When the Revolutionary War had closed the brave black soldier who had fought to give to the world a new flag whose every star should be a star of hope to the oppressed, and whose trinity of colors should symbolize Liberty, Equality and Fraternity, found his race, and in some instances himself personally, encased in a cruel and stubborn slavery.  For the soldier himself special provision had been made in both Northern and Southern colonies, but it was not always hearty or effective.  In October, 1783, the Virginia Legislature passed an act for the relief of certain slaves who had served in the army whose “former owners were trying to force to return to a state of servitude, contrary to the principles of justice and their solemn promise.”  The act provided that each and every slave who had enlisted “by the appointment and direction of his owner” and had “been received as a substitute for any free person whose duty or lot it was to serve” and who had served faithfully during the term of such enlistment, unless lawfully discharged earlier, should be fully and completely emancipated and should be held and deemed free in as full and ample manner as if each and every one of them were specially named in the act.  The act, though apparently so fair on its face, and interlarded as it is with patriotic and moral phrases, is nevertheless very narrow and technical, liberating only those who enlisted by the appointment and direction of their owners, and who were accepted as substitutes, and who came out of the army with good discharges.  It is not hard to see that even under this act many an ex-soldier might end his days in slavery.  The Negro had joined in the fight for freedom and when victory is won finds himself a slave.  He was both a slave and a soldier, too often, during the war; and now at its close may be both a veteran and a slave.

The second war with Great Britain broke out with an incident in which the Negro in the navy was especially conspicuous.  The Chesapeake, an American war vessel was hailed, fired upon and forced to strike her colors, by the British.  She was then boarded and searched and four persons taken from her decks, claimed as deserters from the English navy.  Three of these were Negroes and one white.  The Negroes were finally dismissed with a reprimand and the white man hanged.  Five years later hostilities began on land and no opposition was manifested toward the employment of Negro soldiers.  Laws were passed, especially in New York, authorizing the formation of regiments of blacks with white officers.  It is remarkable that although the successful insurrection of St. Domingo was so recent, and many refugees from that country at that time were in the United States, and our country had also but lately come into possession of a large French element by the Louisiana purchase, there was no fear of a servile insurrection in this country.  The free colored men of New Orleans, under the proclamation of the narrow-minded Jackson, rallied to the defence of that city and bore themselves with commendable valor in that useless battle.  The war closed, however, and the glory of the Negro soldier who fought in it soon expired in the dismal gloom of a race-slavery becoming daily more wide-spread and hopeless.