Daniel Webster Jackson & The Wrongway Railroad

by Robert Walker

  "Yes. Mr. George Hillock, and we desperately need a doctor for him!"

  A well dressed man beside Judge Hatcher rushed forward, saying, "I'm Dr. Dorian Whitaker, Mr. Colfax. Let me come aboard and have a look at the man!" He fought his way forward and stepped onto the gangplank as it came down.

  Brisbane shouted from where he and Lem were held. "Fact I ain't sheriff here no more doesn't change the facts. These people aboard my keelboat come up on me and Lem, got the drop on us and stole off to make free. They're all runaways!"

  "At the courthouse, now! Everybody. We'll settle this confusion legally and rightfully," ordered Halverston. and the new sheriff and his deputies began escorting Isaac Colfax, his sons, Daniel and the passengers from the flatboat.

  The colorful red streamers still flapped in the wind.

  TWENTY

  ON TRIAL IN HANNIBAL

  Hannibal's courtroom was filled. Daniel could feel Mrs. Shorr's eyes on him from as far back as twenty-four rows. She had not said a word to him, but he knew that she must be thinking that she had known all along "the boy will come to no good," as she'd told Judge Hatcher so often. Former Sheriff Brisbane and Lem sat at one table up front, alongside Hannibal's only lawyer whose name happened to be Lawyer, Lawyer Wilson. Folks called him Puddin'head behind his back. To their right, at another table up front, sat Mr. Colfax and his three sons. Daniel and all the workmen, crew, and passengers of the Excursion Line sat behind them. Every other seat and window-sill space spilled over with townspeople. Others stood just outside the open windows.

  A black man in a fine suit stood up and announced, "All rise for the Honorable Judge William Halverston, presiding. This here is a Special Sessions of the Circuit Court of Hannibal, Missouri, this day of two December, 1852. Citizen Mr. Henry Brisbane versus Businessman and adventurer Mr. Isaac Colfax of the Colfax Excusion Tours. Plaintiff complaining is Mr. Brisbane, who says Mr. Colfax, defendant defending is a no-acount, low-down abolitionist running slaves off from hereabouts and having stolen Mr. Colfax's keelboat to do it with! Says Mr. Colfax is in possession of stolen goods, in the form of the boat and all these here black folks in your courtroom here today, judge."

  "Billy? Is that you, Mr. Billy?" asked Daniel from his seat, realizing that the bailiff was indeed Old Billy.

  "No talking from the floor in my courtroom!" said the colonel-turned-judge, his gavel coming down hard at Daniel's remark.

  But Billy gave Daniel a smile and said, "You did us all proud. Daniel, landing a job on an excursion boat! Don't that beat all, judge? One of our town boys making good?"

  Joe Grier and others at the window cheered this.

  "You done well, too, Billy!"

  Lawyer Wilson shot to his feet, shouting, "Objection, judge!"

  "Agreed!" said Halverston. His voice was louder than his gavel this time. "Bailiff, you will carry on no more personal words with any of the defendants in the case."

  "Yes sir, judge, but I know this boy wouldn't never be mixed up in no slave stealing or thieving of any kind, sir."

  Another cheer followed this remark.

  "Objection!" Lawyer Wilson again shouted. "This is highly prejudicial to Mr. Brisbane's case, your honor."

  "Billy, no more remarks unless somebody wants to call you to the witness stand, do you understand?"

  "I do, your honor, and I begs your pardon, sir, but there ain't a prejudicial bone in that boy's whole —."

  "Bailiff! Do I have to remove you from these proceedings?"

  "No sir, sorry sir." Under his breath, Billy muttered, "Now that Mr. Brisbane, now he's got all kinda prejudicial bones."

  "State your case. Mr. Wilson." said the judge.

  Wilson outlined a tale of how Brisbane, Lem, and a posse of others had confiscated slaves they had caught and housed on the flatboat now docked at the landing, stolen slaves he had hoped to return to their rightful owners, as a man sworn to uphold the laws. Colfax, his sons, and the man Brisbane had laid low with a gunshot had snuck up on them in the middle of the night, shot the sheriff and near drowned Lem and had made off with the slaves, all of whom sat now in the courtroom before the judge.

  Colfax, acting as his own lawyer, stood next and broke into laughter. "This is the most blatant, unsubstantiated pack of lies I have ever faced, but that's all right, for I have traveled the Far East and into India where I have faced tigers and snakes the size of a man's leg. This snake we have here...

  "Objection!" shouted Wilson.

  "Please refrain from name-calling, Mr. Colfax."

  Colfax nodded but did not apologize. "The man is either deluded or a liar, judge."

  "Objection!"

  "Mr. Colfax."

  "Sorry. Your Honor." Colfax simply repeated his story of why he and his passengers were touring the great cities of the South. Proud Hannibal citizens clapped at this. Lawyer Wilson objected to the clapping. When Colfax finished, he produced as exhibit A his ownership papers to the boat.

  Both Judge Halverston and Wilson studied the papers, and Judge Halverston gaveled them into legitimacy, accepting them as real over Wilson's desire to send them out to the county seat for expert examination. Halverston refused. "Call your first witness," he told Wilson.

  "I can't do that, judge."

  "And why not?"

  "Dred Scott case, your honor, a verdict being rendered from the Supreme Court, sir."

  "What's the Dred Scott case got to do with this case?" Halverston glared down on Wilson.

  Wilson pointed to the fifty black defendants in the case, saying, "These men and women are black, your honor."

  "Is that a fact?"

  "Whether free or slave, no black person in these here United States of America can hold citizenship. According to the Supreme Court, sir, and by extension, they can't sit in a witness box, since the highest court in the land says they have no rights as citizens."

  Judge Halverston explained to everyone now confused by Lawyer Wilson: "I am aware of the case of this black man, Dred Scott, who took his fight all the way to the Supreme Court, Mr. Wilson. But I am not going to deny any man or woman, black or white, the right to speak up in my courtroom. This here is Missouri, not Washington, DC, Mr. Wilson." The judge threw it out to the people of Hannibal, saying, "Lawyer Wilson here wants me to deny these folks a trial because of some law passed in Washington. Folks, what say you?"

  "This ain't Washington," agreed Judge Hatcher in the rear of the room.

  "They got a right to a trial," said Joe Grier through the open window.

  "Give 'em their day in court," said a rough-looking hill man. A shout of agreement followed this, and the trial continued.

  "If we're to do it right, folks, it's up to Lawyer Wilson here to prove that Mr. Colfax is an abolitionist, and that these people are not freeborn sight-seeing tourists here, but some fifty runaway slaves!"

  "Dress mighty fine for shoeless runaways," muttered Billy in the silence.

  "Brisbane and Wilson have to prove beyond a shred of doubt that these people are guilty. That means these people are innocent and freeborn citizens of the North until somebody can show me unmistakable evidence to the contrary."

  "I call Lem Deter to the stand, your honor," said Wilson, taking another direction. Lem told the same story as Brisbane, while Daniel began wondering how George might be doing at the doctor's office. Sissy and Daisy had stayed with George.

  Colfax got his turn at Lem and the story that he and Brisbane had concocted. "Isn't it true, sir, that you and Sheriff Brisbane have in fact been running a scam all about these parts for years? Trapping up runaways in a keelboat like my boat out there at the landing, only to transport those runaways down to St. Louis? There to sell them on the auction block for your own gain, sir?"

  "Sheriff and me wouldn't never do such a law-breaking thing."

  "No, I suppose not. I have no more questions of this witness, your honor, but I would like to enter into evidence Exhibit B. My own birth certificate, showing I am who I state I am, sir, and with the bill
of sale on the boat, which you already have, then the two documents support one another."

  "Accepted into evidence." said the judge.

  "Why don't we have some A, B and C's?" Lem asked Lawyer Wilson.

  "Good question, your honor," said Colfax, pacing, "why hasn't Sheriff Brisbane produced his ownership papers on the boat, if it is indeed his?"

  "Lost...lost in a storm," replied Brisbane sullenly.

  Halverston's eyes scanned from one document to the other, saying, "These look in order, gentlemen." Wilson rushed the bench to have a look, his face falling.

  "Forgeries and lies!" shouted Brisbane, getting to his feet and going for Colfax, shouting, "He stole them slaves and that excursion nonsense is a cover for the Underground Railroad!"

  The mention of the freedom railway sent a hush over the crowd. Brisbane lashed out at Colfax, who expertly ducked and brought up a left to Brisbane's temple and a right to his stomach, sending Brisbane staggering back into the arms of Lem. Halverston gaveled and shouted for order, threatening to jail both men if they could not behave in a civil manner in his courtroom.

  Colfax bowed and pleaded forgiveness. Brisbane scuttled back to his seat, grumbling. His eye began to swell.

  Colfax turned to the people in the gallery and asked. "Have any of you ever seen slaves who dressed in the manner of my well-to-do patrons? Ever?"

  "They don't look like no slaves I ever saw," said one man from the back row of the courtroom.

  "Don't talk or act like slaves." said the mill owner.

  "We got a good man shot and likely dying over to your doctor's office, and we're looking at a huge delay in our schedule, judge, all on account of some mistaken identity," said Ichabod, who stood up from the crowd of Blacks on trial. "I speak for most here when 1 say, it's time we put this nonsense to rest. Will you run your judgeship's eyes across my freedom papers and tell me that I ain't who I say I am?"

  "Let's see your papers, sir," said Halverston to Ichabod.

  The white haired old man came forward just as Daisy and Sissy entered a side door, brought in by the new sheriff, Mr. Ken Morgan. When Daisy saw what Ichabod was up to. she pulled free and sassily walked to the bench as well, her parasol twirling. "You just have a good look at my papers, too, judge. Now, my boy's hurt real bad over there, and I brought you his papers, too. If he don't pull through, somebody's gonna pay."

  "You'll make no threats here. Madam," the judge warned. Then he studied all three sets of papers, passing each in turn on to Wilson.

  "Parson Palmer and Mrs. Hillock are right, your honor!" said Tom. He boldly stood to come forward. Mr. Fairfield's look of worry was mixed with a kind of pride as he saw Grady stand beside Tom. Grady added, "Your judgeship, I am Mr. Wileford, Charles Wileford the Third, and this man beside me is Mr. Ezeekiel Radcliff, and we, too, have the papers to prove it."

  "Come forward Mr. Wileford the Third, Mr. Radcliff."

  "Sound like a lot of exciting stories happen around here, but I got myself a piece of land up to Haymaker County in Michigan to get me back to before the cold comes on too harsh. I was freeborn in Michigan, you see, and my family has always held land there," Grady continued. He next spoke of his father and mother by name.

  "Let me see those papers you mentioned, Mr. Wileford."

  Tom spoke up next, telling about his home in Iowa.

  "Let's see," began the judge, rubbing his chin thoughtfully, and asking, "Mr. Colfax, what does that put us at, Exhibit C for Mr. Palmer—Parson Palmer—D for Mrs. Hillock here, E for Mr. Wileford the Third and F for Mr. Radcliff?"

  "Every one of my passengers has papers, your honor, so we could take up the whole alphabet and go 'round again."

  "And the men working your crew?" asked the judge.

  "All have bill of sale on 'em, and I got an arrangement with my slaves, your honor."

  "Really, and what's that?"

  "They work for their freedom. After six years of excursions, they can make up their minds to stay on and take a paycheck or go off free."

  "They're all forgeries!" declared Brisbane, red-faced.

  "Control your client, Mr. Wilson. As for the documents, I can find no evidence of forgeries, but entertaining the idea that I have been made a fool of, Mr. Brisbane, who in this room is so fine a forger that my eyes are deceived? Mr. Isaac Colfax? His sons? Daniel Webster Jackson?"

  "That one that was shot, that's who! When I caught him bounty-hunting slaves himself. I found papers on him! Papers he made up."

  "A bounty-hunting black man running slaves?" asked Halverston. "You want this court to believe that?"

  "Ask Judge Hatcher!"

  Halverston looked to the back of the room at his former opponent. "Judge, you got anything to add to Mr. Brisbane's allegations against the young man who was shot?"

  Judge Hatcher bit his lip, shook his head and finally said, "No, I don't ever recollect such a character as former sheriff Brisbane speaks of."

  "And Mr. Brisbane." continued Halverston, "are you calling me a fool? That I can be so readily and easily

  tricked by a black man with paper and pen? That a black man could outfox me, you, this entire assemblage, this entire town and county, sir?"

  The crowd grumbled its mean agreement to this logic. Wilson got to his feet, saying, "My client didn't...doesn't meant to imply that you are a fool, your honor, no, nor that everyone in this room is a fool, no sir."

  "Good!"

  Daisy turned to the crowd and said, "I am Abigail Mosely Hillock. My beloved husband took the fever some three years ago, and my son, George, who is laying up in the doctor's office with that man's bullet in him. is the only-est thing I got left on this earth. Henry, my husband, was the best provider there could be, and he left just enough for comfort, and for a time, I feared spending any of it on this trip, but George, poor George, he wanted so to come on the excursion, so much I couldn't deny him. Now this...it were a grand trip till we hit Hannibal. Before this, we got to visit with some of our Southern relatives along the river. Uncle Rufus, Aunt Bess, but I'd have never stepped foot in Hannibal, Missouri had I known my poor baby George would be shot down like a dog by that man!" She ended with an angry glare and a pointing finger.

  "All the rest of you who have papers, please submit them to my bailiff," Judge Halverston instructed. "Mr. Colfax, deliver up your papers on any crewmen who happen to be slaves, please. I can assure you, Mr. Wilson, every document will be examined thoroughly."

  As this was done. Judge Halverston tested several more of the excursion people, asking about their histories, their homes. Then Lawyer Wilson asked if he could question one little girl who had come forward.

  Colfax stiffened and Judge Halverston took in a deep breath but said, "That is your right, Mr. Wilson. Go ahead."

  "What's your real pappy's name, child?" Wilson asked, smiling at the girl.

  She shyly replied. "Benjamin McElroy and Meredith. Married 1829, but I didn't come along till six years later, after they give up hope of ever having me or any child, but Momma said no, that they had to have hope, and so here I be standing."

  "What was your mother's maiden name?"

  "Overton."

  "Where were they married?"

  "Keokuk."

  Wilson looked from the small girl to the paper she'd produced, and it read the same. He then had a go at the five-year-old beside the girl, asking, "And Tad, where do you live?"

  "Thaddeus is my name, not Tad. Only my pap can call me Tad. I was born in Cairo, Illinois, but we folks now live in Wisconsin."

  Lawyer Wilson sat down, beaten. Brisbane conferred with him, whispering and furiously spitting in his ear. Brisbane knocked over a water pitcher and glasses at the table, shouting, "Judge, those slaves are mine! This nonsense has gone on long enough!"

  "Yours, Brisbane? How is that, sir? When did you start holding slaves?" asked the judge.

  "That is to say, they're my prisoners. I rustled them up from being runaways from over at Rantul County, where they run off from.
..from a fella named Blainy."

  "And what Mr. Colfax here said about you running slaves to the auction block in St. Louis? That was all a fabrication?"

  "Weren't no fabrication, it was an out and out lie, judge!"

  "Even though there've been reports about you being seen in St. Louis selling off black folks on the auction block, Mr. Brisbane?" he asked.

  "That's a bold-face lie, too, judge!"

  "Well there is one way to find out if it's a lie or not, Mr. Brisbane," Halverston coolly replied, looking out over Daniel's head to someone in the back of the room. Daniel turned to see Mr. and Mrs. Blainy at the rear, alongside Judge Hatcher and Reverend Thornbush. Daniel's heart sank, and he saw that Daisy, Sissy, Ichabod and some of the others also saw their "rightful" owners as well. It appeared all was now lost.

  "I have a Mr. Blainy in the courtroom, Mr. Brisbane. He's the man from Rantul County who came to me with a story of how some fella posing as a major from Louisiana managed to steal all of his slaves with a worthless check. I don't imagine you'd know who this here Major Splitshot might be, former Sheriff Brisbane?"

  "Me, no...no sir," replied Brisbane.

  Mrs. Blainy shouted, "That's the man. all right! He's the one flimflammed us out of our slaves!"

  Mr. Blainy calmed his wife, and came forward. Judge Halverston said, "Mr. Blainy, I know you have experienced a major, major loss—no pun intended. But can you tell this court, sir, if any of these black people in the courtroom today are familiar to you, sir?"

  A silence fell over the place like the hour before dawn. Daniel quaked in his skin. Then he heard Mr. Blainy plainly say, "No sir, not a one of them is mine. I'm afraid there's been a terrible mistake made, shooting at these people and holding these good folks up for trial."

  Brisbane jumped to his feet, shouting, "Liar! You're a liar, Blainy! This ain't right! It's all turned around!"

  "Sheriff, take Mr. Brisbane into custody. Hold him on the charge of attempted murder, lying to this court, and suspicion of slave-running for profit on some sort of backward, wrongway Underground Railroad."