THREE AT GRACE[ToC]
The Story of the First Jewish Settler in Alabama.
Colonel Hawkins, the Indian agent for the government at Pole Cat Springs, Alabama, in 1804, leaned across the pine table to extend a cordial hand to his visitor. Abram Mordecai, who stood before him, although almost fifty, gave one the impression of a much younger man. Lean and lithe as a panther, with shaggy black hair and keen eyes, his distinctly Jewish features were so tanned and weather-beaten that he looked far more the Indian than the Jew. He nodded gayly to his employer before he flung himself into a chair, his gun-stock between his knees, his great brown hands clasped behind his head. As he sat there dressed in the buckskin shirt and trousers of his half-civilized Indian neighbors, every free movement of his large body suggesting his life in the wilderness, the Jewish adventurer presented a perfect picture of the pioneer of his day.
"I have come, Colonel Hawkins," he began in his usual abrupt manner, "to ask your help in building a cotton gin. Yes," as the other showed surprise, "I know the enterprise seems a strange one for a rover like me to suggest, and, perhaps, a foolish undertaking in the wilderness. Yet the wilderness must pass and we must build now for the days to come."
"Go on, Mordecai," encouraged his chief. "What are your plans?"
"I know how eager you are to civilize the Indians in our region and teach them the arts of peace," went on Mordecai. "Thus far we have done nothing but trade with them for pelties and healing barks and oils. But could we not have the squaws raise the cotton and bring it down the river in their canoes and prepare it in our gin for the market in New Orleans?"
"Good." Hawkins nodded approvingly. "First we must gain permission of the Hickory Ground Indians for the erection of our gin, for it will not be wise to risk their enmity at the outset. But there is not another gin in the state. Where shall we find a pattern; where shall we get the workmen to fashion one for us; or the needed tools?"
"I have thought of that," Abram Mordecai told him. "There are two Jews of Georgia, Lyon and Barrett, who have both the tools and the skill for the task. I met Lyon when we were both young men serving in the army under General Washington. You can rely upon him for faithful service."
A little smile curved the agent's lips. "You Jews!" he exclaimed. "Is there any enterprise in which you have not had a hand? Even back to the building of the pyramids in old Egypt! It is like a Jew to plan the first cotton gin in Alabama—and to bring two of his race to build it."