After Massachusetts led the way with the formation of the 54th and 55th regiments, scores of federal black regiments were then formed, called the United States Colored Troops.
On July 4, 1864, Congress passed an act allowing any state to appoint agents to recruit southerners, primarily into the all-black United States Colored Troops. In exchange for providing bounties, states received credit towards their own recruiting quotas.
Massachusetts recruiting agents were sent to southern locations and enlisted almost 2,500 men, most in Vicksburg, Mississippi, and Hilton Head, South Carolina. These southern recruits could be credited to Massachusetts towns, to drafted men seeking substitutes, or even to patriotic citizens who donated funds to sponsor a “representative recruit.” As a number of states competed for these southern recruits, Massachusetts offered the same $325 bounty paid to its own troops at the time. Later, some raw recruits were found to have been cheated out of promised bounties by unscrupulous agents or officers.
U.S. Colored Troops
This image, taken in Washington, D.C., depicts Company E of the 4th U.S. Colored Infantry.
Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division
Descriptive list, Norfolk, Virginia, 1864
This roll provides physical descriptions and occupations of black men recruited by a Massachusetts agent in Norfolk, Virginia. These soldiers were primarily assigned to the 38th Infantry Regiment and the 1st Cavalry Regiment, U.S. Colored Troops.
Massachusetts Archives
Testimony, 1866
Newton native Colonel Alfred Stedman Hartwell, a white officer in the 55th Massachusetts Infantry, was asked to lead an investigation after the Civil War into irregular recruiting practices in the South. This letter received by Hartwell describes how one southern Massachusetts recruit had been cheated out of most of his bounty.
Courtesy State Library of Massachusetts, Special Collections
Read a Transcription of the letter
Charleston So Ca
Feby 21st 1866
Brev Brig. Gen A.S. Hartwell
General:
At your request I have the honor to furnish you with the following extract of my report – addressed to Brev Lt. Col. W.L.M. Burger A.A. Gen Dept. of S.C. dated Dec 16th 1865.
Extract
"5th Ned Rivers Co H. (21st U.S.C.T.) credited to Massachusetts, States that he received himself from the state Pay Master thirty five ($35.00) Dollars and placed the remainder of his state bounty – two hundred and ninety ($290.00) Dollars, in the hands of Lieut. Col. Jonathan Rice, the principal recruiting Agent for Massachusetts, who, as he states, promises to pay the money to his (the recruits) mother. He also alleges that Col Rice has never paid it to his mother."
Bounty elective roll
Vicksburg, Mississippi
December 1864
Recruits from the South chose how they wished to have their bounties paid by Massachusetts, with most electing to receive the $325 at once. While most were African-American, a number of white men also signed up and were assigned to Union regiments in both northern and southern states. This roll shows that many southern recruits, both black and white, were illiterate, as they marked Xs rather than signing their names.
Massachusetts Archives