What first brought black men back to the north was slavery. Black people did not want to be in the South for it was a place where slaves, mostly black men, were forced to work, and many cruelties were placed upon them. None of these people wanted to be exploited to do work, so they went to the North. It could also have been the Civil War, and black people may have chosen to go to the North since people in the North believed in no slavery.