Above: Black infantry troops returning to Fort Douglas from the SpanishAmerican War. Courtesy Historical Department, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Improbable Ambassadors: Black Soldiers at Fort Douglas, 1896-99 BV M I C H A E L
J.
CLARK
is CLEAR, few people know that on the east bench, overlooking Salt Lake City and touching the boundaries of the University of Utah, more than six hundred Black people—soldiers of the United States Twenty-fourth Infantry, wives, children, and others— lived, worked, and attended school for almost four years in one of the most attractive locations in the western United States. Twenty-one graves in the little Fort Douglas cemetery, with weatherworn markers X V L T H O U G H T H E RECORD
Mr. Clark is director of the Institute for the Study of Black Life and Culture and a doctoral candidate in history at the University of U t a h .
