=^^%^ :* ^O II ^—.. _- TO "il talmi.BlOiflFml'O o BY WILLIAM L. ROYALL, OP THE NEW YORK BAR. fill" i 1 • I t V j " Judex damnatur cum noceas ahsolvitury O 1 NEW YORK: E. J. HALE & SON, PUBLISHERS, * 17 Murray Street. i ^ 1880. i A REPLY ll TO a AFflOrstoiMflEormFOfllS, n WILLIAM LJ-'^ROTALL OP THE NEW YORK BAR. ''Judex damnatur cum nocens absolvitur. NEW YORK: E. J. HALE & SON, PUBLISHERS, 17 Murray Street. 1880. 48 65 55 JUL 1 7 1942 PREPAOE In the following pages I have endeav^ored to write the truth, and I have written it without regard to the matter of whom it may hurt. I liave said some hard things, and I have not attempted to soften their native rugged n ess by sugar coatings. I look upon the book to which I have attempted a reply as a wilful, deliberate and malicious libel upon a noble and generous people, amongst wliom I was born and raised, and in full sympathy with whom I hope to live and die. I look upon its author as one of the most contemptible fellows of those who have libelled that people, and not at all less contemi)tible because highly endowed with intellect; but rather more so, because, with all the disposition towards grovelling malice which a weaker man could have, he has yet far greater powers to injure, and he has de- liberately used those powers to their full extent. I have made no mealy-mouthed defence of the people of the South. It is not on bended knee and with cring- ing accent that, self-appointed advocate though I be, I have brought their cause before the world. I have attempted to speak for a race of whom the males are men, as I believe those men would have their race sj)oken for. Writing in this spirit, I feel that those who do me the honor to read this essay are entitled to know some- thing of who and what I am, in order that they may be the better able to judge what weight is to be given to what I say. As a young Virginian, I was a soldier in the Con- federate army, from the beginning of the war to the end of it. After the war I practised law, in Eichmond, Va., until January", 1880, when 1 founded a daily news- paper, called '' The Commonwealth," and edited it un- til August 1, 1880, in a vain endeavor, along with the rest of the "rebel element" there, to save my native State from the infamous brand of repudiation, which the Kepublicans and the scalawag native white popu- lation were seeking to put upon her From the time that repudiation has been an issue in Virginia politics, I have been prominently connected with public affairs there. I mention these things, to show that I have been in a position to know the temper and feelings of the Southern people. I do not perceive that anything further personal to myself would be interesting or use- ful to the public, and I shall, therefore, proceed with the work which 1 have undertaken. 'iFo8l'sEiTaii,lfOi»ftlieFils," REPLIED TO CHAPTER I. A PRETENDER UNMASKED. This is a small book; but it would be difficult to find more malice in a large one. Tliat it is written with great cleverness, it is needless to say. Tbe poi)ularity to which it has attained is the surest evidence of that. It pretends to be a picture of life and manners in the Southern States. Those who know tlie people of those States, know it to be no picture, but they recognize in it a grotesque caricature. It contains just enough of truth to give color, skilfully wrought into a warp and woof of suppressio veri and suggestio falsi. Manifestly, the writer has seen much of the life and ways of the people of the South, and he has learned much of those people. Instead, however, of using his knowledge to represent them fairly, he has used it to misrepresent them. Much as the writer has seen of the people of that section, be does not know them. He could not paint a picture of Southern life, if he tried— and his 6 object Las been to mislead. He lias manifestly heard a good deal of the uegro dialect j and yet Lis represen- tations of that dialect are ridicnlons to tLose wLo Lave been raised witL tLe negro. His negro conversations are no more like the real langnage of the negro tLan a Chinaman's pigeon Euglisli is like tLe EuglisL of Herbert Spencer. He comes abont as near represent- ing tLe negro dialect correctly, as tLe EtLiopian stage players, wLo never saw a negro, usually come. Had ''Tlie Fool" possessed tLe knowledge of SoutL- ern character, necessary to draw it to the life, he would never have blundered here ; and a blunder at this point inevitably betrays, to the knowing, the imi)os- tor who pretends that he understands that people. We read, in the eleventh and twelfth chapters of the Book of Jndges, that tliere was war between the Epliraimites and tlie Gileadites, and that the Gileadites slew many of the Ephraimites, even unto all that fell into their hands, when they ascertained that they were Ephraimites. Tberetbre, when an unlucky wight of an Ephraimite fell into the hands of the Gileadites, it is not unnatural that he should have denied his nation- ality. The Gileadites, however, had one sure test for an Ephraimite. The latter could not pronounce the Hebrew letter sh in the word Shibboleth. Conse- quently, when a stranger was suspected of being an Ephraimite, he was subjected to this test, and if the answer came Sibboletk, off went his head. Milton has commemorated the fact in the following lines : " Without reprieve, adjudged to death, For want of well pronouncing Shibboleth." The Ephraimites' " want of well pronouncing' Shib- boleth," did not betray him more snrelj' , than " Thi^ Fool's" ridiculous negro conversations betray him. When a writer undertakes to describe the life and manners of the Southern people, and makes the negroes talk a lingo, composed in part of accurate and correct English, and in part of a jargon that never ex isted anywhere, save in the imagination of some one who supposed he could talk their language a priori, we know that lie is an impostor, and is dealing with a subject that he is utterly" incompetent to handle. Just as, by the same token, we know that the pre- tended soldier who can give you marvellous accounts of his exploits during the war, and especially at the battle of Fredericksburg, was a camp follower or de- serter, or something worse, when we hear him talking of the charge on ^^ Saint Marye's Hill" ("Fool's Er- rand," p. 133).* The work is a systematic and well considered libel upon the people of the Southern States of this Union, and is very well calculated to do them a most foul injury and wrong. *The charge was on the hill upon which Mr. John L. Marye's house is situated. " The Fool" evidently got the idea in his head that 3Iarye was some sort of corruption of Saint Mary. CHAPTEE II. SOUTHEEN LIFE AND CHARACTER, AS PORTRAYED BY '' A FOOL." " A Fool's Errand " purports to tell tlie story of the resideuce of a Northern man who had served through the war iu the Federal army, in the Southern States, from the year 1865 to 1877 or 1878. This Northerner had gone South in good faith to dwell there and to cast in his lot with the people there. It recounts a sad life for him, and one of terrible oppres- sion and persecution, due to the fact that he was a Northern man. It represents the white people as almost unanimously animated with the most intense, bitter and savage hatred of the negro, viewed other- wise than as a chattel, as property— viewed as a com- ponent part of society, and very graphically and powerfully unfolds a story of wrong, outrage and op- pression, of which he was, through years, systemati- cally made the victim by the white people. It pretends to tell the story of the notorious Ku-Klux plots. It represents the entire white population of the South that had been in symi)athy with the Confederacj , as actively engaged in this Ku-Klux conspiracy, which had its ramifications in every county and neighborhood of the Southern States, and which beat, hung and shot negroes by the thousands, just for the sport of the thing. To be sure that I do him no injustice, I will quote a 9 few passages out of tlie many in which "The Fool" describes the state of affairs. A committee of citizens having addressed him a note of a somewhat warning character, he replies to it, and in that reply he says: " Of course, as I have not access to the secret archives of the Klan, 1 have no means of verifying this estimate. You will recollect that this estimate em- braces every unlawful act perpetrated by armed and organized bodies in disguise. The entry of the prem- ises and surrounding the dwelling, with threats against the inmates 5 the seizure and destruction or appropri- ation of arms; the dragging of men, women and child- ren from their homes, or compelling their flight ; the binding, gagging and beating of men and women ; shooting at specific individuals, or indiscriminately at inhabited houses; the mutilation of men and women in methods too shocking and barbarous to be recounted here ; burning houses, destroying stock, and making the night a terror to peaceful citizens by the ghastly horror of many and deliberate murders" (p. 221). Again, describing the general condition of the country, he says (p. 226): "A strange commentary upon civilization; a strange history of peaceful years — bloody as the reign of Mary, barbarous as the chron- icles of the Comanche. Of the slain there were enough to furnish forth a battle field — and all from those three classes, the negro, the scalawag and the carpet bagger — all killed with deliberation, overwhelmed by num- bers, roused from slumber at the murk midnight, in the hall or the public assembly, upon the river brink, 10 tlie lonely woods road, in simulation of the public ex- ecutioner — shot, stabbed, hanged, drowned, mutilated beyond descriptiou, tortured beyond conception, * * * and then the wounded — those who escaped the harder fate — the whipped, the mangled, the bleeding, the torn! men despoiled of manhood ! women gravid with dead children ! bleeding backs ! broken limbs ! Ah ! the wounded in this silent warfare were more thousands than those who groaned upon the slox)es of Gettys- burg ! Dwellings and schools and churches burned ! People driven from their homes and dwelling in the woods and fields ! The poor, the weak, the despised, maltreated and persecuted." In this wholesale game of murder, rapine and plun- der, " The Fool " represents that tbe entire white pop- ulation of the South— save those that were attached during the war to tlie Union — took hnnds, and all from a bitter, malignant, unyielding hatred for the negro as a component part of society. By consequence, too, he represents that they extended this feeling to all per- sons who came from the North. At ])age 155 he says : '* Whatever or whoever was of the North or from the North was the subject of ridicule, denu'nciation and immeasurable malignity and vituperation." This is the picture of a fearful social condition, and if it were a correct one, it would justify ver^- serious retlection at the hands of philanthropists generally. That it is as false as hell itself, every man who has lived in the South knows perfectly well. That during what is known as the period of recon- 11 structioD, in several of the Soiitliern States there were violence, disorder, and possibly outrage, no candid Southerner will deny. But that there was any such state of affairs as "The Fool" represents— a wholesale plot in which all or any considerable por- tion of the people were engaged — every man, woman and child Avho knows anything of the subject, knows to be ridiculous. And yet, I doubt not that this " Fool's " picture of the state of society in the South will be accepted by the world as drawn to nature. The Northern and Western parts of this Union are blessed with a credulity touching all matters which tend to bring the Avhite people of the Southern States into disgrace and contempt, which, as an article of Faith, wonld meet the requirements of all that the most enthusiastic professor of the Christian religion could ask for. No story, however monstrous, which repre- sents a Southern community in an attitude of violence and detiant turbulence, is too gross for Northern belief. The typical idea of the Southerner is that of a long, lank man, with scraggy hair and beard, and broad brimmed, slouch hat, who has no less than two revolvers always concealed about his person, which he will immediately use with deadly effect, whenever an opportunity to trespass upon some other person's rights occurs. Without taking the trouble to inform them- selves correctly touching the peoi)le of the South, they accept any derogatory story that timid sensationalists or designing scoundrels may choose to invent, as the truth regarding those people. I have met frequently with curious and absurd illustrations of this. 12 Oolouel S , of South Carolina, related to me an amusing instance of it. A few years back he was re- turning home from a summer's sojourn at the Green- brier Wbite Sulphur Springs of West Virginia, byway of Eichmond, Va. On the way, two gentlemen got on the train, returning from the Hot Spriugs in Bath County, Virginia, where they had been for some time taking the hot baths for rheumatism. One was a Mr. A , of Boston, and the other an acquaintance of Colonel S , Mr. B , of Charleston, S. C. They had become well acquainted with each other, and had frequently talked over the condition of the South. Mr. B was a hon vivantj and was very fond of what was good to drink as well as of what was good to eat. In the course of the journey he came to Colonel S , and told him that the gentleman from Boston had some of the finest brandy he had ever seen ; that he had given him two drinks of it, but he wanted another, and was ashamed to ask him for it. <' Come," says he, "let me introduce you to him, and he'Jl offer you a drink, and in that Avay I'll get another." Colonel S thanked him, but begged to be excused. Soon afterwards he saw B talking very confidentially to A , and nodding significantly at himself, and very soon the two came up, and Mr. A was pre- sented to Colonel S . A seemed very anxious to play the agreeable, and offered the party some of his brandy. In this way B got bis drink. When the party arrived in Eichmond, B went on through, but Colonel S and his Boston friend 13 stopped. They went to their rooms and dressed, and soon after, the Bostonian meeting Colonel S , asked him to go over to the bar and get a julep. S asked to be excused. " Oh," says A , " don't you mind me. Pm all right. I wouldn't tell on you for the world. I don't care how many of them are killed." On hearing this S took in the situation. He saw at once that B , to get his drink of brandy, had told some story on him that would excite the Bos- tonian's interest and would thus lead him to seek S 's acquaintance, when an ofier of the brandy to the party w^ould follow. He therefore went with A to the bar. Whilst standing there he said, " What tale did B tell you about me, anyhow !" "Oh," says A , "don't you mind me; I'm not going to tell on you. I don't care if you was to kill all of them." " But what," says S , " did he tell you about me?" " Oh," says A , " your friend told me all about your troubles. He told me about your being a Ku- Klux, and having killed those three negroes, and about your being up here in the mountains hiding around to keep from being caught." "JS'ow that just shows," said S , "how you people get fooled. I'm no Ku-Klux, and I never killed a negro in my life. I'm not that sort of a man." "Oh, never you mind," said A , "I'm all right. I'm not going to tell on you. You can just feel per- fectly satisfied about that." 14 And he parted witli S under the full belief that he was a terrible Ku-Klux, and has, no doubt, many times since made his children's hair stand on end with accounts of the desperate, ruffianly Ku-Klux that he met on that trip. Mr. Conkling would do well to put the account of these three murders into his scraj) book to swell the list of the helpless negroes who have been assassinated. I will mention another ridiculous thing of this sort that came under my observation. After Mr. Tilden had been elected President of the United States, but before Mr. Hayes took his seat, a wag came into the City of Eichmond one evening on a crowded train. There was, as usual, a large crowd of idle, lazy negroes standing around the depot. Tliis wag jumped oft* amongst them, and commenced going from one to another, making a cross mark with a piece of chalk on the back of each. Somebody asked what he was doing it for. '' Oh," says he, *' Mr. Tilden sent me word that I could have all I could mark." A panic ensued amongst the negroes, which extended very considerably beyond those at the depot. I afterwards heard of this thiug being seriously told out in Minne- sota as an evidence of a desire and purpose upon the part of the Southern people to re-enslave the negroes if they could. 15 CHAPTER III. THE REAL SITUATION AT THE SOUTH — THE CARPET BAGaERS— A. W. TOURGEE. He wbo would really understand the present state of affairs in the Soutb, and the temper and feeling of the people toward the negro and toward the govern- ment, must take a retrospective view of society there for the past twenty years. In 1860 there can be no doubt that a large part of the population of the Southern States was opposed to a secession of those States from the Union. But when once the act of secession was accomplished and the tocsin of war bad sounded, the entire white popula- tion, almost as one man, became ardent sympathizers with the Confederacy, and earnest supporters of its' cause. Leaving out of view an inconsiderable part of the mountains of the South, and leaving out of the account such cowardly vagabonds as would profess friendship for one cause or another, according as the immediate profession would tend to save their persons from tlie risk of war — persons who were no more friendly to the Union than to the Confederacy, but who were eternally friendly to themselves alone — it would be safe to say that after tbe date when the first battle of Manassas was fought, there were not twenty- five persons in any one of the Southern States who did not sympathize heart and soul with the Confederacy and its cause. 16 " The Fool " has represented that there was a con- siderable body of the people that remained true all through the war to the Union, who exhibited the highest heroism in defying tlie Confederacy, and who were subjected to outrageous treatment for their loyalty to the United States. This is all the merest bosh and stuff. Let any man name the individuals in any neighborhood who sympathized with the Union, and I will undertake to show them to have been a set of selfish, cowardly skulkers from military service, with a rare exception here and there. It is altogether a mistake, too, to believe, as many Northerners do, and as "The Fool" would represent, that the lower orders of society were/lragooned into sup- port of the Confederacy by the dominating higher and slave holding class. The institution of slaver3 , leaving the slave owner great leisure time, gave greater oj)por- tunities for the cultivation of all those relations of life which tend to produce individuality of character, than any other condition of life of which we have an ac-| count. Each slave owner, producing from his own resources almost everything that was necessary to life, was independent in a measure, of ever^^ one else, and, being under no necessity to exert himself in the way of manual toil, his attention was principally engaged with what goes in the direction of tlie ornamentation and embellishment of life. The individuality of character which this mode of life tended to arouse, was not con- fined to those who were slave owners ; it extended from them, by contagion, to all orders of life. The '^poor 17 white man " was as prompt to resent any apparent trespass upon his rights or personal dignity at the hands of his rich neighbor, as the rich neighbor would have been to resent the same thing at the hands of his social -peer. Many a court green has witnessed a rich slave owner receive a black eye and a bloody nose from a '' poor white man" of his neighborhood in retaliation for some slight which the poor man took as an indig- nity. This individuality of the people was exhibited in a marked manner in their jury trials. All orders of the white people were liable to jury service in Virginia, and I think I should risk nothing in saying, that in the thirty years preceding the war, there were more hung juries in the State of Virginia than in the States of New York, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Massachu- setts and Maine combined, during the same period. Each man, therefore, of the population, went into the movement for the establishment of the Confederacy, from his own desire to see it established, and not be- cause he was driven into it by terror of his more j)ower- ful neighbor. Tliey made a fierce and a desperate struggle to accomplish their end, fully aware of what was at stake, but in no measure intimidated by the possibility of defeat. Having exhausted themselves, they threw down their arms with the most unreserved l)urpose of abiding by the issue. They recognized the judgment of the tribunal to which they had appealed as deciding two things: first, that there existed no right or power in any State to withdraw from this Union, but that it was, in the language of the Supreme 18 Court, "an indissoluble union of indissoluble States;" and second, that the institution of slavery was to be forever at an end in the Southern States. Having appealed to the tribunal of arms, declaring that before that tribunal the}^ would make good the other side of both these propositions, and their chosen tribunal having decided agaiust them on both points, it never entered into their heads to say or do one thing that could be said to be in contravention of the judgment that it had pronounced. They accepted the result of the war as having settled both these points, and having placed them beyond the domains of controversy. They looked, however, with the utmost horror and dismay upon the suggestion that the ballot was to be placed in the hands of their former slaves. With the disfranchisements imposed upon themselves, they saw that this might well lead to the entire rule and dominion of each State passing into the hands of those slaves. They reflected that themselves were a proud and haughty people, de- veloped by the habits and modes of thought of gen- erations into a race peculiarly sensitive to whatever may have the appearance of personal indignity. They saw the African, on the otlier hand, totally destitute of every element in human character that governmental aptitude demands. Neither he, nor any generation of his ancestors, had ever had any instruction in those matters that are essential to a just appreciation of the responsibilities of a ruler. His ancestor had been brought to this country a savage — to bring him here 19 be bad been trapped and lassoed in tbe jungles of bis native foresc as men bunt wild beasts. Tbe negro's position after coming bere bad been more tbat of a domestic animal tban of a member of societ^^ How could tbe dominant race, being a race sucb as tbe Soutbern people are, look upon tbe prospect of com- plete dominion over tbemselves passing by one single move to tbese tbeir former slaves, witbout considering it one of tbe most fearful tbroes and revolutions to wbicb society could fall a victim ? Wbo can blame tbem for looking upon tbis as tbe very worst evil tbat could befall tbem ? Wbo can blame tbem if tbey sliould bave determined to die ratber tban see it ac- complished "? Wbo can deny tbat to tbeir minds it was tbe same tbing as turning tbemselves over to plun- der, murder and rapine '? Suppose tbat by some sweep of a magician's wand it sbould be so ordained tbat tbe monkeys in Africa sbould become tbe dominating race tliere, and tbat tbe men and women of Africa's wastes sbould bow tbeir beads in submission to monkey rule. Wbo is be, bearing tbe form and semblance of a man, wbo would not sbare in tbe indignation of tbe buman beings tbere, and wbo would not justify tbem in oi)posing tbis dominion, wbetber by sbot gun or by fraud ? How could fraud be predicated upon resistance to sucb a state of things 1 Lieutenant-Colonel Napier, of tbe Britisb armj^, wbo bas perhaps seen the Bushman of Soutbern Africa to as much advantage as any other person, has given tbe following grapbic x>icture of him : 20 " The Dutch Boer, the Griqua, the Bechuana, the Kaffir, all entertain the same dread of, and aversion to, those dwarfish hordes, who, armed with their diminutive bows and poisoned arrows, recklessly plun- der and devastate, without regard either to nation or color, and are in their turn hunted down and destroyed like beasts of prey, which, in many respects, they re- semble. Time, a knowledge of and an occasional intercourse with people more civilized than themselves, have made little change in the habits and disposition of this extraordinary race. The Bushman still con- tinues unrelentingly to plunder, and cruelly to destroy, whenever the opportunity presents itself. His resi- dence is still amongst inaccessible hills, in the rude cave or cleft of the rock, on the level karroo, in the shallow burrow, scooped out with a stick, and sheltered with a frail mat. He still, with deadl^^ effect, draws his diminutive bow, and shoots his poisoned arrows against man and beast. Disdaining labor of any kind, he seizes when he can on the farmer's herds and flocks, recklessl}^ destroys what he cannot devour, wallows for consecutive days with vultures and jackals amidst the carcasses of the slain, and, when full}^ gorged to the throat, slumbers in lethargic stupor like a wild beast, till, aroused by hunger, he is compelled to wander forth again in quest of prey. '^ When he cannot plunder cattle, he eagerly pursues the denizens of the waste, feasts indifferently upon the lion or the hedge hog, and, failing snch dainty mor- sels, philosophically contents himself with roots, bulbs, 21 locusts, ants, pieces of liide steeped in water, or, as a last recourse, he tightens his girdle of famine, and as Pringle says, * He lays him down, to sleep away, In languid trance, the weary day,' " Whether this precarious mode of existence may, oi may not have influenced the personal appearance of the Bushmen, it is difficult to say, but a more wretched looking set of beings cannot be easily imagined. The average height of the men is considerably under five feet, that of the women little exceeding four. Their shameless state of nearly comi)lete nudity, their brutal- ized habits of voracity, filth, and cruelty of disposi- tion, appear to place them completely on a level with the brute creation ; whilst the clicking tones of a lan- guage, composed of the most unpronounceable and dis- cordant noises, more nearly resemble the jabbering of apes than sounds uttered by human beings." Suppose that through some social convulsion these Bushmen should be ordered into power and control over their neighbors, the Dutch Boer, the Griqua, the Bechuana, or the Kaffir. Would it be expected that the latter should submit to the rule ? Would they not rise in the majesty of their nature and protest that it was a mockery of human government to force human beings, developed to their point in civilization, to bow in obedience to the rule of such beasts as these? They would, and every man, woman and child on this earth who knows the sentiments of human nature, would clap and applaud the act. 22 I do not of course mean to say, that the civilization of the Southern negro is advanced no further than that of the Bushman. But I do mean to say, that the differ- ence between the civilization of the Bushman and that of any of his neighbors, the Kaffir for instance, is not so wide as that between the Southern negro and the Southern white. I mean to say, that tliere would be more show of reason to force the Kaffir to submit to the rule of the Bushman than there would be to force the Southern white man to submit to the rule of the Southern negro. It altogether fails to meet the exigencies of the case to say that the Southern people, having held the negroes in their state of slavery, are themselves re- sponsible for their present state of civilization. This is not a question as to who is resi)onsible for the con- dition of things; it is an inquiry" as to what is the real condition. Whoever may be responsible, the fact nevertheless exists, that the negro in his present state is not fitted to be put in dominion over the white people, and that conclusion being arrived at, disputes as to who is responsible for the situation will do for the entertainment of the male and female old women 5 but statesmen and practical i)eople have no time for them. Now, from the very ending of the war the Federal government exhibited a fixed determination to force the white people of the South to bow their necks to the negroes' yoke. It was decreed that a race, trans- formed in the twinkling of an eye from slave to free, * 23 should be placed in absolute power over the race that for generations had held them as slaves. This was contrary to nature, and it was not reasonable to sup- pose that it could be done without producing violent social commotions. I will not deny that there have been such ; but that they were not so violent as to drape the entire land in mourning, is the only surpris- ing thing about the whole matter. From the very ending of the war the edict went forth from Washington that no man should hold office in the Southern States who could not swear that he had had no sympathy with the Confederacy. As the entire white population had been in earnest sympathy with the Confederacy, this confined the possibility' of governmental agencies to the negroes and such strangers as might happen to come there, ^o negroes could be found who were competent to discharge the offices of government, which practically confined the incumbency of office to the strangers who might hap- pen to offer themselves. There was no lack of these. The number who were willing to forego all the enjoy- ments of their own homes to assist in the patriotic duty of '' reconstructing the rebel States," was equal to what the most enthusiastic patriot could have hoped from his countrymen, and the utter unselfishness with which they took possession of every office that had a salary attached to it, was in perfect keeping with the patriotism of their natures. The whole South was at once overrun with the larvae of the North. Wherever there dwelt a scoundrel, who feared that his neighbors 24 would give him his deserts in the form of a coating of tar and feathers, that neighborhood lost a citizen, and the South gained an apostle of reconstruction. When- ever the womb of the North revolted at its burden, and spewed forth some putrid mass of crime, the South received a patriot who knew nothing but "restoration of the Union," and devotion to the " poor downtrodden negro." These vultures and harpies came into every neighborhood where an office was to be filled. They inflamed the minds of the negroes with sensational stories of a determination on the part of the white peo- ple to re-enslave them. They made them believe that unless they organized themselves, and stood shoulder to shoulder, the white people would again reduce them to slavery. They organized them into what were called " Union Leagues" — organizations that had but one watchword, opposition to the whites. These " car- pet baggers," for this was the name with which the people dubbed them, had but one purpose in all this, and that was to use the negroes^ ballots to put them- selves into all the offices in each State. Backed by the Federal Government they succeeded, and from the time that their governments were established they bent all the energies of their natures to swindling and plundering the people in every i^ossible way. They stole directly and they stole indirectly. They robbed the public treasuries of every dollar they contained, and then increased the taxes of the people to replenish them that they might have more to steal. When all was absorbed that these sources would furnish, they 25 created the States' bonds, sold them for twenty-five and thirty cents on the dollar, and stole that, leaving the people with the burden of the bonds upon them. All this by men who had no particle of interest in the country, except in that part of it which they carried upon their dirty persons, l^o people was ever afflicted by such a curse as the Southern people were afflicted by in these carpet baggers, ^neas must have had them in his prophetic eye when, three thousand years ago, he described the harpies with which he met on the islands of Strophades. "Tristius hand illis monstrum nee sgevior ulla Pestis et ira Deum Stygiis sesse extulit undis. Virginei volncrum vultus, fcedissima ventris Proluvies, uncaquas manus, et pallida semper ora fames." I will give one illustration of the way in which these harpies plundered the people. The town of Vicks- burg, Mississippi, contained, in 1868, about thirteen thousand inhabitants, of which, about six thousand were negroes, and, therefore, non-property holders and non-tax payers. It owed nothing at that time, and the rate of taxation was very small. In 1868, Yicksburg passed into the hands of a carpet bagger government, under which it rested until 1872. In that time, those carpet baggers had caused the rate of taxation to be raised to six per cent., on a heavy assessment of prop- erty, and they had fastened upon the town a bonded debt of six hundred thousand dollars, bearing ten per cent, interest, and a floating debt of over one hundred thousand dollars. Having destroyed the credit of the 2 26 place, they issued the scrip, representing the floating debt, at from forty to sixty cents on the dollar — that is, for an article worth Ave dollars, they would give the town's promise to pay ten dollars. Fifty thousand dollars would pay for all that was done with all the money received, in consideration of this load of debt. It requires no careful reading of "A Fool's Errand," to discover that ^^The Fool" was one of these carpet baggers, and that his errand to the South was that of his fellows. Fortunately^, we are not left to the evidence which his book furnishes, of the purposes for which he went South. We have the good luck to have other and complete outside evidence upon those points. From the close of the war until 1871, the good old State of North Carolina was the victim of a carpet bag government, which was as atrocious as any that afflict- ed any other Southern State. When her own j)eople got possession of their government, her legislature ap- pointed a commission of eminent lawyers, to investi- gate the villany and rascality of which the State had been made a victim during the time of carpet bag rule. This commission took a great mass of testi- mony, and it has been published as the ^'Eeportof the Fraud Commission." It is Document No. 11, of Session 1^71-72. And, oh ! it does disclose a period of rascality, knavery, theft and plunder, which makes the reader rage and gnash his teeth. An account of one little transaction which it unearths will be found interesting. Geo. W. Swepson and certain accomplices, of whom 27 one M. S. Littlefield, of l^ew York State, calling him- self '^ General/' was the chief, determined to go into partnership with the State of North Carolina, in the business of building railroads, from the French Broad Eiver to the Tennessee line, at Ducktown and Paint Rock. An act was accordingly passed by the carpet bag negro Legislature of North Carolina, chartering the Western North Carolina Railroad, as it was to be called, and providing that the State should sub- scribe to two thirds of its stock, when certificate was made to the Board of Internal Improvement, that one third of what it would cost had been subscribed by solvent individuals, and the building of the road had been put under contract. The State's subscription was to be paid for in her bonds, which were to be de- livered to the president of the company. In October, 1868, those who proposed to organize the company had a meeting at Morganton- $308,000 was, at that meeting, subscribed to the stock, and it was resolved that the subscribers should pay up in cash five per cent, of their subscriptions. $200,000 of this $308,000 was subscribed for by ''General" M. S. Littlefield, $100,000 by one Reynolds, of Statesville, and $8,000 by other parties. Littlefield gave his check on a Bal- timore banking house, for $10,000, for his five per cent, which check was never paid,- and Reynolds gave his note for $5,000, for his five per cent., which, likewise, never was paid. Five per cent, in money was paid on the $8,000. Thus, this great enterprise was started on a cash capital of four hundred dollars. 28 George W. Swepson was made president of the company. Shortly afterwards subscriptions were added, mak- ing the whole amount $2,000,000. Of tliis additional subscription Colonel S. McD. Tate took $500,000, and General K. M. Henry took $400,000, and General M. S. Littlefield took the bnlance. Nothing was ever paid on their subscriptions. The subscriptions neces- sary to secure $4,000,000 of the State's bonds were thus secured, save only that the requirement of the statute that they should be made by solvent individuals, was hardly complied with. It was necessary, however, under the law, to go one step further. The road must actually have been put under contract, before the State could be called upon to issue her bonds. But with gentlemen as accommodating as General Little- field around, this, of course, would not long remain a difficulty. It is true, that legislative lobbying had theretofore seemed to be his forte, and he had not been known to have had much experience in building rail- roads, but he was not the man to allow a trifle of this sort to stand between a friend and good luck. So he took a contract to build the road from Asheville west, while Colonel S. McD. Tate took one to build it from Asheville to Paint Eock. Thus Mr. Swepson was en- abled to certify to the Board of Internal Improvement that $2,000,000 of the capital stock had been sub- scribed for by SOLVENT individuals, and that the building of the road was under contract. He accord- ingly made these certificates, whereupon $4,000,000 of 29 the bonds of the State of North Carolina were issued to him, in payment of her subscription to the road. It is refreshing to consider the view which Swepson took of the transaction at the time he made the certifi- cates. The following question was asked him by the commission : " Q. Were not those contracts considered at the time a mere formal compliance with the charter to procure the issuing of the bonds, and without any expectation that either of the parties would comply with the terms by doing the work ? " "A. It was considered a mere formal compliance in order to get possession of the bonds. There was no expectation that either of the parties would do the work themselves, or any part of it, and that the road would be let to real contractors." Within a short time $2,640,000 more of North Caro- lina's bonds were issued to him on the same account. None of them were able to give any intelligible account of how this $2,640,000 came to be issued to him, though Mr. Swepson stated, page 213 : " In regard to having the second instalment of bonds (after the $4,000,000), I think there was an additional subscription made by Littlefield, but the five per cent, was not paid by him. My impression is, tliat I must have made the certificate to the governor, otherwise I do not see how I could have gotten the bonds. But I cannot say, whether I did or did not make the certificate; hut I got the bonds.^^ Thus under a scheme by which the State was to subscribe to two-thirds of the stock when the other third was subscribed for hj solvent individuals, and the building of the road was put under contract to responsible parties, Swepson was put into possession of $6,367,000 of the State's bonds, when there had 30 been only a sham subscription to $2,210,000 of the stock, and the building of the road had been put under sham contracts to these sham subscribers. Swepson remained president of the company until October, 1869. In that time he had disposed, either by sale or hypothecation, of $5,089,000 of these bonds, leaving$l,278,000 of them in his possession, accounted for by him as lost through various accidents and misfortunes (page 320). How much of the proceeds of these $5,089,000 of bonds the railroad got the benefit of, I do not know j but Mr. Swepson has given us an interesting account of what he did with $880,000 of the proceeds of them. In his testimony he has told us, at page 328 (compare page 221), that, thinking he saw a good thing down in Florida, he took $160,000 of the proceeds, and bought a majority of the capital stock of the Florida Central Railroad, and $720,000 of it and bought $1,000,000 of the bonds of the Pensacola and Georgia Railroad. In answer to the commis- sion's questions, regarding this transaction, he stated, page 209 : " Wlieu I commenced to make these investments, I intended them on my own account; but, after the heavy losses I sustained in New York and other places, I turned them over to Lictlefield, to secure the Western Railroad Company, he agreeing to pay the full amount of the Florida investment to that company." After Swepson had been president for one year, it was determined to turn him out and make Littlefield president. I suppose that such a carcass offered pick- ings that were too good for any one man to be allowed 31 to remain long in possession of it -, and the State hold- ing a majority of tlie stock, whoever could control the State's vote could be made president. Swepson gave the commission the following account of that, p. 217 : " In New York, just before the election of president of the com- pany, in 1869, Mr. Roberts, the secretary of the company, and Mr. Dowell, of Asheville, were caucusing frequently with General Little- field. Littlefield came to me and stated that it was determined that he should be elected president of the company at the next October meet- ing. I told him ' Very well,' but that they must settle with me; that a good many of the bonds were pledged as margins for various per- sons, and I had lost some of them ; that they must take these bonds and assume the margins ; that they must take my investments in Florida, and if they would settle up, and let me out with whole bones, T would settle with the road in everything, and willingly stand aside and say nothing. Littlefield agreed to do so. We both attended the meeting at Asheville, where I declined to be a candidate for the presi- dency. A caucus of the Republican members of the corporation was had, I understood, at which I was not present; but General Littlefield told me it was determined to have a Republican president of tie road, and that he was to be elected, * * * The meeting of stockholders was had, and General Littlefield by them elected president." So that, as the Florida investment of the road's money turned out badly, it was determined that the road might have it. It may be imagined that authority for all this stu- pendous and infamous robbery was not obtained with- out paying for it, and this brings us to the most delicious morceau of the whole evidence. We will preface this by the statement that all the world now knows that "The Fool," the author of "A Fool's Errand," who has professed to write an account of his 32 experiences in the South, is A. W. Tourgee, a carpet bagger, who migrated to North Carolina directly after the war, and who held office in North Carolina under her carpet bagger government as judge of one of her circuits. Mr. Swepson told the commission, pp. 201 to 203: " la the special session of 1868 a bill was passed making an appro- priation to the western division of the Western N. C. Railroad, as I now remember. That bill did not accomplish the purpose; for the reason, as I understand, that no tax was levied to pay the interest. In the fall of that year I was elected president of said road. I came to Raleigh, and urged the passage of another bill through the Legis- lature. I was then told by Littlefield and Deweese, who were a kind of lobby lawyers, Littletield being the principal, that I would get no bills through the legislature unless I entered into the same arrange- ment, which they said the other railroad presidents had made, to pay a certain per cent, (ten per cent, in kind) of the amount of the appropriations." (Let it be recollected that Littlefield had already made his great subscriptions to the stock of the road, and had already taken his great contract to build it.) "I understood from Littlefield and Deweese that all the other railroad presidents had made such an arrangement with them. I had no conversation or agreement with the railroad presidents myself; but it was generally understood that each of them had employed Littlefield as a lobby law3^er. I then agreed to their proposition, and afterwards paid Littlefield upward of $240,000 in money and some bonds for his services in procuring the passage of the bills through the legislature, making appropriations to the western division of said road. Q. "How did you make those payments to Littlefield, of money and bonds? A. " I paid money in various ways. Sometimes upon Littlefield's order; sometimes by taking up his notes and notes of other parties at his request ; sometimes in money to him ; some bonds. Q. " "Will you give the names of the individuals to whom these several sums of money have been paid ? 33 A. "I have a list of the various sums of money paid out, the time when paid, and the names of the persons to whom paid, which Hst I will furnish hereafter as a part of my testimony. I have it not now with me. Q. " You stated in the former part of your examination that you would furnish a list of the names of persons to whom money and bonds were paid. Are you prepared to give that list? A. " Since my last examination, I have had a full examination made by my clerk and book keeper, Mr. Rosenthal, of the accounts kept by him, and I hereby furnish to the committee a copy from the books of the account entitled ' M. S. Littlefield with G. W. Swepson.' This account I beheve to be correct. The same was kept by my book keeper and clerk, Mr. Rosenthal. This list embraces the amount of $241,713.31, which I stated in my report made to N. W. Woodfin and other commissioners, had been expended to secure the charter and appropriations on account of the western division of the W. N. C. R.R. Co. Q. " Will you please state particularly on what account these vari- ous sums of money were paid, and whether you have vouchers for the same? A. "As T stated in my previous examination, I was told by General Littlefield and Deweese that I could get no bills through the legisla- ture unless I entered into the same arrangements agreed upon by the other railroad presidents, which he said was to pay ten per cent, in kind on the amount of the appropriations. In pursuance of this agree- ment made with Littlefield, who was the principal man in the negotia- tion, the various sums of money were paid out to the different persons named in the lists furnished upon orders given by Littlefield, or upon notes given by him." The account which Mr. Swepson furnished of the items of this $241,713.31, paid for getting his bills through the legislature, is found at page 316 of the report. The first item on the account is : "June 11, 1868. To A. W. Tourgee, $200." 2* 34 Near the end of the account the following item ap- pears : "July 24, 1869. To A. W. Tourgee and protest, $3,502.55." Explaining the items of this account, Mr. Swepson told the commission, j). 203 : "In regard to the item of $3,500, charged to have been paid to A. W. Tourgee, my recollection is that this was a draft of A. W. Tourgee, drawn on me without authority, and I did not pay it until some time after it had gone to protest, when General Liltlefield requested me to pay it, and charge it to him on this account. I did so." Again, page 218, the commission returned to this account and asked the following question : Q. "Look over the account furnished by you as charged against Littlefield, and explain the items as well as you can recollect, and the considerations therefor. A. " All these items were paid, as I have before stated, under an agreement between me and Littlefield. As to item charged to A. W. Tourgee, June 17, 1868, of $200, the account given by Mr. Rosenthal is correct." We go now to Kosenthal's testimony-, p. 225. After stating that he was clerk and book keeper for Swep- son from 1865 to the fall of 1870, and that he had made out the account which Swepson had filed, and that it correctly represented the money that Swepson had paid on account of his bargain with Littlefield, he was asked : Q. " Do you know the consideration for which these various sums of money were paid ? 35 A. " As to the first item charged against A. W. Tourgee, of $200, my impression is that it was a note that was in bank which was over- due, and Swepson took it up. It is probable, however, that it is for money loaned directly by Swepson to Tourgee. I was told to charge it to Littlefield. I was told by Mr. Swepson that he was to pay Little- field a certain sum for getting these railroad bills through the legisla- ture, and these payments were to be charged against that account. As to the second item of $3,502.55 against Tourgee, of date July 24, 1869, a draft drawn by Tourgee on Gr. TV. Swepson for $3,500 was presented for payment, and payment refused, and it went to protest. Seme time afterwards Mr. Swepson instructed me to pay it, and charge it to this account, v/hich I did." The commission state, at page 21, that they had summoned all persons referred to in Swepsou's account before them to be examined with reference to the pay- ments there charged, and that all had come except James Sinclair and Judge Tourgee.* ''General" Byron Lafliu, a "visiting statesman," who did North Carolina the honor to represent one of her counties in her legislature, and who figures in several places in the report (Mr. Swepson accounts for $55,000 of the $1,278,000 that he was short by this item, " 55 bonds hyi)othecated with Clews & Co., on ac- count of Byron Laliin"), got into an omnibus one day to go to the railroad depot on his way North, about the time that the carpet bagger government was fall- ing to pieces; some one called to him, " Why, general, are you not coming back ? " " Oh," said he in reply, " is there anything left "?" Little matters of this sort are quite sufficient to account for the i)eople of North * See Addendum, page 87. 36 Carolina having made Mr. Tourgee's stay there quite disagreeable to Lim, without resorting to the presump- tion that he was unpopular by reason of being a I^orthern man. I have no doubt that if '^ General " Laflin should come forward to testify in the matter he would tell us that his stay was made quite as uncom- fortable as Mr. Tourgee's. But one result could flow from this state of things. Those who looked for peace and order under it, expect- ed the laws of nature to reverse themselves. They were people who could persuade themselves to believe that water could be coaxed into running up hill, or that Niagara's torrent might be checked with a finger. Just so long as the negroes remained banded into a solid organization — held together for the sole and ex- clusive purpose of dominating the whites, and just so long as the carpet baggers remained amongst the people egging the negroes on, and encouraging them to maintain their organizations — -just so long there was bound to be hostility between the races and bitter and undying hatred of the carpet baggers. Be the com- munity where it may, the virtue, the intelligence and the property of that community must rule it, and when the community is divided into two distinctly marked races, and one of them contains all the virtue, intelligence and property, and the other has none of either, then the more civilized race must dominate the less civilized, whether it be more numerous or whether it be less numerous. If it is not done by direct force, it will be done by superior knowledge and art. It 37 must be so as between the Southern negro and white ^ it would be so as between the Northerner and the Chinaman; it must happen between the Englishman and the Zulu. If the people of the North and West would only learn the lesson which reflection and experience long- to teach, they would abandon the attempt to force an intercommunion of the races in the South, which the law^ of nature forbid. They would learn that race prejudice is the most powerful force that operates upon the human mind, and that all the bayonets on earth cannot force a race, holding the relation to another race that the white people of the South hold to the negroes, to live in submission to that less civilized race. Eisk of death is more endurable to them, and a persistent effort to force the submission must result in constant revolution and bloodshed. The people of the North and West are greatly mis- taken, too, in their idea of the relations that exist in the South between the two races. There is no hostility whatever between them when the negroes are let alone, and no designing scoundrels stir up strife be- tween them for the accomplishment of their own ends. The attempt to maintain carpet bag governments in the South having been abandoned for several years past, the utmost cordiality and amity have come to exist between the two races. The two races having been born and reared together, each understands perfectly his position in the social scale, and neither attempts to invade the domain of the other. The negro is pressing himself 38 along, acquiring property and educating bis children. With nothing to excite the white man's prejudice of race, this is telling on him. He is beginning to watch with great interest the negro's development from a condition of servitude into one that will in time fit him for the discharge of a citizen's duties. He aids and encourages him in every way in his power. He gives him absolute protection in all his rights of person and X^roperty. In the courts the negro receives as absolute justice when his controversy is with a white man, as the white man would receive in a controversy with another white man. The white man all over the South is tax- ing himself, and heavily too, to furnish free school education to the negro, and it is telling wonderfully upon that race. A few of the facts relating to this matter in the State of Virginia will be interesting in this connection. The white people of Virginia over- threw the carpet baggers and got possession of their government in 1869. From that time to this they have annually taxed themselves to keep up an elaborate free school system, and the following numbers of negro children have been annually taught in the free schools: In 1871, there were 38,554 ; in 1872,46,736; in 1873, 47,506; in 1874, 52,086; in 1875, 54,941; in 1876, 62,178; in 1877, 65,043; in 1878, 61,772; in 1879, 35,768 ; in 1880, 68,000. Here are more than half a million of negro children that the white people of the State of Virginia have given the advantages of education to in the past ten years. The negroes themselves have contributed little 39 or nothing toward the cost of it. The expense of it has been voluntarily borne by the white people of the State, and that notwithstanding the utter disorgani- zation of labor left by the war, the loss of capital and the destruction of property, and the terrible pressure of a very large public debt, created before the war. The difference of conditions being considered, the other Southern States show a parallel state of affairs. The white people of Yirgiuia have shown the same humane spirit in their care for the negro insane. A central lunatic hospital has been established for them, in which all the insane negroes of the State are placed, and they there receive the very same attention and care that are bestowed upon the white insane. Every medical appliance which the progress of civilization shows to be adapted to the treatment of the insane, is furnished to these negroes. For the past ten years there have been in this hospital an average of nearly three hundred patients each year. The very great expense of this is voluntarily borne by the white people of Virginia. As illustrative of the utter absence of hostile feelings between the races when they are allowed to dwell together without the disturbing influence of selfish carpet baggers, I ventnre to make this statement. The proprietors of a street car line in Richmond, Charleston, Savannah, Mobile or JSTew Orleans, might on any day discharge ever}^ white driver and fill their places with negroes, and no greater commotion would ensue than upon any other ordinary change in a busi- ness. 40 I should not like to see the result if such an experi- ment should be tried in the City of New York or in Boston ! When the Virginia delegation to the Democratic convention, at Cincinnati, went out, one gentleman, a delegate from the City of Eicbmond, carried his servant, a negro man, with him. On the way to Cincinnati, it became necessary to travel all night on the Pennsylva- nia Eailroad. The gentleman mentioned, determining that his servant should be comfortable, hired a sleep- ing berth for him. Mr. Samuel J. Eandall, speaker of the House of Representatives, and a prominent candi- date for the presidency — so prominent that the great State of New York cast her entire seventy votes for him — was on the train, and it was so crowded that he could not get a sleeping berth. The conductor of the train came to this Virginia delegate and asked him if he would not make his servant surrender his berth to Mr. Randall ; that if he did not, Mr. Randall would have to sit uj) all night. The delegate very i>romptly told him that he would not; that it was a mere ques- tion of whether Mr. Randall should be uncomfortable all night or whether his servant should be uncomfort- able, and that Mr. Randall had as well be uncomfort- able as his servant. And he went to the negro and told hiai to let him know if any effort was made to deprive him of his berth, and that he would protect him. Every Virginia delegate to the convention can vouch for the truth of this statement. Now, this delegate was in every way identified in the 41 most intimate manner with that element in the South- ern States which ^' The Fool " represents as hating the negro with an intense hatred, and yet he would not consent to see his negro servant made uncomfortable to make the present speaker of the House of Eepre- sentatives, and possible future president, comfortable. I would like to see which one of "The Fools" who vex the ear of the public with their snivelling lies about the oppression of the negro, would have done this ! AVhichever one of them had been applied to, he would have hastened, with obsequious self-abasement, to kick his servant out, that the great man might enjoy his ease. It is only necessary to leave the white man and the negro alone, and they dwell together in perfect peace, and the negro will, by degrees, evolve himself into such a condition of civilization, as to entitle himself to a share in the political administration of the country. But, if this constant effort to force an unnatural as- similation of the races is kept up, disorder and confu- sion must be the result. When a small auger hole is bored through the bottom of a tank full of water, if let alone, it will, by degrees, draw all the water off and leave the tank in perfect condition. But if an attempt be made to force the water through this small orifice, so that the tank may be emptied in half the time, it will burst and great damage will be done. 42 CHAPTER IV. TREATMENT OF NORTHERNERS IN THE SOUTH. "The Fool" represents the Southern people to have been animated with a bitter hatred towards all people from the Korth. This also is a slander upon them, and can easily be shown to be one. They did and do have the most intense feeling of hostility for all Northerners who, like "The Fool,'' came amongst them to band the negroes together as a political ma- chine, through which they might be i)lundered and robbed. But every Northerner who has gone into the South since the war, settled amongst the people, and shown an intention to accept the situation as it is, and to try and build up the country and retrieve the losses of the war, has been received by the people with re- spect and hospitality, without any regard whatever to the place from whence he came. Gilbert C. Walker, of the State of New York, came to Virginia in the year 1865, connected with the Fed- eral army, and settled at Norfolk, Va. As soon as the war was over, he accepted it as ended, and showed by all he did and said, that he proposed to live in jieace and amity with the people amongst whom he had settled. He soon became exceedingly popular. In 1869, when the white people of Virginia were given an opportu- nity to struggle for the possession of their govern- ment, they selected Gilbert C. Walker — Northerner though he was, connected with the Federal army 43 thoiigli he had been— and made him their candidate for governor, against H. H. Wells, a Northerner of the carpet bagger stripe, whom the negroes made theirs. Walker was elected governor. He served his term of four years with great satisfaction to all orders of the people, and when he came out of his office, he was the most popular man before the white people of Vir- ginia in the State. He could have beaten any other man in the State, upon a direct vote of the white people, for any office within their gift. I have, my- self, seen him come into the Richmond Theatre, when it was filled from pit to dome, with all classes of peo- ple, from the humblest artisan to the proudest scion of the old slave holding aristocracy, and I have seen the entire body, ladies and gentlemen, rise as one man to cheer him. As soon as his term of governor was ended, he offered himself as a candidate for nomination, by the white people, for member of the House of Eepresent- atives, from the metropolitan district of Virginia, containing the City of Richmond, the capitol of the late Confederacy. His competitor for the nomina- tion was Col. John H. Guy, a gentlemen of the highest integrity and character — universally respected and esteemed — a man who had been a distinguished colonel in the Confederate army, and who was in every way identified with the old slave holding element. Yet Wallcer heat Col. Guy, before the white people, ten votes to one. He was elected to Congress, served his term of two years, returned, and offered again for the white 44 people's nomination. This time no one dared to run against him, and he was made the white man's candi- date, nem. con. Colonel Albert Ordway, of Massachusetts, came into Eichmond at the surrender, in command of a Massa- chusetts regiment. He settled there, and at once manifested a purpose similar to Walker's. He gained unbounded popularity, w^as constantly sent to the city council by the white people — was made their candidate for Congress, and was one of the most popular mem- bers of the Eichmond club, a social institution, which was very small and very select, and composed almost entirely of the bluest blood of the old slaveholding aristocracy. General W. F. Bartlett, of Massachusetts, had been a distinguished soldier in the Federal army. He had commanded a brigade of negroes at the terrible battle of July 30, 1864, known as the battle of '^ The Crater." In 1872 he settled in the City of Eichmond. Writing to his friends in Massachusetts, he says: "Before we had been here a month we found ourselves over- whelmed with kindness, cordiality and hospitality from the very nicest people here." '' Palfrey'' s Life of Bartlett;^ page 235. These facts speak for themselves. They give voice to louder tones than all the brays of all the fools that ever went on errands of plunder and theft. And in- stance might be i^iled upon instance, taken from each Southern State, indicating the cordial reception which the people have ever given to all Northerners who 45 have come to settle amongst tliem for the purpose of buildiug up the country. They have had no feelings of hostility for any Northerners except those who have come amongst them to plunder and rob, and to band the negroes together as a political machine for their own subjection. They have, and in the nature of things must have, a deep and abiding hatred for those. CHAPTER Y. NORTHERN IDEA OF THE ^' REBEL BRIGADIER" — THE "rebel brigadier" THE MOST LAW ABIDING CITIZEN IN THE COUNTRY — DUPLICITY OF THE REPUBLICAN ADMINISTRATION IN VIRGINIA POLI- TICS. There is a general belief in the minds of Northern people that the white people of the South are a law- less, turbulent, disorderly set, quite opposed to every- thing in the nature of conservatism. The '^ Rebel Brigadier" represents to the Northern mind an em- bodiment of all that is opposed to law and order. Now, no greater injustice was ever done to a people than this error does to the Southern people. There is no people now living upon the globe who are so entirely conservative in their character as the white people of the Soathern States. They fought the late war from a sense of duty, and with a deep seated conviction that they were right. However much a 46 Ii^orthern man may declare tliat the act of the Soutliern mail was treason, j^et to the mind of the Southern man his act was not ouly right in the sight of God, but en- joined upon him by His law. Having failed in his contest he has loyally surrendered the propositions for which he fought, and he proposes loyally to abide by the covenant into which he entered at the end of the war. He will not tolerate a suggestion of anything which is not in perfect faith with the terms upon which the surrender of his arms w^as received. Should a Northern State attempt to secede from this Union, no part of the country could be relied upon so surely to coerce her to resume her proper relations to the general Government as the lately seceded States. The State of Virginia to-day affords a striking illustra- tion of the conservative character of the '' Eebel Brig- adier." Before the late war, that State had borrowed a large sum of money, wiiich had been ex]3ended in creating her railroads, canals and public institutions, for which she had given her bonds. Within the past five years an effort, headed by Wm. Mahone, who was a major-general in the Confederate army, has been set on foot to repudiate a large part, if not all, of this debt. In the fall of 1879 an election for members of the legislature was held in Virginia, and the issue in that election was the repudiation or non-repudiation of the debt. In that election all the negroes (wiio con- stitute the Republican party of the State) voted for legislative candidates who favored repudiation, ivhile every " Bebel Brlgadier^^ in the State^ save and excejjt Wm. Mahonej voted to maTce the State pay her debt. 47 There exists to-day in every county in Virginia, a feeling of bitterness between the repadiators and the debt payers, more intense than any that ever existed between any x)olitical factious in the United States. Duels have been fought over it, and constant personal collisions have occurred and are occurring, and yet every single ^' Rebel Brigadier " who now resides in the State of Virginia^ except Wm. Mahone^ is on the side of the debt payers. Here they are by name — every person now living in the State of Virginia, who held rank in the Confed- erate army of brigadier-general and above, with the rank of each : 1st. General : General Joseph E. Johnston. 2d. Lieutenant-General : General Jabal A. Early. 3d. Major-Generals : General Fitz Lee, General W. H. F. Lee, General D. H. Maury, General Robert Ran- som, General H. Heth, General J. L. Kemper, General James A. Walker, General L. L. Lomax, General Wil- liam Smith, General G. 0. Wharton, General Samuel Jones, General William B. Taliaferro, General Oustis Lee, General Thomas L. Rosser, General Charles Field. 4th. Brigadier-Generals : General William H. Payne, General Lindsay Walker, General McComb, General R. D. Lilly, General D. A. VVeisiger, General John Echols, General R. L. T. Beale, General Joseph R. Anderson, General John R. Cooke, General Eppa Hunton, General J. H. Lane, General M. D. Corse, General Beverly Robertson, General T. T. Miinford, 48 General William E. Terry, Geoeral William Terry, General T. M. Logan, General Williams C. Wickham, General P. T. Moore, General Seth Barton. This is a galaxy of citizens of which any State that ever existed might be proud. No nobler, truer, more self-sacrificing men ever lived in any country, than those whose names are mentioned above. Show them anything that it is their duty to do, and they will do it, let the consequences be what they may. In the election just held, three presidential electoral tickets were run and voted for in the State — two Han- cock tickets and one Garfield ticket. One of the Han- cock tickets was put in nomination by a convention of the " Readjusters " party. All the negroes voted for the Garfield ticket, and all the whites, save a percent- age too small to be of consequence, voted for one or the other of the Hancock tickets. The result was, for the Debt payers' ticket, 96,912 votes ; for the ''Readjusters" ticket, 31,674; for the Republican ticket, 84,020. Now I do not mean to say that all who voted for the debt payers' ticket are debt payers. But I do mean to say, that a very large proportion of them, perhaps eight out of ten, are. It is easy therefore to see how quickly the matter of repudiation would be disposed of in Vir- ginia if the " Rebel Brigadiers" and the white people were allowed to have their wa3', and the Republican party did not force the State into repudiation. In the contest that is going on in Virginia over this question of repudiation, not only are the ^' Rebel Brigadiers " on the side of the debt payers, but almost 49 all of what is derided as the "rebel element" is on the same side. Indeed, there is nothing on the side of the debt payers save and except that which is denomi uated m the North as the " rebel element." On the side of repudiation are all the negroes, i. e., the Ee- publican party, and the bummer and office-seeking element of the whites. The debt payers' party is niade up of those who constituted the controlling classes before the war, while the Repudiators' party is made up almost entirely of the Republicans in the State «. e., the negroes. It is but justice to say that of the lew white people in the State who are Republicans, some, perhaps a majority, are debt payers. But the tact stands, an incontestable fact, that the State of Jirgima is before the world this day as a repudiating State, and made so by the vote of the Eepublican party, and in the face of the fierce and indignant pro- test of the "Eebel Brigadiers." Not only did the rank and file of the Eepublican voters vote for the re- pudiators' candidates in the election of a legislature in the fa 1 of 1879, but those Eepublican candidates who were elected to the legislature, with but few exceptions, voted for the measures of repudiation that were biougbt before that body. A bill was brought up for Its consideration, known as the Eiddleberger bill, which repudiated nearly one-half of the debt straight out and provided the machinery for repudiating all the rest, and this bill could not have passed either body of the legislature without the votes of the Eepub bean members, and it was passed through both bodies 3 50 ly their votes. It is not a statute of Virginia to- day, solely because her governor, a gallant "rebel" colonel who had lost his right arm in battle at the head of his regiment, vetoed it, and her constitution requiring a vote of two-thirds of the body to pass it over his veto, the effort made by the Republican members to accomplish that end was defeated by the " rebel element*' of her legislature. Further, with all the clatter that the Republican party makes about it being the party of law and order and public credit in this country, its leaders gave all the aid aud eucouragement in their power to the repu- diation party in Virginia in this same election. The negroes vote absolutely at the beck and call of the administration of the Federal government. In the contest iu Virginia, in the fall of 1879, had the Federal administration put in its oar, and made a serious effort to control the negro vote, that vote would have been cast solidly for the debt payers' candidates. But, because the debt payers' party was composed of the respectable part of the white people of the State, the influence of the administration was all thrown, in a silent and secret way, upon the side of the repudia- tors, whilst great preteuce was publicly made that the administration was on the side of the debt payers. One fact will prove this statement beyond the possi- bility of cavil. When the canvass was at its hottest, Mr. Green B. Raum, next in the Treasury Department to the secretary, made public proclamation, that as an important part of Mr. Hayes' administration, he had 51 ItlltT '^T,^".«'^-«"' ^» officer of internal revenue at Petersburg, that .t had been reported to the govern- Sec T 'frrf -P>'^-«-; -cl that he hla anvt!. '»'!'* t"^"^ government would not tolerate any such views ,n one of its ofBcers, and that he must fctionTf ir T" *'' ^"'^ "' P^^"'^