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قراءة كتاب A Letter to Hon. Charles Sumner, with 'Statements' of Outrages upon Freedmen in Georgia
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A Letter to Hon. Charles Sumner, with 'Statements' of Outrages upon Freedmen in Georgia
of. They sent word to me that I was one of the leaders of the Grant club, and they would whip me. I saw them pass my house one night, and I should think there were thirty or forty of them. They looked in the night like Jersey wagons. I supposed they were after me, and I took my blanket and gun and ran to the woods and lay out all night, and a good many other nights. Nearly all the Radicals in the neighborhood lay in the woods every night for two weeks before election. The Kuklux would go to the houses of all that belonged to the Grant club, call them to the door, throw a blanket over them and carry them off and whip them, and try and make them promise to vote for Seymour and Blair. The night I saw them they went to the house of Mr. Henry Davis and ordered him out. He refused to come out and they tore down both of his doors. He fired at them and escaped. I heard a good many shots fired at him. He lay out about a week in the woods, and then slipped back in the night and got his family and moved off. He had bought a place and paid $250 on it but he could not get a deed, and he has gone off and left it. They then went to the house of Tom Pitman and Jonas Swanson, called them to the door, threw blankets over their heads, carried them off and whipped them tremendously. They told them that they were damned Radicals and leaders of the Grant club, and that they would whip every one that voted for Grant, and would not give any work to any but Democrats.
"Bob Wiggins, a preacher, was whipped all most to death because they said he was preaching Radical doctrines to the colored people. It was supposed for a good many days that he would die, but he finally recovered.
"I attended the election at Ellaville. None of the Radicals that had been Ku-Kluxed tried to vote; but a good many Radicals did try to vote, but the judges made them all show their tickets, and if they were for Grant they would not let them vote. I saw how they treated others and did not try to put my vote in. I went early in the morning, and the white and colored Democrats voted until about noon, when I went home."
Andersonville, February 7, 1869.
STATEMENT OF RICHARD REESE.
Richard Reese, President of the Grant club of Schley County, confirms the statements of George Smith in regard to the treatment of the Radicals in Schley County. He says:
"When the Ku-Klux commenced riding about the country I was at Macon attending the colored convention. When I got home some white men, Democrats, who were friends of mine, told me that the Ku-Klux would certainly kill me if I staid at home at nights. I took my blanket and hid in the woods. I have never had a gun or pistol in my life. I lay in the woods every night until after election. Day times I came home and worked my crop. One day, as I was in my yard, Mr. Jack Childers, a Democrat, came along from Americus, and said to me, 'Where is old Dick, the damned old Radical?' I said, 'Here I am.' He said, 'Well, you will be certain to be killed.' I said, 'Well, if they kill me they will kill a good old Radical, and I haven't got much longer to live noway.' He then started to get out of his buggy and come at me, but the man with him held him in and drove on. I had the Grant tickets in my house, and went to the Bumphead precinct, but there were more Radicals than Democrats there, and they would not open the polls at all. We staid there till twelve o'clock, then started for Ellaville. The white and colored Democrats were voting, but they would not let a Radical vote until about two o'clock, when Charley Hudson got upon a stump and said no man could vote unless he had paid his taxes. He then got down, and he and nearly every white man there went around to the colored voters and told them that if they would vote the Democratic ticket their tax was paid. I offered my ticket, and they said my tax was not paid, and if I put in my ticket they would put me in jail, and send me to the penitentiary. I had already agreed with a white man, who owed me $50, to pay my tax, and he said he had done it, but when I found him, and he found what was the matter, he said he had not paid it. They demanded $4.50 poll-tax, and I paid it and put in my vote. They were determined that I should not vote, and I was determined that I would vote for Grant any way, as I was the president of the club. They told me if I would vote for Seymour and Blair I need not pay my taxes. After I got my vote in I took all my Grant tickets and scattered them among the crowd, and told my club they need not try to vote, it would do no good. Grant would be elected without Schley County, and we all went home.
"Last spring we built a school-house, and hired a white lady to teach our school for several months. We held meetings and schools every Sunday. Friday night, February 5, 1869, our school-house was burned up.
"Last night we had a meeting to see what we could do about building another house. We have a deed of one-and-a-half acres of land, but there is no timber on it, and the owners of the land around have put up a paper forbidding us to cut a stick on their's, and see how tight they have got us. We want the Government or somebody to help us build. We want some law to protect us. We know that we could burn their churches and schools, but it is against the law to burn houses, and we don't want to break the law or harm anybody. We want the law to protect us, and all we want is to live under the law."
Andersonville, Feb. 7, 1869.
STATEMENT OF REV. CHARLES ENNIS.
Charles Ennis informs me that he was sixty-two years old last June; that he was the slave of Mr. G. C. McBee, who kept the ferry on the Holston river, fifteen miles from Knoxville Tennessee; that he has often ferried the Hon. Messrs. Brownlow and Maynard over the river; that he learned to read when a small boy, and that he is now a preacher and teacher. He is the most intelligent colored man I have seen at Andersonville. He says:
"My wife has been a midwife for many years, and has attended upon a good many white and colored women in child-birth. Last year we lived in Mitchell County, and Mr. Henry Adams, of Baker County, sent for her to attend his wife, who was about to be confined. The child was born and did well. After the riot at Camilla we were afraid to remain in Mitchell County. I lived within three miles of Camilla, and a good many of the dead were very near me, but I did not see any of them. I was afraid to go from home. Dr. Sanders, who attended upon those who were shot, told me that more than fifty were killed and wounded. Mr. Adams said his wife liked my wife so well that he wanted us to go to Houston County with him, and he would pay our expenses there; and then he would certainly get me a school, and I could live on his place with my wife, and he would pay her $50 a year wages. I told him we would not engage by the year, but only by the month, so long as we could agree. Mr. Robert Adams, his uncle, was his partner, and managed the plantation. On the 19th of January, 1869, he told my wife he wanted breakfast very early, as he was going to attend the burying of his nephew's wife next morning. She got up before day and got it, and I carried it to him and he ate it by candle light. After breakfast, as my wife was going to milk, he came out doors, and when he saw her he said: 'O you d——d old b——h, I have catched up to you, you G—d d——d old rogue,' and a good deal more of the same sort. I was surprised at this, as I knew she had got the breakfast all right, and I had carried it in to him. I went out and asked him in a mild manner, 'Mr. Adams, what is the matter? what has she done?' He made no reply at all, but rushed at me and caught me by the hair and commenced beating me. He struck me