Two Colored Women with the American Expeditionary Forces. Illustrated de [AFRICAN AMERICANS - WW1] HUNTON, Addie W[aites] and Kathryn M[agnolia] Johnson - [1920]

Brooklyn: Brooklyn Eagle Press, [1920]. First Edition. Hardcover. The authors served as YMCA volunteers in France from 1917 to 1919; this memoir serves partially as an account of their shared experiences in the Great War, and partially as a record of the accomplishments of the Black regiments to whose support they were assigned. More than a volume of "uplift" journalism, the book is notable for its unflinching focus on the many "officially sanctioned" injustices visited on Black soldiers by their white countrymen, which the authors contrast with the far more enlightened attitude of their French hosts. In her article on Hunton in Notable American Women, Jean Blackwell Hutson notes that "...an undercurrent of bitterness and indignation [over the indignities suffered by Negro troops] ... pervades Two Colored Women with the American Expeditionary Forces...She [Hunton] also notes, however, that the Negroes in the A.E.F. 'developed in France a racial consciousness and racial strength that could not have been gained in a half century of normal living in America'" (NAW II:251ff). Hunton (d. 1943) went on to be quite active in the field of Civil Rights; among many other organizational affiliations, she served as vice-president and field secretary of the NAACP and as a national organizer for the National Association of Colored Women. Kathryn M. Johnson (d.1953) became a pioneering African-American woman bookseller, selling books - and spreading literacy - door-to-door as a sales agent for Associated Publishers and other Black-owned presses. Uncommon, especially in dustjacket. WORK p.403. Notable American Women II:240ff. AANB (2008) IV:p.392ff; p.599ff. First printing. Octavo; cloth boards, titled in gilt on spine and front cover; original printed dustjacket; [1-8];9-256,(3)pp; frontispiece and 35 inserted leaves of photographic plates (halftones) including portraits and views. A tight, clean copy, solidly Very Good with just a hint of rubbing to spine titles. In scarce printed dustwrapper (supplied from another copy). The dustwrapper is generally soiled, with closed tears to rear panel; partially separated at spine-fold with minimal tissue reinforcements for stabilization verso; one ca. 1/4" x 1" loss at rear flap-fold, not costing any text: Good only, but presentable and complete, including extracts of reviews by Jessie Faussett, Hubert Harrison and others.