The Complex Legacy of General William R Shafter
William Rufus Shafter, born to a pioneer family in the Michigan Territory (1835), rose to prominence during the Civil War and later commanded troops that helped win the Spanish-American War. A hero, by nineteenth-century standards, yet largely forgotten today. Towns across the country are named in his honor, but history also records his criticisms.
Bull Shafter
As a young man, Shafter was bigger than most, a better athlete than most, and smarter than most of his peers. He was given the nickname “Bull” because of the way he bullied other kids. His grandfather was a county judge and state legislator in Vermont, as two of his uncles would be.
The whole extended family were abolitionists and active in politics. Both his grandfather’s and his uncle’s homes served as stops on the “Underground Railroad” according to the Friends of Freedom Report. So when the Civil War broke out, Shafter immediately enlisted in the Union Army.
The Civil War
Shafter served in the 7th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment and fought at the Battle of Fair Oaks. He led a charge on the first day of the battle, was wounded but concealed his wounds so he could continue fighting on the second day. “Bull” indeed! For this, he later received the Medal of Honor for heroism. Shafter returned to the field as a major in the 19th Michigan Volunteer Infantry Regiment but was captured at the Battle of Thompson’s Station and spent three months in a Confederate prison. He was released in a prisoner exchange in 1864.
Shafter was offered the position of colonel in command of the 17th United States Colored Infantry. The Union Army had thus far never sent Black soldiers into battle. Most were slaves just a few years earlier. With courage and conviction, Shafter accepted the command and led the regiment at the Battle of Nashville.
Shafter also recruited his brother-in-law, Capt. Job Aldrich, and later his twin younger brothers, James and John, into his regiment as officers. The Battle of Nashville was devastating, likely more than normal because the Confederates could see that the Union soldiers were Black. The regiment was lured into a steep valley dug out for railroad tracks and ambushed. Aldrich died immediately. Shafter was the one who found his body the next morning and wrote to his widow.
“It is useless to attempt by words to soothe your sorrow, and though you are the sorest afflicted, believe me when I say that you have shed no bitterer tears than I when I found poor Job. He was as dear to me as either of my own brothers. It was an awful battle, Sis, and we are of the many who are called to mourn.”
“The good die first, while those whose hearts are dry as summer dust burn to the socket.”
Despite the massive casualties, the Black soldiers more than proved themselves. It’s unknown how this experience affected Shafter. Throughout his service during the Civil War, he’s often described as, “cool, brave, and a good disciplinarian.”
Continued Army Service
Shafter enlisted in the Regular Army after the Civil War ended and was involved in the Indian Wars. He commanded the Forty-first Infantry for three years and the Twenty-fourth Infantry for 10 years, both United States Colored Troops, while stationed at a variety of forts in the southwest. For the most part, those years were spent protecting settlements from hostile Indians and Mexican bandits. Otherwise, he was scouting the vast, relatively empty territory, reflecting the army’s more general shift from Reconstruction to Indian affairs. He picked up the nickname “Pecos Bill” for leading his hungry and thirsty command to the Pecos River in Texas.
This period from 1866 to 1898 (between the Civil War and the Spanish-American War) has a surprising amount of storytelling mentioning Shafter. He was assigned to different forts from Texas to Arizona. The tales that cross paths indirectly include Wyatt Earp, Billy the Kid, Poncho Villa, and Geronimo.
From a history of Fort Davis, Texas, “The imperious Shafter’s constant bullying and dogged determination offended many subordinates. Yet whatever his faults, Shafter quickly made his presence known.” When Shafter would take command of a new fort, he would relieve the previous commander’s officers of their responsibilities and replace them with his own. It is evident from other memoirs that crossing Shafter could get you court-martialed. But the limits of the “good disciplinarian” tag would be push the limits more than once.
In 1869, he was brought up on charges from Captain Orville Burke, Forty-first Infantry (a white officer under Shafter’s command). Shafter was found guilty under the first charge of using unwarrantable language toward a subordinate officer in the presence of enlisted men. He confessed to five of the seven specifications under the third charge of disobedience of orders, in that he used military equipment for civilian purposes. No significant action was taken.
While commanding the Twenty-fourth Infantry in 1877, Lieutenant Edwin Turner of the Tenth Cavalry, accused Shafter of immoral behavior and defrauding the government. Shafter counter-charged Turner. The charges against Shafter could have led to his court-martial, but since the hearing was held in Washington and Lt. Turner was confined to Texas, Turner was unable to testify. Ultimately, no action was taken.
In 1881–82, he took command of Fort Davis in southwest Texas.
The Flipper Affair
When Shafter and the First Infantry arrived to take over command from the Tenth Cavalry, he again relieved their officers of their command. Having no replacement for quartermaster, he left Lieutenant Henry Flipper as acting commissary of subsistence and quartermaster.
Lt. Flipper was the first Black officer in the Army. Born a slave in Georgia, he learned to read by age eight from an educated slave. After the Civil War, he attended a missionary school and then studied at Atlanta University. A white Republican congressman from Georgia appointed Flipper to West Point in 1873. He was the fifth Black candidate to apply to the academy, the third to be accepted, and the first to graduate. By all accounts, Flipper had a stellar reputation and was well-liked in the civilian community around Fort Davis. The only negative accounts stemmed from jealous rumors and letters that hinted of impropriety between Flipper, a Black man, and Mollie Dwyer, a white woman (sister-in-law of a commander).
Flipper was in charge of funds: incoming and outgoing payments for various supplies. Sometimes the checks arrived late, by stagecoach, but would balance by the end of the month. At one point, Flipper realized that some checks must have completely gone missing and he had already issued his report. Having written a book about his life, he was expecting royalty income and wrote a check to square up the discrepancy but his royalty check was also late. When all this surfaced, Shafter charged Flipper with embezzlement and conduct unbecoming an officer for falsified reports, writing a bad check, and lying to his commanding officer.
The trial found Flipper innocent of embezzlement but guilty of conduct unbecoming an officer and he was court-martialled. Flipper had plenty of support both within the military and from the civilian community, so the conviction was appealed. Although the Army’s judge advocate general concluded that the conviction was racially motivated, President Chester Arthur refused to reverse his conviction. Flipper was dishonorably discharged from the Army in 1882. Flipper spent the rest of his life trying to clear his name.
Several individuals renewed the effort in the 1970s. They argued that others with similar charges had received much lighter sentences. In 1976, the Army granted a full pardon to Flipper after an extensive review of his record, and of the testimonies and proceedings of the court-martial. In 1999, President Bill Clinton pardoned Flipper posthumously, thus restoring his rank and the achievements of his military career.
The judgment points to Flipper’s discharge as racially motivated on Shafter’s part. However, it’s impossible to know Shafter’s motivations. To be sure, he was no angel. He had a long history of offensive outbursts, vindictive behavior, and general bullying — a disciplinarian, as they say. He, too, had been accused of conduct unbecoming an officer. There was also a letter that Flipper sent to a Black, civilian attorney named John F. Quarles, who released the letter to the press. The letter said that Flipper thought he was being set up by Shafter. Predictably, this infuriated Shafter and it is possible that having this matter aired outside of military channels contributed to Shafter’s actions. Lastly, it’s hard to discount Shafter’s decades-long association with the Black troops and his family’s abolitionist stance.
National Context
Immediately after the Civil War, there were opportunities for Black men in the South. Men were elected to local and national government, as encouraged by the Fourteenth Amendment. Men, like Flipper, went to college. But this window of opportunity closed in most southern states beginning with the election of 1876 (another disputed electoral college event), which triggered the end of Reconstruction, and accelerated with restrictive voting rights in those states beginning around 1890. The last Black congressman from the South was elected in 1896 and re-elected in 1898. No Black people served in Congress for the next 28 years, and none represented any southern state for the next 72 years.
According to my grandfather’s history text, published in 1910:
“This change in the conditions of suffrage practically excludes, and is intended to exclude, the great majority of the negroes from voting, and it gives the white race the entire control. In this way, the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution has practically been set aside and no longer has any real effect.”
What happened in Congress paralleled what happened at West Point. Other than Flipper, only two other Black cadets would graduate in the 19th century: one in 1887 and another in 1889. A fourth Black cadet wouldn’t graduate from West Point for another 46 years.
Regardless of Shafter’s motivations for initiating the charges against Flipper, the severe sentencing and multiple appeals were done by many others, all the way up to the President.
Spanish-American War
The Spanish-American War, fought between April and August of 1898, was Shafter’s last military battle. Naval victories dominated the war, augmented by the Army such as Shafter’s troops at Santiago de Cuba and Roosevelt’s at San Juan Hill (Roosevelt was a colonel serving under General Shafter). Shafter, always a big man, now weighed over 300 pounds at age 62. His obesity was a liability and he commanded from well back of the battles. Delays in communication, tropical disease, and lack of supplies all complicated his tactics for which he drew criticism.
Elsewhere with Shafter in this photo might be Captain William McKittrick, Shafter’s aide-de-camp. Of course, Shafter had many aides and multiple troops. But, McKittrick happened to be Shafter’s cattle ranching buddy and was married to Shafter’s daughter. McKittrick’s father had died during the Civil War. Two of his cousins had died aboard the USS Maine, which sank in Havana Harbor and precipitated America’s entry into this war. McKittrick had the honor of raising the American flag over the Governor’s palace in Santiago.
Conclusion
Shafter’s fame grew in the national spotlight during the Spanish-American War thanks, in part, to the newspapers of the day. From the outset of the war, he was in the news almost daily with his dispatches. Within 17 days of landing on Cuba, they secured a surrender. “I doubt,” said his contemporary Gen. Guy Henry, “if there is another officer who would have ‘gotten there’ as he did.” There was controversy even in real-time, but Shafter forced the battle when others might have waited (one controversy is that he signed a letter asking for permission to wait). Nonetheless, he was true to his “Bull” nickname from childhood.
In this post-Civil War era and prior to World War I, the newspapers elevated generals and admirals to hero status. Parades and whistlestop speeches were given all over the country.
As historian Alon Confino has written, “national memory demands compromise and requires adulteration” (“adulteration” in the sense of altering its original form by adding materials or elements that aren’t usually part of it — what we’d call “spin” today).
In later decades, the type of hero Americans preferred were those who acted to expand rights, alleviate misery, rectify injustice, and promote freedom, per Wineburg Monte-Sano (2008). Shafter isn’t the type of hero people like these days. He got results but acted inappropriately quite often and illegally multiple times. The laws and general expectations have tightened since the nineteenth century, so his behavior would be way out of line today.
Was Shafter a racist? No, I don’t think so; he was a spiteful, overreacting bully. Did Lt. Flipper deserve a pardon? Yes, I think so; the punishment he got appeared to be inconsistent with similar cases. Did the military establishment protect itself? It looks that way. Was the military establishment systemically racist? My opinion is that the military probably was simply protecting its officers in the last decades of the 1800s; whether that changed in the 1900s seems likely based on the overall national context.
Regardless, Shafter’s legacy is complicated.
https://www.army.mil/article/73083/black_soldier_battled_prejudice_with_honor
“The Fall of a Black Army Officer: Racism and the Myth of Henry O. Flipper (review)” https://muse.jhu.edu/article/262524/summary
Review of The Fall of a Black Army Officer: Racism and the Myth of Henry O. Flipper By Charles M. Robinson III Bruce A. Glasrud
https://phparchives.wordpress.com/2020/05/13/letter-william-shafter-19-december-1864/
https://www.hampshire.edu/sites/default/files/shared_files/Wineburg_Famous_Americans_JAH_1.pdf
“The Leading Facts of American History” D. H. Montgomery, 1910
