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January 16
In the midst of his "March to the Sea" during the Civil War, General Sherman and Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton met with 20 black community leaders of Savannah, Georgia. Based partly to their input, Gen. Sherman issued Special Field Order #15 on January 16, 1865, setting aside the Sea Islands and a 330-mile inland tract of land along the southern coast of Charleston for the exclusive settlement of Blacks. This land had been confiscated by the Union Army. Each family would receive 40 acres of land and an army mule to work the land, thus "forty acres and a mule," a phrase incorporated into the English language for compensation that was to be awarded to freed African American slaves after the Civil War but was returned instead to former landowners. The order applied to black families who lived near the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. On a national level, this and other land, confiscated and abandoned, became the jurisdiction of the Freedman's Bureau, which was headed by Gen. Oliver Otis Howard (for whom Howard University is named). He wanted to "give the freedmen protection, land and schools as far and as fast as he can." By June 1865, around 10,000 freed slaves were settled on 400,000 acres in Georgia and South Carolina. But President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated and Andrew Johnson became president. Johnson revoked the order, issued special pardons, and returned the property to the white ex-Confederates, the former owners. Because of this, the phrase has come to represent the failure of Reconstruction and the general public to assist African Americans.H
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The African American Registry®, The African American Registry® Copyright 2005, 2006
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