De massa had three boys to go to war, but dere wuzn’t one to come home. All the chillun he had wuz killed. Massa, he los’ all his money and de house soon begin droppin’ away to nothin’. Us niggers one by one lef de ole place and de las’ time I seed de home plantation I wuz a standin’ on a hill. I looked back on it for de las’ time through a patch of scrub pines and it look’ so lonely. Dere warn’t but one person in sight, de massa. He was a-settin’ in a wicker chair in de yard lookin’ out ober a small field of cotton and cawn. Dere wuz fo’ crosses in de graveyard in de side lawn where he wuz a-settin’. De fo’th one wuz his wife. I lost my ole woman too 37 years ago, and all dis time, I’s been a carrin’ on like de massa—all alone.123
After the war, Savilla Burrell left the plantation near Jackson’s Creek, South Carolina, on which she had been raised as a slave. Not until many years later did she return to visit her old master, Tom Still, in his final days. Sitting there by his side, trying to keep the flies off him, she could clearly see the lines of sorrow “plowed on dat old face” and she recalled that time when he had looked so impressive as a captain in the Confederate cavalry. “It come into my ’membrance de song of Moses: ‘de Lord had triumphed glorily and de hoss and his rider have been throwed into de sea.’ ”124
Chapter Four
SLAVES NO MORE
Slavery chain done broke at last!
Broke at last! Broke at last!
Slavery chain done broke at last!
Gonna praise God till I die!
Way up in that valley,
Pray-in’ on my knees,
Tell-in’ God a-bout my troubles,
And to help me if He please.
I did tell him how I suffer,
In the dungeon and the chain;
And the days I went with head bowed down,
An’ my broken flesh and pain.
I did know my Jesus heard me,
’Cause the spirit spoke to me,
An’ said, “Rise, my chile, your children
An’ you too shall be free.”
I done ’p’int one mighty captain
For to marshal all my hosts;
An’ to bring my bleeding ones to me,
An’ not one shall be lost.
Now no more weary trav’lin’,
’Cause my Jesus set me free,
An’ there’s no more auction block for me
Since He give me liberty.1
ON THE NIGHT of April 2, 1865, Confederate troops abandoned Richmond. The sudden decision caught Robert Lumpkin, the well-known dealer in slaves, with a recently acquired shipment which he had not yet managed to sell. Desperately, he tried to remove them by the same train that would carry Jefferson Davis out of the Confederate capital. When Lumpkin reached the railway station, however, he found a panic-stricken crowd held back by a line of Confederate soldiers with drawn bayonets. Upon learning that he could not remove his blacks, the dealer marched them back to Lumpkin’s Jail, a two-story brick house with barred windows, located in the heart of Richmond’s famous slave market—an area known to local blacks as “the Devil’s Half Acre.” After their return, the slaves settled down in their cells for still another night, apparently unaware that this would be their last night of bondage. For Lumpkin, the night would mark the loss of a considerable investment and the end of a profession. Not long after the collapse of the Confederacy, however, he took as his legal wife the black woman he had purchased a decade before and who had already borne him two children.2
With Union soldiers nearing the city, a Confederate official thought the black residents looked as stunned and confused as the whites. “The negroes stand about mostly silent,” he wrote, “as if wondering what will be their fate. They make no demonstrations of joy.” Obviously he had not seen them earlier that day emerging from a church meeting with particular exuberance, “shaking hands and exchanging congratulations upon all sides.” Nor had he heard, probably, that familiar refrain with which local blacks occasionally regaled themselves: “Richmond town is burning down, High diddle diddle inctum inctum ah.” Whatever the origins of the song, the night of the evacuation must have seemed like a prophetic fulfillment. Explosions set off by the retreating Confederates left portions of the city in flames and precipitated a night of unrestrained looting and rioting, in which army deserters and the impoverished residents of Richmond’s white slum shared the work of expropriation and destruction with local slaves and free blacks. Black and white women together raided the Confederate Commissary, while the men rolled wheelbarrows filled with bags of flour, meal, coffee, and sugar toward their respective shanties. Along the row of retail stores, a large black man wearing a bright red sash around his waist directed the looting. After breaking down the doors with the crowbar he carried on his shoulder, he stood aside while his followers rushed into the shops and emptied them of their contents. He took nothing for himself, apparently satisfied to watch the others partake of commodities long denied them. If only for this night, racial distinctions and customs suddenly became irrelevant.3
Determined to reap the honors of this long-awaited triumph, white and black Yankees vied with each other to make the initial entry into the Confederate capital. The decision to halt the black advance until the white troops marched into the city would elicit some bitter comments in the northern black press. “History will show,” one editor proclaimed, “that they [the black troops] were in the suburbs of Richmond long before the white soldiers, and but for the untimely and unfair order to halt, would have triumphantly planted their banner first upon the battlements of the capital of ‘ye greate confederaci.’ ” Many years later, a former Virginia slave still brooded over this issue. “Gawdammit, ’twas de nigguhs tuk Richmond,” he kept insisting. “Ah ain’t nevuh knowed nigguhs—even all uh dem nigguhs—could mek such uh ruckus. One huge sea uh black faces filt de streets fum wall tuh wall, an’ dey wan’t nothin’ but nigguhs in sight.” Regardless of who entered Richmond first, black newspapers and clergymen perceived the hand of God in this ironic triumph. The moment the government reversed its policy on black recruitment it had doomed the Confederacy. And now, “as a finishing touch, as though He would speak audible words of approval to the nation,” God had delivered Richmond—“that stronghold of treason and wickedness”—into the hands of black soldiers. “This is an admonition to which men, who make war on God would do well to take heed.”4
To the black soldiers, many of them recently slaves, this was the dramatic, the almost unbelievable climax to four years of war that had promised at the outset to be nothing more than a skirmish to preserve the Union. Now they were marching into Richmond as free men, amidst throngs of cheering blacks lining the streets. Within hours, a large crowd of black soldiers and residents assembled on Broad Street, near “Lumpkin Alley,” where the slave jails, the auction rooms, and the offices of the slave traders were concentrated. Among the soldiers gathered here was Garland H. White, a former Virginia slave who had escaped to Ohio before the war and now returned as chaplain of the 28th United States Colored Troops.
I marched at the head of the column, and soon I found myself called upon by the officers and men of my regiment to make a speech, with which, of course, I readily complied. A vast multitude assembled on Broad street, and I was aroused amid the shouts of ten thousand voices, and proclaimed for the first time in that city freedom to all mankind.
From behind the barred windows of Lumpkin’s Jail, the imprisoned slaves began to chant:
Slavery chain done broke at last!
Broke at last! Broke at last!
Slavery chain done broke at last!
Gonna praise God till I die!
The crowd outside took up the chant, the soldiers opened the slave cells, and the prisoners came pouring out, most of them shouting, some praising God and “master Abe” for their deliverance. Chaplain White found himself unable to continue with his speech. “I became so overcome with tears, that I could not stand up under the pressure of such fulness of joy in my own he
art. I retired to gain strength.” Several hours later, he located his mother, whom he had not seen for some twenty years.5
The white residents bolted their doors, remained inside, and gained their first impressions of Yankee occupation from behind the safety of their shutters. “For us it was a requiem for buried hopes,” Sallie P. Putnam conceded. The sudden and ignominious Confederate evacuation had been equaled only by the humiliating sight of black soldiers patrolling the city streets. For native whites, it was as though the victorious North had conspired to make the occupation as distasteful as possible. Few of them could ever forget the long lines of black cavalry sweeping by the Exchange Hotel, brandishing their swords and exchanging “savage cheers” with black residents who were “exulting” over this dramatic moment in their lives. After viewing such spectacles from her window, a young white woman wondered, “Was it to this end we had fought and starved and gone naked and cold? To this end that the wives and children of many dear and gallant friends were husbandless and fatherless? To this end that our homes were in ruins, our state devastated?” Understandably, then, local whites boycotted the military band concerts on the Capitol grounds, even after Federal authorities, in a conciliatory gesture, had barred blacks from attendance.6
Four days after the entry of Union troops, Richmond blacks assembled at the First African Church on Broad Street for a Jubilee Meeting. The church, built in the form of a cross and scantily furnished, impressed a northern visitor as “about the last place one would think of selecting for getting up any particular enthusiasm on any other subject than religion.” On this day, some 1,500 blacks, including a large number of soldiers, packed the frail structure. With the singing of a hymn, beginning “Jesus my all to heaven is gone,” the congregation gave expression to their newly won freedom. After each line, they repeated with added emphasis, “I’m going to join in this army; I’m going to join in this army of my Lord.” But when they came to the verse commencing, “This is the way I long have sought,” the voices reached even higher peaks and few of the blacks could suppress the smiles that came across their faces. Meanwhile, in the Hall of Delegates, where the Confederate Congress had only recently deliberated and where black soldiers now took turns swiveling in the Speaker’s chair, T. Morris Chester, a black war correspondent, tried to assess the impact of these first days of liberation: the rejoicing of the slaves and free blacks, the tumultuous reception accorded President Lincoln when he visited the city, the opening of the slave pens, and the mood of the black population. “They declare that they cannot realize the change; though they have long prayed for it, yet it seems impossible that it has come.”7
It took little time for the “grapevine” to spread the news that Babylon (as some blacks called it) had fallen. When black children attending a freedmen’s school in Norfolk heard the news, they responded with a resounding chorus of “Glory Hallelujah.” Reaching the line “We’ll hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple tree,” one of the pupils inquired if Davis had, indeed, met that fate. The teacher told her that Davis was still very much alive. At this news, the pupil expressed her dismay “by a decided pout of her lips, such a pout as these children only are able to give.” Still, the news about Richmond excited them. Most of the children revealed that they had relatives there whom they now hoped to see, several looked forward to reunions with fathers and mothers “dat dem dere Secesh carried off,” and those who had neither friends nor relatives in the city were “mighty glad” anyway because they understood the news to mean that “cullud people free now.”8
When the news reached a plantation near Yorktown, the white family broke into tears, not only over the fall of Richmond but over the rumor that the Yankees had captured Jefferson Davis. Overhearing the conversation, a black servant rushed through the preparation of the supper, asked another servant to wait on the table for her, and explained to the family that she had to fetch water from the “bush-spring.” She walked slowly until no one could see her and then ran the rest of the way. Upon reaching the spring, she made certain she was alone and then gave full vent to her feelings.
I jump up an’ scream, “Glory, glory, hallelujah to Jesus! I’s free! I’s free! Glory to God, you come down an’ free us; no big man could do it.” An’ I got sort o’ scared, afeared somebody hear me, an’ I takes another good look, an’ fall on de groun’, an’ roll over, an’ kiss de groun’ fo’ de Lord’s sake, I’s so full o’ praise to Masser Jesus. He do all dis great work. De soul buyers can neber take my two chillen lef me; no, neber can take ’em from me no mo’.
Several years before, her husband and four children had been sold to a slave dealer. Her thoughts now turned to the possibility of a reunion.9
Only a few miles from the Appomattox Courthouse, Fannie Berry, a house servant, stood in the yard with her mistress, Sarah Ann, and watched the white flag being hoisted in the Pamplin village square. “Oh, Lordy,” her mistress exclaimed, “Lee done surrendered!” Richmond had fallen the previous week, but for Fannie Berry this was the day she would remember the rest of her life.
Never was no time like ’em befo’ or since. Niggers shoutin’ an’ clappin’ hands an’ singin’! Chillun runnin’ all over de place beatin’ tins an’ yellin’. Ev’ybody happy. Sho’ did some celebratin’. Run to de kitchen an’ shout in de winder:
Mammy, don’t you cook no mo’
You’s free! You’s free!
Run to de henhouse an’ shout:
Rooster, don’t you crow no mo’
You’s free! You’s free!
Ol’ hen, don’t you lay no mo’ eggs,
You’s free! You’s free!
Go to de pigpen an’ tell de pig:
Ol’ pig, don’t you grunt no mo’
You’s free! You’s free!
Tell de cows:
Ol’ cow, don’t you give no mo’ milk,
You’s free! You’s free!
Meanwhile, she recalled, some “smart alec boys” sneaked up under her mistress’s window and shouted, “Ain’t got to slave no mo’. We’s free! We’s free!” The day after the celebration, however, Fannie Berry went about her usual duties, as if she hadn’t understood the full implications of what had transpired. And as before, she permitted her mistress to hire her out. Finally, the woman for whom she was working told her she was now free, there was no need to return to her mistress, and she could stay and work for room and board. “I didn’t say nothin’ when she wuz tellin’ me, but done ’cided to leave her an’ go back to the white folks dat furst own me.”10
Unlike many of their rural brethren, who evinced a certain confusion about the implications of freedom and when to claim it, the blacks in Richmond had little difficulty in appreciating the significance of this event. And they could test it almost instantly. They promenaded on the hitherto forbidden grounds of Capitol Square. They assembled in groups of five or more without the presence or authorization of a white man. They sought out new employers at better terms. They moved about as they pleased without having to show a pass upon the demand of any white person. “We-uns kin go jist anywhar,” one local black exulted, “don’t keer for no pass—go when yer want’er. Golly! de kingdom hab kim dis time for sure—dat ar what am promised in de generations to dem dat goes up tru great tribulations.” And they immediately seized upon the opportunity to educate themselves and their children, to separate their church from white domination, and to form their own community institutions.11
Less than two years after the fall of Richmond, a Massachusetts clergyman arrived in the city with the intention of establishing a school to train black ministers. But when he sought a building for his school, he encountered considerable resistance, until he met Mary Ann Lumpkin, the black wife of the former slave dealer. She offered to lease him Lumpkin’s Jail. With unconcealed enthusiasm, black workers knocked out the cells, removed the iron bars from the windows, and refashioned the old jail as a school for ministers and freedmen alike. Before long, children and adults entered the doors of the new school, some of them reca
lling that this was not their first visit to the familiar brick building.12
2
DESPITE THE IMMEDIATE GRATIFICATION experienced by the black residents of Richmond, the death of slavery proved to be agonizingly slow. That precise moment when a slave could think of himself or herself as a free person was not always clear. From the very outset of the war, many slaves assumed they were free the day the Yankees came into their vicinity. But with the military situation subject to constant change, any freedom that ultimately depended on the presence of Union troops was apt to be quite precarious, and in some regions the slaves found themselves uncertain as to whose authority prevailed. The Emancipation Proclamation, moreover, excluded numbers of slaves from its provisions, some masters claimed to be unaware of the emancipation order, and still others refused to acknowledge it while the war raged and doubted its constitutionality after the end of hostilities. “I guess we musta celebrated ’Mancipation about twelve times in Harnett County,” recalled Ambrose Douglass, a former North Carolina slave. “Every time a bunch of No’thern sojers would come through they would tell us we was free and we’d begin celebratin’. Before we would get through somebody else would tell us to go back to work, and we would go. Some of us wanted to jine up with the army, but didn’t know who was goin’ to win and didn’t take no chances.”13
Been in the Storm So Long Page 28
