Just two years later, thanks to pressure from civil rights leaders and the black press, the Navy told these 16 enlistees — the sons and grandsons of slaves — that they would attempt to integrate the officer corps and prove wrong the prevailing wisdom, which held that their race was incapable of discipline and unworthy of rank.
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There were roughly 100,000 black men in the Navy in January 1944.
They were segregated from white officer candidates and separated from other black enlisted men.
No official explanation was ever given as to why three men were dropped from the program—but the decision meant that the first group of black officers, a group that passed with flying colors, would have the same completion rate as an average white class.
Dan C. Goldberg, a journalist for Politico, is the author of The Golden Thirteen: How Black Men Won the Right to Wear Navy Gold, available now from Beacon Press.
