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Photographer: Library of Congress
Caption: African Americans constructing military stockade and ditch
Additional Description: The elaborate nature of fortifications required much labor. As occurred many times during the war, the Confederate government requisitioned slave labor and impressed free blacks to assist soldiers in building earthworks here in Loudoun County. One such freedman, James Fields, later recalled, “When the rebs put up forts at Leesburg, they took me and made me work on the breastworks. … I stayed there 31 days – they paid me $6.00 in script for working.
Submitted: May 25, 2017, by Brandon Stahl of Fairfax, Virginia.
Database Locator Identification Number: p383364
File Size: 0.056 Megabytes

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