The Sergeant

The Incredible Life of Nicholas Said: A Slave of the Ottomans, A Free Man with the Czars, A Hero of the Union Army

Dean Calbreath

• Publisher: Pegasus Books
• Year: 2023
• ISBN:
  9781639363254
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: American Civil War History
• Index: History

From the nobility in the kingdom of Borno to being kidnapped into slavery, the inspiring life-story of Nicholas Said is an epic journey through the nineteenth century that takes him from Africa to the Ottoman Empire, and finally from Czarist Russia to the American Civil War, becoming a sergeant in one of the first African American regiments in the Union Army. In the late 1830s a young Black man was born into a world of wealth and privilege in the powerful, thousand-year-old African kingdom of Borno. But instead ofbecoming a respected general like his fearsome father (who was known as The Lion), Nicolas Said's fate was to fight a very different kind of battle.At the age of thirteen, Said was kidnapped and sold into slavery, beginning an epic journey that would take him across Africa, Asia, Europe, and eventually theUnited States, where he would join one of the first African American regiments in the Union Army. Nicholas Said would then spend the rest of his life fighting forequality. Along the way, Said encountered such luminaries as Queen Victoria and Czar Nicholas I, fought Civil War battles that would turn the war for the North, established schools to educate newly freed Black children, and served as one of the first Black voting registrars.In The Sergeant, Said's epic (and largely unknown) story is brought to light by globe-trotting, Pulitzer-prize-winning journalist Dean Calbreath in a meticulouslyresearched and approachable biography. Through the lens of Said's continent-crossing life, Calbreath examines the parallels and differences in the ways slaverywas practiced from a global and religious perspective, and he highlights how Said's experiences echo the discrimination, segregation, and violence that are stillbeing reckoned with today.There has never been a more voracious appetite for stories documenting the African American experience, andThe Sergeant's unique perspective of slaveryfrom a global perspective will resonate with a wide audience.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Author’s Note
• Chapter 1: Voyage of the ‘Recruit’
• Chapter 2: The Lion of War and His Son
• Chapter 3: The Antelope Hunt
• Chapter 4: In the Realm of the Ottomans
• Chapter 5: The ‘Thunderer’
• Chapter 6: New Name, New Religion
• Chapter 7: The Grand Tour
• Chapter 8: Land of the Puritans
• Chapter 9: Islands of the Fallen
• Chapter 10: Call of the Missions
• Chapter 11: The Select School
• Chapter 12: Boot Camp
• Chapter 13: Coffin Land and Folly
• Chapter 14: Land Crabs and the Swamp Angel
• Chapter 15: “Led by Love of Country”
• Chapter 16: Foray into Florida
• Chapter 17: “The Greatest Discontent Prevails”
• Chapter 18: “Well, Let Them Shoot”
• Chapter 19: Reaching the Crossroads
• Chapter 20: Baptized in Blood
• Chapter 21: “Babylon is Falling”
• Chapter 22: “The Negro Pundit”
• Chapter 23: The Toast of Charleston
• Chapter 24: The “Anti-Radical”
• Chapter 25: “An End to My Peregrinations”
• Chapter 26: “Safety and Harmony”
• Chapter 27: Journey’s End?
• Chapter 28: Epilogue
• Photographs
• About the Author
• Notes
• Index
• Copyright