History of the Negro Race in America from 1619 to 1880. Vol 1: Negroes as Slaves, as Soldiers, and as Citizens

In 1882, a former Union soldier and Ohio legislator set out to do something unprecedented: write a comprehensive history of Black Americans from the first enslaved Africans arriving in 1619 through Reconstruction. George Washington Williams had delivered a powerful Fourth of July oration in 1876, and that experience convinced him the country needed to see Black history documented in full, not as footnotes to white history but as a complete narrative of survival and contribution. He directly confronts the era's prevailing racial theories, using biblical scholarship and historical evidence to refute claims of Black inferiority that so many had accepted as fact. The book traces Black soldiers fighting in every American war from the Revolution forward, proving their devotion to a nation that had yet to fully embrace them as citizens. This is a landmark work, one of the first serious histories of Black America written by a Black author who lived through the period he documents. It remains essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the foundations of the Black American experience.