Essay On African Americans In The Military

Living back then in 1900’s for African Americans wasn’t easy at all. Dealing with slavery the African Americans had gotten the chance to enlist in the military as some of them did, they had thought that by doing so maybe on their return home and by doing right by fighting they would be looked upon as soldiers instead of slaves. “It was seen that though the African Americans comprised just 10 percent of the US population, 13 percent of the inductees were blacks.” The African Americans knew that enlisting the army wouldn’t be easy for them, but they had hoped that in doing so they would gain respect.
Nevertheless, when African Americans were allowed to recruit to the army there still was a rule that they couldn’t become marines. In the Navy and Coast Guard they only allowed them to so little and had menial positions. At the end of World War 1 there were African Americans who were in cavalry, infantry, signal, medical and engineer units working as intelligent officers, surveyors and chaplains, chemists and truck drivers. The army didn’t make it easy on the African Americans very little of them only worked in combat and the rest relegated to labor battalions. Four African Americans
As a result white Americans became nervous concerning the changing societal structure.” (African Americans in World War 1) When the African Americans returned home the white Americans were worried that when they would be back that they would want to demand them and take over their jobs of some sort. Since their return there was a rise in racial tension between the whites and the black Americans. The African American soldiers only wanted to celebrate just like all other soldiers in their victory. They thought that they’d be greeted as heroes on returning back to their homes but that wasn’t the outcome since the white Americans set their mind to think they wanted