 Approximately 2,000 white North Carolinians from western North Carolina enlisted in the Union Army and fought for the North in the war.In addition, black men rapidly volunteered to fill two Union regiments raised in the coastal areas of the state that were occupied by Union forces in 1862 and 1863.During Reconstruction, many African-American leaders arose from people free before the war, men who had escaped to the North and decided to return, and educated migrants from the North who wanted to help in the postwar years.