‘Slaves’ Gamble’ topic of Black History Month lecture
Monday, February 15, 2016
by: Rene Abadie
HAMMOND – Gene Allen Smith, director of the Center for Texas Studies at Texas Christian
University, will present “The Slaves’ Gamble: Choosing Sides in the War of 1812” as
speaker at Southeastern Louisiana University’s 16th annual Black History Month Lecture
to be held Feb. 15.
Sponsored by the Department of History and Political Science, the lecture will
be held at 11 a.m. in the Student Union Theatre followed by a book signing. The lecture
is free and open to the public.
“History is the story of real people, and here personal vignettes show how historical
characters, both slaves and free blacks, struggled to find freedom during the War
of 1812,” said Smith, professor of history at TCU. “In that conflict, the United States
reaffirmed its political, economic and cultural freedom, white Americans realized
that armed blacks posed a serious threat to the status quo, and black Americans had
their last chance to secure freedom through force of arms until the Civil War ended
slavery.”
Smith is the author of several of books. He has received research awards from
TCU and Montana State University and fellowships from the Henry E. Huntington Library,
the Virginia Historical Society, the U.S. Department of the Navy, the U.S. Military
Academy at West Point, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
