Pushing pens and pencils on top of desks, tapping keys of clicking typewriters, bending over buzzing sewing machines, plying needles over tailors’ benches, before the humming looms, by the dangerous railroad crossings, in the car-filled train yards, between the handles of loaded wheelbarrows, through the crops of farmerette fields, among the death-dealing explosives in munition and arsenal plants and in many other places, thousands of brave and willing Colored women were to be found either in yeowomen’s suits or overalls and blouses steadfastly working with cheery dispositions and hopeful smiles.
In December, 1918, two distinguished Colored Americans were sent to Europe on special missions as follows; Dr. Robert R. Moton, who was sent by the President of the United States and the Secretary of War to investigate the conditions of and talk to the Colored soldiers, and Dr. W. E. B. DuBois who went to Europe as the representative of the N. A. A. C. P. and The Crisis to collect historical data pertaining to the American Colored fighters in the World War and to call and form a Pan-African Congress.
At Home Buying Liberty Bonds
“The Biennial meeting of the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs was held in Denver, Colorado in July, 1918. Among the important subjects considered at this meeting were: Temperance, Suffrage, Lynchings, Religious Work, Negro Women’s Problems, Food Conservation and what the Negro Women Were Contributing to War Work Service. It was pointed out that the Association had representation on the Women’s Committee of the Council of National Defense, that in the Third Liberty Loan, 7,000 Negro Women were at work and raised $5,000,000. It was also stated that, judging from the number of buttons sold through the colored women’s clubs, that about $300,000 had been contributed in Red Cross Drives.”
“David H. Rains, a wealthy Negro farmer, living near Shreveport, Louisiana, walked into the Liberty Loan Headquarters in that city and purchased $100,000 worth of the Fourth Liberty Loan Bonds and said that: ‘If they fell short of the quota he would make up the deficiency.’ (Work’s Negro Year Book, 1918-1919 edition, pages 48-49). According to an article on page 273 in the April 1921 issue of The Crisis, ‘Mr. Rains, who is reputed to be worth $1,500,000, owns 2,000 acres of land on which there are 40 producing oil wells; he pays a clerk $100 a day to check up his royalties.’”
“A report from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was that the Negro school children subscribed for $27,000 worth of Third Liberty Loan Bonds. Through a Negro bank in that city, over $400,000 worth of Bonds were bought, and it was stated that the total amount of Third Liberty Loan Bonds purchased by the Negroes of Philadelphia was more than $1,000,000.”
“At the close of the Third Liberty Loan Drive, the United States Treasury Department awarded first place among all the banks of the country to a Negro bank, the Mutual Savings, Portsmouth, Virginia. This bank was given a quota of $5,700 to raise. A total of over $100,000, almost twenty times the stipulated quota was raised. This bank was assigned $12,500 as its quota of the Fourth Liberty Loan. Its total subscription for this loan was reported to have been $115,000.”
“The Negroes of Jacksonville, Florida, were awarded the first honor flag given to Negroes for exceeding their quota in the Third Liberty Loan Drive. They were asked to raise $50,000; they raised $250,000. In the Fourth Liberty Loan Drive, they were assigned a quota of $500,000 and raised over $100,000 more than this amount. The following are additional examples of subscriptions of Negroes to the Fourth Liberty Loan: Mobile, Alabama, $250,000; Norfolk, Virginia, $250,000; Kansas City, Missouri, $500,000; Savannah, Georgia, $500,000; Memphis, Tennessee, $700,000; Chicago, Illinois, $1,000,000; Birmingham, Alabama, $1,155,000; Maryland, $2,000,000.”
“When Secretary McAdoo visited Little Rock, Arkansas, in the interest of the First Liberty Loan, he was presented with a certified check for $60,000 as the Mosaic Templars’ bit toward financing the war. This society’s subscriptions were added to for subsequent loans until a total of $135,000 was invested in Liberty Bonds.”
Not only rich Colored people gave freely of their wealth, but poor Colored people sacrificed to extents that are not imaginable in giving their last few dollars to help end that world strife, as soon as possible.