and integrated black sailors into the service. Many of the recruits, particularly those who served in the deepwater navy, were former merchant seamen. These were skilled seafarers who had long been accustomed to living and working in the integrated world of the ship's forecastle. Unlike the army, which segregated and demeaned black soldiers, the navy recognized and valued these seamen. Ships were too small to afford the luxury of segregation, and all hands were needed for battle. Indeed, in matters of pay, promotion, and discipline, black sailors found equal treatment in the U.S. Navy. In combat they served with great distinction. No black sailor, of course, ever became a commissioned officer, but numerous men did join the noncommissioned ranks.

Ramold's analysis is intriguing. Through logs, letters, pension records, and other official records, he has found and traced hundreds of men. He makes his point well--black seamen in the Union navy were, for the most part, accorded the same treatment as their white counterparts. What is less certain is why. Why was the navy demonstrably less racist than the army and the rest of northern society? Ramold suggests several answers, but more probing is needed. Closer analysis and comparison of the leadership between the army and navy, civilian and uniformed, might yield results. This, however, is a minor complaint against a book that is both provocative and pathbreaking.

In the end, as Ramold points out, fair treatment of blacks in the Union navy was a brief shining moment. In the aftermath of the war, American society afloat and ashore turned increasingly racist as Jim Crow elbowed aside racial justice.

WILLIAM M. FOWLER JR.

Massachusetts Historical Society