A more unbending battle
Subtitle: the Harlem Hellfighters' struggle for freedom in WWI and equality at home
By: Peter N. Nelson.
Publisher: Basic Civitas
Published: 2009
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 291
ISBN-13: 9780465003174
Subjects: United States. -- Army. -- Infantry Regiment, 369th; United States. -- Army -- African American troops -- History -- 20th century; France. -- Armée -- African American troops -- History -- 20th century; World War, 1914-1918 -- Regimental histories -- United States; World War, 1914-1918 -- Participation, African American; African Americans -- Social conditions -- To 1964
Description: The untold story of the Harlem Hellfighters, the all-black World War I regiment from Harlem who--against all odds--became one of the most feared and decorated units of the war.

The 369th Infantry Regiment was the first African-American regiment mustered to fight in World War I. In a war where the vast majority of black soldiers served in the service of supply, unloading ships and building roads and railroads, the men of the 369th trained and fought side-by-side with the French at the front and ultimately spent more days in the trenches than any other American unit. They went to war in defense of a country afflicted by segregation, Jim Crow laws, lynchings, and racial violence, but a country they believed in all the same. In A More Unbending Battle, journalist and author Peter Nelson chronicles the little-known story of the 369th. Recruited from all walks of Harlem life, the regiment fought alongside the French, since they were prohibited by America's segregation policy from working together with white U.S. soldiers. Despite extraordinary odds, the 369th became one of the most successful and feared regiments of the war. The Harlem Hellfighters, as their enemies named them, showed extraordinary valor on the battlefield, with many soldiers winning the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of honor, and were the first Allied unit to reach the Rhine River. A riveting depiction of both social triumph and battlefield heroism, A More Unbending Battle is the thrilling story of the dauntless Harlem Hellfighters. - Jacket flap.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Parades; title: The argument; title: A resented presence; title: Orphans; title: Baptism; title: Summer in hell; title: The guns of autumn; title: Who won the war?; title: The last parade