Back down memory lane in 2010...this is me sharing a moment with Ambassador Andrew Young along with Dr. Brian Wills, Director of the Center for the Study of the Civil War Era at Kennesaw State University, at the African-American Soldiers in Combat USCT Civil War historical marker dedication in Dalton, GA. We were so honored.
(Okay, Ambassador Young paid me a super-duper compliment...he said, and I quote: "Young lady, I love that jacket." OMG, I designed this jacket and my mother sewed it for me!)
The historical marker reads:
"African-American Soldiers in Combat"
"Near Dalton on August 15, 1864, during the Civil War, the 14th United States Colored Troops (USCT), whose enlisted men were mostly former slaves, helped drive off a Confederate cavalry attack on the Western and Atlantic Railroad, U.S. General William T. Sherman’s main supply line during the Atlanta Campaign. Later, on October 13, 1864, the 44th USCT was in a fort protecting the railroad through Dalton when the garrison commander surrendered to Confederate General John B. Hood. In accordance with Confederate policy, many of the 600 captured black troops were returned to slavery. Black troops rarely saw combat in Georgia, though nearly 200,000 African Americans served in the U.S. armed forces during the war."
"Erected for the Civil War 150 commemoration by the Georgia Historical Society, the Georgia Battlefields Association and the Georgia Department of Economic Development 155-3
Location: Fort Hill School, 104 Fort Hill Terrace, Dalton"