- African Americans at War: An Encyclopedia
Jonathan D. Sutherland has produced a two-volume encyclopedia dealing with the changing role of African Americans in the armed forces of the United States, their evolution from a source of emergency manpower to a routine component of the military and naval establishments. He selected more than 250 items for inclusion and used cross-referencing, a detailed index, two chronologies (one general and the other dealing specifically with racial desegregation), and other appendices to shape these items into a coherent whole. He has included brief lists of references and further readings after some of the articles, as well as a formal bibliography, which, though impressive, emphasizes books at the expense of articles in scholarly journals.
The use of two chronologies reflects the importance of the racial desegregation of the armed forces but in doing so weakens the general chronology, which seems padded with events, like a helicopter crash involving Colin [End Page 1302] Powell (p. 634), that affected the careers of individuals but did little to alter the history of African Americans at war.
The author also uses the general chronology to describe briefly (p. 631) the exploits of Charles M. Bussey, a Tuskegee Airman in World War II who fought as an Engineer officer during the Korean War. Elsewhere he mentions (pp. 66, 98) Colonel John A. Cash's postwar investigation of the denial of a recommendation that Bussey's actions deserved the Medal of Honor. Instead of devoting an entry to Bussey, his heroism, and the results of Cash's efforts, the encyclopedia relies on Bussey's absence from the appended list of African Americans who earned the Medal of Honor to indicate that the denial stood, regardless of Cash's investigation.
Since the author has chosen to concentrate on the contributions of African Americans in preparing for and fighting the wars of the United States, he touches lightly on the colonial period—though he covers Lord Dunmore, the Royal Governor of Virginia, and the Ethiopian Regiment he raised in 1775 to help suppress the American Revolution (p. 146)—and on the black militia units that took shape in the defeated Confederacy during Reconstruction, some of which saw federal service during the Spanish-American War.
The author does an excellent job in dealing with individuals. Besides listing the African Americans awarded the Medal of Honor and other combat heroes, he sketches such pioneers as the Navy's first black officers, the Golden Thirteen of World War II (p. 205), the first African American to graduate from the Naval Academy, Wesley A. Brown (p. 78), and Henry O. Flipper (p. 185), the first black graduate of the U.S. Military Academy. The encyclopedia also includes an entry for Michael Morris "Hell-Roarin' Mike" Healy (p. 217), an officer in the Revenue Cutter Service rather than the Navy, whose legendary service in nineteenth-century Alaska varied from rescues at sea to establishing a reindeer herd ashore. The coverage of the racial integration of military aviation not only profiles prominent African-American airmen like Generals Benjamin O. Davis, Jr. (p. 121), and Daniel "Chappie" James, Jr. (p. 255), but also acknowledges the efforts of others like Colonel Noel Parrish (pp. 408, 426), a white officer who helped to teach the Tuskegee Airmen how to fly.
In short, the work paints a complete, at times vivid, picture of African Americans in the armed forces. The encyclopedia answers many questions likely to be raised by high school or college students and should encourage further research. Unfortunately, the statistics illustrating the long-term change in the importance of African Americans to the armed forces are currently buried in the general chronology and elsewhere, such as in "African American Enlistment" (p. 2) and "African American Officers" (p. 5). The information might have had greater impact if it had been summarized in graphs or charts, perhaps in an appendix.