Jackson, Miss., January 15, 1894.Gen. S. G. French, Winter Park, Fla.My Dear General: I have read carefully your letter of the 8th instant; also the newspaper article, "Vox Populi," and find your statement in thisarticle perfectly correct. I was the staff officer who accompanied you to Gen. Polk's headquarters.... Hood said that he would ride with you to Polk's headquarters, as he was to meet Gen. Johnston there.... We rode along leisurely, you and Hood in front, myself and one or two of Hood's staff in the rear. This was possibly an hour after dark. Arriving at Gen. Polk's, we found there, besides Gen. Polk, Gens. Johnston and Hardee. [This is an error. Neither was there when we arrived.—S. G. F.]Of what happened at the consultation room of course I know nothing. I am sure that you came from the room between 10 and 11 o'clock, followed by Gen. Johnston, who, standing on the steps, told you when you went back to your command to have the word passed through your division that we would fight in the morning, and prepare for it....About 1A.M.I was waked up by some one inquiring for Gen. French's headquarters.... A courier said that he had an order for you, which we read by making a light. It was the order for us to move, with instructions to leave a few men at thebreastworksto hammer and make a noise to conceal our retreat. I am sure this order fell upon us like a bombshell.If you uttered a word about having a position that you could not hold, I never heard of it; and if you had thought so, I am sure that you would have mentioned it to me. On the other hand, I remember clearly that we discussed the situation, and both concluded that we held a very strong position, and could hold it against all odds....Now all this Cassville affair is as clear to my mind as on the night that it happened. There is no doubt upon my mind that Gen. Hood, and he alone, was responsible for our retreat from Cassville. It is all a mistake about French and all staff officers being sent beyond earshot.... When we left Gen. Polk's headquarters you and I went alone. Hood remained. I hope you will be able to put this matter right, and let the responsibility rest where it properly belongs.Very glad to hear from you. With best wishes, etc.Yours very truly,J. A. Shingleur.Savannah, August 8, 1874.Gen. S. G. French.Dear General: Long absence prevented my receiving and acknowledging your very clear and satisfactory reply to my question on the subject of small arms. It is all that I could desire. I wish only to meet such of Hood's assertions as impugn thetruthof my statements. If he goes on, and I understand that he intends to do so, I shall avail myself of your kind offer.Can you not sometimes take Savannah in your way from Mississippi to New York, andvice versâ? It would be very pleasant to me to see you in my house, where there is always ample room for you and cordial welcome.Yours truly,J. E. Johnston.Savannah, June 13, 1874.Gen. S. G. French.Dear General: You may have observed that Gen. Hood has renewed his attacks on me in his report of 1865. His last shot is in the form of a letter signed by poor old Oladowski, the ordnance officer, in which it is asserted that the army lost 19,000 small arms in the part of the campaign in which I commanded. As I have no ordnance returns, I can only refute this calumny by the testimony of the most prominent officers, and in that connection beg you to write me (for publication) about the number of muskets your division lost in the campaign, if any. Certainly the enemy took none, for you never failed to hold the ground intrusted to you. You probably have some idea of the probable losses of arms by your corps, or if it had any losses. And can you say, perhaps, if those losses could have been great enough to correspond with Col. Oladowski's statement? You will oblige me very much by giving me whatever information you can in relation to this matter.Very truly yours,J. E. Johnston.
Jackson, Miss., January 15, 1894.
Gen. S. G. French, Winter Park, Fla.
My Dear General: I have read carefully your letter of the 8th instant; also the newspaper article, "Vox Populi," and find your statement in thisarticle perfectly correct. I was the staff officer who accompanied you to Gen. Polk's headquarters.... Hood said that he would ride with you to Polk's headquarters, as he was to meet Gen. Johnston there.... We rode along leisurely, you and Hood in front, myself and one or two of Hood's staff in the rear. This was possibly an hour after dark. Arriving at Gen. Polk's, we found there, besides Gen. Polk, Gens. Johnston and Hardee. [This is an error. Neither was there when we arrived.—S. G. F.]
Of what happened at the consultation room of course I know nothing. I am sure that you came from the room between 10 and 11 o'clock, followed by Gen. Johnston, who, standing on the steps, told you when you went back to your command to have the word passed through your division that we would fight in the morning, and prepare for it....
About 1A.M.I was waked up by some one inquiring for Gen. French's headquarters.... A courier said that he had an order for you, which we read by making a light. It was the order for us to move, with instructions to leave a few men at thebreastworksto hammer and make a noise to conceal our retreat. I am sure this order fell upon us like a bombshell.
If you uttered a word about having a position that you could not hold, I never heard of it; and if you had thought so, I am sure that you would have mentioned it to me. On the other hand, I remember clearly that we discussed the situation, and both concluded that we held a very strong position, and could hold it against all odds....
Now all this Cassville affair is as clear to my mind as on the night that it happened. There is no doubt upon my mind that Gen. Hood, and he alone, was responsible for our retreat from Cassville. It is all a mistake about French and all staff officers being sent beyond earshot.... When we left Gen. Polk's headquarters you and I went alone. Hood remained. I hope you will be able to put this matter right, and let the responsibility rest where it properly belongs.
Very glad to hear from you. With best wishes, etc.
Yours very truly,
J. A. Shingleur.
Savannah, August 8, 1874.
Gen. S. G. French.
Dear General: Long absence prevented my receiving and acknowledging your very clear and satisfactory reply to my question on the subject of small arms. It is all that I could desire. I wish only to meet such of Hood's assertions as impugn thetruthof my statements. If he goes on, and I understand that he intends to do so, I shall avail myself of your kind offer.
Can you not sometimes take Savannah in your way from Mississippi to New York, andvice versâ? It would be very pleasant to me to see you in my house, where there is always ample room for you and cordial welcome.
Yours truly,
J. E. Johnston.
Savannah, June 13, 1874.
Gen. S. G. French.
Dear General: You may have observed that Gen. Hood has renewed his attacks on me in his report of 1865. His last shot is in the form of a letter signed by poor old Oladowski, the ordnance officer, in which it is asserted that the army lost 19,000 small arms in the part of the campaign in which I commanded. As I have no ordnance returns, I can only refute this calumny by the testimony of the most prominent officers, and in that connection beg you to write me (for publication) about the number of muskets your division lost in the campaign, if any. Certainly the enemy took none, for you never failed to hold the ground intrusted to you. You probably have some idea of the probable losses of arms by your corps, or if it had any losses. And can you say, perhaps, if those losses could have been great enough to correspond with Col. Oladowski's statement? You will oblige me very much by giving me whatever information you can in relation to this matter.
Very truly yours,
J. E. Johnston.
The act of confiscation, and the President's proclamation setting free the slaves in the Confederacy, could not abolish slavery, because it existed under the laws of theStates. It altered no State law, but it did affect slavery in this way: it caused many slaves to leave their owners, and thus diminished their property and their wealth, but they could buy others under the law.
The President has no legislative power; he cannot declare martial law, for it overthrows the constitution, and his will would become the law; how can the President, an executive officer, nullify laws and condemn and punish at his pleasure?
The great latent power in the constitution is, in Art. I., Sec. 8, to provide for the common defense and general welfare. Under this section almost all the outrages of the war were committed, restrained only by international rules of war; but these were utterly ignored under the plea that this war is only a rebellion, a family affair. Under this article resides the power to imposestaxesto any amount for the common defense and public welfare.
The confiscation act of Congress was declared by the United States Supreme Court to be unconstitutional, and, in truth, it was passed as a punishment against the "rebels," without an indictment, trial, or conviction. The constitution declares that thetrialof allcrimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be byjury.
As the slave owners were called the onlyprivilegedclass in the United States, it is pertinent to inquire if they did not exist in all the States when the Union was formed, and if the North did not sell their title to be yet a privileged class for a mess of pottage; and then howled at the purchasers for being a privileged people!
Who demanded the continual enlargement of slavery by making it legal to steal or purchase negroes from Africa until the year 1808, to give employment to the six hundred slave ships owned in the North? for the statement is that toward the close of the slave trade there were about that number belonging to New England and New York engaged in that pious enterprise. We know the town of Newport, R. I., had one hundred and seventy ships employed in this money-making trade in the year 1750, and undoubtedly the number increased largely in after years, when made legal; so, on the whole, no doubt six hundred ships were in the trade.
The question here presents itself—and it is a proper one to ask—who first owned these slaves; how did they obtain them; how did they treat them; and to whom did they sell these human beings for money; and then, with the price of blood in their pockets, begin to preach against the sin of slavery? Ye hypocrites! who thank God "we are not slave owners, we got rid of them long ago."
It has been said by a Northern writer that "indirectly, and for the purpose of a more equal distribution of direct taxes, the framers of the constitution tolerated while they condemned slavery; but they tolerated it because they believed it would soon disappear. They even refused to allow the charter of their own liberties to be polluted by the mention of the wordslave; but take heed, did not this convention give way to the clamor of the owners of slave ships to continue for twenty years the increase of slavery? They could not, consistently with honor or self-respect, transmit to future ages the evidence that some of them had trampled upon the inalienable rights of others."
"Though slavery was thus tolerated by being ignored, we should not dishonor the memory of those who organized the government to suppose that they did intend to bestow upon it thepower to maintain its own authority, the right to overthrow or remove slavery or whatever might prove fatal to its permanence or destroy its usefulness."
The answer is:Yes, but not by making war and laying waste the country; burning dwellings, public buildings, towns; sinking shipping, blockades; capturing, killing, imprisoning innocent people; nor by creating enormous debts, nor yet by cruel war, but by removing the evil bycompensation"for theterm of service" of the slaves to their owners.
The government is under obligation to compensateparents, masters ofapprentices, masters ofslavesforloss of serviceand labor of their subjects who are enlisted in the army and navy, for the constitution recognizes slaves as "persons held to labor or service."
England compelled the abolition of slavery in her colonies, and she paid in compensation to the slave owners one hundred million dollars. Out of this, the Cape Colony, in Africa, obtained fifteen million dollars, which was about four hundred dollars per slave.
If, then, slavery was believed to be fatal to the permanence of the constitution, it could have been abolished as it was in England, or in some equitable way without the clash of arms.
This indenture is here presented for no other purpose than to evidence the mode of manumitting slaves by the Abolition Society in the City of Brotherly Love about four years after the constitution of the United States was framed.
From this instrument of writing it appears that "Betty" was set free (so called) on the 14th of September, 1792, on condition that she should become a bond servant by contract for seven years. Her signature to the indenture (original) is made on the left-hand corner, and not covered by the photograph.
From the wording of her indenture to her master Bordley, it would appear that verily her second condition was worse than her first, and her last worse than all; for in her fifty-seventh year she was to be turned adrift in her old age, possessed of only two suits of apparel—"one of which is to be new"—to struggle with adversity. She was now, however, free to play cards and dice,go to alehouses, taverns, and playhouses, and dance and contract marriage, etc.
It would be interesting to know how she passed the remaining years of her life. That is buried in oblivion. Had she remained a slave—"held to a service of labor," which was her first condition—she would have had a home for life. To depend on the benevolence of the Northern people was to be in a worse condition than that of a slave, for the slave did know that he had a friend and a home for life.
How little is known, even at this day, at the North of the general relation between the owner and the slave in the latter days of slavery's existence! and I hope it will not shock the sensibility or puritanical feelings of ye scribes and Pharisees when I state that in the family graveyard near Columbus, Ga., where my wife's father and mother and some of her brothers and sisters rest, there repose the remains oftheirAunt Betty, who nursed all the children of the family. She was, in name, a slave; in reality, she had all the privileges of a member of the family, and when she died the children declared she should sleep beside them in death, as she had lived with them in life and would rise with them at the resurrection.
I could tell where a slave, after her death, was carried near fifty miles to sleep in the family graveyard, with her master and mistress, who had preceded her to the sacred spot where dust returns to dust. These, and other instances I know, speak of kind feelings, and are significant of the ties that existed between the master and the slave; and this intimacy between master and slave, and almost companionship of children and servant, were more common than any harsh behavior toward them. A man who abused a slave was held in contempt, and was, I suppose, shunned by his neighbors. I had no experience with such men. Once the overseer on our place was going to punish a man for persisting in annoying another. The alleged offender sent for me, and I investigated the case. He was charged with being too gallant with another man's wife, an accusation very prevalent in high society now, when my lady can get a divorce in the morning and marry her admirer in the evening, or the husband do so, as the case may be. No punishment was given the negro in this matter, for the want of evidence; and I here state that no whipping of a negro ever occurred on the plantation.
The difference between the wage earner and the slave is, theright to change residence. The former, with his family of wife and children, is too often, for want of means, unable to avail himself of his right, and is therefore practically on a level in this respect with the bondsman, and he becomes reduced to the slavery of wages, which in this age—howling for wealth—becomes a pitiful condition, from which he seeks relief in strikes, so often in vain. He cannot succeed against the money power of the great trusts and monopolies, the power of the State and military interference of the United States forces; so in the end he is only steeped deeper in poverty. From all this the slave was free and happy, if his laughter, song, and dance indicate contentment.
I do dislike egotism, and yet to establish the fact that slaves did possess the power to change masters and homes—and you will admit that practical experience is better than any theory—I will tell you plainly what occurred to me touching this matter.
As administrator of an estate where the land and servants had to be sold, the heads of the families were given notice, months in advance, that they could visit or otherwise see the owners of the neighboring plantations and other persons with whom they would like to live, and induce them to buy the family at the sale: and when the sale was made I think all had selected homes. In this case, at the sales many were informed that they would be bid in by the heirs. I never knew a family to be separated.
I believe it was in the autumn of 1856 I wished to obtain a good cook, and went to New Orleans. Beard & May, cotton brokers, informed me that the German Vice Consul was going home, and had the best cook in the city. I called on Mr. Kock at his office, and he gave me a note to his wife, stating the object of my calling. Madame sent for the cook, and she came into the drawing room and was introduced to me, and my business made known to her. She was a fine-looking woman. She asked me the usual questions—such as "Biddy" in the intelligence office asks persons in quest of a cook—about where I lived, number in the family, if there was a church near by, nearest town, etc. Obtaining the desired information, she told her mistress she did not wish to leave the city, and she was directed to retire. Mrs. Kock said she wished the servant to be satisfied with her new home, etc.
Next Beard & May sent me to a French family. Madame came in, and sent for the cook she wished to sell. This one varied the questions, she asked even as to hot dinners on Sundays, and then she said she would not like to live on a plantation; and so the visit was fruitless. Then Beard & May told me to question the servants they held for sale, and there I found a woman about thirty years old, of fine personal appearance, who was willing to accept a position in the country, and I bought her.
A few days after, Beard & May called on me and said my cook, Maria, wanted to see me; so I went to her, and she then told me she wished I would buy her husband Jim. I expressed my displeasure that she had not told me she was married before I bought her. However, I bought Jim to satisfy her, and took them both home with me. Maria was installed in the kitchen, and proved to be a good cook. Jim had charge of the horses, etc. At the beginning of summer we went North. Jim was put to work in the field. He soon ran away, stayed in the woods by day, came home often at night, and told the overseer that he would come home when I did. When we returned in the autumn, Jim came to see me and explained that he had never worked in the field; so he worked again at the stables and ginhouses. I now learned that Maria and Jim had never been married. When spring came, I told Jim I would take him back to New Orleans, and he was willing to go. I left him with Beard & May to be sold. When we returned in the fall Jim had not been sold. In the winter I visited New Orleans. The steamer arrived during the night. In the morning as I was going on shore I saw a number of fine hacks on the levee awaiting passengers; among them the driver of a fine carriage cried out: "O Master Sam, here is your carriage; ride with me. Don't you know Jim? Mighty glad to see you, Master Sam." He drove me to the St. Charles Hotel. Soon Jim came to see me, and I told him if he did not find a home for himself before I left the city I would have him sold to some one out in the country without consulting him. The result was, Jim got the owner of the livery stable to buy him, and that was the last I saw of Jim. No one would purchase Jim because he told every one who wanted him, "If you buy me, I will run away;" and so he hired himself out for about nine months, at twenty dollars per month, as a hack driver, which supported himself free of expense to me.
And now about Maria: In the spring she got in the habit of having fits, and would foam at the mouth, and the old cook would have to come over. This continued over two weeks.
One morning I saw my neighbor Courtney riding up to my gate rather rapidly. He was excited and said: "Capt. French, I want you to buy my man Parker or sell me Maria." Parker had the main charge of some one hundred and thirty servants on Courtney's place. As I had no use for Parker, I would not entertain buying him, and replied that I would sell him Maria. When he became more composed, he told me that "Parker had become stupid, thoughtless, and could not remember what was told him, and when I called him to account he informed me that he was so much in love with Maria that his mind was all 'up-sot,' but if I would only buy Maria he would be so happy, and be the best hand on the place if she were his wife." And so Maria became Parker's wife, and never feigned having fits any more. Marriage cured them. Her fits were all "put on" to get a new home at Courtney's.
I was now quite tired and wearied with cooks, but nevertheless, being in New Orleans, I made another venture. Beard & May said they had a good cook. She was a woman of about twenty, with a jolly round face, and said she was a fine cook, and I bought her. Her name was something like Amanda, as I remember it. She was a willing, good-natured creature, but so careless that half the dishes were spoiled; so during the summer I took her to New Orleans and left her with Beard & May (early in the morning), then drove to the hotel. I had finished my breakfast and was smoking in the rotunda, when I saw Amanda approaching, accompanied by a tall, elderly gentleman, to whom I was introduced, naming him "my new master." He was from one of the parishes of the State. He asked me some questions about his new servant, and said he thought her a good cook, and honest, from what she told him. He apologized for the early call, as he had to leave on the morning steamboat. Bidding Amanda good-by, I concluded to abide with our old cook again.
I have briefly sketched these, some of my experiences with slaves, to establish the fact that bondsmen on the Mississippi did have the privilege of selecting very often the persons with whom they wished to live, as well as the place, which is by poverty deniedthe poor white men when in the iron grip of the rich corporations, where they are held by the relentless "slavery of wages."
A man acting for himself and in the interest of his family must have feelings of humanity for his servants. Their welfare and happiness are indissolubly linked with his, aside from his accountability for his acts to his God. Corporations have no souls, and no God to worship except Mammon. They have no ear for the misfortunes or ills of an employee, no physician for sickness, no priest for the dying, nor coffin for the dead. All these the slave has.
Truly the relentless thirst for gold over the road to wealth crushes to death like a worm the poor laborer beneath its tread. There is no provision in the charter of a trust company for care of life or soul of a laborer, and his condition is disguised in the (unknown to him) glorious privileges of independence, liberty, and freedom. What a mockery are all these human rights to a family perishing in a hut by a coal mine for want of clothing and food, with no ministering hand! And yet all the wealth in the world was obtained from the earth by the miner and farmer.
God in the beginning proclaimed the relations and the obligations between master and bond servant in Holy Writ, and he will judge them by their deeds; but God hath not, nor hath man defined the humanities inseparable between a trust company and its employee, except by injunctions and courts and bayonet rule.
Bad as it is, some may be inclined to believe that Betty, under her indenture, had more privilege and enjoyment than most of the white laborers in the employment of many monopolies.
In connection with this indenture is presented the picture of the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher selling slaves on his theatrical pulpit stage in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, to raise money, and fire the Northern hearts against the South.
The audience is large, and their countenances express delight at this fine scene of buffoonery, which was then consideredone of the "eight great personal eventsof thenineteenth century," and hence worthy of preservation. When passion shall have subsided, and calm judgment presides, it will perhaps be regarded as an act of charlatanry unworthy of so great a man. These great personal events are said to be:
I regarded Mr. Beecher an orator, and have listened to his discourses on theology to his congregation with admiration; but his attacks on slavery were made perhaps with as little knowledge of the condition of the bondsmen as that distinguished kinswoman of his, Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, has shown in her ideal novel, "Uncle Tom's Cabin." They produced a diseased state of public sentiment, and Demos, turned loose, strained the ties of love and kindred relations that bound the States by the compact, and precipitated secession and war on the South.
If slavery be considered a wrong, and no doubt it was, then, in justice to all concerned in its establishment in the United States and to the condition of the slaves in 1861 and the means resorted to for their liberation, it becomes a matter of impartial consideration, and when that day comes, the South will stand before the world vindicated, and the verdict will be both parties guilty, as will be shown hereafter.
Slavery was only madepossibleby bringing in ships negroes from Africa; and that was mainly done by the people of Old England, New England, and New York City. They were largeship owners. They sent their vessels for slaves, and obtained them by theft, by capturing them in the midnight glare of burning villages, or by purchase.They owned them all.They were indeed inhuman slave dealers. They sold some of them to all the thirteen colonies, and to the several States formed of them under the constitution, and they continued this slave tradelegallyuntil 1808, and illegally until 1862. (See "American Slave Trade," by J. R. Spears.)
In Old England the question of slavery was discussed calmly, with justice and common sense, and they arrived at an equitable decision—viz., that the government should compensate the owners for their property rights in persons held to labor or (in language undisguised) in slaves, and, as I have already stated, $100,000,000 was appropriated to purchase them and set them free, an act of justice to the owners.
In this land of freedom the pious people of the North (I speak plainly) sold their slaves to the planters in the South, and, with the slave money in their pockets, rejoiced that they were not like the people South, and as Pilate did (figuratively) they took water and washed their hands before the people, saying: "We are innocent of the sin of slavery now!"
Next, from causes already stated, like the crusaders to the Holy Land, the fanatical crowd came down South, and took the slaves that they once owned and sold from the purchasers, and forced the States to set them free without compensation. By this act they took over $3,000,000,000 worth of private property from the owners—the greatest robbery ever committed on earth.
In the common courts of the country it has been adjudged, I believe, that the thief is a greater criminal than the receiver of the stolen property; but when the thieves steal the same property a second time, what should the sentence of the court be? Of that crime the North stands convicted.
There is a higher power than any established by man.
"God moves in a mysterious wayHis wonders to perform."
"God moves in a mysterious wayHis wonders to perform."
"God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform."
In days of old he arraigned nations before his august court, and they lived or perished at his will. The day is not far distant when the South, at his command and in his own way, will arise from their down-trodden condition, to the surprise of their oppressors.Her fields will blossom as the rose, the busy hum of industry will be heard in the land, and the commercial sails of the world will ride on the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, plying to South America and the Orient through the canal that will connect the two great oceans. What position then will the New England States hold in the general prosperity of the States? Then it will be seen, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord." And even now along the Atlantic seaboard great steamers go North mainly laden with articles made from wood, lumber, pig iron, cotton goods, fruit, and the great metropolitan hotels and the people generally depend on the fields and gardens of the South for their vegetables half the year; and so it goes on in arithmetical progression of increase.
Leaving out the negroes, the South has a homogeneous population; the solidarity of the nation will rest on her. In 1861 there was less thanoneforeigner to the hundred in the population of North Carolina, while in the West it ranged fromthirtytosixtyper cent. (See census reports.) The cities of Chicago and New York contain a population which will be found to be a conglomeration of all the peoples on the face of the earth—with their political ideas, their morality, their vices, their language, and their religion—and on no question will they agree unless purchased for a price, as a business transaction, for money, and "the love of money is the root of all evil," and the history of Rome will be repeated.
Historians estimate the number of slaves carried from Africa to the Americas and the West Indies Islands to have been from eight to twelve millions, out of which number about five hundred thousand died or were killed at sea, and their bodies were thrown overboard. And now let thesinof slavery rest on the North or the South, as it will finally be declared by the consensus of public opinion, when investigation discloses and proclaims the horrible cruelty of the Northern slave owners who brought them here, and contrast it with the amelioration of their condition and their advancement in intelligence and morality acquired by the teaching of the best men and women in the South. This opinion will be recorded.
The negro, as sold by his first owner, was a stupid animal speaking a jabbering lingo; he was now taught and trained in civilization until he was adjudged by the North, when set free,capable to perform all the duties pertaining to the high official positions to which the United States government did appoint him or his brother negroes elected him. Yes, under the teachings and training of their owners on the plantations and in the cities, while slaves, they were converted from fetichism to Christianity, and from cannibalism to gentility of living, and their beastly nature curbed by moral surroundings and force of example; and now, to humiliate the Southern people, who were disfranchised, political plans were arranged to have negro Senators elected instead of whites, and from Mississippi two negroes were occupying at different periods seats in the United States Senate chamber. Their names were Revels and Bruce. The latter I have seen riding through my plantation. From Senator he became Register of the Treasury of the United States, a position long held by my friend, Gen. W. S. Rosecrans, United States army.
Out of the three million soldiers that were in the United States army, there were not as many discharged soldiers holding office in the South in 1869 as there were ex-slaves out of the four hundred thousand negro men eligible to office. This indicates either the soldiers' unfitness for office, or that the selection of negroes was made to humiliate the people of the South.
It may be asked: Whence came Christianity among the slaves? Did it come by nature? No, nature is uniform in her laws, and developed no Christianity among the negroes in Africa, or elsewhere when left to themselves; hence it came by teaching, for on Sundays the master and mistress, nurse and children, in the carriage were always escorted to church by the young men on horseback, dressed in their clean and best attire, where all worshiped together in the Lord's house. Also, on many plantations, clergymen were maintained with ample compensation by two or three neighboring planters to preach the gospel to their people.
Whence came qualifications for business, unless taught by their owners? Reading, writing, and arithmetic do not come by birth, and the peasant and the prince alike have to study to comprehend even "the rule of three."
It is not pleasant to refer to the want of information among the common people in the North and West in regard to the real relation of the bondsmen to their owners, or to the ignorance of the masses of the nations of Europe on this question. In Europe they had a foretaste of freedom in 1848; but slavery in the UnitedStates was a sealed letter to them all. For the North there is this excuse: the almost nonintercourse between the North and the South precluded personal observation, and they were taught in the schools, in the lecture room, from the rostrum and the pulpit, by the press in every village, town, and city all over the land, to believe the fabulous accounts of the ills of slavery to be true, and that the slave owners were cruel, illiterate, uncultured, and had "plantation manners," unfit for association with the immaculate people of the North. The populace of the North learned nothing from the utter failure of the advent of John Brown in Virginia, where slaves fled from him with horror and left him to his deserved fate; on the contrary, he was by the North held up as a saint who gave his life for freedom's cause.
Far and wide the abolition and free-soil party preached a crusade against the people of the South to liberate the slaves, and Mr. Beecher's picture shows to what low means they stooped to awaken enthusiasm for their cause. It spread to Europe, and when they commenced the war the illiterate masses there joined in the crusade against the South, as they did to rescue the holy sepulcher from the hands of the infidel, on which occasion, Proctor in his "History of the Crusades" says, "the Welshman forgot his hunting, the Scot his companionship with vermin, the Dane his carouse, and the Norwegian his raw fish," in their fanatical desire to reach Jerusalem; and so again the Welshman, the Scot, the Norwegian, the Dane, the German, and the rest of Europe came over here to enlist as substitutes in the Federal army in its crusade against the institution of slavery which was founded by their ancestors.
Herod the Great, an Idumean, to secure the throne of Jerusalem to the Idumean line of Jews, murdered his wife, the beautiful Mariamne, and his two sons by her. They were handsome, had been educated in Rome, were very accomplished, and beloved by the Jewish people; but as they were, through their mother, of the Asmonean line of Jews, Herod condemned them to death to secure the succession as he desired. When the war between the States ended, the white people of the Confederacy were in the way of the line of succession of the radical party to maintain office; so they were disfranchised, and a new race was made citizens to take their place: they were the late negro slaves, the pets and "wards of the nation!"
Now, when it was told to Augustus Cæsar that Herod had murdered his two sons by Mariamne, he said that "it was better to be one of Herod'spigsthan one of his sons;" and so when the white people of the South were politically murdered, many of their friends said: "It were better to be a 'ward of the nation' than a son of the Confederacy." These cruel proceedings have been condemned by all the civilized nations of Europe, and will be condemned by the impartial historians of the North when passions shall have subsided.
The enslaving of the negro race in the colonies—and which was largely confined to those called Southern, and almost entirely to them after the ending of the slave trade—placed the white people of the colonies on a higher and broader plane and released them from the daily struggle after the "almighty dollar."
The busy minds of the Northern people were constantly more and more given to trade and traffic, while those of the South turned to the enjoyment of a home life; freed from restraint and care, they practiced the amenities of social life, with honor, truth, and charity to all. Strange as it may appear, a civilization—based on slave labor, that was tolerant in religion, that encouraged freedom of thought, led their minds to the contemplation of the rights given man by his Creator when he breathed the breath of life into his body as he came into this world—resulted in prompting these men to embody their views on this question of divine right in the Mecklenburg Declaration, made in Mecklenburg County, N. C., May 20, 1775, and which was substantially expressed again, July 4, 1776, in the Declaration of Independence, read in Philadelphia.
And so it was from the thoughtful minds of these quiet slave owners came these two proclamations: that man was indued, or born, with certain "inalienable rights" derived from his Maker—namely, "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." These were some of the developments of acivilizationbased on slavery.
To secure these rights unto themselves, after the Confederation, they framed the Constitution of the United States, but unfortunately it was established on a compromise that was left for futurity to interpret; and disagreement on this matter led to secession as a solution and last resort.
JOSEPH E. BROWN.
JOSEPH E. BROWN.
Passing by the particular events of the war between the States, it may not be unprofitable to inquire what was the difference inthe developments of the two civilizations that followed the formation and establishment of the Constitution; the North by itself, free, and the South with her peculiar institutions. By their fruits ye must judge them.
There were seventeen Presidents anterior to President Grant, out of which number eleven were Southern born, and six the product of free soil, if we include John Adams. In jurisprudence, the South gave us a Marshall; in the forum they need no mention, as statesmen they have but few peers; among diplomats, John Laurens, of South Carolina, a member of Washington's staff, special Minister to France, stands preëminent; in the darkest hour of our struggle, at the court of Louis XIV., he saved the colonies and turned the tide of war in our favor.
In the field we have Washington, Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Forrest. For an honest opinion of Gen. Lee and his soldiers, see Theodore Roosevelt's life of T. H. Benton: there he standspeerless. Those who desire to learn more about Col. John Laurens may read the December number ofMcClure's Magazine(1899).
Such are some of the fruits of a civilization that has passed away.
When I survey the past, and from it make prophecy of the future, I am as candid in saying I rejoice that slavery is no more as I am in condemning the brutal manner in which it was abolished; and nevertheless I am as sincere in my love of my whole country as I am imbued with dislike to that class of people who out of hatred precipitated that war on the Southern people out of envy because they imagined that the planters were a more favored people than they themselves were.
A Roman consul was never accorded a triumph for a victory in civil war, nor were the spoils of war his. But after this civil war, as it is termed, ended, the emblems of victory have waved in triumph in our faces, and are carefully preserved instead of being hidden away, and the universal looting has enriched the soldiers' homes with the spoils of war. Senator Charles Sumner wanted the captured flags returned.
War is not barbarous, nor is it "hell;" it is just what parties choose to make it. When confined to the enlisted troops it is seldom cruel. Hell is an expression adopted to silence argument on the cruel manner in which the United States governmentprosecuted the war: when this subject is mentioned we are silenced by the declaration, O well, "war is hell any way."
To cover up his own iniquities, Gen. Sherman said: "War is hell."
During the war with Mexico I was with Gen. Taylor from Corpus Christi to Buena Vista, and during that period heard of but one case of robbery, and that was at Papagallos, on the march to Monterey. There a soldier stole a chicken. Seeing a crowd of officers in the street, I rode up to ascertain the cause.
Gen. Taylor had dismounted. There was the offender; he was severely reprimanded and placed under guard. Turning to the accuser—an old woman—the General gave her some silver coin in payment for her chicken. That war was not hell.
When Richard Cœur de Lion was ill in Palestine the Islam commander, Saladin, "sent him the choicest fruits and refreshment of snow during the burning heat of summer; and at the siege of Jaffa, Saphadan, the Mohammedan chief, observing Richard dismounted, sent him two Arabian horses, on one of which he continued the conflict until nightfall. He further solicited and obtained from Richard the honor of knighthood for his son." This was not much like hell.
Again, Richard promulgated, like Gen. W. T. Sherman, regulations for the government of his troops. "Athiefwas to have his head shaved, to be tarred and feathered." Had Sherman issued and enforced an order like this, the sight of his troops would have frightened all the inhabitants out of Savannah.
Extract from an Address of Gen. S. G. French Made to the U. C. V. Camp, No. 54, Orlando, Fla., June 8, 1893.
Comrades: The solemn ceremony of Decoration Day has been performed. The few graves, alike of the Confederate and the Union soldiers that rest in our cemetery, have been decorated with floral offerings, and the cause that so few of the Confederate dead sleep where loving kindred can care for them inclines me to say a few words in regard to the unknown dead.
From Dalton down to Atlanta, and around that city, there was one continuous conflict for one hundred days, and not a daypassed without some troops being engaged, and so the dead were left throughout a hundred miles on either side, resting where they fell.
If we turn to the east again, we find that Gen. Grant crossed the Rapidan May 4, 1864, and, taking the direct line to Richmond, immediately the battle of the Wilderness followed, and he announced that he was going "to fight it out on that line if it took all summer." A few days after came the battle of Spottsylvania, and June 1 that of Cold Harbor, where the Federal troops refused to make a second attack.
In these three great and sanguinary battles the commander of the Union forces did not meet with success, and so on the first day of summer he left that line and swung around, as McClellan did, to the James river. After Cold Harbor it seems as if there was no desire for another general engagement, and the hammering away mode of war commenced on Lee. On July 18, 1864, President Lincoln called for five hundred thousand more men, and so the detrition process went on for nine months, mainly on and near the picket line, being in all nearly eleven months and a half that Lee confronted Grant's hosts of men, and over all this extent of country lay the blue and the gray side by side in death. Devastation, as in the Palatinate, had done its work.
Now when the war ended, the Federal government, with commendable zeal, very humanely collected most of its dead and had their remains removed to its beautiful cemeteries, and there keeps green the sod and fresh the flowers on their graves.
There was no Confederate government to collect and care for the remains of the Confederate dead. Along the banks of the "Father of Waters" for more than a thousand miles the inhabitants tread unawares over the unknown graves of those who battled for the South. Along the shores of the Potomac, the Rappahannock, and the James wave the golden harvests on soil enriched by their blood and moldering dust. There the grapes grow more luscious and the wine is redder. From the capes of the Chesapeake adown the stormy Atlantic, and trending around the Gulf, rest thousands of our dead; or go to the heights of Allatoona, to Lookout's lofty peak, or Kennesaw Mountain's top, and you may seek in vain where the dead rest. Time, with the relentless force of the elements, has obliterated all traces of their graves from human eye; they are known only to Him whocan tell where Moses sleeps in "a vale in the land of Moab." So the forgotten are not forgot, the Hand that made the thunder's home comes down every spring and paints with bright colors the little wild flowers that grow over their resting places, and they are bright on Decoration Day. The rosy morn announces first to them that the night is gone, and when the day is past and the landscape veiled with evening's shade, high on the mountain top the last ray of the setting sun lovingly lingers longest, loath to leave the lonely place where the bright-eyed children of the Confederacy rest in death.
And wherefore did they die? They fell in defense of their homes, their families, their country, and those civil rights arising from that liberty God gave man as a heritage in the beginning. They furnished to their country much that will be noble in history, wonderful in story, tender in song, and a large share of that glory which will claim the admiration of mankind. We can today place no wreaths of immortelles on their unknown graves, yet we can rest assured that the echoes of posterity will render their deeds illustrious.
And now, as I look back on the past and recall to mind your trials and sufferings—which will be forgotten—I am sure the world will not forget that your valormerited a successwhich is better now than to have achieved it.