My Southern Home: Or, the South and Its People

by William Wells Brown

“No.”

“Then, why do you expect Mr. Frierson to do it?”

“Oh! he’s a nigger and I look for more from him than I do from a white man.” So it is clear that this is the result of jealousy.

The recent case of the ill-treatment of Cadet Whittaker, at West Point, shows most clearly the unsuspecting character of the negro, when dealing with whites. Although Whittaker had been repeatedly warned that an attack was to be made upon him, and especially told to look out for the assault the very night that the crime was committed, he laid down with his room-door unfastened, went off into a sound sleep, with no weapon or means of defence near him. This was, for all the world, like a negro. A Yankee would have had a revolver with every chamber loaded; an Irishman would have slept with one eye open, and a stout shillalah in his right hand, and in all probability somebody would have had a nice funeral after the attack. But that want of courage and energy, so characteristic of the race, permitted one of the foulest crimes to be perpetrated which has come to light for years.

But the most disgraceful part in this whole transaction lies with the Court of Investigation, now being conducted at West Point under the supervision of United States officials. The unfeeling and unruly cadets that outraged Whittaker, no doubt, laid a deep plan to cover up their tracks, and this was to make it appear that their victim had inflicted upon himself his own injuries. And acting upon this theory, one of the young scamps, who had no doubt been rehearsing for the occasion, volunteered to show the Court how the negro could have practised the imposition.

And, strange to say, these sage investigators sat quietly and looked on while the young ruffian laid down upon the floor, tied himself, and explained how the thing was done.

If the victim had been a white man and his persecutors black, does any one believe for a moment that such a theory would have been listened to?

Generations of oppression have done their work too thoroughly to have its traces wiped away in a dozen years. The race must be educated out of the ignorance in which it at present dwells, and lifted to a level with other races. Colored lawyers, doctors, artisans and mechanics, starve for patronage, while the negro is begging the white man to do his work. Combinations have made other races what they are to-day.

The great achievements of scientific men could not have been made practical by individual effort. The great works of genius could never have benefited the world, had those who composed them been mean and selfish. All great and useful enterprises have succeeded through the influence and energy of numbers.

I would not have it thought that all colored men are to be bought by the white man’s smiles, or to be frightened by intimidation. Far from it. In all the Southern States we have some of the noblest specimens of mankind,—men of genius, refinement, courage and liberality, ready to do and to die for the race.