THE NEGRO AT THE CLOSE OF THE CIVIL WAR 9 
Thus, at the close of the war, all the Negroes 
were somewhat better prepared for freedom than 
they were in 1861: the slaves on the plantation 
by the increased opportunities given during the 
war for the development of self-reliance and in- 
dependence of character; the Negro soldiers by 
their experience in army life; and the Negroes 
in the colonies and on the abandoned plantations 
by their sufferings, by having to rely upon them- 
selves, and by their familiarity with the customs 
of free and half free labor; and all of them by the 
partial throwing-off of servile habits. 
DEMORALIZATION AT THE CLOSE OF THE WAR 
Conditions following the surrender of the 
Confederate armies and the consequent general 
emancipation were not favorable for the well- 
being of the Negroes. Nearly 200,000 Negro 
soldiers, somewhat unfitted by army life for 
peaceful pursuits, were gradually mustered out 
of service with no homes to go to and with 
several hundred thousand of their relatives scat 
tered over the border states and in the camps 
and Negro colonies. To unite families was diffi- 
cult and often impossible. The abandoned plan- 
tations were soon given back to the white owners, 
a proceeding which unsettled the Negroes who 
had expected a division of property. The refugee 
colonies were disbanded one by one, throwing 
numbers of blacks into the world with no plans 
and with hardly any faculty for making plans. 
Many of those who had remained slaves until 
1865 now attached themselves to the armies of 
Occupation or crowded around the garrison posts.