This Is it, the Ohio Medal of Honor recipient : From slavery to freedom, Read More Here.
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A 24-year-old farmer from Greater Cincinnati enlisted into the Ohio Volunteer Militia, a precursor to the Ohio National Guard, on June 7, 1863, presumably, to fight the Confederacy under the banner of freedom. For Powhatan Beaty, who grew up a slave in Richmond, Virginia, what would that fight for freedom mean, given that over 4 million of his fellow black Americans were still enslaved?
It likely meant an end to 200 whiplashes in a day, the branding, the rattle of shackles and chains, the severance from family sold, the sexual assault of loved ones, the friends hanged or burned alive or shot by firing squad, the mutilations or the solitary confinement in a hot box.
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For Powhatan Beaty, who stood 5 feet 7 inches tall and had a promising career as an actor and playwright ahead of him, what would that fight for freedom mean for his immediate future, given that over 620,000 men died and many more were wounded, some maimed for life, in the Civil War? It likely meant carnage and maybe worse: the ground-shaking artillery barrages, the shattered bodies, the wound infections, the bone-sawing amputations, the nightmares of shell shock, the chills of yellow fever, the smallpox lesions, the dehydration and the malnutrition.
Still, Beaty was both ready and there for his country, willing to answer the call in the face of war and its probable horrors. “Soldiers like Beaty fought to end slavery; that was their prime motivation,” said Anthony Gibbs, with the Ohio History Connection. “The second thing they were fighting for was citizenship. Even though they lived in a free state at that time, they still weren’t allowed to vote in many places. They still were not allowed to take public office. They couldn’t send their students to public schools and such. They believed that by fighting for President Lincoln and the Union that they could gain basic and full citizenship rights. The third thing is that they wanted to disprove this theory that they were somehow unequal because of their race, that they were somehow inferior.”
It likely meant an end to 200 whiplashes in a day, the branding, the rattle of shackles and chains, the severance from family sold, the sexual assault of loved ones, the friends hanged or burned alive or shot by firing squad, the mutilations or the solitary confinement in a hot box.
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For Powhatan Beaty, who stood 5 feet 7 inches tall and had a promising career as an actor and playwright ahead of him, what would that fight for freedom mean for his immediate future, given that over 620,000 men died and many more were wounded, some maimed for life, in the Civil War? It likely meant carnage and maybe worse: the ground-shaking artillery barrages, the shattered bodies, the wound infections, the bone-sawing amputations, the nightmares of shell shock, the chills of yellow fever, the smallpox lesions, the dehydration and the malnutrition.
Still, Beaty was both ready and there for his country, willing to answer the call in the face of war and its probable horrors. “Soldiers like Beaty fought to end slavery; that was their prime motivation,” said Anthony Gibbs, with the Ohio History Connection. “The second thing they were fighting for was citizenship. Even though they lived in a free state at that time, they still weren’t allowed to vote in many places. They still were not allowed to take public office. They couldn’t send their students to public schools and such. They believed that by fighting for President Lincoln and the Union that they could gain basic and full citizenship rights. The third thing is that they wanted to disprove this theory that they were somehow unequal because of their race, that they were somehow inferior.”
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