They stood up to fight for a nation that didn't want them. They stood up to fight for freedoms they barely had. They stood up to be counted as men in a country that called them "boy." They fought and died, and their stories go largely untold. They were timeless, historical, and immediate. They were CIVIL WARRIORS.

Zachariah Tyler was a black man, a whitewasher by trade, who served as a minister at the St. James AME Zion Church in the upstate village of Ithaca, New York. It was 1863, and the men in Reverend Tyler's congregation were eager to participate in the war that had torn the United States apart. But until that December, New York had refused to allow black men to fight. When the first Army recruiter finally arrived on Christmas Eve, Reverend Tyler enlisted to watch over his son and the 24 other men from Tompkins County who would be serving in the 26th United States Colored Troops.

CIVIL WARRIORS is taken directly from the historical record, and is brought dramatically to life in a unique spoken word format by Producer/Directors Deborah Hoard and Che Broadnax, and Co-Producer/Screenwriter Ben Porter Lewis. It is a story of war on two fronts – the armed conflict between North and South, and the battle for recognition and rights for black Americans. It is a story of a shared struggle, of courage and determination, victory and grief. It is their story, and it will be told.