White Soldiers in Trouble

Thirty-two white soldiers are charged with assaulting a woman in Denver, and President Roosevelt declares there must be a trial before “dismissing them without honor” like he did in the Brownsville affair.

It would be well for him to note that instead of dismissing these white soldiers from the service without honor, he ordered a court-martial to try them. This is in keeping with the law and why any other treatment should have been accorded colored soldiers is the mystery of the century. It is evident though that white soldiers area adepts at the business of shooting up towns if the above telegram is to be taken as an indication. President Roosevelt and the War Department seemed desirous of convincing the country that only colored men are liable to be guilty of such offenses, but with the reports from Denver, where thirty-two white soldiers are charged with criminally assaulting one white woman and the affair just cited, it would seem that it is about time for the distinguished occupant of the White House to reverse himself so quickly as to make it appear that the front part of his head looks like the back part. These facts are interesting and it may be that the awakening of the country to the injustice practiced upon the Companies B, C, and D of the Twenty-fifth United States Infantry may be heralded before the dawn of the new year.

“White Soldiers in Trouble,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed May 12, 2025, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/719.