num_pages: 340
description: Called upon for the first time to render military service outside the States, Negro soldiers (called Smoked Yankees by the Spaniards) were eager to improve their status at home by fighting for the white man in the Spanish-American War. Their story is told through countless letters sent to black U.S. newspapers that lacked resources to field their own reporters. The collection constitutes a remarkably complete and otherwise undisclosed amount of the black man’s role in—and attitude toward—America’s struggle for empire. In first-hand reports of battles in the Philippine Islands and Cuba, Negro soldiers wrote from the perspective of dispossessed citizens struggling to obtain a larger share of the rights and privileges of Americans. These letters provide a fuller understanding of the exploits of black troops through their reports of military activities and accounts of foreign peoples and its cultures.
language: English
title: "Smoked Yankees" and the Struggle for Empire: Letters from Negro Soldiers, 1898–1902
titlecomplete: "Smoked Yankees" and the Struggle for Empire: Letters from Negro Soldiers, 1898–1902 (University of Arkansas Press Reprint Series)
genres: History
ratings_count: 7
publisher: University of Arkansas Press