Army Bases That Honor Confederate Traitors Could Soon Be Renamed for These Heroes
WASHINGTON — During the Jim Crow era, nine Southern Army bases were named for treasonous Confederate generals who fought to preserve slavery and white supremacy. Now a commission established by Congress has suggested new names for the bases that “embody the best of the United States Army and America.”
Fort Bragg in North Carolina would be renamed Fort Liberty, if the recommendations are approved by Congress. The other bases would honor some of the Army’s most distinguished heroes. These are their stories:
Fort Johnson (Fort Polk, Louisiana)
Pvt. Henry Johnson deployed to Europe during World War I in a storied Black regiment known as the Harlem Hellfighters. The U.S. armed forces were segregated, and the Hellfighters were not allowed to fight on the front lines with other U.S. troops. Instead, the Black soldiers fought under the command of their French allies.
That put Johnson and his unit at the front lines, “against all odds — Black Americans wearing French uniforms,” in the predawn hours of May 15, 1918, as German troops swarmed his sentry post at the edge of the Argonne Forest, according to a biography provided by the naming commission.
-more-
https://www.yahoo.com/news/army-bases-honor-confederate-traitors-115801444.html
= new reply since forum marked as read
