The above photo was taken in Texas thirty-five years after the morning of June 19, 1865, when Union Major General Gordon Granger arrived on the island of Galveston to take command of the more than 2,000 federal troops recently landed in the department of Texas to enforce the emancipation of its enslaved population and oversee Reconstruction, nullifying all laws passed within Texas during the war by Confederate lawmakers. The order informed all Texans that, in accordance with a Proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all enslaved people were free, although not in the border states until later.
Still free, but the fight for equality is not over by a long shot.
Happy ‘tenth.
Information from Wikipedia.