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Based upon his experiences as a volunteer soldier during the Spanish-American War, Charles Johnson Post painted this scene
depicting chaotic post-battle medical care in Cuba in 1898. Disease-related medical problems still prevailed on the island
when the Ninth U.S. Volunteer Infantry arrived there several weeks after the fighting ceased. Ten volunteer infantry units
were popularly known as the "Immunes" because they were reserved for enlisted men "possessing immunity from diseases incident
to tropical climates." Because many erroneously believed that African Americans were naturally immune to tropical diseases,
black leaders lobbied President McKinley to reserve all ten of the planned Immune regiments for African Americans; a compromise
set aside the Seventh through Tenth USVI for black volunteers. Two companies of the Ninth Immunes were comprised of African
Americans from Texas. The Ninth was the fourth (and only black) Immune regiment to be deployed to Cuba, where bacteria ultimately
killed many more American soldiers, including Immunes, than Spanish bullets did. For more information about the Texas soldiers
in the Ninth Immunes, see Roger D. Cunningham's article, "'A Lot of Fine, Sturdy Black Warriors': Texas's African American
'Immunes' in the Spanish-American War," which begins on page of 345 of the January 2005 issue.
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