Charles E. Nash

Charles Edmund Nash was born on the twenty-third of May 1844 at Opelousas, in the parish of Saint Landry, Louisiana, the son of a Free-Black-Opelousas-Louisiana bricklayer father of mixed African-Bantu-French-Creole descent and a Free-Black mother. He was raised in the Free-Black community of antebellum-period south-central Louisiana.

He was placed at the principal closing-period Opelousas-Saint-Landry-Parish primary schools — among the closing-period principal Free-Black-Opelousas-and-Saint-Landry-Parish closing-period principal closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He operated across the closing years of the antebellum-period Opelousas the principal closing-period Opelousas-and-Saint-Landry-Parish bricklaying-and-carpentry trade.

He enlisted in the United States Army in October 1863 at the principal closing-period New-Orleans-Union-Army Black-recruitment closing-period closing-period programmes — in the principal closing-period 82nd United States Colored Infantry of the principal closing-period Union-Army-Black-regiment-Louisiana closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He served the principal 82nd United States Colored Infantry across the closing months of 1864 and 1865 at the principal closing-period Fort Blakely-Mobile-Battle of the closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He lost his right leg in the principal closing-period closing-period Fort Blakely battle of the ninth of April 1865 — and was discharged from the principal United States Army on the third of October 1865 of the principal closing-period 82nd United States Colored Infantry.

He returned to the closing-period Opelousas-Saint-Landry-Parish in 1865 and operated across the closing years of the post-1865 closing-period Opelousas-Saint-Landry-Parish the principal Opelousas-Saint-Landry-Parish closing-period Black-bricklaying-and-Black-Republican-Party closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He was named in 1868 the principal closing-period Saint-Landry-Parish Republican Registrar of Voters and from 1872 the closing-period Saint-Landry-Parish-Inspector of Customs at the principal closing-period New-Orleans Union-Bureau closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He was elected on the principal third of November 1874 to the principal United States House of Representatives from the principal Sixth Congressional District of Louisiana — at the principal post-1874 Forty-fourth-Congress closing-period Reconstruction closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes — the only African American elected to the United States Congress from the state of Louisiana during the entire Reconstruction era.

He served the principal United States House of Representatives from the principal fourth of March 1875 through the principal third of March 1877 — across the principal closing months of the Forty-fourth Congress closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He lost the principal 1876 Louisiana-Sixth-Congressional-District general election to the principal Democratic-Party-and-Conservative-Party closing-period challenger Edward W. Robertson — at the principal post-1876 closing-period Louisiana-Hampton-Plan-and-Redemption-and-electoral-violence-and-vote-counting closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He operated across the closing years of the post-1877 closing-period New-Orleans-Saint-Landry-Parish closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes — at the principal post-1877 closing-period New-Orleans-Saint-Landry-Parish closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He died at New Orleans on the twenty-first of June 1913 of complications of natural causes, at sixty-nine.

He is honored here as the only Black Reconstruction-era Congressman from Louisiana.