The Slave Minuteman

The story of Crispus Attucks is well known but I'd never heard of the valor of Prince Estabrook. (thx JB)

From the Boston Globe...

Price — like the character he plays, the enslaved Prince Estabrook — was the sole African-American in the room. For 36 years, the retired electrical engineer has evoked Estabrook, gathering at 4 a.m. with the knowledge that he will be wounded by 6:15: the first black soldier ever to fight and take a musket shot, for what would become the United States.

“Sometimes, I wish it was possible to talk to him,’’ said Price, who served in a segregated unit 175 years after Estabrook stood alongside white militiamen. “This is a no-win situation as far as he’s concerned. Let’s say the Minutemen win, which is kind of unlikely. He’s still just a slave. Let’s say the Minutemen lose. He’s a slave who fired on the king’s troops.

“He’s in big trouble no matter what happens.’’

Estabrook, about 34 at the time, recovered from his wound and went on to fight eight years for the militia and Continental Army, one of about 5,000 mostly forgotten men of color to fight with the revolutionary cause. He emerged a free man; slavery in the Commonwealth was abolished by judicial decision in 1783, just before the end of the war.