Speech of George Mason, August 22, 1787

The infernal traffic originated in the avarice of British merchants. The British government constantly checked the attempts of Virginia to stop it. The integrity and welfare of the whole Union is concerned in the matter. The evil of slavery was experienced in the late Revolution. Had slaves been treated as they might have been by the enemy (i.e., liberated and armed), they would have proved dangerous instruments in their hands.

The prohibition of the slave trade by individual States was of none avail so long as South Carolina and Georgia were left free to bring Africans into the country. The new Western territory would be filled with the wretched creatures.

Slavery discourages the arts and manufactures. The poor despise labor, when they see it performed by slaves. Negro slaves prevent the immigration of free white laborers, who really enrich and strengthen a country.

Slavery debases morals; every master is born a petty tyrant. It brings the judgment of heaven on a country. As nations cannot be punished in the next world, they must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes and effects Providence punishes national sins by national calamities.

SOURCE: Marion Mills Miller, American Debate: The Land And Slavery Question, 1607-1860, p. 101-2

Anti-Slavery Meeting in Andover, published August 8, 1835

MR. EDITOR — I regret that the former account I was sent of your labors of our excellent brothers Thompson and Phelps, was so meager a statement of their untiring efforts among us.  Circumstances, however, obliged me to compress into a small space, what was worthy of being given at much greater length; and for the benefit of those who have not the privilege of listening to the discussion of a question of so much importance to every American citizen as that of slavery, a fuller sketch of the remaining meetings shall be given.  As my remarks will be confined for the most part to the speeches of Mr. Thompson, it must not be supposed that I can give anything like an adequate idea of the cogency of his arguments or of the power of his eloquence.  To eulogize him as an orator would be idle.  It would be like daubing paint upon a finished portrait, which would only soil it instead of adding to its beauty. Those who would form any just conception of Mr. Thompson as a public speaker and a christian philanthropist, must both see and hear him, and those who have once listened to him, are well aware that even an analysis of a speech of his , so closely joined in all its parts, so replete with profound thought, and so profusely embellished with rhetorical flowers of every hue and ever ordour, cannot be embodied in a single brief paragraph.  I shall therefore not attempt to give his own expressions, but merely a general description of his discourse.

On Sunday evening, July 12th, Mr. Thompson addressed a crowded audience, from Ezekiel xxviii. 14, 15, 16 – “Thou art the anointed the cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so : thou wast upon the holy mountain of God: thou hast walked up and down in the midst of these stones of fire. Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee. By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.”

Mr. Thompson remarked that though this was a passage of inimitable beauty, it was one of tremendous and awful import. While it drew the picture of the wealth and grandeur of ancient Tyre, it contained the prediction of its downfall. Mr. Thompson then proceeded to portray in matchless colors the prosperity and glory of the renowned city, whose “builders had perfected her beauty, whose borders were in the midst of the sea, whose mariners were the men of Sidon, and who was a merchant to the people of many islands.” Her fir trees were brought from Hermon, her oaks from Bashan, her cedars from Lebanon, her blue and purple and fine linen from Egypt, her wheat and oil and honey from Judea, her spices and gold and precious stones from Arabia, her silver from Tarsus, her emeralds and coral and agate from Syria, her warriors from Persia, and her slaves from Greece. Her palaces were radiant with jewels, and many kings were filled with the multitude of the riches of her merchandise. But iniquity was found in her. She had kept back the hire of the laborer by fraud. By the multitude of her riches she was filled with violence. She made merchandise of the bodies and souls of men, therefore she should be cast down. Many nations should come up against her and destroy her walls and break down her towers. All this had been literally fulfilled.

Mr. Thompson then applied his subject to America. Your country, said he, is peculiarly an anointed cherub. Heaven smiled upon the self-denying enterprise of your praying, pilgrim fathers, and in two centuries a great nation has risen into being — a nation whose territories stretches from the Canadas to the Gulf of Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the Rocky Mountains — a nation whose prowess by land and by sea is unsurpassed by any people that have a name — a nation whose markets are filled with the luxuries of every clime, and whose merchandise is diffused over the world. The keels of your vessels cut all waters. Your ships lie along the docks of every port of Europe, and are anchored under the walls of China. The deer and the buffalo fall before the aim of your hunters, and the eagle is stricken down from his eyry. Your hardy tars visit the ice-bound coasts of the North, and transfix the monsters of the polar seas. Your coasts are thronged with populous and extended cities, and in the interior may be seen the spires of your churches towering above the beautiful villages that surround them. Above every other nation under heaven, yours is distinguished for its christian enterprise. You can give the Bible to every family within the limits of your own territory, and pledge it to the world. Your missionaries are in all quarters of the globe, and your seventeen thousand clergy are preaching salvation, in the midst of your own population. Other nations of Christendom behold with complacency the good effected by your charitable societies, and would be proud to emulate you. No nation has ever been so peculiarly blessed. You are placed upon the holy mountain of God, and walk up and down in the midst of the stones of fire, but you have sinned. Ye make merchandise of the bodies and souls of men. Ye have torn the African from his quiet home, and subjected him to interminable, bondage in a land of strangers. Violence is in the midst of you, and the oppressor walks abroad unpunished. One-sixth part of your whole population are doomed to perpetual slavery. The cotton tree blooms, and the cane field wanes, because the black man tills the soil. The sails of your vessels whiten the ocean, their holds filled with sugar, and their decks burdened with cotton, because the black man smarts under the driver's lash, while the scorching rays of a tropical sun fall blistering upon his skin. He labors and faints, and another riots on the fruits of his unrequited toils. He is bought and sold as the brute, and has nothing that he can call his own. Is he a husband? the next hour may separate him forever from the object of his affections. Is he a father? the child of his hopes may the next moment be torn from his bleeding bosom, and carried he knows not whither, but at best, to a state of servitude more intolerable than death. He looks back upon the past, and remembers his many stripes and tears. He looks forward, and no gleam of hope breaks in upon his sorrow-stricken bosom. Despair rankles in his heart and withers all his energies, and he longs to find rest in the grave. But his dark mind is uninformed of his immortal nature, and when he dies he dies without the consolations of religion, for in christian America there is no Bible for the slave. Your country being thus guilty, it behoves every citizen of your republic to consider lest the fate of Tyre be yours.

Mr. Thompson closed by expressing his determination to labor in behalf of those in bonds, till the last tear was wiped from the eye of the slave, and the last fetter broken from his heel; and then, continued he, then let a western breeze bear me back to the land of my birth, or let me find a spot to lay my bones in the midst of a grateful people, and a people FREE indeed.

Never did the writer of this article listen to such eloquence; and never before did he witness an audience hanging with such profound attention upon the lips of a speaker. But those who take the trouble to read this article, must not suppose that what I have here stated is given in Mr. Thompson's own words. Perhaps I may have made use of some of his expressions, but my object has been to give a general view of this surpassingly excellent address of our beloved brother.

On Monday evening, Mr. Thompson gave a lecture on St. Domingo. It being preliminary to subsequent lectures, it was mostly statistics from the time of the discovery of the island, down to the year 1789. Mr. Thompson remarked that he had a two-fold object in view in giving an account of St. Domingo. First, to show the capacity of the African race for governing themselves; and, second, to show that immediate emancipation was safe, as illustrated by its effects on that island. St. Domingo, he said, was remarkable for being the place where Columbus was betrayed — for its being the first of the West India Islands to which negro slaves were carried from the coast of Africa — for the cruel treatment of the first settlers in the Island to the aborigines — for the triumph of the liberated slaves over the French, and those of the islanders who joined them — for being the birth place of the noble minded, the gifted, the honored, but afterwards, betrayed Toussaint L’Ouverture, who was born a slave, and a great part of his life labored as a slave, yet as soon as his chains were broken off, he rose at once to a man — to a general to a commander-in-chief, and finally to the Governor of a prosperous and happy Republic.

At the close of the exercises, Mr. Thompson informed the audience, that on the next evening they would be addressed by Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Editor of the Liberator, — the much despised and villified Wm. Lloyd Garrison was to address the citizens of Andover on the subject of slavery.

Tuesday evening arrived, and with it arrived Wm. Lloyd Garrison, Editor of the Liberator. The house was crowded by many, who, we doubt not, came from mere curiosity, to see the man who had been held up to the world as the “enemy of all righteousness — the “disturber of the public peace — the “libeller of his country” — the “outlawed fanatic”—the reckless incendiary, who was propagating his seditious sentiments from one end of the land to the other, and yet in this free country, suffered to live notwithstanding.

After prayer and singing, brother Garrison arose, and said, he stood before them as the one who had been represented to the public as the propagator of discord, and the enemy of his country — that almost every opprobrious epithet had been attached to his name; but since one term of reproval had been spared him — since his enemies had never called him a slaveholder, he would forgive them all the rest, and thank them for their magnanimity. He spoke for some time on the supercilious inquiry so often iterated and reiterated by our opponents; Why don't you go to the South? He remarked, that the very individuals who made this inquiry, and were denouncing us as fanatics, well knew that death would be the lot of him who should broach such sentiments at the South, and should the advocates of abolition throw away their lives by recklessly throwing themselves into the hands of those who were thirsting for their blood, then indeed, might these haughty querists smile over their mangled bodies, and with justice pronounce them fanatics. He touched upon several other important points which I must pass over in silence. His manner was mild, his address dignified and dispassionate, and many who never saw him before, and whose opinions, or rather prejudices were formed from the false reports of his enemies, and confirmed by not reading his paper, were compelled, in spite of themselves, to form an idea entirely the reverse of what they had previously entertained of him. His address did much towards removing the prejudice that many had against him, and proved an excellent catholicon to the stomachs of those who are much given to squeamishness, whenever they hear the name of Garrison mentioned.

On Wednesday evening, Mr. Thompson was to have continued his remarks on St. Domingo, but a heavy rain prevented most of the audience from coming together, and by the request of those present, the address was deferred until the next evening, and the time spent in familiar conversation. An interesting discussion took place, and lasted about an hour and a half. Many important questions were canvassed, to the entire satisfaction, we believe, of all who listened to them.

On Thursday evening, Mr. Thompson resumed his account of St. Domingo. Commencing with the year 1790, he showed that the beginning of what are termed “the horrid scenes of St. Domingo,” was in consequence of a decree passed by the National Convention, granting to the free people of color the enjoyment of the same political privileges as the whites, and again in 1791, another decree was passed, couched in still stronger language, declaring that all the free people of color in the French islands were entitled to all the privileges of citizenship. When this decree reached Cape Francais, it excited the whites to great hostility against the free people of color. The parties were arrayed in arms against each other, and blood and conflagration followed. The Convention, in order to prevent the threatening evils, immediately rescinded the decree. By this act, the free blacks were again deprived of their rights, which so enraged them, that they commenced fresh hostilities upon the whites, and the Convention was obliged to re-enact the former decree, giving to them the same rights as white citizens. A civil war continued to rage in the island until 1793, when, in order to extinguish it, and at the same time repel the British, who were then hovering round the coasts, it was suggested that the slaves should be armed in defence of the island. Accordingly in 1793, proclamation was made, promising “to give freedom to all the slaves who would range themselves under the banners of the Republic.” This scheme produced the desired effect. The English were driven from the Island, the civil commotions were suppressed, and peace and order were restored. After this, the liberated slaves were industrious and happy, and continued to work on the same plantations as before, and this state of things continued until 1802, when Buonaparte sent out a military force to restore slavery in the Island. Having enjoyed the blessings of freedom for nine years, the blacks resolved to die rather than again be subjected to bondage. They rose in the strength of free men, and with Toussaint L’Ouverture at their head they encountered their enemies. Many of them, however, were taken by the French, and miserably perished. Some were burnt to death, some were nailed to the masts of ships, some were sown up in sacks, poignarded, and then thrown into the sea as food for sharks, some were confined in the holds of vessels, and suffocated with the fumes of brimstone, and many were torn in pieces by the blood hounds, which the French employed to harass and hunt them in the forests and fastnesses of the mountains. At length the scene changed. The putrifying carcases of the unburied slain poisoned the atmosphere, and produced sickness in the French army. In this state of helplessness they were besieged by the black army, their provisions were cut off, a famine raged among them so that they were compelled at last to subsist upon the flesh of the blood hounds, that they had exported from Cuba as auxiliaries in conquering the islanders. The French army being nearly exterminated, a miserable remnant put to sea, and left the Island to the quiet possession of their conquerors. Mr. Thompson concluded with the following summary: First, the revolution in St. Domingo originated between the whites and the free people of color, previous to any act of emancipation. Second, the slaves after their emancipation remained peaceful, contented, industrious, and happy, until Buonaparte made the attempt to restore slavery in the Island. Third, the history of St. Domingo proves the capacity of the black man for the enjoyment of liberty, his ability of self-government, and improvement, and the safety of immediate emancipation. Friday evening, Mr. Thompson closed his account of St. Domingo, by giving a brief statement of its present condition. He showed by documents published in the West Indies, that its population was rapidly multiplying, its exports annually increasing, and the inhabitants of the Island improving much faster than could be reasonably expected.

After the address, opportunity was given for any individuals to propose questions. A gentleman slaveholder commenced. He made several unimportant inquiries, and along with them, abused Mr. Thompson, by calling him a “foreign incendiary.” Mr. Thompson answered in his usual christian calmness and dignity, not rendering reviling for reviling. The discusion continued to a late hour, and when it closed the audience gave evidence of being well satisfied with the answers given, and some who attended that evening for the first time, subscribed their names to the Constitution. Thus closed Mr. Thompson's labors with us for the present, and he left town on Saturday, July 18th. Mr. Phelps remained and addressed us on Sabbath evening, but the small space left to me, will not admit of my giving any account of it. As to the good accomplished by the labors of Messrs. Thompson and Phelps, some further account may be given hereafter. At present, I will only say, that upwards of 200 have joined the Anti-Slavery Society since they came among us.

Yours, in behalf of the A. S. Society at Andover,

R. REED, Cor. Secretary.

SOURCES: Isaac Knapp, Publisher, Letters and Addresses by G. Thompson [on American Negro Slavery] During His Mission in the United States, From Oct. 1st, 1834, to Nov. 27, 1835, p. 77-83; “Anti-Slavery Meetings at Andover,” The Liberator, Boston, Massachusetts, Saturday, August 8, 1835, p. 1.

Gerrit Smith to Stephen C. Phillips, October 13, 1846

Peterboro, October 23,1846.

Hon. Stephen C. Phillips, of Salem, Mass.:

Dear Sir — This day's mail brings me the speech which you delivered at the meeting recently assembled at Faneuil Hall to consider the outrage of kidnapping a man in the streets of Boston.

I am not insensible to the ability, eloquence, beauty, of this speech: — and yet it fails of pleasing me. The meeting, after I saw its proceedings, was no longer an object of my pleasant contemplations. Indeed, Massachusetts herself has ceased to be such an object. There was a time, when, among all commonwealths, she was my beau ideal. Her wisdom, integrity, bravery — in short, her whole history, from her bud in the Mayflower to the blossoms and fruits with which a ripe civilization has adorned and enriched her — made her the object of my warm and unmeasured admiration. But, a change has come over her. Alas, how great and sad a one! She has sunk her ancient worth and glory in her base devotion to Mammon and Party.

When, in the year 1835, one of her sons — that son to whom she, not to say this whole nation, owes more than to any other person, was, for his honest, just, and fearless assaults on slavery, driven by infuriate thousands through the streets of her metropolis with a halter round his neck, Massachusetts looked on, applauding. So far was she from disclaiming the mob that she boasted, that her “gentlemen of property and standing” composed it. Indeed, one of her first acts after the mob, was to choose for her governor the man who promptly rewarded her for this choice by his official recommendation to treat abolitionists as criminals.

Massachusetts was not, however, lost to shame. It was not in vain that the finger of scorn was pointed at her for this mob and for other demonstrations of her pro-slavery. For very decency's sake, she began to adjust her dress, and put on better appearances. Indeed, anti-slavery sentiment became the order of the day with her: and, from her chief statesman down to her lowest demagogue, all tried their skill in uttering big words against slavery. But, the hollowest sentiment and the merest prating constituted the whole warp and woof of this pretended and unsubstantial opposition to slavery. Massachusetts still remained the slave of Party and Mammon. She would still vote for slaveholders, rather than break up the national parties to which she was wedded. She would still make every concession to the slave power to induce it to spare her manufactures.

A fine occasion was afforded Massachusetts, a few years ago, to talk her anti-slavery words, and display her anti-slavery sentiment, and right well did she improve it. I refer to the casting of the fugitive slave George Latimer into one of her jails. Instantly did she show anti-slavery colors. She was anti-slavery all over, and to the very core also, as a stranger to her ways would have thought. But beneath all her manifestations of generous regard for the oppressed, she continued to be none the less bound up in avarice— none the less servile to the South. The first opportunity she had to do so, she again voted for slaveholders.

Then came the project to annex Texas. The slaveholders demanded more territory to soak with the sweat and tears and blood of the poor African. This was another occasion for Massachusetts to make another anti-slavery bluster. She made it: — and then voted for Clay — for the very man who had done unspeakably more than any other man to extend and perpetuate the dominion of American slavery. As a specimen of her heartlessness, in this instance of her anti-slavery parade, her present Whig Governor, who was among the foremost and loudest to condemn this scheme of annexation, is now calling, in the name of patriotism, on his fellow-citizens to consummate it by murdering the unoffending Mexicans.

Next came the expulsion of her commissioners from Charleston and New Orleans. Again she blustered for a moment. She denounced slavery and the South. She boasted of herself, as if she still were what she had been; as if “modern degeneracy had not reached” her. But, the sequel proved her hypocrisy and baseness. After a little time, she quietly pocketed the insult, and was as ready as ever to vote for slaveholders.

I will refer to but one more of the many opportunities which Massachusetts has had to prove herself worthy of her former history. It is that which called out your present speech. This was emphatically an opportunity for Massachusetts to show herself to be an anti-slavery State. But she had not a heart to improve it. Her own citizens in the very streets of her own gloried-in city, had chased down a man, and bound him, and plunged him into the pit of perpetual slavery. The voice of such a deed, sufficient to rend her rocks, and move her mountains, could not startle the dead soul of her people. They are the fast bound slaves of Mammon and Party. True, a very great meeting was gathered in Faneuil Hall. Eloquent speeches were made; and a committee of vigilance was appointed. But nothing was done to redeem herself from her degeneracy: nothing to recall to her loathsome carcass the great and glorious spirit which had departed from it; nothing was done for the slave. When the year 1848 shall come round, Massachusetts, if still impenitent, will be as ready to vote for the slaveholders whom the South shall then bid her vote for, as she was to do so in 1844.

Your great meeting was a farce; — and will you pardon me, if I cite your own speech to prove it? That speech, which denounces your fellow-citizen for stealing one man, was delivered by a gentleman, who (risum teneatis?) contends, that a person who steals hundreds of men is fit to be President of the United States! It is ludicrous, beyond all parallel, that he, who would crown with the highest honors the very prince of kidnappers, should, with a grave face, hold up to the public abhorrence the poor man, who has only just begun to try his hand at kidnapping. Then, your contemptuous bearing towards Captain Hannum and his employers! — how affected! If you shall not be utterly insensible to the claims of consistency, who, when you shall have Henry Clay to dine with you, will you allow to be better entitled than this same Captain Hannum and his employers to seats at your table? Cease, my dear sir, from your outrages on consistency. You glory in Mr. Clay. How can you then despise and reproach those who, with however much of the awkwardness of beginners, are, nevertheless, doing their best to step forward in the tracks of their “illustrious predecessor?”

It would be very absurd — would it not? — for you to denounce the stealing of a single sheep, at the same time that you are counting as worthy of all honor the man who steals a whole flock of sheep. But, I put it to your candor, whether it would be a whit more absurd than is your deep loathing and unutterable contempt of Captain Hannum and his employers for a crime, which, though incessantly repeated and infinitely aggravated in the case of Mr. Clay, does not disqualify him, in your esteem, to be the chief ruler of this nation— to be, what the civil ruler is required to be — “the minister of God.”

You intimate, that the State Prison is the proper place for Captain Hannum and his employers. And do you not think it the proper place for Henry Clay also? Out upon partiality, if, because he is your candidate for the presidency, you would not have this old and practical man-thief punished, as well as those who are but in their first lessons of his horrid piracy!

To be serious, Mr. Phillips — you are not the man to have to do with Captain Hannum and his employers, unless it is to set them an example of repentance. It becomes you not to look down upon them —but to take your seat by their side, and to bow your head as low as shame and sorrow should bow theirs. No—if Captain Hannum and his employers should steal a man every remaining day of their lives, they could not do as much to sanction and perpetuate the crime of man-stealing, as the honored and influential Stephen C. Phillips has done by laboring to elect to the highest civil office the very man stealer, who has contributed far more than any other living person to make man-stealing reputable, and to widen the theatre of its horrors.

Alas, what a pity to lose such an occasion for good as was afforded by this instance of kidnapping. That was the occasion for you and other distinguished voters for slaveholders to employ the power of your own repentance in bringing other pro-slavery voters to repentance. That was the occasion for your eyes to stream with contrite sorrow, and your lips to exclaim: “We have sinned: — we have sinned against God and the slave: — we have not sought to have Civil Government look after the poor, and weak, and oppressed, and crushed: — but we have perverted and degraded it from this high, and holy, and heaven-intended use, to the low purposes of money-making and to the furtherance of the selfish schemes of ambition: we have not chosen for rulers men who, in their civil office, as Josiah in his, “judged the cause of the poor and needy'—men who, in their civil office, could say, as did Job in his, ‘I was a father to the poor’ — ‘I brake the jaws of the wicked and plucked the spoil out of his teeth’ — but we have chosen our Clays and our Polks — pirates, who rob, and buy and sell, the poor — monsters, who, with their sharks' teeth devour the poor.” Deny, doubt, evade it, as you will — you may, nevertheless, my dear sir, depend upon it, that it is for your repentance and the repentance of all the voters for slaveholders, that God calls. He calls, also, for the repentance of the American ministry, that so wickedly and basely refuses to preach Bible politics, and to insist on the true and heaven-impressed character of Civil Government. Depend upon it, my dear sir, that your disease and theirs is one which can be cured by no medicine short of the medicine of repentance. I am not unaware that this is a most offensive and humbling medicine — especially to persons in the higher walks of life; — nevertheless, you and they must take it or remain uncured. No clamor against Captain Hannum and his employers — no attempt to make scape-goats of them — will avail to cure you.

Alas, what a pity that a mere farce should have taken the place of the great and solemn measure which was due from your meeting! Had your meeting felt, that the time for trifling on the subject of slavery is gone by; and had it passed, honestly and heartily, the Resolution: “No voting for slaveholders, nor for those who are in political fellowship with slaveholders,” it would have had the honor of giving the death-blow to American slavery. This resolution, passed by such a meeting, would have electrified the whole nation. Within all its limits every true heart would have responded to it, and every false one been filled with shame.

When the glorious Missionary, William Knibb, had seen the slaveholders tear down and burn a large share of the chapels in Jamaica, he set sail for Great Britain. Scarcely had he landed, ere he began the cry, “Slavery is incompatible with Christianity.” He went over his native land, uttering this cry. A mighty cry it was. The walls of British slavery felt its power as certainly as did the walls of Jericho the shout by which it was prostrated.

The power of the cry: “No voting for slaveholders, nor for those who are in political fellowship with slaveholders,” would, were it to proceed from the right lips, be as effective against the walls of American slavery, as was the cry of William Knibb against the walls of British slavery. You, and Charles Sumner, (I know and love him,) and Charles Francis Adams, and John G. Palfrey, are the men to utter this cry. Go, without delay, over the whole length and breadth of your State, pouring these talismanic words into the ears of the thousands and tens of thousands who shall flock to hear you; and Massachusetts will, even at the approaching election, reject all her pro-slavery candidates. Such is the power of truth, when proceeding from honored and welcome lips!

Be in earnest, ye Phillipses and Sumners and Adamses and Palfreys — be entirely in earnest, in your endeavors to overthrow slavery. You desire its overthrow, and are doing something to promote it. But you lack the deep and indispensable earnestness; and, therefore, do you shrink from employing the bold and revolutionary means which the case demands. No inferior means however, will accomplish the object. As well set your babies to catch Leviathans with pin-hooks, as attempt to overthrow American slavery by means which fall below the stern and steadfast purpose: “Not to vote for slaveholders, nor for those who are in political fellowship with slaveholders.” But, only press the hearts of your fellow-men with this, the solemn and immovable purpose of your own hearts—and fallen Massachusetts rises again — and American slavery dies—and your names are written in everduring letters among the names of the saviors of your country.

Very respectfully yours,

Gerrit Smith.

SOURCES: Octavius Brooks Frothingham, Gerrit Smith: A Biography, p. 196-200

Gen. Cameron and the African.

From the Washington Chronicle.

General Cameron, American minister to St. Petersburg, now in this city on official business, is known to be a very agreeable and entertaining talker.  One incident which he relates with great humor, deserves reproduction in the columns of the Daily Chronicle.

Arriving at a small German town on the evening of Whitsuntide – which is a famous and favorite holiday with the Lutherans – he was struck with the descent and comfortable appearance of the people who crowded the streets; but what most interested him was a tall, stout and impressive negro, far blacker than Othello, even before he was represented as a highly colored gentleman.  Supposing him to be an American negro, Mr. Cameron went up to him and said: “How are you, my friend?” using the Pennsylvania German, in which the General is a sort of adept, when to his infinite horror, the colored individual turned upon him and said, in good guttural Dutch, “I am no American; “I am an African; and if you are an American, I do not want to talk to you.  I won’t talk to any man who comes from a country professing to be free, in which human beings are held as slaves.”  And this was said with a magisterial and indignant air that would have been irresistibly comic.  General Cameron made his escape with the best grace possible from his stalwart and sable antagonist, and supposed he had got rid of him, but on passing into an adjoining room with his secretary, Bayard Taylor, to take a glass of lager beer, he was again confronted by the German African, who reopened his vials of wrath, concluded by turning to the general and asking him in broad German, “Sag bin ich recht, or bin ich unrecht?” which means, “Say, am I right or am I wrong, answer me?”  General Cameron made inquiry as to the negro, and ascertained that one of the nobility in the neighborhood who had spent some years in Africa, on a scientific and hunting tour, brought back with him to Germany a very handsome native, who, in the course of time, developed into the individual that sought the opportunity to administer a rebuke to an American who lived in a country professing to be free, yet recognizing the institution of human slavery.

— Published in The Fremont Weekly Journal, Fremont, Ohio, Friday, December 5, 1862, p. 4

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: May 18, 1865

A feeling of sadness hovers over me now, day and night, which no words of mine can express. There is a chance for plenty of character study in this Mulberry house, if one only had the heart for it. Colonel Chesnnt, now ninety-three, blind and deaf, is apparently as strong as ever, and certainly as resolute of will. Partly patriarch, partly grand seigneur, this old man is of a species that we shall see no more — the last of a race of lordly planters who ruled this Southern world, but now a splendid wreck. His manners are unequaled still, but underneath this smooth exterior lies the grip of a tyrant whose will has never been crossed. I will not attempt what Lord Byron says he could not do, but must quote again: “Everybody knows a gentleman when he sees him. I have never met a man who could describe one.” We have had three very distinct specimens of the genus in this house—three generations of gentlemen, each utterly different from the other — father, son, and grandson.

African Scipio walks at Colonel Chesnut's side. He is six feet two, a black Hercules, and as gentle as a dove in all his dealings with the blind old master, who boldly strides forward, striking with his stick to feel where he is going. The Yankees left Scipio unmolested. He told them he was absolutely essential to his old master, and they said, “If you want to stay so bad, he must have been good to you always.” Skip says he was silent, for it “made them mad if you praised your master.”

Sometimes this old man will stop himself, just as he is going off in a fury, because they try to prevent his attempting some feat impossible in his condition of lost faculties. He will ask gently, “I hope that I never say or do anything unseemly! Sometimes I think I am subject to mental aberrations.” At every footfall he calls out, “Who goes there?” If a lady's name is given he uncovers and stands, with hat off, until she passes. He still has the old-world art of bowing low and gracefully.

Colonel Chesnut came of a race that would brook no interference with their own sweet will by man, woman, or devil. But then such manners has he, they would clear any man's character, if it needed it. Mrs. Chesnut, his wife, used to tell us that when she met him at Princeton, in the nineties of the eighteenth century, they called him “the Young Prince.” He and Mr. John Taylor,¹ of Columbia, were the first up-country youths whose parents were wealthy enough to send them off to college.

When a college was established in South Carolina, Colonel John Chesnut, the father of the aforesaid Young Prince, was on the first board of trustees. Indeed, I may say that, since the Revolution of 1776, there has been no convocation of the notables of South Carolina, in times of peace and prosperity, or of war and adversity, in which a representative man of this family has not appeared. The estate has been kept together until now. Mrs. Chesnut said she drove down from Philadelphia on her bridal trip, in a chariot and four — a cream-colored chariot with outriders.

They have a saying here — on account of the large families with which people are usually blessed, and the subdivision of property consequent upon that fact, besides the tendency of one generation to make and to save, and the next to idle and to squander, that there are rarely more than three generations between shirt-sleeves and shirt-sleeves. But these Chesnuts have secured four, from the John Chesnut who was driven out from his father's farm in Virginia by the French and Indians, when that father had been killed at Fort Duquesne,² to the John Chesnut who saunters along here now, the very perfection of a lazy gentleman, who cares not to move unless it be for a fight, a dance, or a fox-hunt.

The first comer of that name to this State was a lad when he arrived after leaving his land in Virginia; and being without fortune otherwise, he went into Joseph Kershaw's grocery shop as a clerk, and the Kershaws, I think, so remember that fact that they have it on their coat-of-arms. Our Johnny, as he was driving me down to Mulberry yesterday, declared himself delighted with the fact that the present Joseph Kershaw had so distinguished himself in our war, that they might let the shop of a hundred years ago rest for a while. '”Upon my soul,” cried the cool captain, “I have a desire to go in there and look at the Kershaw tombstones. I am sure they have put it on their marble tablets that we had an ancestor one day a hundred years ago who was a clerk in their shop.” This clerk became a captain in the Revolution.

In the second generation the shop had so far sunk that the John Chesnut of that day refused to let his daughter marry a handsome, dissipated Kershaw, and she, a spoiled beauty, who could not endure to obey orders when they were disagreeable to her, went up to her room and therein remained, never once coming out of it for forty years. Her father let her have her own way in that; he provided servants to wait upon her and every conceivable luxury that she desired, but neither party would give in.

I am, too, thankful that I am an old woman, forty-two my last birthday. There is so little life left in me now to be embittered by this agony. “Nonsense! I am a pauper,” says my husband, “and I am as smiling and as comfortable as ever you saw me.” “When you have to give up your horses? How then?”

_______________

¹ John Taylor was graduated from Princeton in 1790 and became a planter in South Carolina. He served in Congress from 1806 to 1810, and in the latter year was chosen to fill a vacancy in the United States Senate, caused by the resignation of Thomas Sumter. In 1826 he was chosen Governor of South Carolina. He died in 1832.

¹ Fort Duquesne stood at the junction of the Monongahela and Alleghany Rivers. Captain Trent, acting for the Ohio Company, with some Virginia militiamen, began to build this fort in February, 1754. On April 17th of the same year, 700 Canadians and French forced him to abandon the work. The French then completed the fortress and named it Fort Duquesne. The unfortunate expedition of General Braddock, in the summer of 1755, was an attempt to retake the fort, Braddock's defeat occurring eight miles east of it. In 1758 General Forbes marched westward from Philadelphia and secured possession of the place, after the French, alarmed at his approach, had burned it. Forbes gave it the name of Pittsburg.

SOURCES: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 390-3

Diary of William Howard Russell: May 2, 1861

Breakfasted with Mr. Hodgson, where I met Mr. Locke, Mr. Ward, Mr. Green, and Mrs. Hodgson and her sister. There were in attendance some good-looking little negro boys and men dressed in liveries, which smacked of our host's Orientalism; and they must have heard our discussion, or rather allusion, to the question which would decide whether we thought they are human beings or black two-legged cattle, with some interest, unless indeed the boast of their masters, that slavery elevates the character and civilizes the mind of a negro, is another of the false, pretences on which the institution is rested by its advocates. The native African, poor wretch, avoids being carried into slavery totis viribus, and it would argue ill for the effect on his mind of becoming a slave, if he prefers a piece of gaudy calico even to his loin-cloth and feather head-dress. This question of civilizing the African in slavery, is answered in the assertion of the slave owners themselves, that if the negroes were left to their own devices by emancipation, they would become the worst sort of barbarians — a veritable Quasheedom, the like of which was never thought of by Mr. Thomas Carlyle. I doubt if the aboriginal is not as civilized, in the true sense of the word, as any negro, after three degrees of descent in servitude, whom I have seen on any of the plantations — even though the latter have leather shoes and fustian or cloth raiment and felt hat, and sings about the Jordan. He is exempted from any bloody raid indeed, but he is liable to be carried from his village and borne from one captivity to an other, and his family are exposed to the same exile in America as in Africa. The extreme anger with which any unfavorable comment is met publicly, shows the sensitiveness of the slave owners. Privately, they affect philosophy; and the blue books, and reports of Education Commissions and Mining Committees, furnish them with an inexhaustible source of argument, if you once admit that the summum bonum lies in a certain rotundity of person, and a regular supply of coarse food. A long conversation on the old topics — old to me, but of only a few weeks’ birth. People are swimming with the tide. Here are many men, who would willingly stand aside if they could, and see the battle between the Yankees, whom they hate, and the Secessionists. But there are no women in this party. Wo betide the Northern Pyrrhus, whose head is within reach of a Southern tile and a Southern woman's arm!

I revisited some of the big houses afterwards, and found the merchants not cheerful, but fierce and resolute. There is a considerable population of Irish and Germans in Savannah, who to a man are in favor of the Confederacy, and will fight to support it. Indeed, it is expected they will do so, and there is a pressure brought to bear on them by their employers which they cannot well resist. The negroes will be forced into the place the whites hitherto occupied as laborers — only a few useful mechanics will be kept, and the white population will be obliged by a moral force drafting to go to the wars. The kingdom of cotton is most essentially of this world, and it will be fought for vigorously. On the quays of Savannah, and in the warehouses, there is not a man who doubts that he ought to strike his hardest for it, or apprehends failure. And then, what a career is before them! All the world asking for cotton, and England dependent on it. What a change since Whitney first set his cotton-gin to work in this state close by us! Georgia, as a vast country only partially reclaimed, yet looks to a magnificent future. In her past history the Florida wars, and the treatment of the unfortunate Cherokee Indians, who were expelled from their lands as late as 1838, show the people who descended from old Oglethorpe's band were fierce and tyrannical, and apt at aggression, nor will slavery improve them. I do not speak of the cultivated and hospitable citizens of the large towns, but of the bulk of the slaveless whites.

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 157-8

Diary of William Howard Russell: April 27, 1861

Mrs. Trescot, it seems, spent part of her night in attendance on a young gentleman of color, who was introduced into the world in a state of servitude by his poor chattel of a mother. Such kindly acts as these are more common than we may suppose; and it would be unfair to put a strict or unfair construction on the motives of slave owners in paying such attention to their property. Indeed, as Mrs. Trescot says, “When people talk of my having so many slaves, I always tell them it is the slaves who own me. Morning, noon, and night, I'm obliged to look after them, to doctor them, and attend to them in every way.” Property has its duties, you see, madam, as well as its rights.

The planter's house is quite new, and was built by himself; the principal material being wood, and most of the work being done by his own negroes. Such work as window-sashes and panellings, however, was executed in Charleston. A pretty garden runs at the back, and from the windows there are wide stretches of cotton-fields visible, and glimpses of the river to be seen.

After breakfast our little party repaired to the river side, and sat under the shade of some noble trees waiting for the boat which was to bear us to the fishing grounds. The wind blew up stream, running with the tide, and we strained our eyes in vain for the boat. The river is here nearly a mile across, — a noble estuary rather, — with low banks lined with forests, into which the axe has made deep forays and clearings for cotton-fields.

It would have astonished a stray English traveller, if, penetrating the shade, he heard in such an out-of-the-way place familiar names and things spoken of by the three lazy persons who were stretched out — cigar in mouth — on the ant-haunted trunks which lay prostrate by the seashore. Mr. Trescot spent some time in London as attaché to the United States Legation, was a club man, and had a large circle of acquaintance among the young men about town, of whom he remembered many anecdotes and peculiarities, and little adventures. Since that time he was Under-Secretary of State in Mr. Buchanan's administration, and went out with Secession. He is the author of a very agreeable book on a dry subject, “The History of American Diplomacy,” which is curious enough as an unconscious exposition of the anti-British jealousies, and even antipathies, which have animated American statesmen since they were created. In fact, much of American diplomacy means hostility to England, and the skilful employment of the anti-British sentiment at their disposal in their own country and elsewhere. Now he was talking pleasantly of people he had met — many of them mutual friends.”Here is the boat at last!” I had been sweeping the broad river with my glass occasionally, and at length detected a speck on its broad surface moving down towards us, with a white dot marking the foam at its bows. Spite of wind and tideway, it came rapidly, and soon approached us, pulled by six powerful negroes, attired in red-flannel jackets and white straw hats with broad ribbons. The craft itself — a kind of monster canoe, some forty-five feet long, narrow, wall-sided, with high bow and raised stern — lay deep in the water, for there were extra negroes for the fishing, servants, baskets of provisions, water buckets, stone jars of less innocent drinking, and abaft there was a knot of great strong planters, — Elliots all — cousins, uncles, and brothers. A friendly hail as they swept up along-side, — an exchange of salutations.

“Well, Trescot, have you got plenty of Crabs?"

A groan burst forth at his insouciant reply. He had been charged to find bait, and he had told the negroes to do so, and the negroes had not done so. The fishermen looked grievously at each other, and fiercely at Trescot, who assumed an air of recklessness, and threw doubts on the existence of fish in the river, and resorted to similar miserable subterfuges; indeed, it was subsequently discovered that he was an utter infidel in regard to the delights of piscicapture.

“Now, all aboard! Over, you fellows, and take these gentlemen in!" The negroes were over in a moment, waist deep, and, each taking one on his back, deposited us dry in the boat. I only mention this to record the fact, that I was much impressed by a practical demonstration from my bearer respecting the strong odor of the skin of a heated African. I have been wedged up in a column of infantry on a hot day, and have marched to leeward of Ghoorkhas in India, but the overpowering pungent smell of the negro exceeds everything of the kind I have been unfortunate enough to experience.

The vessel was soon moving again, against a ripple, caused by the wind, which blew dead against us; and, notwithstanding the praises bestowed on the boat, it was easy to perceive [t]hat the labor of pulling such a dead-log-like thing through the water told severely on the rowers, who had already come some twelve miles, I think. Nevertheless, they were told to sing, and they began accordingly one of those wild Baptist chants about the Jordan in which they delight, — not destitute of music, but utterly unlike what is called an Ethiopian melody.

The banks of the river on both sides are low; on the left covered with wood, through which, here and there, at intervals, one could see a planter's or overseer's cottage. The course of this great combination of salt and fresh water sometimes changes, so that houses are swept away and plantations submerged; but the land is much valued nevertheless, on account of the fineness of the cotton grown among the islands. “Cotton at twelve cents a pound, and we don't fear the world.”

As the boat was going to the fishing ground, which lay towards the mouth of the river at Hilton Head, our friends talked politics and sporting combined, — the first of the usual character, the second quite new.

I heard much of the mighty devil-fish which frequents these waters. One of our party, Mr. Elliot, sen., a tall, knotty, gnarled sort of man, with a mellow eye and a hearty voice, was a famous hand at the sport, and had had some hair-breadth escapes in pursuit of it. The fish is described as of enormous size and strength, a monster ray, which possesses formidable antennae-like horns, and a pair of huge fins, or flappers, one of which rises above the water as the creature moves below the surface. The hunters, as they may be called, go out in parties, — three or four boats, or more, with good store of sharp harpoons and tow-lines, and lances. When they perceive the creature, one boat takes the lead, and moves down towards it, the others following, each with a, harpooner standing in the bow. The devil-fish sometimes is wary, and dives, when it sees a boat, taking such a long spell below that it is never seen again. At other times, however, it backs, and lets the boat come so near as to allow of the harpooner striking it, or it dives for a short way and comes up near the boats again. The moment the harpoon is fixed, the line is paid out by the rush of the creature, which is made with tremendous force, and all the boats at once hurry up, so that one after another they are made fast to that in which the lucky sportsman is seated. At length, when the line is run out, checked from time to time as much as can be done with safety, the crew take their oars and follow the course of the ray, which swims so fast, however, that it keeps the line taut, and drags the whole flotilla seawards. It depends on its size and strength to determine how soon it rises to the surface; by degrees the line is warped in and hove short till the boats are brought near, and when the ray comes up it is attacked with a shower of lances and harpoons, and dragged off into shoal water to die.

On one occasion, our Nimrod told us, he was standing in the bows of the boat, harpoon in hand, when a devil-fish came up close to him; he threw the harpoon, struck it, but at the same time the boat ran against the creature with a shock which threw him right forward on its back, and in an instant it caught him in its horrid arms and plunged down with him to the depths. Imagine the horror of the moment! Imagine the joy of the terrified drowning, dying man, when, for some inscrutable reason, the devil-fish relaxed its grip, and enabled him to strike for the surface, where he was dragged into the boat more dead than alive by his terror-smitten companions, — the only man who ever got out of the embraces of the thing alive. “Tom is so tough that even a devil-fish could make nothing out of him.”

At last we came to our fishing ground. There was a substitute found for the favorite crab, and it was fondly hoped our toils might be rewarded with success. And these were toils, for the water is deep and the lines heavy. But to alleviate them, some hampers were produced from the stern, and wonderful pies from Mrs. Trescot's hands, and from those of fair ladies up the river whom we shall never see, were spread out, and bottles which represented distant cellars in friendly nooks far away. “No drum here! Up anchor, and pull away a few miles lower down.” Trescot shook his head, and again asserted his disbelief in fishing, or rather in catching, and indeed made a sort of pretence at arguing that it was wiser to remain quiet and talk philosophical politics; but, as judge of appeal, I gave it against him, and the negroes bent to their oars, and we went thumping through the spray, till, rounding a point of land, we saw pitched on the sandy shore ahead of us, on the right bank, a tent, and close by two boats. “There is a party at it!” A fire was burning on the beach, and as we came near, Tom and Jack and Harry were successfully identified. “There's no take on, or they would not be on shore. This is very unfortunate.”

All the regret of my friends was on my account, so to ease their minds I assured them I did not mind the disappointment much. “Hallo Dick! Caught any drum?” “A few this morning; bad sport now, and will be till tide turns again.” I was introduced to all the party from a distance, and presently I saw one of them raising from a boat something in look and shape and color like a sack of flour, which he gave to a negro, who proceeded to carry it towards us in a little skiff. “Thank you, Charley. I just want to let Mr. Russell see a drum-fish.” And a very odd fish it was, — a thick lumpish form, about four and a half feet long, with enormous head and scales, and teeth like the grinders of a ruminant animal, acting on a great pad of bone in the roof of the mouth, — a very unlovely thing, swollen with roe, which is the great delicacy.

“No chance till the tide turned,” — but that would be too late for our return, and so unwillingly we were compelled to steer towards home, hearing now and then the singular noise like the tap on a large unbraced drum, from which the fish takes its name. At first, when I heard it, I was inclined to think it was made by some one in the boat, so near and close did it sound; but soon it came from all sides of us, and evidently from the depths of the water beneath us, — not a sharp rat-tat-tap, but a full muffled blow with a heavy thud on the sheepskin. Mr. Trescot told me that on a still evening by the river side the effect sometimes is most curious, — the rolling and pattering is audible at a great distance. Our friends were in excellent humor with everything and everybody, except the Yankees, though they had caught no fish, and kept the negroes at singing and rowing till at nightfall we landed at the island, and so to bed after supper and a little conversation, in which Mrs. Trescot again explained how easily she could maintain a battalion on the island by her simple commissariat, already adapted to the niggers, and that it would therefore be very easy for the South to feed an army, if the people were friendly

SOURCE: William Howard Russell, My Diary North and South, p. 141-6

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: August 29, 1864

I take my hospital duty in the morning. Most persons prefer afternoon, but I dislike to give up my pleasant evenings. So I get up at five o'clock and go down in my carriage all laden with provisions. Mrs. Fisher and old Mr. Bryan generally go with me. Provisions are commonly sent by people to Mrs. Fisher's. I am so glad to be a hospital nurse once more. I had excuses enough, but at heart I felt a coward and a skulker. I think I know how men feel who hire a substitute and shirk the fight. There must be no dodging of duty. It will not do now to send provisions and pay for nurses. Something inside of me kept calling out, “Go, you shabby creature; you can't bear to see what those fine fellows have to bear.”

Mrs. Izard was staying with me last night, and as I slipped away I begged Molly to keep everything dead still and not let Mrs. Izard be disturbed until I got home. About ten I drove up and there was a row to wake the dead. Molly's eldest daughter, who nurses her baby sister, let the baby fall, and, regardless of Mrs. Izard, as I was away, Molly was giving the nurse a switching in the yard, accompanied by howls and yells worthy of a Comanche! The small nurse welcomed my advent, no doubt, for in two seconds peace was restored. Mrs. Izard said she sympathized with the baby's mother; so I forgave the uproar.

I have excellent servants; no matter for their shortcomings behind my back. They gave me all thought as to household matters, and they are so kind, attentive, and quiet. They must know what is at hand if Sherman is not hindered from coming here — “Freedom! my masters!” But these sphinxes give no sign, unless it be increased diligence and absolute silence, as certain in their action and as noiseless as a law of nature, at any rate when we are in the house.

That fearful hospital haunts me all day long, and is worse at night. So much suffering, such loathsome wounds, such distortion, with stumps of limbs not half cured, exhibited to all. Then, when I was so tired yesterday, Molly was looking more like an enraged lioness than anything else, roaring that her baby's neck was broken, and howling cries of vengeance. The poor little careless nurse's dark face had an ashen tinge of gray terror. She was crouching near the ground like an animal trying to hide, and her mother striking at her as she rolled away. All this was my welcome as I entered the gate. It takes these half-Africans but a moment to go back to their naked savage animal nature. Mrs. Izard is a charming person. She tried so to make me forget it all and rest.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 324-6

Lieutenant William Thompson Lusk to Elizabeth Adams Lusk, 1861

Headquarters 79TH Regt.

Camp Advance, Co. K.

Virginia, 1861.

Dear Mother:

A most delightful moonlight forbids my retiring at the usual hour to rest, so I will write and let you know that all is well — that we have had a dull week, that there has been naught to stir the sluggish blood since last week save once, when it was thought that the Army of Beauregard was marching in heavy columns upon us, but it didn't come, so we all said: “Pooh, pooh! We knew it wouldn't. They are too wise to attack us.” Alas, that we should have to tell that sorry tale of Bull Run! Walter has written me, and is full of our defeat. He does not feel flattered by the cheap lithographs in the shop windows representing “Yankees Running,” which are thrust upon his sight all over England. He is delighted though to think that the 79th did well, and that I was a member of the Highland Regiment. As we file out of our camp, full equipped, the soldiers of other Regiments are wont to say, “There go the Highlanders. There will be fighting to-day.” We are now formidably intrenched, and I think can make a tolerable defence against the foe. The Richmond Examiner says: “We” (the Southerners) “flaunt our flag defiantly in the face of the cowed and craven-hearted foe, but they tamely endure the insults we heap upon them, and refuse to accept out challenge to a fair and open fight.” Well I think we can afford to endure the flaunting of the “stars and bars” until McClellan is ready, when we hope to march forward, seeking winter quarters in the pleasant mansions of the South. Just this same thing the Southerners are hoping to gain in the North. Beauregard thinks Philadelphia, Baltimore and New-York, gay places in the season, where the Southern youth may join in the festivities of winter. Nous verrons.

We have a little parson in our regiment, who has a due regard for his personal safety. We love to get him into our tents, and describe with graphic truthfulness the horrid nature of shell wounds. The worst of shells too, we add, is, that they can be thrown to such a distance that even the Doctor and Chaplain are exposed to their death-bearing explosions. Our parson grows uneasy, and when an alarm is given, starts off, carpet-bag in hand, to our intense amusement, for the nearest place of safety. He is like that worthy chaplain, who, on the eve of battle, told the soldiers, “Fear not, for those of you who fall, will this night sup in Paradise.” The battle commenced and the chaplain began to display most entertaining signs of terror. He was reminded of the consoling language he had himself used in the morning. “No thank ye,” he answered quickly, “I never did like suppers.” To such an extent are we obliged to resort to everything to amuse ourselves. Our darkeys give us some amusement and much more trouble. Ours, we have dubbed the “Pongo,” who knows how not to do it, in a manner to excite our unbounded admiration. In the evening these Africans have a way of getting around the fire and singing real "nigger melodies," which are somewhat monotonous as regards the music, and totally idiotic as regards the words. A favorite of theirs goes thus — viz:

My little boat is on de ocean

Where de wild bird makes de music

All de day.

This will sometimes be repeated for a couple of hours by the indefatigable nigger — indefatigable in this alone.

Good-bye, darling mother.

Most affec'y.,

W. T. Lusk.

SOURCE: William Chittenden Lusk, Editor, War Letters of William Thompson Lusk, p. 87-9

Diary of Mary Boykin Chesnut: September 19, 1861

A painful piece of news came to us yesterday — our cousin, Mrs. Witherspoon, of Society Hill, was found dead in her bed. She was quite well the night before. Killed, people say, by family sorrows. She was a proud and high-strung woman. Nothing shabby in word, thought, or deed ever came nigh her. She was of a warm and tender heart, too; truth and uprightness itself. Few persons have ever been more loved and looked up to. She was a very handsome old lady, of fine presence, dignified and commanding.

“Killed by family sorrows,” so they said when Mrs. John N. Williams died. So Uncle John said yesterday of his brother, Burwell. “Death deserts the army,” said that quaint old soul, “and takes fancy shots of the most eccentric kind nearer home.”

The high and disinterested conduct our enemies seem to expect of us is involuntary and unconscious praise. They pay us the compliment to look for from us (and execrate us for the want of it) a degree of virtue they were never able to practise themselves. It is a crowning misdemeanor for us to hold still in slavery those Africans whom they brought here from Africa, or sold to us when they found it did not pay to own them themselves. Gradually, they slid or sold them off down here; or freed them prospectively, giving themselves years in which to get rid of them in a remunerative way. We want to spread them over other lands, too — West and South, or Northwest, where the climate would free them or kill them, or improve them out of the world, as our friends up North do the Indians. If they had been forced to keep the negroes in New England, I dare say the negroes might have shared the Indians’ fate, for they are wise in their generation, these Yankee children of light. Those pernicious Africans! So have just spoken Mr. Chesnut and Uncle John, both ci-devant Union men, now utterly for State rights.

It is queer how different the same man may appear viewed from different standpoints. “What a perfect gentleman,” said one person of another; “so fine-looking, high-bred, distinguished, easy, free, and above all graceful in his bearing; so high-toned! He is always indignant at any symptom of wrong-doing. He is charming — the man of all others I like to have strangers see — a noble representative of our country.” “Yes, every word of that is true,” was the reply. “He is all that. And then the other side of the picture is true, too. You can always find him. You know where to find him! Wherever there is a looking-glass, a bottle, or a woman, there will he be also.” “My God! and you call yourself his friend.” “Yes, I know him down to the ground.”

This conversation I overheard from an upper window when looking down on the piazza below — a complicated character truly beyond La Bruyère—with what Mrs. Preston calls refinement spread thin until it is skin-deep only.

An iron steamer has run the blockade at Savannah. We now raise our wilted heads like flowers after a shower. This drop of good news revives us.¹

_______________

¹ By reason of illness, preoccupation in other affairs, and various deterrent causes besides, Mrs. Chesnut allowed a considerable period to elapse before making another entry in her diary.

SOURCE: Mary Boykin Chesnut, Edited by Isabella D. Martin and Myrta Lockett Avary, A Diary From Dixie, p. 129-30

XXXVIIth Congress – First Session

WASHINGTON, April 21.

SENATE. – Messrs. Howe and Howard presented memorials from citizens of Wisconsin and Michigan, praying for a ship canal from Lake Michigan to the Mississippi river.

Mr. Doolittle spoke in favor of the resolutions in regard to Brig. Gen. Stone.

Mr. Wade replied to him.

Mr. Cowell offered a resolution calling on the Secretary of State for the names of all persons, resident of the State of Kentucky, who have been arrested by his order, and confined in forts, camps, and prisons, since the 1st of Sept. last. Also number and age of those who had been released; and the number, names and ages of those retained.

Mr. Sumner objected, and the resolution was laid over under the rule.


HOUSE. – Mr. Cox, of Ohio, submitted the following: Resolved, That the secretary of War inform the House of the following facts: 1. What has delayed reply to the resolution of this House, calling for information as to the age, sex, condition, &c., of Africans employed in Gen. Wool’s department. 2. What number of slaves has been brought into this District by the army officers, or other agents of the Government, from Virginia, since the enemy abandoned Manassas, and their lines on the Potomac. 3. What number of fugitives from Maryland and Virginia are now in the city of Washington, their sex, and probable ages. 4. What number is now in, and has been sent to Frederick, Md. 5. How many are now fed and supported by the money of the U. S., appropriated by congress to prosecute the war. 6. By what authority where both old and young, male and female, sent by rail to Philadelphia, at whose expense, the amount of expense, and the purpose for which they were sent. 7. If he has not the means to answer these inquiries, to take the necessary steps to obtain the information.

On motion of Mr. Lovejoy, the resolution was tabled, 65 against 31, the republicans generally voting in the affirmative.

On motion of Mr. Porter, a resolution was adopted, instructing the committee on invalid pensions for disabled soldiers of the present war. The House reconsidered the vote by which the resolution was adopted to-day, calling for the expenditures of the Western department and then rejected it.

Mr. Divens resolution requesting the Attorney General to bring a suit against Gen. Fremont and Mr. Beard, to recover money obtained on the order of Fremont, was taken up. Mr. Divens [spoke] of the extravagance of the expenditures on the St. Louis fortifications; the money having been drawn without any just equivalent and without any form of law.

Mr. Colfax disapproved of the St. Louis contracts, but the circumstances under which they undertaken, offered an extenuation for them. Why did government then wait until Gen. Fremont was in the face of the enemy before they malignantly pursued him. Why not wait until the end of the war, instead of so acting as to cause him to loose the confidence of his army in front of the foe.

Mr. Blair replied to Mr. Colfax, that St. Louis never was in danger, excepting from Gen. Fremont, who brought with him a gang of Californians to the prejudice of the people of Missouri. He admitted that the was partly influenced in placing Gen. Fremont in command in the west, but he had suffered for it, and he hoped he would be pardoned.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Tuesday Morning, April 22, 1862, p. 1