by Barry Harrin
We knowed freedom was on us, but we didn’t know what was to come with it. We thought we was going to get rich like the white folks. We thought we was going to be richer than the white folks, ‘cause we was stronger and knowed how to work, and the whites didn’t, and they didn’t have us to work for them any more. But it didn’t turn out that way. We soon found out that freedom could make folks proud, but it didn’t make ‘em rich.
Did you ever stop to think that thinking don’t do any good when you do it too late? Well, that’s how it was with us. If every mother’s son of a black had thrown ‘way his hoe and took up a gun to fight for his own freedom along with the Yankees, the war’d been over before it began. But we didn’t do it. We couldn’t help stick to our masters. We couldn’t no more shot ‘em than we could fly. My father and me used to talk ‘bout it. We decided we was too soft and freedom wasn’t going to be much to our good even if we had a education.“
Now here is a totally different point of view from a white Texan who was an eye-witness to the post Civil War Reconstruction in Leon County. He clearly still retained his racial bias in 1902.149
‘The reconstruction legislation of the Federal Congress deprived the great mass of the white people of the Confederate States, for the time being, whether so designed to or not, of all political control and transferred the same to the Federal military authorities, the ignorant negro, and the carpet-bagger.
The reconstruction laws disenfranchised a large number of the people of each of the rebel States. Not only did this legislation disenfranchise many of the white people of the Confederate States, but it put the ballot and the right to hold office into the hands of the recently emancipated slave, and delivered the white people of the rebel States absolutely into the power of the military.
The military was clothed with the legislative, executive and judicial authority. The Confederate States presented the spectacle of a free and intelligent people, in the twinkling of an eye deprived of all political authority, and their newly freed and ignorant slaves placed in power over them. These slaves to whom was given an authority over the lives and property of the whites, had no intelligence, no experience, and no more capacity for the exercise of the ballot and the powers of intelligent and just government than the mules they drove for their former masters. This reconstruction legislation so drastic and unprecedented, came unexpected, and fell with stunning force on the people of the Confederate States.
Under the State governments established in the rebel States, the creatures of reconstruction legislation of the Federal Congress, many ignorant and corrupt men obtained office, in order to have better opportunity to serve their own interest and greed, regardless of the rights and interests of the people. To such extent did this evil obtain that these governments in many instances, instead of conserving the rights of person and property, and protecting the accumulations of honest industry and thrift became engines of oppression, pillage and robbery; and it became a matter of self-preservation to the vast majority of the white people to oust these official vampires and put in office, in their stead, men of integrity and intelligence who were identified in interest and sympathy with the hopes and desires of the great mass of the people.
Chief among the troubles that came in the train of reconstruction to plague the people of Texas, none were fraught with greater evil than the Freedman’s Bureau and the Loyal League. The originators of these organizations intended them to nurture, educate and solidify the Southern negroes to the interest of the Republican Party and perhaps as an incident, they intended them to protect the negro against imposition by the Southern whites, who they mistakenly supposed were the natural enemies of the negro.
Whether this was so or not, the corrupt influences that crept into both of these organizations resulted in the indiscriminate robbery of the negro and the white man. In a short time after the advent of the League, the negroes throughout Leon County were gathered into it. The negroes at once became insulting and impudent in their intercourse with the whites, and much excited over the assurance given them by the white League leaders that they would, in a short time, receive from the government forty acres of land and a mule. Many of the negroes were so confident of receiving this bounty that they mentally selected forty acres they would take, and the particular mule belonging to their former master. It was not long before parties came along who represented to the negroes that they had authority to survey and set apart to them their land, which they would do for a consideration. They did a thriving business with the poor deluded negro. Through the influence of the Bureau and the League the negroes became soured, dissatisfied and hostile to the whites, and many of them abandoned their employers and their crops, refused to labor, spent their time roaming about the country, to the great alarm of the whites, especially the women and children, and seemed to think that freedom consisted of a pony, six shooter and an exemption of work. The men and women were constantly running to the Bureau Agent with complaints of violence used on them by white people, or that some white man owed them and would not pay them, or would not divide the crop fairly with them.
The whites were continually harassed with these complaints, their persons arrested and carried by the soldiers before the Bureau, and their property forcibly seized by order of the agent. “The reconstruction act of the 3rd of March, 1867, required the general in command to cause a registration of voters before the first day of September of the same year, prescribing the oath to be taken by the voter and the qualifications he must possess in order to register, also the appointment: by the general boards of registration, comprised of three loyal citizens, who were to be managers of the election, count the votes and make return of same to headquarters. The registration board in Leon County consisted of two white men and one negro. It was with great reluctance that the Confederates of that county went before a board, one of which was a former slave, to qualify themselves to vote. In fact, many refused to do so and remained disenfranchised.
Of the voting population of Leon County, there were about two whites to one negro, but so many of the whites refused to register, and many were disqualified from registering, that the negroes had absolute control of the county from the time reconstruction commenced up to the election in November, 1873. At the election in November, 1869, it is evident from the vote on the constitution, which resulted for ratification 73,366 against 4928, that comparatively few of the whites were registered, or if registered did not vote.
At this election in 1869, for ratification of the constitution, the election of governer, members of Congress and all State and county officers, one of the lieutenants in charge of the Federal soldiers at Brenham, when it was burned, was sent down with a company of soldiers to supervise the election in Leon county. The polls were open for four days, and there was but one polling place in the county, and that was at Centerville the county seat. The election was held upstairs in the court house, the board of registration nominally conducting the election, but really the lieutenant in charge of the soldiers. At the foot of the stairs, he stationed three soldiers with loaded guns and fixed bayonets; at the top of the stairs he stationed two more soldiers armed as the others. He, most of the time, was seated at the table used by the election board, exercising total control over the whole matter. No one was permitted in the room during the polling but a voter, and if he was a Confederate he was told not to linger, as his presence was not needed. Through this cordon of soldiers, free-born white men had to pass to vote. It was such an indignity and such a bare-faced travesty on the freedom of elections that many of the whites who had cast aside their pride and registered refused to vote.”
Below you will find the actual loyalty oath from the Journal of the Reconstruction Convention which met at Austin, Texas, June 1, A. D. 1868. Clearly this was an effective technique by the radical Republican administration to disenfranchise large percentages of whites from voting or maintaining their civil rights.
Their total loss of power, impoverishment and realization that they were less than second
class citizens made them very, very angry … and so began a second Civil War throughout the South, in Texas and definitely in Karnes County and Helena.
Chapter 18: Civil War Reconstruction in Karnes County
As you may wonder at this point, what was Helena and Karnes County like during Reconstruction? As you will quickly see it was quite inhospitable, very angry and dangerous. Karnes County became known as one of the most lawless areas in the State of Texas.
A German immigrant who came to the town in late 1868 related that “although the regular occupation of the inhabitants was cattle raising, they enjoyed most stealing horses and looting the freight wagons which passed along the nearby road from Indianola toward inland points. He added significantly that the local authorities “had no power to check this lawlessness.”150
The years immediately following the Civil War were a time of transition and danger for the citizens of Helena and Karnes County. They were still on the very edge of civilization and because of that they attracted some very unpleasant guests. Karnes County and its county seat of Helena were like a magnet attracting hundreds of desperados, outlaws, and former hard-core Confederates from all over the Southwest. Helena became the self-proclaimed “Toughest Town on Earth.”151
A writer for the “San Antonio Express” newspaper in 1868 described the town of Helena as “a mean little Confed town with 4 stores, 4 whiskey mills and any amount of lazy vagabonds laying around living by their wits.” He added that “these inhabitants own nothing, but have enough money for whiskey, tobacco and occasionally a game of monte.”
The unsavory reputation Helena developed can best be demonstrated by one of the favorite pastimes of the hundreds of undesirables. This pastime was known as the “Helena Duel.”
The so-called “Helena Duel” usually was initiated due to an overabundance of whiskey and testosterone. The dueling process was remarkably simple. First, the left hand of each participant was tied together with rawhide. Then each participant was given a short sharp bladed knife placed in the right hand. Both participants were then spun around until disoriented, to the amusement of the assembled rabble.
The knives were short so vital organs could not easily be cut, therefore, bleeding from multiple cut and stab wounds was slow and entertaining for the drunken, cheering, crowds. The fights normally continued until one of the unlucky participants bled to death. The blood thirsty drunken crowds amused themselves by betting on the outcome. This was Helena’s version of Las Vegas.152
One of the most vicious gunfighters of the Reconstruction Era was William Preston Longley, known as Wild Bill Longley. Longley was destined to increase the danger level in the already dangerous town of Helena. He was born on October 6, 1851 and raised in Evergreen, Texas. Wild Bill had a particular hatred of Yankees and the newly freed Negroes.153
Once the Civil War ended Texas Reconstruction radical Republican Governor E. J. Davis started a new State Police force, made up of at least one third mostly ex-slaves. Naturally, this did not sit well with the former Confederate whites.
On a chilly day in December 1866, Bill Longley and his father happened to be in Evergreen. Just at that time a black police officer, who had been drinking heavily, was riding down the street waving his pistol in the air and cussing out the local townspeople.
After the black police officer began insulting his father, Bill stepped forward and told the police officer to lower his gun. The policeman then pointed his gun at a fifteen year old Bill Longley, who killed the policeman with a single shot. Not long after Longley joined other young men and began terrorizing newly freed slaves. He killed two more freed Negroes in Lexington, Texas.154
After killing several other men, in order to elude the authorities, he eaded west. Longley went to Karnes County and worked as a cowboy for John Reagan on his ranch just outside Helena.155
One day on his way back to the ranch after spending some quality time in the Helena saloons Longley was chased by a cavalry regiment. It seems that they had mistaken him for Charlie Taylor of the famous Taylor gang. After killing one of the troopers Bill escaped to Arkansas and was graced with a $1000 reward on his head by the military authorities.156
Wild Bill Longley finally met his maker after being hung to death in Lee County, Texas October 11, 1878.157 This gunfighter and all around bad guy, is reputed to have killed 32 men before his execution.
Now if you think that you’ve seen it all … you haven’t!
Once the Civil War ended and for a period of several months, civil administration and law and order basically collapsed throughout Texas, including Karnes County. Things got so out of hand that thieves even broke into the state treasury in Austin and stole the last gold the state had left.158
Remember our Polish friends in Panna Maria. Well, those poor farmers were picked out for special treatment by the cowboys, desperados and ex-Confederates from Helena. They were singled out because many of the ex-Confederates and sympathizers considered them as traitors due to the large number of Poles who fought for the Union or supported it. After about six months things calmed down for the Poles … that is until 1867.159
It was the spring of 1867 when all hell broke loose in Karnes County. It began when the anti Johnson U.S. Congress assumed control of Reconstruction. The Congressional plan allowed only freed Negroes and men loyal to the federal government to vote.
In each state of the south, registrars of voters were appointed in the counties to enroll all voters who could swear to the “ironclad” oath that they had never in any way supported the Confederacy. In effect these registrars were disfranchising a majority of the white voters and in their places allowing the former slaves and the detested northern sympathizers to go to the polls.
In Karnes County four registrars of voters were appointed in 1867. One of these men was a Pole named Emanuel Rzeppa and he became the object of probably the greatest hatred from the local whites. The anger of many Karnes County whites was immediate and frequently the Registrars received the brunt of the rage. However by the summer of 1867 the Poles were also targeted by the disenfranchised ex-Confederates.160
During the voter registration at Panna Maria in early August 1867 the first of many acts of violence and intimidation against the Poles by the ex-Confederates and cowboys had begun. The Americans galloped into the Polish village on horseback. The Americans not only abused the county registrars, but also beat two immigrants who were receiving their naturalization papers.161
As civilization faded it came down to survival of the fittest. This is the environment that the Polish farmers of Panna Maria found themselves. They were targeted by gangs of thieves, robbers and murderers. Whether in Karnes County or traveling to San Antonio the Poles were being victimized.
As Helena overflowed with criminals and rough gunslingers they sometimes rode to Panna Maria, after heavy drinking, to test their shooting skill. “On Sunday mornings they would be drunk and looking for girls.”162
The cowboys would often be raising a big ruckus in Panna Maria and would not settle down. During this time the priest had to start mass with a shotgun. “When the unwanted criminals would be riding into town, the priest would shoot at them from the church’s bell tower.” These Helena cowboys staged several raids on Panna Maria sometimes shooting people in limbs or stabbing women with a knife.163
Although the Panna Maria Poles and their Catholic priests made some heroic efforts to fight back, the odds were stacked against them. A small group of farmers against large numbers of drunken cowboys and desperados was a losing battle.
As the situation escalated the Poles had their back to the wall and hesitantly decided to take action. The Poles had previously sought government help with little success. Finally in April, 1869 Fathers Bakanowski and Zwiardowski carried another petition from the people of Panna Maria to one of the military commanders at San Antonio.164
Accompanied by Father Barzynski and Bishop Dubuis, the two priests presented their petition. They discussed with the general the difficulties of the P
oles at Panna Maria, and they requested from him the protection of federal troops. The general replied that he already knew of the problems that the Poles faced and said that he planned to send a body of troops to the County in about a month. Father Bakanowski argued, “In a month…. It could be too late because in this time they could kill all of us.”165
The general made a quick decision based on the seriousness of the situation and called in the cavalry officer who was to command the federal troops to be sent to Karnes County. He asked the young officer how soon he could be ready to leave, to which the officer replied five days. Now it became a reality and the Poles of Panna Maria felt their prayers had finally been answered.
General John S. Mason from the U.S. Army Post of San Antonio had previously visited Karnes County. He strongly suggested to his superiors that a permanent company of infantry be transferred to Helena, as “there is no more lawless population in the state than that of Karnes.”166
