![]() | Black Judas: William Hannibal Thomas and @quot;The American Negro@quot; Subjects: Thomas William Hannibal b. 1843; African Americans -- Biography; African American intellectuals -- Biography; Thomas William Hannibal b. 1843. American Negro; African Americans -- Social conditions -- To 1964; Racism -- United States -- History -- 20t; William Hannibal Thomas (1843-1935) served with distinction in the U.S. Colored Troops in the Civil War (in which he lost an arm) and was a preacher, teacher, lawyer, state legislator, and journalist following Appomattox. In many publications up through the 1890s, Thomas espoused a critical though optimistic black nationalist ideology. After his mid-twenties, however, Thomas began exhibiting a self-destructive personality, one that kept him in constant trouble with authorities and always on the run. His book The American Negro (1901) was his final self-destructive act. JOHN DAVID SMITH is the Charles H. Stone Distinguished Professor of American History at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He is the author and editor of thirty books, including An Old Creed for the New South: Proslavery Ideology and Historiography, 1865-1918 ; Lincoln and the U.S. Colored Troops ; and Black Soldiers in Blue: African American Troops in the Civil War Era . |
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