WAYNESBORO – Chambersburg native Tracy Baer, a licensed battlefield guide at Gettysburg, presented details about the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, the Black Civil War unit depicted in the movie “Glory” during last week’s Waynesboro Rotary Club meeting.
While not the first Black unit formed, it was the first in the North and the first to be recruited as a combat regiment, Baer said. Massachusetts Gov. John Andrew was behind the formation of the 54th, which came together in 1863 following the Emancipation Proclamation.
Because too few free Blacks could be found in Massachusetts to form a 1,000-man regiment, recruits were taken
from other states and even other countries. Pennsylvania, with 344 enlistees, actually had more than any other state.
Baer said he has been able to confirm 47 members of the 54th were from Franklin County. A total of 110 Black soldiers from the county are known to have served in the war. Among them were John Plowden, who lost a leg at Fort Wagner, and William Little, the first Black police constable of Chambersburg. Two sets of four brothers, the
Krunkletons and the Christys, came from the “Little Africa” section near Mercersburg.
Many of the veterans are buried in the Mt. Vernon Cemetery west of Chambersburg and the Zion Union Cemetery in Mercersburg. A total of 180,000 Black soldiers served for the North, and made an immense contribution to the victory of Union forces, Baer said.
