USA > Indiana > Vanderburgh County > Evansville > History of the city of Evansville and Vanderburg County, Indiana, Volume I > Part 20
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A writer says: "Unfortunately all the clear-cut laws prohibiting slavery in Indiana did not have much force with those entrusted with the admin- istration of the laws. There was no secret about holding slaves." But in 1820 it seems that very few had been brought in, for the entire census of the state of Indiana showed only one hundred and ninety slaves. In Van- derburg County there were only ten and there were twenty-four counties in the state in which no slavery existed. It is sad to state that many ne- groes who were emancipated by their owners were kidnapped and sold into slavery in the South. An unfortunate fact was that the negro of that day could neither read nor write and often he was brought into the North and told that after residing here he would then have to sign a paper which was an emancipation paper and he would be a free negro forever. But he didn't realize that the paper he was signing made him about as much of a slave as before it was signed. Here is specimen of how it was done.
The papers would read something like this:
"On the first day of October, 1813, I, John Brown, have this day set free my slave, Thomas Jones, and I hereby make and acknowledge the emancipation paper for his complete freedom. The said Thomas Jones, for the privilege of being known as a free man has agreed to indenture his services to me for a period of thirty years from this date.
"John Brown."
"I, Thomas Jones, do hereby accept the emancipation papers for which I sincerely thank my former master and do cheerfully agree to indenture myself to the said John Brown as per the above agreement.
"Thomas Jones."
"X-My own mark."
This gave the party of the first part absolute control of the negro and if his working ability failed to come up to what he expected, it was no un- usual thing to hear of his being suddenly kidnapped and sold into slavery somewhere down South.
Here is another taken from the records on September 26, 1813:
"I, Noah Freedman, of Indiana, on this date, do hereby emancipate my slave, Mary Ann, to enjoy all the rights of freedom that a negro and an uneducated woman can. It affords me great satisfaction to testify that she has been a most faithful and obedient servant. This paper and freedom . to be in force and effect after the 26th day of September, 1830. Until that time she has indentured her services to me and my family.
"Noah Freedman."
"I, Mary Ann, the former servant of the master, agree to accept my emancipation papers and do agree to faithfully work for my mistress until the 30th day of September, 1833.
"Mary Ann."
"X-My mark.
"Witness-Jason Brown."
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But here was the worst hypocrite of all and this is also taken from the records :
"This is to certify that I, James Hartwell, of my own free will and accord, do this day emancipate and give freedom to a negro slave named Charles Hope, brought by me from North Carolina. In making these pa- pers I want to bear testimony to the painstaking and careful way he has done his work and that he is a quiet and most obedient servant and is always very easily managed. For these good qualities it affords me great pleasure to be able to give him his rightly earned freedom. For some nec- essary expenses that have to be incurred before he can leave the home he has so long lived at and for the love he has for me and my family, he hereby agrees to indenture his services to me for twenty-nine years from the 18th of October, 1809, which is the date of this agreement.
"James Hartwell."
"I, Charles Hope, do hereby acknowledge my thanks to my master for the kindness he has shown me in setting me free and I cheerfully accept the conditions in my freedom papers and agree to serve the time specified or until death. "Charles Hope."
"X-His mark."
Following the records, it shows that this hypocrite who at least might have saved himself the trouble of writing a lot of rot which in reality meant nothing but a splendid certificate in case he wanted to sell him, actually did sell him to a neighbor on the 18th day of the next November, for four head of horses, ten head of cattle, one hundred acres of land and a prom- issory note of $300. One can easily imagine that this negro must have been a remarkably good and able man. The next year this negro went with his master down the Wabash river on a pretended trip to Illinois but was carried further south and sold into slavery for life. Mention has been made elsewhere of the attachment of some of the slaves for their former masters and mistresses. This was exemplified many times after the slaves were given their freedom. The old house servants, who had grown up to know their masters and mistresses, loved them and refused to leave them. It was the field hands and the negro of the lower order who threw down everything, even leaving their implements in the fields and the stock unfed and gathered up their scanty stores and fled to the North.
In 1854 Col. J. B. Cockrain was visiting in an old settlement in southern Indiana. It became known to one of the young ladies that he was collect- ing data for a book about the state, the subject of slavery coming up. She informed him that the family had always kept the emancipation and inden- ture papers of old Tom, who was their slave, and said that she thought it would be interesting. She said that he might copy the papers provided he would not use their names, and they are as follows :
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"May 26, 1815.
"To All Whom It May Concern :
"This is to certify that this day I have set free and by these presents do give emancipation papers to my faithful servant, Thomas Agneu, and from this date he shall be known as a free man. Given under my hand and seal. "(Thomas Trueman.)
"Witness-(Joseph Forth.)"
"This is to certify that I have this day received my emancipation papers from my former master but as I do not know any other home but the one I have always loved and lived at, I do hereby indenture myself to him, Thomas Trueman, for thirty years from this date, he agreeing to feed and clothe me during that time.
"Thomas Agneu."
"X -- His mark."
The story told by the young lady was as follows:
"Just before the state of Indiana was admitted into the Union, my father moved here from a slave state and brought with him Thomas, who was born on the estate. He had no thought that there would ever be any trouble about him, as Tom was as much of a fixture as anything else per- taining to the house, but a friend one day told him that parties were pre- paring to bring habeas corpus and emancipate him. The only thing my father could do was to emancipate him and have him indenture his time after he was a free man. This was done, as shown above, and Tom kept faithfully at work. This was twenty years before I was born. The good, faithful old slave worked with my father nearly twenty-seven years after the indenture was made, when my father died. Tom kept on working with my brother the same as before. On settling up the estate, we found that my father was more in debt than we had supposed and that there would be little left. A cousin of my father, who still lived in a slave state, held a mortgage on our farm. He was a regular Shylock and demanded the last cent, which would take everything, farm and all, at a forced sale. He, however, told my mother that if Tom would go home with him and work for him as long as he lived he would release the mortgage. This my mother would not consent to, as Tom had less than two years of his term to put in, and he was so faithful that she would not listen to any idea of a separation. Tom learned of the condition of things, as we never had any secrets from him, and he had actually agreed to go and give up his life's service for the family he loved so well. He would not consent to anything but that he must go and save the farm and, family from want. The agreement was made, the mortgage was cancelled and Tom went to the home of his new master, now a slave in fact. Shortly after this my mother's uncle died and left her several thousand dollars. This made us independent and my mother's first thoughts were of Tom. She went South to hunt for him and found him working faithfully. She went to his mas-
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ter, told him that she wanted to take Tom back with her and that she was prepared to pay him in full for his mortgage. This he refused, saying that Tom was priceless and that no money would buy him. She tried in every way to have him agree to let Tom go with her but he would not give in. Tom cried and told my mother not to mind, that he had only a short time to live, and was already feeling that old age was creeping on and that he would soon be in another country where no trouble could come. My mother was a woman full of nerve and she determined to get Tom if it could pos- sibly be done. She was advised to go to Evansville and see a lawyer by the name of Conrad Baker."-This was our beloved Conrad Baker who served afterwards as governor of Indiana and who lived in the house now occupied by Mrs. Maggie Gray .- "My mother explained to him the whole situation and showed him where the proper evidence could be found. She also gave him the emancipation and indenture papers. Mr. Baker told her that there was no doubt about Tom being legally a free man and if he could only be gotten into a free state there would be no legal trouble. But it was found that this could not be done, so proceedings were brought in the county where Tom was held, to liberate him. The proper affidavits were made and the court decided that as he had indentured himself for thirty years and had worked over that time, he was now free. He came back to Indiana with my mother and lived with our family during the rest of his life, and when he died we gave him a royal funeral, feeling that we had lost our best friend and one of nature's noblemen."
After Col. Baker had been elected governor he wrote to Col. Cockrain and stated that in his whole law practice he had never handled a case which gave him as much satisfaction as the liberation of old Tom.
Such negroes as old Tom were a credit to the race. He loved the family that raised him. Many of us have known just such negroes and have loved them, as I did my old black mammy Eliza. My mother gave all her slaves their freedom, but to them it was no boon. In an old box is a poor little ring that dear mammy Eliza bought with her little savings and put on my baby fingers. I have had many a gift but none that came more from a true loving heart than this.
In the old days, stealing a horse was considered an awful crime and as in the countries in the far west now, a horse thief was in luck if he escaped hanging to the nearest tree when he was found with the stolen goods on him. Yet, for some reason, it was not considered very much of a crime to steal a slave and take him back south, and for several years prior to 1850 the country was full of fellows from the south devoid of all hon- esty who considered it a smart trick to capture a slave on any kind of a pretext and sell him into slavery. They were aided a great deal by the law which was passed in 1850 which gave slaveholders or those aiding them, the power to organize a posse at any point in the United States to aid them in this work, and made it the duty of the police and peace officers of the United States to aid them at all times in running down alleged
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slaves and this also imposed heavy fines and penalties on any one who would refuse to assist. This was repugnant to a great many persons as Indiana never was intended to be a slave state and the greater number of people who had helped to make this town up to that time, were Eastern, people who were imbued with abolitionistic ideas. There was at that time an anti-slavery league in the east and very many wise and shrewd eastern men were in the organization. They had a detective system and a spy system to help those who were assisting runaway slaves to reach Canada. To be honest, they really had no more right to do this under the law than the southern men had to take back slaves under the law, but I give this to show what the general feeling was at that time. For the last few years before the Civil war, a runaway slave was easily captured in Indiana. There was a perfect system of spies who were firmly against slavery yet who never failed to proclaim themselves as being very deeply in favor of the slave system and through this they they were enabled to get into the good graces of all the southern slave-drivers who came into this region. These latter were often seen passing through the country and of course they were not really entitled to the name of southerners. They may have been born south, but they were of the Simon Legree type, a creature who has been shown up so often in Uncle Tom's Cabin. It will be remembered that Simon Legree was a down-east Yankee of the lowest type and so were these men who pretended to be southern gentlemen, but they had absolutely no right whatever to the name. I class them in the same category with the carpet baggers who were sent south by northern politicians just after the war or as plain horse thieves. They were all of the same type and it would have been a blessing to the country if they could have all been hung to- gether. These slave hunters had their hand bills at every crossing. Many of us remember the old cut of the negro with a bundle carried at the end of a stick on his back. I have seen hundreds of them, and underneath, a description of some alleged runaway and the amount of reward that would be paid for his recovery. These anti-slave spies were able to counteract nearly all the efforts of the slave hunters. They would get information as to the negroes who were being sought after and at once put their friends on their guard and the negro would disappear.
One instance will show how things sometimes worked. An old negro had three sons, 15, 12, 10 years of age respectively. She was keeping them near here until she could send them to Liberia. The boys were good work- ers and had been here about two years. The old man, their father, was a free man and had married a slave and bought her freedom. One evening just as work for the day was closing two men rode up to the front of the house of the farmer for whom the boys were working and said they wanted to see them. They told him they had a description of three colored boys who were born in South Carolina and were slaves and they had called on him to get his assistance in turning them over to their rightful owners. Of course these two men had been posted by some confederate in the neigh-
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borhood who had given a thorough description of the boys, as the descrip- tion they furnished, tallied exactly. The farmer went into the house for a moment and then came back on the porch with his big bear gun in his hands. The men at once commenced to tell him that they did not want any trouble. He said there would be no trouble at all, but he just wanted to show them what kind of a machine he kept around the house to protect the boys so that they could sleep well and be able to do their work the next day. Said he, "These three boys are asleep out there," pointing to a little room in the yard, "and I don't want them disturbed. You cannot have them, fugitive law or any other law and I want to say that I have fits of anger that come on me once in a while and I feel one coming on right now, and" cocking his gun, "the best you can do is to git out of range of this gun. I don't want to hut you, but I am not responsible when these fits come on." They didn't stop to parley but went out and got on their horses and started down the road. When about 75 yards away the old farmer let that bear gun go and for years afterwards he would go into spasms of laughter when he told of what a noise the old gun made and how those fellows lay down on their horses' necks and yelled as they went through the woods. The funny thing was that the next year the farmer ran for the legislature and the confederate of these two men who had posted them, was one of his bitterest enemies. Of course this was because he had been deprived of the boys and he went all through the country telling what a bloodthirsty man the old farmer was and said he could prove that he did not think anything more of the life of a man than he did of a bear. Finally he got so bold about it, that the old farmer one day met him in a crowd and told him that as he had been telling about half of the story he might just as well finish it up and he then and there made him tell the whole thing and the med- ling fellow was laughed out of the town.
One negro was kidnaped at our little town of Princeton. He was a free man who had been given his freedom for saving his master's life in South Carolina. A maniac there had become desperate and had been kept in confinement in the best place they had but with a maniac's cunning he had escaped and was wandering over the country. Seeing this slave's owner at work in the field he crept up behind him and pinched his arms, threw him to the ground and was just starting to cut the man's throat when the negro ran up with a common garden hoe and felled him to the ground, killing him instantly. His master said, "Rube, from this day on you are a free man and I will make out your free papers at once." The papers were made out giving a full history of the reason and this was all recorded on the record books of the county in South Carolina where he lived. To make it certain that no one would ever disturb Rube, he had the history of the case engraved on a gold plate and had it attached to a chain that went around his neck so that if he should be stopped at any time he had only to show this to escape being molested. By some means Rube was captured, taken south and sold and it was in 1832 that he was again seen by a Mr.
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Bayard who was getting cotton out of the river for a boat which he was running to New Orleans. At one landing where the planters were deliver- ing from the sheds, a negro who was rolling the bales aboard, as he came back, stopped at Mr. Bayard's side and whispered quickly, "Don't you know me? I am Rube, who hunted with you in Indiana. Don't let anyone know." Bayard knew him in a moment and his first thought was to help him. So he told him to roll a few bales behind the cabin stairs. Rube told him that his master was on the bank and it would not do for them to be seen talking together but whispered to him that there was a woodyard a few miles below and he would be there when the boat landed for wood late that night. Rube met them at the woodyard and was immediately taken into the hold where he was kept during the entire trip and during the return trip, until they reached one of the military posts on the Arkansas river where Mr. Bayard told the whole story to the commander who agreed to take Rube home and send him back to South Carolina, which he did. The story of his being stolen then leaked out. It seems that Rube started for Evansville and on the road met two men with a wagon. They invited him to take a seat and Rube, who was very fond of showing his medal, told them his whole history. They told him that if he would cook for them they would take him home as they were going to stay in Evansville a few days and then go over to Tennessee and in a few days would be just a few miles from his old home in South Carolina. The poor negro being ignorant of geography, believed them. They did stay in this city for a short time and treated him very kindly but as soon as they got into Tennessee they went right over to Memphis and sold him, claiming that he was their slave whom they had owned since childhood. There seemed to have been quite a number of these negro stealers who made their headquarters around Princeton, as there are several cases on record where they succeeded in getting in their dirty work. In one case two men went to the cabin of two negro men both free, who had lived near Princeton for two years, one of whom could read and write. It is not known exactly how they were cap- tured but the next heard of them they were rolling cotton on the levee at New Orleans.
Dr. Adams of Petersburg, tells of a barber who came to Petersburg and opened a shop. One of these negro hunters soon got a perfect de- scription of him and suddenly a stranger appeared on the scene who pro- duced a hand bill that gave an absolutely perfect description of the barber and which also showed that a reward of $200 was offered for his cap- ture, it being claimed that he had run away from Tennessee three years be- fore. They actually arrested him and were ready to start south with him, when Dr. Adams brought some kind of legal proceedings to gain a little time. He then sent a runner to Vincennes and got Robert LaPlante of the old LaPlante family of that city who build the first hotel there and which will be remembered by many people. Mr. LaPlante swore that the negro was born in a small house in his father's yard in Vincennes and that the
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mother and father had worked for his parents up to the time the barber was nearly grown. There was no use in the stranger trying to combat such testimony, and it is strange to say no offer was made to arrest him and he' was allowed to go free.
One of the most villainous schemes ever worked was one in which a father of Honorable Frank B. Posey took quite a part in breaking up. He was assisted by a minister, Rev. Hopkins. There were several free negroes living not far from Rockport and they had been working on the Wabash and Erie canal. They were strong healthy fellows and just the kind who would bring a big price in the south. It is needless to go into particulars, but there were three men all well-armed who got hold of the negroes and got them into a wagon and started south with them. Dr. Posey and Rev. Hopkins trailed them up but found that they were too strong for them, so stopped to talk with them, and while they were talking with them Dr. Posey took one of the lynch pins out of the wagon and stuck it in his pocket. This was a very serious thing in those days as the only way that the thieves could get along was to use wooden pegs which kept breaking and wearing off. This made their progress very slow and Dr. Posey and Rev. Hopkins were enabled to get ahead of them with some friends whom they had induced to assist them. They stopped them before they got to the river and bringing their guns to bear, soon had at least one of them pretty badly frightened. He started to tell the truth and was reminded by one of the other thieves that he had better remember his oath. At this he suddenly became mute just as the Italian Black Handers do in these days and Posey saw that the only way to get the truth was to separate him from the others. This was soon done and when once by himself he told the whole story. It showed that a hotel keeper who lived in Washington, Indiana, had gotten up the whole scheme and had sent for these men to go and steal these negroes and was to reap quite a share of the benefit.
The rescuing party was so strong that they took the thieves, tied them up and stripped them and then had the negroes give each of them 25 lashes apiece on their bare backs with hickory sticks and it is safe to say that the negroes came pretty nearly getting even right there. When the whipping was over they were untied and then gave 10 lashes each of the two men from Evansville who claimed that they had been merely .hired to take charge of the wagon but as it was positively known to them at the time, what was going on, it was thought this admonition might be a good thing.
After the whipping was over, the rescuing party formed in line with their guns ready and pointed out the road leading to Evansville and told the party to "git" and it is needless to say that they "got." The rescuing party kept the express and team to pay them for the trouble to which they had been put and it is needless to say that no one ever came after them. The revolvers and rifle found were given to the negroes as it was decided that they had gone through enough torture to be entitled to them.
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The funny thing about it was that some time afterwards it was heard that the parties who had been whipped arrived home and told a wonderful tale about how they had met a band of horse thieves who not only whipped them but took their team away from them.
This was about the best plan of rescue that was ever pulled off near here and Dr. Posey always said that its success was due to Rev. Hopkins whose keen mind had worked up the plot.
Just one more story.
In 1852 a large man riding a horse covered with lather rode into Princeton, Indiana. Tied to his saddle were a large whip and several pairs of handcuffs, while a brace of heavy revolvers was belted around his waist. He tied his horse to the rack at the public square and hurriedly posted up a notice of three runaway negroes, offering a reward of $500 for their cap- ture. After this he had his horse put away and inquired for the best tavern. He then asked if anybody in Princeton would be willing to help him in getting three of his slaves who had run away, and he soon found two windy gentlemen who boasted of how successful they had been in capturing run- away negroes. They made a deal with him and the reward was to be divided betwen them if they would get three more men so as to make a strong party who could defy any rescue. The three men needed were soon gotten and their raid was planned.
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