Manuel Pereira; Or, The Sovereign Rule of South CarolinaAdams, F. Colburn (Francis Colburn)
General
Manuel Pereira; Or, The Sovereign Rule of South Carolina
Adams, F. Colburn (Francis Colburn)
African Americans -- Fiction; Biographical fiction; Pereira, Manuel -- Fiction; South Carolina -- Fiction
Connected with the city constabulary are two men whose duty it is to
keep a sharp lookout for all vessels arriving, and see that all negroes
or colored seamen are committed to prison. One is a South Carolinian, by
the name of Dusenberry, and the other an Irishman, by the name of Dunn.
These two men, although their office is despicable in the eyes of
many, assume more authority over a certain class of persons, who are
unacquainted with the laws, than the mayor himself. The former is a
man of dark, heavy features, with an assassin-like countenance, more
inclined to look at you distrustfully than to meet you with an open
gaze. He is rather tall and athletic, but never has been known to do any
thing that would give him credit for bravery. Several times he has been
on the brink of losing his office for giving too much latitude to his
craving for perquisites; yet, by some unaccountable means, he manages
to hold on. The other is a robust son of the Emerald Isle, with a broad,
florid face, low forehead, short crispy hair very red, and knotted
over his forehead. His dress is usually very slovenly and dirty, his
shirt-collar bespotted with tobacco-juice, and tied with an old striped
bandana handkerchief. This, taken with a very wide mouth, flat nose,
vicious eye, and a countenance as hard as ever came from Tipperary, and
a lame leg, which causes him to limp as he walks, gives our man Dunn the
incarnate appearance of a fit body-grabber. A few words will suffice
for his character. He is known to the official department, of which
the magistrates are a constituent part, as a notorious ----l; and his
better-half, who, by-the-way, is what is called a free-trader, meaning,
to save the rascality of a husband, sells liquor by small portions, to
suit the Murphys and the O'Neals. But, as it pleases our Mr. Dunn, he
very often becomes a more than profitable customer, and may be found
snoring out the penalty in some sequestered place, too frequently for
his own character. Between the hours of ten and twelve in the morning,
Dunn, if not too much incapacitated, may be seen limping his way down
Broad street, to watch vessels arriving and departing, carrying a
limp-cane in one hand, and a large covered whip in the other. We were
struck with the appearance of the latter, because it was similar to
those carried in the hands of a rough, menial class of men in Macon,
Georgia, who called themselves marshals, under a misapplication of the
term. Their office was to keep the negro population “straight,” and do
the whipping when called upon, at fifty cents a head. They also did the
whipping at the jails, and frequently made from five to six dollars a
day at this alone; for it is not considered fashionable for a gentleman
to whip his own negro. We noticed the universal carrying of this whip,
when we first visited Macon, some four years ago, and were curious to
know its purport, which was elucidated by a friend; but we have since
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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