The Grand Review Coming Soon

Army coming down Pennsylvania Ave

The African American Civil War Museum is delighted to be a key organizer of a huge event taking place this upcoming spring 2015, marking the 150th anniversary of one of the most important parades in the nation's history.  The Grand Review Parade will assemble 6 to 10,000 marchers and spectators in Washington, DC on Sunday, May 17, 2015.  The event will commemorate the Grand Review of the Armies, which took place on May 23, 2015.  The original event took place in a much smaller Washington, but its sense of healing and unity resonates powerfully in our own time.  At the time the nation was still recovering not just from the Civil War itself, but from President Lincoln's assassination at Ford's Theater the previous month.

Lincoln's successor, President Andrew Johnson, made plans for a formal review of the Union troops in part to mark the end of the war and the Union victory, but also to try to lift the spirits of citizens in the capital and across the nation.  On May 18, 1865 the army issued Special Order No. 239, calling for a Grand Review, a two day parade in Washington, DC of the main Union armies.  In all, more than 150,000 soldiers would parade through the nation's capital, filing past the president and his cabinet, as well as Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant positioned on a special reviewing stand in front of the White House.

Army filing past Presidential Review Stand, 1865

At 9:00am on May 23, a signal gun fired a single shot and Major Gen. George Meade, the victor of Gettysburg, led an estimated 80,000 men of the Army of the Potomac down the streets of Washington past thousands in the crowds.  On the following day at 10:00am, General William T. Sherman led the 65,000 men of the Army of the Tennessee and the Army of Georgia past the admiring crowds and celebrities, most of whom had never seen him before.  Within a week of the celebrations, the two armies were disbanded and many of the volunteer regiments and batteries were sent home to be mustered out of the army.

Army filing past crowd 

This parade is the culmination of a weekend of events to commemorate the end of the Sesquicentennial of the Civil War.  The original Grand Review Parade held in May, 1865, marked the end of the war and the dismissal of many of the troops.  No African American regiments were allowed to march in 1865 but the 2015 march will correct a great wrong in history as the USCT, Volunteer and Regular Union Regiments will march down Pennsylvania Ave together.  We invite you to participate in this Sesquicentennial Commemoration and celebrate our event theme a "New Birth of Freedom and Union," inspired by one of President Abraham Lincoln's most noted speeches The Gettysburg Address.  To learn more about the Grand Review Weekend please visit the event website www.grandreviewparade.org.  Hope to see you there.

How do you plan to commemorate the closing days of the Civil War?

Briana Welch, Eastern Senior High School

What Were They Watching for on Watch Night?

What Were They Watching for on Watch Night?

With great expectations, African Americans looked to January 1, 1863, as the day of jubilee.  They congregated in churches and around “praying trees” in secret locations across the country on the evening of December 31, 1862, to “watch” for the coming of the Emancipation Proclamation; thus, the tradition of “watch night” was born.  “It is a day for poetry and song, a new song,” wrote Frederick Douglass.  “These cloudless skies, this balmy air, this brilliant sunshine, (making December as pleasant as May), are in harmony with the glorious morning of liberty about to dawn up on us.”  President Lincoln had promised a proclamation emancipating slaves in the states in rebellion 99 days earlier; and on “watch night,” Americans of African descent faithfully “watched” for his proclamation to be issued on the 100^th day.  In Boston, Douglass reported that “a line of messengers was established between the telegraph office and the platform at Tremont Temple.”  When what Douglass called the “trump of jubilee” was heard, “joy and gladness exhausted all forms of expression, from shouts of praise to sobs and tears.”

In Washington, Reverend Henry M. Turner, pastor of Israel Bethel AME Church located on Capitol Hill, wrote that it was in the churches of the District of Columbia where “expressions of sentiments” for the Emancipation Proclamation could be heard.   “Watching” for the issuing of the final Emancipation Proclamation was not simply “watching” for emancipation.  African Americans were “watching” for the opportunity to fight for freedom.  The enslaved in the District had already been emancipated, but they prayed for the freedom of all.  Indeed, they were willing to fight for the freedom of all.  “Several colored men in this city,” wrote Reverend Turner, “say they are now ready for the battlefield.  Abraham Lincoln can get anything he wants from the colored people here from a company to a corps.  I would not be surprised to see myself carrying a musket before long.”  Later that year, Turner would recruit hundreds of men and become a chaplain in the Union Army.

It is important that we in the 21^st century understand that the Emancipation Proclamation did not simply free the slaves.  It declared free slaves in the states in rebellion.  It was in Lincoln’s words “a fit and necessary war measure” for preserving the Union.  Lincoln wrote in the Proclamation that it “was warranted by the Constitution upon military necessity.”  The military necessity that led to the Emancipation Proclamation meant that the help of African Americans was needed to save the Union.  Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy, declared in January 1863 that the “proclamation is also an authentic statement by the Government of the United States of its inability to subjugate the South by force of arms.”  In the 19^th century African Americans, the leadership of the Confederacy, and the leadership of the Federal government understood that the Emancipation Proclamation was a military necessity that explicitly called on the help of African Americans.

Unequivocally, Lincoln believed that African descent soldiers were critical to Union success.  The President wrote to General Ulysses S. Grant in August 1863 stating that he believed African descent soldiers were “a resource which if vigourously [sic] applied now, will soon close the contest.”  Grant replied stating that he shared the President’s belief declaring that “by arming the negro, we have added a powerful ally.”  In response to a supporter who opposed emancipation and the use of African descent soldiers, Lincoln wrote, “I know, as fully as one can know the opinions of others that some of the commanders of our armies in the field, who have given us our most important successes, believe the emancipation policy, and the use of colored troops, constitute the heaviest blow yet dealt to the rebellion; and that at least one of those important successes could not have been achieved when it was, but for the aid of black soldiers.  Among the commanders holding these views are some who have never had any affinity with what is called abolitionism, or with Republican party politics, but who hold them purely as military opinion.” 

Therefore, when we celebrate and commemorate “watch night” and the 150^th anniversary of the issuing of the Emancipation Proclamation, we should appreciate the importance of African Americans in saving the Union and freeing themselves.  Such an appreciation is to understand the practical significance of the Proclamation as the people who made the history understood it.  We are commemorating the “watching for” the hour that the government’s policy aligned with prayers of liberation and celebrating African descent patriots being armed with the Emancipation Proclamation.  As we gather in churches, synagogues, and mosques in prayer across the country on “watch night;” we should appreciate that with faith and courage on December 31, 1862, Americans of African descent were “watching for” the opportunity to secure “the blessings of  liberty for themselves and their posterity” under the banner of the U. S. Constitution.  With the support of the Federal government, they were deployed as enforcers of the Emancipation Proclamation.  Indeed, January 1, 1863 was a day of Jubilee not because the slaves were set free but because the enslaved were called upon to save the Union and armed accordingly with the legal authority to set themselves free.