African American Experiences During World War I

By Gramond S. McPherson

African Americans hoped to use their wartime experiences as a vehicle to achieve full rights as American citizens, yet, white society sought to keep African Americans in their inferior position. Initially, the War Department saw no use for black soldiers in combat roles. Within the Army, black inductees served mostly in Quartermaster and Engineer units that provided labor support both domestically and overseas. Additionally, the Navy restricted black inductees to menial positions including service as ships’ waiters. In both services, their responsibilities required little to no training in firearms. White Southerners, especially, feared the prospect of armed black men trained to fight as a danger to white supremacy

Thus, the experience of many African Americans soldiers proved to be a story of humiliation, mistreatment, and outright brutality. While keenly familiar with segregation, black soldiers resented its enforcement in the military along with their mistreatment by white authorities and civilians, especially in the South. In one instance, in Houston, Texas, on August 23, 1917, the black Twenty-fourth Infantry Regiment stationed at nearby Camp Logan retaliated when they heard that the Houston Police had arrested and beaten several members of their unit by arming themselves and marching into Houston. In a two-hour period, some members of the unit killed fifteen whites, including four police officers, wounding twelve others while the unit lost four of their own. The Army issued harsh punishments, indicting 110 of the 118 in the unit, hanging nineteen soldiers; sixty-three soldiers received life sentences in federal prison.¹

Despite this setback, black leaders pressured the War Department for better protection of the rights of black soldiers along with creating greater opportunities for them to fight. Outrage from the black community and press over the Houston court-martials and other racial injustices, along with the mobilization of black leaders, finally convinced the War Department to create two segregated Infantry Divisions--the Ninety-second and the Ninety-third. Additionally, the War Department created a black officer training camp in Fort Des Moines, Iowa, to train and commission black officers to serve in the segregated units. Of the 200,000 officers in the military, only 1,200 (less than one percent) were black. Black officers faced constant challenges to their leadership and authority by white authorities in the military and had to overcome stereotypes that falsely labeled them as either cowards or incompetent. Eventually over 40,000 African Americans served overseas in France in combat divisions.²

Further Information

Dalessandro, Robert J. and Gerald Torrence. Willing Patriots: Men of Color in the First World War. Atglen, PA: Schiffer Publishing Ltd., 2009.

Haynes, Robert V. “Houston Riot Of 1917.” Handbook of Texas Online. June 15, 2010. Accessed June 20, 2018. https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/jch04.

Keene, Jennifer D. World War I: The American Soldier Experience. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2011.

Williams, Chad. Torchbearers of Democracy: African American Soldiers in the World War I Era. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2010.

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