General Edward Wild Lost his arm at South Mountain and later took command of a brigade of black infantry that soon became known as "Wild's African Brigade". The brigade, headquartered in Norfolk, comprised the 55th Massachusetts Infantry, and the 2nd and 3rd North Carolina Colored Volunteers. A fervent abolitionist, he aggressively recruited black soldiers for the United States Colored Troops, as well as helping recruit white officers to lead them, including helping Robert Gould Shaw fill his officer complement for the 54^th Massachusetts Infantry. Wild was friends with fellow abolitionist and author Harriet Beecher Stowe and enlisted her half-brother, James C. Beecher, as a white officer in one of the new black regiments. Wild freed hundreds of slaves in North Carolina, resettled them safely on Roanoke Island in North Carolina, and then recruited many of them to join the military. Back marked Black and Batchelder, Boston.