“We are still anticipating the arrival of the day when the Government will do justice to the Fifty-fourth and Fifty-fifth Regiments, and pay us what is justly our due.
“We have fought like men; we have worked like men; we have been ready at every call of duty, and thus have proved ourselves to be men: but still we are refused the thirteen dollars per month.
“Oh, what a shame it is to be treated thus! Some of us have wives and little children, who are looking for succor and support from their husbands and fathers; but, alas! they look in vain. The answer to the question, ‘When shall we be able to assist them?’ is left wholly to the Congress of the United States.
“What will the families of those poor comrades of ours who fell at James’s Island, Fort Wagner, and Olus-tee, do? They must suffer; for their husbands and fathers have gone the way of all the earth. They have gone to join that number that John saw, and to rest at the right hand of God.
“Our hearts pine in bitter anguish when we look back to our loved ones at home, and we are compelled to shed many a briny tear. We have offered our lives a sacrifice for a country that has not the magnanimity to treat us as men. All that we ask is the rights of other soldiers, the liberty of other free men. If we cannot have these, give us an honorable discharge from the United-States service, and we will not ask for pay.
“We came here to fight for liberty and country, and not for money (we would scorn to do that); but they promised us, if we would enlist, they would give us thirteen dollars per month.
“It was all false. They only wanted to get the halter over our heads, and then say, ‘Get out if you can.’
“Sir, the Fifty-fourth and Fifty-fifth Regiments would sooner consent to fight for the whole three years, gratis, than to be put upon the footing of contrabands.
“It is not that we think ourselves any better than they; for we are not. We know that God ‘hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth;’ but we have enlisted as Massachusetts Volunteers, and we will not surrender that proud position, come what may.”
Sergt. William Walker, of Company A, Third South-Carolina colored troops, feeling that he and his associates were unjustly dealt with, persuaded his company to go to their captain’s tent, and stack their muskets, and refuse duty till paid. They did so, and the following was the result:—