Joe Hennissey was a sergeant with Company A of the Sixth U.S. Colored Heavy Artillery during the American Civil War. He was stationed at Fort Pillow in April, 1864. Just prior to the Battle of Fort Pillow, fellow sergeant Ben Robinson expressed concerns that the parapet of the fort was too thick to allow the heavy guns to be depressed low enough to aim at attackers who were close to the fort. Hennissey dismissed Robinson's concerns, primarily because the ship the USS New Era was anchored on the Mississippi River, ready to support the fort.
Although of equal rank, Robinson, a black man, tended to defer to the white Hennissey. Robinson was aware that many whites believed the Irish were only a half step up from blacks, but he didn't see much grounds for the distinction. Robinson could appreciate that there may have been a certain equality of status between them viewed from other perspectives, but as for himself he recognized that the Irishman, no less than any white man, had the status of being his social superior.[1]
