colored infantry failed to reach the confederate trenches in their charge at port hudson in may 1863. but in april 1865 the regiment was part of the black division that helped take the last confederate for the outside mobile. it was all a question of training and experience. i might add a few words in favor of william tekumse sherman before closing. he is notorious for not wanting anything to do with black troops in his atlanta campaign, and only taking one half of one regiment with him on his march through georgia and the carolinas. these five companies of the 110th u.s. colored infantry were the only black regiment represented at the grand review in washington at the end of the war. but sherman was the only -- sherman was a bigot. and he did not mince words about it. but he was the only union official i came across, military or civilian, who recognized that black people might have some ideas of their own about the future. he wrote, sherman, "if negros are to be taken as soldiers by undue influence or force and compelled to leave their women and the urn uncertainty of their new condi

well, elsewhere union armies were capturing nashville, new orleans, memphis, vicksburg, port hudson, chattanooga, for the purposes of our story, the colored troops in virginia were overwhelmingly recruited in the northern states and were no more use at first than an equal number of new white regiments. this is an important point because, as i found out while researching the book, escaped slaves were a source of expert local knowledge to union armies, going at least back to the landing in south carolina in the fall of 1861 when an escaped slave known to us only as brutus advised captain quincy adams gilmore, an officer of engineers, gilmore called brutus the most intelligent slave i have met here, quite familiar with the rivers and creeks between savannah city and tiebee island. he made his escape last week in a canoe. two years later, when the commander of a union raid up the yazoo river in mississippi wanted to send a message to his headquarters in vicksburg, two sergeants of the third mississippi colored cavalry dressed as slaves, which they had been until recently, and delivered t

michael depalo who is the director and general manager of the port authority trans hudson corporation. representing the american public transit association. thank each of you for being here this morning. and we look forward to hearing from each of you as you give us your thoughts and opinions on the grants reform that has been introduced. this bill is on effort by this committee last year and how the grant is -- has been set up. but we recognize that there are challenges and we believe that it is also time for reform. if you could, maybe keep your comments two to three minutes and summarize it for the committee. bear in mind that your written testimony will be placed in the record so before i begin with the open testimony, let me recognize mr. price. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to join with you in welcoming this panel. it's particularly important, i think, to hear from this panel this morning. we are interested in the current grant programs and how they're working and how they can be improved. but we're, of course, especially focused on this new proposal for national prepared