The Harlem Hellfighters: Fighting Racism In The Trenches Of WWI
'The Weight Of The World'
Their training prepared them for combat, but racial segregation in the U.S. Army kept them from marching to the front lines in France. Instead, they, and other African-American soldiers, were put to work unloading ships.
"[The white establishment] did not think that African-Americans had the intelligence to think clearly," Brooks says.
The French army absorbed the Hellfighters to help replenish their own ranks, finally giving them the opportunity to fight that the U.S. Army denied them. Still, Sanders adds that some French officers doubted whether the African-American soldiers had enough courage to go into battle.
But the Hellfighters did not disappoint.
"[The French] were shocked at how willing the Americans were to charge into the face of death," Brooks explains. "Everybody [in this unit] had so much to prove on every level. The soldiers had to prove their courage. The officers had to prove their intelligence and their courage. There really was the weight of the world on all their shoulders."
'Proud To Be Americans, Proud To Be Black'
Melville Miller was 16 when he joined the Harlem Hellfighters, which was first formed as the 15th New York National Guard regiment. Decades after World War I, he could still recall marching through formerly German-occupied territory.
"That day, the sun was shining, and we were marching. And the band was playing," Miller told an interviewer for the 1977 documentary Men of Bronze. "Everybody's head [was] high, and we were all proud to be Americans, proud to be black, and proud to be in the 15th New York Infantry."
i i