Brevet Brigadier General Bernard G. Farrar, Colonel of the 6th US Colored Artillery (Heavy), enlisted in the 30th Missouri Infantry in 1862. In August 1863, while assigned to the post at Natchez, Mississippi, he recruited a regiment of African-American soldiers. This unit became the 6th US Colored Heavy Artillery. Farrar resigned from his post as the unit's colonel in May 1865 and took a position in St Louis. Farrar had also served as the commander of forces at Vidalia, Louisiana and Natchez, Mississippi. The 6th US Colored Heavy Artillery was mustered out in May 1866.This file consists of letters, orders, and affidavits related to the recruiting of African-American soldiers, anticipated attacks the and plundering of plantations in the Natchez and Vidalia area. An account of an attack led by Farrar near Vidalia, given in a letter to the editors of the 'Natchez Democrat', is also present. An 1870 letter to Farrar from J.W. Alvord, General Superintendent of Education at the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands, relates to the education of the freedmen.
