Abstract:
After two years of vicious warfare, the North was reeling. President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation went into effect on January 1, 1863, and a group of prominent Philadelphia businessmen pledged themselves to support the Union and President Lincoln without reservation. Mostly of Quaker beliefs and long-time supporters of abolition, the group formed a patriotic club named the Union League. Next, they took on the task of raising colored regiments and establishing Camp William Penn, the first Federal training ground for colored troops. This is the story of that valiant enterprise.