The 1st South Carolina Volunteer Infantry was formed in late 1862 from escaped slaves from South Carolina and Florida. As part of a celebration of emancipation at Port Royal, the regiment received its colors from its colonel, Thomas Higginson. Sergeant Prince Rivers, the new color sergeant, then addressed the crowd. The unit was one of the first federally organized black regiments and became the 33rd U.S.C.T. in February, 1864. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Army Life in a Black Regiment (Cambridge, MA: Riverside Press, 1900), 56.
Record Data
Date Certainty
Exact
Type
Battles/Soldiers
