ADDRESS DF WELCOME GIVEN AT A RECEPTION
TENDERED TO THE MEN WHO HAVE
-n RETURNED FROM THE BATTLE FRONT
BY THE MEN'S PROGRESSIVE CLUB
OF THE FIFTEENTH STREET
PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH ,
APRIL 24, 1919,*
BY THE PASTOR, REV. FRANCIS J. GRIMKE.
Young gentlemen, I am glad to welcome you home again after
months of absence in a foreign land in obedience to the call of
your country—glajd that you have returned to us without any
serious casualties.
I am sure you acquitted yourselves well; that in the record
that you have made for yourselves, during your absence from
home, there is nothing to be ashamed of, nothing that will reflect
any discredit upon the race with which you are identified. The
colored soldier has always commanded respect, even from his ene¬
mies ; the colored soldier has always played a man's part in
every struggle in which he has been engaged; he has never turned
his back upon the enemy; has never shown himself a coward.
It is generally admitted that there is no better soldier, in all the
world, than the colored soldier.
While you were away you had the opportunity of coming in
contact with another than the American <type of white man; and
through that contact you have learned what it is tt> be treated
as a man, regardless of the color of your skin or face identity.
I.Jnfortunately you had to go away from home to receive a man's
^treatment, tc^"breathe the pure, bracing air of liberty, equality,
fraternity. And, while it was with no intention of bringing to
you that knowledge, of putting you where you could get that
kind of experience, but simply because they couldn't very well
get along without you, I am glad, nevertheless, that you were
sent. Yoji know now that the mean, contemptible spirit of race
prejudice that curses this land is not the spirit of other lands:
you know now what it is to be treated as a man. And, one of
the things that I am particularly hoping for, now that you have
had this experience, is that you have come back determined, as
never before, to keep up the struggle for our rights until, here
irj these United States, in this boasted land of the free and home
of the brave, every man, regardless of the color of his skin, shall
l.e accorded a man's treatment.
Your trip abroad will'be of very little value to the race in this
country unless you have come back with the lo\ c of liberty,
equalityy rnity burning in your r,culs, and the .determination
to set other souls 011 fire with the same spirit. In the struggle
that is before us, you can do a great deal in helping to better
conditions. You, who gave up everything—home, friend, rela¬
tives—you who took your lives in your liands and went forth to
lay them, a willing sacrifice upon the altar of your country and
in the interest of democracy throughout the world, have a right
to speak—to speak with authority; and that right you must exercise.
We, who remained at home, followed you while you were away,
with the deepest interest; and, our hearts burned with indigna¬
tion when tidings came to us,,as it did from time to time, of the
manner in which you were treated by those over you, from
whom you had every reason, in view of the circumstances that
took you abroad, and what it was costing you, to expect decent,
humane treatment; instead of ):he treatment that was accorded
you. The physical hardships, incident to a soldier's life in times
of war, are trying* enough, are hard enough to bear—and, during
this world war, on the other side of the water, I understand they
were unusually hard. To add to these the insults, the studied
insults that were heaped upon you, and for no reason except that
you were colored, is so shocking that were it not for positive evi¬
dence, it would be almost unbelievable.
That shameful record is going to be written up, and published,
so that the whole world may read it, and learn how black men,
who went out from these shores to die at theirs country's call,
were treated simply because of the color of their skin. The
world ought to know it; and will know it; and it is yourduty to
help those who will make the record to make it as complete as
possible: The facts as you know them, let them come out; write
out your personal experience and put it where it^can be available
for the historian, in order that the facts may be preserved as one
of the most shameful and detestable exhibition of race, prejudice
that can be found in all the world. I know of nothing that sets
forth this cursed American race prejudice in a more .odious,
execrable light than the treatment of our colored soldiers in this
great world struggle that hsis been going on, by the very govern¬
ment that ought to have shielded them* from the brutes that
were over them.
Again, most, gladly do I welcome you back home; and most
earnestly do we express the hope that every man of you will play
a man's part in the longer and more arduous struggle that is
before us in battling for our rights at home. If it was worth
going abroad to make the world safe for democracy, it is equally
worth laboring no less earnestly to make it safe at home. We
r Hal 1 be greatly disappointed if you do not do this—if you fail to
do yofr part. —