USA > Illinois > Edwards County > History of the English settlement in Edwards County, Illinois : founded in 1817 and 1818, by Morris Birkbeck and George Flower > Part 18
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"A suit has been lately instituted at Edwardsville against
250 ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
me for the recovery of the sum of two hundred dollars for each negro emancipated by me and brought to this State. The suit has been brought under a law pased on the 30th of March, 1819, which was not printed or promulgated until the October following. In the meantime, that is about the first week in May, my negroes emigrated to and settled in this State. What is truly farcical in this suit is, that a poor worthless fellow who has no property and of course pays no taxes, has been selected to institute it, from the fear he has of being taxed to support the negroes I emancipated; when they, who are all young and healthy, are so prosperous as to possess comfortable livings, and some of them pay as much as four dollars a year tax on their property. I should, indeed, my friend, be unfortu- nate, were I now compelled to pay two hundred dollars for each of my negroes, big and little, dead and living, (for the suit goes to this,) after the sacrifices I have made and the efforts to befriend and enable them to live comfortably. For I not only emancipated all my negroes, which amount- ed to one-third of the property bequeathed me by my father, but I removed them out here at an expense of be- tween five and six hundred dollars, and then gave each head of a family and all those who had passed the age of twenty-four, one hundred and sixty acres of land each, and exerted myself to prevail on them to hold to an honest and industrious and correct course. This they have done in a remarkable degree; so much so, with all the preju- dices against free negroes, there never has been the least ground for a charge or censure against any one of them. And now, for the first time in my life, to be sued for what I
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GOV. COLES' LETTER CONTINUED.
thought to be generous and praiseworthy conduct, creates strange feelings; which, however, cease to give me perso- nal mortification, when I reflect on the character and motives of those who have instituted the suit.
"Just about the time this suit was instituted I had the misfortune to lose by fire two-thirds of all the buildings and enclosures on my farm, together with about two hund- red apple-trees and many peach-trees, many of each kind large enough to bear fruit. And, soon after, the State- house having been consumed by fire, a project was set on foot to rebuild it by subscription. Luckily, to the plan and arrangements, I declined subscribing, and proposed others which I thought would be more for the interest of the State, of the country, and the town, and which it is now, by the way, generally admitted to have been the best.
. "This, however, was immediately laid hold of by some of the factious conventionists, who, being aware that the loss of the State-house would operate to the injury of their favorite measure, and being anxious to display great solici- tude for the interests of the people here, and that too as much as possible at the expense of the anti-conventionists, busied themselves in misrepresenting my measures and motives for not subscribing my name to their paper, and, with the aid of large portions of whisky, contrived to get up a real Vandalia mob, who vented their spleen against me in the most noisy and riotous manner nearly all night for my opposition to a convention, and for my refusal, as they termed it, to rebuild the State-house.
"All these, and other instances of defamation and perse- cution, create in my bosom opposite feelings, one of pain
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and the other of pleasure. Pain, to see my fellow-man so ill-natured and vindictive, merely because I am the friend of my species, and am opposed to one portion oppressing another; pleasure, that I should be in a situation that enables me to render service to the just and good cause in which we are engaged; and, so far from repining at their indignities and persecutions, I am thankful to Providence for placing me in the van of this eventful contest, and giving me a temper, zeal, and resolution which I trust will enable me to bear with a proper fortitude the peltings which are inseparable from it. In conclusion, I pray you to do me the justice to believe that no dread of personal consequences will ever abate my efforts to promote the good of the public, much less to abandon the great funda- mental principles of civil and personal liberty; and to be assured of my sincere friendship.
EDWARD COLES."
Having made mention of the unscrupulous conduct of many southern Illinoians, in their intrigues with the legis- lature at Vandalia, candor obliges me to acknowledge a class of honorable exceptions in the ranks of the conven- tionists. Although in favor of the convention, and no doubt at that time in favor of the introduction of slavery into the State, they acted with their party in a legitimate way, casting their votes in favor, but participating in no way with the disgraceful mobs, and more disgraceful acts with the legislature, led on by the party of whom Willis Hargrave, Esq., was the representative. Among these exceptions I record with pleasure the names of our two Judges, Hon. Wm. Wilson, and his associate, Judge Thomas
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THE CLOVEN -FOOT EXPOSED.
C. Browne-the former of Carmi, White County, the latter of Shawneetown, Gallatin County. Their quiet and dig- nified conduct at Vandalia was appreciated and remarked on to me by Governor Coles as strikingly contrasting with the disgraceful position the other two judges had assumed as leaders of a drunken mob, yelling "convention or death," under the windows of the chief-executive officer of the State, to endeavor by intimidation to gain his compli- ance with their infamous conspiracy against the liberties of the people. I lamented to differ with many worthy friends, men of influence and standing, in our part of the country; many of whom have since with manly frankness acknow- ledged their error.
. If any doubts remain as to the intention of the conven- tion, the following editorial remarks from the Shawncetoron Gasette, June 14, 1823, must dispel them :
" THE CONVENTION.
"The vote of the 'last Legislature, recommending the call of a new convention, seems to have produced a good deal of excitement in the western part of the State, and to have called forth already some pretty warm discussion. In this quarter, as yet, we have heard but little said on the subject, owing probably to the great degree of una- nimity which prevails in favor of the measure. The people in this part of the State (in this and the adjoining counties particularly) have too great an interest at stake in keeping up the manufacture of salt at the saline, to be easily diverted from the course they intend to pursue, by · making the question turn upon the propriety or impropri- ety of introducing negro slavery. They are persuaded
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
that, unless the time can be enlarged, during which the slaves of the neighboring states can be hired to labor at the furnaces, the works, after the year 1824, must be abandoned, and this main source of revenue to the State be lost; besides all the advantages which they individu- ally derive from the market, which, when in operation, those works create. The people in this part, also, in common with others in all parts of the State, desire an amendment of the constitution in other particulars where- in it has been found defective, and many (we are far from concealing it) are in favor of the introduction of slavery, · either absolute, as it exists at present in the slave-holding states, or in a limited degree-that is to say, to exist un- til the children born after its admission shall arrive at a certain age, to be fixed by the constitution."
This, I think, tells the whole story. It will be seen during the slavery controversy that Mr. Birkbeck was assailed as a Quaker; as by the land-speculators and the enemies of the Settlement in the East he had been charged as an infidel. By these gentry, any epithet that was un- popular it was considered fair to throw at an opponent.
In one short year from this time Mr. Birkbeck was no more. His sudden death altered the intentions and changed the destiny of his family. To Mr. William McClure of New Harmony, Mr. Birkbeck's library, con- sisting of many hundred volumes of choice books, was sold. And, I believe, through the influence and introduc- tion of Mr. McClure, the two brothers Bradford and Charles Birkbeck went to Mexico to try their fortunes. They have succeeded-Bradford as a miner at Zacatecas;
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DROWNING OF MR. BIRKBECK.
Charles, four hundred miles distant from his brother, as an agriculturalist. Although the general manner of Mr. Birk- beck's death is well known to me, the minute circumstances attending that sad event being recorded in the journal of Mr. Hall, I make from it the following extract: "June 4th, 1825, Mr. Birkbeck went to Harmony, and took a packet of letters for us to Mr. Owen, who, being on the eve of his departure to England, had kindly promised me to deliver them. On his return, on Friday, happened the melancholy catastrophe of Mr. Birkbeck's death, who was drowned in Fox River on his return from Harmony. On his crossing at Fox River with his third son, Bradford, they found the flat on which they expected to be carried over had been taken away. They entered the water with their horses with the intention of swimming over. Bradford's horse plunged and threw him in the water. Being a good swim- mer, he, although encumbered with a great-coat, and very weak from recent illness, had nearly reached the opposite shore, when he heard his father's voice calling for assist- ance; and turning himself round he saw him struggling in the middle of the stream, and returned to his assistance. Upon reaching him his father caught hold of him and they both sunk together. Upon rising he desired his father to take hold of his coat in another place, which he did, and both sunk again. But this time Bradford alone arose. Throwing himself upon his back, he floated, and, quite exhausted, reached the bank; when, after some time, his cries brought a person to his assistance, who. endeavored to recover the body of his father. But in vain. It was not found until the day following, when it was brought up
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
with an umbrella firmly grasped in his right hand. Mr. Birkbeck's horse was also drowned, but Bradford's got over safely. The body of Mr. Birkbeck was taken to Harmony and there interred with every mark of affection and re- spect. So perished Morris Birkbeck, in the sixty-second year of his age."
Whatever may be thought of Mr. Birkbeck, by those who would square every man's opinion by their own; the inhabitants of the State of Illinois, if for nothing else, should hold his memory in respect and gratitude for the decided part he took against the introduction of slavery, in his letters of "Jonathan Freeman."
CHAPTER XI.
Interest in' the Convention Question-Difference between Slaves and Servants-Asperity and Bitterness of the Contest-The English Spoke their Minds Freely-Estrangement of Friends-The Eng- lish Settlement Persecuted-Outrages on Colored Men-Lawsuit in Albion-Threatening Letters from Kidnapers-Negroes Kid- naped in Illinois and Indiana-The White-River Desperadoes- Their Arrest-Persecution of the Colored Men in the English Settlement-Mr. Flower sends a Colony to Hayti-Account of Difficulties Encountered-The Colony a Success in Hayti-The Settlement the Object of Detraction and Misrepresentation-The Fate attending Discoverers of New Countries and Founders of Colonies-Illustrated in the Case of William Penn-Treatment of Mr. Flower-The Cause of It.
IT was no wonder that we felt deep interest and mani- fested much excitement on the convention question. We had chosen, as we thought, one of the freest governments in the world, and one of the freest states in the Union, because it was new and free, for our future residence. We had brought to it our property and our families, and to be there betrayed into the jaws of Slavery, excited our indig- nation and determined opposition. But, says the slave- holder, you bring your servants, why may not we bring ours? Because you have no servants to bring ; you have only slaves. The term servant designates one of the parties to a free contract. The master has no more legal power over the servant, in England or America, than the servant has over the master. But you have stolen our term and
I7
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ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
applied it to your slaves. Servants in the South there can be none, as long as the poor, degraded negro slave stands in the way. Keep to the proper designation, and call them not your servants, but your slaves. A slave, although in human form, is a being despoiled of all the rights of humanity; purposely kept in ignorance, driven by the lash, or the fear of it, to his work, for which his master gives him no pay. An unfortunate wretch, from whom all the good to which his nature aspires is withheld; steeped in all that is vicious and depraved. This is a slave; the man made brute. To this poor, degraded being is the slave-holder obliged to entrust his property, his domestic animals, and his children. We desire not that compound of society found in a slave-state, a degenerate European aristocracy, and a full-blooded African barbarism! Besides, we ac- knowledge no property in man; with principles and prac- tices so opposite, there can be no peace; let us therefore keep apart.
Under every form of government, even the most despotic, where property in man is disavowed, there may and do exist a variety of ties, both political and social; not sev- ered by any line of distinct demarkation. They may have family connections, and many other interests in common. The rich are frequently brought to poverty, and the poor often become rich. These classes are not naturally hostile to each other; for they have a common interest; friends in . peace and companions in war. But in a nation composed of free and slave, there is no society. One portion of the people is separated from the other by an impassible gulf. The laws made by one class are known to the other only
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INFLUENCE OF THE ENGLISH SETTLEMENT.
by their severity. Whatever this may be, it is no republic. Give to this tyrannical confederacy some proper name.
The contest through which we had passed was carried on by that degree of asperity and bitterness which must ever be felt, where principles and practices are so opposite as freedom and slavery. We spoke our minds freely, perhaps . rashly, as Englishmen are apt to do, and this, doubtless, gave to many persons offence, which our silent vote might not have done. Many families and friends were separated and estranged from each other; and individuals who had hitherto met in easy social acquaintance, found avoidance less disagreeable than meeting. I look back to the part we took in that contest with some pleasure, and with some pride. It may be too much to say that our Settlement decided the fate of the State in favor of freedom; when other settlements and small communities were exerting themselves as heroically, and as well. But when we con- sider the small majority by which this Free-state held to its integrity, it may perhaps be inferred that, if our influence, as well as our votes, had been cast the other way, Illinois would probably have been at this day a slave-state. This important election over, the people, once more in quietude, pursued their accustomed vocations.
The negro question, having been settled by the State-vote governmentally, came upon us individually in no pleasant way. In these bickerings and disturbances, whether polit- ical or personal, we should always bear in mind the differ- ence of feeling that exists between Englishmen and Amer- icans, toward the African race. Englishmen, never having witnessed in their own country suffering, destitution, and
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degradation connected exclusively with any peculiarity of complexion, have no feeling of superiority or inferiority as connected with a cuticle of any color. Americans, on the contrary, North as well as South, retain the old colonial feeling of hatred to color. In our own neighborhood, the recent contest left the feelings sore. A grudge was owed to us; we had pitilessly exposed and zealously fought the pro-slavery party.
Three black men and their families-Gilbert Burris, Neptune Calvin, and Matthew Luther-came from the neighborhood of Carmi, for employment. They appeared to be very decent men, had been brought up in the habits of industry and sobriety by the Shakers, by whom they were emancipated and brought to this State. Their papers were examined, found to be regular, and were recorded. Luther was a miller, and attended the mill in Albion, that was built by my father, and after his death owned by me. The other two were farmers, and right good corn- farmers, too. To these I rented land on the usual terms of ten bushels of corn to the acre. To us it made no difference, black or white; if they did our work we paid them their wages. Whenever they or their little property received injury from wilful theft or violence, I gave them protection. I soon found this in some sort to be an offence ; and to my surprise, by some Eastern men as well as South- ern. We were verdant in those days, and did not know that "black men had no rights that white men need respect." A black man named Arthur, who had been in my service for more than a year, was suddenly arrested and taken before a magistrate, a New Englander, and
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KIDNAPPING-POOR MOSES MICHAELS.
claimed as a slave. As he came from Indiana, where he had resided many years, I pleaded that he could not be a slave-the laws of the Territory and the State alike forbid- ding slavery. They claimed to hold him by an indenture- law for ninety-nine years. I pleaded the nullity of the law. Our poor magistrate, Moses Michaels, who never dared say "boo to a goose," after spending half a day and going over to another magistrate three miles off to consult, did not give the black man up, but put me in unreasonably heavy bonds of two thousand dollars for his appearance at the next county-court, to be held at Palmyra, the then county-seat, on the great Wabash, nineteen miles and five months of time distant.
Long before the assembling of the court, parties were sent over from Indiana to steal the man away, that I might be mulcted in the penalty of the bond; whilst they might run him off and pocket his price when sold as a slave. The interval between the decision of the magistrate and the meeting of the county-court was spent in constant watchfulness, mental disturbance, and frequent skirmishes, often imperiling life. The man, Arthur, appeared duly at court. John McLean of Shawneetown, was counsel for plaintiff; Judge McDonald of Vincennes, for me, as defend- ant. The counsel conferred together. McDonald exhibited a decision of the supreme court of Indiana in a similar case. John McLean was too good a lawyer, and too shrewd a man, to allow any case to come into court where the law was dead against him. So the case was never called, and the man returned to my service as a free man. So this case was terminated in Illinois, that is to say, after I had paid my counsel his fifty-dollar fee.
262 ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
When at Vincennes some months afterward, I was served with a writ and arrested by the sheriff, at the instance of the claimant of Arthur. I had to choose between going to jail and giving bond. The latter was easily effected. Before the meeting of the Indiana court, I received several threatening letters to deter me from appearing at court. When the time arrived three friends accompanied me there, all armed. The law was again in my favor. But an enemy more mighty than the kidnapper fell upon us. A terrible epidemic, resembling the yellow-fever, prevailed at this time at Vincennes. We were all four of us taken down with it, and lay long in a precarious situation between life and death.
Another case of this kind from Indiana produced another set of tactics on the part of our opponents. A man of color was working for me. His pretended claimant, with suitable associates, suddenly surrounded the cabin of the black, and had him bound before the alarm at my house, a short distance away, was given. In this case the kidnap- pers gained their point, taking him before a magistrate of pro-slavery tendencies. He gave the man up to the claimant, who took him into Indiana, and the man was never heard of afterward. I presented the claimant, a man of note and in official station, to the grand-jury. Whilst stating the case, one of the jurymen called out with some excitement, that the man was quite right in taking the negro. The foreman of the jury said, "Sir, you only came to present the facts, and in so doing are quite right." In turning to leave the room, I saw at once the case was de- cided, and so it was. The bill was refused. The majority of the jury were decidedly pro-slavery.
1
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THE "WHITE-RIVER INDIANS."
My presentation to the grand-jury gave great umbrage to all in Indiana who held black men properly entitled to their freedom, under their fraudulent indenture-law, which had already been decided by their supreme court to be null, void, and of no effect.
Kidnapping of whole families of free blacks in the south of Indiana was no uncommon thing. The moral sense of the community received no shock at such outrages. A horse-thief was held to stricter accountability than a man- thief. The south of Indiana, like the south of Illinois, is chiefly peopled by Southerners, who hold property in higher esteem than liberty.
In the timbered regions of Indiana, on the White River, lived a set of desperadoes who had the appellation of "White-River Indians." Among these were a family sunk low in barbarism, and all the grosser vices. The sons of this family, three in number, associated with one or two others more respectable, but who would not at that period decline a foray on the pro-slavery side, were sent over to molest us, especially me and my family, even to the taking of life. Yet these wretches found harbor and encourage- ment among the Southern settlers around us.
Suddenly alarmed by the sound of human voices, the barking of dogs, and the report of fire-arms, I ran over to my father's house a little before midnight. An Englishman, Thomas Harding, who lived at my father's as farm-servant, having occasion to step out of the house, was knocked down by the blow of a club on the back of his head, by some man who stood concealed in the shadow, close to the wall of the house. My father, alarmed by the noise, went out,
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264 ENGLISH SETTLEMENT IN EDWARDS COUNTY.
saw one man retreating from the court-yard into the woods, and another lying bleeding on the ground, appar- ently lifeless. He dragged the wounded man into the house and closed the door. At first we thought it an attempt at house-breaking. But finding who the parties were, and their object, we assembled our forces. Many shots were exchanged, and the marauders for a time driven off. The annoyance from these fellows became so great, that we determined to rid ourselves of them at all hazards. Myself, Mr. Hugh Ronalds, Mr. Henry Birkett, together with a constable, mounted and went in pursuit. We over- took them after a hard gallop on a hot summer's day, in the open woods, ten miles distant. We were equal in number, man for man. They with rifles, we with pistols. Whilst the constable was reading his warrant, we rode up, got within the rifle-guard, and presented our pistols, each to his man. At this juncture, a very ill-looking fel- low, one of the gang, suddenly rode up at full speed. This gave them the advantage of one in number, of which the last comer instantly availed himself, by jumping from his horse and leveling his rifle at Mr. Ronalds, whom he doubt- less would have shot had not the man I was guarding as suddenly leaped from his horse and knocked up the rifle, when in the act of being discharged.
Many other things of the same character occurred. It was a state of warfare of the most disagreeable kind. They were taken back to Albion and bound over.
A circumstance inexpressibly ludicrous occurred in the midst of the strife. Amid oaths, boastings, refusals to sur- render or return, when every one was meditating murder
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A COLONY FOR HAYTI.
on the other, our Yankee constable brought forward a quart bottle of whisky, with a deprecatory smile and good- humored voice-"Now, boys, come and take a drink; now come along with us quiet, and we'll treat you like gentle- men." The effect was sudden; the transition of feeling complete. We all laughed, and did as our worthy constable bade us-at least, all our prisoners did. We returned to Albion riding in pairs, with our arms in our hands. There never was a slave taken in our neighbor- hood, and I believe that there never was more than one that came to it.
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