This Day in History: 1863-05-01

By a joint resolution adopted by the Confederate Congress and signed by Confederate President Jefferson Davis,  the Confederacy authorizes enslavement or execution of Black union troops captured in the Civil War. The barbaric policy states that “negroes or mulattoes, slave or free, taken in arms should be turned over to the authorities in the state in which they were captured and that their officers would be tried by Confederate military tribunals for inciting insurrection and be subject, at the discretion of the court and the president, to the death penalty.” Learn more.