Young, Charles (1864—1922)

African American Army Officer

In 1889, Charles Young became the third African American to graduate from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Young built an impressive military resume over the next three decades, advancing to the rank of colonel in spite of ongoing racial hostility; Young's rise through the Army ranks coincided with the growing strength of white supremacy in American politics and society. Racial discrimination, ever present in Young's career, crested in the early months of World War I when senior Army officials forced him into retirement, against his wishes and despite the protests of the African American public, to avoid the possibility of a black colonel commanding a regiment.

Young was born in Kentucky in 1864 and reared in Ripley, Ohio. After graduating from West Point, he served five years as a second lieutenant in the all-black 9th and 10th cavalries. In 1894 he transferred to Ohio's Wilberforce University to teach military science and tactics, French, and math. By the time of his promotion to first lieutenant in 1896, Young was the highest-ranking black officer in the Army, and when the Spanish—American War broke out two years later, he was the only black officer qualified to lead combat troops. The Army granted Young a wartime promotion to major and placed him in charge of training the 9th Ohio Volunteer Battalion, an African American National Guard unit. Although his men did not see action in Cuba, Young's rank and responsibilities made him an anomaly in a military establishment convinced of black soldiers' inferiority. After the war, Young received a promotion to captain and rejoined the 9th Cavalry in the Philippines where he helped to suppress the independence movement led by nationalist Emilio Aguinaldo.

Following the Spanish—American War, legislators in the South systematically disbanded their states' black militias, arguing that they did not want armed African Americans thinking themselves the equal of white men. The War Department and officials in the regular Army went along with this expansion of segregationist, “Jim Crow” policies by maligning the ability of African American officers, blocking black enlistments [Page 961]in combat roles, and assigning black regulars to places where their presence would not upend racial hierarchies.

Young spent much of his career out West or abroad. After the Philippine Insurrection, he was garrisoned with the 9th Cavalry at the Presidio in San Francisco, where he served in 1903 as the acting superintendent of Sequoia National Park. From 1904 to 1907, he was assigned to work with the Military Intelligence Division as an attaché in Haiti. He returned to the Philippines and the 9th Cavalry in 1908. In 1912 he left for Africa, serving as a military attaché and adviser in Liberia. Young's first opportunity to act as a superior officer to a large number of white commanders came with the 1916 Punitive Expedition against Mexican revolutionary Francisco “Pancho” Villa. By the time of the expedition, when American troops pursued Villa and his followers across the Mexico border, Young had been promoted to major and made a squadron commander in the 10th Cavalry. The squadron performed admirably under Young, saving a white squadron from almost certain death at the hands of 600 Mexican federales and receiving citations and accolades for their work. His success made him a hero in the African American community.

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