A Woman's Life-Work-Labors and Experiences of Laura S. Haviland Part 40

The next was queried. "Ah, I's played de fool," he said, "in jist dat kind o' tradin'. I's an ole backslider. Ole Satan had me, sure, an' I cried, 'Ma.s.sar Jesus, save me from dat horrible pit,' an' he fotch me out, an' put dese feet on de rock, and here I means to stan'."

Others were examined, and a season of prayer followed. Their prayers were marked for their originality and earnestness. Said one woman, "Oh Lord, do please hitch up your cheer a little nearer your winder--draw aside your curtain, an' look down 'pon us poor creturs, an' gib your table-cloth a good shake, dat we may pick up a few crumbs."

There were many of these much more intelligent than I supposed I should find them, and used as good language as the white people.

House-servants and body-servants were more intelligent than those who lived only in the field. They were very imaginative, and talked with G.o.d. One woman in giving a sketch of slave life, said a young girl went to a night meeting contrary to orders, and for so doing was stripped naked and whipped in the presence of the other slaves, the master himself plying the lash. While she cried for mercy her master replied, "I'll give you mercy." "Good Lord do come and help me." "Yes, I'll help you" (and kept plying the lash). "Do, Lord, come now; if you ha'n't time send Jesus." "Yes, I'm your Jesus," retorted the inhuman persecutor, and he continued to ply the lash until thirty strokes were well laid on.

The colonel commanding this post called on me with a request to go to Gloucester Court-house, to look after the condition of the freedmen there. There were several very old, crippled people in Gloucester, in almost a nude condition. I agreed to go, and the colonel went to procure a buggy, as his own was broken; but he failed to get one, though more than a double price was offered, because he was a Yankee.

He returned discouraged, as he was unwilling to send me in a Virginia cart, the only government conveyance. I told him I had frequently seen the wealthiest ladies sitting on straw, with no other seat in the cart.

"O yes," he answered, "the F. F. V.'s ride in that way here. But you look too much like my mother to see you go in that style. I could not bear to have your children in Michigan know that I sent their mother out to ride thirty miles in that way;" and tears filled his eyes, as he referred to his own mother in his far off Northern home. I told him if I could accomplish any good by going, I was more than willing to take the cart-ride, as I could make a seat with my bale of clothing, and thus I went.

I crossed York River at Gloucester Point, and stepped into a store to wait for our soldier driver. Here a Southern brigadier-general addressed me in the following style:

"I reckon you are from the North, madam."

"I am from the State of Michigan," I said, "but more directly from Was.h.i.+ngton."

"You Northern people can not be satisfied with robbing us of millions of dollars in slaves, that were just as much our property as your horses and cattle, but you stole our sheep and horses, or any thing else you could get hands on; and yet that was not enough. Now you have a bill in Congress to rob us of our land, and of course it will pa.s.s.

Then we'll go to work and mix up a little cake to bake for our families, and you'll come and s.n.a.t.c.h even that away from us."

"You probably refer," I said, "to the bill just introduced, to allow the _leaders_ in this Rebellion no more than twenty thousand dollars'

worth of real estate, confiscating the balance, to sell in parcels to the soldiers and poor people, black or white, on liberal terms, to liquidate the _war debt_. This debt would never have been contracted, had not the South brought on the war. You fired upon Sumter; you determined to sever the Union. It was a bargain of your own making. You determined to make slavery the chief corner stone of the Republic, but another stone, _Liberty_, has ground it to powder. We had better accept the situation as we find it, and not call each other thieves and robbers because your chief corner-stone is no more. G.o.d never designed that we should make merchandise of human beings. In the written Word we find that G.o.d made of one blood all the nations of the earth. We find there no lines of distinction because of color or condition. Now let us drop slavery and hold it no longer as the bone of contention, and live henceforward a united nation."

With flushed face and flas.h.i.+ng eyes he said, "_Never_, NEVER shall we give up our rights. We acknowledge you have overpowered us, but you have not, and _never will_, conquer us; we shall yet in some way secure our _rights_ as Southerners, notwithstanding all your Northern preaching."

"If you carry out your position," I rejoined, "you will unite with some foreign power to break up our government, or to grind its republican form into powder and scatter it to the four winds."

"Of course we should, and you can't blame us for doing that. It is just exactly what we shall do if we have the chance."

After a few minutes unpleasant talk of this sort our soldier drove in front of the door for me. We borrowed a little box, upon which a coffee sack of clothing was laid, and we thus made a comparatively comfortable seat.

We reached Gloucester, and, on May 10th, went to the office of Captain McConnell. He was engaged all the morning in hearing complaints on the part of the freedmen and in adjusting their wrongs. Some of them were pitiable cases of outrage, but we can not report them here. There were eight difficulties settled within the few hours that I remained in the office. I resumed visiting and supplying the wants of the dest.i.tute as far as my means would allow. There were some old and crippled people here in the same condition as those whom I had relieved in other places in this part of the State. As usual, I took with me my Bible, for these colored people had none, because they had never been permitted to learn to read. Many of them gave thrilling sketches of their experiences in slave-life.

On May 13th, at four o'clock P. M., I found myself back at Old Yorktown. Here I visited the cave in which General Cornwallis was found. The old wood house in which the treaty was signed is covered with thick moss. A two-story brick building was Was.h.i.+ngton's head-quarters after he took possession of Yorktown. It was also the head-quarters of the Union generals after it fell into their hands.

Here was the stamping-ground of two great armies. The contention was not now with British red-coats, as in the Revolution, but with our brethren in gray. Richard Lee, an ex-slave-holder, undertook to whip a colored man with the help of his overseer, after the old style, but in the struggle he found himself cut in two or three places, and the blood was flowing pretty freely from the overseer. The colored man told them whipping days were past, and he came out of the affray with but few scratches. His offense was refusing to work on Sunday afternoon. They entered no complaint at the office of the Freedmen's Bureau, and the colored man went about his business unmolested.

After taking leave of many dear friends at this place, through the kindness of sister Ailsgood, the matron of the Teachers' Home, I was conveyed to the boat in Lieutenant Ma.s.sy's carriage. We enjoyed a beautiful run on the Chesapeake. Among our pa.s.sengers for Norfolk was a young lady who seemed bright and gay, but had nearly spoiled herself with affectation. She was going to visit her aunt previous to entering upon her new duties in teaching a school.

"I never did do any thing of the kind," she told me; "but pa says I must; now that we have lost all our servants by this awful war. But I don't know how I'll do. Do you think I can teach a small school?"

Receiving a word of encouragement, she went on:

"I reckon I'll have to try. We've always had a lady preceptress at our house, besides the nurse, to take care of us."

A few minutes after I saw her weeping bitterly, as if her heart was nearly broken. Placing my hand upon her shoulder I inquired if she had heard bad news that was grieving her? She sobbed and sighed with quite an effort in commanding her feelings to speak.

"No; do you see that man yonder with a light hat on?"

"Yes."

"Well, he winked at me, and I was never so insulted in my life."

And she burst again into tears.

"Don't grieve over that," I said; "I wouldn't look at him."

"But I never was so insulted. I'm so glad my brother ain't here; I tell you there'd be trouble."

"Never mind; don't notice him."

"Won't you stand by me?"

"Yes; I'll stand here," I answered. And she soon became calm, when I thought it safe to leave. But a few moments later I saw her weeping as hard as ever. I went across the cabin to her relief the third time and inquired, "What is the trouble now?"

"He winked at me again, and I never, never was so insulted. I know if my brother was here he'd shoot him, for he'd never stand this."

I stood by her this time till I saw her in the ladies' dressing-room, by her request remaining between her and the object of her fears, who was at least fifteen feet from us, sitting in the farthest end of the cabin. After she had washed and combed her hair she asked, "How does my hair look? I never combed my hair myself. Our nurse did that always, until six months ago our last servant left us, I don't know if it looks well anyhow, for I don't know how to dress it. And do my eyes look as if I'd been crying?"

"Not to be noticed," I said. "You look all right."

"Will you see if that fellow has gone out?"

On the report that he had left she returned. I inquired if she was alone.

"O, no, not entirely; pa put me under the care of a splendid man; I reckon he's on deck; O, he's such a beautiful gentleman; he was pa's overseer a good many years; pa thought he couldn't carry on our plantation without him; when I see him I'll be all right. I reckon you've heard of my pa. Everybody knows him--Mr. Hampton--in Gloucester County, one of the most splendid counties in the State. Were you ever in Gloucester County?"

"I was there last week," I answered.

"Isn't it the most beautiful county you ever saw?"

I replied, "Nature has done enough to make it so."

"It was a grand county before the war," she said. "Everybody thinks it's the best county in the State of Virginia."

But my opinion widely differed from hers. It seemed to me one of the darkest and most G.o.d-forsaken corners of the earth. But the influence of slavery had its deleterious effects upon whites as well as blacks.

Laura Hampton knew nothing of self-reliance. All she knew was to be a consequential young lady of distinction, full of exalted qualifying adjectives in the superlative degree. But she was not so much to blame as her parents for her simpering and tossing the head with overstocked affectation. She was to be pitied for her unfortunate surroundings. Her "splendid man," a "beautiful gentleman," was a coa.r.s.e, burly headed "Legree" in appearance.

I arrived at Norfolk at four o'clock P. M., and found a pleasant home at the Tyler House. Here, I met eighteen teachers, with whom I enjoyed a refres.h.i.+ng prayer-meeting, led by S. J. Whiting, a missionary, who gave an interesting sketch of his experience in the Meudi Mission in Africa. I gave an account of the work accomplished through the blessing of G.o.d in the Mississippi Valley, while I was accompanied by my dear sister Backus, and spoke of trials I had recently pa.s.sed through. Here were kindred spirits, with whom we held sweet communion, and with our Heavenly Father, who is ever near at hand.

While in this part of the State, I saw a white woman who had been cruelly a.s.saulted and beaten with a raw-hide by her sister and niece for a.s.sociating with the teachers of our freedmen's schools. They thought she had disgraced the family; but she said she would not turn away from those Christian ladies, however her own kindred might treat her. O the wrongs and outrages which the spirit of slavery inflicted not only on the blacks, but also on the white people of the South!

CHAPTER XV.

EXPERIENCES AMONG FREEDMEN.