A Woman's Life-Work-Labors and Experiences of Laura S. Haviland Part 45

Brother Smart, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Adrian, was then holding a series of meetings; and being told of the accident at the evening meeting, he said: "Elder Jac.o.kes informs me that sister Haviland is supposed to be in a dying state from a dangerous fall in the orphan asylum this evening. I propose to pursue my subject no further, but to turn this meeting into a season of prayer for her restoration, if in accordance with the Lord's will; if not, that her mantle may fall upon another, to carry forward that enterprise. The Lord can hear and answer here as readily as by her bedside." He then led in fervent supplication, followed by a few others. Said a friend present: "The announcement fell upon us like an electric shock, and I never heard brother Smart, or those who followed, pray with such power.

Then brother Bird arose and said, 'I feel confident that we shall have an answer to our prayers, that sister Haviland will be restored or another take her place.'"

My dear sister in Christ, Elizabeth L. Comstock, was at that time laboring in the Master's vineyard in Chicago. Hearing of the accident by means of the telegram sent to my daughter residing in that city, she mentioned it at the Moody noon prayer-meeting, and requested prayer for my restoration, if it were the Lord's will. I was made the subject of prayer also at Pittsford Wesleyan Methodist protracted meeting.

A letter came from Rev. E. M. Cravath, of Cincinnati, addressed to me.

In answer, my daughter, L. J. Brownell, wrote that "mother is unconscious from a dangerous fall, and we (her children) are earnestly praying for her restoration. If our Heavenly Father sees meet to grant our pet.i.tion, you will receive a reply from her when practicable." The immediate reply was: "You may rest a.s.sured our All-wise Father will restore your mother if he has further work for her to do. You may also be a.s.sured that her friends in this city are uniting in prayer with her children for her recovery."

I was so nearly conscious at one time that I heard some one say, "She will never speak again." The thought struck me forcibly that I was going to get well, and yet I had no sense of being ill. But I reflected that my children must be very sad at the thought of giving me up, and I would try to say, "I am going to get well." With all the effort I could command I could not utter a syllable. Then I tried to see if my children were present; but I seemed to be in a pure, soft, white cloud, such as we sometimes see floating in the ethereal blue, where I could discover no countenance of those moving around my bed. Consequently I gave over the effort, and was again lost to all consciousness until three days and nights had pa.s.sed. Then the first returning consciousness was the pa.s.sing away of that beautiful white cloud, and I recognized my three daughters standing before me. One of them said, "Mother looks as if she knew us." Why, yes, I thought, they are my daughters; but what are their names? and what is my name? Then I surveyed the room. The papered wall, maps, pictures, and furniture all looked familiar; but where am I? Am I in some large city, or in a country place? I am advanced in years; and what have I done in all my life? But I could recall nothing.

While in this mental soliloquy, it came to me what my name was, and that this was the orphan asylum.

"Do you know me, mother?" said my daughter Jane.

It was a matter of reflection before I could utter the word "yes," and then a study to give her name. At length I p.r.o.nounced it. Another daughter made the same query, and I had the answer, "yes," ready, but it seemed a hard study again to recollect the name Mira. The same effort brought to my lips the name of Esther when she addressed me.

"Don't have the least anxiety or care," she said, "about this orphan asylum, for the friends have brought gram, flour, meal, meat, and groceries in abundance." O what a relief these words brought! Surely the Lord is the Father of the fatherless.

After studying for words I said, "What is the matter?" for I felt that my head was very sore, and my face swollen. When told that I had fallen down cellar and was badly hurt, I was surprised, for I could recall nothing of the fall. After calling to mind the various residences of my daughters, and words to inquire how they knew of the accident, I was told that my son-in-law telegraphed them. At length I reached the conclusion that I became stunned by the bruise on my head, and fell asleep and slept my senses all away, and that was the reason I did not know any thing. I thought, must I learn to read again? Shall I ever know any thing? How sad it will be not to know how to read or do any thing; but I will leave all in the hands of the dear Savior. They gave me medicine that I knew I had taken. Did I not take this an hour ago?

"O no, mother, not since yesterday." What day of the week is to-day?

"Monday." Then to-morrow will be Tuesday. "Yes." I have got so far, I will remember that, thought I. Again another dose of medicine was given. Did I take this yesterday? "You took this two hours ago." It is certain that I do not know any thing. How sad it will be when I get well of this hurt (as I had no doubt but I should) and not know any thing. But, then, the second thought of leaving it with the Lord was a resting-place. But consciousness was gradually restored. The next day my son Daniel came; but he did not dare to approach the front door, fearing that a tie of crepe on the k.n.o.b would be the first to tell him the sad story of his mother's departure He was met at the back door by his three sisters, one of whom informed him of a faint hope of my recovery, as there was evidence of returning consciousness.

A day later the fourth daughter, Anna H. Camburo, arrived. I was thus permitted to meet all my children save one, whose infant son had died the day after the news reached him of my fall. But as the children daily informed their brother Joseph of increasing hope of my recovery, he, of my six children, was the only absent one. Through their tender care and the blessing of G.o.d, in answer to many earnest prayers, I was spared to toil on a few years longer. To him alone be all the praise!

My Savior never seemed nearer.

It was January, 15, 1869, when I fully realized that consciousness was restored. I renewed my entire consecration to the service of my Lord and Master. All was peace and quiet within. The inmates of the asylum, between twenty-five and thirty, were so quiet that it seemed as if no more than my own children were moving around me. During the second week, through my dear friend Elizabeth L. Comstock, seventy-five dollars was sent to us from friends in Chicago. A few days later thirty dollars came from the same city. The fourth week after the fall I was removed to my home in the city of Adrian, accompanied by my five children, three of whom then returned to their homes. In four months I had so far recovered as to be able to do moderate asylum work, and in one year I solicited and received one thousand dollars for the asylum, aside from the means sent during my inability to labor. This kept the asylum in supplies, we hardly knew how, only as it came from the Father of the fatherless. Within ten days after my arrival at home I received three checks of fifty dollars each from the Cincinnati Branch of the American Missionary a.s.sociation, from the Friends' Sabbath-school, in Syracuse, New York, and from John Stanton, Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C.

In all this severe trial I had no regrets in making this scheme another specialty in my life-work. I visited nine county poor-houses, learning the number of children in each, and noting their condition, with the view of reporting to our next Legislature. In three of the county houses were girls, half idiotic, who had become mothers. In one there were twenty children of school-age, sent to school four hours each day.

As I followed the matron through the dormitory and other parts of the house, I saw by the filthy appearance of the sheets and pillows, as well as a want of order generally, a great need of system. As I was about to leave I remarked to the matron, "You have many unpleasant tasks to perform here."

"La me, I guess we do," she said.

"You have plenty of vermin to deal with, I suppose?"

"Indeed we do. You can sc.r.a.pe up quarts of 'em."

I added her testimony to my report. Then, after visiting many of the infirmaries on April 6th, I attended meetings of our county supervisors and superintendent of the poor. I reported our work, and presented an order for dues for the previous month. Having arranged my monthly report, I presented it to the monthly meeting of our asylum a.s.sociation.

I retired weary, and awoke to see Dr. Pearsall about to leave my room.

He was giving directions to my two anxious daughters. To my surprise my son-in-law remarked, "Mother is so much better, I will return home."

Here was a mystery I was unable to solve, and I insisted on knowing why the doctor was there, now nearly 2 o'clock in the morning. I was informed that I had suffered an attack of apoplexy. I was not the least startled, but told them if I had had a fit of that character, I was liable to go at any time, and I wished to say a few things and then I would sleep: If I should be taken away in an unconscious state for them not to have the least uneasiness about me, as my way was clear. I wished my children to live nearer the Savior, and meet their mother in a fairer clime than this, and I requested them to tell my dear absent children the same. I then directed how my little effects should be divided among my six children, and rested well in sleep until the usual hour of waking, and was able to dress in the afternoon.

Within ten days I rode to the asylum, made arrangements to rent the land of the asylum farm for the coming season, and wrote to brother G.

A. Olmstead to take my place in looking after its interests for a few months, as my physicians told me it was unsafe for me to continue mental labor, and I must rest at least six months. This was another heavy drawback upon our faith and work, as we had designed to circulate our pet.i.tion during the remainder of the year, so as to have it ready to present to the next Legislature. Rev. G. A. Olmstead undertook the work of soliciting, and kept the asylum comfortably supplied until his health failed. Then a devoted and self-sacrificing sister, Catharine Taylor, took the field, while I spent six months visiting my children.

The severest prescription I ever took from physician, was to _think of nothing._ But I succeeded admirably, and spent much time in drawing bits of clippings and rags of diverse colors through canvas, making domestic rugs for each of my children. I called upon various physicians, who gave it as their opinion that I could safely accomplish one-fourth of my former work, but I did not even reach that amount of labor. In a little over a month's work, with a pet.i.tion to the Legislature in my pocket, and at the home of Anson Barkus and wife, I was taken with another midnight fit, and was much longer unconscious than before, but I returned home the following afternoon, accompanied by brother Backus. Twenty-five miles ride on the car and a mile in the hack did not improve the strange pressure in my head. Within a week I had five terrible spasms, lasting at times from five to twenty minutes; during consciousness I was not able to speak a word. When I appeared more comfortable, and my head more natural, greater hopes of my recovery were entertained by my physician and children.

I thought these fits were faintings; for I felt as if I had waked out of sleep each time. But the purple fingernails on the last day led me to suppose that I would die in one of these faints. Between the fits I most earnestly prayed that, if it was the Lord's will, I might be restored to work for him a little longer; but, if otherwise, I would praise him still for taking me over the beautiful river. O what a mistake to call it a dark, deep river, when it is only a bright, rippling stream, just across which all is peace and joy for evermore!

This was the constant breathing of my soul all day; and it vividly flashed upon my mind that fifteen years were added to Hezekiah's life in answer to prayer. This prayer, followed by these words, ran through my mind during all that happy day. Can death, that is called the last enemy, look pleasant? It did look pleasant to me. Praise filled my soul.

That day will never be forgotten as long as memory and reason endure.

In the evening I slept three minutes, they said, by the watch, and when I awoke I could talk as easily as ever. From that day I improved in health. These spasms were caused by the pressure of blood in reopening the temporal artery, or forcing its way through a new channel. I again received the tenderest of nursing on the part of my four daughters, and praise is due only to him who is the prayer-hearing G.o.d. With the fervent prayers of that memorable day come the words of the poet:

"'Tis a glorious boon to die, A favor that can't be prized too high,"

because of an abundant entrance to be administered to us into the glorious mansions prepared by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

CHAPTER XVIII.

PRESENT CONDITION OF THE FREEDMEN.

Our investigations have proved to the friends of the former slaves that their emigration from the South was not inst.i.tuted and put into operation by their own choice, except as the force of circ.u.mstances, in their surroundings, pressed them into this remarkable movement. Monthly reports of the Kansas Freedmen's Relief a.s.sociation have also proved satisfactory to thousands of donors toward their relief. The increasing intelligence among the four millions and a half of slaves, declared free by the nation's pen in the hand of her President, Abraham Lincoln, they found did not bring with it the glorious sunlight of freedom the proclamation promised in its dawn. After fifteen years of patient hoping, waiting, and watching for the shaping of government, they saw clearly that their future condition as a race must be submissive va.s.salage, a war of races, or emigration. Circulars were secretly distributed among themselves, until the conclusion was reached to wend their way northward, as their former masters' power had again become tyrannous. This power they were and are made to see and feel most keenly in many localities, a few incidents will show.

Elder Perry Bradley left Carthage, Leek County, Mississippi, in January, 1880, and testifies to the following facts:

"In October, 1879, twenty-five or thirty masked men went into Peter Watson's house, and took him from his bed, amid screams of 'murder'

from his wife and seven children; but the only reply the wife and children received at the hands of the desperadoes was a beating. Their boy of twelve years knocked one down with a chair. While the fighting was going on within, and in their efforts to hold their victim outside, he wrenched himself from their grasp--leaving his s.h.i.+rt in their hands--and ran through the woods to my house, around which colored men gathered and protected him. Although twelve gun-shots followed him in the chase, yet none hit him. By the aid of friends he took the first train he could reach, which, to his surprise, took him twenty-five miles southward, instead of in a northern direction. At Ca.s.siasca, Attala County, Mississippi, not knowing whether they were friends or foes, he told them he wanted to go to Kansas. They told him he should swear that he could not make a living there, before they would allow him to go North. As he found they were all Democrats at that depot, he consented to their demand; consequently they brought the Bible, and he took his oath 'that he could make a living there, but could not get it.' The Democratic 'bull-dozers,' who had sworn they would hang him if they ever caught him, took his span of horses, wagon, three cows, and his crop of cotton, corn, sugar-cane, and potatoes (all matured), and gave his wife money with which to pay the fare for herself and seven children, the twenty-five miles on the cars to meet her husband. The colored men were told 'that if they would be Democrats they could stay; but Republicans and carpet-baggers could not live there.'

"Austin Carter, a Methodist preacher, was an earnest temperance worker, and was prospering in that part of his work. He was also a strong Republican. He was shot dead in August, 1878, near New Forest Station, Scott County, Mississippi, on the railroad running east and west between Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi, while on his way home, between the hours of six and seven o'clock P. M. He received four shots in the back of his head, which instantly took his life. His wife and children knew nothing of it until the shocking tidings reached them the following morning. Thomas Graham, a wealthy merchant at Forest Station, reported that the man who shot him had gone to Texas and could not be found or heard from; and nothing was done to find the murderer or to bring him to justice."

Elder Perry Bradley was told by a number of this cla.s.s of Democrats, at various places where he was accustomed to preach, that he could not live there and preach unless he would vote the Democratic ticket and teach his people to do the same. Said he, "In the town of Hillsboro, at one of my meetings, the bulldozers came into the congregation and took me out of the meeting, held in a school-house one mile from Hillsboro, on April 15, 1879, at ten o'clock P. M., where I had preached during our day meetings without disturbance. Captain Hardy, leading the band, took me into the woods to an old deserted house, in which was their general or chief commander, Warsham, who asked the following question: 'Will you stop preaching to your people that Christ died to make you all free, body, soul, and spirit?' 'I can not stop preaching G.o.d's truth as I find it in the Bible,' was my answer. 'I want you to understand now that you can't preach such doctrine to our n.i.g.g.e.rs,' was the rejoinder. He then directed them to give me two hundred lashes.

They took me out in the front yard and drove four stakes in the ground, to which each wrist and foot was fastened. After being disrobed of my clothing and fastened, face downward, two men were selected to do the whipping, one on each side, alternating their strokes, while the rabble stood around until the two hundred lashes were given. Then they were told to stop and let me up. Too weak and trembling to stand, I was again queried whether I would not now preach the Democratic doctrine and vote that ticket? I replied, 'I can not conscientiously make such a promise.' 'Why not? 'Because I do not believe there are Democrats in heaven.' Said their general, Warsham, 'We'll turn him loose with this brus.h.i.+ng; may be he'll conclude to behave himself after this.' Turning to me he said, 'Remember, this is but a light brus.h.i.+ng compared with what you'll get next time; but well try you with this.' I returned to my home with my back cut in many deep gashes, the scars of which I shall carry to my grave. Yet I praised G.o.d in remembrance that my loving Savior suffered more than this for me, and that this suffering was in his cause. As soon as I was able to continue my work for my Lord and Master among my people I was again enabled to proclaim the riches of his grace. A few weeks after resuming my work I preached on the Dan.

Lewis' place, in Scott County, where I had held meetings undisturbed.

But the same company sought me out, and took me out of an evening meeting into the woods about three miles distant to hang me. After due preparations were made they pa.s.sed their whisky around, of which they all drank so freely that in their carousings they got into a fight, and while drawing pistols at each other young Warsham, the acting captain, in whose charge I was left, cut the rope that bound my hands behind me, and told me to 'go.' And gladly I obeyed the order and left them engaged in their fight and too drunk to notice my escape. I left that land of darkness as soon as possible for this free Kansas, and I have my family with me, for which I thank my Deliverer from the jaws of the lion of oppression, and praise the Lord of hosts for a free country, where I can vote as well as preach according to the dictates of my own conscience without the torturing whip or the hangman's rope."

Professor T. Greener, of Howard University, Was.h.i.+ngton, D. C., who has been prominently identified in the new exodus lately returned from a trip to Kansas, where he visited the colored colonies, and gathered information regarding the black emigrants. He reports them as doing well, constantly receiving accessions to their numbers, and well treated by their white neighbors. He says: "Indications point to a continuance of emigration during the Winter, and increase in the Spring, not in consequence of any special effort on the part of those who favor this solution of the vexed Southern question, but because the emigrants themselves are proving the best agents and propagandists among their friends South." Professor Greener is warm in his praise of Governor John P. St. John and the people of Kansas.

A staff correspondent of the Chicago _Inter-Ocean_, writing from Topeka, Kansas, December 31, 1879, says: "During four weeks' travel through the State, I estimate the number of colored emigrants at fifteen, or twenty thousand. Of these one-fifth probably are able to buy land, and are making good progress at farming. Most of the others have found, through the Freedmen's Relief a.s.sociation, places as laborers, and are giving good satisfaction; and in no county are they applying for aid, nor are burdens upon corporate charities. The demand for laborers seems stretched to its fullest capacity, as the acc.u.mulation of refugees at the barracks (now nearly seven hundred), for whom no places can be found, clearly indicates. Judging from what I learn from the refugees themselves, and from the increasing numbers, now from twenty-five to fifty arriving every day, we predict that the movement to Kansas will soon a.s.sume such proportions as to astonish the country, and unless the tide can be turned, or the charity of the North be more readily bestowed, the suffering which the relief committee, although laboring faithfully with the means at their command, has not been entirely sufficient to relieve during the past cold weather, will soon be turned to general dest.i.tution and great suffering among the pauper refugees."

The greatest crime in many portions of the South is being a Republican.

This has added largely to the emigration, and the tide has reached not only Kansas, but the older States of the North. It has entered Indiana, Ohio, and Illinois, and soon will find its way into Wisconsin, Iowa, and Michigan. We find no political chicanery of the North in this universal uprising of the colored people of the South in leaving the home of their birth. But it is the mistaken policy of the South that is driving their laborers northward; that is, compelling them to flee to more congenial surroundings. It is among the wonders that they waited so long and so patiently for the better day to come. Not long ago one thousand arrived in Parsons, Kansas, in the south-western part of the State. Governor St. John gave them a temperance speech with other good advice. Two hundred and twenty-five arrived in Topeka, and while I was at the barracks over seventy came in from Texas. Hardly a day pa.s.sed while I was there but we heard of fresh arrivals. Eleven wagon-loads came into Parsons, and two of the men came to Topeka and reported the condition of many of them as very poor. We relieved within three weeks over one thousand persons.

_The crime of being a Republican_, in many portions of the South, is shown by the following testimonies. I interviewed an intelligent colored man, John S. Scott, of Anderson County, South Carolina. He came well recommended as a well qualified teacher. He had taught twenty-eight terms of school in South Carolina and six terms in Georgia; but if he succeeded in collecting half his pay he did well. He handed me a package of certificates and commendations. His friends were about to run him for office, but his life was threatened, and he was informed that they were determined to have a "white man's government,"

and gave him to understand that if he got the office, his life would be worthless.

Abbeville district, in that State, was Republican, and John Owen was an influential colored Republican. During the election he was arrested and placed in jail, under the charge of selling forty-eight pounds of twisted tobacco without license. When arraigned before the court it was proved that he had no such article, yet they fined him fifty dollars.

He had raised tobacco, but it was still in the leaf. The fine was paid, and after the election he was released.

In the Seventh Congressional District, on Coosa River, September 24, 1877, a white man by the name of Burnam offered to purchase a small cotton farm near his, owned by a colored man, and offered him forty dollars for it. The owner replied, "I will sell to no man for that amount." Nothing more was said on the subject, and the colored man purchased a few pounds of bacon of Burnam and left for home. As he had to pa.s.s a little skirt of woods, Burnam took his gun, crossed the woods, and came out ahead of the colored man and shot him dead! He remained at his home two weeks, when the excitement over the cold-blooded murder became unpleasant for him, and he left the neighborhood, and had not returned in March, 1878, the date my informant left the country. The murdered man was a Republican.

Sanford Griffin was an honorably discharged soldier, and he testified that Columbus Seats was shot dead by Frank Phillips, in Clarksville, Tennessee. Griffin made an effort to have the murderer arrested, but failed. No difference was known to exist between them, except on the subject of politics. Seats was a Republican, and could not be induced to vote the Bourbon ticket.

In the autumn of 1878 Vincent Andersen was brought into Clarksville, Montgomery County, Tennessee, at eleven o'clock A. M. The following night a mob took him out of jail and hanged him on a locust tree on the Nashville Pike, near Clarksville. This case Griffin made an effort to bring before the court, but failed. The jailer, Perkins, said the men who brought Anderson to the jail, came in the night, and having overpowered him, forcibly took the jail key. But a girl of thirteen years testified that she saw the men in conversation with the jailer, and was confident they paid him money. Vincent Anderson had purchased ten acres of land, and had paid every installment promptly, and was on the way to the railroad station to make his last payment, when the mob took him to jail, until the darkness of night favored their wicked purpose of taking his life. He could not be prevailed upon to vote the Bourbon ticket.

One more incident this intelligent ex-Union soldier gave to which he was a witness: A young white woman, Miss Smith, purchased a pistol and remarked, "I am going to kill a n.i.g.g.e.r before the week is out." During that week her father and Farran, a colored man, had a dispute, but Farran had no thought of any serious result from it. But as Lydia Farran, the wife of the colored man, was on her way to the field to help her husband, Miss Smith, the white girl of eighteen or twenty years of age, took the pistol she had purchased a day or two previously, and followed Lydia and shot her dead! She left two little children, then a colored family got to their distracted father, who escaped for his life. He had not known of any difficulty between his wife and Miss Smith, or any other of the family, and could attribute the cool calculating murder of his wife to no other cause than the little difference of opinion that was expressed a few days previous to the fatal deed! Sanford Griffin succeeded in bringing this case before the court. But the charge of the judge to the jurors was, "You must bear in mind that Miss Smith was the weaker party, and if the shooting was in self-defense, it would be justifiable homicide." The jury so returned their verdict, and the case was dismissed.

The Freedmen's Aid Commission in Kansas relieved the wants of many of these refugees from the South; but the number of colored people was so great that, until they could find places to work for others or for themselves, the Commission had difficulty to care for them. A circular letter was issued, appealing to the friends of the cause for help. To this letter, sent out in December, 1879, these few telling words, from our dear friend and Christian philanthropist, Elizabeth L. Comstock, were added: "The treasury is nearly empty; city and barracks very much crowded; refugees coming in faster than we can care for them; money urgently needed for food, fuel, and medicine, and also to provide shelter." We take pleasure in announcing that our appeals from time to time met with responsive chords in many hearts, and relief was sent to the peris.h.i.+ng.