Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 35.djvu/75

Rh considerate and just to their slaves, and no stronger proof could be desired than was afforded by the conduct of the slaves generally during the war.

For months at a time there were numerous families of women and children wholly dependent on the negroes for support and protection. Those women and children were cut off from their male relations and friends, and yet from the beginning to the end of the war no such thing as an insurrectionary movement was known or heard of, nor the use of any incendiary language whatever charged, reported or hinted against the negroes. As a matter of fact the commands of the smallest child in the master's family were obeyed without a murmur.

True, a number of them left or were carried or enticed away and many who went enlisted in the Federal Army, but on the other hand, a large majority of them remained at home and -actually hid themselves and the stock of their masters whenever they heard the cry, "Yankees coming!"

This is positively true. I could cite numerous instances and name parties were it necessary. Not only did a large majority of the negroes remain at their homes, but they took care of the property and families of their masters, raised crops, and did all other customary and necessary work just as they had before the war, when owners and overseers watched over them. I personally know instances where the negro men alternately slept on the gallery or before the door of their master's home in order to protect the family against all harm.

These are facts that flatly contradict and give the lie direct to the oft repeated assertions of the Abolitionist (slanders on the negroes) that the negroes hated the whites of the South and only worked for and obeyed them because they were compelled to do so.

These are facts, and no matter what may be the outcome of the developing of the future, as a race the negroes by their conduct and their fidelity in times and under circumstances that might well have and did put their allegiance and fidelity to the severest test, earned and entitled themselves to the kind consideration, the friendship and love of our people.

True, after the war had ended and they became free their ignorance was imposed upon and many of them allowed