Officers of
the Famous African-American Regiment. Left to right: Maj. J.R. White; Lt. Col. Otis B.
Duncan, highest ranking African-American officer in the U.S. Army; Lt. W.J. Warfield (National
Archives 165-ww-127a-009a)
When I was researching Hyde Park/Kenwood/Woodlawn’s first women representatives, I came across the name of William J. Warfield, who was elected in 1928 in the same district. Warfield was the 15th African-American to serve in the Illinois House. The first African-American in the Illinois legislature was John W. E. Thomas in 1876. Though he wasn’t among the first, his election was striking enough that W.E.B. DuBois wrote a letter to him, asking for a photograph and a brief biography for the Crisis.
I discovered something else about him. He was a highly decorated veteran of World War I. He was in the 8th Regiment of the Illinois National Guard when it got called to active duty on the Mexican Border in 1916, after Pancho Villa and others started raiding across the border during the Mexican Revolution. The chaos that ensued showed how very unready the U.S. was to enter the world war raging in Europe.
He got called up again in 1918 in World War I, when the National Guard regiment was assigned to the 93rd Division. When they got to Europe, the African-American Division was assigned to the command of the French, mostly because the Army didn’t want to deal with the issues of segregation. The 93rd fought under Marshall Foch at the Meuse-Argonne Offensive and the Oise-Aisne Offensive. Over 500 soldiers in the 93rd receive the French Croix de Guerre for gallantry in the face of the enemy, 520 were killed, and 2,600 were wounded. The U.S. Army ignored the 93rd because officially it had zero days in battle because it hadn’t fought with the U.S. Army. Under pressure, the U.S. Government acknowledged in 1919 that the unit had seen combat and awarded 75 Distinguished Service Crosses.
In a list of awards, it described the one for William J. Warfield. He was a First Lieutenant near Ferme-de-la-Riviere. He and his platoon were cut off from their company, but he led a “stubborn resistance against enemy machine-gun nests,” capturing the gun and killing the crew, even though he had been severely wounded. He refused medical relief until the machine gun was silenced.
Here's what I could find about his civilian experience. As a representative in the Assembly, he was a Republican. He made his money in
real estate, serving as a tax attorney with the assessor’s office for a time.
He lived at 704 or 706 East 50th Place (both addresses were listed).
All the time, his distinguished military service continued. By 1940, he was a Brigadier General in the National Guard, the second African-American to hold that rank in the history of the United States. But with the war and active duty for the Guard, he was forced to retire due to illness. At some point, soon after, he entered the VA nursing home north of the city. There’s a letter from Eisenhower to him for sale on the internet. Eisenhower was in Chicago and tried to phone him. The nurse told him that Warfield was unable to speak, so Eisenhower dashed off a note on stationery from the Blackstone Hotel, wishing him well and pointing out that he, Eisenhower, had also served on the Mexican border in 1916 and they were fellow soldiers.
Photo from the Illinois National Guard list of past officers.
Du Bois, W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt), 1868-1963. Letter from W. E. B. Du Bois to William J. Warfield, September 17, 1929. W. E. B. Du Bois Papers (MS 312). Special Collections and University Archives, University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries
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