Henry Leland Clarke (1907-1992) wrote this letter from Boston where he was completing his Ph.D. in musicology at Harvard University during World War II (1939-1945.) He wrote in February, 1944 that he believed it was “very unlikely that Uncle Sam will want my services.” In fact, Clarke would be inducted into the United States army that year. In the same letter, he shared his progress in writing about the 17th-century English composer John Blow, his army physical, French friends in Boston, and attending a talk by an African American friend about Black veterans of World War I (1914-1918.)
Although African Americans were allowed to serve only in segregated units of the United States military during the First World War, Clarke wrote how his friend “spoke movingly of the depth of feeling with which the Negroes love and consider themselves a part of the U.S.A.” He recounted his first-hand knowledge of the staunch patriotism of African American soldiers, recounting a story of standing beside a young soldier in St. Nazaire, France, as they watched an American ship headed for home. He shared that the man “wept and declared if he ever got back to the U.S.A. he would never leave it again.” Clarke added, “(Later he [Clarke’s friend] discovered that this same boy’s father had years ago been lynched!)” The United States Armed Forces remained officially segregated until 1948.
