The correspondent of the Cincinnati Gazette with Gen. Mitchell’s Division, relates and incident which shows how willingly the loyal blacks respond to the call of our army commanders:
“There is one thing for which Col. Turchin is worthy of all praise. The most of the planters in the neighborhood of the bridge which he built, had fled from their plantations, or were so frightened that they did not attempt to exercise any authority over their slaves. – The colored people, of course, came crowding around our troops. Col. Turchin asked them if they were willing to work. They all with the utmost alacrity, declared that they were; and in a short time, 150 pairs of stout, honest dusky hands were working away at the bridge. Never did laborers perform more cheerful willing service; and when at meal time they drew up in two ranks, for the purpose of receiving their rations, a happier and more smiling, grinning set of countenances is seldom ever seen.
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 10, 1862, p. 3
“There is one thing for which Col. Turchin is worthy of all praise. The most of the planters in the neighborhood of the bridge which he built, had fled from their plantations, or were so frightened that they did not attempt to exercise any authority over their slaves. – The colored people, of course, came crowding around our troops. Col. Turchin asked them if they were willing to work. They all with the utmost alacrity, declared that they were; and in a short time, 150 pairs of stout, honest dusky hands were working away at the bridge. Never did laborers perform more cheerful willing service; and when at meal time they drew up in two ranks, for the purpose of receiving their rations, a happier and more smiling, grinning set of countenances is seldom ever seen.
– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, May 10, 1862, p. 3
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