African-American veteran looking to promote justice
I's quiet. "It's a blessed thing to be given the gift of words," Gramma always sez to us, "but even the sharpest of tongues can't save you from the biggest serpent." My sergeant always dun told us, "Discretion's the better part of valor." I try to follow them words best I can, but being a black man in America who lets rebuttals go on past, especially at a time like this, ain't an easy task. I am a patient man, which is the trait I hold highest above all my other virtues. My actions will prove my character and someone will see me for a good man and not another dumb nigga walking 'round in Greenwood. Although, I do try to practice my elocution as often as I can, seeing as people seem to respect police officers more when they got good grammar and such.
I ain't got much with me, save for my clothes and my boots and my pistol. I own a few different pieces that I keep locked away safely at my place of residence, including a Roth-Steyr autoloading pistol, my Grampappy's old Colt revolving pistol, a 1917 Enfield rifle like I used in France, a couple of big Winchester shotguns (a lever-action that I keep in my patrol vehicle and a slide-action I use for hunting), and a nice, big 1911 pistol with some stag-horn grips that stays on my hip on patrol.
I's born in Vinita, Oklahoma in 1896 sometime, but I don't remember much from all that. I really only remember Mama loading up the babies and taking us to Tulsa, where she worked as a typist for some lawyers. Daddy was a boxer and did some amateur stuff here and there, but never really broke it big time because he lost too much. We weren't that badly off; most folk in the Greenwood district at that time's more up-and-coming than any other black community in America except maybe for Harlem, as far as I know. As soon as I's old enough, I enlisted with the US Army to earn some extra money and earn some kind of nobility for myself, I guess. Being a soldier's a fine thing, a fine job, a noble occupation, or it was at the time. That was in 1911, and I stayed with the 371st Infantry Division until the end of the War when we got de-mobilized. I came back to Tulsa and found some work as a bartender until 1921, when the riot happened. That was some crazy bologna. People was dying everywhere, it seemed like everything had bullet holes in them; I literally had these flashbacks to the Marne and I almost assaulted what I thought was a fortified German position, but it turned out to be a fortified white position. I wound up inside the Mount Zion Baptist Church with a group of other guys, and we were under siege like Hell wanted to come busting in through the front door. National Guard came in and broke everybody up, but not until after the planes firebombed all of Greenwood. After that, I stayed on and helped with the reconstruction effort. I couldn't handle seeing that kind of violence; I was really angry. So, I used my savings to become a police officer, although it wasn't easy right after the riot and all, and with rampant racism, I'm surprised it even happened at all. But God gave me the blessing of a good character, and I stand proudly every day when I put that gold badge over my heart. I'm one of the best officers of the peace that Tulsa's ever seen in its short history, and with the ratification of the outlaws of the 18th Amendment getting out of control, I feel like my good track record is just the tip of the iceberg, seeing as I've been assigned to a special inter-state task force meant to bring down multiple-ordinance offenders, all being organized in Chicago. Maybe my white superiors are sending me on a suicide mission; I know tough work when I see's it.