One Drop in a Sea of Blue: The Liberators of the Ninth Minnesota

Soldiers in the Union Army volunteered for many reasons—to reunite the country, to put down the southern rebellion. For most, however, slavery was a peripheral issue. Sympathy for slaves often came only after the soldiers actually witnessed their plight.

In November 1863, thirty-eight men of the Minnesota Ninth Regiment responded to a fugitive slave's desperate plea by holding a train at gunpoint and liberating his wife, five children, and three other family members who were being shipped of...