Aleck was brave-hearted to a fault. He was likewise physically courageous, and could bear the worst kind of punishment, ordinarily, without flinching. He was now vanquished, for hours he lay like one who had “given up the ghost,” beyond conjecture. Still he did not die until the following night. He was providentially discovered by some negroes, in the woods, taken to his cabin, and brought to consciousness.
Before he expired he told his dreadful story to four witnesses, who gave it in substance to the United States authorities, as we have now stated the details; but unfortunately—on account of the disguises of his heartless tormenters and murderers—he could give no description that pointed to the personal identity of the offenders.
He learned that his wife was dead, before his own lamp of life went out, and simply asking of the colored friends who gathered about his death-bed-side, that the humble pair might be laid in the same grave, poor Aleck Noye sank to his final rest, and yielded up his spirit to the God who gave it. The children were taken away by some of the poor neighbors who esteemed the quadroon family for their virtues, and universal kindness towards them, and thus closed another awful tragedy in North Carolina—of which over six hundred came under the knowledge of the United States District Attorney, in a single county, (not all of them fatal, to be sure), and which have been duly reported by him, officially, within a comparatively limited period, since the close of the war.
Is there no “combination of purpose or design” in all these instances of wrong? Does there exist “no organization among these men” for evil? And have these terrible doings no “political significance” as is asserted in the minority Report of the Congressional Committee upon the Ku Klux Klan outrages? In the face of this accumulated, overwhelming, damning evidence—will any one believe that the Honorable gentlemen (who have put forth this paper in opposition to the majority Report of that Committee), are not themselves convinced that all this is true; and that not one half of the shocking story of the infamy of this wretched Klan has been told?
Will it be impressed upon the minds of the public of this enlighted nation, North or South, through any sophistry, argument or theorising, that all these living witnesses and victims are liars, and perjurors? Have not these events occurred? And if so, what is the cause of the wrong doing? It happens, unfortunately, for the “Union Democracy,” who flout at these accounts of the doings of the Klans, that none but Radicals or negroes are assailed. And also that never has a Radical been found associating with these Ku Klux midnight marauders and, butchers, in an attack upon one of their victims! Is there “no political significance” in this fact?
It is simply idle to propose such a fallacious and utterly groundless doctrine. The fact is patent, and the matter is clear as that the sun shines over the earth at mid-day—to the mind of every intelligent being who can see or read—that the opponents of the Republican party, in the guise of Ku Klux Klans, supported unblushingly by the “Union Democracy” of the country, and their Democratic allies, are the combined movers, operators, sustainers and abettors of this crusade, and that their first and last and continuous aim and hope is to weaken or destroy the Radical sentiment in the land.
Thus far, however, thanks be to God! the American people have not been deceived by the theories or the assertions of those who would tear down the fabric of our wholesome Republican Government. And far distant be the day when such attempts to overturn that government may succeed. “There is a right way for us and for our children, and the hand of God is upon all them for good, that seek him; but his wrath is against all them that forsake him.”... And it is written, that “he who shunneth iniquity and oppression, and followeth after righteousness, alone findeth life, righteousness and honor.”
THEN AND NOW.