A Currier & Ives print, entitled, "The Gallant Charge of the Fifty Fourth Massachusetts (Colored) Regiment." Organized in March 1863, and led by Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, a twenty-six-year-old Boston abolitionist, the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry was one of the first black units formed in the northern states. The unit gained lasting fame when it staged a heroic but doomed assault on Confederate positions at Fort Wagner, Morris Island, near Charleston, South Carolina, on July 18, 1863 which led to the death of Shaw. Currier & Ives