William U. Saunders
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William U. Saunders (1835 - September 1, 1883) was a barber, soldier, politician, and lawyer who represented Gadsden County, Florida, in the Florida Legislature during the Reconstruction era.[1]
He was born in Baltimore, Maryland. He served in the United States Colored Infantry from 1863-1866.[2] The Lincoln Zouaves unit of the Henry Winter Davis Guard may have been coordinated partly by Saunders.[3] In August of 1869 he was appointed special agent of the Post Office Department, for an annual salary of $1,200; he was the first black person to hold this position.[4] He was a delegate from Gadsden County to the 1868 Constitutional Convention of Florida despite having been in the county only a few days in his life, according to one account.[5] He had been a barber in Illinois[6] or Maryland.[7] He was described as an eloquent speaker.[7] In 1948 he was described as a Northern Radical Republican.[8]
He traveled the state rallying Black voters.[9]
Historian T. D. Allman wrote that racist revisionists tried to recast him as mulatto to deny his being a black man.[10]
An African American, he served in the United States Colored Infantry from 1863-1866. Canter Brown Jr. documented him as "mulatto". He represented Gadsden County at the 1868 Florida Constitutional Convention. He described as a "fluent speaker."[11]
He died in Clinton, Kentucky.[11]
