Black and White: Land, Labor, and Politics in the SouthFortune, Timothy Thomas
History
Black and White: Land, Labor, and Politics in the South
Fortune, Timothy Thomas
African Americans -- Southern States; Southern States -- Economic conditions; United States -- Race relations
Q. Do you find that the feeling among the negroes which
resulted in the exodus of a few years ago has been allayed
and perhaps has disappeared?
--A. I will tell you something that is rather amusing about
that. The first that I heard of a negro exodus in my section
of the country--it was to Kansas--was my manager coming into
my room one morning and saying that the negroes were going
out to the river to go to Kansas. I said, "It is several
miles to the river; how are they going?" Said he, "They are
toting their things out on their heads." Said I, "Go right
at once there and offer them the wagons on the plantation to
haul the things. What is the matter?" Said he, "I don't
know; I went out this morning and summoned the hands to the
field, but they say they are all going to Kansas." I got on
my horse and rode out and met a negro who had been my
engineer. I said to him, "What is the matter, where are you
all going?" He stopped right on the road and said, "Mr.
Calhoun, you never have deceived me, and I am going to tell
you what is the matter. There were two men came through here
last week, one night, and said 'You see this picture?' There
is a picture of a farm in Kansas for me that General Grant
has bought out there for me. That is so because my name is
on the back of it, and here is my ticket; that carries me to
Kansas." Said I, "Let me see it." He showed me a piece of
pasteboard that had printed on it "Good for one trip to
Kansas." Said I, "What did you pay him for this?" He said,
"We paid him $2 a piece." "How many of you are in this
thing?" "Over eighty of us are in this thing." Said I, "That
man then swindled you out of $160; he is an imposter; there
is no farm bought for you in Kansas." I saw that the time
for me to remonstrate with them was not then; they were on
their way to the Mississippi River, and I let them all go.
After they got out there I went and expostulated with them;
told them of the difference in climate, soil, and everything
else that they were accustomed to, and that if they went
there many of them would lose their families and children.
They would not listen to me. They went on to the river bank,
and those negroes who went out there owed me over $109,000.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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