ADDRESS OF PROF. C. G. FAIRCHILD.
From the trend of the discussion this morning I find that a large responsibility has drifted into my hands. There is among the churches in the North a deep, unmistakable interest in those long-neglected ignorant whites of the South. It is a difficult problem to tell how to turn this into channels that shall benefit these people without on the one hand neglecting the work already undertaken by this Association or, on the other, giving some suspicion of countenancing a color line and perhaps bringing a clashing of interests between sister societies. In the report on education just received, special attention was turned to the mountain whites. Perhaps the solution of our difficulties may be found here. Certainly there will arise in your minds no suspicion of waning interest in the colored people or sympathy with caste on the part of those who have heretofore been closely connected with this mountain work at Berea College and the surrounding regions. It is their unanimous conviction that work undertaken for these mountain people with firm faith in Christian brotherhood and unswerving courage will assist in unfurling upon a higher masthead the broad motto borne on the seal of Berea College for twenty-five years past: “God hath made of one blood all nations of men.”
The term “mountain” stands for much more than appears at first. It stands for a larger, more inviting and fertile section than many are aware of. It comprises a stretch of country commencing in the Virginias and extending to Alabama, 500 miles one way by 200 the other. Much of the land, not simply in valleys, but also upon the benches of hillsides and even upon the broad mountain tops, is as fertile as the better known sections of the South. At the base of these hills lies an untold wealth of coal, iron and other minerals which is, as yet, almost untouched, while the summits of these hills are still crowned with the virgin forests. This country supports now a population of two millions, though its capabilities are wretchedly developed. The growth since the war in these regions has been at almost double the ratio of that of other parts of the South.
But the term “mountain” bespeaks a country with different social and political characteristics. Slavery had no use for a self-respectful, laboring white man. The badge of manual labor was a badge of servile degradation. Of two brothers one would chance to get a little start, own a few slaves and all society would spur him onward. The other, less fortunate at the start, would slip away to some mountain hamlet and lead an uneventful, unambitious life and bring up a large family in utter ignorance. He plodded on his way, working only as necessity compelled him, instinctively hating slavery, slave-owners and slaves. Thus slavery rejected not simply this broken mountainous country, but the large class of whites which inhabited this region. If the North cares to dignify physical labor in the South, if it feels the need of a class that has a natural love for free, republican institutions, if it cares to have the common-school system take rooting in the soil, if it desires a class of whites that shall be the wise, consistent friends of the colored people, perhaps it may find that this large body of whites rejected by slavery will prove the effective agency under the divine planning for this purpose. The stone which the builders rejected may become the head of the corner.
But one or two railroads cross this section. There are few towns of any importance, and a man who should own $10,000 worth of property would be the great man for twenty miles around. They are an agricultural people, each family living on its own little farm of 50 to 100 acres, the homestead often having been handed down through two or three generations. The houses range from the painted and unpainted frame house of four to six rooms to the very common little log hut of one to two rooms where you will find huddled together at night a father and mother, and children of every age, and you yourself if you happen to be their guest. The most that is needed for family wants, from corn and bacon to tobacco, is raised by themselves. Often such a family will not see $50 in cash the year round. Even the old hand looms find a friendly shelter in those Rip Van Winkle hollows. A man who moved from these regions to Berea, that he might give his seven children an education, wore upon his back his carefully preserved wedding suit, the wool for which he himself had cut from the backs of his father’s sheep, and which his mother, after spinning, and weaving, and dyeing with butternut bark, had cut and made for him. A little shovel plough, a hand-made hoe, and an unkempt mule with a straw collar make up the agricultural outfit. The schoolhouse is a log hut sometimes without doors and windows, or even a floor. For religious services, dependence is placed upon the chance visits of an exhorter who sometimes cannot read, and is even proud of getting his inspiration at first hand. There is a section of Eastern Kentucky, 200 miles one way by 100 the other, that has not a settled minister of any denomination. Some hesitate about extending the work of this Association beyond the blacks, but they need have little scruple here, for this section of the map of our country is black through illiteracy. More than half of the adult white population native born, of the same stock and lineage that furnished from the more favored sections the Clays and Breckenridges, that gave to this country Abraham Lincoln—more than half of this white population cannot read or write. Thus, not on the farther side of broad oceans, or even the distant borders of our land, but right at hand in the very heart of the best settled and most cultured part of our country lies this territory, vast in extent, utterly neglected by all uplifting agencies in the past, peculiarly susceptible to the awakening influences of the changed social conditions at the South, where there is an ignorance so dense that when we remember that they are our brothers and sisters, not by Christian ties simply but by direct blood and lineage, we must hang our heads in shame. Surely if the Church at the North is sighing for new worlds to conquer, what more claim can there possibly be upon its attention and benevolence?
It is a matter of congratulation that this work can be entered upon by this Association at once and with vigor, without embarrassment or exciting in any quarter criticism or suspicion. It is idle for us to suppose that the social growth of generations enforced by ignorance, savage heredity and marked physical characteristics, has wasted away in less than a score of years. More vital than any political problem or the growth of any special church polity is the question whether the time can ever come in this country when the negro in debating his chances and opportunities in life shall not be made to feel that his color is a drawback to him. In working out the solution of this problem this Association has borne a part that is fast challenging the respect of the South and the admiration of the North. This is a vantage ground that it is hazardous to yield. The work of this Association is understood everywhere to mean that nothing less than the utter demolishment of every barrier in the upward progress of the negro race will satisfy it. If, therefore, the churches lay upon it this further work, we feel sure that not only by heritage will it prove true to these fundamental principles, but that the workers at present in the South will exercise an Argus-eyed vigilance that nowhere shall there be a shadow of a suspicion that the spirit of caste has influenced its action. Without rashness on one hand or neglecting its opportunities on the other, the churches at the North can thus safely gratify their present earnest and commendable, though somewhat tardy, desire to benefit the needy whites of the South by asking this Association to turn its attention specially to these mountain whites.
The friends of this Association should also remember that the man whose name as a missionary has been the longest on your roll, the Rev. John G. Fee, was born at the base of these Kentucky hills. You should remember, too, that the men who made an anti-slavery church and school in a slavery State years before the war were these mountain whites. This Association nursed its firstborn on these mountain slopes. As patriots, some of whose sons sleep on that Southern soil, you should remember that this whole section was loyal in the battle for a united country unstained by slavery. West Virginia parted from the parent State under this patriotic impulse. Some mountain counties in Kentucky sent more men into the Union army than they had liable to military duty. Surely gratitude for such help in that struggle is not so dead at the North that it will not say to this Association: “If you have the opportunity by churches and schools to repay in part the debt we owe, we will see that you have the money and the men.”