USS Maine Tablet (1912), old Rochester City Hall, Fitzhugh Street
Scene 1: Havana, February 1898
from 1896 film, Boxing match or Glove Contest
Scene 2: Pawtucket, Rhode Island, February 1898
Scene 3: Washington, February 1898
Scene 5: New York, February, 1898
Scene 9, Siboney, Cuba June 1898
Scene 17 New York
And on early war films Filming, faking and propaganda: The origins of the war film, 1897-1902
Stephen Crane in Greece during the Greco-Turkish War, 1897
Mr. Crane’s Vivid Story: Scene 5 Montana US Military Encampment, February 1898
During their 1896 excursion from Fort Missoula, Mont., to Yellowstone National Park, riders of the 25th Infantry Bicycle Corps, led by 2nd Lt. James A. Moss, at top, pose on Minerva Terrace at Mammoth Hot Springs.
The black Buffalo Soldiers are on horseback, deftly carrying out precision drills to the command of their white officer, General Miles.
General Miles: At ease!
(A currier arrives. He delivers an animated message.)
Young Trooper: Hey, Sutton, whassup wit dat? Do you think them Injuns is on the warpath agin’?
Tenth Cavalry During Apache Wars 1889
Veteran Trooper #1: Boy, you are raw. There haven’t been any Injuns to kill since Sitting Bull and Wounded Knee. And that was almost ten years ago. Last I heard that Apache Gee-ron-neemo was selling auto-mo-biles on his Reservation. Boy, it’d be more likely we was invadin’ Canada.
Veteran Trooper #2: The days of the Injuns and the Wild West are gone. I don’ know why they keep us out here, ‘cept the white folks back home don’t want alot of niggers with guns around.
General Miles: Men, I have just been alerted that the USS Maine has blow up in Havana Harbor. We think it was a Spanish torpedo. 268 American sailors are dead. I might add that 28 of them were colored boys. This is sure to be war. You Buffalo Soldiers are the bravest, toughest cavalrymen in the United States Army and I am proud to have served with you. If it is war, I expect and know that every man will do his duty.
(cheers): Hurrah for General Miles! To hell with Spain!
Buffalo Soldier, Black Corporal
Raw Trooper: Dis is even better dan Injuns. Nows I’m gonna see myself some real fighten’.
Veteran Trooper #1: I’m with you there, boy. I’ll be glad to get out of this backwater fort. Maybe they’ll make me a commissioned officer.
Veteran #2: Man, don’t you ever learn? All this time and aint one of us has been made an officer. You think it’ll be any different after we kill some Spaniards? Why are we going to Cuba to fight the white man’s war, anyway?
African American “Buffalo Soldiers” in Cuba, 1898
Veteran #1: The Cubans are our brothers and theys being treated wors’n slaves.
Veteran #2: That’s true enough. But before they send the Army down to Cuba, they oughtta send it down South and round up every last lynch mob.
Veteran #3: I’ll go further. The black man oughtta have his own Army. No. He oughtta have his own country. His own Empire!
(The troops break up into small groups.)
Veteran # 1 to Raw Trooper: Boy, don’t listen to them. And don’t get too close to them. Theys gonna be trouble for sure.
Somethings eatin’ at them so bad they can’t see nothing good. Listen to what the Gen’ral said about the Buffalo Soldiers. And our duty. Remember the Maine! To Hell with Spain!
Arlington National Cemetery. Civil War monument, with a plaque also honoring Spanish-American War veterans, erected in 1920. Life-sized bronze statue of Union soldier and Norfolk native Sgt. William H. Carney tops the monument. Carney was the first black Congressional Medal of Honor recipient. The story of Carney’s regiment inspired the 1989 movie “Glory,” which starred Denzel Washington as Carney
In 1915, Rochester novelist and journalist F. Grant Gilmore published, The Problem: A Military Novel about a black soldier who served in Cuba and the Philippines. It was likely the first war novel written by an African-American
