claim the discharge." There is a touching
anecdote related of Baron Stenben on the occasion of the disbandment of
the American army. A black soldier, with his wounds unhealed, utterly
destitute, stood on the wharf just as a vessel bound for his distant home
was getting under way. The poor fellow gazed at the vessel with tears in
his eyes, and gave himself up to despair. The warm-hearted foreigner
witnessed his emotion, and, inquiring into the cause of it, took his last
dollar from his purse and gave it to him, with tears of sympathy
trickling down his cheeks. Overwhelmed with gratitude, the poor wounded
soldier hailed the sloop and was received on board. As it moved out from
the wharf, he cried back to his noble friend on shore, "God Almighty
bless you, Master Baron!"

"In Rhode Island," says Governor Eustis in his able speech against
slavery in Missouri, 12th of twelfth month, 1820, "the blacks formed an
entire regiment, and they discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity.
The gallant defence of Red Bank, in which the black regiment bore a part,
is among the proofs of their valor." In this contest it will be
recollected that four hundred men met and repulsed, after a terrible and
sanguinary struggle, fifteen hundred Hessian troops, headed by Count
Donop. The glory of the defence of Red Bank, which has been pronounced
one of the most heroic actions of the war, belongs in reality to black
men; yet who now hears them spoken of in connection with it? Among the
traits which distinguished the black regiment was devotion to their
officers. In the attack made upon the American lines near Croton River
on the 13th of the fifth month, 1781, Colonel Greene, the commander of
the regiment, was cut down and mortally wounded; but the sabres of the
enemy only reached him through the bodies of his faithful guard of
blacks, who hovered over him to protect him, every one of whom was
killed. The late Dr. Harris, of Dunbarton, New Hampshire, a
Revolutionary veteran, stated, in a speech at Francistown, New Hampshire,
some years ago, that on one occasion the regiment to which he was
attached was commanded to defend an important position, which the enemy
thrice assailed, and from which they were as often repulsed. "There
was," said the venerable speaker, "a regiment of blacks in the same
situation,--a regiment of negroes fighting for our liberty and
independence, not a white man among them but the officers,--in the same
dangerous