Segregation In The Civil War Essay

“A house divided against itself cannot stand” -Abraham Lincoln. President Lincoln was utterly correct when he stated this, the Civil War brought a great amount of tension amongst the states. In the northern states the war began as fight against the succession of the Confederate states from the Union. While in the south fought against the threat to their everyday lives, which one major part was slavery. Throughout the Civil War over 620,000 soldiers lives were lost and among those deaths 40,000 of them were the lives of African-American soldiers. Segregation also followed the blacked soldiers into their lives in the military, they faced unfair wages, not allowed to fight in battles, and much more. One of the greatest movies released that

Similarly, this scene is also identified in the article Blacks in the Civil War which states, “Black soldiers were initially paid $10 per month which $3 was automatically deducted for clothing, resulting in a net pay of $7” (Blacks in the Civil War, 2). This scene is a perfect example of segregation amongst the Union army because black soldiers were denied full pay at first, even though they are battling alongside white soldiers who are fighting for the same cause. Another scene that highlights the segregation among the Union army was when the 54th Regiment received their new muskets and they were told that they were not going to be used in combat instead for labor work. The black soldiers spent all their time training and finding out they will not be used in combat was devastating. However, later on in the movie the black soldiers were granted to participate in combat. As stated in Blacks in the Civil War, “Because of prejudice against them, black units were not used in combat as extensively as they might have been” (Blacks in the Civil War, 2). Segregation was not only just present in the everyday lives of the black population, but for the black men who joined the Union army, it followed them into their military lifestyle as