THE 92ND DIVISION
The storm center of the Negro-American troops was the 92nd Division. The brigading of the 93rd Division with the French made wholesale attack and depreciation difficult, since it was continually annuled by the generous appreciation of the French. The 92nd Division, however, was planned as a completed Negro Division, manned by Black company officers. Everything depended on the General and field officers as to how fair this experiment should be.
From the very first, there was open and covert opposition and trouble. Instead of putting Colonel Young, a distinquished Negro officer, at the head; the White General Ballou was chosen and then he was surrounded by southern white officers who despised "Black" officers.
General Ballou was well-meaning, but weak, vacillating, and without the ability to command Negro-American troops. Ballou was afraid of southern criticism. He was morbidly impressed by the horror of this "experiment" and proceeded from the first to kill the moral of his troops by his orders he issued and his speeches. The General sought to make his Negro officers feel personally responsible for the "Houston outbreak"; he virtually ordered his Negro officers to submit to certain personal humiliations and discriminations without protest. Thus, before the 92nd Division was fully formed, General Ballou had spread hatred and distrust among his officers and men. "That old Ballou stuff!" became a by-word in the division for anti-negro propaganda. Ballou was finally dismissed from his command for "tactical Inefficiency."
The main difficulty, however, lay in a curious misapprehension in White men of the meaning and method of race contact in America. They sought desperately to reproduce in the Negro division and in France, the racial restrictions of America. The White theory was that any new freedom would "spoil" the "Blacks". White americans did not understand the fact that men of the types who became Negro officers would protect themselves from continuous insult and discrimination by making and moving in a world of their own. Black soldiers associated socially where they are more than welcome. Black soldiers lived for the most part beside neighbors who liked them. They attended schools where they were not insulted and worked where their work was appreciated. Of course, every once in a while they had to unite to resent encroachments upon their world, new discriminations in law, and custom. Fortunately, this was an occational incident and not continuous.
The world which General Ballou and his field officers tried to re-create for Negro officers was a world of continuous daily insult and discrimination to an extent that was artificial and entirely unnecessary, arousing the liveliest astonishment and mystification.
An example of discrimination is shown when the Headquarters Company of the 92nd Division sailed for Brest. Elaborate quarters in the best hotel were reserved for White officers. An unfinished barracks, without beds and in the cold mud, were assigned Negro officers. The Black officers went to their quarters and then returned to the city. Black officers found that the White Americans, unable to make themselves understood in French, had not been given their reservations, but had gone to another and poorer hotel. The Black officers, immediately, explained and took the fine reservations.
As no Negroes had been trained in artillery, it was claimed, immmediately, that none were competent. Nevertheless, some were finally found to qualify. Then it was claimed that technically trained privates were impossible to find. There were plenty to be had if they could be gathered from various camps. Permission to
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