The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 1, July, 1862

One of the natives told me that the lawyer was a 'stuck-up critter;' 'he don't live; he don't—he puts-up at th' hotel.' And the hotel! Would Shakspeare, had he known of it, have written of taking one's ease at his inn? It was a long, framed building, two stories in hight, with a piazza extending across its side, and a front door crowded as closely into one corner as the width of the joist would permit. Under the piazza, ranged along the wall, was a low bench, occupied by about forty tin wash-basins and water-pails, with coarse, dirty crash towels suspended on rollers above them. By the side of each of these towels hung a comb and a brush, to which a lock of every body's hair was clinging, forming in the total a stock sufficient to establish any barber in the wig business.

It was, as I have said, ten o'clock when we reached the station. Throwing the bridles of our horses over the hitching-posts at the door, we at once made our way to the bar-room. That apartment, which was in the rear of the building, and communicated with by a long, narrow passage, was filled almost to suffocation, when we entered, by a cloud of tobacco-smoke, the fumes of bad whisky, and a crowd of drunken chivalry, through whom the Colonel with great difficulty elbowed his way to the counter, where 'mine host' and two assistants were dispensing 'liquid death,' at the rate of ten cents a glass, and of ten glasses a minute.

'Hello, Colonel! how ar' ye?' cried the red-faced liquor-vender, as he caught sight of my companion, and—relinquishing his lucrative employment for a moment—took the Colonel's hand.

'Quite well, thank you, Miles,' said the Colonel, with a certain patronizing air, 'have you seen my man Moye?'

'Moye, no! What's up with him?'

'He's run away with my horse, Firefly—I thought he would have made for this station. At what time does the next train go up?'

'Wal, it's due half arter 'leven, but 'taint gin'rally 'long till nigh one.'

The Colonel was turning to join me at the door, when a well-dressed young man of very unsteady movements, who was filling a glass at the counter, and staring at him with a sort of dreamy amazement, stammered out: 'Moye—run—run a—way, zir! that—k—kant be—by G—d. I know—him, zir—he's a—a friend of mine, and—I'm—I'm d—d if he an't hon—honest.'

'About as honest as the Yankees run,' replied the Colonel: 'he's a d—d thief, sir!'

'Look here—here, zir—don't—don't you—you zay any—thing 'gainst—the Yankees. D—d if—if I an't—one of 'em mezelf—zir,' said the fellow staggering toward the Colonel.

'I don't care what, you are; you're drunk.'

'You lie—you—you d—d 'ris—'ristocrat—take that,' was the reply, and the inebriated gentleman aimed a blow, with all his unsteady might, at the Colonel's face.

The South-Carolinian stepped quickly aside, and dexterously threw his foot before the other, who—his blow not meeting the expected resistance—was unable to recover himself, and fell headlong to the floor. The Colonel turned on his heel, and was walking quietly away, when the sharp report of a pistol sounded through the apartment, and a ball tore through the top of his boot, and lodged in the wall within two feet of where I was standing. With a spring, quick and sure as the tiger's, the Colonel was on the drunken man. Wrenching away the weapon, he seized the fellow by the necktie, and drawing him up to nearly his full hight, dashed him at one throw to the other side of the room. Then raising the revolver he coolly leveled it to fire.

But a dozen strong men were on him. The pistol was out of his hand, and his arms were pinioned in an instant; while cries of 'Fair play, sir!' 'He's drunk!' 'Don't hit a man when he's down,' and other like exclamations, came from all sides.

'Give me fair play, you d—d North-Carolina hounds,' cried the Colonel, struggling violently to get away, 'and I'll fight the whole posse of you.'

'One's 'nuff for you, ye d—d fire-eatin' 'ristocrat,' said a long, lean, bushy-haired, be-whiskered individual who was standing near the counter: 'ef ye wan't ter fight, I'll 'tend to yer case to onst. Let him go, boys,' he continued as he stepped toward the Colonel, and parted the crowd that had gathered around him: 'give him the shootin'-iron, and let's see ef he'll take a man thet's sober.'

I saw serious trouble was impending, and stepping forward, I said to the last speaker: 'My friend, you have no quarrel with this gentleman. He has treated that man only as you would have done.'

'P'raps thet's so; but he's a d—d hound of a Seseshener thet's draggin' us all to h—l; it'll do th' cuntry good to git quit of one on 'em.'

'Whatever his politics are, he's a gentleman, sir, and has done you no harm—let me beg of you to let him alone.'

'Don't beg any thing for me, Mr. K–' growled the Colonel through his barred teeth, 'I'll fight the d—d corn-cracker, and his whole race, at once.'

'No you won't, my friend. For the sake of those at home you won't,' I said, as I took him by the arm, and partly led, partly forced, him toward the door.

'And who in h—l ar ye?' asked the 'corn-cracker,' planting himself squarely in my way.

'I'm on the same side of politics with you, Union to the core!' I replied.

'Ye ar! Union! Then giv us yer fist,' said he, grasping me by the hand, 'by–it does a feller good to see a man dressed in yer cloes thet haint 'fraid ter say he's Union, so close to South-Car'lina, tu, as this ar! Come, hev a drink: come, boys—all round—let's liquor!'

'Excuse me now, my dear fellow—some other time I'll be glad to join you.'

'Jest as ye say, but thar's my fist, enyhow.'

He gave me another hearty shake of the hand, and the crowd parting, I made my way with the Colonel out of the room. We were followed by Miles, the landlord, who, when we had reached the front of the entrance-way, said: 'I'm right sorry for this row, gentlemen; but th' boys will hev a time when they git together.'

'Oh! never mind,' said the Colonel, who had recovered his coolness; 'but why are all these people here?'

'Thar's a barbecue cumin' off to-morrer on the camp-ground, and the house is cram full.'

'Is that so?' said the Colonel, then turning to me he added, 'Moye has taken the railroad somewhere else; I must get to a telegraph-office at once, to head him off. The nearest one is Wilmington. With all these rowdies here, it will not do to leave the horses alone—will you stay and keep an eye on them over to-morrow?'

'Yes, I will, cheerfully.'

'Thar's a mighty hard set round har now, Cunnel,' said the landlord; 'and the most peaceable git inter scrapes ef they han't no friends. Hadn't ye better show the gentleman some of your'n, 'fore you go?'

'Yes, yes, I didn't think of that. Who is here?'

'Wal, thar's Cunnel Taylor, Bill Barnes, Sam Heddleson, Jo' Shackelford. Andy Jones, Rob Brown, and lots of others.'

'Where's Andy Jones?'

'Reckon he's turned in; I'll see.' As the landlord opened a door which led from the hall, the Colonel said to me: 'Andy is a Union man, but he'd fight to the death for me.'

'Sal!' called out the hotel-keeper.

'Yas, massa, I'se har,' was the answer from a slatternly woman, awfully black in the face, who soon thrust her head from the door.

'Is Andy Jones har?' asked Miles.

'Yas, massa, he'm turned in up thar on de table.'

We followed the landlord into the apartment. It was the dining-room of the hotel, and by the dim light which came from a smoky fire on the hearth, I saw it contained about a hundred people, who, wrapped in blankets, bed-quilts and traveling-shawls, and disposed in all conceivable attitudes, were scattered about on the hard floor and tables, sleeping soundly. The room was a long, low apartment—extending across the whole front of the house—and had a wretched, squalid look. The fire, which was tended by the negro-woman, (she had spread a blanket on the floor, and was keeping a drowsy watch over it for the night,) had been recently replenished with green wood, and was throwing out thick volumes of black smoke, which, mixing with the effluvia from the lungs of a hundred sleepers made up an atmosphere next to impossible to breathe. Not a window was open, and not an aperture for ventilation could be seen!

Carefully avoiding the arms and legs of the recumbent chivalry, we picked our way, guided by the negro-girl, to the corner of the room where the Unionist was sleeping. Shaking him briskly by the shoulder, the Colonel called out: 'Andy! Andy! wake up!'

'What—what the d–l is the matter?' stammered out the sleeper, gradually opening his eyes, and raising himself on one elbow, 'Lord bless you, Cunnel, is thet you? what in–brought you har?'

'Business, Andy. Come, get up, I want to see you, and I can't talk here.'

The North-Carolinian slowly rose, and throwing his blanket over his shoulders, followed us from the room. When we had reached the open air the Colonel introduced me to his friend, who expressed surprise, and a great deal of pleasure, at meeting a Northern Union man in the Colonel's company.

'Look after our horses, now, Miles; Andy and I want to talk,' said the planter to the landlord, with about as little ceremony as he would have shown to a negro.

I thought the white man did not exactly relish the Colonel's manner, but saying: 'All right, all right, sir,' he took himself away.

The night was raw and cold, but as all the rooms of the hotel were occupied, either by sleepers or carousers, we had no other alternative than to hold our conference in the open-air. Near the railway-track a light-wood fire was blazing, and, obeying the promptings of the frosty atmosphere, we made our way to it. Lying on the ground around it, divested of all clothing except a pair of linsey trowsers and a flannel shirt, and with their naked feet close to its blaze—roasting at one extremity, and freezing at the other—were several blacks, the switch-tenders and woodmen of the station—fast asleep. How human beings could sleep in such circumstances seemed a marvel, but further observation convinced me that the Southern negro has a natural aptitude for that exercise, and will, indeed, bear more exposure than any other living thing. Nature in giving him such powers of endurance, seems to have specially fitted him for the life of hardship and privation to which he is born.

The fire-light enabled me to scan the appearance of my new acquaintance. He was rather above the medium height, squarely and somewhat stoutly built, and had an easy and self-possessed, though rough and unpolished manner. His face, or so much of it as was visible from underneath a thick mass of reddish gray hair, denoted a firm, decided character; but there was a manly, open, honest expression about it that won your confidence in a moment. He wore a slouched hat and a suit of the ordinary 'sheep's-gray,' cut in the 'sack' fashion, and hanging loosely about him. He seemed a man who had made his own way in the world, and I subsequently learned that appearances did not belie him. The son of a 'poor white' man, with scarcely the first rudiments of book-education, he had, by sterling worth, natural ability, and great force of character, accumulated a handsome property, and acquired a leading position in his adopted district. Though on 'the wrong side of politics,' his personal popularity was so great that for several successive years he had been elected to represent his county in the State Legislature. The Colonel, though opposed to him in politics—and party feeling at the South runs so high that political opponents are seldom personal friends—had, in the early part of his career, aided him by his indorsements; and Andy had not forgotten the service. It was easy to see that while two men could not be more unlike in character and appearance than my host and the North-Carolinian, they were warm and intimate friends.

'So, Moye has been raisin h—l gin'rally, Cunnel,' said my new acquaintance after a time. 'I'm not surprised. I never did b'lieve in Yankee nigger-drivers—sumhow it's agin natur for a Northern man to go Southern principles quite so strong as Moye did.'

'Which route do you think he has taken?' asked the Colonel.

'Wal, I reckon arter he tuk to the run, he made fur the mountings. He know'd you'd head him on the traveled routes; so he's put, I think, fur the Missusippe, where he'll sell the horse and make North.'

'I'll follow him,' said the Colonel, 'to the ends of the earth. If it costs me five thousand dollars, I'll see him hung.'

'Wal,' replied Andy, laughing, 'if he's gone North, you'll need a extradition treaty to kotch him. South-Car'lina, I b'lieve, has set up fur a furrin country.'

'That's true,' said the Colonel, also laughing, 'she's 'furrin' to the Yankees, but not to the old North State.'

'D–d if she han't,' replied the North-Carolinian, 'and now she's got out on our company, I swear she must keep out. We'd as soon think of goin' to h—l in summer time, as of joining partnership with her. Cunnel, you're the only decent man in the State—d–d if you han't—and your politics are a'most bad 'nuff to spile a township. It allers seemed sort o' queer to me, thet a man with such a mighty good heart as your'n could be so short in the way of brains.'

'Well, you're complimentary,' replied the Colonel, with the utmost good nature, 'but let's drop politics; we never could agree, you know. What shall I do about Moye?'

'Go to Wilmington, and telegraph all creation: wait a day to har, then if you don't har, go home, hire a native overseer, and let Moye go to the d–l. Ef it'll du you any good, I'll go to Wilmington with you, though I did mean to give you secesheners a little h—l here to-morrer.'

'No, Andy, I'll go alone. 'Twouldn't be patriotic to take you away from the barbecue. You'd 'spile' if you couldn't let off some gas soon.'

'I du b'lieve I shud. Howsumdever, thar's nary a thing I wouldn't do for you—you knows thet?'

'Yes, I do, and I wish you'd keep an eye on my Yankee friend here, and see he don't get into trouble with any of the boys—there'll be a hard set 'round, I reckon.'

'Wal, I will,' said Andy, 'but all he's to du is—keep mouth shet.'

'That seems easy enough,' I replied, laughing.

A desultory conversation followed for about an hour, when the steam-whistle sounded, and the up-train arrived. The Colonel got on board, and bidding us 'good-night,' went on to Wilmington. Andy then proposed we should look up sleeping accommodations. It was useless to seek quarters at the hotel, but an empty car was on the turn-out, and bribing one of the negroes, we got access to it, and were soon stretched at full length on two of its hard-bottomed seats.

The camp-ground was about a mile from the station, and pleasantly situated in a grove, near a stream of water. It was in frequent use by the camp-meetings of the Methodist denomination, which sect, at the South, is partial to these rural religious gatherings. Scattered over it, with an effort at regularity, were about forty small but neat log cottages, thatched with the long leaves of the turpentine-pine, and chinked with branches of the same tree. Each of these houses was floored with leaves or straw, and large enough to afford sleeping accommodations for about ten person, provided they spread their bedding on the ground, and lay tolerably close together. Interspersed among the cabins were about a dozen canvas tents, which evidently had been erected for this especial occasion.

Nearly in the centre of the group of huts, a rude sort of scaffold, four or five feet high, and surrounded by a rustic railing, served for the speaker's stand. It would seat about a dozen persons, and was protected by a roof of pine-boughs, interlaced together so as to keep off the sun, without affording protection from the rain. In the rear of this stand were two long tables, made of rough boards, and supported on stout joists, crossed on each other in the form of the letter X. A canopy of green boughs shaded the grounds, and the whole grove, which was perfectly free from underbrush, was carpeted with the soft, brown leaves of the pine.

Being fatigued with the ride of the previous day, I did not awake till the morning was well advanced, and it was nearly ten o'clock when Andy and I took our way to the camp-ground. Avoiding the usual route, we walked on through the forest. It was mid-winter, and vegetation lay dead all around us, awaiting the time when spring should breathe into it the breath of life and make it a living thing. There was silence and rest in the deep wood. The birds were away on their winter wanderings; the leaves hung motionless on the tall trees, and nature seemed resting from her ceaseless labor, and listening to the soft music of the little stream which sung a cheerful song as it rambled on over the roots and fallen branches that blocked its way. But soon a distant murmur arose, and we had not proceeded far before as many sounds as were heard at Babel made a strange concert about our ears. The lowing of the ox, the neighing of the horse, and the deep braying of another animal, mingled with a thousand human voices, came through the woods. But above and over all rose the stentorian tones of the stump speaker,

'As he trod the shaky platform,With the sweat upon his brow.'

About a thousand persons were already assembled on the ground, and a more motley gathering I never beheld. All sorts of costumes and all classes of people were there; but the genuine back-woods corn-crackers composed the majority of the assemblage. As might be expected, much the larger portion of the audience were men; still I saw some women and not a few children, many of the country people having taken advantage of the occasion to give their families a holiday. Some occupied benches in front of the stand, though a larger number were seated around in groups, within hearing of the speaker, but paying very little attention to what he was saying. A few were whittling, a few pitching quoits, or playing leap-frog, and quite a number were having a quiet game of whist, euchre, or 'seven-up.'

The speaker was a well-dressed, gentlemanly-looking man, and a tolerably good orator. He seemed accustomed to addressing a jury, for he displayed all the adroitness in handling his subject, and in appealing to the prejudices of his hearers, that we see in successful special pleaders. But he overshot his mark. To nine out of ten of his audience, his words and similes, though correct and sometimes beautiful, were as unintelligible as the dead languages. He advocated immediate, unconditional secession; and I thought from the applause which met his remarks, whenever he seemed to make himself understood, that the large majority of those present were of the same way of thinking.

He was succeeded by a heavy-browed, middle-aged man, slightly bent, and with hair a little turned to gray, but still hale, athletic, and in the prime and vigor of manhood. His pantaloons and waistcoat were of the common home-spun, and he used, now and then, a word of the country dialect; but as a stump-speaker, he was infinitely superior to the more polished orator who had preceded him.

He, too, advocated secession as a right and a duty—separation, now and forever from the dirt-eating, money-loving Yankees, who, he was ashamed to say, had the same ancestry, and worshiped the same God as himself. He took the bold ground that slavery is a curse to both the black and the white, but that it was forced upon this generation before it was born, by these same greedy, grasping Yankees, who would sell not only the bones and sinews of their fellowmen, but—worse than that—their own souls, for gold. It was forced upon them without their consent, and now that it had become interwoven with all their social life, and was a necessity of their very existence, the hypocritical Yankees would take it from them, because, forsooth, it was a sin and a wrong—as if they had to bear its responsibility, or the South could not settle its own account with its Maker!

'Slavery is now,' he continued, 'indispensable to us. Without it, cotton, rice, and sugar will cease to grow, and the South will starve. What if it works abuses? What if the black, at times, is overburdened, and his wife and daughters debauched? Man is not perfect any where—there are wrongs in every society. It is for each one to give his account, in such matters, to his God. But in this are we worse than they? Are there not abuses in society at the North? Are not their laborers overworked? While sin here hides itself under cover of the night, does it not there stalk abroad at noonday? If the wives and daughters of blacks are debauched here, are not the wives and daughters of whites debauched there? and will not a Yankee barter away the chastity of his own mother for a dirty dollar? Who fill our brothels? Yankee women! Who load our penitentiaries, crowd our whipping-posts, debauch our slaves, and cheat and defraud us all? Yankee men! And I say unto you, fellow-citizens,' and here the speaker's form seemed to dilate with the wild enthusiasm which possessed him, ''come out from among them; be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing,' and thus saith the Lord God of hosts, who will guide you, and lead you, if need be, to battle and to victory!'

A perfect storm of applause followed. The assemblage rose, and one long wild shout rent the old woods, and made the great trees tremble. It was some minutes before the uproar subsided; when it did, a voice near the speaker's stand called out: 'Andy Jones!' The call was at once echoed by another voice, and soon a general shout for 'Andy!' 'Union Andy!' 'Bully Andy!' went up from the same crowd which a moment before had so wildly applauded the secession speaker.

Andy rose from where he was seated beside me, and quietly ascended the steps of the platform. Removing his hat, and passing to his mouth a huge quid of tobacco, from a tin box in his pantaloons-pocket, he made several rapid strides up and down the speaker's stand, and then turned squarely to the audience.

The reader has noticed a tiger pacing up and down in his cage, with his eyes riveted on the human faces before him. He has observed how he will single out some individual, and finally stopping short in his rounds, turn on him with a look of such intense ferocity as makes a man's blood stand still, and his very breath come thick and hard, as he momentarily expects the beast will tear away the bars of his cage and leap forth on the obnoxious person. Now, Andy's fine, open, manly face had nothing of the tiger in it, but for a moment, I could not divest myself of the impression, as he halted in his walk up and down the stage, and turned full and square on the previous speaker—who had taken a seat among the audience near me—that he was about to spring upon him. Riveting his eye on the man's face, he at last slowly said:

'A man stands har and quotes Scriptur agin his feller-man, and forgets thet 'God made of one blood all nations thet dwell on the face of the 'arth.' A man stands har and calls his brother a thief, and his mother a harlot, and axes us to go his doctrines! I don't mean his brother in the Scriptur' sense, nor his mother in a fig'rative sense, but I mean the brother of his own blood, and the mother that bore him; for HE, gentlemen, (and he pointed his finger directly at the recent speaker, while his words came slow and heavy with intense scorn,) HE is a Yankee! And now, I say, gentlemen, d—n sech doctrins; d—n sech principles; and d—n the man thet's got a soul so black as to utter 'em!'

A breathless silence fell on the assemblage, as the person alluded to sprang to his feet, his face on fire, and his voice thick and broken with intense rage, and yelled out: 'Andy Jones, by –, you shall answer for this!'

'Sartin', said Andy, coolly inserting his thumbs in the armholes of his waistcoat; 'eny whar you likes—har—now—ef 'greeable to you.'

'I've no weapon here, sir, but I'll give you a chance mighty sudden,' was the fierce reply.

'Suit yourself' said Andy, with perfect imperturbability; 'but as you han't jest ready, s'pose you set down and har me tell 'bout your relation: they're a right decent set—them as I knows—and I'll swar they're 'shamed of you.'

A buzz went through the crowd, and a dozen voices called out, 'Be civil, Andy'—'Let him blow'—'Shet up'—'Go in, Jones'—with other like elegant exclamations.

A few of his friends took the aggrieved gentleman aside, and, soon quieting him, restored order.

'Wal, gentlemen,' resumed Andy, 'all on you know whar I was raised—over thar in South-Car'lina. I'm sorry to say it, but it's true. And you all know my father was a pore man, who couldn't give his boys no chance—and ef he could, thar warn't no schules in the district—so we couldn't hev got no book-larning ef we'd been a minded to. Wal, the next plantation to whar we lived was old Cunnel J–'s, the father of this Cunnel. He was a d—d old nullifier, jest like his son—but not half so decent a man. Wal, on his plantation was an old nigger called Uncle Pomp, who'd sumhow larned to read. He was a mighty good nigger, and he'd hev been in heaven long afore now ef the Lord hadn't a had sum good use for him down har—but he'll be thar yet a d—d sight sooner than sum on us white folks—that's sartin. Wal, as I was saying, Pomp could read, and when I was 'bout sixteen, and had never seed the inside of a book, the old darkey said to me one day—he was old then, and thet was thirty years ago—wal, he said to me: 'Andy, chile, ye orter larn to read—'twould be ob use to ye when you're grow'd up, and it moight make you a good and 'spected man. Now, come to ole Pomp's cabin, and he'll larn you, Andy, chile.' I reckon I went. He hadn't nothin' but a Bible and Watts' Hymns; yet we used to stay thar all the long winter evenings, and by the light of the fire—we war both so durned pore we couldn't raise a candle atween us—wal, by the light of the fire he larned me, and 'fore long I could spell right smart.