USA > Mississippi > Pike County > Pike county. Mississippi, 1789-1876: pioneer families and Confederate soldiers, reconstruction and redemption > Part 27
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30
The Southern people are persistently charged, by a certain class of Northern writers and historians, as being responsible for, and the foun- ders of, the institution of slavery in the United States; when it is a fact beyond contradiction that one of the very first acts of the founder of the first colony in Georgia was to prohibit the introduction of sla- very; and later on the question began to look so serious that South
Carolina and other States had to pass stringent laws to prohibit fur- ther importation of slaves. The very first act creating the territorial government of Mississippi prohibited the importation of slaves from any foreign port, and as late as the secession of Alabama that State made the initiatory move for the abolition of slavery, which was re- ferred to the Confederate government, but, the war coming on, it was not considered practicable to do so, as organized labor and their services were needed in the production of crops to sustain the armies;
317
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
and, besides, the Southern people held to the belief of gradual eman- cipation in twenty years, and compensation to their owners, while Northern abolitionists held to immediate manumission without compensation.
CHAPTER IX.
Ex-Governor Adelbert Ames, before the Congressional Committee of investigation on Mississippi affairs, testified to a general system of intimidation, frauds and violence on the part of the white people, by which voters in Republican counties were prevented from voting. He found it impossible, without a bloody collision between the masses (he should have said between the races), as he was not supported by the troops, to secure the negroes in their rights in the recent election. He testified that there were riots, shootings and threats, and that the pretext set up by the white citizens of Mississippi of robbing the State by excessive taxation was wholly ungrounded- that taxation in Mississippi was only seventy cents per head, against sixteen dollars in New York. He failed to draw the comparison be- tween the people of New York, possessed of billions of wealth, and those of Mississippi, whose fortunes had been swept away by the con- flagrations and vandalism of an invading army in which he aided, succeeded in its system of plunder by the military government set over them of which he assumed executive authority. In order to contradict the testimony of Governor Ames, given after he had been deposed, a few statistics will be valuable for the enlightenment of those in search of truth.
The constitution of Mississippi did not authorize the executive to involve the State in debt, but at the expiration of his authority the debt of Mississippi is shown to be $2,631,804.24.
Land assessed to owners
$83, 774, 279
Land held for taxes 12,099, 218
Assessed valuation of personal property 35,639,555
Grand total.
$131,513,052
318
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
THE RATE OF TAXATION,
In 1865
$ 1.00 on $1, 000-white rule
In 1866
1.00 on
1, 000-white rule
In 1867
I.oo on 1, 000 -- white rule
In 1868
I.oo on 1, 000-white rule
In 1869
1.00 on 1, 000-white rule
In 1870
5.00 on
1, 000 -- negro rule
In 1871
4.00 on
1, 000-negro rule
In 1872
8.50 on 1, 000-negro rule
In 1873
12.50 on 1, 000-negro rule
In 1874
14.00 on
1, 000-negro rule
In 1875
9.25 on
1, 000-negro rule
In the foregoing it will be seen that the rate of taxation under the government of Ames, in 1874, was fourteen times greater than under white rule, and under military domination, the five years previous to negro rule supported by the military, and in 1875, the last year of his term, it was nine and one-fourth times greater; and in the face of these figures he goes before a Congressional committee and testifies that the charge made by the only taxpayers (the white citizens) of Mississippi, of robbing the State by excessive taxation, was wholly ungrounded.
It was a source of pleasure to the white people of Mississippi, after so many years of excitement and peril, to have at the head of the executive department such a man as John M. Stone. Governor Stone was born in Tennessee and entered the Confederate service as Captain of the Iuka Guards. He distinguished himself by his gal- lantry at the first battle of Manassas, in July, 1861, and became com- mander of the Second Mississippi Regiment. His career as a Confed- erate soldier and his personal courage was such that with him as Governor, and freed from Federal interference, the people of Missis- sippi felt confidence in maintaining white supremacy; but there must be no relaxation of vigilance and organization, not only to make secure the possession of the State government, but to work for the success of the national Democratic ticket in the coming fall of 1876.
On May 5th, John S. Lamkin, Chairman of the Democratic Execu- tive Committee of Pike County, issued a call to the Democrats of the
319
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
county to meet in general convention on the 3rd of June to take into consideration matters recommended by the State Executive Commit- tee.
At this convention the executive committee was reorganized by the election of W. F. Simmons, F. M. Lea, E. C. Andrews, A. A. Boyd, Ephraim Prescott, and Capt. John S. Lamkin, again chosen as Presi- dent, and Hugh Q. Bridges, Secretary.
The following delegates were chosen to the State convention to assemble in Jackson on the 14th of June: Dr. George Nicholson, W. Fleet Simmons, Benjamin Lampton, Ralph Regan, W. C. Barnes, R. H. Felder, W. Lee Patton, James Greener, W. W. Vaught, and Joe Mixon.
To Congressional convention: Dr. George Nicholson, W. Fleet Simmons, J. H. Crawford, Thomas J. Hall, R. J. Boone, Parham Thompson, D. W. Hurst, H. Q. Bridges, S. E. Packwood, and W. D. Davidson.
A resolution was passed urging the various political clubs to keep up a thorough organization.
The club at Osyka was organized with Joseph Mixon as President and Joe Mallett Secretary.
The club at Tyletown was organized with Benjamin Lampton, President; Jesse K. Brumfield, First Vice-President; George Smith, Second Vice-President; F. M. Lea, Treasurer, and J. H. Crawford, . Secretary.
The club at Magnolia was organized with Gen. E. McNair, President, and William C. Vaught, Secretary.
On June 4th, 1876, the Hancock Democratic Club of Osyka was organized, with W. D. Davidson, President, and Meyer Wolf, Secretary, and a membership of sixty-seven, with ten negro members, being the first negroes to join a Democratic club in Pike County. The fol- lowing are their names: Rev. William Greenfield, Rev. G. Robertson, Henry Woods, Henry Roberts, T. B. Commons, Jacob Halfin, Henry Tate, Robert Brumfield, William Brumfield, Bird Braxton.
Two large clubs were formed in the Silver Creek district, whose patriotic citizens were ever in the line of duty. The Tilden Demo-
!
2
1
ī
320
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
ciatic Club was formed with the election of C. W. Simmons, President; S. M. Simmons, Vice-President; and R. L. Simmons, Secretary. Two negroes, Scott Barnes and Thomas Robertson, joined the club. H. W. Sandifer was elected Corresponding Secretary.
The Tilden, Hendricks and Hooker Club was organized at Carters Creek on the 25th of July, 1876, with Joel J. Bullock, President, and John May, Secretary.
The Tilden Colored Democratic Club was organized in Magnolia August 1, 1876, with Samuel Madden, President; Thomas Jefferson, Vice-President; James Scott, Treasurer; Martin Russell, Secretary ; and Joe Singletary, Captain of the Club, and twenty-seven colored members. The men composing this club were the most influential of their race in the precinct, and went to work to organize this club of their own accord and without any influence used on them by the white people. They had lived ten years under the rule of the mili- tary and carpetbagism, which created only a feeling of unrest and a clashing of interests with the white people, and they were willing to make the change in harmony with those upon whom they must depend for peace and protection to themselves and their families. The Freedmans Savings Bank, the offspring of the system of carpet- bag robbery of the negro race in the South, and the total failure of a delivery of the gift of forty acres and a mule, had impressed them- selves on their minds and caused an awakening which placed them in line with their old masters to free the State from misrule.
Simmons Precinct Democratic Club was organized July 29, 1876, with the election of Benjamin Franklin Ellzey as President, and A. S. Smith, Secretary. Resolution inviting colored members adopted.
On the 12th of August, the Holmesville Democratic Club was or- ganized at Holmesville, with John G. Leggett, President, and Hugh Murray Quin, Secretary. A resolution inviting colored members was adopted. David C. Walker, Robert S. Bridges and H. M. Quin were elected delegates to the Central Club organization in Magnolia, third Monday in August.
At the National Democratic Convention held in St. Louis, Mo., on the 27th of June, 1876, Samuel J. Tilden, of New York, was nomi-
321
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
nated for President and Thomas A. Hendricks for Vice-President of the United States.
Rutherford B. Hayes, of Ohio, was nominated for President and William A. Wheeler for Vice-President by the Republican Convention.
In the organization of the Democratic party of Mississippi in 1876, for the final overthrow of carpetbagism and military interference in State affairs, the people had much to convince them that their late defeated opponents were using every effort possible ro reestablish themselves and negro rule in power. John R. Lynch, negro, in the national House of Representatives, from Mississippi, said:
"I desire to make what may be a final appeal. I use the word 'final' be- cause, as little as you may think of it, the condition of the colored people of the South to-day, if not of the whole country, is a seriously critical one. We are standing, as it were, upon the brink of our political and, I may add, personal destruction. When we look to the right we find the angry billows of an en- raged democracy seeking to overwhelm us. When we look to the left, we find that we are crushed to the earth, as it were, with an unjust and an un-Christian prejudice. When we turn to the rear, we find the assassin in certain portions of the country ready to plunge the dagger into our hearts for a public expression of our honest conviction. We turn our faces to you as our friends, our advo- cates, our defenders and our protectors.
"The Democratic party has an armed military organization in several of the Southern States called the White League. This organization has been brought into existence for the sole and exclusive purpose of accomplishing with the bullet that which can not be accomplished with the ballot; for con- trolling public opinion and carrying popular elections by violence and force of arms; for the purpose of destroying the freedom of speech, the freedom of opinion, the freedom of the press and the protection of the ballot. Its mission is to accomplish practically within the union that which could not be accom- plished through the madness of secession."
This sable representative in the United States Congress, sent there by his carpetbag and negro supporters of Mississippi, forgot to say that the white people of the State had been for ten years held under the yoke of a military despotism, and made to pay all the taxes, and assume the burden of debts thrust upon them without their consent. This speech was simply one of the old appeals for United States troops.
The Deputy United States Revenue Collector, D. M. Redmond, had succeeded in getting a troop of cavalry stationed at McComb City, and 21
1
1 !
וה
1
322
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
..
to put a finishing touch to the speech of John R. Lynch, a white preach- er of the gospel who had made his home in McComb City, and shared the kindness and hospitality of its people, Rev. H. M. Church, pre- siding elder of the African Episcopal Church, came out in a slanderous letter published in the New York Witness, on the election of 1875, against the white people of Amite and Pike Counties, so full of vehe- ment slander and falsehood as to excite the contempt of all Northern people who had settled in McComb, and who, from a sense of justice to themselves and those with whom they had cast their destinies, felt compelled to publish a statement contradicting this intermeddlers' statements.
The Magnolia Herald copied Church's letter at the time and char- acterized him as a man of mischief, sleeping and eating with negroes, and inciting them against the white people
Bishop Haven, of the Northern Methodist Church, published a letter in which he stated that at a conference of the A. M. E. Church, he was told how a certain Louisiana representative was brutally mur- dered by the white people. The representative referred to was John Gair, a notorious thief and murderer, who caused the poisoning of Dr. Sanders of Clinton, La., and H. M. Church was Bishop Haven's informer.
The McComb City Intelligencer, published by a Northern gentle- man,* commenting on the scathing editorial of the Magnolia Herald on Church's slanderous letter and that of Bishop Haven, said:
"This is true. Our community here is composed of Northern men and Southern men and people of both political parties and the various Protestant and Catholic denominations, and we believe the feeling is universal that Church, when he resided with us, was a strife-making nuisance. His letter to the New York Witness, defaming the very people who, in another portion of it, he admits have treated him with hospitality and kindness, is characteristic of the man."
Fred Barrett, who had figured in Amite County, sent out the fol- lowing in an open letter in the Southern Republican, published by him at Jackson :
*W. H. Townsend.
323
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
"By becoming fiends infuriate, devils incarnate, as our enemies did last year, we could spread consternation and dismay, ruin and death, in our course; we could soon teach the enemy the full force of his favorite resort, VIOLENCE."
GRANT MUST CALL OFF HIS DOGS.
The New York Herald, in the following language, insisted that President Grant must be made to "take his heavy hand off the South."
"In this canvass one demand should be made by all who love their country, irrespective of party sentiment-let Grant take his heavy hand off the South. Of our soldiers we may say to him, as Richard III. said to Stanley, 'What do they in the South when they should serve their country in the West?' Why should Mississippi be strongly garrisoned while troops are wanted to fight Sit- ting Bull in Dakota and all that region which is now threatened with a cruel and possibly disastrous war? Senator Bayard, in a recent debate, showed how Mississippi has suffered under one of the worst governments ever known, and how much moderation and wisdom are wanted to enforce the much needed reforms. The views of Mr. Bayard are not extreme in this case. Mississippi and the whole South, indeed, are orderly enough, and a presidential campaign is not the time when large bodies of troops should be stationed in any State, when they are needed to fight the common enemy. There is a dividing line between caution and rashness, and we hope the administration may find it."
Rainey, the negro member of Congress from South Carolina, said if they failed to get troops in the South to control the election, he would advise his people to arm themselves and to sell their lives as dearly as possible. "Then," he added with a snap of his jaws, "if we' are not strong enough to fight that way, by the living God, we will bring the torch into combat, and burn out all who seek our destruc- tion."
Gen. Phil A. Sheridan, the "Rough Rider" of the Shenandoah Valley, in Virginia, who, with five thousand troops, passed up that section and desolated it, at a time when there were none to defend it, making war on its unarmed and helpless inhabitants, it was announced by telegram had been appointed military commander of the States of Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and Alabama.
The apprehension of the people in consequence of this appoint- ment could not be appreciated. It was evident to them that Presi- dent Grant and the radical party intended again to place the South-
324
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
ern States under military rule in order to control the coming fall election.
Sheridan's connection with the Louisiana troubles and his denun- ciation of our people as banditti, and having advocated that they be tried as such and shot, gave room for the most serious consequences. Another military despotism, presided over by a man whom they re- garded as destitute of civilized sensibilities, a brute in character as a commander, the slaughterer of a camp of sick Indians, was considered to be willing to perpetrate any outrage that might be desired of him by his master against the white people of these States in order to reëstablish negro supremacy.
Just at this time a great fever of excitement was raised by the news from Wilkinson County and West Feliciana Parish, La.
One Weber, a member of the Louisiana Legislature, instructed the negroes that the only hope for the success of the radical party in that State, was to prevent the Democrats from organizing and break up their club meetings by armed force. Learning a club was to be organized at Dr. Perkins' place, seven miles south of Woodville, at the State line, about forty armed negroes went there to break it up. Finding no club and no one else to kill they murdered Max Aronson, a Jew storekeeper, and wounded his colored clerk.
Gains, the negro leader, seconded by Swazey and Ben King, two other negro leaders, proclaimed war and began to increase his force.'
In the meantime Col. Mose Jackson raised a small body of men and on Sunday engaged in a lively skirmish with the negroes, about six hundred strong. On Monday it was ascertained that the negroes had concentrated a force of about eight hundred men at Fort Adams. Col. Jackson was heavily reinforced, and was joined by two large con- panies of cavalry, under Col. Powers. The negroes were attacked and routed with severe loss. Gains, the leader, was captured and hung.
All these circumstances, with some little local disturbances caused by negroes insulting white ladies, created intense anxiety among the people of Pike County and convinced them that the time had not yet come when they should cease to be on the alert or relax their energies in the coming political contest.
٢
السعر
325
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
If the reader will bear with the writer in this recital it will be shown that all the means that could be brought to bear in Pike County would not prevent an utter destruction of the negro race at this mo- ment if the same circumstances surrounding other communities had been forced upon the white people here. It has already been said that a great influence was wielded by one man in Pike County, which few people appreciated at the time. The very first outbreak on the part of the negroes would have been the death knell of the race in Pike County. At Tylertown a negro named Dick Tyler, who has been mentioned in a former chapter as an obedient and trustworthy slave, insulted some white ladies in that community. It was a wise precaution taken by twenty men of his own color to provide them- selves with the necessary outfit for his punishment, which resulted in his leaving the country.
The Democratic Club at Tylertown was presided over by Benja- min Lampton, a man well beloved by all people, and it was composed of members that would not permit an insult to a white lady by negroes. They had invited the negro men of the community to join them and aid in the effort to restore amicable political relations with them. The negroes were dependent for homes, for labor to earn their support, for the food they ate, for the clothes they wore, for medicines and med- ical attention, for the education of their children, wholly upon the white people, and it was time for them to cease obstructing the ave -. nues which led to peace and happiness and prosperity. When these things could be impressed upon their minds, it was then and then only that a future security for them could be assured. On one occasion, the most important perhaps that ever occurred in that little village, a voice was heard that awakened an interest in the future course of the negroes at Tylertown. When the Democratic Club told them that their rights were not in danger and that they should be made secure in all that pertained to good citizenship, the voice of reason should have come to them for once. They had never attended a Democratic political speaking. It had been the policy of their lead- ers to hold up to their view the ever frightful and cadaverous skele- ton constructed from the corpse of slavery.
.
4
1
326
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
In the next few weeks succeeding the one mentioned here a case occurred in the adjoining county of Lawrence which gave a backse : to the efforts made to smooth over racial conditions. A negro com - mitted an assault upon a white lady, but was promptly hung for the crime.
The radical papers all over the South began the publication of the most extreme and incendiary editorials, advising the negroes to acts of desperation, calculated to incense the Democratic press and cause them to retort in an equally threatening and vindictive spirit.
These were some of the conditions presented at the opening of the campaign of 1876, and they were conditions to be met with a firni resolve.
When the white people saw the character of the forces arrayed against them it was determined to be fully prepared and conduct & campaign under the most aggressive conditions. The executive committee arranged a plan of campaign and all the clubs in the county held weekly meetings. Hon. Samuel E. Packwood, Hugh Q. Bridge; and the editor of the Magnolia Herald were appointed speakers to visit the clubs and address the people on public occasions. Thomas R. Stockdale, Samuel A. Matthews, David W. Hurst, Isaac Apple- white, Harry Applewhite, John S. Lamkin, James C. Lamkin, all able speakers, entered in the work to secure the success of the party.
An effort was made to break up the negro Democratic Club at Magnolia by putting the negro women forward to abuse its members, and threats were made by the "inconvincible" negroes, as they were termed, but the Democratic whites gave them protection and put it stop to it at once. Pike County had its share of irreconcilable and obstreperous negroes who needed something more than gentle per- suasion and argument, and, while the white clubs in all the election precincts were offering inducements to them to come with them, it was determined never again to be placed under negro domination. The carpetbagger and negro had been on top for some years and held the guns while the white people had to pay the bills and feed them. The whites were on top now and held the guns and they were going to continue to hold them at all hazards. Argument and reason had
1
327
HISTORY OF PIKE COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI
failed to convince them in the past. It was time for a practical illus- tration of Caucasian manhood and tutelage by object lessons.
The negro club at Magnolia worked so earnestly and faithfully against the threats and intimidations offered them by men and women of their own color that they were honored by the white people of Mag- nolia with a public banner presentation. The banner was received on the part of the club by Martin Russell, the Secretary. Russell was an ex-Union soldier, an educated man and a good judge of hu- man nature.
It was a curious fact that all, or nearly all the great newspapers at the North were wholly in sympathy with the carpetbaggers and negroes against the white people of their own race and blood. All of the so-called savage barbarity, outrages and crimes claimed to have been perpetrated in the Southern States, were laid at the door of the white people. The negro was the innocent lamb led to the slaughter pen, and the carpetbaggers were the persecuted missionaries and Chris- tian martyrs to the cause of humanity, and it gave unction to their benighted souls when the military interceded to oppress the Southern whites.
In every single instance within the knowledge and experience of this writer, where there was a clash between the negroes and whites, the negroes were the beginners and aggressors. It is so to-day.
During this political campaign, in 1876, there is only one instance to be recorded where Democratic speakers succeeded in drawing the attention of a negro audience at a public meeting in Pike County. The club at Tylertown extended a special invitation to S. E. Pack- wood, Hugh Q. Bridges and the writer to deliver addresses at that place. Packwood was well known as a forceful speaker; he had lived among them for twenty-five years. Hugh Bridges was a captivating orator and the editor of the Herald was born and raised among them. A large number were present.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.