LYCOS RETRIEVER 
African Americans
built 640 days ago
Many African Americans mistakenly perceived the Civil War, which began in April of 1861, as a war against slavery. But as Alton Hornsby, Jr., pointed out in Chronology of African-American History, "[President Abraham] Lincoln's war aims did not include interference with slavery where it already existed." Early in the struggle, the president felt that a stand "against slavery would drive additional Southern and Border states into the Confederacy," a risk he could not afford to take at a time when the Union seemed dangerously close to dissolving. By mid-1862, though, the need for additional Union Army soldiers became critical. The Emancipation Proclamation, issued by Lincoln in 1863, freed the slaves of the Confederacy. With their new "free" status, blacks were allowed to participate in the Civil War. By the winter of 1864-65, the Union Army boasted 168 volunteer regiments of black troops, comprising more than ten percent of its total strength; over 35,000 blacks died in combat.
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The first cases of HIV in African Americans were identified in the early 1980s. Initially the virus principally affected gay men and intravenous drug users (IDUs) within the black community, much as it did in the rest of the population. However, in January 1983, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) documented the first two cases of AIDS in women. Both women had acquired HIV through sex with an intravenous drug user. One of these women was Latina; the other was black.
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African Americans