Enlightened Free Thinking Nubian Kings And Queens

Josiah Thomas Walls was born a slave in Winchester, Virginia on December 30, 1842.  He was conscripted by the Confederate Army and captured in Yorktown by Union forces in 1862.  Walls then enlisted in the U.S. Colored Troops Infantry Regiment in 1863 where he rose in rank to First Sergeant.  Prior to his discharge from the Army in 1865, Walls married Helen Ferguson of Newnansville, Florida. After leaving the U.S. Army, Walls settled in Alachua County, Florida and became active in local politics.  After passage of the U.S. Military Reconstruction Act of 1867, Walls joined the newly formed Republican Party in Florida.  He was an elected delegate to the 1868 state constitutional conventions and shortly afterward was elected to the lower house of the State Legislature in 1868.  He advanced to the State Senate representing the 13th District, which was mostly Alachua County, in 1869.  First elected to the Congress in 1870, Josiah T. Walls became Florida...

Black and Tan Republicans were African Americans in the Reconstruction-era South who were loyal to the Republican Party.  When the Republican Party was founded in 1854, few African Americans joined.  By the time of the election of Abraham Lincoln, the Party began to attract support from Northern blacks. That support continued to grow into the late 1860's as many Southern blacks, now voting, cast ballots for the Republicans. After the 15th Amendment to the US Constitution was passed in 1870, allowing most of the black males in the former Confederate states to vote,  the Republican Party (also known as the Grand Old Party or GOP) commanded the loyalty of an overwhelming majority of African Americans. Many of the newly enfranchised Southern black men now formed "Black and Tan" clubs, which along with similar organizations like the Union League, helped to institutionally tie these voters to the Republican Party.  Black Republican votes were also driven b...