Education
THE chief educational work to be done among the colored troops overseas was that of teaching them to read and write, as large numbers were unable to sign the payroll. These men were drafted into the army often without regard to age or physical fitness. One man from Texas, upon delivering a company of men to a lieutenant whom he thought to be white, remarked that he had brought him a good bunch of Negroes, and had plenty more down there if he wanted them. At first, he said, they took all the men who had just purchased little farms, so that the property would soon return to the original owners, and then they just went out through the country and gathered them up everywhere, so that they could get their full quota without sending their white boys. Of course, he said, the Negroes didn’t know any better and just thought they had to come.
This shows the dense ignorance that existed in no small degree among them, and many of them knew only one name, didn’t know when nor where they were born, and couldn’t tell the time of day. This ignorance was not all confined to the colored men, however. One white captain remarked publicly that he had white men in his battalion who were equally ignorant, and that upon asking one man where he was born, his reply was “Toons County,” which was the limit of his knowledge concerning the matter.
In Camp Lusitania, St. Nazaire, France, there were 9,000 colored stevedores, and out of this number 1,100 could not write their names, and a large per cent. of the remainder had only mediocre training. On the other hand, some were college graduates and undergraduates, and were of great value to those who undertook the task of teaching the large number of illiterates. They readily volunteered their assistance, and took great pains with their unfortunate comrades, helping them in school and out to get the amount of training that the limited facilities offered.
The writer, during her nine months’ period of service at Camp Lusitania, gave most of her time to this kind of work, and while it was difficult, the gratitude of the men fully compensated her for all the trouble. Upon first entering the camp, there was no provision made to assist in reaching these men, or ascertaining who they were. The Y. M. C. A. had furnished a large number of books, which were piled away in the hut unused. These books were taken and a request made at the cinema for all who desired training in English to manifest it by remaining in their seats at the close of the show. In this way we were able to reach a large number, and through them others could be reached, so that in time the work grew until the writer’s entire time was consumed in teaching and directing the work.
One man told how his parents had died when he was quite young, and that he was afterwards bound out to a white family to herd cattle for fifty cents a week. He wanted to go to school so badly that he slipped off and went two days, when the man for whom he worked found it out and beat him so that he never went back any more. He said he had a wife from whom he had not heard since he had been in France, but that he couldn’t read her letters anyway, and he was not expecting her to write. He worked very hard, however, and in time was able to write well and read third grade reading matter. One day he came in joyfully and said he had written his wife a letter and had gotten a reply. This, no doubt, was a wonderful day in his life, when he had acquired sufficient knowledge to make himself understood in a written communication. At times their gratitude was most pathetic, and one man had tears in his eyes as he told the writer how he had been so anxious to learn, but had been ashamed to let her know that he couldn’t write his name, and had hesitated a long time before he finally decided to come.
To learn to write one’s name seems an easy matter, but some of these men would try patiently for an hour or so and the letters would have no form, nor resemble in any way the characters they were trying to make. Then the instructor would take each great rough hand in her own and help the soldier to trace the form of the letter so that he would get an idea of how to go about making the first curve of his initial. When he would finally master the first initial of his name he would be so delighted that he would go to his barracks and make all the boys whom he knew give him assistance, so that in a day or two one could realize that he was making splendid progress.
This kind of work went on without much difficulty until the Armistice was signed; at this time every soldier became doubly sure that he was going home “toute de suite” (at once); and to add impetus to an already bad situation, their colonel got up in the auditorium and told them that they would all eat Christmas dinner at home. This completely demoralized the work until after the holidays. By this time they had all concluded that they were going to remain in France a while anyway, and some began to say that they would be glad if they were able to eat dinner at home the next Christmas.
By the beginning of the new year the army decided to take a hand in the educational work, and through its chaplains force all illiterates to attend school. This brought the entire 1,100 at Camp Lusitania to the Y. M. C. A. hut to receive instruction. All of them could not be reached at one time, but two or three hundred could be crowded into the class rooms twice a day, so that every two days the entire number would be reached. The writer would teach them en masse, first from the blackboard, having them follow her in sounding the letters, pronouncing the words, and giving the diacritical markings; then from a small booklet called “English Reading Lessons,” provided by the Educational Commission of the Army and Navy Y. M. C. A. These booklets, containing twenty lessons drawn from the soldiers’ experience in routine camp life and drilling, would be furnished by the hundreds, free, so that every man could have a book. After they had all read the lesson in concert, the volunteer teachers, about twenty-five all told, would each address himself to a group of the men, and hear them read individually. In this way each man could get a small amount of individual attention.
One day, by some means, Mr. Ferguson, the hut secretary, found a French mimeograph machine at the Y. M. C. A. warehouse. It was the only one, it seemed, in the entire section. The writer, after many trials and failures, learned to use it, and with the assistance of Private Stokes and one or two others, was able to make a large number of copies of written sentences. These would be taken by Chaplains Hodges, Jefferson, and their assistants, including Reverend McCoomer, whom the army had appointed to do educational and religious work. They would be distributed among the men in the class room, pencils given them free, and every man would labor earnestly to learn to write; then the men would be permitted to take the copies to their barracks, where they would practice during their leisure moments.
The mimeograph was also used to furnish problems in numbers to the men who were learning to make figures, add and subtract. After having a lesson from the blackboard, they would take the papers to their barracks, solve their problems, and bring them in the next day for correction. Mr. Julius Rosenwald visited Camp Lusitania during the year, and left two hundred dollars to be used for the benefit of the soldiers there. An automobile school was finally established and a number of the soldiers took advantage of the training. In the white camps much industrial training was introduced, and no small amount of attention given to higher education as well.
The Y. M. C. A. made ample provision for the purpose of giving the soldiers the opportunity to learn French. French professors were employed to visit each hut at stipulated hours, where the men would be taught en masse, the rudiments of conversational French. Small books published for the express purpose were put without cost into the hands of each man who had a desire to learn, and very few of them could be found after a few lessons and a little contact with the French people, who could not readily make themselves understood with regard to small matters that concerned their everyday life.
Colored Members of Army Educational Corps and Some University Students
1. Captain D. K. Cherry. 2. Secretary William N. Nelson. 3. Secretary William H. Crutcher. 4. Secretary Benjamin F. Hubert and group of students in attendance at Universities in Paris. 5. Secretary Joseph L. Whiting. 6. Secretary George W. Jackson. 7. Secretary John C. Wright.
About the first of April, 1919, the Army decided to take over the entire educational work of the Y. M. C. A., and invited the educational secretaries, the writer included, to leave the organization and come over to the army. It promised to carry out the original contract made by the Y. M. C. A., and give them the rank and uniform of an officer. Eight colored men accepted this offer and went into the army. They were Mr. J. C. Wright, formerly of Tuskegee Institute, Mr. F. O. Nichols, of Philadelphia, Mr. Benjamin F. Hubert, State College, Orangeburg, S. C., Mr. William Nelson, A. & T. College, Greensboro, N. C., Mr. Joseph L. Whiting, Tuskegee Institute, Mr. Thomas Clayton, Piqua, Ohio, Mr. W. H. Crutcher, A. & M. College, Tallahassee, and Mr. George W. Jackson, Louisville, Ky. Of this number Mr. J. C. Wright was appointed Supervisor of Instruction for colored troops and Lecturer in Civics; Mr. F. O. Nichols, Lecturer in Civics, and Mr. Benjamin F. Hubert, Supervisor of Agricultural Instruction among the colored troops.
These men were attached to the staff of the University of Beaune. As Supervisor of Instruction, Mr. Wright was well qualified, being a graduate of Oberlin College, Dean of Tallahassee Normal School, and having done splendid work as a Y. M. C. A. secretary at Camp One, Hut 5, St. Nazaire. Here he found a large number of men from the 301st Stevedore Regiment, one of the largest military organizations in France, and among them the first colored American soldiers to land on French soil. About 30 per cent. of these men were illiterate. On the contrary, a number of them were college trained men, having been engaged in professional and business pursuits.
Mr. Wright undertook the task of preparing these men to go back to civilian life with at least the rudiments of an English education. His first method was to get men who could not read and write to voluntarily attend classes scheduled at the Y. M. C. A. hut; but this was quite a difficult matter, for after ten or twelve hours’ work on the dock, the men were usually too tired to do anything that was not compulsory. Then he succeeded in getting it made a military duty for all men who could not sign the payroll to attend class three nights in a week for a certain period. This plan was successful only to a limited degree, as compulsion was left largely with company commanders, who were not entirely in sympathy with the idea. They contended that the army was no place for a man to make up for his lost school advantages, and some said it was too much to require such a duty of tired, hard-working troops; but too anxious and determined to be discouraged, the effort was continued, and after much advertising and several large public meetings held in the interest of the work, there were over five hundred men who enrolled for class work. Of this number 328 were actually taught by volunteer teacher-soldiers. One sergeant compelled the thirty illiterates of his company to attend school every night there were classes being taught; and after eight weeks all but nine could sign the payroll, and many of them, men still in the morning of their manhood, received such an inspiration as to give them a desire to enter school after their return to the States, and it is known to be true that some of them are at this moment enrolled in different schools and receiving instruction.
Mr. Wright, together with his colleagues, Mr. Nichols and Mr. Hubert, as members of the staff of the University of Beaune, were sent out singly and as a team to lecture and hold institutes in the different sections of France where colored troops were located. It is estimated by them that they reached as many as twenty thousand men, and impressed them with the importance of community co-operation and collective effort in bettering the conditions in the neighborhoods where their civic lots would be cast; also with the importance of buying land and taking advantage of the industrial opportunities which the war had brought about.
The other five members of the colored army educational corps did local work. Mr. J. L. Whiting, who had formerly been educational secretary at Camp Montoir, near St. Nazaire, and who had already done splendid work, went back to his original field of labor. Here in September, 1918, he began with an enrollment of forty, in classes in reading, writing, arithmetic, and civics. By April, 1919, the enrollment, with the assistance of the new compulsory rule of the army, had increased to 868, with 19 soldiers detailed to assist in the work. He found that there were more than 1,000 troops below the fourth grade, who would be glad of an opportunity to attend school, and that there were in every company of colored troops as many as 30 men who were unable to sign the payroll. Mr. Whiting accomplished wonderful results in spite of the handicap of no books, no suitable accommodations, and for a considerable time no regularly detailed teachers.
He set writing copies for all of these men with his own hand, taking their work home each day and reviewing and criticising it. He held classes in the mess halls, many times cold and damp and with no lights except that which could be gotten by the use of candles; and by the close of the work he had not only done much towards wiping out the X (his mark) sign from the payroll, but had given them sufficient foundation for the acquiring of a fair education.
Mr. George W. Jackson had been assigned by the Y. M. C. A. to be Educational Director at Is-sur-Tille. Here he found about 15,000 colored soldiers hailing from Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana and Texas. They were S. O. S. troops, working just back of the combat area. Mr. Jackson was returned here by the army to complete the work started by the Y. M. C. A. During his period of service here he learned that about 2,500 of the colored soldiers had very limited education or none at all. With the assistance of detailed tutors he was able to eliminate 90 per cent. of this illiteracy in about three months. Most of them learned to sign the payroll after about three weeks’ instruction, and by the time they were demobilized fully one-third had written letters to their relatives at home. Classes in secondary and college subjects were also held, in addition to instruction in French, bookkeeping, current topics, and the Bible.
Mr. Thomas A. Clayton was secretary in charge of the educational work at Camp Ancona, near Bordeaux, where on January 10 an Army Post School was organized. Of 6,987 men in camp at this time, 1,378 could not sign the payroll; 1,457 had had four years’ schooling or less; 584 had attended high school, and 137 had attended college. By the close of the work 367 illiterates had learned to write their names. Classes in French and the study of the history and literature of the French people were also organized, and became very popular among the soldiers.
Special attention was given at this school to the teaching of agriculture. A Farmers’ Institute was held, which had a total attendance of 18,000 in three days. The meetings were held under the auspices of Dr. H. Paul Douglass, of Syracuse, N. Y., and farmers’ clubs were organized and a special instructor given them. In all classes, including primary and elementary subjects, there were 503 students enrolled.
Mr. W. H. Nelson had been doing educational work at Brest under many handicaps. For a long time they were unable to get a Y. M. C. A. hut completed. In December, 1918, the writers of this volume went up from St. Nazaire to visit them. They found the staff of two secretaries and a chaplain struggling along as best they could, with no floor in a large part of their building and no lights except what could be produced by the use of numerous candles. They were very happy to see some colored women, and brought us a bountiful supper from one of the company kitchens. This we ate from a small, bare table, by the light of one or two flickering candles. Then the writers were placed upon a box to elevate them a little, while they talked for the encouragement of the soldiers who gathered in a small room, which afterwards became the school room. The little force of secretaries was badly discouraged because they were unable to secure the facilities that had been given to other huts, but by dogged determination they finally succeeded in finishing a beautiful building which was kept immaculately clean in spite of the fact that they were never able to secure any women secretaries. To this place Mr. Nelson was returned after he became a member of the army educational corps, and continued his work of teaching. He had about 1,000 illiterates in the camp whom he attempted to reach. Of this number a total of 372 actually received valuable training.
In addition to the army’s taking over the entire educational work of the Y. M. C. A., it provided means by which a limited number of graduate students would have an opportunity to attend the great universities of France and England; at the same time it established the American University for undergraduates at Beaune, Cote d’Or. This school provided facilities for training in all college courses as well as vocational and technical subjects, and brought over from the States a corps of the very best instructors that could be secured. It also utilized much of the splendid ability already in the army. The French Minister of Education loaned the school a corps of experienced French teachers, who were supplemented through the courtesy of the French Minister of War.
Students at University of London
1. J. Douglass Sheppard. 2. James L. Moran. 3. E. M. Brewington. 4. Ulysses S. Young. 5. Henry L. Marriott. 6. Walter A. Powers. 7. Milton F. Fields. 8. Ulysses S. Donaldson. 9. Leonard Barnett.
Post and Division Schools were established in connection with the university, the purpose of the Division School being to accommodate all who were not qualified to enter the university proper. Here were taught vocational courses and academic and commercial subjects of high school grades. The Post School was composed of those who needed elementary training in English, arithmetic, and citizenship and of men who were unable to read and write the English language. Special provision was made for a Post School for colored soldiers with colored instructors, but it never materialized. To attend the university came 120 colored soldiers who matriculated in the College of Arts and Letters, Agriculture, Science, Journalism, and Music.
Colored American soldiers from all parts of France made application for admission to the Foreign Universities. In some places they were told that colored soldiers were not allowed to attend, and every effort was made to get the young officers of the 92nd Division out of France before they could make application for the coveted privilege and thereby embarrass the army.[6] We have learned of only one whose application was not refused, that of Capt. D. K. Cherry of A. & T. College, Greensboro, N. C., who attended the University of Bordeaux. Several non-commissioned officers were admitted, however, and in the University of London nine matriculated—Corporal James D. Sheppard, Peoria, Ill., Engineering; 1st Sergt. Leonard Barnett, Fleming, Ohio, Psychology, English, and Methods in Education; Ulysses S. Donaldson, Terre Haute, Ind., English Literature; 1st Sergt. W. A. Powers, Xenia, Ohio, Music and Philosophy; 1st Sergt. E. H. Brewington, Salisbury, Md., History and Literature; Sergt. U. S. Young, Madison, N. J., Philosophy and Psychology; Sergt. Milton F. Fields, Des Moines, Iowa; James L. Moran, Lancaster, Mass., Astronomy, and Henry O. Mariott, of Boley, Okla.
Four entered the University at Bordeaux, one the University of Toulouse, one the University of Marseilles, and seven the different universities in Paris—Charles S. Wilkerson, Phar.D., Pittsburgh, Pa.; Charles A. Johnson, Phar.D., Columbia, S. C.; Oscar S. Johnson, B. S., Louisville, Ky.; Thomas Williams, Phar.D., Patterson, La.; George Washington Mitchell, A.B., Marshall, Tex.; Clarence Glead, Phar.D., Lawrence, Kan., and Mr. McKenzie, a lawyer from Richmond, Va.
Mention should be made also of the Army Candidate School at Langres, France. The school was located at Fort Dela Bonnelle, and 62 non-commissioned officers representing all the colored combat regiments in France were enrolled there. Of this number, one sergeant died, two became ill at examination time, and 56 received commissions. This was the best record for the proportion receiving commissions of all the 17 platoons represented there. Of this number all whose initials ranged from A to D were sent to the 370th Infantry; the others were distributed throughout the 92nd Division. The 325th Signal Corps Battalion attended school at Gondrecourt, and made one of the best records of any battalion from the standpoint of hardworking students and improved efficiency, while the five colored company officers of the 167th F. A. attended school at La Cortrine, and the colonel in charge of the school reported that they made the best record for studiousness and work accomplished in a period of two weeks of any American units in a given length of time.
There were other schools where some colored soldiers secured training in wireless telegraphy and other technical subjects, and 33 2nd lieutenants received instruction at the French Artillery School at Vannes. While visiting that city during their period of training there, the writers were told by a French general with whom they conversed while waiting for a train, that these men all showed superior mental capacity, and were much loved by all the French citizens because of their splendid behavior and gentility of manners.
Another phase of educational work among the troops was the developing of libraries. In this work the American Library Association was the moving spirit. Thousands of volumes of books were contributed to this Association by the American people, and the Y. M. C. A. acted as a medium by which they were placed within reach of the soldiers. This offered a special opportunity for colored welfare workers to give another kind of training to soldiers that thousands were unable to get in their home cities. In very few cities in the South are any library facilities provided for the colored people. They are not permitted to go into the public libraries, and only a few cities have colored Branch Carnegie Libraries, such as Louisville or Houston, or a colored library established through other channels such as the one in Guthrie, Oklahoma. As a result, thousands of men coming from the South had no training in the use of libraries, and special attention had to be given everywhere to instituting and teaching booklending systems; otherwise all books would have disappeared in a day or two, not to be read always, but to be utilized in various and sundry ways such as a hiding place for letters, or a pad upon which to write. In time they all learned, however, to borrow and return books in a given time, and the library soon became the most popular place about the hut. It was always kept warm and attractive and it was the only place about the hut where one could make himself comfortable in an arm or steamer chair. Through the generosity of the American public, magazines and periodicals became plentiful after the Armistice was signed, and the soldiers would tarry late, often until taps, before they would tear themselves away from the news item which brought such interesting information from home.
1. Library at Camp Lusitania, St. Nazaire, France. 2. Colored College Students at University of Beaune. 3. Colored Students in Farm School, University of Beaune.
Large and valuable libraries were established for the colored soldiers at Camp Lusitania, and the Embarkation Camps at St. Nazaire, in the Leave Area at Challes-les-Eaux, at Camp Romagne, at Camp President Lincoln, Brest, and at the two colored huts at Camp Pontanezen, and were of invaluable service in educational and cultural work among the soldiers. Through these channels and the opportunities offered through the different Y. M. C. A. and Army Schools, the colored men received a new impetus and a new vision, and with the assistance of the training that comes from travel and contact, have returned to their homes better equipped for citizenship and future service to their race than they possibly could have been otherwise through all the years of a lifetime.
Group of soldiers, the majority of whom assisted in the work of education at Camp Lusitania, St. Nazaire, France
“They said they were too slow, too dull, too this and that to do it,
They couldn’t match the method of the Hun,
And then to arm a million—why, the land would surely rue it
If a million blacks were taught to use a gun.
But right won out, and they went in at all detractors smiling;
They learned as quick as any how to shoot,
They took the prize at loading ships, and riveting and piling,
And trained a thousand officers to boot.
And when they went they took a boon no others had been bringing,
For whether with a pick or with a gun,
They lightened every labor with a wondrous sort of singing,
And turned the pall of battle into fun.
O, the Frenchman was a marvel, and the Yankee was a wonder,
And the British line was like a granite wall,
But for singing as they leaped away to draw the Kaiser’s thunder,
The swarthy sons of Dixie beat them all.”
Leslie Pinckney Hill.