Documenting the American South Logo

Anti-Slavery Leaders of North Carolina:
Electronic Edition.

Bassett, John Spencer, 1867-1928

Ed. by Herbert B. Adams


Funding from the Institute for Museum and Library Services
supported the electronic publication of this title.


Text transcribed by Apex Data Services, Inc.
Images scanned by Matthew Kern
Text encoded by Apex Data Services, Inc., Melissa Meeks and Natalia Smith
First edition, 2002
ca. 190 K
Academic Affairs Library, UNC-CH
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,
2002.

No Copyright in US

Source Description:
(title page) Anti-Slavery Leaders of North Carolina
(series) Johns Hopkins University studies in historical and political science, series XVI, No. 6
JOHN SPENCER BASSETT
Herbert B. Adams
74, x p.
BALTIMORE
THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS, PUBLISHED MONTHLY
JUNE, 1898.

Call number C326.4 B31a c.5 (North Carolina Collection, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)


        The electronic edition is a part of the UNC-CH digitization project, Documenting the American South.
        The text has been entered using double-keying and verified against the original.
        The text has been encoded using the recommendations for Level 4 of the TEI in Libraries Guidelines.
        Original grammar, punctuation, and spelling have been preserved. Encountered typographical errors have been preserved, and appear in red type.
        Publisher's advertisements following page 74 are transcribed as text.
        Series pagination (pp. 267-334) has not been preserved.
        All footnotes are inserted at the point of reference within paragraphs.
        Any hyphens occurring in line breaks have been removed, and the trailing part of a word has been joined to the preceding line.
        All quotation marks, em dashes and ampersand have been transcribed as entity references.
        All double right and left quotation marks are encoded as " and " respectively.
        All single right and left quotation marks are encoded as ' and ' respectively.
        All em dashes are encoded as --
        Indentation in lines has not been preserved.
        Running titles have not been preserved.
        Spell-check and verification made against printed text using Author/Editor (SoftQuad) and Microsoft Word spell check programs.


Library of Congress Subject Headings

Languages Used:

LC Subject Headings:


Revision History:


        

Illustration

[Half-Title Page Image]


        

Illustration

[Title Page Image]


SERIES XVI
No. 6
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY STUDIES
IN
HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL SCIENCE

HERBERT B. ADAMS, Editor.

        History is past Politics and Politics are present History.--Freeman.

Anti-Slavery Leaders
OF
North Carolina

BY

JOHN SPENCER BASSETT, Ph.D., J. H. U.
Professor of History in Trinity College, North Carolina

THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS, BALTIMORE
PUBLISHED MONTHLY
JUNE, 1898.


Page 5

PREFACE.

        When, about three years ago, I began to make a study of slavery in North Carolina I found that there were some men like Mr. Helper, Prof. Hedrick, and Mr. Goodloe, whose participation in the anti-slavery cause demanded a more extended notice than it was possible to give in a general treatment of the subject. Consequently, I have prepared the present sketches. I offer them to the public because it does not seem good that the personalities of North Carolina's contributors to the anti-slavery cause should be forgotten.

        For assistance in this work my thanks are due to Mr. Helper, Mr. Goodloe, Mr. Charles J. Hedrick, of Georgetown, D. C., and Dr. Dred Peacock, of Greensboro, N. C.

J. S. B.

APRIL 15, 1898.


Page 6

CONTENTS.


Page 7

Anti-Slavery Leaders of North Carolina.

THE HOME OF THE ANTI-SLAVERY SENTIMENT.

        No section of the old South contained so much anti-slavery sentiment as did the western parts of Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina, the northern part of Georgia and the eastern parts of Kentucky and Tennessee. This was due to causes entirely natural. The South Atlantic coast region is divided into two distinct kinds of country. Next to the ocean there is a strip of land, varying from fifty to one hundred miles in width, which is a fertile and well watered plain. West of this, and stretching to the mountains, is a hilly region, whose clay soil, though fertile in spots, is not naturally as productive as that lying on the river banks to the east. The eastern division was first settled. It fell almost from the first into the hands of wealthy planters, and soon held many slaves. The western portion, as well as the lands beyond the mountains, was occupied by settlers during the eighteenth century. These came chiefly from Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey and New England. Many of them were Scotch-Irish, and not a few were Germans. Many were persons who had arrived in America a few years before, and who were still poor. Nearly all settled on small farms, which they expected to work with their own hands. Being remote from water communication, they were a long way from market, and consequently industry progressed slowly. They raised most of the articles they consumed, and what they bought they got by carting their wheat or driving their stock from fifty to a hundred miles to Richmond, Va., to Fayetteville, N. C., or to some other point at the head of


Page 8

navigation of the various rivers that traversed this section. Under such conditions the upland counties remained frugal, industrious, simple and democratic. Here slavery was introduced very slowly. From the conditions of industry, as well as from the habits of the people, slavery had at first little encouragement. Had not the eastern and southern edges of this section been opened to the cotton industry, and had not the raising of slaves for the far South become profitable, slavery very probably would have gained no foothold here.

        All the conditions of small farms, simple habits and democratic ideals which have been ascribed to this general region were emphatically attributable to that part of it which lay in North Carolina. The western part of this State, until the railroads were built, about the middle of this century, was very distinct from the eastern part. A line drawn from the Roanoke river at Halifax, through the western parts of Edgecomb, Greene and Lenoir counties, across the center of Duplin and the western part of Pender, thence straight to the Cape Fear river, then continued to the neighborhood of Fayetteville, then across the western end of Harnett, the eastern sides of Wake and Franklin, and thence to the Roanoke river; such a line would enclose a territory which, save for as much of the valleys of the Roanoke, Tar, Neuse and Cape Fear as lay in it, was a level plain, covered with pine forest, and which was not very attractive to immigrants. This region was thinly settled, and until it was cleft by the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad it was not well developed. It remained a "pine barren," and served to divide the east from the west. The counties west of this, except those along the Cape Fear and Roanoke rivers, contained few spots in which slavery had planted itself with any considerable rootage. In the West was, also, no great love of slavery. If a vigorous appeal could have been made against slavery in these counties, they could very likely, at any time before 1860, have been carried for freedom. It is noteworthy that all the anti-slavery leaders the State produced came from within, or near, this region.


Page 9

        Besides the economic and territorial differences between these two regions, one ought to mention a political difference. The counties of the east were small as compared with those of the west. The State Senate was, by the Constitution of 1776, composed of one Senator from each county. The House of Commons was composed of two Representatives from each county and one from each of six designated towns. In 1835 there were in the west twenty-six counties, while there were thirty that might be classed as eastern in spirit. The eastern counties were much smaller than those of the west. This gave the predominance of power to the smaller east. The importance of this is seen in the fact that the selection of the Governor and other executive officers of the State, the judges and the officers of the militia, was left to the Assembly. The west rebelled against this arrangement, and won its rights in the Constitutional Convention of 1835. It was then provided that Senators should be elected from districts formed on the basis of public taxation, and that the members of the House of Commons should be apportioned among the counties on the basis of federal population. The relief for the west is obvious. Of the counties that now had four Representatives, all were western, and of those that had three, nine were western and three eastern; while of those that had only one, twenty were in the east and five in the west, three of the latter being mountain counties, which to this day are very thinly settled. At the same convention the election of Governor was given to the people. Still the gain of the west was not all that it desired. It saw that representation in the House of Commons on the basis of federal population bore severely on it. It was with difficulty that the party leaders could keep this question out of the struggle for the abolition of property qualification for the election of Senators, which was fought through and won, in 1857, after a contest of nine years. Had not the issue of the war removed this inequality, it is safe to say that it would have become an issue between the two sections before many years had


Page 10

passed. Indeed, if we consider the righteousness of antislavery in the abstract, and the superior strength of the vigorous west, it cannot be doubted that, had the question been left to be determined in a peaceful struggle, the west would finally have removed the stain of slavery from the State.

        One other factor of the struggle in the west ought to be mentioned. I refer to the Quakers. There were in Guilford, Randolph and adjoining counties a large number of this sect.1

        1 The Quakers in the Northeastern part of the State were strongly opposed to slavery and supported emancipation; but they did not become so notable for anti-slavery spirit as their western brethren. This was probably because they were in a strong pro-slavery region.


These were as ardent in the cause of abolition here, in the face of slaveholders, as their brethren had been in Pennsylvania. By the time the colonies were committed to the cause of independence the Friends were committed to the cause of abolition. In the face of harsh laws which made emancipation very difficult, they worked on, liberating their own slaves, and sometimes buying slaves of other people that they might liberate them. Those that they could induce to go they sent to the free States; those that would not go they transferred to the Society and held them in only nominal bondage. Thus by the middle of the century they had worked slavery out of their connection. They ever remained a nucleus for anti-slavery sentiment. They joined with their non-Quaker neighbors in the support of a Manumission Society. They accustomed the people around them to the ideas of anti-slavery, and that was a great advance for that day.

        Thus the economic, social and political forces of the western counties made them less friendly to slavery than the eastern counties. Of all the region of the later Confederacy, that which lay in these counties was very probably the strongest in anti-slavery sentiment. It is not strange that out of the sturdy inhabitants of this section there should have come leaders who went so far as to condemn certain


Page 11

effects of slavery, and boldly to denounce the entire system as iniquitous and unprofitable. The most noted of these leaders were Hinton Rowan Helper, Benjamin Sherwood Hedrick and Daniel Reaves Goodloe. The first two lived within this region, and the third, although he was reared in a county which I have classed as eastern, belonged to the same class of people of small means as made up the mass of the people of the west. One other name ought to be added to these, as well for its prominence in anti-slavery efforts as because it admirably illustrates the conditions under which the contest against slavery must be waged. This person, Lunsford Lane, was a member of the enslaved race itself, and perhaps did his most effective abolition preaching in the way in which he rose above the condition of a slave, purchased his own freedom and that of his family at a cost of $3500, retaining at all times the esteem of the best people in the community in which he lived, and receiving the explosions of the wrath of the more violent element in the same community.

HINTON ROWAN HELPER.

        Hinton Rowan Helper was born in Davie county, North Carolina, December 27, 1829. His paternal grandfather was born near Heidelberg, Germany, and came to North Carolina in 1752. His maternal grandfather, who was of English descent, was Cannon Brown, of Virginia. His father, Daniel Helper, married Sarah, the daughter of Cannon Brown, and the pair settled down on a small farm on Bear creek, a tributary of the South Yadkin river. Here there were born seven children, the last of whom is the subject of this sketch. Daniel Helper died in the fall of 1830, and the widow and her seven children, the eldest of whom was less than twelve, were left to support themselves as best they could. They had four slaves, a man and his wife and their two children, and from the labor of these the family managed to live. The training of young Hinton was such as many a backwoods boy gets: rough sports in


Page 12

the open air, hunting and fishing, all kinds of farm work in season, a little schooling in the neighborhood schools, and finally a term or two in a neighboring academy, which, in this case, happened to be in the village of Mocksville. With such an outfit he found himself at the threshold of manhood. His health was not very robust, but as he grew older he became stronger, and he is now an admirable specimen of well-preserved manhood.

        When twenty years old he moved to the city of New York, which he made his home for some months. When he came of age, however, he started off to California, by way of Cape Horn, hoping to make his fortune in the gold regions. At Valparaiso, Chile, the ship stopped for provisions and masts, and this gave the young man his first direct acquaintance with South America, a country with which his later life has been somewhat closely associated. His stay in the gold region was short and unprofitable. In 1854, three years after he had set out, he returned to the farm and settled down to the life in which his boyhood had been spent. Such a life was too dull for him. His mind was active, and he had a store of observations made during his absence. Some minds seem to be set on ball bearings, they work so easily. Mr. Helper seems to have such a mind. His ready use of words and his incisive mental processes easily fitted him for writing. In the quiet of the farm life he wrote an account of his journey, which he called "The Land of Gold." In 1855 the work was ready for the press. He made arrangements for publication with Mr. Charles Mortimer, of Baltimore, then the publisher of the Southern Quarterly Review, and a strong pro-slavery Virginian. In his travels Mr. Helper had found no slave labor. He had been struck with the superiority of free labor. This, he concluded, was particularly true of the cities; and he thought that slaves should be relegated to the country. The work of printing had progressed to some extent when the publisher discovered these sentiments. He refused to print them. The author, anxious for the safe delivery of his first-born, and having already paid $400 for work done on the book, was in despair.


Page 13

He hesitated as to what to do, and at length told the printer to do as he chose with the matter. Mortimer then cut out the objectionable passages and published the book.

        The result of this course was important. The young man, chagrined at what he deemed an outrage, determined that he would be heard. He returned to North Carolina and began an extensive study of the question of slavery. In a year he had formulated his views. In June, 1856, a few days after the nomination of Fremont for the Presidency, he started again for the North, taking with him the manuscript of "The Impending Crisis of the South." In Baltimore he stopped long enough to aid in forming a Republican association, one of the first in the South, and destined soon to be broken up by a pro-slavery mob. He hardly expected to get a publisher for his work in this city; but he, nevertheless, tried to secure one. Failing completely, he went on to New York. Here he found more sympathy for his views, but only a little aid in putting them before the public. The work was offered to the Harpers, Scribner, Appleton and all the other regular publishers, but not one would take it. In his despair he offered the manuscript for nothing, but the offer was not accepted. They all declined, because to publish such strong anti-slavery views, or to have them brought out in connection with their firms, would drive away their Southern patronage. Mr. James Harper, an Abolitionist himself, and a man to whom Mr. Helper had brought a letter of introduction, said to the young author, with great frankness, that while he concurred with the book in its hostility to slavery, and found it worth bringing out, yet, after consulting with his business partners, it had been decided that publishing it would cause the firm to lose at least twenty per cent. of their annual trade. In view of such a fact, they did not dare to undertake the work.

        These were no doubt wise business methods, but they disheartened the author. Between seven and eight months he spent going from one publisher to another. How much he suffered in the meantime will not be easily imagined. Convinced that he had a great principle at stake, he was determined


Page 14

to exhaust every energy to accomplish his task. This long period of waiting was endured with steadfastness. He was committed to the right of being heard on a question on which his opinions had once been suppressed. He felt that he was demanding vindication. At length, worn out with anxiety and disgusted at what he thought a lack of courage on the part of the publishers, he decided to accept an offer made by Mr. A. B. Burdick. That gentleman, who was a book agent rather than a book publisher, agreed to issue the book in his own name, Mr. Helper having previously secured him against loss. The venture proved a handsome success. Mr. Burdick made a fortune from the sales, but, unfortunately, lost it in stock speculation.

        "The Impending Crisis of the South" was well calculated to attract attention in the North. The author was a Southerner, not of the slave-holding aristocracy, but of the class of small farmers. He approached the question from the economic side, while other anti-slavery writers had approached it from the side of the rights of the negro. The literary style was clear and cutting. The author wrote in behalf of the non-slaveholding whites of the South, for whom he claimed an opportunity to make a living. There was a grim directness in the following words, taken from the preface to the first edition: "The genius of the North has also most ably and eloquently discussed the subject in the form of novels. New England wives have written the most popular anti-slavery literature of the day. Against this, I have nothing to say; it is all well enough for women to give the fictions of slavery; men should give the facts." In the same preface he referred to the fact that he was a Southerner, as proud as any of his birthplace, and added: "As the work, considered with reference to its author's nativity, is a novelty, * * * so I indulge the hope that its reception by my fellow-Southrons will be novel; that is to say, that they will receive it as it is offered, in a reasonable and friendly spirit, and that they will read it and reflect on it as an honest endeavor to treat a subject of vast import without


Page 15

rancor or prejudice, by one who naturally comes within the pale of their own sympathies."

        These were fair words; but Mr. Helper must have known well when he wrote them that his book would receive little favor in the South. If he hoped otherwise, he was soon undeceived. The appearance of the work in the summer of 1857 was the signal for a flood of denunciation from that quarter. It was at once declared to come within the provision of the laws against the circulation of incendiary literature. To own a copy was against good taste, and traitorous to the interest of the South. In 1859 John A. Gilmer was the Whig candidate for the governorship in North Carolina. His opponents charged him with owning a copy of "The Impending Crisis." His friends replied by declaring that John W.Ellis, the Democratic candidate, had a copy. The Raleigh Standard, the leading Democratic paper of the State, indignantly denied the charge against Ellis. The truth of the matter, it said, was that in 1858, while Ellis was in New York, Mr. Helper, who had known him in North Carolina, called on him and later on sent a copy of the book. This Mr. Ellis threw out of the window. Sometime later Governor Ellis received another copy through the mails, and that he used for lighting his pipe.1

        1 Raleigh, N. C. Standard, Aug. 10, 1859.


Making bonfires of the book was a mild feature of its reception in many parts of the South. The Northern papers reported that a number of persons were hanged or otherwise killed for having copies in their possession. The truth of the latter statement it has been impossible to prove.

        The enemies of Mr. Helper tried to break down his arguments by blackening his character. It was charged that he had taken fraudulently a sum of money from an employer in Salisbury, N. C., and that when accused of the crime he had admitted it, alleging that he was at the time only seventeen years old, and that another clerk had induced him to take the money. This charge was repeated by Senator Biggs, of North Carolina, in a congressional debate, in


Page 16

1857.1

        1 Raleigh, N. C. Standard, Dec. 7, 1859.


Mr. Helper and his friends indignantly denied the charge, and produced a certificate from his former employer stating that it was false.2

        2 The New Englander, Vol. 15, p. 647.


This accusation continued to be repeated by the Southerners.3

        3 See Samuel M. Wolf's "Helper's Impending Crisis Dissected" )1860), p. 75.


The Standard believed the charge, and doubtless but echoed public sentiment in the State when, in 1859, it said that Helper was good enough for the Abolitionists; he stole money, while Greeley and Thurlow Weed wanted to steal slaves: there was no difference.

        The reception of "The Impending Crisis" by the Northern public, while favorable, was not immediately flattering. Its great popularity was doubtless caused by the political interest that sprang out of it. This came about in this way: In 1857 a gentleman from Rhode Island, whose name is not given, acting in conjunction with Mr. John Bigelow, associate editor of the New York Evening Post, made arrangements to print 100,000 copies of a compendium of "The Impending Crisis." The panic of that year coming on soon after, the project was dropped. In March, 1859, the scheme was revived in a different form. A number of gentlemen, among whom were Samuel E. Sewell, Cassius M. Clay, F. P. Blair, Jr., Charles W. Elliot, David Dudley Field and Charles A. Peabody, now issued a circular, calling for subscriptions to a fund of $15,000 in order to print, as a campaign document, 100,000 copies of such a compendium. The circular said, among other things: "No other volume now before the public, as we conceive, is, in all respects, so well calculated to induce in the minds of its readers a decided and persistent repugnance to slavery and a willingness to coöperate in the effort to restrain the shameless advances and hurtful influences of that pernicious institution." The scheme was endorsed by the leading Republican members of Congress, among whom were Messrs. Colfax, Grow, Giddings,


Page 17

Dawes, Washburn and John Sherman, and by the most prominent Abolition leaders, among whom were Thurlow Weed, Wm. Cullen Bryant, B. S. Hedrick and Horace Greeley. The latter gentlemen declared: "Were every citizen in possession of the facts embodied in this book, we feel confident that slavery would soon pass away, while a Republican triumph in 1860 would be morally certain." It is of interest to know that of the amount collected, North Carolinians subscribed $165. Among the subscribers were Professor Hedrick and Mr. Goodloe, whom the Raleigh Standard described as "two other recreant sons of this State.1

        1 Raleigh Standard, Dec. 7, 1859.


        The plans thus set forth were accomplished. One hundred thousand copies of the compendium were printed in 1860 and distributed throughout the doubtful States of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Indiana and Illinois. In their estimate of the book the Abolitionists were right. Its style cut like a knife. It showed clearness, conviction, and a certain intensity which would likely make a more striking appeal to the voters than the more restrained statements of a more scholarly work. It was not free from the vivid rhetoric to be expected from a self-taught young man from the backwoods, and yet, for the purposes in view, this was no disadvantage.

        The success of this circular was not calculated to soothe the feelings of the Southern Democrats, whose feelings were already at the highest pitch. Their newspapers took up the matter, publishing extracts to show that "The Impending Crisis" was incendiary. To the Southerners this was a deliberate purpose of the Republicans to arouse the entire North against the South. Shortly after the compendium scheme was assured there occurred John Brown's attacks on Harper's Ferry. The South was more convinced than ever of the harmfulness of the book which the Abolitionists were using to propagate their doctrines. While affairs were in this shape Congress met. The caucus nominee of


Page 18

the Republicans for the Speakership was John Sherman, who, with other Congressmen, had signed the above-mentioned circular. To his election the Southerners opposed their strongest efforts. As soon as Congress met a resolution was introduced which declared "That no person who has endorsed and recommended [Helper's] book, or the compendium from it, is fit to be Speaker of this House." One of the fiercest debates in the history of that body now began. Southern members used the bitterest threats. Members on each side went armed, fearing a resort to force. The debate on the resolution was dropped long enough to take some ballots for Speaker, but without any election. Ignoring the usual holiday recess, the contestants went on until, on January 30, 1860, Sherman withdrew his name. Three days later Pennington, of New Jersey, was elected by the Republican and American votes.1

        1 See the preface of the "Impending Crisis," (1860).


        The attracting of public attention to "The Impending Crisis" had a most exciting effect on its sale, which hitherto had not been extraordinary. The demand for it was now immense. Copies might be seen in stacks on every news stand and in every book store of the North. Some proslavery men tried to prevent its sale. The president of the Norristown Railroad Company ordered that it should not be sold in the railroad cars, the gentlemen's waiting-rooms, or the railway stations.2

        2 See Garrison's Liberator, Jan. 20, 1860.


Such efforts were in vain. By the autumn of 1860, 142,000 copies, including the compendium, had been sold. It is doubtful if any other American book not fiction, except, perhaps, Mr. Harvey's "Coin's Financial School," has reached so great a circulation in so short a time. Had the war not begun in 1861, which destroyed the occupation of more Abolitionists than one, the circulation would have gone much higher.

        A more impartial view of the book from a scholar's standpoint would be the book reviews it received at the time it


Page 19

was published. The New Englander (Vol. 75, p. 635, 1857), in calling attention to the fact that the author wrote from the side of sociology, said: "On the subject in this department he has made the most complete and effective presentation within our knowledge. It is thorough, reliable, demonstrating, overwhelming. It consists of facts which cannot be denied or gainsaid; facts derived to a large extent by careful examination and comparison from the census, which cannot be suspected of anti-slavery bias, since it was compiled under the direction of an eminent statistician who is notorious for his pro-slavery principles and zeal." The Westminster Review, having less interest in the conflict, and being more critical in point of style, said, with much justness: "The style of production is peculiarly American. Its language and ideas alike are often extravagant, and its allusions sometimes very personal. Statistics and other facts are well arranged and fully authenticated, but the conclusions of the author are not always correct, and occasionally exhibit a want of practical political knowledge. 1

        1 Vol. 75 (1861), p. 81.


        The burden of Mr. Helper's story was the benefiting of the non-slaveholding whites of the South. These ought to be distinguished from the "poor whites." The latter were a class, in themselves more or less shiftless, living around among the large plantations, without ambition and mostly in extreme poverty. They were largely wrecks, both industrial and moral, on the shores of society; although a child occasionally came out from among them whose efforts enabled him to reach a high place in society. The former class were the small farmers who worked their lands without slave labor. They were most numerous in the west, among the Scotch-Irish and the Germans. They were thrifty and sturdy, and when they removed to the Northwest, as many of them did to escape the effects of slavery, they proved valuable citizens. Emancipation of the slaves would have been a blessing to either of these classes. By it one class would have been raised slowly from degradation


Page 20

to respectability, the other from respectability to wealth. What either of these classes suffered from the slaveholders is seen in this extract from Helper: He says there were several kinds of pine near his boyhood home, "by the light of whose flamable knots, as radiated on the contents of some half-dozen old books, which, by hook or crook, had found their way into the neighborhood, we have been enabled to turn the long winter evenings to some advantage, and have thus partially escaped from the prison grounds of those loathsome dungeons of illiteracy in which it has been the constant policy of the oligarchy to keep the masses, the nonslaveholding whites and the negroes, forever confined."1

        1 The Impending Crisis, p. 110.


        To improve the condition of this class it was necessary to abolish slavery. He started out to learn "why the North has surpassed the South." [2]

        2 Ibid., p. 74.


He boldly attacked the notion that the South excelled the North in agriculture. From the census of Professor De Bow himself, who was a strong Southerner, he showed that in bushel-measure products the North was far ahead of the South, and that the hay crop alone of the North was worth more than all the cotton, tobacco, rice, hay, hemp and cane-sugar raised in the South. This comparison was also made in regard to farm animals, total wealth, gross expenditure and various other items from the census columns. These arguments, inasmuch as they attempt to prove the superiority of free labor over slave labor, were well taken. The North and the South had begun the period of national existence about equal in resources and opportunity. That the latter section had fallen so far behind must be due to slavery. In summing up this feature of the question he uttered the following characteristic sentence: "It makes us poor; poverty make us ignorant; ignorance makes us wretched; wretchedness makes us wicked, and wickedness leads us to the devil."

        Sound as the argument was, there was much that was calculated to make Southern blood boil. It was a time of stern


Page 21

conviction. Each side had little of the spirit of toleration. Mr. Helper ought not to be blamed, perhaps, that he did not rise above the spirit of his surroundings. Certain it is, he was no master of saying unpleasant truths in a palatable way. At times he spoke bluntly, often bitterly. In one place he exclaims: "No man of genuine decency and refinement would have them [the negroes] as property on any terms."1

        1 The Impending Crisis, p. 75.


Speaking of the increase that would be realized in the value of lands if slavery were abolished, he said, addressing the slaveholders: "Now, sirs, this last sum is considerably more than twice as great as the estimated value of all your negroes, and those of you, if any there be, who are yet heirs to sane minds and generous hearts, must, it seems to us, admit that the bright prospects which freedom presents for a wonderful increase in the value of real estate, ours as well as yours, to say nothing of the thousand other kindred considerations, ought to be quite sufficient to induce all the Southern States in their sovereign capacities to abolish slavery at the earliest practicable period."2

        2 Ibid., p. 107.


In the same spirit he finds in the South "three odious classes of mankind; the slaves themselves, who are cowards; the slaveholders, who are tyrants; the non-slaveholding slavehirers, who are lickspittles."3

        3 Ibid., p. 118.


He arraigned severely "the illbreeding and ruffianism of the slaveholding officials" for their conduct in Washington, where, "on frequent occasions, choking with rage at seeing their wretched sophistries scattered to the winds by the logical reasoning of the champions of freedom, they have overstepped the bounds of common decency, vacated the chair of honorable controversy, and, in the most brutal and cowardly manner assailed their unarmed opponents with bludgeons, bowie-knives and pistols. Compared with some of their barbarisms at home, however, their frenzied onslaughts at the National Capital have been but the simplest breach of civil deportment, and it is only for the purpose of avoiding personalities that we refrain from divulging a few instances of the unparalleled
Page 22

atrocities they have perpetrated in the legislative halls south of the Potomac. * * * A few years of entire freedom from the cares and perplexities of public life would, we have no doubt, greatly improve both their manners and their morals; and we suggest that it is a Christian duty, which devolves on the non-slaveholders of the South, to disrobe them of the mantles of office, which they have so worn with disgrace to themselves, injustice to their constituents, and ruin to their country."1

        1 The Impending Crisis, pp. 131-2.


        The last sentence brings up the non-slaveholders, whose wrongs he breathed out as fire. He said to the slaveholders "Do you aspire to become the victims of white non-slave holding vengeance by day, and of the barbarous massacre of the negroes by night? Would you be instrumental in bringing upon yourselves, your wives and your children, a fate too horrible to contemplate? Shall history cease to cite as an instance of unexampled cruelty the massacre of St. Bartholomew, because the world--the South--shall have furnished a more direful scene of atrocity and carnage? Sirs, we would not wantonly pluck a single hair from your heads; but we have endured long, we have endured much; slaves only of the most despicable class would endure more. * * * Out of your effects you have long since overpaid youselves for your negroes, and now, sirs, you must emancipate them--speedily emancipate them or we will emancipate them for you!"2

        2 Ibid., p. 106.


This extract smacks of insurrection. In another place this is found: "In reason and in conscience, it must be admitted, the slaves might claim for themselves a reasonable allowance of the proceeds of their labor. If they were to demand an equal share of all the property, real and personal, which has been accumulated or produced through their effort, heaven, we believe, would recognize them as honest claimants."3

        3 Ibid., p. 142.


These sentiments seemingly grew out of a commendable sympathy for the slaves, and they had a certain justification in facts, yet it is impossible
Page 23

not to see that preaching them to the slaves would have tended to arouse the negroes to insurrection. It is but just to add that such extreme statements occur rarely, and charity should prompt us to think that when they do occur they are but temporary feelings which sober action would repudiate.

        But it was the effect that the book might have on the non-slaveholding whites, more than its effect on the negroes, that the slave-owners feared. Well might they have feared on this score. In 1850 the white population of the slave States was 6,184,477. About 1,200,000 of these must have been voters. Mr. Helper calculated on the basis of De Bow's census that not more than 200,000 slaveholders were voters.1

        1 The Impending Crisis, p. 117.


Accordingly, the non-slaveholding voters must have had a vast majority of the votes. What must have been the result if these votes could have been united against the slave power? He appealed to the non-slaveholders. He told them that they had all the burdens of government and none of the benefits of legislation; they had furnished the fighting force of the armies of the South, yet they had never received from the legislators even "the limited privileges of common schools," while the slaveholders had gone to the North for their teachers and their skilled mechanics, and when asked to do so had contemptuously refused to redress the wrongs of the non-slaveholders. Today this may suggest the demagogue, but there is a deal of truth in it. The remedy must be political. He said: "Give us fair play, secure to us the right of discussion, the freedom of speech, and we will settle the difficulty at the ballot-box." His programme embraced seven principles; "1. Thorough organization and independent political action on the part of the non-slaveholding whites of the South. 2. Ineligibility of pro-slavery slaveholders; never another vote to anyone who advocates the retention and perpetuation of human slavery. 3. No coöperation with pro-slavery politicians; no fellowship with them in religion;
Page 24

no affiliation with them in society. 4. No patronage of proslavery merchants, no guestship in slave-waiting hotels; no fees to pro-slavery lawyers; no employment of pro-slavery physicians; no audience to pro-slavery parsons. 5. No hiring of slaves by non-slaveholders. 6. Abrupt discontinuance of subscriptions to pro-slavery newspapers. 7. The greatest possible encouragement to free white labor."1

        1 The Impending Crisis, pp. 123-4.


        To put these measures into force he proposed the calling of a convention of non-slaveholders from every State in the Union. This should devise the means of fighting slavery, and should publish a platform of principles and invite the support of the non-slaveholders of the South and Southwest. The tendency of this scheme toward Republican politics is evident. Of course the Democrats opposed it. Exceptions can only be taken to the methods by which they opposed it. It is not difficult to imagine the fate of a half-dozen Republican speakers, who, acting on Mr. Helper's suggestion, might have gone to North Carolina to organize the non-slaveholding whites. An illustration of what would have befallen them we have in the experience of Rev. Daniel Worth. Were it not that slavery and the fortunes of many good but mistaken people went down so disastrously in the avalanche of war, words could not be found too strong to denounce the false spirit that made it impossible to preach in a fair manner a doctrine of simple political principles and to appeal in a constitutional way to the best intelligence of those who were recognized as legal voters. More unfortunate than reprehensible was it that the spirit of intolerance had so taken possession of some of the leading people of the State as is shown by the incident which will now be related.

        Rev. Daniel Worth was a native of Guilford county, North Carolina, where, in early life, he had been a justice of the peace. Later he removed to Indiana, and at length became a member of the legislature in that State. Late in 1858 he returned to the neighborhood of his birthplace as a


Page 25

preacher in the Wesleyan Methodist Church. He preached the doctrine of his church, which was strongly anti-slavery, not without criticism, but, on account of the good feeling for his kinsmen, who were prominent people, without molestation. He planted a church at Sandy Ridge, near James-town, in Guilford county, and his postoffice was New Salem. His church had but few members. He aroused the opposition of many Quakers, most of whom were for non-intervention in regard to slavery. Worth thought they should be more positive in their opposition.

        In December, 1859, after the Harper's Ferry affair, Mr. Worth was arrested on the charge of circulating Helper's book, and of preaching in a way "to make slaves and free negroes dissatisfied with their condition." He was required to give bond of $5000 for his appearance at the Superior Court the following spring, and of $5000 more to keep the peace. The first bond he gave. The second he thought unjust, and would not give. He was accordingly confined in the Greensboro jail throughout the winter. While there the sheriff of Randolph county arrested him on the same charge, and bound him over to the spring court. Other sheriffs waited around the place for him, fearing that he might be released and escape. While he was in prison five other men were arrested in Guilford and several more in Randolph, charged with having distributed Helper's book. One of these was Jesse Wheeler and another was an old man named Samuel Turner. All of these seem to have been natives who were converted by Mr. Worth's appeals. The Raleigh Standard bore witness to his success. It said that a few months before this occurrence only one copy of the New York Tribune came to Mr. Worth's postoffice, and that came to Mr. Worth himself. Now twelve copies were received there. To this it added: "We think it probable that one hundred to two hundred copies of the Tribune are circulated in this State, together with numerous abolition pamphlets from Indiana and Ohio." Wheeler alone was said to have distributed more than fifty


Page 26

copies of "The Impending Crisis." On his trial before the magistrate that committed him, Mr. Worth read from the book in order to show that it was not incendiary, a proceeding which the Raleigh Standard seems to have considered especially provoking.

        The arrest occasioned great excitement in the vicinity, and for a time crowds surrounded the jail. A great crowd was in the courtroom when the case finally came to trial. The case was taken up and finished in one sitting. It was midnight when it went to the jury. In his charge the judge is reported to have said that "to sustain the allegation of seeking to excite the slaves and free colored people to discontent, it was not necessary to prove that the book had been read by or recited to a free negro or slave, or that any such knew anything or any part of its contents."1

        1 See N C. Standard, Jan. 4, 1860. Dec. 14 and 21, 1859.


The jury returned at 4 A. M. with the verdict of "guilty." The jury, said the Fayetteville (N. C.) Presbyterian, was composed largely of non-slaveholders.2

        2 Copied in The Liberator, June 15, 1860.


The legal penalty was imprisonment for not less than one year and the pillory or the whipping-post, in the discretion of the judge. The court remitted the whipping on account of the age and calling of the prisoner, and sentenced him to one year's imprisonment. Many of the bystanders, said the New York Tribune, regretted the leniency of the court, and hoped that a more severe judge in another county might add the whipping. From this judgment the prisoner appealed to the Supreme Court of the State, and giving a bond of $3000, he was released. He at once repaired to New York city, where he made anti-slavery speeches and tried to raise money enough to repay the loss of his bondsmen. His bondsmen were his sympathizers, and the court records show that they were required to pay the forfeited bonds. On appeal, the judgment of the lower court was confirmed. It is likely that the authorities of Guilford were glad to be rid of him, so much attention was his case attracting in the North. He
Page 27

lived through the war that settled the question of slavery, and died within two years after its termination.1

        1 See Helper's "Nojoque", p. 199.


        After the publication of "The Impending Crisis," Mr. Helper did not feel that it would be safe for him to return to his home. He accordingly remained in New York in business. In 1861 President Lincoln appointed him Consul to Buenos Ayres. He arrived at his post in the following spring. In 1863 he married Miss Mary Louisa Rodriguez, of Buenos Ayres. His official services at this place were satisfactory, but uneventful. In November, 1866, he resigned his position and sailed for America. He made his home in New York city, where, with some interruptions, he has since continued to reside.

        It was about the time of his return from South America that he severed his connection with the old leaders of the anti-slavery cause. When he took up the study of slavery he took it up merely as it affected the whites. He never was an advocate of the equal rights of the negro. On the contrary, he has always had too violent aversion for them. To this day he will have nothing to do in a business way with any hotel or other enterprise that employs negroes. He regards the negro as an inferior race, without possibility of satisfactory progress, and would hail with delight the day when not one of the race should be in the country. These views are not wanting in "The Impending Crisis;" but in 1857 they were overshadowed, both in his own and in the popular mind, by the question of the evil effects of slavery on the whites. With the question of slavery gone, his mind turned to the negro. He saw how much the presence of the negro had retarded Southern progress, and he conceived a positive dislike for the whole race. While in Buenos Ayres a friend requested him to furnish American papers of protection to a negro, but he stoutly declined, on the ground that the "United States of America are already burdened with four million too many" of negroes.


Page 28

        When he returned to North America the Republicans were coming to deal with the negro problem. Their attitude did not meet with his approval. His pen, always facile, at once went to work; and by the middle of the next year he published "Nojoque, a Question for a Continent." Mr. Helper's best friends must regret that he should have written this book. It is a severe, and, at times, an unreasonably violent, attack on the negro. It assailed, in the strongest way, what it stigmatized as the "Black Congress," and proposed an alliance between white Republicans and loyal Democrats, which, having secured control of the government, should offer the negroes aid to get out of the country by a specified time. Those that did not go should be sent away by main force or "be quickly fossilized in bulk beneath the subsoil of America." The plan was, in short, to expel as many as could be persuaded to go, and to massacre the others. As a part of the history of the time, the book deserves no consideration. It is only in connection with its author, who did before this a great part in a most important work, that it need be mentioned at all. It is charitable to say that recent events had so accustomed Mr. Helper to death that he was inconsiderate of the value of human rights and human life. As to his estimate of the negro, it is enough, in view of the development of opinion on the subject both North and South, to say that he underestimated the blacks. Two other books in the same spirit followed closely on "Nojoque." These were "Negroes in Negroland," and "Noonday Exigencies."

        One result of these later books was to sever completely his relations with the old leaders of the Abolitionists. His failure to accept the theory of the equality of man had always prevented them from receiving him with warmth. They now dropped him altogether, and Henry Wilson, in 1875, when he wrote the "History of the Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America," failed to give him credit for the great influence of "The Impending Crisis." The cause seems to have been the views of the negro problem expressed in these post-bellum publications.


Page 29

        Mr. Helper's later years have been given to the promotion of the Intercontinental Railroad, a scheme by which it is proposed to build a railway from some point in the upper Mississippi basin, through Mexico and Central America, across the highlands on the east of the Andes and across the plains to Buenos Ayres. Later developments would extend this road until it should at last reach the Hudson Bay on the north, and the Straits of Magellan on the south. He removed to St. Louis, Mo., that he might better push this scheme. With characteristic ardor he offered large prizes for the five best essays on the advantage of his scheme, and then published these essays at his own cost. In various ways he has spent on this project $48,000 out of his own pocket. The recent Pan-American Congress took up the matter and secured appropriations by the various nations for the support of an Intercontinental Railway Commission, which has offices in Washington city. Three corps of engineers have been sent to survey the routes. Their work is accomplished, and the reports will soon be published.1

        1 This fact was recorded in 1896. Later information is not at hand.


In the meantime certain roads have been built independently of one another, which may easily be used as sections of the proposed larger system. The evident advantage of such a road makes it certain that as the countries through which it will pass become more thickly settled it will necessarily be built. Mr. Helper's scheme, and the most commendable persistence he has shown in his thirty years of sacrifice and effort in its behalf, has drawn the eyes of business men toward the opportunity, and in the day when it shall be made a real fact the pluck of its promoter will be appreciated by the public. At present Mr. Helper remains a hale and active man of sixty-seven, kind to those who call on him, and ever hopeful for the project which he has on his hands.

BENJAMIN SHERWOOD HEDRICK.

        Benjamin Sherwood Hedrick, eldest son of John Leonard Hedrick and Elizabeth Sherwood Hedrick, was born in


Page 30

Davidson county, near Salisbury, N. C., February 13, 1827. The name indicates that the family was sprung from the German stock, which had a large share in settling this part of the State. John Leonard Hedrick was a farmer on a moderate scale. He was able to give his children the advantages of the neighborhood schools, and to give them enough property to serve for a start in life. The boy, Benjamin, attended the neighborhood schools, and fitted for college under Rev. Jesse Rankin, a Presbyterian minister of Salisbury. There is a story, told and reiterated in the heat of the controversy that afterwards arose, that his father offered him the choice of a college education or property enough to begin life on. For the boy there could be no hesitation in a case like this. He took the opportunity to get an education. In 1847 he entered the university of the State at Chapel Hill, and in 1851 he graduated with the highest distinction. His mind was of a scientific turn, and he made fine progress in chemistry and mathematics. At this time Hon. W. A. Graham, Secretary of the Navy, and a native North Carolinian, asked President Swain, of the university, to recommend a young man to be appointed as clerk in the office of the Nautical Almanac. President Swain recommended Mr. Hedrick, who immediately received the appointment. The duties of this office seem to have been at Cambridge, Mass., and by this means the young graduate was able to take advanced instruction in Harvard College. While there he studied chemistry under the great Agassiz. In 1852 he was married to Miss Mary Ellen Thompson, daughter of William Thompson, of Orange county, North Carolina. In 1854 he was recalled to his Alma Mater to take the Chair of Analytical and Agricultural Chemistry. This position he held until October, 1856, when he was expelled from the faculty for causes connected with his views on slavery.

        It is not hard to trace the development of Professor Hedrick's views on slavery. His birth and his early surroundings had put him in sympathy with that large number of


Page 31

small farmers in the western part of the State, who, as we have already seen, were generally opposed to slavery. His boyhood home was near Lock's Bridge, on the Yadkin river, and on the road that led through that part of the State from Virginia to South Carolina. He declared that he had seen on this road as many as two thousand slaves in one day going to the south, and most of them in the hands of speculators. This seems to have made a deep impression on his sensitive nature. In later life he became convinced that it was a very harmful taking away of property which ought to be left in the State to develop it. The people around him had great cause to complain of slavery. They were mostly workers themselves, and felt all the hardships that free labor must suffer in competition with slave labor. Many of them, through this very reason, had been driven from the State. "Of my neighbors, friends and kindred," said Professor Hedrick in his defence, "nearly one-half have left the State since I was old enough to remember. Many is the time I have stood by the loaded emigrant wagon and given the parting hand to those whose faces I was never to look upon again. They were going to seek homes in the free West, knowing, as they did, that free and slave labor could not both exist and prosper in the same community." This statement he supported by showing that in 1850, according to De Bow's census, which ought to be good Southern authority, there were in Indiana alone 33,000 native North Carolinians, while in all the free West there were 58,000. This was enough to make an Abolitionist out of a less responsive nature than Professor Hedrick's. These facts had an early influence on him. His stay in the North only confirmed this conclusion. It was easy enough for a young man of the planter class, used to the luxury of his Southern home, to spend some time in the North without becoming convinced that in general social welfare the North was ahead of the South. It was far easier for a young man of the middle class, used to the hardships and limitations of the


Page 32

free labor of the South, to go to the North and come to an entirely opposite conclusion; and it was not a very remote mental process to conclude, further, that this difference was due to slavery. Young Hedrick was sprung from the middle class of farmers, and his mind naturally went through the process that has been indicated.

        All accounts of Professor Hedrick agree that he was a man of singular gentleness of character. In a private letter to the writer, Mr. Hinton R. Helper, who knew Professor Hedrick well, says: "With all his virtues, and he was full of them, modesty, amounting almost to bashfulness, was one of his peculiar characteristics." Such a man was not likely to create strife deliberately. Honest, gentle, intelligent, he was, it is but fair to think, more competent to know the right thing to do in the position in which he was placed than we whom a wide interval of time and interests has removed from him. Let us assume in what shall follow that he acted as properly as one might expect from a man of such a character.

        In August, 1856, there was an election of State officers in North Carolina. Professor Hedrick went to the polls in the village of Chapel Hill, in which the university is located, and voted for the Democratic candidates. A bystander asked him if he intended to vote the same ticket in the national election in November following. It is likely that his views on slavery were known, and that this question was asked to make him commit himself in public. He replied that he did not know. He was then asked if he would vote the Whig ticket, and he answered in the negative. Finally he was asked if he would vote for Fremont. To this he answered very frankly that he would so vote if a Republican electoral ticket should be formed in the State. There was no attempt to conceal his intention, and it at once became known among both students and villagers. Mr. Helper, in the letter already quoted, says that time and again Professor Hedrick assured him that he never once sought to


Page 33

disseminate his views among the students or other persons around the place.

        This was in August. No active opposition seems to have been made to these views by those closely associated with him who held them. In the North Carolina Standard, Raleigh, N. C., the leading Democratic newspaper of the State, there appeared on September 13, 1856, a short article under the title, "Fremont in the South," the concluding paragraph of which declared: "If there be Fremont men among us, let them be silenced or required to leave. The expression of black Republican opinions in our midst is incompatible with our honor and safety as a people. If at all necessary, we shall refer to this matter again. Let our schools and seminaries of learning be scrutinized; and if black Republicans be found in them, let them be driven out. That man is neither a fit nor a safe instructor of our young men who even inclines to Fremont and black Republicanism." The editor of the Standard, Mr. W. W. Holden, was a man of strong editorial ability. He is said to have boasted that in North Carolina affairs he could kill and make alive. It seems to have been in some such spirit as this that he now turned his guns on the Abolitionist in the university faculty. It was undoubtedly his deliberate purpose to drive Professor Hedrick from his position. Two weeks after the appearance of the article just quoted, the Standard contained a communication, signed "An Alumnus," which brought up the subject in a more direct manner. The writer began by calling attention to the danger of sending Southern youths to Northern colleges, where they would be taught "black Republicanism," and then shifted to the article in the issue of September 13, just mentioned. He goes on to say: "We have been reliably informed that a professor in our State university is an open and avowed supporter of Fremont, and declares his willingness, nay, his desire, to support a black Republican ticket, and a want of a Fremont electoral ticket in North Carolina is the only barrier to this Southern


Page 34

professor from carrying out his patriotic wishes. Is he a fit or safe instructor for our young men?" This professor, says Alumnus, ought to be dismissed from his position, and if the faculty and trustees have no power to dismiss him, the legislature at its approaching session ought to take up the matter. With feelings highly outraged, he asks: "Upon what ground can a Southern instructor, relying for his support upon Southern money, selected to impart healthy instruction to the sons of Southern slave-owners, and indebted for his situation to a Southern State, excuse his support of Fremont with a platform which eschews the fathers of his pupils and the State from whose university he received his station?"

        All this was plainly aimed at Professor Hedrick. He consulted his friends as to what he should do. He was advised to say nothing, since any defence he should make would not be believed. One of his colleagues made a visit to Hillsborough about that time, and came back with the information that the articles in the Standard had made a deep impression on the inhabitants of that town. Several of the trustees were said to be denouncing Professor Hedrick as an "Abolitionist," which he was, and as "a stirrer up of the poor against the rich," which he certainly was not. The accused remained silent no longer. He wrote a defence of his position, which was published in the Standard of October 4, 1856. Had he been playing a game with his enemies this would have been a bad play. It gave them an opportunity of bringing a definite charge against him. Had he kept silent, the burden of proof would have remained on them. Moreover, it gave them an opportunity of avoiding the real issue, and of proceeding against him for taking part as a professor in the university in partisan politics; although it must be confessed that it was in the slightest sense partisan to express a preference for a party that was not organized or likely to be organized in the State in which he must vote. On the other hand, Professor Hedrick had his rights. He was a self-directing and a self-accounting citizen, and it


Page 35

was perfectly right for him to express his opinion on a public question about which he was being abused in the public prints. Regardless of the question of expediency, his course was ingenuous and manly. In the light of present knowledge, the South knows that he spoke the truth, and one ought not to criticise a man for speaking the truth, especially if he be an instructor in an institution of learning, which ought at all times to be a leader of truth.

        Professor Hedrick's statement was made in a spirit of fairness, and with far less temper than either the editor or "An Alumnus" had shown. Owning readily that he was the man aimed at in the Standard, he avowed with frankness that he preferred Fremont for President, and gave two reasons--(1) because he liked the man, and (2) because Fremont was on the right side of the slavery question. Discussing the latter reason, he branched out into an argument against slavery, perhaps the only anti-slavery argument ever admitted to the columns of the Standard. This feature made five-sixths of his article. He cited the views of Washington, Jefferson, Henry, Madison and Randolph on slavery. The works of these statesmen were much read in the library of the university. He said that in the western part of the State popular sentiment was against slavery, and that a large number of people had gone from there to the West. He made the point that the continual taking away of slaves for the far South cut off a great deal of the labor of the State that ought to be left to develop it. He declared that he had nothing to do with the politics of the students, adding: "They would not have known my own predilections in the present contest had not one of the number asked me which candidate I preferred." Of "An Alumnus" he said: "I shall not attempt to abridge his liberty in the least, but my own opinion I will have, whether he is willing to grant me that right of every freeman or not. I believe I have had quite as good an opportunity as he has to form an opinion on the question now to be settled. And when 'Alumnus' talks of 'driving me out' for sentiments


Page 36

once held by [Washington and Jefferson] I cannot help thinking that he is becoming rather fanatical." He closed by saying: "I do not claim infallibility for my opinions. Wiser and better men than I have been mistaken. But holding, as I do, the doctrines once advocated by Washington and Jefferson, I think I should be met by arguments, and not by denunciation."

        Having tormented its victim until he had forced him into a position of public condemnation, the editor of the Standard now proceeded to destroy him in the most systematic manner. In an editorial in the same issue with Professor Hedrick's defence it was declared that it could not be expected of " 'An Alumnus' or any other citizen of this State to argue with a black Republican." The editor repeated that a man who "even inclines to Fremont and black Republicanism" is not fit to be an instructor in the university. He added: "This is a matter, however, for the trustees of the university. We take it for granted that Professor Hedrick will be promptly removed."1

        1 This editorial and Prof. Hedrick's defence were reprinted in the New York Tribune (semi-weekly), Oct. 17, 1856, and in the New York Herald (weekly), Oct. 18, 1856, and possibly elsewhere.


A week later "A Trustee of the University" took up the matter in the same paper, saying: "This sentiment, avowed by one of the professors, will sink the institution, now grown to giant size and still increasing, unless the trustees forthwith expel that traitor to all Southern interests from the seat he now so unworthily fills. He should be ordered away as a foul stain on the escutcheon of the university to show to the country that the institution is a sanctuary from such vile pollution." A correspondent from Norfolk, Va., wrote also in the same strain.

        Before these two letters were written the university faculty had considered the case. The defence had appeared on Saturday, October 4. The paper must have reached Chapel Hill not sooner than Saturday afternoon. At noon on Monday following the faculty was called together by


Page 37

President Swain, all the members being present. In calling up the matter the president said: "In an institution sustained like this, by all denominations and parties, nothing should be permitted to be done calculated to disturb the harmonious intercourse of those who support and those who direct and govern it. And this is well known to have been the policy and practice during a long series of years."1

        1 North Carolina Standard, Oct. 15, 1856.


The communication of President Swain was referred to a committee consisting of Professors Mitchell, Phillips and Hubbard. These reported as follows:

        "Resolved:

        "I. That the course pursued by Professor Hedrick, set forth in his publication in the North Carolina Standard of the 4th inst., is not warranted by our usages, and that the political opinions expressed are not those entertained by another member of this body.

        "2. That while we feel bound to declare our sentiments freely upon this occasion, we entertain none other than feelings of personal kindness and respect for the subject of them, and sincerely regret the indiscretion into which he seems in this instance to have fallen."


        After a brief discussion the resolutions were adopted, Messrs. Mitchell, Phillips, Fetter, Hubbard, Wheat, Phipp, C. Phillips, Brown, Pool, Lucas, Battle and Wetmore voting in the affirmative. Mr. Harrisse voted in the negative, "simply on the ground that the faculty is neither charged with black Republicanism nor likely to be suspected of it." He considered the whole affair as personal to Professor Hedrick. The students of the university expressed their sentiments by assembling on the campus as soon as the Standard containing the defence was received, and by burning the professor in effigy to the tolling of the bell.

        On October 11, the executive committee of the board of trustees of the university met in Raleigh, Governor Bragg presiding, the sole purpose being, apparently, to dispose of


Page 38

this matter. From the minutes of the meeting I take the following:

        "The president laid before the committee a political essay by Professor Hedrick, published in the North Carolina Standard of the 4th inst., together with sundry letters and papers relating thereto. Whereupon,

        "Resolved, That the executive committee has seen, with great regret, the publication of Professor Hedrick in the Standard of the 4th inst., because it violates the established usage of the university, which forbids any professor to become an agitator in the exciting politics of the day, and is well calculated to injure the prosperity and usefulness of the institution.

        "Resolved, That the prompt action of the faculty of the university on the 6th inst. meets with the cordial approbation of this committee.

        "Resolved, That in the opinion of the committee, Mr. Hedrick has greatly if not entirely destroyed his power to be of further benefit to the university in the office which he now fills."


        These resolutions were passed unanimously.

        While the specific words were not used, this was in reality a dismissal. The next issue of the Standard announced, "with much gratification," the removal of Professor Hedrick. Referring to his probable course in the future, the paper further said: "If the Abolitionists should take him up the history of his conduct will follow him, and they will know, as he will feel, that they have received into their bosom a dangerous but congenial and ungrateful thing." This was a bitter thrust at a defeated antagonist. It is worth noting, because it says not one syllable about the offence of writing a political letter. The Standard a week later took up the matter again, and laid down its general doctrine as follows: "We say now, after due consideration, but with no purpose to make any special application of the remark, that no man who is avowedly for John C. Fremont for President ought to be allowed to breathe the air or tread the soil of North Carolina."


Page 39

        The cause assigned for the dismissal of Professor Hedrick became afterwards a matter of dispute. The Wilmington Commercial said at the time, in reference to the action of the executive committee: "It was not extra-judicial, as some persons suppose. Some years ago, on account of the introduction of certain political influences into the university, the trustees established a standing rule that neither professors nor scholars should engage in political conflicts. It was under this rule that Mr. Hedrick was dismissed, in consequence of his perseverance in wrong-doing, after being duly admonished that he was violating a law of the institution. The wisdom of this regulation will be quite apparent to every reflecting mind."1

         Reprinted in the Hillsboro Recorder, Nov. 12, 1856.


As to when Professor Hedrick had been "duly admonished," or in what sense he had been guilty of "perseverance in wrong-doing," does not appear from any evidence obtainable. On the contrary, Mr. Helper says that Professor Hedrick said time and time again that he never once tried to convert a student to his views. The above utterance does not seem to have been seen by Professor Hedrick until his return to the State in the following January. Then he sent the Wilmington Commercial a complete statement, which is worthy of extensive quotation. He said, after quoting the charge above mentioned:

        "Now all this about the trustees having established any such a rule as the one referred to above is a pure fabrication. No such rule exists, and, of course, I could not violate it or be 'duly admonished' in regard to it. But you say I persevered in wrong-doing after I was duly admonished that I was violating a law of the institution. This is utterly false. I was assailed in two different issues of the Standard. I was charged with being a dangerous member of the community, and the editor called upon the mob to drive me from the State as an outlaw. Under these circumstances, I wrote my defence, declaring that I held no opinions inimical to the peace and welfare of the State, that in opposing


Page 40

the extension of slavery I was but holding the doctrines of the best and greatest of Southern men that have lived. The publication of this defence is the sum and substance of my offending. The editor of the Standard said, without waiting for the action of the committee, that he took it for granted that I would be removed. Several of the trustees, since reading my defence and the assaults of the Standard, have assured me that I acted just as a high-minded and honorable man should have acted under the circumstances.

        "The trustees have never been able to assign any reason for my dismissal, except that Holden and the mobocracy required it, and Holden and the mobocracy must be obeyed or the stars might fall, or some other equally great calamity happen to the State.

        "But some will say that I violated a usage of the faculty in defending myself against the attack of the Standard, That is as false as the charge of violating a law of the institution. It is true the faculty have always refrained from taking any prominent part in the politics of the day. But they have always expressed their party preferences as freely as other citizens, who do not make a trade of politics, and when necessary have resorted to the press to give publicity to their opinions on this same vexed slavery question. The same 'usage' exists in regard to the judges. But during the late contest Judge Saunders, before I wrote my 'defence,' addressed a letter to his political friends in Baltimore, which was designed to influence the election, and it was largely circulated by the party presses in the State. No one, however, thought of dismissing Judge Saunders for his breach of 'usage.' And as he was one of the executive committee of the board of trustees, of course he had too much regard for consistency to vote for dismissing me for doing no more than he did himself.

        "The following sentence from an editorial in the Standard explains the whole matter. The editor says: 'Our object was to rid the State and the university of an avowed Fremont man, and we have succeeded.' This explains the action


Page 41

of the board, and there is no need to resort to 'rules' which never existed, or to usages which have nothing to do with the matter.

        "The act establishing the university says that the board trustees may remove a professor for misbehavior, inability or neglect of duty, and they shall have power to make all such laws and regulations for the government of the university and preservation of order and good morals therein, as are usually made in such seminaries, and as to them may appear necessary; provided, the same are not contrary to the inalienable liberty of a citizen and the laws of a State.1

        1 See Laws of 1789, Chap. 20, section 8.


        "If it is a misbehavior to defend oneself against the denunciations of a fanatical party paper, then the trustees have dismissed me with a show of reason. The 'inalienable liberty of a citizen' is little worth if it be to cost one the labor of years to claim a voice in the election of a President, and when accused of holding opinions dangerous to the community, not to be permitted to say to the slanderer that the charge is false. My defence has not been reprinted in a single paper in the State; and yet, in order to drive me from my home and kindred, it has everywhere been published that I was an Abolitionist and the mob excited against me. I have asked that my letter be published to speak for itself and me, but in every instance the editors have refused me even that, whilst at the same time many have not hesitated to circulate every paragraph that could work against me.

        "The papers which have in any way given currency to the notice that I was dismissed for violating any law of the university or the State, will, I hope, do me the justice to publish this note."


        To this plain argument the Commercial of February 5, 1857, the same issue in which the above communication appeared, replied editorially:


Page 42

        "In another column is a communication from Professor Hedrick, containing animadversions on the course of Mr. Holden, of the Standard, and the party to which he belongs. In regard to the 'established rule,' we do not recollect now who was our authority for it, but we well remember that we considered it reliable, certainly as much so as any statement made by Mr. Hedrick can be.

        "Mr. Hedrick is hardly entitled to the courtesy we show him, for, by using the term 'Holden and Mobocracy,' he offers an insult to the great and powerful and patriotic party with which we have the honor to act. However, we let that pass, for our readers will have a great opportunity of observing the great advantages of collegiate attainments and station in the charming style in which the professor turns up the 'pure Saxon.' Young man, too, we believe. Quite smart for his age, certainly. Very bad, indeed, that the youth of our university must lose the benefits of his fine examples and specimens of Addisonian purity and style of elegance and diction. Was he somewhat in a passion when he wrote the words false, falsehood, etc? Well! We wonder! His language being so strong, so argumentative, so convincing, we dare say his gesticulations would be magnificent. We trust that the faculty will permit Mr. Hedrick to recite the communication we publish to the scholars, so that they may lose nothing of its beauties, either as regards its sentiments or the lessons that may be derived from action. Action is everything according to the notion of Demosthenes--'action, action, action,' was his motto. Let somebody see Mr. Hedrick act the thing."


        Here are two articles, each of which may be left to speak for the merits of the side it advocates. On the one side we have a clear, strong argument, unanswerable, a sense of outrage, a protest against passion; on the other we have an avoidance of argument in the beginning, a ruthless unwillingness to concede a desire for truth to the other side, an appeal to passion, and a supercilious tone of superiority. It was a great misfortune for the South that the


Page 43

defence of slavery should have committed it so decidedly to habits of denunciation and intolerance. It was the embittering of tempers naturally sweet, to which only years can bring back their gentleness.

        On October 21, 1856, there was an educational convention in Salisbury, which, it will be remembered, was near Professor Hedrick's boyhood home. Before the recent trouble Professor Hedrick had been appointed a delegate to this convention, and now he decided to attend. One object in going was to learn what was the opinion of the people in that part of the State in regard to his case. In Salisbury he stopped at the house of Rev. Jesse Rankin, who had prepared him for college, and who was then conducting a girls' boarding school in that place. In the evening he went to the Presbyterian Church, where the sessions of the convention were held. He took a seat in the gallery, and seeing his father in another part of the gallery, he went over and sat beside him. This helped to attract attention to his presence. It was soon generally known that he was in the building. A crowd began to collect outside, shouting his name and in various ways evincing an ugly disposition. Their object, said the town paper, was to disgrace him and to force him to leave the place. This made him the object of the gaze of a large part of the audience. Some called him "Fremont" in derision. The children, misunderstanding the allusion, thought he was Fremont, and looked on with wonder and dread. One of them remarked in his hearing that he "was a dreadful little man to be President." Professor Hedrick was embarrassed, and drew his cloak around his face. When the convention adjourned he started out, accompanied by his father and his former teacher. Directly facing the door he saw an effigy of himself, gotten up by some of the young men, and by the side of it a transparency, on which were the words: "Hedrick, leave, or take tar and feathers!" This effigy was burned in the presence of himself and nearly every other member of the convention. The mob gave three groans for the object of their displeasure,


Page 44

who, for his part, accompanied by his father and Mr. Rankin, retired to his lodgings. The passion of the mob was now aroused. They could not forbear to torture as long as their victim was within reach. Between 200 and 300 marched to the boarding school, where they serenaded the hated Abolitionist in true "Calathumpian style," as the Raleigh Standard pronounced it. They shouted, hissed, gave three groans and demanded that he leave town or take an application of "the juice of the pine and the hair of the goose." They even threatened to enter the house and do him personal violence. In the words of the local paper, they "proceeded in a most riotous and reprehensive manner to compel Hedrick to leave town." Finally the mob was quieted by several prominent citizens, who do not seem, before this, to have exerted themselves in the matter. The crowd went to their homes, Professor Hedrick agreeing to leave before daylight. Commenting on this occurrence, the Salisbury Banner said: "We regret this unfortunate occurence as well as every lover of quiet, yet it was a certain demonstration that black Republicans and their infamous principles cannot and will not be tolerated in this goodly land of ours. We admire the spirit, but regret the necessity of the manner in which the condemnation was made."1

        1 The story as given in The Salisbury Republican Banner, Oct 28, 1856, was reprinted in the Boston Traveller, Nov. 6, 1856. A slightly varying account is that of the Raleigh Standard, Nov. 6, 1856. From these two narratives as well as from facts furnished by Prof. Hedrick's family the above has been reproduced.


        Early next morning the young man, hunted from the scenes of his boyhood like a criminal, took his way to the house of his brother, who lived near the railroad station of Lexington. To the latter place he at length went with his father to take the train for his home in Chapel Hill. Fearing trouble, the two separated. The precaution was well taken. An excited crowd had gathered, and suspecting that Professor Hedrick might be on board, they searched the cars for him. By


Page 45

getting on the train at the last moment he was able to elude his pursuers, and to reach his home in safety. A few days later he left the State for the North. It was reported at the time that a meeting to express approval of the action of the university authorities was planned in Hillsborough, but that its promoters gave it up for fear that it might be turned against them and made to express approval of Professor Hedrick.

        In January, 1857, the fugitive returned to the State. The excitement of the campaign had subsided, and there was no further political gain in persecuting him. He was allowed to come and go in peace. It was at this time that he wrote his statement for the Wilmington Commercial. It was also at this time that the following, which I find among his papers, was written:

UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA,
CHAPEL HILL, N. C., February 2, 1857.

        The proceedings of the faculty in the foregoing case were dictated by the sense of duty; and subsequent reflection has produced no change of opinion as to the course pursued. We regret most sincerely that a departure from the usages of the institution rendered [necessary] any action on our part.

        We repeat now, what we said then, that we entertain for Professor Hedrick none other than feelings of kindness and respect; and we cheerfully add our decided testimony to his high natural abilities and scholarly attainments. We believe that in these respects, especially as a mathematician and analytical chemist, he has few superiors of his age.

(Signed), D. L. SWAIN, Pres.,

E. MITCHELL, Chem. Prof.,

F. M. HUBBARD, Lat. Prof.,

J. T. WHEAT, Logic and Rhet. Prof.


        What could have been the occasion for this paper I am unable to learn. It is possible that friends of Professor


Page 46

Hedrick had asked for a modification of the former action of the faculty. It cannot have been meant for a letter of recommendation, for five days later these same professors, with one other, signed such a letter in regular form, in which they spoke most flatteringly of their former colleague as a man and as a scholar.

        From North Carolina Professor Hedrick went to New York. Here he was employed as a clerk in the Mayor's office, at the same time lecturing and teaching in the city. In 1861 he gave up this work to become a principal examiner in the United States Patent Office in the Department of Chemistry and Metallurgy, where he remained till his death. From 1872 till 1876 he was also Professor of Chemistry and Toxicology in the University of Georgetown. During the war he relieved many distressed fugitives and prisoners from North Carolina. This was a work in which his gentle nature took great delight. After the war he was an earnest worker for the restoration of civil order in his native State. He died at his residence in Washington, September 2, 1886.

        Of his scientific services in the Patent Office this is not the place to speak at length. His long period of service indicates that his work was entirely satisfactory. An associate in the Patent Office, in an article in The American Inventor (Cincinnati, Ohio,) September, 1886, speaks of this part of his career. From this article a few facts will be taken. When he came to take charge of his work, Professor Hedrick saw that but few patents were issued, and the business of the officials seems to have been thought to be to "head off inventors and kill inventions. * * * There was no sort of sympathy with the inventors, and but small desire to aid them in perfecting and obtaining the patents." This he thought wrong. He adopted a more liberal policy in his own department. His associates were shocked. They thought him a radical. But the commissioner, Mr. Holloway, was broad-minded and fair, and Professor Hedrick's "anti-slavery record was so pronounced that no scorn or ill-will


Page 47

had any adverse influence on him." He held his position, and in the course of time the whole office came to espouse his policy in reference to inventions. It was due chiefly to this movement which he set going that the Patent Office began its great development immediately after the war. Many of the patents that he granted were hotly contested, but the courts almost always sustained his judgment. In the course of time he was generally recognized as one of the most efficient, if, indeed, not the most efficient, of all the men in the office in which he served.

DANIEL REAVES GOODLOE.

        Daniel Reaves Goodloe was born in Louisburg, N. C., May 28, 1814. His ancestors came from Virginia to North Carolina. His father read medicine, but never practised it. He was a school teacher, although, from his early leaning toward medicine, he continued to be called "Dr. Goodloe." Not far back in the family there was a fortunate combination of English, Welsh, Danish and Huguenot blood. Mr. Goodloe's mother was of a Welsh family named Jones. In neither origin nor association was he connected with the class of large slaveholders. In his youth he attended the "old field" schools of the place, where he acquired the merest rudiments of knowledge. Later on he entered the Louisburg Academy, which was supported by the prominent families of the neighborhood, and had the reputation of being among the best schools of its kind in the State. His progress here was not great, however. When he left the school he could boast of no learning beyond the English branches, except a "smattering of Latin." Later in life he went to Tennessee, and there, at Mt. Pleasant, Maury county, studied mathematics, with good results, under a Harvard graduate named Blake. When still a boy he went to Oxford, N. C., and entered a printing establishment there, his purpose being to learn the printer's trade. This period of his life he recognizes as of great formative value in his


Page 48

mental development. Typesetting taught him, as he himself says, "to analyze sentences and to discard, in my mind, superfluous and inappropriate words. Perhaps the slow process of putting the types together was favorable to this result. At any rate, I have always regarded those years thus spent as not the least advantageous to me in the matter of mental training."

        After two years and one-half of apprenticeship, Mr. Goodloe, then just of age, tried a newspaper venture of his own. He began in Oxford, N. C., the publication of The Examiner. The venture was ill-timed, and soon ended in disaster. The editor, encumbered with debt and disgusted with newspapers, went, after some wanderings in Tennessee, back to Louisburg to read law. After a year's study he was licensed to practise in the county courts, and a year later, in January, 1842, secured permission to practise in all State courts. He settled in Louisburg and waited for cases. For nearly two years he waited, but with little success. He had no aptitude for public speaking, and did not succeed in acquiring the facility in argument which is necessary in the general practice of country courts. Mr. Priestly H. Mangum, a brother of Senator Mangum, and a lawyer of prominence, saw this deficiency in the young man, and advised him that it might be overcome by running for some political office. The necessity of defending publicly his position, thought Mr. Mangum, would develop fluency of speech. Franklin county, of which Louisburg is the county seat, was at that time overwhelmingly Whig. Mr. Goodloe was a Whig. His most intimate friends were leading Whigs, and they offered to put him in nomination. "But," says Mr. Goodloe, "I had a thorn in the flesh, which restrained me. I had a profound conviction of the evils of slavery, moral and economical. The agitation had not then reached to fever heat, but it was rising, and it began to be seen that the interest of slavery underlay and touched every other question. I should have been called upon to define my views on the subject, which I could not have done without


Page 49

injury to the Whig cause, to my friends, and to myself." The proferred nomination was accordingly declined. This was a very characteristic action of the man. One of the most prominent traits revealed in his career is his honesty.

        After a year of idleness in Louisburg Mr. Goodloe went to Tennessee, hoping to find fortune more favorable there. This was not his first trip to that State. In 1836, just after the failure of The Examiner, he turned to the West. In 1836 he volunteered in Maury county, Tennessee, to go to fight the Indians. The forces were intended to fight the Creeks, in Alabama; but before the command to which he belonged could rendezvous at Fayetteville, Tenn., the Creeks had surrendered. The volunteers then agreed to go to Florida, against the Seminoles. They went, serving six months as mounted volunteers. They had several skirmishes with the Indians. They were at length mustered out of service at New Orleans. For this service Mr. Goodloe now receives a "service pension." On his second trip to Tennessee he found that there was as little of an opening there for a man who was both a printer and a lawyer as he had formerly found for a man who was only a printer. He accordingly decided to go to Washington City. There he arrived, with no money and few friends, January 22, 1844. At length Senator Mangum came to his assistance and secured him employment as assistant editor of a daily paper called The Whig Standard, of which Mr. Nathan Sargeant, a journalist of repute, was the editor-in-chief. The Standard was not a financial success, and in a few weeks Mr. Sargeant withdrew, leaving the entire management to his newly-acquired assistant. During the hotly-waged campaign of 1844 Mr. Goodloe had control of the paper, but he was not able to fix it so deeply in the affections of his party that it would supply more than a campaign want. On the defeat of Mr. Clay it suspended. He then edited the Georgetown Advocate for a short while, and finally took a small school. He at length secured employment of a more permanent nature when he became assistant editor of the


Page 50

National Era, a prominent anti-slavery weekly, published in Washington, and edited by Dr. Gamaliel Bailey. This paper had been founded in 1847 in order to advocate the principles of the Liberty Party. It had, however, says Mr. Goodloe, always remained free from party domination. On account of the illness and subsequent death of Dr. Bailey, Mr. Goodloe became at length the editor-in-chief. He had now reached a position in which he was thoroughly identified with the anti-slavery clause. It is now time that we see how he came to hold such views.

        In August, 1831, there occurred in Northampton county, Virginia, the well-known Nat Turner Rebellion. The whole slaveholding South was highly alarmed. In Virginia the occurrence divided public opinion. Many people thought it proved one of the dangers of slavery and advocated the enactment of such laws as would look toward the gradual extinction of slavery. This proposition was most warmly supported in the western counties of Virginia. In January of the succeeding winter the legislature took up the matter and had a long debate on the question of gradual emancipation. The speeches made on this occasion were both exhaustive and able. Slavery was handled with a great deal more freedom than it met with again in the South until it felt the rough force of Grant's army at Appomattox. The ablest men in the State took part in it, and they were mostly on the side of emancipation. Among this number was one worthy of special mention, viz., Mr. Charles J. Faulkner, now of West Virginia. He was then a young man, and spoke ably and convincingly for freedom. The two leading newspapers of Richmond, the Enquirer and the Whig, organs, respectively, of the Democratic and Whig parties, were both for emancipation. Mr. Goodloe was then a journeyman printer in Oxford, N. C. These two papers came regularly to the office as exchanges. They were seized and devoured by the boy. In this way the arguments of the anti-slavery side were deeply impressed on his mind. In fact, the statesmen of Virginia who were opposed to emancipation


Page 51

did not attempt to defend slavery. They merely maintained that emancipation was impracticable. The planters of the eastern part of the State, where slavery was strongest, had a more effective measure than argument to use against the proposition. They saw that the life of slavery was threatened. They affected to believe that the debates would stir up the slaves to further resistance. They called indignation meetings, in which it was declared that the legislative debates were incendiary. The clamor they raised frightened some of the more timid members of the legislature, with the result that further discussion of the matter was dropped, not, however, before the friends of freedom had in one of the ballots come within one vote of winning the fight. "From that time," writes Mr. Goodloe, "dates the intense hostility in all the South to the idea of emancipation in any form, whether immediate or gradual. From that time the legislation of the Southern States took on a harshness never before practised. Negroes were forbidden to learn to read, and to teach them to read was punishable by fine and imprisonment. The statutes of every Southern State bear evidence to this effect."

        The Virginia debates were read with interest by many North Carolinians. Some of the State newspapers took the side of emancipation. This was notably true of the Greens-borough Patriot, then edited by William Swaim. Here was a man of strong talents and much ability in writing. He wrote a pamphlet about this time, which was an attack on slavery. Mr. Goodloe says that it would have done credit to any writer. It was reprinted by William Goodell, of New York, but a search in many places has failed to bring it to light.

        While at Louisburg, a lawyer without clients, Mr. Goodloe's mind continued to dwell on the moral and economic evils of slavery. It seemed to him an impossiblity that an institution manifestly founded on an injustice to a whole race could be economically wise or generally salutary. Says he: "The objections to slavery pointed out by Northern


Page 52

writers, that free labor was more efficient, and that a free man would do more work than a slave, failed to satisfy me. I was aware that nothing hindered Southern capitalists and Southern planters from employing free labor. But they gave the preference to slave labor as a matter of convenience and of profit. Slaves, where the institution was tolerated, were preferred to any other form of property. Lands in all the South had little market value. They rarely increased in value after the country became settled and occupied. Personal property other than slaves had no salable value, but there was always a market for slaves, either at home in the old States, or in the Southwest." Still it was impossible not to see that the slave States were far behind the free States in general development. Mr. Goodloe thought much over this disparity in the industrial, educational, literary and social progress of the two sections. After much reflection he settled the question to his satisfaction. One day in 1841, while driving from Louisburg to the neighboring town of Franklinton, the conclusion came to him "that capital invested in slaves is unproductive, that it only serves to appropriate the wages of the laborer." This he proceeded to illustrate as follows: Two farmers live on opposite sides of the Ohio river, the one in Ohio, the other in Kentucky. Each has 100 acres of equally fertile land, and an equal capital in tools and stock. But the Kentuckian must own ten slaves to work his land at an investment cost of $10,000. The two have equal amounts of money invested in land, and they raise equal amounts of produce. Now, when it comes to calculating the net returns of the year, the Kentuckian will have to make more money clear in order to receive an income on the capital invested in slaves. Hence it takes more capital to conduct farming operations in Kentucky than in Ohio. "It is true," adds Mr. Goodloe, "that the Kentuckian receives a larger proportion of the crop than the Ohio man; but he receives it as the wages of the ten slaves, who receive nothing. But Kentucky, the community in which the slaveholder resides,


Page 53

is enriched to no greater extent than Ohio, where the farmer must divide profits with the laborer." The same would be true of slaves worked in a factory. "It may be said that he may hire the slaves. No matter; they still are slaves involving an unnecessary investment of capital. The State in which the factory is situated is the loser of actual capital, whether the employer of the slaves, as hired men, loses or not. The South, when the Civil War came on, held near 4,000,000 of slaves, which they valued at an average of nearly $750 each, and the aggregate value was nearly $3,000,000,000. This abstraction of so vast a sum from active use furnishes another explanation of the dearth of commerce, manufactures and all the conveniences of life from the South. The abolition of slavery destroyed no property. It only changed or transferred titles."

        In regard to individual wealth, this view was wrong. If a slave-owner receives wages for slave labor that is a return for slave capital, and to that extent the capital is not unproductive to him. At the same time the value of his slave has another element of gain in the offspring of the slave. In regard to social wealth, Mr. Goodloe's view seems mainly correct, if it be considered from the Northern standpoint. The North said that the slave was a person, a member of society. Consequently his own property was decreased as much as his master's was increased, and the wealth of the community was not affected. The South said, however, that the slave was not a person, not a member of society, but a thing. His property was not decreased by his not owning himself, because he was nothing. His master's property in him was, accordingly, a loss to the property of no member of society. On the contrary, it was a gain to one who was certainly a member of society, and for that reason a gain to society itself. Happily, we are all now agreed that the slave was a person in the eyes of all humane feelings, and that his rights were defeated by his enslavement. The theory, then, that capital invested in slaves is unproductive as social wealth is a good theory. The further


Page 54

view that emancipation destroyed no property needs, however, some modification. Temporarily, emancipation did destroy property. Value depends upon usefulness. One of the conditions of usefulness is efficiency. When one recalls the disorganized condition of labor in the South just after the war, he will see that although the labor forces were outwardly undiminished, they were still not so efficient as they had been, because they lacked sufficient direction. This effect has been temporary. How long it has continued, or will continue, depends upon the negro's acquisition of the habit of working without compulsion, a process in which, it ought to be said, his progress seems satisfactory. An opposing force to this fall in the productiveness of negro labor has been an increased productiveness of white labor under conditions of freedom. What is the exact resultant of all these forces it would be interesting to discover. On the whole, it seems in favor of the new régime.

        Mr. Goodloe's views were embodied in a pamphlet, and when he went to Washington he laid it before Mr. John Quincy Adams at his house, nearly opposite the Ebbitt Hotel. Mr. Adams examined it carefully and praised it highly. He asked the author if he proposed to publish it. The answer was that he was unable to do so. Mr. Adams then suggested a newspaper publication, and said that there was a young man named Greeley, who was publishing an anti-slavery Whig newspaper in New York, but that he, Mr. Adams, was not acquainted with him. On consideration he advised that the article be sent to Mr. Charles King, a son of Rufus King, then publishing the New York American. This course was followed, and the article appeared in the American at the end of March, 1844. Two years later the author printed 500 copies of the article in pamphlet form. Later in life, while reading Mill's Political Economy, he was struck with the statement that mortgages are no part of natural wealth. Reasoning by analogy, he thought Mill must have his idea of slavery; but further investigation showed that the arguments used in reference to mortgages


Page 55

had not been applied, as might have been done, in reference to slavery. Mr. Goodloe then sent his pamphlet to the distinguished economist and received a letter in reply, in which Mr. Mill said that Mr. Goodloe was clearly right, and that he would embody the idea advanced in the pamphlet in his next edition of the Political Economy, but he did not publish another edition.

        The National Era in its earliest days drew its patronage from the whole country, wherever there was anti-slavery sentiment. It was one of the few papers that were advocating that cause. With Mr. Lincoln's election a large number of papers appeared as supporters of anti-slavery principles. Against these papers the Era could not compete. Local Abolitionists turned to support their home enterprises, and the older journal, after having fought the battle through to victory, died as a result of the success of the cause it had advocated. Left out of employment by this collapse, Mr. Goodloe became Washington correspondent of the New York Times, then strongly Republican. On April 16, 1862, President Lincoln signed Senator Wilson's bill to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. A sum of money not exceeding $1,000,000 was appropriated to pay for the liberated slaves, and it was provided that the average price should not be more than $300 each. To carry out this law a committee consisting of Messrs. D. R. Goodloe, chairman; Horatio King and J. M. Broadhead, were appointed to value the slaves and to order payment for the same. The committee sat for nearly nine months, took evidence, heard arguments, examined the slaves themselves with the aid of Mr. B. M. Campbell, an expert slave dealer from Baltimore, and awarded such sums under the law as they thought just. In this way 3000 slaves were liberated, at a cost to the government of $900,000, in round numbers.1

        1 See Ingle: The Negro in the District of Columbia, Johns Hopkins University Studies, 11th Series, pp. 105-8. Some further details have been supplied from Mr. Goodloe's own statement.



Page 56

        For a year or two after this Mr. Goodloe was engaged in editorial work on the Washington Chronicle. In September, 1865, he was appointed United States Marshal in North Carolina. This position he held until the inauguration of President Grant, when he was removed for party reasons. He remained in North Carolina for some years, but finally returned to Washington city, where he occupied himself at first with the compilation of a book, which was later published under the title of "The Birth of the Republic." He afterwards wrote a history of the reconstruction period, but being unable to print it himself, he sold the manuscript to a prominent politician. That gentleman incorporated it in a book of memoirs, which he was about to issue to cover his experience as a politician, and he used Mr. Goodloe's work without giving him credit. Having purchased the work, he doubtless felt relieved from any obligation to acknowledge its connection with another. Later on Mr. Goodloe compiled a synopsis of the debates of Congress from the earliest times to the present day, but the work has not been published. He remained in Washington writing for the newspapers and investigating many features of our national history. In the winter of 1894-5 he published in the Raleigh (N. C.) News and Observer a series of articles on the reconstruction frauds in North Carolina, which is undoubtedly the best thing written on the subject. In the spring of 1896 he returned to Raleigh, N. C., where he still resides.1

        1 The facts for the above sketch are derived, unless otherwise stated, from data furnished by Mr. Goodloe himself.


ELI WASHINGTON CARUTHERS.

        Few people, perhaps, who know Dr. Caruthers as an historian realize that he wrote a book on slavery. He was, as most of those who know of him will understand, pastor of Presbyterian churches around Greensboro, N. C., for over forty years. He was a man of conviction and was known to be opposed to slavery; but he made no display of his


Page 57

views. Finally, one Sunday morning in July, 1861, at his church at Alamance, he prayed that the young men of his congregation who were in the army "might be blessed of the Lord and returned in safety though engaged in a bad cause." The next day the officials of the church informed him that they needed him no longer. It was probably after this that he wrote his work on "American Slavery and the Immediate Duty of Slaveholders." This book was not published, and until recently few knew of its existence. In February, 1898, it was discovered by Dr. Dred Peacock and placed in the Ethel Carr Peacock Library at Greensboro Female College.

        Two prefaces were written; one when the manuscript was prepared, and one in 1865, when the author made some changes in it. In the second preface he says:

        "The following work would have been published years ago, but for the last fifteen years its publication or circulation would not have been tolerated in any one of the Southern States. It was written at the request of some valued friends who had expressed the wish to see my views in a more permanent form than the incidental or transient utterances of conversation, without any design of ever giving it to the public in its present form."


        Although slavery had then been abolished, it was decided to publish, because the people were thought to be in a better mood to understand and to do justice to anti-slavery arguments, and because "we have the authority of the Bible for holding up the calamitous events to the wicked actors in them as warnings." In the first preface is this statement: "There are some hard things in it [the book], and if there were not it could do no good; for an evil of such an extent, enormity, and long standing cannot be demolished or removed by a little smooth talk. The whole truth must be told. . . . . The language is not abusive, and was certainly not intended to be so; for neither my disposition nor my principles allow me to employ harsh and vituperative language."


Page 58

        Dr. Caruthers was born in Rowan county, N. C., October 26, 1793. He graduated from Princeton in 1817. It was, perhaps, while there that he shaped his views on slavery. Here he met Mr. G. M. Stroud, author of "The Laws Relating to Slavery." From this work he took many of his facts, and it is possible that Stroud had a certain formative influence on the views of his friend.

        A text was placed at the beginning of the book: "Let my people go that they may serve me" (Exodus, 10: 8). The author stated that he should treat African slavery as "viewed in connection with the covenant of redemption." Plainly, he contended that the negroes should be free so that they might become Christians, and that they could not become such in slavery. How he developed this thought is gathered from the following abridgment of the Table of Contents:

        "I. The Claim--My People.

        "1. On creation and preservation. Natural differences among men furnish no justification of slavery. The deep and long continued degradation of the Africans in their own land no reason why they should be enslaved. The alleged antiquity of slavery no justification of the practice. The orderings of Providence furnish no justification of slavery.

        "2. The Lord's Claim on the Africans and all other races and portions of mankind is founded on Redemption. The opinions of learned and good men in favor of slavery is no proof that it is right. Slavery originated in avarice, falsehood, and cruelty.

        "II. The Demand; 'Let my people go': The Demand enforced by Providence; Human beings cannot be held as property. . . . . . .

        "III. Reason of the demand, 'That they may serve me.' Their powers can never be developed while they are in a condition of slavery. According to the present laws and usages of the land slaves cannot make that entire consecration of themselves to the Lord which the Gospel requires and to which the renewed nature prompts them. Under


Page 59

existing laws and in the present state of society slaves cannot have that equality of rights and privileges which is in the New Testament accorded to all true believers."


        The purpose of the book, as he said, was "to contrast the unjust, unchristian, inhuman laws of the South relating to slavery with the teachings of the Bible and the original instincts of Nature." He was impelled to write the book because he had never seen a treatment of the slavery question from this standpoint. Whatever other books may have been written on slavery, it is certain that none gave a more positive note of opposition than this. On the separation of families he was very hard. "Many a sad tragedy of broken hearts and ruined homes," said he, "has been the result [of separation]. I have known some instances in which they have been permitted to live on in great harmony and affection to an advanced age; but such instances, so far as my observations have gone, have been, 'like angels' visits, few and far between.' Generally, in a few years at most, they have been separated--sold off under the hammer like other stock and borne away to a returnless distance."

        It was, however, against the law forbidding slaves to be taught to read and write that he reserved his strongest anathemas. When this law was passed, he charged, the only argument made for it was that if slaves could read they would read the Declaration of Independence, the speeches in Congress, and the newspapers, and so become acquainted with their rights, discontented with slavery, and less profitable to their masters. "It seems strange," he continued, "that a Protestant, a Christian people,--nominally such, at least,--are not ashamed to use such an argument." In another place he burst forth: "How dare you by your impious enactments doom millions of your fellow-beings to such gross and perpetual ignorance? How dare you say that neither they nor their unborn generations shall ever be taught to read the glorious revelation that God has given and designed for them as much as for you?" Still later, he returns to the subject and says: "When do you think that


Page 60

you will have made so much money by their labor that you will be willing to let them go? . . . . If you believe, as you pretend, that the Lord's design in permitting them to be brought here was that they might be converted and prepared to carry the Gospel back to Africa, repeal your laws forbidding them to be taught; give them the time, means, and motives necessary to improve them and send them back full handed and well instructed to the land of their fathers." It is doubtful if a stronger or clearer anti-slavery argument was ever made on this continent.

        This is enough about a book that was never printed. Its author was not, strictly speaking, an anti-slavery leader. He did not stand out as a teacher of opposition to slavery. He was not a leader. But he wrote one of the strongest arraignments of slavery in the abstract that ever appeared. His book was a sermon expanded. Along with the manuscript I found a manuscript sermon on the same text (Exodus, 10: 8), showing whence came the book. This book was not given to remove slavery, but to cure the wound made by forcible emancipation. When the South writhed in bitterness under its hard fate, it would have been a good thing for its peace of mind if it could have been made to see that the extinction of slavery was for the best. Had Dr. Caruthers lived his attempt in this direction would, no doubt, have been delivered to the public. It would, perhaps, have failed immediately. Ultimately, it would have reached those for whom it was intended. Today most people in the South acquiesce in the conclusion that slavery was an evil. But there are few who understand why it was an evil. No better foundation for the study of present social conditions in the South can be had than a complete survey of the conditions of Southern slavery. For such a survey, Dr. Caruthers' work is of great value.

LUNSFORD LANE.

        It is a fit thing that this series of sketches should close with the story of the career of a member of the enslaved race


Page 61

itself. This story will illustrate many sides of the slavery question in the South. Here is the blight of slavery on white and black, the exceptionable negro, who, by admirable perseverance and endurance, struggles on to freedom, the mass of thoughtless and unambitious negroes in the background, the touch of human sympathy on the part of the better class of whites, and the maddened roar of the ignorant and infuriated larger class. How truly was this a picture of slavery and its surroundings.

        Lunsford Lane1

        1 This sketch is based on the "Memoir of Lunsford Lane," by Rev. Wm. G. Hawkins (Boston, 1863). The narrative is not free from the extravagances of a zealous Abolitionist. In places conversations have been reproduced with a freedom worthy of the Greek historians, and at times the author has allowed his imagination to portray surroundings which are characteristically Southern, but which in this case did not exist. As for the main facts of the narrative, I have no reason to reject them. Information about the case is hard to obtain in Raleigh, but from an old resident I obtained a corroboration of the account of the mobbing of Lane as herein given. Still I have not found any mention of the occurence in the Raleigh papers of that day. One of these papers was edited by Thomas Loring who was the Mayor before whom Lunsford was tried, yet it is silent. It is likely that the matter was not published for fear of the effect it would have when copied in Northern papers.

        A letter from Mr. Hawkins says that the facts were obtained from Lunsford himself, and that on a visit to Raleigh after the war the "material facts outlined in the story" were confirmed by a number of colored people who had known, or were related to, Lunsford Lane. Mr. Hawkins closes thus:

        "He [Lane] impressed me as being a man of uncommon natural intelligence and truthfulness, and I have no doubt that the account of his life which I have given is substantially true."

J. S. B.



was a slave of Mr. Sherwood Haywood, a prominent citizen of Raleigh, N. C. His master was the owner of two plantations, one in Wake county, near the city of Raleigh, the other in Edgecomb county. Lunsford was born in the early part of the century, and grew to manhood before the beginning of the severer attitude toward the slaves which came after the Northampton insurrection of 1831. His parents, of pure African descent, had been kept
Page 62

in the town for family service, and thus their offspring had opportunities beyond the other negroes. Lunsford early learned to read and write, a privilege that would not legally have been allowed him a few years later. Many men of political prominence visited at his master's house, and from waiting on these he acquired much general information. He also learned a great deal from the speeches of great politicians. He heard speeches from Calhoun, Preston, of South Carolina, Badger, Mangum, and many others of less note. He waited on La Fayette when he passed through Raleigh in 1824, and was greatly impressed by the distinguished Frenchman's devotion to liberty. Once he heard Dr. McPheeters, the Presbyterian minister in Raleigh, say: "It is impossible to enslave an intelligent people." This made an impression which he never forgot. His desire to gain his freedom grew daily, and all the spare money that he received as fees from his master's guests was put away toward that end.

        In the hope of acquiring liberty there was not a little encouragement for him in the life of the negroes of the town. At that time a strict surveillance had not been established over the religious and social meetings of slaves. They accordingly often in their chance meetings discussed means of improving their condition. The natural inclination of the negro to speech-making helped in this process. The following illustration of this faculty will be of value here. The colored boys of the town had a custom of assembling every Sunday afternoon at a certain mineral spring in the suburbs of the place and discussing, in imitation of the whites, the issues of the day. Some of them, especially the slaves of prominent men, could repeat with great exactness speeches that they had heard during the week. The whites were often present at these meetings, and the master of a bright slave boy would feel a pride in the prowess of his negro and encourage him to improve. At last, however, they came to see that the effect of this was to turn the minds of the slaves toward freedom, and they forbade the meetings. In such conditions the boy Lunsford found himself placed.


Page 63

        His early savings for the purpose of buying his freedom had reached a considerable sum by the time the boy became a man. A part of this he lost through bad investments, and the balance he was forced to spend on his wife. As soon as he was grown he had married a slave of Mr. William Boylan, a most excellent citizen of Raleigh. Shortly afterwards Mr. Boylan had to sell this woman, but he gave her the privilege of selecting for her new master anyone who would buy her. Lunsford was a Baptist and his wife a Methodist. True to the instinct of the race, she decided the matter according to church affiliations. His wife concluded that she would be better off if she were owned by a member of her own church, and he prevailed upon Mr. Benjamin B. Smith, a wealthy Methodist, to purchase her and her two children, the price paid being $560. Lunsford charged that Mr. Smith neglected to feed and clothe the woman properly, knowing that her husband, who was known to have some money, would not let her suffer. In this way he exhausted the balance of his early savings.

        Lunsford had been taught by his father the secret of making a superior kind of smoking tobacco, and this the father and son now began to manufacture for the market. To have free opportunity for this he hired his time, paying for it from $100 to $120 a year. It was some time near this date that his master died. Mr. Haywood had been an indulgent master. He had assured Lunsford that he should be allowed to buy himself. Lunsford now found himself the property of his former master's widow, and he feared that she would not be willing to fulfill the promise. He says, however, that she valued the good opinion of her neighbors, and that they would expect the fulfilment of Mr. Haywood's promise. Stifling his doubts, he worked all the harder. The demand for his tobacco was growing. He enlarged his plant and made arrangements to sell the product in the neighboring towns of Fayetteville, Salisbury and Chapel Hill. At the end of about eight years he had saved


Page 64

$1000. With much anxiety he approached his mistress to propose the purchase of his liberty. Of this negotiation he says: "I casually asked her price, provided I should desire my freedom. She said she would be satisfied with $1000. I then very frankly told her I greatly desired my freedom, and asked if she was ready to execute the deed, provided I could find some person whom I could trust by whom the purchase in my behalf could be made." A slave, it should be said, had no standing in law, and could not make a contract. Lunsford, therefore, had to get some trusted white man to buy and then emancipate him. He decided to entrust the affair to Mr. Smith, his wife's master. That gentleman, after making the purchase, applied to the courts for leave to emancipate Lane. Now by law slaves could be freed for meritorious services only. No such services could be shown in this case, and the application was refused. Mr. Smith, who was a merchant, then proposed that Lane should accompany him on his next trip to the North and have the freedom papers issued there. This was agreed to, and a year later the emancipation papers of Lunsford Lane were recorded in New York city.

        Lunsford was, like most negroes, religious by nature. He says that attendance on church services was a means of much instruction for him. He got the written permission of his mistress to join the Baptist Church. Every Sunday there was one sermon for the slaves preached by a white parson--a law of 1831 forbade any slave or free negro to preach to slaves. These sermons, he says, were usually on the duty of the slaves to obey their masters. The texts were usually like these: "Servants, be obedient to them that are your masters," and "not with eye-service, as men pleasers." One kind-hearted preacher, whom all the slaves liked, became very unpopular when he preached a sermon in which he argued that God had predestined the negroes to be slaves. Lunsford found a friend in Dr. Heath, a Presbyterian minister, who afterwards became a popular temperance lecturer. He was a Virginian, and before


Page 65

coming to Raleigh had liberated a large number of slaves, and through the Colonization Society had sent them to Africa. His views of slavery were liberal, and he helped Lunsford in many ways.

        The business sense of Lane now began to expand his lines of labor. Although he kept to the manufacture of tobacco, he added the making of pipes, and began to sell almost everything kept in an ordinary village store. He also opened a wood yard, and bought horses and wagons for use in connection with it. He was patronized by whites as well as by blacks. In 1839 he bought a house and lot, for which he paid $500. It had long been his object to buy his wife and children, the latter of whom now numbered six. Mr. Smith offered to sell them for $3000. This was thought to be too much, and after negotiating it was reduced to $2500, at which sum the purchase was effected. He gave Mr. Smith five notes for $500 each, and received in return that gentleman's obligation that when the notes were paid he would sign a bill of sale for the slaves. It is impossible not to notice here the rapid appreciation in the value of slave property. This woman and two of her children had been bought not more than eight years earlier for $560, and were now sold at an advance of $1940, and in the meantime the master had had her services. It was a happy day for the former slave when he brought his wife and children out from the house of bondage and gathered them around his own fireside with good hope of seeing them soon as free as himself. His achievement had been wonderful, and is an indication of what a policy of gradual emancipation might have done in developing his race, could circumstances have been so shaped that it might have been entered upon. He had paid $1000 for his freedom. He had paid another $1000 in yearly wages while he was hiring his time, had supported himself and helped to support his family in the meantime, had paid $500 for his home, and had a good business in his own name.


Page 66

        All this prosperity was beginning to attract the notice of the whites. Several other negroes in the place were making progress in the same way. Some of the whites thought this was likely to have a bad effect on the slaves generally. Fearing something like this, Lunsford had been careful, as he said, not to intrude his intelligence, but to seem to know less than he did know. He dressed as poorly and fared as simply as if he were still a slave. He also said that he was careful never to do anything which looked like leadership of the other negroes, that he had done nothing disorderly, and that he had never plotted to free the slaves. The good opinion in which he was held by some of the best men in the place is evidence that this is true. On the evidence of his biographer none of these things were alleged against him. Everything indicates that he devoted himself quietly to the one object of purchasing his family. Certainly with that object in view it would have been a most unwise thing to appear to be an agitator. Throughout the administration of Governor Dudley, and through part of that of Governor Morehead, he was janitor and messenger in the office of the Governor's private secretary. Both the Governor and the private secretary testified to his great efficiency and integrity. To one class of whites, however, his presence and his success were becoming exceedingly objectionable. These were the younger and more adventurous members of the community. They were in most cases the poorer classes, although some reckless sons of the leading families acted with them. They inherited one effect of the system of slavery in the ignorance that all this class shared for lack of common schools. With untaught minds their passions were often the impulse of action, and such seems to have been the condition now. They were unable to see far enough to understand that an industrious and progressive negro like Lane would be an advantage to the negro race, making them more conservative and restraining the tendency to excesses. They became alarmed, and soon convinced themselves that it would be a great calamity if every


Page 67

negro could buy himself and his family at the good round prices that Lane had paid. They determined to run him out of the community. Inasmuch as he had been freed in New York, they concluded that he came within the provision of a statute which forbade free negroes from other States from coming into North Carolina to live. Free negroes violating this act and not removing out of the State within twenty days after notice of it had been served on them were liable to a fine of $500, in default of which they should be sold for ten years. About the first of November, 1840, Lane received notification from two justices of the peace as follows: "Unless you leave and remove out of this State within twenty days you will be proceeded against for the penalty prescribed by the said Act of Assembly, and be otherwise dealt with as the law directs."

        There seems to have been no question that under the law Lane was indictable. He, for his part, appealed to his white friends. He went to see Mr. C. C. Battle, private secretary to Governor Dudley, who took up the matter with energy. Mr. Battle wrote to the attorney on the opposite side, mentioning the services of Lane, especially during the session of the Legislature, which was then about to begin, and asking that the prosecution might be suspended until January 1. No objection was made to this, and the matter was dropped for the time. The object was to stay proceedings until the Legislature met, and then to get a private law allowing the defendant to stay in the State until he had finished paying for his family, he agreeing to leave when that was accomplished. On the day the Legislature convened he was again summoned to appear before the same magistrates and show cause why he should not be punished for remaining in the city twenty days after notice had been given. He easily gave bail to appear at court thirty days later. At the meeting of the court the prosecution was not ready for trial, and the case was postponed until the next court, three months later. He thus gained four months. In the meantime his petition was before the Legislature. The other free negroes


Page 68

in the town who were buying their families had received notices similar to that of Lunsford, and they, too, had petitioned the Legislature. The petitions were referred to a committee, which brought in a bill favorable to the negroes. The fate of this bill was a matter of great concern to Lunsford. No negro was allowed to enter the chambers of the two houses when the Assembly was in session. He found out the committee to whom the matter was referred, and then patiently traced it through its several stages until the day on which it was set for final decision. He waited anxiously around the Statehouse, he interviewed the members as he could approach them, and he awaited the result with great concern. Finally a member came out and said: "Well, Lunsford, the negro bill is killed." It was a severe blow to the poor man. To us, who view the matter after passions have cooled and the false theories of slavery are gone, it seems certainly to have been the doing of a great cruelty. It is to the great credit of Lunsford Lane and the other men who were in the same position that they bowed quietly and without open complaint to the decision. Slavery demanded, above all things, the certainty of its own perpetuation. Before that, all else--sympathy, confidence, generous sentiments, industrial skill, and public intelligence--must go down. It accordingly developed a hundred eyes with which to discover, and a hundred hands with which to stop, any movement of the slave that looked toward his freedom.

        Nothing was now left for Lunsford but to make his preparations for leaving, and for leaving without his family. He thought of some friends he had made in the North when he had gone there to be liberated. Thither he now turned his steps. When he reached Washington City he called on Mr. Joseph Gales, formerly the editor of the Raleigh Register, but then living in Washington with his son, who was one of the editors of the National Intelligencer. Mr. Gales received him kindly, and undertook to help him on his journey. He gave him some recommendations, and warned him that he


Page 69

might have trouble in getting through Baltimore, since the railroad station in that place was being watched closely to stop runaway slaves from the South. As it turned out he did have some difficulty in Baltimore, though not exactly the same kind that he had been warned against. He came near falling victim to what seems to have been a plot to kidnap and sell him into the far South from whose depths, if he ever reached there, his voice would probably never have been able to make itself heard by his friends. Shortly after he had reached the city he and a traveling companion were arrested, at the instance of a negro trader named Slatter, of rather unfavorable reputation, on the charge of being runaway slaves from the South. The case was tried before a magistrate named Shane, whom the negro friends of Lunsford considered an accomplice of Slatter. Regardless of the fact that the two men had their freedom papers properly signed, the justice was about to give judgment against them, when a Mr. Walsh, a rising young lawyer of the city, who was gaining some note as being on the side of the slaves, rose and made so strong an argument in favor of the men that the magistrate was constrained to release them. Lane then proceeded to Philadelphia, where he found friends, who, in turn, sent him on to other friends in New York. Here it was agreed that he should be given countenance in going through the North to make appeals for funds to liberate his family. Returning at once to the South, he settled his affairs preparatory to his departure. He had already paid Mr. Smith $560 on his indebtedness, and he had received one boy, whom he took North and left with friends. Mr. Smith now agreed to accept the house and lot in Raleigh for $500, provided, the balance of $1440 should be paid in cash. It was arranged that the case then pending against him should be dropped, he paying the cost and leaving the State. With these things done, he left for the North just as the court to which he was bound over was convening.

        His hopes of assistance were not in vain. By lecturing in many places, chiefly in New England, presenting the simple


Page 70

facts of his experience, he was able to collect in about one year the amount he wanted to raise. Early in 1842 he wrote to Mr. Smith, asking him to get the Governor to give him a written permission to come back to Raleigh to get his family. The Governor replied that he had no authority to grant such a privilege, but that he thought it would be perfectly safe for Lane to come to Raleigh, provided he stayed no longer than twenty days. This seems to have been good law under the statute. On Saturday, April 23, 1842, the ex-slave arrived in Raleigh. He remained quietly with his family during Sunday, and Monday morning went to the store of Mr. Smith to have a settlement, hoping to be off as soon as possible. Before he could transact his business he was arrested and taken before the Mayor on the charge of "delivering abolition lectures in the State of Massachusetts." When asked to plead he said he did not know whether he was guilty or not. He recounted his early life in Raleigh, and recalled the story of his struggles, his persecution, and his expulsion. This story, he said, he had been telling in Massachusetts. He had told it privately, in churches, or wherever he could get a hearing. He had asked help in rescuing his family. The people had responded to his appeals. He had never asked a contributor whether he was an Abolitionist or not; but it was likely that he had received some money from that source. He closed by reminding them that he would not come back until the Governor had said that he thought it would not be a violation of the law. The Mayor then called for further evidence. None was offered, and the case was dismissed. This course by the Mayor was eminently proper. The action which Lane had no doubt committed would have had the effect of exciting the slaves if it had been committed in the South; but it was not in the State, and accordingly entirely without the jurisdiction of North Carolina courts; besides, the evidence against him was absolutely nothing. Nothing but the blindest feeling could have brought such a charge.


Page 71

        After the trial, Lunsford was about to leave the court-room, when he was warned that he would be killed in five minutes if he went into the crowd that was collected in front of the door. The Mayor tried to pacify the crowd, but was unsuccessful. He advised Lane to leave the town the next day. Lane said he was willing to go at once, and would trust Mr. Loring, the Mayor, to take his money, settle with Mr. Smith and send on the liberated wife and children to Philadelphia. This was agreed upon, and Lane succeeded in reaching the station as the train was about to leave. The crowd, however, followed him, surrounded the train and declared that it should not leave with the object of their wrath on board. The Mayor was present and appealed to the mob, but in vain. They demanded that the negro's trunk should be searched for abolition literature. While they turned their attention to this task, Lane's friends were glad to hurry him off to the safety of the jail. This moment is described by Lunsford himself. He says: "Looking from my prison window I could see my trunk in the hands of officers Scott, Johnston and others, who were taking it to the City Hall for examination. I learned afterwards that they broke open my trunk, and as the lid flew up the mob cried out, 'a paper, a paper.' A number seized it at once, as hungry as hounds after a passing fugitive in the Southern swamps. They set up a yell of wild delight, and one young man of profligate character, a son of one of the most respectable families in the place, glanced upward toward my prison window and by signs and words expressed his gratification." The sheet, however, proved to be a local publication and entirely inoffensive. After the trunk was fully examined the carpet bag was searched. In neither could the crowd find anything that was criminating, and they were temporarily quieted.

        Lane was advised to stay in the jail until night, and then go to the home of Mr. William Boylan, who was so highly esteemed in the community that his house, it was thought, would be a safe asylum. To this he assented. Between


Page 72

nine and ten o'clock at night he left the jail; but he had gone only a few yards when he was seized by a large number of people and rudely drawn away to an "old pine field," where the gallows stood, it being then a permanent institution in Raleigh. He thought they intended to hang him. At length they stopped. They began to question him about his abolition lectures. Finally a bucket and a feather pillow were brought. "A flood of light and even joy sprang up within me," says he. It was to be tar and feathers. A journeyman printer put on the first daub of tar. When the dressing had been applied in regular style, he was given his watch and his clothes and allowed to go his way. He went to his home. Some of his persecutors went with him. They had given an outlet to their passions in the great rough joke they had just played, and now they were in a good humor again. They laughingly watched him remove the tar and feathers, and told him that so far as they were concerned, he might stay in town as long as he chose.

        In the meantime his friends had become alarmed, and had appealed to the Governor for protection. A detail of soldiers was accordingly furnished, which guarded him at Mr. Smith's house all night. Next morning he settled his business matters and made ready to start with his family for Philadelphia. His old friends now showed him the greatest kindness. One gave him food enough to last on his journey, and another sent a carriage to take him and his family to the station. He went to say farewell to his former mistress, Mrs. Haywood, who was then very old. She was much grieved at what had happened, and ended by giving him his aged mother to take with him. She added that he might pay her $200 for the old woman if he ever felt himself able, and if not the loss should be her own. A great crowd had assembled to see the family off. Most of the mob of the day before were there, and appeared to be hostile still. Mr. Boylan had arranged with the conductor of the train to stop on the edge of the town and take up Lane, who was to wait there while his wife and children got on at the


Page 73

station. The mob, not finding the object of their hatred, concluded that he would not leave on that day, and allowed the train to go. When Lunsford did get on he found one of them a passenger on the train. The rioter of the day before was very angry at the escape of his victim, and ran out as the train stopped at the stations, trying to excite the bystanders to go in and drag out the escaping Abolitionist. These attempts were unsuccessful, and in due time the fugitives arrived in Philadelphia.

        Of Lunsford Lane's residence in the North but little need be said here. After a short stay in Philadelphia he went to New York, and from there he went to the annual May meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society. Later he settled in Boston. For some time he was engaged as a lecturer for the anti-slavery cause in New England. In this work he was said to have been very successful. On account of the severe climate of Boston, where he had lost three of his children, he at length removed to Oberlin, Ohio. Here another child died, and he lost through bad investments in real estate most of the money that he had been able to save. On the occurrence of the notable Oberlin Rescue Case he returned to Boston. Early in life he had learned something of the medicinal value of the ordinary herbs in the fields of the South. Relying on such knowledge, he began the manufacture of a medicine which he called "Dr. Lane's Vegetable Pills." In the sale of this he had some success. Later he removed to Worcester, and there remained for some time. He continued to be active in the anti-slavery cause until the war. When or where he died it has been impossible to learn.

        The fact that he rose from slavery to freedom, and to some note as a lecturer, against the most discouraging opposition, is evidence that Lunsford Lane was a remarkable man. He was a true son of toil. He was patient, and when he was reviled, reviled not again. His biographer has given too little of a picture of his character. The annals of his native State, even when he was thought worthy of being mobbed, have


Page 74

dropped his name. The little glimpse that we have of his real self shows what a promise of hope he was for the race he represented. We know enough to be certain that it was a most short-sighted policy in his State that drove him and a number of others out of the community, and made impossible the development of other negroes like unto him. Since the war we have sadly missed such strong characters in our negro population. Twenty-five years before the war there were more industrious, ambitious and capable negroes in the South than there were in 1865. Had the severe laws against emancipation and free negroes not been passed, the coming of freedom would have found the colored race with a number of superior individuals who in every locality would have been a core of conservatism for the benefit of both races. Under such conditions Lane would have been of great beneficent influence. This thought was impressed on the writer in a striking way during the past autumn. He was attending a fair of the negro race in a North Carolina city. Going the rounds of the exhibit of live-stock his attention was attracted by a placard which read: "Horses Owned and Exhibited by Lunsford Lane." Approaching a respectable-looking negro farmer, he said: "Who is Lunsford Lane?" "I am, sir," was the reply. "What kin are you to the original Lunsford Lane?" "Don't exactly know, sir; reckon he was my uncle." "What became of him?" said the writer, thinking to draw the colored man out. "Think he must 'a' emigrated," came the answer. Here was thrift enough to become the owner of a pair of very good farm horses, but not enough of intelligence to remember the fate of the most remarkable member of the man's family, who was still alive thirty years ago. How much did that family lose in the emigration of Lunsford Lane!


        NOTE:--On page 12 the publisher of "The Land of Gold" is given as Mr. Charles Mortimer. The authority for the statement is Mr. Helper himself, (See Noonday Exigencies--pp. 155-163). A copy of "The Land of Gold," which has only come into my hands at the latest possible moment before going to press, has this in print: "Baltimore: Published for the Author, by Henry Taylor, Sun Iron Building, 1855." At this late moment I am unable to reconcile these two statements.               J. S. B.



Page I

THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS
OF BALTIMORE.

        A full list of publications will be sent on application.

        Business communications should be addressed to the Johns Hopkins Press.


Page II

        WILLIAM & WILKINS
COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
6 SOUTH CALVERT STREET
BALTIMORE

        The most modern equipment in Steel Die Machinery enables us to produce at moderate cost Stamping from large dies and in great quantities


Page III

MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES.

        MONTHLY PUBLICATION
With intermission from July to October inclusive.

        DEVOTED TO THE INTERESTS
OF THE
ACADEMIC STUDY OF ENGLISH, GERMAN,
AND THE
ROMANCE LANGUAGES.

        A. MARSHALL ELLIOTT, Managing Editor.

        JAMES W. BRIGHT, H. C. G. VON JAGEMANN, HENRY ALFRED TODD,
Associate Editors.

        This is a successful and widely-known periodical, managed by a corps of professors and instructors in the Johns Hopkins University, with the co-operation of many of the leading college professors, in the department of modern languages, throughout the country. While undertaking to maintain a high critical and scientific standard, the new journal will endeavor to engage the interest and meet the wants of the entire class of serious and progressive modern-language teachers, of whatever grade. Since its establishment in January, 1886, the journal has been repeatedly enlarged, and has met with constantly increasing encouragement and success. The wide range of its articles, original, critical literary and pedagogical, by a number of the foremost American (and European) scholars, has well represented and recorded the recent progress of modern language studies, both at home and abroad.

        The list of contributors to MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES, in addition to the Editors, includes the following names:

        ANDERSON, MELVILLE B., State University of Iowa; BANCROFT, T. WHITING, Brown University, R. I.; BASKERVILL, W. M., Vanderbilt University, Tenn.; BOCHER, FERDINAND, Harvard University, Mass.; BRADLEY, C. B., University of California, Cal.; BRANDT, H. C. G., Hamilton College, N. Y.; BROWNE, WM. HAND, Johns Hopkins University, Md.; BURNHAM, WM. H., Johns Hopkins University, Md.; CARPENTER, WM. H., Columbia College, N. Y.; CLÉDAT, L., Faculté des Lettres, Lyons, France; COHN, ADOLPHE, Harvard University, Mass.; COOK, A. S., Yale University; COSIJN, P. J., University of Leyden, Holland; CRANE, T. F., Cornell University, N. Y.; DAVIDSON, THOMAS, Orange, N. J.; EGGE, ALBERT E., St. Olaf's College, Minn.; FAY, E. A., National Deaf-Mute College, Washington, D. C.; FORTIER, ALCÉE, Tulane University, La.; GARNER, SAMUEL, U. S. Naval Academy; GERBER, A., Earlham College, Ind.; GRANDGENT, CHARLES, Harvard University, Mass.; GUMMERE, F. B., The Swain Free School, Mass.; HART, J. M., University of Cincinnati, Ohio; HEMPL, GEO., University of Michigan; HUSS, H. C. O., Princeton College, N. J.; VON JAGEMANN, H. C. G., Harvard University; KARSTEN, GUSTAV, University of Indiana, Ind.; LANG, HENRY R., The Swain Free School, Mass.; LEARNED, M. D., Johns Hopkins University, Md.; LEYH, EDW. F., Baltimore, Md.; LODEMAN, A., State Normal School, Mich.; MORFILL, W. R., Oxford, England; MCCABE, T., Johns Hopkins University, Md.; MCELROY, JOHN G. R., University of Pennsylvania, Pa.; O'CONNOR, B. F., Columbia College, N. Y.; PRIMER, SYLVESTER; Providence, R. I.; SCHELE DE VERE, M., University of Virginia, Va.; SCHILLING, HUGO, Wittenberg College, Ohio; SHELDON, EDW. S., Harvard University, Mass.; SHEPHERD, H. E., College of Charleston, S. C.; SCHMIDT, H., University of Deseret, Salt Lake City, Utah; SIEVERS, EDUARD, University of Tübingen, Germany; SMYTH, A. H., High School of Philadelphia, Pa.; STODDARD, FRANCIS H., University of City of New York; STURZINGER, J. J., Bryn Mawr College, Pa.; THOMAS, CALVIN, University of Michigan, Mich.; WALTER, E. L., University of Michigan, Mich.; WARREN, F. M., Johns Hopkins University, Md.; WHITE, H. S., Cornell University. N. Y.

        Subscription Price, $1.50 Per Annum, Payable in Advance.

        Foreign Countries, $1.75 per Annum.

        Single Copies, 20 Cents.

        Specimen Pages sent on Application.

        Subscriptions, advertisements, and all business communications should be addressed to the

        MANAGING EDITOR OF MODERN LANGUAGE NOTES,
JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY, BALTIMORE, MD.


Page IV

Recent Publications of the American Economic Association.

        Price of each of the first ten volumes of monographs, unbound $4.00. Bound in cloth, $5.00 for a single volume, $4.00 for each additional volume. The set of ten bound volumes, $41.00, sent prepaid. Price of volume eleven, unbound, $2.00; bound in cloth, $2.50. Price of each volume of Studies, unbound, $2.50; bound in cloth, $3.00. Any bound volume will be sent post-paid to members for 75 cents in addition to the unbound numbers, if returned prepaid in good condition. Copies can also offered in half morocco, at 50 cents per volume additional to the price in cloth.

        Separate subscriptions by non-members, libraries, etc., for the Studies, $2.50 per year; or $4.00 for all the publications. Any single monograph may be obtained at the price given in the list.

        One-sixth Discount to Members and Subscribers on all Orders.

        Address Applications for Membership and Inquiries to

        THE SECRETARY OF THE AMERICAN
ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION,
Ithaca, N.Y.

        Address Subscriptions and Orders for Studies and Monographs to the publishers,

        THE MACMILLAN CO.,
66 Fifth Avenue,
New York.


Page V

American Journal of Archæology.
SECOND SERIES.

        The Journal of the Archæological Institute of America.

        SIX TIMES A YEAR.

        Annual Subscription, $5.00.

        Single Numbers, $1.00.

        The JOURNAL OF THE ARCHÆOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA was established in 1897. It contains:

        This material will be distributed, as convenience may determine, in the different numbers of the Journal for the year.

        Important papers are reprinted and issued separately.

        Communications or the Editors may be addressed to JOHN H. WRIGHT, Editor-in-Chief, Cambridge, Massachusetts, or to any member of the Editorial Board.

        Subscriptions will be received by the Publishers, who also have on sale all the other publications of the ARCHÆOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA.

        THE MACMILLAN COMPANY,
66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK.


Page VI

STUDIES IN HISTORY, ECONOMICS AND PUBLIC LAW
EDITED BY THE FACULTY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE
OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY.

        RECENT NUMBERS.

        The set of nine volumes is offered for $25; bound, $30.

        FOR FURTHER INFORMATION APPLY TO
PROF. EDWIN R. A. SELIGMAN, Columbia University.
or to THE MACMILLIAN COMPANY, New York.


Page VII

ANNUAL PUBLICATION OF
HISTORICAL PAPERS
Trinity College, Durham, N. C.

        PRICE OF EACH SERIES, $1.00; THE TWO FOR $1.50.

        Address, Trinity College Historical Society,
DURHAM, N. C.


Page VIII

NOTES SUPPLEMENTARY TO THE STUDIES.

        The set of fifteen series is now offered, uniformly bound in cloth, for library use, for $45.00. The fifteen series, with sixteen extra volumes, in cloth, for $66.00.

        All business communications should be addressed to THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS, BALTIMORE, MARYLAND. Subscriptions will also be received, or single copies furnished, by any of the following


Page IX

EXTRA VOLUMES OF STUDIES
IN
Historical and Political Science.

        The extra volumes are sold at reduced rates to regular subscribers to the Studies.

        The set of fifteen (regular) series is now offered, uniformly bound in cloth, for library use, for $45, and including subscription to the current (sixteenth) series, for $48.

        The fifteen series, with sixteen extra volumes, in cloth as above, for $66.

        All business communications should be addressed to
THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS, Baltimore, Maryland.


Page X

THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS
OF BALTIMORE.

        CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN OPINION OF THE
FRENCH REVOLUTION.

        BY
CHARLES DOWNER HAZEN, Ph. D.
Professor of History, Smith College.
325 pp. 8vo, cloth.--$2.00.

        This essay attempts to study and depict the opinions of Americans with reference to a revolution which they followed with the most intense interest.

        NOW READY:

        Studies in Historical and Political Science.

        Volume XVII of the Series of "Extra Volumes" of Studies.

        INDUSTRIAL EXPERIMENTS IN THE BRITISH
COLONIES OF NORTH AMERICA.

        BY
ELEANOR LOUISA LORD,
164 pages. Cloth.--$1.25.

        Orders and remittances should be sent to
THE JOHNS HOPKINS PRESS,
Baltimore, Md.