on
shown the whites. We had the same speakers to address them. The
Rotary Club presented them with small silk flags, as they did the
whites. The band turned out to escort them to the train; and the
Negroes went to camp with as cheerful a spirit as did the whites.
One of them when asked if he were going to France, replied: 'No,
sir; I'm not going "to France". I am going "through France".'"

"In dealing with the Negroes," the Arkansas board report says, "the
southern boards gained a richness of experience that is without
parallel. No other class of citizens was more loyal to the
government or more ready to answer the country's call. The only
blot upon their military record was the great number of delinquents
among the more ignorant; but in the majority of cases this was
traced to an ignorance of the regulations, or to the withholding of
mail by the landlord, often himself an aristocratic slacker, in
order to retain the man's labor."

Many influences were brought to bear upon the Negro to cause him to
evade his duty to the government. Some effort in certain sections of the
country was made to induce them not to register. That the attempt to
spread German propaganda among them was a miserable failure may be seen
from the statement of the Chief of the Bureau of Investigation of the
Department of Justice, made to the United States Senate committee:

"The Negroes didn't take to these stories, however, as they were
too loyal. Money spent in the south for propaganda was thrown
away."

Then too, these evil influences were more than offset by the various
publicity and "promotion of morale" measures carried on through the
office of the special assistant to the Secretary of War, the Hon. Emmet
J. Scott, and his assistants. Correspondence was kept up with
influential Negroes all over the country. Letters, circulars and news
items for the purpose of effecting and encouraging continued loyalty of
Negro citizens, were regularly issued to the various papers comprising
both the white and Negro press. A special committee of 100 colored
speakers was appointed to deliver public patriotic addresses all over
the country, under the auspices of the Committee on Public Information,
stating the war aims of the government and seeking to keep unbroken the
spirit of loyalty of Negro American citizens. A special conference of
Negro editors was summoned to Was