Unnamed Negro Soldiers

This icon represents the other black soldiers whom Caspey Strother mentions in the stories about World War I he tells his family. He never mentions any of their names, usually referring to them as "boys," but he does refer specifically to two: "de Captain's dog-robber" and "a school boy" (59). (Caspey's stories are obviously wild exaggerations, if not outright inventions, but there were large numbers of African American soldiers -- enlisted men, draftees and officers -- who served during the war in one of the two all-black divisions created by the U.S. Army.)