Why do your think that African American soldiers were treated better in Europe than at home?

Answer 1

The question assumes that African American soldiers WERE treated better in Europe than at home. The truth is much more complex. For example - Hitler and many of his followers insisted that those of African extraction were sub-human (which is one of the reasons he was infuriated and embarrassed when Jesse Owens did so well in the Berlin Olympics). Consequently, African American soldiers were sometimes treated far worse as POWs. It is also true that many of the regions near the Mediterranean had built up bigotry against those from across the Mediterranean in Africa and applied those attitudes to African-American soldiers.

With that said - many times the African-Americans WERE treated better in Europe than at home. Slavery took longer to die out in the US than in most of Europe so they were further removed from those attitudes. Africans - being in closer proximity to Europe than America - were somewhat more common to the Europeans as just being from Another Country rather than as part of an established underclass. There is also the factor that as liberating soldiers they were being welcomed regardless of ethnic origin - which certainly would give them a higher status than they enjoyed at home. This reception was, of course general to ALL the liberating soldiers, black, white, green, or purple.