| Y/M/D | Description | Place |
|---|---|---|
| 1863/05/28 | Saw the first black Regiment, or Regiment of Blacks march through Beacon St! An imposing sight, with something wild and strange about it, like a dream. At last the North consents to let the Negro fight for his freedom. - HWL | Nathan Appleton Residence, Boston |
| 1863/07/18 | While leading the 54th Massachusetts in a charge on Fort Wagner, Colonel Robert Gould Shaw mounts a parapet and urges his men forward, shouting "Forward, Fifty-Fourth, forward!". He is shot through the chest three times and dies almost instantly. | Morris Island Lighthouse, Folly Beach |
| 1863/07/25 | Men of the 54th, still unpaid, raise $2,832 for a stone memorial for Robert Gould Shaw. Men of the 55th give $1,000. | |
| 1863/07/30 | In late July, Rufus Saxton, from his HQ at the Whitehall ferry landing in Beaufort, addresses the Colored Soldiers and Freedmen that the principles for which Shaw fought and died will be vindicated and urges them to pay a last tribute. | Beaufort, SC, South Carolina |
| 1863/09/00 | In early Sept, Gage writes to F Shaw of a gathering in an unplastered and unpainted church at which $27 was raised due to a sermon by James Lynch. Members of the congregation came forward with the mite to be added to the other mites, for the good work. | Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, SC, South Carolina |
| 1864/00/00 | Due to local hostility and unstable ground, the 1st Shaw memorial will not be built. The funds were used to establish the first free school for Black children in Charleston, the Shaw Memorial School, the only school to employed negro teachers. | |
| 1865/00/00 | Joshua Benton Smith initiates a new call for a memorial in Boston. Smith, a former escaped slave, worked in the service of Col Shaw's family before he became a successful caterer. He later worked in the Massachusetts legislature. | Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Regiment Memorial, Boston |
| 1865/10/00 | In the autumn of 1865, a meeting is held in the council chamber at the State House, at the call of Gov Andrew, Dr Samuel Howe, Sen Charles Sumner, Col Henry Lee, J B Smith, and others, to consider the matter of a suitable memorial to Robert G Shaw. | Massachusetts Statehouse, Boston |
| 1867/00/00 | Saint-Gaudens is inspired to depict Shaw on horseback with marching soldiers from a painting he saw in France, Campagne de France 1814, by Jean-Louis Meissonier, which shows Napoleon on horseback with rows of infantry, now at the Musee d'Orsay. | Musee d'Orsay, Paris |
| 1883/00/00 | Shaw Memorial committee of 21 prominent Bostonians, including the abolitionist senator, Charles Sumner, award the sculpture commission to Saint-Gaudens. | Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Regiment Memorial, Boston |
| 1894/00/00 | A committee member complains that bronze is wanted pretty damned quick! People are grumbling for it, the city howling for it, and most of the committee have become toothless waiting for it! Gaudens made 40 models, showing each soldier as a distinctly. | |
| 1897/05/00 | The 11x14 foot Shaw Memorial bronze cast is completed at the Gorham Company foundry in Providence, RI, at a cost of $7,000. | Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Regiment Memorial, Boston |
| 1897/05/31 | Under light rain, The Shaw Memorial is unveiled. The crowd cheers, a band plays up "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" and an artillery battery on the Common fires a 17 gun salute. Three warships in the harbor each fire a 21 gun salute. | Robert Gould Shaw and the 54th Regiment Memorial, Boston |
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