Garland H. White
Garland H. White (1829 – July 5, 1894) was a preacher and politician who served as Chaplain for the 28th United States Colored Infantry (28th USCT).
He escaped slavery to Ontario just before the war started and became a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME).
White had no education as a slave and may have gained basic reading and writing skills while working as a servant in Washington.
[1] Another man owned by Toombs and a friend to White by the name of William Gaines also became a notable Methodist preacher, but was not freed until the Union Army arrived in Georgia during the Civil War.
[4][5][6][a] slave named Allen and White were owned by then congressmen Alexander Hamilton Stephens[b] and Robert Toombs of Georgia, respectively.
[1] While still a private, the regiment left Indianapolis on April 24, 1864, for Washington, D.C.[1] White continued to advocate for his promotion to the chaplaincy of the 28th USCT and wrote another letter to Seward about this time.
The men worked as laborers until June 28 when they accompanied MG Philip Sheridan's cavalry to Prince George's Court House where it was assigned to the all-black 4th Division commanded by BG Edward Ferrero in the trenches before Petersburg.
In the battle, White likely was assigned to the surgeon or other support activities and his job as acting chaplain was to comfort the wounded and dying soldiers.
[1] While in the lines before Petersburg, White complained of a respiratory illness, and he had a chronic cough for the rest of his life.
On November 18, it was ordered out of the line of the siege and to travel to the Bermuda Hundred on the James River and assigned to provost duty at the army's supply depot at City Point.
Later that day White witnessed the arrival of Abraham Lincoln and the celebration among people of Richmond at their "Great Emancipator".
Published in the Christian Recorder, April 22, 1865 A letter from Chaplain Garland White, Indiana's first African American officer After three days in Richmond, the 28th returned to City Point and did not accompany the army to Appomattox Court House where Lee surrendered.
[22] While at City Point, White provided religious counselling to private Samuel Mapp of Company D, 10th USCT, who was sentenced to die by the army.
[24] Controversially, White wrote that blacks in the Union Army should not concern themselves greatly with equal pay and instead focus on victory and personal improvement.
[25] He also wrote about many details of his regiment's experience, including an emotional description of the Battle of the Crater and of the Fall of Richmond, as well as their time in Texas after the war.
[27] In late May, the regiment sailed to Texas, arriving in Indianola on July 4 and moving to Corpus Christi on August 13 as a part of General Russell's brigade.
[1] From Texas, White continued to contribute letters to the Christian Recorder, where he discussed black suffrage.
[22] At demobilization on November 8, 1865, White gave every Christian "in this Command" a certificate of good moral and religious standing.
After the war, White tried and failed to gain an appointment with the Freedmen's Bureau, and returned for a short time to Indiana and Ohio before moving to North Carolina.
[1] In 1874, White ran for Congress in North Carolina's Black Second District as an independent candidate against Republican John Adams Hyman, but finished a distant third behind Hayman and Democrat George W. Blount; local Republicans alleged his candidacy was promoted by the Democratic party to divide the Black vote.
[28][29] In 1876, White campaigned in support of Democrat Samuel J. Tilden for president against the eventual winner, Republican Rutherford B.
[30] Around this time, White was a pastor at a church in Halifax, North Carolina, but he was dismissed by his congregation for his support of the Democrats before the end of the 1870s.
[14] When the Federal government withdrew from North Carolina in 1877, White's position as a supporter of the Democrats put him on the side of the party which would soon come to power in the state.
[30] In 1882, White's health forced him to move to Wilmington, North Carolina, where he hoped to find relief.
However, his health worsened and he moved back to the northern part of the state, settling in 1884 in Weldon, North Carolina, near to his former home in Halifax.
He was bedridden for much of the time after September 1884, and in July 1885 applied to Washington for an invalid pension based on a respiratory illness contracted during the siege of Petersburg.
