In 1951 I was commanding A Battery of the 82nd FA
Bn. One morning my Battalion Commander called me on our battalion telephone
net.
“Graves,” he said. “We are about to receive black soldiers
as replacements. You are my only battery commander who is not from the South.
Will you take the first ones?”“Of course, Sir. I’d be happy to.”
That is how our all-white battalion first integrated.*
As I recall we received five black soldiers, a sergeant, a
corporal and three privates initially. The sergeant was a graduate of Texas
Tech, a quiet well qualified non-com who was immediately assigned to fill a
vacancy as Chief of Detail (the battery survey and fire direction team) and he
took charge immediately of all his white subordinates and did an excellent job.
A perfect fit.
The corporal whose name was Nelson was a small cocky man
from Chicago with an aggressive personality. He had been what he called an ‘ambulance
chaser’ working for lawyers in the Windy City. It took a month or so for our
veteran soldiers to accept him because of his cockiness. He had several altercations
with the old timers. He finally became accepted when he challenged anyone to a
boxing match. He proved to be an excellent boxer and he beat several
challengers bigger than him. He soon gained respect and became a popular among
the men.
Unfortunately, we lost the other three. They had infantry
MOS’s (Military Occupational Specialty) and were transferred out of the
artillery. While we had them they proved to be excellent hardworking men who
had made positive contributions in the battery.
I have always been quietly proud of those men and the part I
had to play in the integration of the 82nd Field Artillery
Battalion, which was the general support battalion of the 1st
Cavalry Division.**
*The armed forces officially integrated as of 1948, but it was
not until two years later the units in Korea began receiving black soldiers.
**The battalion was armed with 155mm Howitzers rowed by high
speed tractors.
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