Joseph Fletcher, who came into Kansas July 8, 1879, I found by his papers to be an honorably discharged soldier from Mississippi. He testifies to the following facts: "I saw one hundred men killed by shooting and hanging during the two years, 1878 and 1879; and my brother was one of them; I can point to their graves to-day in the two parishes I worked in. This was in the Red River section, Mississippi. Their crime was their persistence in voting the Republican ticket." A number of the representative men from those parishes were interviewed, and they testified to the same things A number of them had been soldiers.
Andrew J. Jackson, directly from Waterproof, Mississippi, says: "Fairfax was a smart, educated man. He owned his house and land, and gave a lot to the colored Baptist Church and mostly built it. But the bulldozers burned both house and church. He rebuilt his house. The Republicans nominated him for Senator, and the Bourbon Democrats found he would be elected. They threatened his life, and as he found snares were laid to entrap him, he made his escape to New Orleans for safety. When, they learned as to his whereabouts, a number of men wrote for him to come back, and they would drop the matter and let the election go as it would; but he heeded neither their letters nor telegrams. One of his friends was fearful that he would heed their persuasions and went to see him, and told him not to listen to their sweet talk, for the bulldozers only wanted him back so that they might take his life. The white Democrats continued to write to him to come back and advise the colored people not to go North, and they would promise to protect him, for every body wanted him to return and none would molest him. As he did not return for all their pledges, one man, who had always appeared very friendly with him, went to see him, and told him that all who had opposed him pledged their word and honor that he should not be disturbed in the least if he would only return and persuade the colored people not to go to Kansas, as he had more influence over them than any other man. He assured him so confidently that he concluded to trust them, and returned to the bosom of his family on Saturday; but before Monday morning he was shot dead. The heart-rending scene can better be imagined than described."
Said one intelligent man, "We can do nothing to protect the virtue of our wives and daughters." Near Greenville, Mississippi, a colored woman was passing through a little skirt of woods, when she was attacked by two white men, who violated her person; then, to prevent exposure, they murdered her in the most savage manner. They tied her clothes over her head and hanged her by her waist to a hickory sapling, and ripped open her bowels until a babe, that would within a few weeks have occupied its place in its mother's arms, fell to the ground. Just at that juncture two colored men came in sight, and the white men dodged into the woods. This drew attention to the awful scene of the dying woman weltering in her gore. They hastened to cut her down, and just as she was breathing her last she whispered, "Tell my husband." One watched the corpse while the other went to inform the husband. This barbarous murder, which took place in April, 1879, was twice related to me in the same way by different women from the same neighborhood, who attended the funeral. As I related this to our friend, W. Armour and wife, of Kansas City, he remarked that the same incident had been told to him by some of the new arrivals. We repeat, Who can wonder at their flight?
On July 12th and 13th two boat-loads more of refugees, numbering four hundred persons, landed in lower Kansas City. I heard it again repeated, "What shall we do? Here in Topeka are two hundred poor people waiting to go somewhere to get work, and only two hundred dollars in our treasury!" What shall we send them? More than fifty men and women were then out hunting work; many found it and rented cabins. We waited for a reply from the railroad authorities, to see if they would take two hundred passengers for that money to Colorado.
This association met and reached the conclusion to telegraph Mr. W. Armour and his co-laborers, at Kansas City, to send the four hundred at that place to other points, as it was impossible to receive them in Topeka until those already there were furnished with homes, or more money should come to our aid. I returned to Kansas City, and found their hands and hearts full also, and heard the query repeated, "What are we to do for these poor people? We can not send them back, and they must be fed until we hear from places to which we have telegraphed." Favorable replies came for seventy-five families to Colorado. The colored minister, Elder Watson, was to take them away, and visited St. Louis to request the friends in that city to send no more in this direction for the present.
A white woman called to see some of these poor people, and brought chicken broth for a very sick man. She said she was born in Virginia, raised in Georgia, where she had taught school, and also taught in Mississippi and Alabama. Because she contended for the rights of the colored people, as they were free, she was ostracised and compelled to leave the South. Said she, "I have seen them hung and shot like dogs. They can not tell you the half of what they suffer. I know it, for I have seen it."
While I was still visiting among these people, the steamer Fannie Lewis landed with one hundred and four more refugees from Mississippi. Here they had nothing for their covering except the open sky. We feared that, unless other States should rally to the rescue, nothing but suffering and death would be before them. Kansas had domiciled about what she could for the present, unless further aid should be given from without. This State had hardly recovered from the sweeping devastation of war when drought swept over her rich prairies, and scarcely had she recovered from that drawback when the grasshoppers came and desolated her again. Then the Macedonian cry, "Come over and help us," was heard and answered. Again we raise this cry in behalf of this oppressed people, and it will meet a generous response.
When forty thousand dependents were thrown into young Kansas by Price's raid through Missouri, followed by Colonels James Lane and Jennison, I received from General Curtis the report that twenty thousand poor whites and as many freedmen were here to be cared for by government and the benevolence of the North. At that time of sore need Michigan placed in my hands two thousand six hundred dollars in money, and from seven thousand to eight thousand dollars in supplies to relieve the perishing and dying of that day. The lesson is not forgotten, that it is more blessed to give than to receive. He alone who knows the end from the beginning can tell the future of our country, and of the five million of its inhabitants of African descent. Yet eternal right must and will triumph. The debt our nation owes to the ex-slave should be paid. The hundred thousand colored soldiers who fought as bravely to save our nation's life as did their paler-faced brethren, and faced the cannon's mouth as fearlessly for the prize above all price—liberty—are worthy of consideration. They were ever true to our soldiers. Many of our prisoners escaping from rebel dungeons were piloted by them into our lines. Many black "aunties" took their last chicken and made broth for our sick Union soldiers, as did the one I met in Natchez, Mississippi. She had been free a number of years, and had her yard full of geese, ducks, and chickens; but all went for Union soldiers. She was a noble Christian woman. She said, "I feels so sorry for a sick soldier, so far from their home. I feels happy for all I kin do for 'em. I knows Jesus pay me." Another colored woman whom I met at Gloucester Courthouse, in Virginia, did the same.
An ex-soldier wrote in a note, found in a box of valuable clothing sent to the refugees in Kansas: "I send this as a small token of the gratitude I owe to the colored people for saving my life when I was sick and escaping from a loathsome rebel prison. They took care of me and conducted me safely to our Union camp. This goes with a prayer that God will bless that suffering people."
We have the testimony of many witnesses. Among them is J. C. Hartzell, D. D., of New Orleans, editor of the Southwestern Christian Advocate. He says, "The cruelties endured by the colored people of the South can not be overdrawn." He knew of a number of families that took homesteads on government lands and were doing well for themselves, but masked "Bourbons" went in a company and drove them off, telling them they "had no business with homes of their own. The plantation was their place, and there they should go." One man undertook to defend himself and family with his gun, but receiving a serious wound from one of the Bourbons, he hid from his pursuers. One of his white friends heard of what had befallen him, and took him to New Orleans for safety, as he knew him to be an industrious and peaceable man. Here he employed a skillful surgeon to treat him. Our informant saw the bullet taken from his body, and thought his life could be saved. But he is sure to lose it if he returns to his own home. Rev. J. C. Hartzell said he had received letters from various places all over the South, written by intelligent colored ministers, that their Churches were closed against them until after election. The same thing was told me by many of those I interviewed.