IMPACT ON HISTORY

By JAMES SYDNEY

Charles Young made an early acquaintance with the military. His father, a former slave, served as a private in the Fifth Regiment of the Colored Artillery (Heavy) Volunteers.

Born March 12, 1864, in Mayslick, Kentucky, Charles was determined to become a good soldier. He attended a white high school in Ripley, Ohio and at age 16, was the first black to graduate with honors from the school, after which he became a teacher in the black high school of Ripley. While engaged in teaching, he wrote and passed a competitive examination for appointment as a cadet at West Point. In 1883 he reported to the military academy and in 1889 graduated with his commission, the third black man in all America to graduate from West Point at that time. Charles then began a career of active service that was to take him to the rank of Colonel and to the countries of Mexico, Haiti, Liberia, and Cuba. In Cuba, during the Spanish-American War, Young commanded the 9th Ohio Battalion of the National Guard.

By the terms of the Treaty of Washington of 1897, Great Britain nominated Lord Herschell, the Chief Justice, and Lord Justice Richard Henn Collins, a Justice of the Court of Appeals and the Privy Council. They were at that period two of the leading judges in Great Britain. Venezuela, on the other hand, nominated Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, Melville Fuller, and another US Supreme Court Judge, David Brewer, who had served as Chairman of the dissolved United States Venezuelan Boundary Commission. The choice of American judges by Venezuela was a sure indication of the full confidence that Venezuela held for the USA which championed its case throughout the period 1895-1899.