ARBITRARY ARRESTS

IN THE SOUTH;

OR,

SCENES

FROM THK

EXPERIENCE OE AN ALABAMA UNIONIST.

BY

R. S. THARIN, A.M.,

A NATIVE OP CHARLESTON, S. C. ; FOR THIRTY YEARS A RESI
DENT OP THE COTTON STATES, AND COMMONLY KNOWN
IN THE WEST AS " THE ALABAMA REFUGEE."

NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY JOHN BRADBURN,

(SUCCESSOR TO M. DOOLADY,)

49 WALKER-STREET.

1 863.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S63,
BY E. S. THAEIN,

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States
for the Southern District of New York.

RENNIE, SHEA & LINDSAY,
STKKKOTYPEHS AND EI.KCTROTYPBRS,

R. CRAIG HEAD,
Printer.

81, 83 & 85 Centre-street,

NEW VOBK 81,83 & 85 CSNTKK-ST.

TO THE

"POOR WHITE TRASH"

OF THE SOUTH,

AND

"THE MUDSILLS"

OF THE NOKTII,
THIS AUTOBIOGRAPHY IS RESPECTFULLY

15 Y THEIR FELLOW-CITIZEX AND ADVOCATE,

THE AUTHOR.

222205

CONTENTS.

PAGE

INTRODUCTION — In which the author, by irrefragable tes
timony, establishes his claim to the reader's confidence. 11

SCENE THE FIRST.
THE LAWYER'S OATH 47

SCENE THE SECOND.
SOUTHERN RIGHTS 83

SCENE THE THIRD.
THE VIGILANCE COMMITTEE 105

SCENE THE FOURTH.
THE MOB 121

SCENE THE FIFTH.
THE VERDICT 145

SCENE THE SIXTH.
IN EXILIUM 166

SCENE THE SEVENTH.

"THE CITY OF THE GREAT KING" (COTTON); or, Mont
gomery as Capital of the Confederate States in Feb
ruary ,"l861 194

LETTER from the Author to his Mother, in Charleston,
S. C. . ... 241

PREFACE*

THE hoar has at last arrived, when the truth, long
trampled under the feet of frenzied rnobs, must be heard
in the South ; and when the conservative element of the
North, long lost sight of and denied, must be attended
to and obeyed.

The time when conservative views (Unionism) have
been visited with "punishment" in the South, is passing
away ; and the time when the same conservative pa
triotism was brow-beaten in the North, is also passing
away.

The liberty of speech, the rights of personal liberty,
personal security, and personal property — these must
hereafter remain intact from the inroads of Radicalism
in both sections.

In this great hour of national purification, it is crim
inal to advocate the perpetuation of selfish feuds. Un
less the factious ravings of Radicalism be quelled, the
Union cannot be restored. Radicalism caused our
troubles ; conservatism alone can cure them !

If the cotton-planters calculated on the radical course
Abolition has been pursuing, — -denying the existence of
any Union feeling in the South, and forcing down the
throats of truer men than themselves, their own wild doc-

* Written before the Proclamation of the President, and be
fore the 22(1 of September, 1802.
1*

6 MJKFACE.

trines as a test of loyalty, — if, I say, the courtiers of
"King Cotton" based their calculations on such a course
in the present administration, and if they acted purposely
to produce that very effect, then has their rascality been
equaled by their skill and foresight, and we must yield
them our admiration as statesmen, although we must
execrate them as men.

Again, if the advocates of Radical Abolition com
pletely alienate the two sections, in order to preserve
the Union, then their statesmanship is worthy of the
contempt of all history ; and their hypocrisy will receive
its just reward from the hands of an indignant and long-
suffering citizen soldiery !

No one denies that slavery is an evil ;

No one denies that adultery is an evil ;

But the Shakers, who advocate absolute non-inter
course between the sexes in order to destroy adultery,
are not a whit less ridiculous than those Abolitionists
who advocate the utter extermination, or provincial vas
salage, of the people of the South in order to destroy
slavery. They would " make a wilderness, and call it
peace."

The personal narrative which follows, embraces the
record of that Unionist who, although a Southerner by
birth, claims the honor of having dealt the first bloiv
against Secession, and who narrowly escaped to tell the
tale.

While lie avoids all allusion to slavery, except in
cidentally to his narrative, it will, nevertheless, be seen
that he considers himself as owing no allegiance to any
one institution, North or South, however "peculiar," un
less that institution retain its proper dimensions among
others.

PREFACE. i

The reader is invited to the following pages, as a
chapter in this strange Rebellion, wherein he may learn
how " Southern Rights" were respected in Alabama, in
the person of a non-slaveholder of that State, — a native
of South C.-ivKii.i, a graduate of the College of Charles
ton, S. C., and a former law-partner of William L. Yan-
cey, — whose only offense consisted in his being true to
his oath to support the Union, and the Constitutions, re
spectively, of the United States and of Alabama.

There are some beings, who, wearing the form of man,
consider it the sacred duty of every one to think with
the crowd who happen to surround him at the time of his
utterances. According to this very large class, which
has its representatives in every age and clime, sodomy
was right until Sodom was destroyed. The only idea
they have formed of LOT, is, that public opinion now
sustains his course, and, therefore, they sustain it also.
Had they inhabited Sodom, however, in LOT'S own
time, they would have vociferously condemned the old
patriarch as eccentric, and would have been as noisy as
the other Sodomites in the mob, which they would
have certainly joined, as a sacred duty to sodomy and
Sodom.

There is another class, who would, to-day, justify the
mob of Sodom, as having acted to the best of their
knowledge and belief.

Another class seize upon an inflamed state of public
opinion, to launch upon their neighbors unmitigated
evils, on which they fatten and grow great at the public
cost.

I may add still another sort of human beings, who,
availing themselves of a status belli, exasperate the bel
ligerents and the struggle itself, in order to carry a cer-

8 rtJKFAOK.

tain point by its prolongation. Every new element of
vindictiveness and of barbarism, which is added by any
cause, — even by the defeat in battle of their own side,—
they hail as a promise of the success of their own fanatical
notions.

The first class, represented in this unhappy country
by the Secessionists of the South, will have neither the
desire nor the opportunity to listen to reason until mob-
ocracy shall have received a check from the outraged
people of the South.

The second, "of which the traitors of the States still
loyal are an example, have the opportunity, but not the
desire, to hear the truth. Because they see around them
much to condemn, they discover in Jeff. Davis every thing
to praise. They offer but an apology for treason.

The third class is to be seen in the perjured leaders of
the Rebellion. They seized upon an inflamed state of
feeling which they themselves had excited, to bring upon
the country a revolution, which they are to ride, they
hope, into power and greatness. Under the cry of
" Southern Rights," they openly trample upon Southern
Rights.

The other class — the Radicals of the North — seize
upon the belligerent state of the country as a glorious
opportunity for the consummation of their cherished
plans, and, in order to bring about the emancipation of
the slave, deliberately render it almost impossible to
save the Union, or close the war. Under the cry of
"the war for the Union," they fight against the Union.*

* I beg pardon, — they do not fight for any thing. They
" stay at home in order to shape the policy of the Nation." —
Vide Fremont's speech at Boston this month (Sept., 1862 >.

Tli us, like the Radicals of the South, who, after precipitat-

PREFACE. 9

But there is another class of men, who, aware of the
existence and motives of all the others, will yet pursue
the even tenor of their own way, and who, before com
ing to a conclusion on public or private matters, will
weigh the arguments on both sides, and judge for them
selves, in accordance with the facts.

I believe this class to be scattered over the length
and breadth of this whole nation, both in loyal and dis
loyal communities, and to them I appeal for a hearing
and a just verdict.

To the historian — if he belong to this class — I am not
unwilling to leave the rest.
WASHINGTON, D. C., Sept. 11, 1862.

ing their poorer neighbors into bloodshed and ruin, are exempt
from conscription, if owners of twenty negroes, these Radi
cals of the North, after having deceived hundreds of thousands
by the cry, now, alas ! no longer true, even in semblance, " the
war for the Union," exempt themselves from service in the
field, if stealers of one.

" Were I the Queen of France, or what's better, Pope of Rome
I'd have no fighting men abroad nor weeping maids at

home ;
All the world should be at peace, and if fools must show their

might,

Why let those who made the battles, be the only ones to
fight." Old Song.

INTKODUCTION*

IN the month of February, in the year of our
Lord 1861, and of American Independence the
85^A, there appeared in Cincinnati a homeless ref
ugee, whose heart was almost broken, and whose
sensitive soul was writhing under wrongs, which
his unassisted efforts had been insufficient to obvi
ate or resist.

The victim of that most untamable of all wild
beasts, an infuriated and unreasoning mob, he had
been exiled from his native South, because the
oath he had taken to support the Constitutions of
Alabama and of the Union, he kept with scrupu
lous and undisguised devotion to truth and patriot
ism. The Southern newspapers favorable to
Secession, were loud in their hired denunciations.
The Charleston Courier, a paper which opposed
Secession in 1852, denominated him a " renegade"
who opposed it in 1861. His offense consisted in
undeviating and unadulterated UNIONISM !

O

It is to the personal narrative of that political
refugee, that the reader's indulgent attention is
respectfully invited. It will be advisable to de
tain the reader, in limine, in order to explain mat
ters necessary for the comprehension of the in-

* In sinsAVfir to the question, " "Who is IIP V"

12

INTRODUCTION.

terior and exterior life wliicli is recorded in the
ensuing pages.

My first care was to find some one who woukl
recognize me. I was not about to skulk through
the world like a whipped cur, but to appeal from
my persecutors to the true, the brave, and the
conservative all over the country. I was not
ashamed, but proud of the cause of my expatria
tion ; and I was conscious that misfortune can
never 'overcome entirely a true and loyal heart,
unless that misfortune be deserved.

I, therefore, consulted a Directory, proceeded to
the a Cincinnati Female Academy," inquired for
Professor Milton Sayler (since a prominent mem
ber of the Ohio Legislature), who had met me at
Richmond, Ya., in 1857, at a " Convention of the
Young Men's Christian Associations of the United
States and British Provinces." By him I was
immediately recognized, and introduced, by let-
t'T, to Rev. E. G.Robinson, pastor of the 9th-street
Baptist Church, and, through him, to the member
ship generally.

It would be voluminous to mention all the good
people who sympathized with me. Levi Coffin,
a noble Quaker, afforded the exile an asylum be
neath his roof. Col, B. P. Baker, a young, talent
ed, and Christian merchant, now doing business at
02 Front-street, New York, showed me every
kindness. Judge Bellamy Storer I was happy to
include among my warm personal friends. He
indorsed a letter from me to his friend, the Presi-

INTRODUCTION. 13

dent, asking for my appointment as commissioner
to Europe, to repel the misstatements of the rebel
commissioners, among whom, it will be remem
bered, was William L. Yancey, my former law-
partner, whose antecedent rascalities, and pro-
&\a,ve-trade proclivities, had come under my own
observation in Alabama. Judge J. B. Stallo was
peculiarly kind and sympathizing. Commissioner
Schwartz assisted me in sending for my family,
and did all he could to smooth my pathway among
strangers.

I soon began to find myself an object of public
interest. The newspapers formally announced
my presence in the city. I became a subject of
constant conversation and comment. I need not
say how unsolicited and how unpleasant were the
every-day attentions which were becoming fashion
able. The Unionists hailed my presence as a
proof of the wickedness of Secession. The Abo
litionists hailed my advent as a proof of the wick
edness of Slavery. I was not a little amused by
the persistent suggestions of the latter, who con
sidered me as, ex necessitate, one of their number.
One of the ladies who resided at " Friend Coffin's,"
told me I ought to have received " seventy eight
lashes, well laid on, to make me an Abolitionist."
This lady, who, in other respects, is quite rational,
although not national, commences her surname
with a " C" and concludes it with an " n." Her
first name is Elizabeth.

A Mr. Essex, from Missouri, was also an in-

INTRODUCTION.

mate. He was a democrat and a gentleman, who
sympathized with my sufferings, and will testify
to these facts.

I had been able to bring to Cincinnati no docu
mentary proof of the correctness of my statements ;
and this circumstance began to operate upon the
minds of some who had never seen me, and whose
politics were never considered particularly obnox
ious to Jeff. Davis. Started by these, surmises
began to travel through the community as to my
loyalty, veracity, etc.

These surmises soon became rumors, which be
came magnified, in timid eyes, to the most ludi
crous proportions. Not hearing these things my
self, and not supposing such things possible among
sensible people, I was somewhat startled to see in
the columns of the Cincinnati Enquirer , a short
editorial, saying I had not told the truth in de
claring myself a former partner of Yancey ; that
I was but a law-student in his office at most,
as my youthful appearance would show. These
wonderful outgivings of those "pantalooned old
women" who began to look upon me as a Seces
sion bomb-shell about to explode in the streets of
Cincinnati and deprive them of their modicum of
brains, were suddenly brought to a close by the
two following extracts, one from the Maysville
(Ky.) Eagle, the other from the Cahawba (Ala
bama) Gazette.

The following, which I mention first, occurred
last in point of time, but I place it, in substance,

INTRODUCTION. 15

here, in order to comment upon the other extract
referred to :

" R. S. Tharin, Esq., a former law-partner of William L.
Yancey, was mobbed at Collirene, Lowndes county, Alabama,
and exiled because lie opposed Secession with its own weap
ons — secret leagues !

" So that is the way you manage down in Dixie ! Mr. Yan-
cey may get up a ' secret league' to destroy the old Union ;
but the moment his former law-partner, Mr. Tharin, attempts
to counteract his plans by a similar method of procedure, he
is barbarously maltreated and unconstitutionally exiled.

"Mr. Tharin is now a political refugee, who, in his own
person, is a monument at once of his own daring and of the
unsparing villainy of his persecutors."

This needs no comment ; it speaks for itself.

It will be proper to state that the Cahawba
Gazette is, or was, when it could get paper, pub
lished in Dallas county, Alabama. The Cincin
nati Daily Press copied from it the following :

From the Cahaicba (Ala.) GAZETTE.

" ORDERED OFF. — We learn from Col. R. Rives,* Collirene,
Lowndes county (Alabama), that a man named Robert S.
Tharin, a lawyer of Wetumpka (Ala.), was taken up at Colli
rene last week, tried by a jury of citizens, convicted, punished,
and banished from that community for expressing and en
deavoring to propagate sentiments that were dangerous to the
peace of society. He had conversed with several non-sl&ve-
holders in the neighborhood, and proposed to them the or
ganization of a secret Abolition society, and said he was
going to establish a newspaper (at Montgomery), to be called
the Non-Slaveholder. The evidence against him was conclu
sive. The punishment inflicted was physically slight, although
it was degrading."

•" Pronounced Recces.

1C INTRODUCTION.

There are several features of this short editorial
which would repay criticism :

1st. ITS THOROUGH MENDACITY; that word, "Ab
olition," the " fruitful source of all our woe," being
skillfully interpolated for the basest of purposes.
The thing itself, as predicated, was a physical im
possibility. In the whole cotton region there are
not, and never have been (as every Southern man
knows), enough Abolitionists to form a " society"
of fifty ; nor can any one — not even a sap-headed
editorial tool of " King Cotton" — really suppose
that I would be now living to narrate the events
of my miraculous escape, had I been actually con
victed of that greatest offense known to the mob
in the Sunny South. They would have hanged
me without even the form of a trial. The pub
lication of the charge was intended to consum
mate my destruction, because Col. Robert Hives
desired to destroy my testimony (which he knew
he could only do by destroying my life), and thus
to " save his party."

2d. ITS UNBLUSHING EFFRONTERY. I " danger-
ous to the peace of society!" Why, look at this
Rebellion ! look at its assassinations,* its unparal
leled outrages upon American citizens — upon
natives of the South ! look at its bloody hands,
which would " incarnadine the deep" in the effort

* Dr. James Slaughter, to whom was addressed the famous
Slaughter (scarlet) Letter by Yancey, soon after his (unau
thorized) publication of that " private letter," was found dead
in his bed, from the effects of — poison !

1 N TRODUCT ION . 1 7

to wash them clean ! look at its mobs — at one
time burning (at Montgomery, Alabama) the
works of the distinguished Spurgeon ; at another,
drunk with blood and blind with fury, sipping
out of the skulls of slaughtered soldiers ! Yes,
look at its mobs, at its pirates, at its utter destitu
tion of moral principle, at its Radicalism, and say
whether, in my attempt to restrain Alabama from
Secession, / was dangerous to the peace of society !

3d. ITS INSOLENT AND SILLY CHARGES. " He (I)

had conversed with several new-slaveholders in
the neighborhood." " Conversation" with " non-
slaveholders" a crime ! I consider it a glorious
thing to tell the non -slaveholders of their wrongs
and of their rights — "Southern rights!" So far
from conversation with non-slaveholders being a
crime, you will yet learn to your own cost, Mr.
Editor, that it is conversation (and coalition) with
cotton-planters and their editorial dupes, that con
stitutes the political crime of treason ! — another
name for which is Radicalism.

" And proposed to them the organization of a
secret Abolition society !" When Robert Rives
inserted that word "Abolition," he thought he
did a politic thing. He had told me, after my
maltreatment, I " should not escape." He was
determined I should die l>y another mob, since
he had failed to convince the second that " death
Avas not too severe a punishment ;" and so he
thought he would slay me, and save himself by
this unfounded charge.

18 INTRODUCTION.

" And said lie was going to establish (at Mont
gomery) a paper, to be called the ' Non- Slave
holder: "

" Angels and ministers of grace defend ns !"
Xo wonder the planters and the editors trembled
in their boots ! Indeed ! the " poor white trash"
have an " organ /" " Crucify him ! crucify him ! !"
Why, that's as much as to say that all white men
were born free and equal ! — why, that's returning
to first principles with a vengeance ! — why, that's
— agrarianism ! " Crucify him !" What use is
there in Calhoun's wonderful and convenient dis
covery that the Declaration of Independence is a
lie and Thomas Jefferson a humbug, if this young
ster, Tharin, self-educated, mi-cottoned, dares to
think, speak, and even write for himself and his
fellows ?

" We are informed," commences the Gazette,
" by COL. ROBEKT RIVES." Arid who is COL. ROB-
EKT RIVES ?

Col. Robert Rives was descended from the Hu
guenots, of whom a portion, as refugees from the
barbarous decree of an intolerant Louis of France,
selected the banks of the Ashley, in South Car
olina, as the place of their exile. Unlike their
victim, no blood of 1776 coursed through his
veins ; but he was a convert to the senseless doc
trine of the Charleston Mercury, that " minorities
should rule"

Rives had been mainly instrumental in raising
the mob, voted against 'postponing the publica-

INTRODUCTION. 19

tion of the "verdict" until the wife of his victim
should be out of danger, and declared that Mr.
Tharin should not " escape," if lie could pre
vent it.

In spite of the vote of the very mob which he
had raised, to suspend the publication of their
"proceedings" for four weeks, in order to save the
life of an unoffending Southern lady, we find the
same Col. Robert Rives sneaking to the office of
the Cahawba Gazette, a paper not mentioned in
the "verdict," and, weeks before the period desig
nated by the mob for its publication elsewhere,
procuring, in the very face of his promise to abide
by the voice of the meeting, the premature, the
murderous advertisement of the very thing he had
promised to postpone !

Had the voice of the majority suited his " pecu
liar" views, Rives would have acted with them ;
but, being in a minority, he got rid of all diffi
culty on the subject by a very simple process — he
seceded ! i

For such a miserable ignoramus to secede, when
his contemptible minority had ceased to rule^ was
perfectly natural. Thus, on an exceedingly small
scale, he illustrated the " principles" of that stu
pendous crime, which set up the despotic will of
a few cotton-planters, and their worse than Hel
vetic clienteles, against the will of the overwhelm
ing majority of the American people, constitu
tionally expressed.

There is something maddening in the influence

20 INTRODUCTION.

of a mob on a spirit uncontrolled by love of truth.
All the passions of the breast, inflamed with fury,
then leap up, like fiends above the lava-waves of
hell. The eyes roll in liquid insanity ; the heart
glows with the fires of revenge; the venom of
hydrophobia is on the tongue ; and, intoxicated
by the presence of a concurring mob, deeds of
dastardly malignity become the desire and the
fruit, which naught save the popularity of the act
is quoted to extenuate.

Such a being is no longer a man ! he is lost to
manhood, and to all the qualities which elevate
man above the brute creation. Saturated with
the poison of his disease, he riots in images of
horror and of blood — a Moloch in a Pandemonium
of cruel thoughts.

What should be the fate of such a man ? What
would you do to a dog, mad and foaming, which
rushes at the throat of your son ?

This Republic owes it to " the Alabama Ref
ugee," and to all her other children who have
suffered like him, that the murderous hands which
dealt the fiendish blows be no longer uplifted for
destruction. In other words, the National and
State Governments owe to Unionists, everywhere,
protection.

" The wicked shall fall into his own snare/'
The sneaking behavior of Rives produced the op
posite effect from what he designed : it saved me
much inconvenience^ if not danger, by bringing
before the attention of the people of Cincinnati a

INTRODUCTION. 21

perfect eorroboration of tlie story I myself liacl
told, and that from the most unexpected, and,
therefore, most reliable source — my very enemies !
The charge of Abolitionism -no sensible man be
lieved, except the Radicals, from whom it pro
tected me.

The news of the battle of Fort Sumter, 12th
April-, found Cincinnati wrought up to a degree
of excitement unparalleled in the annals of that
city. A spontaneous meeting of many thousands
collected one night in front of the steps of the
Post-office, and various gentlemen addressed the
meeting. Some one called my name. The call
became general — universal. I rose and com
menced thus :

" Fellow-citizens of the United States ! I stand
before you the representative of the Union men
of the State of Alabama."

This was enough. One spontaneous burst of
welcome rose upon the air. Hats were waved ;
men grasped each other by the hand ; the vast
crowd rocked and shouted with an impulse which
showed how the heart of Cincinnati bounded with
delight at the reception of such intelligence.

The following letter, written by an eye-witness
of that scene, will convey the facts better than I
could, or would :

"No. 62 FRONT-STREET, NEW YORK, Aug. 11, 1862.

" DEAK SIR : Yours of late date is received, and, but for the
fact that I have been slightly indisposed, and a little over-

22 INTRODUCTION".

worked in consequence of the absence of my partner, B. C.,
would have had an earlier reply.

" You do right to call me your friend ; for since I heard your
earnest and heartfelt plea for the Union before that immense
audience at the Post-office at Cincinnati, which chained not
only me but hundreds to the spot while you were speaking-,
I have not ceased to believe you not only loyal and true, but
that you deserved something at the hands of Unionists. Your
taking a private soldier's place to assist in putting down the
Iiebellion, shows your pluck and courage. I was glad, while
in Washington, to say a word in your behalf, and only wish I
could have done more. You ask me to address a letter to the
President (in behalf of your appointment as Provisional Gov
ernor of Alabama). I regret I cannot render you service in
that way, as I do not feel sufficiently acquainted with Mr. Lin
coln ; and although I am known to some people in Washing
ton as a Union man, I feel a delicacy in addressing a letter to
Mr. Lincoln, even for my friend Tharin.

" As you are at liberty to show this letter, to that intent let
me here say, that I believe you to be a true Union man, a real
patriot, a Christian, and a man of ability and honor.

" Yours truly,

" B. P. BAKER.

" R. S. TIIARIN, ESQ., Washington, D. C."

The following letter comes in here, as a kind of
post scriptum to the above :

From HON. CALEB B. SMITH, Secretary of Interior.

" DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

" Washington, Aug. 25, 1862.

" DEAR SIR : — I am in receipt of your letter of 18th instant,
in reference to your appointment as provisional governor of the
State of Alabama.

" This is a matter, of course, with which my department has
no official connection, and I can only aid you so far as my rec
ommendation mav do so.

INTRODUCTION. 23

" I have placed your letter before the President with my
recommendation in favor of your appointment, and shall be
gratified to learn that your application is successful.

" Yours,

" Very respectfully,
"CALEB B. SMITH,

" Secretary.
" R. S. THARIX, Esq.".

I have other recommendations for the same
place from other sources; but will not insert them
here.

I will here state, however, that this application
was made while Mr. Lincoln was the unstultified
author of the Greeley letter.

From the Sunny South I had brought nothing:
with me. About three months after my expatri
ation, however, my wife and two children arrived
in Cincinnati. She brought my letter-book, con
taining, among others, the following letter, in the
autograph of Yancey :

" MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA, Oct. 23, 1859.
" DEAR SIR : — I am in receipt of yours of the 20th instant.
My business in Coosa county is not large. In fact I have
not cultivated it, having, for several years, been expecting
to abandon it, to practice in one of the wealthier counties
"below this. If a legal connection can benefit you in Coosa, I
am willing to form one with you, confined to that county.
You to receive one-third and I two-thirds of all receipts. If
this is agreeable to you, you may consider it as formed, com
mencing from 1st November next.

" Yours, truly.

" W. L. YAXCEY.
" R. S. TIFARTX, Esq."

2i INTRODUCTIOX.

Mr. William L. Yancey and his Coosa county
partner did not get on very well together, it seems,
for the following is an extract from another let
ter from the former. I have "both letters entire in
my possession :

" MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA, Dec. 17, 1859.
****** Be so good, therefore, if you" have advertised
our connection, to advertise its dissolution. * * * * * * "

I am glad to have it in rny power, not only to
prove the fact of the partnership, which the Cin
cinnati Enquirer was base enough to deny in be
half of its friend Yancey, but also to show that I
did not long affiliate, even in business, with such
a man as Yancey.

But Mr. Yancey is estopped from ever saying a
word against me, even in the South, by a " P. S."
to the notice of dissolution, in which he " recom
mended his late law-partner to the confidence of
the public, of which he was every way worthy."
This appeared in the Hayneville (Lowndes county)
Chronicle, for the'space of a year.

The impossibility of supporting my family in
the Queen city of the West, on account of the
universal prostration of business, caused me to
seek my fortunes in Richmond, Indiana. My
friend, James Reeves, wrote me from that city
that the opening for a lawyer was good, and I
availed myself of the prospect. Before leaving
Cincinnati, I deemed it advisable to secure the
following letters, which are laid before the reader,

IK TEODUCTION . 2 5

• — in the spirit in which this whole chapter is writ
ten, — in order to prepare his mind for succeeding
chapters, by placing my word, my character, and
my experience beyond the possibility of a reason
able doubt :

Letter from HON. MILTON SAYLER.

"CINCINNATI, OHIO, June 3, 1801.

" It gives me very great pleasure to state that I met the
bearer, Robert S. Tharin, Esq., in the annual convention of the
Young Men's Christian Associations of the United States and
British America, held in the city of Richmond, Va., in May,
1857, to which convention Mr. Tharin was one of three dele
gates from Charleston, S. C. Mr. Tharin occupied a worthy
position in that convention, and, though my acquaintance
with him since has been slight, yet I do not hesitate, from
my knowledge of him, to commend him to those among -vhom
he may go, as a gentleman in every respect worthy of their
good-will and confidence.

" MILTON SAYLEK."

Letter from SAMUEL LOWRY, Escj.

"CINCINNATI, June 4, 1801.

"I met the bearer, Mr. R, S. Tharin, at a convention of
delegates from the Young Men's Christian Associations of
the United States, held at Richmond, Va., May, 1857. He
was one of three representatives from the association of
Charleston, S. C., had the confidence of his colleagues, and,
by his deportment, made a favorable impression on the mem
bers of the convention and the citizens of Richmond.

" SAMUEL LOWRY."

Letter from JUDGE J. B. STALLO.

"Mr. R. S. Tharin, a former law-partner of Mr. Yancey,
has been driven from the State of Alabama on account of
his anti-secession sentiments, and since his expatriation has

a >

26 INTRODUCTION.

spent some months in the city of Cincinnati. During his
stay here it has been my pleasure to meet him occasionally,
and I cheerfully testify that he is a gentleman of culture and
of unexceptionable habits, and that he has won the confidence
and respect of all who had the good fortune to make his ac
quaintance.

" J. B. STALLO."

P. S. l}y REV. E. G. ROBINSON.

" I cheerfully and heartily concur in Judge Stallo's com
mendation of Mr. Tharin.

" E. G. ROBINSON,
' Pastor 9t7i-street Baptist ChurcJi, Cincinnati.'"

A Pleasant Reminiscence.

" RESPECTED SIR : By the consent, not only of the teachers
and of the committee, but by the request of the pupils of the
Hughes High School in general, it was unanimously agreed
to tender our heartfelt thanks to you for the eloquent and
patriotic oration which you delivered at the unfurling of the
Stars and Stripes from the summit of our school.

" With respect,

" J. L. THORNTON,
"J. M. EDWARDS,
" J. T. POMPILLY,
" AMELIA S. WRIGHT,
" MRS. H. B. COONS,
"ELLEN FREEMAN,
" SIDNEY OMOHONDRO, ;
" JOSEPH S. PEEBLES,

"CINCINNATI, OHIO, April 25, 1861.

" LADIES AND GENTLEMEN : I deem it no more than proper
to acknowledge, in writing, the receipt of your highly appre
ciated favor of the 24th instant.

" Your letter of thanks, now before me, will ever be classed

INTRODUCTION. 27

among my most cherished mementoes ; and the kindness which
dictated it will always retain my affectionate and respectful
gratitude.

" In contemplating the many evidences of Cincinnati's Chris
tian hospitality toward myself, I can almost bless the trials
which drove me to find a home amid a community so sympa
thetic and so loyal.

"May our beloved national banner in triumph still Avave
over our city and your school !

" I liaA*e the honor, ladies and gentlemen, to subscribe my
self, with high regard,

" Your obedient serA*ant,

" R. S. THABIN.

" To the Teachers and Committee

of the Hughes High School."

With my wife and children, now trebly dear to
the heart which had lost all other associates save
them, I took up the line of my wanderings west
ward. I bore with me the consciousness of sin
cerity, and desired nothing so much as repose. I
longed for some spot of earth where I might sup
port and educate my family, and heal my bleed
ing wounds with the balm of quiet and study.
Richmond, Indiana, generally known as the Qua
ker City, seemed to invite me to seek needed
tranquillity beneath her maples. Alas ! how lit
tle tranquillity I found there is known to my
numerous friends in the State of Indiana.

When I look back upon that period, my soul
sickens at the contemplation. Called from my
retirement by the voice of the people, at their
frequent meetings I would express my views upon
the crisis without reserve. My popularity became

28 -INTRODUCTION.

greater than I desired, and offensive to those
whose only earthly desire is popularity.

At length I proposed to the citizens the forma
tion of a " Union .Eights Club," at a meeting ap
pointed for the purpose.

The next Saturday there appeared in the "Broad-
axe of Freedom," which is as much a Union paper
as Jeff. Davis is a saint, a ridiculous and menda
cious criticism of my effort on the night alluded
to. I replied, and the editor acknowledged (in
advertently) that he lied. The next issue of the
Richmond Palladium showed the admission of
the Broadaxe of its own falsity, and derided the
position of the editor, who had charged me with
being the author of a piece in the Palladium (of
the very existence of which I was utterly ignorant)
charging the Broadaxe with Secession proclivi
ties.

The editor of the Broadaxe now perpetrated an
act of which any gentleman would be ashamed.
Instead of acknowledging himself in the wrong,
and retiring gracefully from a controversy, to wage
which decently he showed himself incompetent,
he seized upon the weakest and most vulnerable
point in my fortress.

This was rny Southern origin, my former law-
partnership with Yancey, and my omission to vol
unteer !

Pantalooned old women reside in every com
munity. Give them the slightest pabulum for
gossip, and at it they go, as if it was indispensable

INTRODUCTION. 29

to their own happiness to prove every wild sur
mise of every hair-brained babbler to be true.

The suggestion of the JBroadaxe did its dirty
work. At the expense of every principle of honor,
the editor of the Broadaxe (U. S. Hammond) was
victorious. The record of that controversy proves
that he admitted that he lied! What of that?
lie was victorious ! ! At least he, poor fool, so
thought, and, doubtless, so thinks to day.

Driven to the wall by the most unmistakable
signs of mobocraey, which, alas ! I had learned to
detect, I involuntarily volunteered, inviting him to
accompany me, which he disgracefully declined.

But why should /, who suffered so much from
Secession, be driven to volunteer? Why was I
not already in the armies of the Union ?

I had a wife, whom I had promised, when she
came, a picture of despair, to Cincinnati with our
two small children, that I would never leave her
without her consent.

For me, she had left every relative she had on
earth, the sacred dust of her dead, the scenes and
companions of her childhood, her brothers im
pressed into the armies of "King Cotton."

Delicate in health, shattered in constitution, yet
heroic and devoted, this young Southern lady, un
accustomed to hardship, — her mother's favorite,
most indulged daughter, — was, even then, almost
heartbroken at the thought of never seeinir a«:aiii

O o o

her friends in the South.

She was a stranger in a strange land. She had

30 INTRODUCTION.

no old associations in Richmond, Indiana ; she
was chilled by the hard, cold, icy manners of the
ladies of Richmond, so different from the caress
ing kindness of Alabama's fair daughters ; her
little boy was an invalid; her strength was re
duced, by our unparalleled sufferings, to the verge
of prostration.

Did she not need her husband's presence ? Did
she not need his guardian care? No mother, no
friends, no society, — the wife of an exile, a volun
tary exile at his side, — she did need his whole and
most devoted society ; and it was for the purpose
of recuperating her energies, of restoring her
health, and of earning a support for her and her
children, that I had gone to Richmond.

When she saw the printed demand for the sac
rifice, she threw her arms around my neck, and,
in a voice broken by sobs, said that she would
withhold her consent no longer.

Had she not granted her consent, I would have
rotted in Fort Lafayette ; I would have suffered
myself to be torn into atoms by a Northern mob,
headed by an editorial empiric, before I would
have broken my word to her. This she knew, and
she consented.

Many a regiment would have received me
among its field-officers, had I agreed to recruit for
it. But my preference fell on the 57th Regiment
Indiana Volunteers, the Colonel of which was a
native of Virginia, a preacher of the Gospel, and
my professed friend !

INTRODUCTION. 31

When I first went to Richmond, I had been
introduced to this man by my true friend James
Reeves. He, the former, had introduced me to the
first audience (at Star Hall) I ever addressed in that
city. Elated at my success, he " stuck closer than
a brother" to my growing fortunes, was almost
every day in my law-office, called at my house
and took me to walk almost every Sunday. lie
would even point me out in church as a perse
cuted patriot.

What a wonderful instinct has woman ! My
wife said to me, one day, that she distrusted the
sincerity of this clerical gentleman.

I told her that her fears were utterly ground
less ; and that if the preacher proved false, I would
doubt the sincerity of all men.

It is universally known in Richmond that the
colonel and lieutenant-colonel of the 57th Regi
ment both promised me that I should not have
to go as a private, on account of my family. The
first promised me a field-office anyhow, and the
other promised me to use his efforts to obtain
for me a lieutenancy, in order that I might be
appointed adjutant by the former, if I should de
sire it.

The lieutenant-colonel handed me a recruiting

o

permit at the People's Bank, authorizing me to
recruit a company.

I commenced to address the people of the Fifth
Congressional District. The main feature of my
speeches was simply " Union:" I denounced JEny-

32 INTRODUCTION.

land as the fomenter of our dismemberment, and
prophecied difficulties with that power on the oc
currence of the first pretext. This was before the
" Trent affair." I always had overflowing audi
ences, and the good results of my efforts were
soon discernible in the communities I visited.

The success of my undertaking was doubtful,
however. The emissaries of the JBroadaxe fol
lowed me like my shadow. In private they cir
culated the hellish invention that I was a " South
ern spy." I began to realize the fact that those
who had first attacked me were organized for my
destruction. Probably they felt that as they dared
not "go to war" to light Secessionists, the next
best thing they could do would be to destroy the
family and prospects of loyal refugees from Rebel-
dom ! The regiment itself became changed to
ward me. By a few judicious puffs, the Broad-
axe had completely bought up its vain colonel,
who began to turn away at my approach. Poor
man ! he had promised so many people the same
thing, that his rapidly-increasing regiment was
in danger of having more officers than privates.
Some must be thrown overboard ! /was, of course,
a selected victim !

The regiment attained the minimum number ;
but, although I had labored for that regiment
with indefatigable industry (for I desired the pay
of an officer for iny family made destitute by
exile), I was, by the blackest ingratitude, con
signed to its ranks.

INTRODUCTION. 33

The following, from the Palladium of Dec. 14,
1861, expresses the public feeling of the conserva
tives* of Richmond :

" Our friend Tharin, failing to raise a company, mainly
through the slanders propagated and started by the Broadaxe
in regard to him, volunteered as a private soldier in the ranks
and shouldered his musket, — thus showing his faith in our
glorious institutions by his works, and giving the lie to the
foul insinuations against him by his persecutor Ham'an. The
57th has no braver man belonging to it than E. S. Tharin ; and
we predict that, should the opportunity occur, he will win his
way by deeds of valor to promotion, which he already so richly
deserves for his exertions in recruiting for this regiment."

From the TRUE REPUBLICAN (Radical) of December 19, 1861,
published at Centre-mile, Indiana.

" R. S. Tharin, Esq., the Alabama refugee, whose name has
been so much associated with that of the traitor Yancey, entered
McMullen's regiment as a private. Mr. T. has resided for
several months at Richmond. Failing in an effort to raise a
company, he has gone into the ranks. He deserves great
credit for his patriotism."

While encamped at Indianapolis I had an in
terview with the reverend colonel, and demanded
that he keep his word, which, it will be remem
bered, was that I should not have to go as a pri
vate in his regiment.

After much exciting argument, I forced from
him an acknowledgment of his promise, and the
next day received a discharge. By-the-by, he
himself never went with his regiment.

The following letters explain themselves :

* Unionists alone are entitled to this epithet.

INTRODUCTION.

From JUDGE JAMES PERRY to the Colonel of the Sixteenth
Regiment, I. V. M., then stationed at Camp Hicks, Md.

" COL. P. A. HACKLED AN :* — I beg leave to introduce to your
acquaintance, Robert S. Tharin, Esq., a member of the bar, a
gentleman of very fair literary and scientific attainments, a
native of the South, an emigrant from that land of terror and
distress, and loyal to the banner of the Union. Mr. Tliarin
has rendered valuable services in filling up Col. McMullen's
regiment ; but, not being very well satisfied with the officers
of that regiment, he has by them been permitted to choose
another, and has made choice of your regiment, into which he
enters as a private soldier. Two motives have directed him
to the choice of your regiment : first, the term of service is
shorter, and he leaves a family far from any relatives, in a
strange land ; secondly, if the country should need his ser*
vices, after the expiration of the time of enlistment of your
regiment, he intends to strive for a better position than that
of a private in the service. In his behalf, I ask for such kind
ness as you have in your power to bestow.

" I am, very sincerely, yours, etc.,

" JAMES PERRY."

From BENJ. W. DAVIS, Junior Editor of the "Richmond (Ind.)
Palladium."

" RICHMOND, Jan. 12, 1862.

" DEAR SIR : — Permit me, although personally a stranger to
you, but oth&ricise intimately acquainted with you, to introduce
R. S. Tliarin, formerly of Alabama, but now of this city, who
was driven from that State in consequence of his devotion to
the old flag, and who is now a private, a new recruit, in your
regiment. It is rumored here that my friend ORAN PERRY is
about to be promoted to another regiment in the three years'
service, which he well deserves for his sterling good qualities ;
and could the appointment of sergeant-major, which he now
holds, and which place would be vacant by his transfer, be
conferred on my friend R. S. Tliarin, either that post, or the

* Now General.

INTRODUCTION. o->

adjutancy, — which, I learn, will be vacated tor a similar reason,
— would be filled by him with equal satisfaction to yourself
and regiment as now, and it would be rendering a deserved
honor to one who is every way worthy and well qualified, be
side being appreciated by the numerous friends he has made
since sojourning in our little Quaker city.
" Yours truly,

" BENJ. W. DAVIS,
" Jun. Ed. R. Palladium.
" COL. P. A. HACKLEMAN."

Let me liere mention that the officers and mem
bers of the Sixteenth Indiana are deserving of their
great popularity and reputation. It was in the
tent of the chaplain of the Sixteenth, Rev. Ed
ward Jones, that I wrote the personal narrative
which, follows. To the gallant and distinguished
Col. Hackleman, I owe a brother's love. I have
just learned that in the late battle of Corinth,
while leading on his brigade in the most gallant
and heroic manner, the Stars and Stripes waving
triumphantly above his head, his gleaming sword
encouraging his men, his noble countenance ani
mated with a halo of patriotic zeal, with the word
"Forward" upon his lips, he fell into the arms of
victory, leaving no stain on his escutcheon, and
for his children a heritage of glory.

The following, from the Maryland Union (Fred
erick), is the next link in the chain of the refugee's
steps :

"MR. THARIN'S LECTURE.

" FREDERICK, February 10, 1862.

" DEAR SIR : — Understanding, from undoubted authority,
that in our very midst is a gentleman, a former law-partner of

JO INTRODUCTION.

William L. Yancey, who lias experienced in Ms own person
the extreme of Secession cruelty, and whose love for the Union
of his forefathers has been the cause of a martyrdom which
history will record as the most remarkable of the nineteenth
century, we take the liberty of requesting, in behalf of the
patriotic people of Frederick, that you will gratify us by ap
pointing an evening on which to give a narrative of adventures
in Alabama, with such remarks in application as you may see
lit to deliver.

" We feel warranted in the assurance that the theme will
attract an audience second to none which Frederick has pro
duced, and hope you will feel no backwardness in accepting an
invitation which is made in good faith.

" In any event, be assured of the sympathy and apprecia
tion of " Respectfully,

" Your fellow-citizens,
" WM. G. COLE
" D. J. MARKET,
" CHARLES COLE,
" W. MAIIONET,
" M. NELSON.
" R. S. THARIN, Esq.

" P. S. With our compliments, will you please invite the
field-officers of your regiment (Sixteenth Indiana, we believe)
to be present on the occasion T

" CAMP HICKS, February 11, 1862.

" FELLOW-CITIZENS : — Your nattering and highly-apprecia
ted favor, of yesterday's date, containing an invitation to
deliver a lecture on the subject of my adventures and suffer
ings in behalf of the Union, is just received.

" I hold myself ever ready to address my fellow-citizens of
this endangered nation upon the great events which have
swept over the Cotton States like a conflagration, consuming
as stubble the once sacred rights of American citizens, and
threatening to wrap in inextinguishable flames the temple of
Liberty. My duty and my inclination alike impel me to ex
pose the horrors of that Reign of Terror which aims at the

INTRODUCTION. 37

destruction of republican institutions and the subversion of
free speech and free conscience. My own eventful and disas
trous experience is the property of the public, who have a
right to know just what ' Secession' means.

" Secession aims at the heart of loyalty, whether it pulsates
in Northern or Southern breasts. Myself a native of Charles
ton, S. C., an adopted citizen of Alabama, my wife and children
natives of the latter State, my rights were trampled upon the
moment I declared my intention to respect the obligation of
my oath to support the Constitution of the United States and
the Constitution of Alabama. Mobbed, scourged, and exiled,
I now wander amid a people far from the scenes of my child
hood, but not without a feeling of gratitude to that kind Provi
dence who has delivered me from King Cotton, and at the
same time afforded me the opportunity of bearing arms in de
fense of the flag which waved over my ancestral antecedents,
which shadowed my cradle with a blessing, and which will
receive my corpse when expiring.

" I am happy, therefore, to respond to your kind communica
tion in the affirmative.

" If agreeable to you, I will appoint Saturday evening, the
22d instant, as the time of my lecture — leaving the arrange
ment of place and hour, etc., to your kind supervision.

" I have the honor, gentlemen, to remain, with highest con
sideration, " Your fellow-citizen and servant,

" R. S. THARIN,

"Private, 16th Regt. Indiana Vol.
" MR. W. G. COLE and others.

" P. S. The field-officers of the Sixteenth Indiana will be
present, if public duties conflict not with their inclinations."

From tlie MARYLAND UNION.

" AN INTERESTING LECTURE. — It will be seen from the cor
respondence in to-day's paper, that R. S. Tharin, Esq., former
law-partner of Win. L. Yancey, and at present attached to the
Sixteenth Regiment Indiana Volunteers, a gentleman of the
highest respectability, of fine accomplishments, endowed with
rare talents, and an eloquent speaker, will deliver a lecture in
4

38 IXTKODUCTION.

tliis city on Saturday evening, the 22d instant. Due notice of
the hour and place of meeting will be given, and we hope
there will be a general outpouring on the part of our citizens
to hear him, as we feel assured that the lecture will be un
usually interesting, and delivered in the finest style."

One of the aids to Gen. Banks about this time
detailed me from my regiment to write for him
at headquarters, where I remained until some time
after the battle of Winchester.

The lecture was never delivered. The division
of Gen. Banks was ordered to march into Vir
ginia. I went with my regiment, of course.
The following certificate will explain what I was
about in Virginia :

Certificate from CAPT. M. C. WELSH, I. V. M.

" WOODSTOCK, VA., April 2, 1862.

" I take pleasure in stating that R. S. Tharin, Esq., of the
16th Indiana, although exempt from such duty at the time, as
clerk on Gen. Banks' staff, to my certain knowledge borrowed
a gun and accouterments from one of my men (Evans Arm
strong), and did his devoir at the great battle of Winchester,
on Sunday, 23d March, 1862.

" M. C. WELSH,
" Capt. of Comp. D, 1th Lid. Vols"

Having finished my duties at headquarters, I
was proceeding, via Washington, to rejoin my
regiment, when I was detained in this city (Wash
ington) by the reception of a small office in the
Treasury Department. My regiment's term of ser
vice in a few days afterward expired. I received my
discharge and my pay, and proceeded to Indiana

INTRODUCTION. 39

for my family, who are now, tliank God, once
more with their natural protector.

I will conclude this introductory chapter with
a letter to the London Daily Ntwz, to a careful
perusal of which the reader is invited, as it proves
the pro-slave-trade proclivities of William L. Yan-
cey, then commissioner in London of the Confede
rate States, so called. It appeared in the columns
(4rth and 5th) of the London Daily Ntws of Xo-
vember 27, 1861 (page 2).

"YANCEY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE.

CONNER SVILLE, INDIANA, October, 1861.
" To the Editor of the 'Daily New*:

" SIR : In a recent issue of the Times I see a letter from
' Hon.' William L. Yancey, one of the commissioners of the
pasteboard ' Confederacy/ of which he is chief architect, in
which epistle he attempts to show that, in the Southern
Commercial Convention at Montgomery, State of Alabama, in
May, 1858, he was not in favor of the renewal of the African
slave-trade.

" To that Convention — which has identified itself with the
most obnoxious measures ever resorted to for the violation of
the time-honored principles and reciprocal stipulations of both
Great Britain and America — it was my good, or bad, fortune
to be a delegate.

" Interested as, in spite of my indignation, I felt myself in
the great debate, that for five consecutive days occupied the
exclusive attention of the body, I followed up the argument in
all its sickening details, watched every parliamentary and un
parliamentary shift to keep it exclusively before the conven
tion, and, although, disgusted by the sophistries used by all
the parties to the discussion, watched its inception, progress,
and conclusion as I would have watched a gathering avalanche
upon a mountain-top.

40 INTRODUCTION.

" The eloquent champion of the slave-trade on that memo
rable occasion was William L. Yancey ! In fluent periods he
poured out the cataract of his oratory in favor of a measure
which, if successful, could prove no less than the revival of
the accursed traffic in human flesh.

" Leonidas Spratt, of South Carolina, whose whole notoriety
and Southern popularity are derived from his slave-trade mon
omania, and who has since published in Mr. Yancey's ' organ/
the Montgomery Advertiser, his prediction of ' anpther revolu
tion/ on account of the temporary prohibition (by the Provi
sional Congress) of his darling measure, had, at the previous
session of the Southern Commercial Convention (1857), intro
duced a resolution expressly demanding its revival. Of a
committee appointed to report, at the next session, ' on the
advisability of reopening the African slave-trade/ Mr. Spratt,
by virtue of his motion, was constituted chairman, and Mr.
Yancey enjoyed the honor of being named second on that
humane committee.

" The year's recess having expired, we find, at Montgomery,
in 1858, Yancey, Spratt, and the ' Southern Commercial Con
vention.' Mr. Spratt introduced a long, elaborate, and in
comprehensible report, abounding in scientific terms, and
propounding a new governmental and social theory, which
to nine-tenths of the assembly was like the handwriting on
the wall, in need of an interpreter. When, to the great relief
of the unscientific ear of the ' Southern Commercial Conven
tion/ Mr. Spratt had concluded his long-spun production, Mr.
Yancey arose and said, substantially, that

" ' Although he agreed with every word of his amiable and
patriotic friend, Mr. Spratt, still he considered the magnificent
report of that gentleman too unwieldy for parliamentary pur
poses, and that, therefore, as a minority report, which he
would move as a substitute to the original, he would offer the
following resolution :

" ' Resolved, That the Federal laws repealing the African
slave-trade ought to be repealed.'

" Mr. Yancey was too good a lawyer to be ignorant of the
full force and meaning of the legal term 'repealed/ which was
enunciated with significant and sonorous emphasis. Whether,

INTRODUCTION. 4:1

at its inception, the slave-trade was customary or statutory,
the '' repeal' of the ' statute' prohibiting its continuance is
susceptible of but one meaning, and that — its resumption.
In effect, Mr. Yancey's resolution, without the least change in
its meaning, might have been worded :

" 'Resolved, That the African slave-trade ought to be re
vived.'

" In fact, the debate which ensued on the introduction of
the Yancey substitute, ajid which consumed about five days,
to the exclusion of all other matter, was conducted altogether
upon the supposition that the resolution contemplated the re
vival of the trade. With this universal opinion the conven
tion listened to the arguments pro and con. Upon the square
issue of renewal, or non-renewal, each debater took his ground.
The most prominent of these were Roger A.'Pryor, editor of
the Richmond South, published in Virginia, and William L.
Yancey, of Alabama.

" Mr. Pry or opposed Mr. Yancey on several grounds, one of
which I remember to have been that the ' minimum of labor
produces the maximum of value/ which Mr. Yancey com
bated with great enthusiasm. He showed that the ' minimum
of labor' would benefit Virginia, who raises the laborers, but
would injure the cotton States, which consumes them. He
ridiculed Virginia for her want of Southern sentiment, and
foretold her dismemberment, if not her entire defection to ' Ab-
olitiondom,' as he was pleased to call the public opinion of
Christendom.

" ' No !' substantially exclaimed the advocate of piracy, ' No !
I hope the hour is not far distant, when the cotton States, no
longer dependent on the slave-producers of Virginia, will
scatter among their people a wealth of negroes, which will
enable every white man to own one or more. At the present
ruinous prices, which accrue to the benefit of Virginia and
Kentucky only, there is danger of such a reduction in the
number of owners that there might be a collision between the
slaveholders and non-slaveholders, which would dethrone King
Cotton and destroy his influence forever ; and that the only
way to avert this impending crisis, was to import, from Africa,
cheap laborers for the benefit of the cotton-growing States.

42 INTRODUCTION.

lie said that Virginia was incapable of supplying the increas
ing demand at any price, and that, even if she could, the result
must be fatal, for that the Africans were rapidly losing their
color and other valuable qualities in the great Caucasian race,
and needed a fresh infusion of pure African blood to prevent
their entire absorption.'

" It is not my intention to give a synopsis of the fiery de
nunciations that constituted the staple of Mr. Yancey's speeches
in that assembly. Suffice it to say, that, while in his whole
tirade, he did not once, even by implication, disclaim his de
sire to reopen the African slave-trade, he denounced the Federal
laws prohibiting it, as partial to the Northern manufacturers,
and hostile, in spirit, to the agricultural and commercial in
terests of the cotton-growing States. He did not hesitate to
denounce Wilberforce as a whimsical sentimentalist, and even
pronounced England herself a pseudo-philanthropist, who, if
ever she dared to interfere against King Cotton, would find
herself reduced, before the eyes of the world, to the melancholy
alternative of domestic misery and revolt, or of confining her
charities to her own suffering subjects at home.

" Here let me parenthesise, that whenever such men as Wil
liam L. Yancey speak of the South, they never mean the non-
slaveholders, who represent the numerical proportion of fif
teen to one as compared with the ' planters,' or slaveholders.

" Although, in this republican form of government, which
claims the people as the sovereign, and a majority as the
ruler, the non-slaveholders are, by far, the most important
class, yet, on account of the skillful agitation of the slavery
question, the slaveholders have obtained a despotic mastery,
and allude exclusively to themselves and their property, when
they use the expressions ' the South,' ' Southern interests,' &c.

" In order to ' defend the South' and ' her institutions,' from
the encroachments of the public opinion of Christendom, and
the uncomfortable juxtaposition of light with darkness, secret
leagues and associations were inaugurated, consisting entirely
of sworn conspirators, who, being silently armed with the
stolen guns of the unsuspecting government, resisted the laws
by seizing the forts, arsenals, and property of that government,
to the great astonishment of the uninitiated of both the South

INTRODUCTION. 4J

and the North. Thus, possessing all the implements of mili
tary power, this diabolical mob stifled every breath of remon
strance, and almost every thought of resistance. Some of the
oppressed and insulted Unionists (myself among the number)
openly opposed the reign of terror, which was studiously pro
duced by Yancey and his colleagues. False imprisonments,
murders, expatriation, ' cruel and unusual punishments/ — the
torture by cowhide, tar and feathers, and fence-rails, public
and private confiscations, — these were the coercives which en
sued, and which immolated, on the very altars whereon these
men had sought to sacrifice their country, the freedom of the
press and the liberty of speech.

" The writer of this, formerly the partner in law of Yancey,
but true to his oath to support the Constitution and the Union,
was mobbed in Alabama, not far from Montgomery, because
he determined to lose his life, before he would consent to gain
it by submitting to such an unholy usurpation. Frequently
approached on the subject of identifying himself with the
secret league of United Southerners (the offspring of Yancey's
perfidy and genius), he persistently refused ; frequently ' cried
down' at public meetings, when he but endeavored to fulfill
his obligations to his non-slaveholding brethren, he would try
it again, until he was finally mobbed, maltreated, and exiled
' by some of the most respectable citizens' of Lowndes county,
contrary to the laws of the United States, of the Confederate
States, and contrary to the unrepealed statute of the State of
Alabama.

" But, although ill-used, he still survives, and, from that
unmerited obscurity to which his enemies have endeavored to
consign him, he keeps a bright lookout upon the game which
his country's (and his own) enemies are playing, and now and
then defeats the intentions of corrupt players when they en
deavor to cheat.

"If I can advance the cause of truth, justice, and our still
glorious, because righteous, Union, I will be better pleased
with my humble fate, than to enjoy all the hospitalities of a
gorgeous court by a system of intrigue and falsehood unparal
leled in history. No true gentleman considers me ' degraded '

44: INTRODUCTION.

by what has been done by a brutal mob, and, despite my mis
fortunes, I remain infinitely above my late partner in law, be
cause I have ever refused to become his partner in crime !

" Independently of the patriotism which impels me to cherish
the Union of my fathers, I am really solicitous that Great
Britain, the land of my ancestry on both sides of the house,
shall not ignore all her grand legislation on this subject, and
lend her powerful aid to reinstate the foulest traffic known to
history.

"Of my British descent I am justly proud. Col. William
Cunnington, whose relations of that name still live (in Lon
don, I believe), was the lineal maternal ancestor of my father.
In the time of nullification in South Carolina (1832), my
father was the only Unionist out of four brothers. I have the
proud satisfaction of being true, therefore, not only to my
country and my oath, but also to the memory of him, whose
sacred dust I am interdicted by the fiends of mobocracy from
revisiting.

" I am not permitted to correspond with the mother from
whose presence I was illegally and cruelly torn. I know not
whether she be still alive. If she be, may these tearful lines
convey to her the assurance, so necessary to a mother's heart,
that her ill-used son (with his expatriated family) is alive and
well.
f " ' Oh ! if there be, in this world of care,

A boon, an offering, Heaven holds dear,

'Tis the last libation Liberty draws

From the heart that bleeds and breaks in her cause !'

" This reflection is my rich reward and my consolation.
" I am, &c.,

" ROBERT S. THARIN."

The following, from the Richmond (Indiana)
Palladium of January 4, 1862, edited by the Hon.
D. P. Holloway, and the high-sonled, patriotic,
and talented Ben. Davis, is, not inappropriately,
added here :

INTRODUCTION. 45

" THARIN vs. YANCEY.

" Some time ago, R. S. Tharin, Esq., of this city, informed
us lie had written to the London News, refuting the position
taken by Yancey in the London Times, that he (Yancey) was
not nor ever had been in favor of reopening the African slave-
trade. We notice in the Cincinnati Daily Commercial of Dec.
21, the following allusion to that letter. The Commercial
locates our friend Tharin as being in London at the time of
his writing the letter, which is a mistake, as he was at Con-
nersville on a recruiting expedition for the 57th Regiment, at
the time he penned the article. The Commercial says :

" 'In a recent letter to the London Times, Mr. William L.
Yancey, one of the so-called commissioners from Jeff. Davis 'a
bogus government, tried to conciliate our English brethren by
asserting that he had never been in favor of the renewal of
the African slave-trade. Unfortunately for Yancey, this in
trepid falsehood fell under the notice of his old law-partner,
Mr. Robert S. Tharin, in London at the time, and who, in a
letter to the News, shows that Yancey is as big a liar as lie is
a traitor. Both Mr. Yancey and Mr. Tharin were delegates to
the Southern Commercial Convention at Montgomery, May,
1 858 ; and, at that convention, Yancey " denounced the Federal
laws prohibiting the slave-trade, as partial to the Northern
manufacturer, and hostile in spirit to the agricultural and
commercial interests of the cotton-growing States." He, at
the same time, offered the following resolution :

" ' Resolved, That the Federal laws prohibiting the African
slave-trade ought to be repealed.

" ' This disposes of Yancey's claim to veracity, and shows
how worthy a representative he is of that prince of liars and
repudiators, Jeff. Davis.' "

Before proceeding with my adventures and suf
ferings in Alabama, I will here premise, that this
chapter was written merely for the purpose of pre
paring the reader for what is to follow, by placing
before him such Northern and Southern testimony

46 INTRODUCTION.

as will give me a title to his attention in the en
suing pages.

For all real or apparent egotism in this and in
the ensuing chapters, I must apologize on the very
threshold. I know how difficult it would be to
avoid egotism in an autobiography. The very un
dertaking is an egotism. But, from my adven
tures, if any legal fact or any oilier truth ~be re
trieved from oblivion, I shall not regret the risk to
which I subject myself in entering, at this time,
the field of literature.

I hope I am writing more for the good of my
country than for my own. Of this the reader
must form his own judgment from the moderation,
or the contrary, of my style, and my manner of
treating facts.

It will be necessary, of course, to give some
preliminary remarks at the outset, explaining my
presence in Alabama, my antecedents, and some
few occurrences immediately preceding the out
rages upon my Southern Rights, which it is the
duty of this work to record.

SCENE THE FIRST.

MY OATH.

" I do solemnly swear to support the Constitution of the
United States and the Constitution of Alabama ; and never,
for considerations personal to myself, to neglect the cause of
the defenseless and oppressed."

Oath of admission to the Alabama Bar.

FOR this hour I have waited with all the pa
tience of one who always knew that it must come
— who always anticipated the present glorious
attitude of the Democratic party.

Radicalism must, of necessity, fail to administer
the government of a nation so extensive and so
free as ours. The Union is at once the cause and
the effect of Conservatism. It was to be expected
that the inception of hostilities, by action and re
action, would bring about sectional antagonisms.
This was the aim and the hope of the diabolical
clique who " precipitated the Cotton States into a
revolution." Unionism in the South was " tarred
and feathered ;" Unionism in the North was de
nounced as "proslavery." Yancey in the South,
Greeley in the North, belong, in fact, to the same
party — Disunion !

But it was also to be expected that the un
natural excitement would wear off, and common

48 THE ALABAMA RKFUGEE.

sense reinstate itself, when mobocracy and Lynch
law would disgust even their own advocates.
• Freedom of speech and of the press will be the
outgrowth of the very oppressions which have
muzzled the expression of conservative Unionism
in the South and in the North. The very names
of "North" and "South" will perish from the
memory, and the malignity of sectionalism will
die for the want of a basis of operations.

If this book, baptized in the blood and charred
by the fires of a revolution, the occurrence of
which I periled my life to prevent, shall add one
atom ol success, one drop of power, to that great
Niagara of Conservative Unionism which is soon
to burst over both sections in irresistible force —
washing out the blood-stains of Radicalism, to
gether with the unpatriotic names of " North"
and " South," — it will, just so far, accomplish the
principal purpose for which it is now dedicated to
my whole — my bleeding country.

I was born on the paternal estate of "Mag
nolia," just outside of the corporate limits of the
city of Charleston, S. C., on the 10th day of Jan
uary, 1830. After many hardships, I obtained, by
my own perseverance, from the College of Charles
ton, my degree of A. B. in March, 1857; and in
the State of Alabama, to which I had emigrated
in September, 185T, I received my degree of A. M.
in 1860.

My ancestry, on both sides of the house, were
decent people, I am not ashamed to record that

SCENE THE FIKST. 49

William Cunnington, my lineal paternal ancestor,
was a revolutionary colonel, under Gen. Francis
Marion, the great " Swamp Fox" of Carolina his
tory. Nor will it bring the blush of shame to my
cheek to say that my maternal grandfather, the
Eev. Robert S. Symmes, was a graduate of Queen's
College, Oxford, in England, of which realm he
was a native, and that he held a high place among
the literati of the Queen city of the South. My
honored father — may he rest in peace ! — needs no
higher eulogy than that, in 1832, he was the only
Unionist of four brothers; and that, in 1852, and
even up to the time of his decease, he remained
firmly devoted to the integrity of the nation !

My uncle Theodore, a Co-operationist .in 1852,
a Secessionist in 1862, rejoices in the possession of
the life-size likeness of Col. Wm. Cunnington, his
Union grandfather !

My uncle Edward keeps, as an heir-loom, the
likeness of the Father of his country, presented by
his own sacred hand to my grandmother under
the following inspiring circumstances :

Under the magnificent " magnolia," from which
the whole Cunnington estate was called — and un
der whose mighty branches my early boyhood
was mostly passed — was grouped a dinner party,
in honor of a visit from Gen. George Washington
to his intimate friend Col. Cunnington. The toasts
were over, the company were about to rise, when
a lovely apparition riveted all eyes to the table.

Arrayed in a dress, composed of the stars and

50 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

stripes, stood a little girl, with a full-blown mag
nolia (or " laurel," as it is commonly called there)
in her right hand. With childish simplicity she
approached the great Washington — who was ac
customed to such tributes, and who was not at
all abashed, although a very modest man, by so
pointed an action — and lisped these words :

" Will General Washington, who has won so
many unfading laurels already, accept of this em
blem of his greatness from a very little girl ?"

Amid the smiles of the company, the Father of
his country, taking the gift, rose, and, being a
man of but few words, took from his finger a ring,
containing a likeness of himself (which I have
often seen), and handed it to my grandmother,
whom he at the same time affectionately kissed.

Could General Washington rise from his grave,
he would see most of the descendants of that little
girl, who has long since left this world of trouble,
struggling to overthrow that Union for which he
spilled his blood, and the perpetuation of which
he strenuously and repeatedly urged upon them
in his prophetic Farewell Address !

Could Col. Cunnington revisit the scenes of his
usefulness, he would request that the name of
" Cunnington'' be dropped from the names of
those of his descendants who have disgraced it

o

by disunionism, retained by my deceased Union
father, and added to the name of him who writes
these filial words.

My immigration to Alabama was not the result

SCENE THE FIRST. 5J

of a preference for that State. I was invited
thither by letter. "William B. Penrifoj, an old
school and college friend and classmate, wrote me
that my presence in Wetumpka was solicited as a
teacher of the male academy at that place. I went
in consequence of that letter, and found the city
of Wetumpka, like Washington, a " city of mag
nificent distances." The buildings, however, were
neither so large nor so numerous as those of the
latter city. From the refined " Queen city of the
South" to the rural town of Wetumpka was a
letting down ; but I determined to do my duty to
the children under my charge, and I did it.

In the spring term of 1859, I was admitted to
the practice of law at Eockford, Coosa county,
Alabama. Judge Porter King, now a Secessionist,
and always a Disunionist, administered the oath,
which I signed in open court, and by which I
solemnly swore (as every admitted lawyer in the
room, including the judge himself and Win. L.
Yancey, had done) " to support the Constitution
of the United States and the Constitution of Ala
bama, and never, for considerations personal to
myself, to neglect the cause of the defenseless and
the oppressed" As this narrative is developed,
the reader will become convinced that it was for
making myself an exception to the members of
the bar, and the national and State officials, ly
religiously and firmly keeping my oath, that I
suffered the horrors of persecution in the reign
of terror so soon to ensue.

52 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

No sooner had I opened my law-office in Wc-
tumpka, than an opportunity occurred for me to
risk something for the sake of my oath. One of
the " poor white trash" was dragged down to the
margin of the river, laid across a log, and whipped
by a throng of blackguards, on the charge that he
sold liquor to negroes. They had charged him
once with being a negro, and, afterwards, with
associating with negroes. lie was ridden on a
rail until his clothes were literally torn off his
body. From the lintel of his own door he was
repeatedly hanged until he was black in the face.

This victim of unauthorized power sought my
office and asked my advice. He was a pitiable
object. Fright and general bad usage had left
their marks upon him. I could not refrain from
smiling, as he entered in palpable alarm, lest I
should kick him down stairs for asking for his
rights. My eyes were not "quite closed to the
condition of the South even then (1859). I had
felt some very unpleasant and some very indig
nant emotions, when seeing the prostration of the
many at the footstool of the few1-.

Franklin Veitch, as he called himself, com
menced his story. During its recital, sometimes
he would stand on one foot, sometimes on the
other, his hat traveling about from one hand to
the other, from his head to the chair, from the
chair to his head. He sat down at my invitation,
but, the seat of his pants having been ridden off
on the jagged fence-rail the .night before, the cold

SCKNK THE FIRST. 53

contact of the chair started him back to his feet ;
and I involuntarily burst into loud laughter. My
mirth was echoed from the pavement beneath my
window.

Poor Yeitch was overwhelmed. Seizing his

O

hat, and turning upon me a reproachful glance,
which conveyed a lugubrious " d. tu, J?/ititr," ex
pression, he muttered in a tone which cut me to
the heart, " There aiiCt no justice in Alabama!"

I felt humiliated. I approached the poor trem
bling victim of mobocracy. 1 looked with changed
feelings upon him. Encouraged by my manner,
he raised his cowering eyes. Fear had added a
gleam of almost insanity to their expression ; but
there was a ray of hopeful intelligence, as he
caught my pitying glance, which was very touch
ing.

" Mr. Vcitch, who sent you to me*'7

"Mr. Hill."

" "What do you want ?"

" Fair play.*"

" Do you want my services as a lawyer?"

" Yes, sir."

" You are too much excited now — come to me
next week."

"Will you take my case tlten?"

" May be so."

Veitch retired.

Having made inquiry as to the facts of the
case, I found that Yeitch had been a victim to
even Avorse than that of which lie complained.

54: THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

My oath, " never, for considerations personal to
myself, to neglect the cause of the defenseless and
oppressed" returned to my recollection. I found
that to keep that oath would subject me to great
loss of popularity, because the ringleaders of the
little mob were the most popular of the young
men of the town, long residents, and endowed
with negro property, that great passport to im
punity.

In order to show the reader the fatal alternative
which was presi i.ting itself before my mind, I will
explain to him that I was not myself a slaveholder,
and that I was ambitious of success in the noble
profession of my choice, for which I have always
had a passion.

I almost hoped that Yeitch would not come
back. As the time drew near I thought he had
forgotten ; but no ! he came, and again asked me
to take his case. He even urged me to take it for
the sake of justice.

I did not believe him to be a worthy man. I
thought him a low-minded wretch, as he after
ward proved ; but I knew him to be "defenseless
and oppressed."

This was an unpleasant predicament. I felt a
strange anger against Yeitch ; I almost hated him
for being "defenseless" and for being "oppressed."

But I took his case. Thank God, 1 kept my oath !
How few lawyers, alas ! can say that they kept
their oaths when interest opposed duty !

Then dawned DAY THE FIRST of my bitter but

SCENE THE FIRST. 55

virtuous experience — a struggle that shook the
whole community. The parties sued became more
than ever unmerciful to Veitch. They threatened
to kill him, if he did not leave the community
in so many hours ; they offered him bribes. The
poor whites of the town secretly encouraged him
to remain. The case was docketed, and the time
of court was approaching. What the defendants
had to do must be done quickly. Yeitch disap
peared. I appeared at court; the case was called,
and a paper was produced by the defendants dis-

His

missing the case, and signed " Franklin x Yeitch."

mark.

I offered to prove duress ; but the judge dismissed
the matter with indecent haste.

This ^^-slaveholder had yielded his rights
through fear, and had allowed himself to be taken
out of the town.* I have never heard ^r^m him
since, but it seemed to me, at one time, I would
never cease to hear of him. I became the most
unpopular man in Wetumpka. Lies had been
freely circulated pending the trial. For keeping
iiuj oath in that case, I almost lost all. But there
were other counties in which I practiced with im
mediate success.

Franklin Veitch was sent into my office by a
divine power, in order that I might receive my
sight. Before that circumstance, I had seen events
dimly, and "men, like trees walking;" but, with

* To Columbus, Georgia, I believe.

56 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

a sudden unpleasant awakening, I found myself
in a modern Sodom, and felt my blood curdle
within me at the recollection that the class to
which Yeitch belonged had been growing more
and more degraded, more " defenseless" and more
" oppressed," ever since I could remember.

In my native South Carolina I had been too
young to note the workings of aristocracy upon
the oppressed poor. Every one in that State is
too busy in the praiseworthy task of identifying
him or herself with the " powers that be," — in
tracing their " respectability" to the fountain-head
of the first families, whether whig or tory, and in
finding out some unfortunate family upon whom
to look down, — too much absorbed in such de
lightful and ennobling pursuits to pause for the
scrutinizing of the flaws in the " system of civili
zation" in which, as primaries or satellites, they
all unconsciously revolve. Reared in the midst
of aristocratic pretension, my youthful days were
stained with a pride of which I am now heartily
ashamed, and the utter meanness of which it has
been given me to discover and renounce. I pity,
from my soul, the bigoted vacuity of the man who,
in the hard-handed mechanic, upon whose perspi
ration he lives, as the fly lives in the exhalations
of the horse or the ox, can see only society's
" mudsill," and in himself discovers the super
structure, which debases the system upon which
it rests. But I was gradually drawn to this
higher stand-point. I ascended the slope of dis-

SCENE THE FIRST. 57

covery with painful steps. The sensible horizon
is ever in the way of the rational horizon. I had,
as it were, to mount above and beyond the petty
elevation of education, and, by actual insight, by
ocular revelation, coupled with the sublime influ
ence of a recorded and a solemn oath, to meet the
usurper face to face, before I could discover the
cause of so much woe, the origin of so much evil
as was constantly passing before my eyes.

There are many Franklin Yeitches in the South
to-day — many in the army of Secession ; and for
every Franklin Yeitch there is a perjured lawyer;
and for every perjured lawyer, an outraged State
Constitution. The leaders of the conspiracy are
loud in their exclamations for State rights j but
their whole scheme is based upon the destruction
of State and personal rights. They pretend to
timthem independence, but ignore the personal
independence of the white people of the South ;
they shout " Southern rights," yet they have com
pletely annihilated Southern rights: mine, alas!
are — where?

The Secessionists have trampled upon the Con
stitution of the United States, tlie bills of rights of
the several Southern States, and the " Constitution
of the Confederate States of America" — every
provision of each of which relating to personal
security they have, from first to last, deliberately
ignored.

This occurred in 1859. Thus early my mind
was, unhappily for myself and family — but for

58 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

some good purpose I must think — set to work upon
the subject of "Southern Rights"

There was another cause, which placed me in
an unpopular attitude in Alabama. I had advo
cated, in a series of articles, in the "Wetumpka
Enquirer, the establishment of small farms, and
the use of the water-power of the falls and rapids
of the Coosa, which flows through that village. I
had proved the injurious effects upon the " the
people" of over-grown plantations, and had ex
pressed the belief that Wetumpka would soon
eclipse Montgomery, should a judicious application
be made of the water-power and the mineral,
medicinal, and agricultural elements of success
which abounded all around and within her. I
also advocated the abolition of all monopolies :
such as the penitentiary system, by which the
crime of the State was engaged in industrial pur
suits, to the loss of the virtuous poor mechanic. I
was never popular with the cotton-planters after
that. Small farms would benefit the " masses,"
and that would injure them; agricultural pursuits
would make white men see their interests, and
that would diminish the power of "King Cotton.''
But greater events soon occupied the attention of
all minds.

It was some time before the occurrence just re
corded, that the infamous John Brown raid occur
red. I make no apologies for my own course at
that time, which was to offer a series of resolutions,
at a large public meeting at Wetumpka, strongly

SCENE THE FIRST. 59

condemnatory of such diabolical outlawry, and
demanding the protection of the Federal power to
preserve the States from invasion. These resolu
tions were unanimously adopted. The resolutions
were published in the Montgomery Advertiser of
that period.

I had been led to suppose the John Brown raid
to be the first of a series. I had not yet heard
the truth — nor was it until long afterward that I
perused the declaration of John Minor Butts, in
his appeal to the people of Virginia, that the gov
ernor of Virginia admitted that he knew it to be
a farce, and only seized upon it to stir the blood
of Virginia to the notes of war.

I must not omit to mention that, at that meet
ing, contrary to my crjnws (lexire, a vigilance
committee was appointed, that I was included in
that committee, and that, at their first meeting,
which was in my office, I proposed to them the
resolving ourselves into a nucleus for a new na
tional party , to be called the Union f)arty . I pre
sented them a paper, fur their signatures. The
proposition was met with indignation, and my
name Avas, at my desire, dropped from the mem
bership of the committee.

I then appealed to the citizens of Wetumpka
personally. A few only responded — each saying
lie wanted the Union, but the democratic party
would save it. (This was before the "split" in
Charleston, S. C.) I remember Col. Saxon espe
cially said it was a good thing, but that the Ka-

60 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

tional Democracy would yet save the Union — a
prophecy which will, I think, be soon fulfilled.

About this time, at Montgomery, fourteen miles
off, an advertisement, appeared calling upon the
citizens to meet for the formation of a " LEAGUE
OF UNITED SOUTHERNERS." A great deal of ex
citement was the consequence, and so it was
announced, a short time afterward, that it had
failed. But it had not failed. It was formed
into a secret league, although I, among others,
supposed at the time it had failed. I believe it
exists to-day. Yancey was and is the chief.

The State of Alabama, after the call for a
League, became alive with transparencies. Every
town was full of " Knights of Malta." "VVetump-
ka had its secret order of Knights, who carried
about their transparencies illuminated with sym
bolic characters. "R., 1861" was conspicuous
on them. I was asked if I would join them. I
demanded to know their objects. The objects
were secret, but for the benefit of the " South."
In what way ? Joining was the only way to
know.

I did not join. I was at my homo each night
at early candlelight, and never left till morning ;
but /, too, was working for the good of the true
South. I was studying the census of 1850, and
preparing myself to tell the people truths which
they never had been permitted to know before.

But I must not anticipate.

My politics were national democratic. I was

SCENE THE FIRST. Cl

for the nomination of Stephen A. Douglas, as the
only candidate who could save the Union by his
election. When the "great split" occurred at
Charleston, I was completely undecided what to
do. I was disposed then to condemn the persist
ency of the Douglas wing in keeping their nom
inee before the convention, when they must have
seen the danger of disruption which such a course
involved. Kot to detain the reader, however, on
mere questions of expediency, suffice it to say that,
after deep reflection upon the duties of every
American citizen in such a crisis, I resolved to
select those candidates who were most unequivo
cally for the " Union, the Constitution, and the
enforcement of the Laws." This I did without
any sacrifice of my national democracy.

During the great presidential canvass, which
resulted in the lamentable elevation of Abraham
Lincoln to the chief magistracy, I was frequent in
my addresses to the people on the one inexhausti
ble theme of the Union and the Constitution.

As an elector for the Bell-Everett ticket, my
favorite argument in support of my position was
the Farewell Address of that greatest of Southern
ers, George Washington. While I obtained the
plaudits of my own party, I became the object of
mingled fear and hatred by the disunion dema
gogues of my adopted State. Disgraceful scenes
would often occur, when, warmed with my noble
theme, I would launch a fiery denunciation at the
head of Yancey, with whom my law-partnership

G

62 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

had been some time at an end. Several times I
was openly threatened with " tar and feathers,"
and once was hooted down from the rostrum.

It was during the heat of the presidential cam
paign, that the Hon. Jabez L. M. Curry, member
of Congress for the 7th Congressional District of
Alabama, advertised himself to speak at the town
of "Wetumpka. Haggerty Hall was crowded with
a dense mass of people of all parties to hear the
Congressman on the exciting questions of the clay.
During the progress of his remarks, the orator ex
claimed :

" As soon as Abe Lincoln takes the Presidential
chair, five hundred thousand Wide-awakes, al
ready drilling for the purpose, will rush over the
border, lay waste your fields, emancipate your
negroes, and amalgamate the poor man's daugh
ter and the rich man's buck-nigger before your
very eyes!"*

It would be impossible to describe the excite
ment which this declaration of Mr. Curry pro
duced. Of course the Congressman " ought to
know."

Shortly after this remark had been made, I re
quested Mr. Curry to permit me to interrupt the
thread of his discourse, just to make a short
statement. The honorable gentleman audibly con
sented. I arose, and turned my face toward the
audience with the words "Fellow-citizens!"

* See page 197.

SCENE THE FIRST. 63

At a signal from the chief of the Secret Asso
ciation, of which Mr. Curry was indisputably an
honored member, a sudden yell shook the building
to its foundation. Every species of noise, and in
almost every degree of intensity, pervaded the
hall. The clamor was increased by the Uell and
Douglas men, who shouted encouragingly to their
Union representative. I fully expected Mr. Curry
to relieve me of all embarrassment by explaining
the facts. But the assistant precipitator, eager for
applause, and ignoring his permission just given,
remained imperturbably silent.

Under the circumstances, I contented myself
with silencing the most vociferous of my perse
cutors with my clenched fist, and sat down.

After the meeting was over, I dared any man
in the town to say that he went into that meeting
previously agreed to cry me down. Xo one re
sponded, although Kobert Clark was sufficiently
alarmed to have been the man. This man, after
having been the most conspicuous Secessionist in
town during the Presidential canvass, backed down
completely when the war actually commenced.
His treason was not even extenuated by courage.
He planted a little cotton, and so he left the brave
non-slaveholders, whom he had helped to madden
with false statements, to fight and die in order that
he might lounge around Wetumpka and retail the
news. I suppose lie was conscrijAcd, if he ever
entered the army at all.

Shortly after the disgraceful affair just alluded

G-i THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

to, I was informed that there would be a meeting
for free discussion at Buyckville, a German settle
ment about twelve miles from Wetumpka. As
such meetings were very rare, I made it my busi
ness to be present. I also wanted a,n opportunity
to expose the disunionism of John C. Breckenridge
and others, and hoped it would be accorded me.

On my arrival in the village, I perceived that I
had been cruelly deceived. I do not think my
informant had set a trap for me, but I found my
self in the midst of a meeting of Breckenridgers,
who were assembled for the purpose of organizing
a club for their own party, and who were actually
in expectation of Breckenridge speakers from We
tumpka, who had engaged to be present.
• As mere lookers-on in Vienna, there were pres
ent five " Bell-Everett men" and eleven " Douglas
men," total sixteen Unionists.

Having comfortably disposed of my horse and
buggy, I approached the tavern, which also drove
a dry-goods business, and, saluting the crowd,
soon found myself in conversation with an old
acquaintance, William Speigner, who informed me
of my mistake, but insisted I should speak before
the crowd, saying that he would manage it.

A stranger approached us, wras introduced as a
Bell man, and left us to make arrangements.

There was a slight board partition only between
us and several practitioners at the bar in the next
room. The following conversation was therefore
audible :

SCENE JHE FIRST. 65

" Did you see Bob Tharin drive up ?"

" Ya-as."

" Do you think he'll speak ?"

" Dunno."

" But /know he won't , d — n him!"

" Why not ?"

" Bekase he's a d— d traitor !"

" You don't tell !"

" T' be sure. He's the very man we hollered
down atWetumpky t'other day, and we kin do it
agin, I reckon."

" Go in, Pete, I'm along!"

" Hello ! Jo, come in here !"

An outside voice answered, " Hello !"

The outsider became an insider. I heard him
enter, when he was thus addressed by the first
speaker :

"Jo, you ain't for lettin' Tharin speak, ay re
you ?"

" Yes ! most emphatically, I am /"

"Well, I ain't!"

" Why ?"

" Bekase he was hollered down at Curry's meetin'
at Wetumpky."

"Well! what of that?"

" D — me if I want to listen to his d — Union
stuff."

" Pete, you're a fool. The way to make people
want to hear the man is to talk as you do. I am
for letting him git up to talk, and then —

Here followed a whispered conversation, when,
6*

66 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

with a roar of laughter, the three, having imbibed
a last drink, went toward the school-house, which
rose dilapidated in its vine-clad grotto, not far
off.

Soon the " Bell man" returned with the invi
tation for me to go with him to the " acad
emy."

As I drew near the building, I heard the presi
dent of the "club," announce my presence and my
willingness to speak.

It was too late to recede.

The throng consisted principally of strangers to
me, but those who knew rue acknowledged the ac
quaintance. I could easily tell every Brecken-
ridger present from the expression of malignant
hate, or sinister triumph, which sat on the counte
nance of each. By my own party and by the
Douglas men, I was received with the most
marked consideration. A few moments more,
and I found myself facing the crowd and ejaculat
ing "Fellow-citizens."

I had already proved that the territorial ques
tion was a mere abstraction to at least fifteen out
of sixteen of the inhabitants of Alabama, even if,
as was not the case, the territories were at all
fitted by climate for slavery, and was deliberately
weighing the Union, with its countless blessings
to the poor white men — the majority — the people
North and South who owned no slaves, against
the paltry selfishness of the few aristocrats and
their transatlantic allies, who were about to pre-

SCENE THE FIRST. 67

cipitate the Cotton States into a bloody revolu
tion, in order to gratify- an unholy lust for
power.

Suddenly a man in the crowd bawled :

" There ain't no Union now !"

The crowd here commenced shouting " that's
so !" and, fur some moments, nothing else could be
heard.

Waiting patiently until the storm should sub
side, I replied :

" When that declaration shall be true — as it
would never be if I could prevent it — no more
will man be civilized or free. The despots of the
Old World will reinstate their empire over the
New; the Lion of England will again roar in our
forests, and her whelps will make lairs of our cot
ton fields and cities; the oppressed of this country
will seek asylums in other climes, and Liberty will
sink beneath a thousand blows. When your dec
laration shall be true, sir, freedom of speech will
be but a name, and, just in proportion as the Re
public shall drift toward the maelstrom of disso
lution, will American citizens be insulted, their
dearest privileges be invaded, and the right of
speech be trampled upon by infuriated mobs.
Yes, sir, when there shall be no more Union, the
' Cotton States' will become but a ' cotton patch'
of England, over which will reign her ' viceroy,'
in the person of John C. Breckenridge, or of Wil
liam L. Yancey."

Here the Bell and Douglas men, who hate

68 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Yancey, as the author of all the trouble, com
menced a vociferous applause.

The president of the " Breckenridge Club" here
remarked :

" Mr. Tharin, you have gone off in circum
gyrations of eloquence ; but you have not yet told
us the remedy for Southern wrongs. Will you be
pleased, as you are a native of Charleston, South
Carolina, to tell us what you think ought to be
done by the South."

" With pleasure, sir. ' The South,' however, is
rather a general term, and includes a great many
elements. You, sir, have, probably, one idea of
the meaning of ' the South,' and / have, probably,
another. I will proceed to define the term 'South,'
according to the idea which I have received of it :

" 'The South,' when applied to the slaveholding
section of the United States, signifies six millions
of wrhite and three millions of black inhabitants,
by the census of 1850. The blacks are divided
into 'field-hands, house-servants, and mechanics.''
The whites are divided into slave-owners and non-
slave-owners ; the slave-owners or cotton-planters
are divided into lawyers, doctors, and office-hold
ers ; and the non-slave-owners are divided into
' field-hands' and mechanics, with here and there
a professional man snubbed by the planters and
neglected by his own class.

"According to the last census (1850), which, be
ing compiled by a native of Charleston, who is a
resident of New Orleans, J. B. D. De Bow, is to

SCENE THE FIKST. 69

be relied on by us as containing nothing adverse
to Southern taste, and which I now hold in my
hand, the whole population of the United States
was in 1850, about twenty-three millions and fifty-
eight thousand, of wjiom nine millions six hundred
and twelve thousand, nine hundred and seventy-
nine are in the South ; by the same statist the num
ber of slave-owners in the whole South (and else
where in the Union) is three hundred and forty-
seven thousand, live hundred and twenty -live,
wrhile the balance of the white population in the
South is six millions one hundred and eighty-four
thousand, four hundred and seventy-seven. We
will suppose that the whole increase of the white
population of the South is confined to the slave
owners, in order to make the latter attain the
number of five hundred thousand, or half a mil
lion, and suppoxiny the non-slaveholders to have
increased nothing, we have them still numbering
over six millions.

"Tims I have proved, from the admission of
a native of Charleston, a resident of New Orleans,
a graduate of the same college, and a member of
the same literary society (the Cliosophic) as my
self, that the non-slaveholders of the South are at
least twelve times as numerous as the slaveholders.
If we take Alabama herself, we will eee that there
are over fourteen persons who have no negroes to
one who docs own them. In this county, I ven
ture to say, that there are at least thirty non-slave
holders to one slaveholder.

70 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

"Taking the census of Alabama, we find that
there are, in Alabama, only thirty thousand slave
holders ; that is to say, about the population of
Mobile. The white population of Alabama is put
down at over four hundred thousand ; this makes
the non-slave-owners fourteen times as numerous
as the slave-owners.

" If Alabama be divided into fifteen cities, about
the size of Mobile, the non-slave-owners will have
fourteen of them, the slave-owners only one ! In
my native South Carolina the proportion is even
more marked.

" Now, we begin to understand what the term
SOUTH means, as to the inhabitants of the South ;
but we have not yet fully defined it. The South
consists of fifteen States, the smallest of which
contains an area equal to all Greece. Without
particularizing, I will come right down to our own
dear Alabama, wThose wonderful wealth, not yet
half realized, or even understood, is destined to
make her the great emporium of the Gulf of Mex
ico, and whose central railroad, just under way,
will, when completed, give her an opportunity to
dispose of the vast beds of iron and of copper, of
gold and of coal, which enrich her subterranean
recesses. (Applause.) On my way hither, a dis
tance of only twelve miles, I beheld the evidences
of mineral wealth scattered all around me. We
have all the facilities, also, for the culture of the
grape; our streams are remarkable, even on this
continent of great rivers, for their number, navi-

SCENE THE FIRST. 71

gability, and water-power; our vine-bearing hill
sides gusli out iii medicinal springs ; our ' valleys
also stand so thick with corn that they laugh and
sing.' Yes, my Alabamians, our State is the rich
est, our rivers the grandest, our land the greenest,
our skies the brightest, our climate the sweetest,
our girls the loveliest, our boys the bravest in the
world — (prolonged applause) — and our non-slave-
holding population who constitute the people of
Alabama, irrestrainable in the sublime uplieavings
of our volcanic patriotism — ever ready to avenge
even & fancied insult from a non-resident majority
— (wild and vociferous applause) — will not always
ornit to aim a crushing blow at the head of that
Heecy usurper who now looms up iti our very
midst to crush us into the dust!"-

Ilere a commotion sprang up in the furthest end
of the u academy" between two persons :

" He shall speak!"

" He shan't ! I'll kill him ! he lies ! That ain't
the way for a Southerner to speak !"

"Mister!" I exclaimed, "can't you wait until
Fm through, before you begin ?"

Amid great laughter the "president" arose, his
lips quivering writh fury, and demanded :

" How much more steam have you got on board ?"

" Enough to burst your boiler and leave it as
empty as your head !"

The storm of derisive laughter which ensued
was very gratifying to the speaker, but not very
pleasing to my interrupter, who sat down so sud-

2 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

denly as to add a new element to the already vo
ciferous mirth.

When order was restored, I proceeded thus :
" I was saying, when so harmlessly interrupted
(laughter) that the people of Alabama are too
brave even to permit the appearance of an insult
from a non-resident majority (applause). Would
to God, J could say as much for them in their in
tercourse with that resident minority who, enjoy
ing all the offices of profit or of trust, dominate
over them with an iron hand ! (Great confusion
and voices, which I did not stop for.) Would to
God that I could say cotton was discrowned !"

Of course, I was here interrupted. The sixteen
Unionists seemed completely nowhere in the row
that ensued ; they hung their heads in shame, as
much as to say, " There now ! he's gone and done
it." In the midst of the row, a man with a stick
exclaimed :

" Oh, you traitor ! oh, you cuss, you !"
" Traitor ! did you say I was a traitor, sir ?"
("Yes I did!!!") "That same word was used to
the immortal Patrick Henry, when he said in the
Virginia Convention, that George the Third, who
had' an ear to hear, might have his power over
thrown in America. The man who called Patrick
Henry a traitor was himself an infamous tory, and
the man who says that / am a traitor, when I de
nounce ' King Cotton,' who, having no ear to be
appealed to by his trampled subjects, is a greater
tyrant than King George III., why, that man is

SCKNE TIIK FIKST. 73

worse even than a tory. King George had some
color of title to govern the colonies, but what title
has 'King Cotton' to rule Alabama, to mob
Southern men, to trample ' Southern Eights' into
the dust, and to send his emissaries here even to
interrupt and insult ?/i<?, a Southern man, because I
call upon my oppressed countrymen to be free 'I
O Alabama ! proud and glorious Alabama ! rise
from the ashes of thy desolation ! declare thy in
dependence of that single plant, which, monopo
lizing the whole surface of thy soil, shuts up thy
recesses from the industry of thy children; wash
off the stain of Secession from thy symmetrical
limbs in tny beautiful streams, and, under the star-
spangled banner, defy the Yanceys and the Breck-
enridges to rivet thy chains forever upon tliee !

" Would to God that ' Southern Eights' could be
respected by Southern men / that every possible
facility could be afforded for Alabama's full de
velopment ; then we would not have negro-equality
forced upon us by a resident minority, who now
perform the almost entire labor of the State with
their Uack field-hands and mechanics, and thus
make four hundred thousand slaves drive five hun
dred thousand freemen from the culture of the
soil, from the work-bench, from the factory, and
from that personal equality, without which ' State
equality' is but the shadow of a shade !"

Here several planters abruptly left the academy
and gathered under trees outside of the building.

u I was asked what remedy against Southern

74 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

wrongs, I, as a South. Carolinian, would advocate.
South Carolina, gentlemen, has no right to dictate
a policy to Alabama, any more than Massachu
setts has. Nor lias Massachusetts any right to
dictate a policy to South Carolina. We are here
as Alabamians, and as an adopted citizen of Ala
bama, of which my wife and child are natives, I
answer the gentleman's question :

" The best remedy for ' Southern wrongs' is the
vindication of ' Southern rights' — not alone the
rights to power and influence of the minority
whose cotton and niggers and plantations protect
their rights but too well — but the rights of the
poor white man, who owns no niggers, who owns
no cotton, who owns no plantation, but in whose
veins courses the same red stream which bled on
the battle-fields of 1776, to give its descendants
the blessings of freedom and equality. In order
to do this I would

" 1. Let perfect liberty of speech prevail ! Let
no more mobs prevent me, or other Southern men,
from advocating ' Southern Rights' as we under
stand them.

" 2. Let the majority of the people rule their
State of Alabama in the Union ; and let not a con
temptible power-loving resident minority ' precip
itate the Cotton States into a revolution,' which can
but end in the perpetual degradation of the ma
jority. (Applause by the Bell and Douglas men.)

" 3. Let every demagogue who preaches dis
union be avoided as a madman, and let King Cot-

SCENE THE FIRVr. < ;)

ton be consigned to the walks of private life,
throneless and crownless, and co-equal with the
other trees of the field.

"•i. Let the niggers le com fined to the cotton field,
let no more negro blacksmiths, and negro carpen
ters, and negro bricklayers, and negro wheel
wrights be used to drive the poor white man to
poverty and to idleness, that root of all evil.

"Then, and not till then, will Alabama be her
self. Then, and nut till then, will the proper
remedy be applied, as against Southern wrongs.

"You see, I am a Southern RiyhU man \\\ the
broadest sense. I interfere with no man's rights.
I advocate the rights of all ! Of course, I am not
indifferent to my own blood-bought rights. In
deed, as a Southern man, I cannot permit others — •
whether they be Northerners or Southerners — to
invade my own. When I was admitted to prac
tice law in this very county, only fourteen miles
from here, I recorded an oath. Now, what was
that oath ? Was it to support King Cotton ?"-

Here an old gentleman, whose manners had
evinced great delight at my whole speech, and
who had been my most constant applauder, said,
with great glee :

" No, it wan't !" (laughter.)

I continued : " Was it to support John C. Breck-
en ridge ?"

" No ! siree ! !" (laughter.)

" Were you there, sir?"

" I wan't nothin' else."

Y6 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" Did you hear me take the oathf

" Yes ; and I saw you sign it too !"

" Was it to support William L. Yahcey?"

" Not a bit of it."

" "Well, what was my oath, sir?"

" You swore to support the Constitution of
Alabama."

" Was that all ?"

" No : you swore to support the Constitution
of the United States."

" Have I done so to-day ?"

" Ef you haint, nobody ever did."

Here the Bell and Douglas men commenced to
applaud ; and even the Breckenridgers seemed to
think it a plain case, and joined the others.

" Yes, sir, I keep my oath to-day, yesterday,
and forever. That oath is registered in heaven !
I make no light and foolish vows. That oath I
intend to keep always, and, if I lose all the tran
quillity and peace of mind I possess, that oath
shall never, at God's bar, reproach me — as it will
yet reproach many other lawyers and officers of
Alabama — with perj ury .

" In conclusion : what I have said, I have said
in strict accordance with £ SOUTHERN EIGHTS !' If
I have the misfortune to differ with men of wealth
and influence, it shall, at least, never be said of
E. S. Tharm that he was a/raid to give a reason
for the faith that is in him.

" I thank you for your attention."

After the speech was over, not a solitary insult

SCENE THE FIRST. 77

was leveled at me. The Bell and Douglas men
gathered around me in a manner which showed
their intention to protect my (Southern) rights.
Around my buggy they arranged themselves.
The president of the Breckenridge club approach
ed with a crest-fallen countenance.

" Mr. Tharin, I am sorry I acted as I did, sir.
I never interrupted a speaker before."

" Considering it was the Jim t time, you managed
it very well for a new beginner." This was said
by a Douglas man, whose size was of itself an
argument.

" If I only knew it to be your last attempt at
so unworthy a pastime, I could not only forgive
it, but forget it, sir."

A preacher here came up and said that he would
like to discuss the question on the stump with me
at any time I should appoint. I told him that I
would leave it to my friends to appoint any time,
and that I would be happy to meet him, provided
there were no interruptions. On these terms, of
course, the reverend mobocrat saw fit never to
make arrangements.

But the most stormy elections must come to a
conclusion. The contest ended quite too soon for
Alabama's interests. Had the campaign lasted
two months longer, Bell and Everett would have
had a large majority, and she would afterward
have refused to be " precipitated'7 into a foolish
and a bloody revolution.

It was generally known that Abraham Lincoln

To THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

was elected. The Secessionists exulted in his ele
vation, because they had planned and now claimed
it as an argument in favor of Secession. Governor
Moore, according to the programme of the con
spirators, called a convention. It is not necessary
here to state that the convention was called in
order to "precipitate" Alabama out of the Union.
Just on the eve of the assembling of the conven
tion, I published my protest against indecent
haste and the misrepresentation of the public
opinion of the State, and proposed that the con
vention, wiien convened, should proffer to Ala
bama's sister States, North and South, a National
Convention, for the purpose of amending the Con
stitution of the United States in certain important
particulars, unnecessary to be enumerated here.
Previous to that letter, I had addressed one,
through the columns of the Montgomery Con
federation, to a Dr. Wm. C. Penick, over my full
signature, entitled "THE LIBERTY OF SPEECH," in
which it was proved that the right of speech and
the liberty of the press had been entirely destroyed
by the unparliamentary and unconstitutional sur
veillance which the secret societies of traitors and
Breckenridge clubs had been too long holding
over Union meetings, Union .speeches, and Union
men. In this letter was shown the tendency of
mobocracy, and the people were warned against
the reign of terror, which ensued so shortly after
ward, and of which I myself was soon to be
among the most persecuted victims.

SCKXE THE FIRST. 79

When the election of delegates to the Alabama
State Convention was approaching, I announced
myself the INDEPENDENT UNION CANDIDATE for a
seat in that body, and would have been triumph
antly returned from Coosa county, had it not been
for the contemptible tricks of the Weturnpka branch
of the Secret " League of United Southerners," of
which the main society, at Montgomery, was pre
sided over by the notorious "Win. L. Yancey.*

Finding that the secret "Committees of Safety,''
all over the South, were too much for my unas
sisted efforts, which only provoked ridicule, on
account of the isolation of my opposition, I deter
mined to organize " Committees of Safety" for
myself and for the non-slaveholders, to rescue
whom from the perpetual serfdom of a Cotton-
Planters' Confederacy was (and is) my design.
I solemnly devoted myself to the defence of trtf*'
" Southern Rights." While I despised the inso
lent usurpations of the cotton nobility, I loved,
while I pitied, the non-slaveholding whites, whose
only hope in this world was the overthrow of
King Cotton.

Although not, by birth and descent, a non-
slaveholder, I was one of them at the time I speak
of. I knew that never, in Congress, in State legis
latures, in conventions, — whether political or com
mercial, State, sectional, or national, — had the non-

* See the Slaughter Letter, p. 212, in a note. Mr. Y. argued
for " Committees of Safety."

SO THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

slaveholders, as a class, Lad any — the slightest-
representation. On the contrary, "by the aggressive
usurpations of the planters, we had been doomed
to a condition, as a class, but little, if any, above
the negroes themselves. The dominant class, pos
sessing unshared legislative sway, easily excluded
these, \h& people of the South,— under the insulting
epithet of " poor white trash," — from educational
and social advantages, until the mere mechanical
operation of choosing which slaveholder, or cotton-
planter, should w. ^represent us, was all that was
left us. The whole point is conceded in the term
which the planters used to describe the modus of
Secession. " TF0," wrote Yancey to Dr. Slaughter.
""We" — the planters of course — "will precipitate
the Cotton States into a revolution" This, he said
was to be accomplished by " organizing commit
tees of safety all over the Cotton States — firing the
Southern heart, and giving courage to each other."
At first, electing Ijfight to preside over their de
liberations, they shrouded themselves in mystery ;
but, as the conspiracy culminated, after the con
spirators had armed themselves with guns, stolen
from the unsuspecting government, they became
less reticent, and less guarded, and the Unionists
found themselves overpowered and subjugated,
even before many of them fully understood the
signs of the times. What are mere numbers with
out organization and without arms, where a small
proportion of the population, armed, disciplined, or
ganized, and aggressive, hang like a thunder-cloud

SCEXE THE FIRST. 81

over the country. " Southern Rights'' were men
aced then, from within. A resident minority had
obtained the mastery. The indolence of unprepared-
ness weighed down the feeble knees of the multitude1,
and the only way to help ourselves, was to organ
ize, as our enemies had done, in secret. But I was
not destined to succeed, at that time, with my
righteous undertaking. "Whether I shall ercr suc
ceed in organizing my enslaved white brethren of
Alabama and of the South is known only to Om
niscience !

The secret societies commenced, at length, to
show their transparencies in Wetnmpka. Hag-
gerty Hall began to be illuminated at a very late
hour, and as the conspirators became less secret,
resounded with the tread of armed military com
panies. The next move was to " enlist" outsiders " to
meet the invading hosts of the damned Abolition
ists!" Xo means were neglected to ''fire the South
ern heart.'' Tales of insurrectionary plots were
bruited about the country, and the most ridiculous
alarm created in unsuspecting bosoms. Then
came those terrible associations, — the inevitable
outgrowth of all mobocracies, — associations of pro
scription ! The vigilance committee, the " com
mittee of safety," and the Breckenridge club,* by
an almost imperceptible transition, degenerated
into the Jacobin clubs of a new " reign of terror,"

* The Breckenridge club in Alabama was not, of course, the
same kind of club as the Breekenvido-e club XortJi.

82 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

in which he who would not insult the American
flag, was considered amenable to the mob, which
wras incited to its brutal acts by the diabolical
leaders of the secret associations. In every com
munity sprung up some Robespierre, — some scent-
er of human blood ; and to be suspected of Lin-
colnism — their new name of Unionism — was to
suffer, — generally to die! How lamentable for
the sacred cause of the Union that Mr. Lincoln
should have intensified this feeling and weakened
our hopes !

All this time my secret league of Union men
wras slow- ly finding its way to the few ; but I was
alarmed at the thought that I had commenced too
late. Still I persevered ; but such was the jealousy
with which the villagers regarded my movements,
that I wras reduced to temporary inaction.

Every now and then, by way of inspiring a
wrholesome terror in the minds of Unionists, the
Breckenridge club of Wetumpka would denounce
and mob some defenseless person. The victim of
this persecution, who did not immediately recant,
was tarred and feathered, hanged, shot, or acci
dentally committed suicide. The club denounced
a poor illiterate jeweler, "William S. Middlebrooks,
whose only alleged offence was " being a Lincoln-
ite!" The modus opcmndi would, doubtless, be
not uninteresting.

SCENE THE SECOND.

" SOUTHERN RIGHTS."

" To bear affronts too great to be forgiven,
And not have power to punish !"

ON the eastern bank of the Coosa river (a trib
utary of the Alabama), where it flows through
the village of AVetumpka, stands a small square
brick building, containing but two apartments,
and dignified by the euphonious appellation of
the " Calaboose." Herein are incarcerated incor
rigible negroes, or belligerent countrymen, who
become riotous over the fruits of their exchanges
with the stores, which barter for raw produce or
sell for cash the calicoes, shoes, hats, or whisky,
desired by their customers.

On a stormy night, whose impenetrable dark
ness afforded an appropriate vail for the deed of
rascality about to be perpetrated, a low-lived
white man, Bob Clark, sneaked up to the only
window of the calaboose, and, putting his lips to
the grating, whispered —

"Sam!"

Xo answer being elicited, the monosyllable was
repeated in louder and louder tones, until, from

84 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

the floor, a sleepy grunt, well perfumed with bad
whisky, was emitted in a guttural

"Who dat?"

" Hush ! Listen ! Can you tell me, Sam, who
would be a good person to leave some Lincoln-
powder with ?"

" Wha' sort o' powder dat ?"

" Lincoln-powder — powder to shoot white men
with and make niggers free !" *

" "Who be you ? Wha' fur you gwine do dat
ting ? You better take care ob youself, talkin'
sich tings to niggers ? Who you be ?"

" Never mind, Sam, I'm a friend. Do you
think, Sam, that William S. Middlebrooks would
be a safe man to leave some with ?"

" What I know 'bout it ? Lef dis nigger 'lone !
Dono nuffin 'bout it, 'tall. S'pose Mr. Middle-
brooks would do 'bout as well as me. Yah, yah,
yah !"

This was all that was necessary to fasten suspi
cion upon poor Middlebrooks. I am glad I am
not master of invective strong enough to charac
terize adequately the perpetrator of such an act.

The next morning, as I was returning to my
law-office, I saw consternation written upon the
faces of almost all the people I met. Caution had
already become necessary in all Union men, and
conversation between them was, by tacit consent,
waived in the presence or hearing of Disunionists.

* Alas, how proplietic were those words of a traitor !

SCENE THE SECOND. 85

Besides this, the pieces I had published in the
Montgomery Confederation, over my own signa
ture, had rendered me an object of ill-disguised
hatred to the partisan disunion demagogues of the
town. It was, therefore, getting more and more
unfashionable to be seen in my company, unless
on business. But although on that morning no
word wTas spoken by them, the faces of my
friends were full of communications, and their
eyes seemed to appeal to mine to know what
ought to be done.

That some " Secession devilment" had been
perpetrated, and that, too, of a bolder and more
tyrannical character than usual, even in that lati
tude, was too evident to be doubted.

'Not many minutes elapsed after my arrival at
my office before a timid knock was heard at the
door. It opens, and a friend, whose present and
future safety render it improper to mention his
name, entered, with—

" Have you heard the news ?"

" !N"o ; but I perceive there must be something
startling by the manners of the people. What's
up now ?"

" Promise me that, for your own safety and the
safety of the cause, you will not acquiesce in the
request I promised to bear you !"

" If I view acquiescence dangerous to myself
and to the cause of the Union, I will refuse it."

u Good ! Then I will proceed to tell you some
thing startling. As I was passing over the
8

8G THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

bridge, a sound of terror filled my ears, while ap
peared, at the other end of the structure, a packed
mass of howling humanity. From the center of
the crowd towered the gleaming bayonets of the
Wetumpka Light Guard. Upon their nearer ap
proach, I perceived in their midst a white man
bound between two neyroes, the three dragged along
as prisoners in the hands of their unauthorized
captors. He was borne to the Wetumpka Bastile
(Haggerty Hall), where he is now confined. I
soon met his frantic wife, who was following the
maltreaters of her husband. I asked her what
was the matter, when, collecting her scattered
senses, she turned to me with a look i shall never
forget, and said that she was on her way to your
office, in order to get you to sue out the proper
writ, and requested me to entreat you to befriend
her husband."

" Certainly I will. Who is the prisoner?"

" William S. Middlebrooks."

"What! the jeweler?"

"Yes."

"What's the charge?"

" L-i-n-c-o-l-n-i-s-m !"

"Whops that?"

"Don't know. Some pretext of the secret asso
ciation."

" Why Middlebrooks is a Douglas democrat!"

" True ; but his enemies are numerous, l^ou
know his business improves lately, while the busi
ness of McKonichy, the Secessionist, diminishes.

SCENE THE SECOND. 87

It is mighty easy, it seems, for these disunion
devils to break up any man, these days !"

" This is outrageous ! I can't see how the safe
ty of the Union, or even my oicn, can be affected,
by my befriending this injured American cit
izen f '

" Your enemies are even more numerous and
more vindictive than /m' enemies. You would
sooner or later be mobbed, or assassinated ; besides
they will call you an Abolitionist, and thus your
usefulness and your day* will be brought to a si
multaneous close."

" .But have I not in open court, when admitted
to practice law in Alabama, taken and recorded a
solemn oath to support the Constitutions of the
United States and of the State of Alabama, both
of which have been palpably violated this very
morning? Did I not, at the same time, swear
'never, for considerations personal to myself, to
neglect the cause of the defenseless and oppress
ed.'* Is not poor Middlebrooks ' defenseless and
oppressed ?

u When Luther was informed that his enemies
were numerous in Worms, and that he had better
not go thither, he exclaimed: 'Were there in
Worms, as many devils as there are tiles upon the
housetops, I will enter the city !' This is not the
first time that I have risked, and even sacrificed,
popularity, for the maintenance of the non-slave-

* Section 732, Code of Alabama.

88 THE ALABAMA BKFUGEE.

holder's rights, and I'll take this case, if I die for
it!"

" I was afraid you would ! You are imprudent
—but you are 'right /"

The resolution once taken, I proceeded to ar
range my plans.

The danger of the course determined on was,
by no means, inconsiderable. It was, in the ex
citement of the hour, suicide to make known my
determination.

But a thought suggested itself to my mind,
which was acted upon with promptness. I peti
tioned the governor to command the "Wetumpka
Light Guard " to protect myself and client during
the prosecution of the cases about to be com
menced.

It will be remembered that the Governor of
Alabama, Andrew B. Moore, had recorded an
oath to support the Constitution of the United
States and of the State, respectively, and that he
had also sworn " to see that the laws \>e faithfully
executed."

While awaiting an answer from the capitol,
only fourteen miles off, still another outrage was
.committed, of, if any thing, a baser character than
the first.

Some youths, considering themselves as much
authorized to depredate as their mobocratic seniors,
visited the abode of the imprisoned Middlebrooks,
tore down his fences, insulted his wife, and would
have proceeded further ; but the heroic woman

SCENE THE SECOND. 89

0-ave them to understand that she could and would

O

shoot, when the terrified young rebels — especially
Will tarn Me Williams — evacuated!

It was determined to include these also in the
suits at law which were preparing.

It being next to impossible to get a "summons
and complaint" through the post-office, on account
of the censorship of the mails, which was a part of
the Secession system, it was found necessary to
<ret the documents to the clerk of court through

o c

another channel.

Let me here intimate that Middlebrooks was
discharged on the morning of the third day of his
imprisonment. The consequence was that the
writ of Jtabeas co/yiux which had been commenced
was never sent to the proper officer. In the State
of Alabama this is the judge of probate of the
county. lie resided at Rockford, twenty-six miles
of a difficult mountain road from Wetumpka.

" Had a whit<> man," so decided the vigilance
committee of Wetumpka, "said what Sam, the
negro, said concerning Middlebrooks, the latter
would have been liancjfd ; but, for want of ir/iif<>.
testimony, he is discharged.'' This was not very
complimentary to Bob Clark, but shows how easy
it becomes for usurpers to dominate over Southern
Eights !

The answer of the governor now arrived. Xo
letter, no message to his legal correspondent, but
an order to the Wetumpka Light Guard to pro
ceed at once to Pensacola, via Montgomery.
8*

90 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

There can be no doubt that my letter to Gov.
Moore was used by that perjured traitor for my
destruction instead of for my protection. Xot
only was his withdrawal of the Wetumpka Light
Guard evidently so intended, but it is not at all
unlikely that the forsworn governor set his spies
and assassins on my path, because my intentions
toward Middlebrooks showed my devotion to the
poor white people whom his excellency despised
and aided to oppress.

Poor Middlebrooks, although no longer held
"in durance vile," was compelled to languish
under the law of public odium and disgrace, after
disgrace was heaped upon him, on account of a
mere captious suspicion. By an almost unani
mous vote, he was expelled from the military com
pany and left in the most humiliating condition.
This is always the case witli the victim of unau
thorized power. What redress has any man,
North or South, who is falsely arrested or im
prisoned by ruffians and traitors ?

True to my oath " to support the Constitution
of the United States, and the Constitution of Ala
bama, and never, for considerations personal to
myself, to neglect the cause of the defenseless and
oppressed" I had already prepared, in duplicate,
the " summons and complaint," which Alabama,
in her Code, has made and provided as the only
legal commencement of civil and criminal actions.
"False imprisonment" was, of course, the main
charge alleged, and the defendants consisted of the

SCENE THE SECOND. 91

most influential and wealthy of the planters of the
community.

There was a double danger attendant upon mail
ing the summons and complaint in AVetumpka.
First, it would probably be ransacked at the post-
office and withheld from the mail ; and, next, my
own danger would be, by no means, trifling.

My mother was, at the time, on a visit from
my native Charleston, S. C., to "Wetumpka. On
her return toward Charleston, she was to stop
a few days, on a visit to her brother-in-law's fam
ily, at Collirene, Lowndes county, Alabama, and
I determined to fulfill a long standing promise, and
visit my relations in her company.

When I embraced my wife and little daughter
at Wetumpka, a shadow fell upon my spirit — a
shadow from that stormy interim, that was to in
tervene between that parting and our next meet
ing.

Little did either of us think the time was so
near. Three or four months from that parting,
the husband and wife, and their two children, met
at Cincinnati, which neither of them had ever
seen before.

How appropriate it is that a loyal husband
should enjoy the society of a loyal wife ! The
former risks his life fur the Union — the latter
leaves her mother and her childhood scenes, her
brothers pressed into the Southern army, the re
mains of her sacred dead, and cleaveth unto her
husband.

92 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

The reflections which passed through my mind,
as I sat with my mother in the cabin of the
steamer, which was " coughing down the river"
in the manner peculiar to river-craft, were of a
varied character. About three years before that
night, I had alighted from the stage at the " Coosa
Hall," a stranger to the ways of Alabama. Full
of that high-toned feeling which I then denomi
nated " Southern chivalry," I had entered upon
my duties as a teacher with a high regard for the
nobleness of the profession, and not without a
secret delight at the feeling of having "all the
world before me, where to choose." For many
months after I had arrived in Wetumpka, my
popularity had increased. The young of both
sexes had courted my society. The old had com
mended and caressed me. In the parlors of the
citizens I wras ever a welcome guest. My friends
were everywhere, and my enemies nowhere.
Among the beautiful daughters of the village I
found a paradise of innocent recreation. I did
not think to proclaim to all the world that I
owned no cotton ; for in the innocence of my
heart I supposed they all knew it sufficiently well.
But I wras, unknown to myself, floating upon a
treacherous stream. The roses which supported
my reclining limbs were all artificial. Let me
illustrate :

. From the air of city-life, which I brought with
me from the " Queen city of the South," the rustic
population of Wetumpka had formed the idea,

SCENE THE SECOND. 93

"he must be rich" Xever to mortal Lad I ever
breathed that I was, or was not rich. The idea
had been burn of their own good wishes, or else
of their sordid desires, concerning me.

Among the ladies of Wetumpka was one whom
I sometimes met in company, and sometimes
visited at her cottage home not far from the banks
of the Coosa. The good sense, the modesty, the
goodness, which illuminated her life, made their
impression upon me, as they had universally im
pressed all who had ever had the pleasure to know
her. Graceful and dignified, she participated, like
some superior being, in the gay scenes around her.
The cup of pleasure, which others too eagerly, or
too noisily quaffed, she sipped with a retiring gen
tleness, which, all unconsciously to herself, was
the passport to many a youthful heart.

From the gorgeous temples of affluence, and
their bejeweled daughters, I began to steal away
to the cool freshness of her moonlit piazza, to
listen, with her, to the moekbird's evening hymn,
and to a voice more sweet than even his, which,
in all ages of the world, has had its entranced lis
teners. Insensibly to ourselves, our hearts melted
into one, and our hands soon followed the ex
ample. On the 20th of April, 1858, I led her to
the altar a blooming bride, and never has she
given me cause to regret the most happy act of
my life.

The unostentatious manner in which we com
menced our married life, soon removed the scales

9tt THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

from the eyes of those who had supposed I " must
be rich," and a most marked change became visi
ble in the little world of my wife's native town.

The true condition of things began to dawn
upon me. We were non-slaveholders ! We had
preferred each other's society to the plantations
and negroes, which it is almost invariably the
grand object of Southern marriage to secure.
Having disdained to ally myself, by marriage, to
King Cotton, I was soon to experience the " slings
and arrows of outrageous fortune." Men, who had
looked up to me as their oracle, in politics, in
literature — I write without egotism, for to be their
oracle was not much, to be sure — began to detract
from my real merits as much as they had once
overrated them. One of these, whose unholy am
bition it was to " marry a plantation" and who,
after many efforts, had at length succeeded, al
though his conduct confessed that it had an en
cumbrance — an unloved wife — was particularly
marked in his opposition to myself. His planta
tion, in one week after he obtained it, had made
him monarch of all he surveyed. I shall not men
tion his name ; but, if he ever reads this book, he
will recognize his likeness in this description.

I never envied the planters of Wetumpka, or,
indeed, of any part of the South. My dislike to
them arose from their contemptible meanness,
their utter disregard to common decency, their
supercilious arrogance, and their daily usurpa
tions of powers and privileges at variance with

SCENE THE SECOND. 95

my rights, and the rights of my class. Xo sooner
had I insulted their self-esteem by taking the case
of Franklin Veitch, than business deserted my
office, and an odium as unjust as it was, at the
time, inexplicable, pursued my steps. Even some
of those who should, by every tie of friendship
and of relationship by marriage, have sustained
my honorable course, had yielded to the popular
clamor, and dared not show their kindliness, if
they felt it. But I had not married the whole
family, although I felt bitterly the tame syco
phancy which would pander to the mob, and
which, while it possessed every opportunity to
know the truth, would, nevertheless, "go with
a multitude to do evil."

After all I had suffered, there was still a tie
that bound me to A\retumpka. It was the native
place of my wife, and had been the scene of some
happy days to me. I hoped soon to return to it,
to clasp my family to my heart. It was not with
out a pang, and a fearful augury of evil, that I
felt myself receding from its "darkening shores.*'
I raised my eyes. My mother's sad and tearful
countenance met my view, her eyes resting upon
me with a commiserating glance that showed that
she had read my thoughts. In silence we drifted
down the Coosa, both of us thinking of the won
derful changes that had transpired in my destiny
since, three years before, I had parted from that
mother in Charleston, with hope in my eye and
elasticity in my step. We had not met once in

96 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

that three years, and now, on her return home
ward, I could see that she experienced alarm for
the exposures I was subjected to, on account of
my uncompromising Unionism. She had come
lately from a city and from a State where Seces
sion had flung around itself the folds of revolu
tionary drapery. What everybody said, she had
believed ; but what a different view she must have
entertained of " Southern Eights," when her son
had to go to another county to mail the writ which
was intended to vindicate the inborn rights of an
ill-used Southern man !

After stopping an hour at Montgomery, which
was waving, even then, with significant flags,
we continued our voyage until we arrived, at
about 10 P. M., at Benton, in Lowndes county,
where we disembarked, and waited for morning.
The next day we started in a team drawn by two
mules, and, sticking about a half-dozen times in
the heavy prairie mud, which rose above the hubs
of the wheels, by the help of levers of fence-rails
we " pried" ourselves out, and arrived, at length,
at our destination.

Nature never made a lovelier spot than Collirene
Hill. As the most dramatic event of my life took
place upon this arena, it may not be amiss to
givo the reader a short description of its topog
raphy.

Collirene Hill, or rather hills, must be conceived
of as an abrupt elevation on the Bentonward side,
stretching its summit, in the shape of a broad table

SCENE THE SECOND. 1)7

of land for about a square mile, in every direction
around my uncle's home, except where a lovely
little valley nestled behind his house into a field
of several acres which he partially cultivated.
To the crest of the hills, from the direction of
Benton, the elevation is precipitous. Several fine
houses of wood ornament the flat stretch of ground
on its top, and the acerose pines twinkle their
fronds in unbroken forests beyond the lowland
plantations which lie perdu at their limits. The
blacksmith shop of Doctor Dunklin, resounded on
one side of the road, and my uncle's wheelwright
shop was jammed in a hollow, on the other. In
the former, the Doctor, a cotton-planter, of course,
employed two stalwart black slaves, while in the
latter my aged uncle shoved daily his laborious
plane. Both the Doctor and the wheelwright
would have blazed into frenzy had you told them
Edward Everett was not for negro-equality. They
had been both for Breckenridge in the last presi
dential canvass, and, so, they imagined they were
the peculiar guardians of "Southern Rights."
The Doctor by " Southern Rights" understood his
own rights to employ black mechanics to the ex
clusion of his neighbor, the wheelwright ; and'the
wheelwright, who had grown gray at his work
bench, understood, by " Southern Rights," the
right of Doctor Dunklin to think as he pleased
and act as he pleased in the premises.

Having mailed the writ to the clerk of court of
Coosa county, and having addressed a letter to
i)

98 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

my friend, Hon. Lewis E. Parsons, of Talladega, a
Douglas democrat, who was entreated to officiate,
should accident prevent the writer from being
present at the trial, I turned my attention to
the elements of which " Collirene Hill" was com
posed.

The little community of Collirene, on account
of its natural beauty, consisted almost entirely of
"planters." A few persons of the poorer class
existed among them, but their numbers were ex
ceedingly small, and their influence smaller.

The wheelwright shop of my uncle, Daniel C.
Tharin, was frequented by the "chivalry" of the
neighborhood, who amused themselves by shoot
ing at a tall board, hewn into the shape of a man,
and denominated " Old Abe." This crowd con
sisted of Col. Itobert Rives, " Professor" Harris,*
Dr. Dunklin, Dr. Dunklin Pierce, and others,
whose principal occupation, when they were not
shooting at " Old Abe," was the discussion of the
relative merits of Jeff. Davis, Bill Yancey, and
Alexander H. Stevens. Dr. Dunklin Pierce hav
ing just returned from witnessing the inauguration
of Davis, at Montgomery, was full, to bursting,
with enthusiasm and "chivalry." Such was his
delight at the " success" of Secession, which, he
claimed, was insured by the inauguration of Jeff.
Davis, that he rushed toward the imperturbable
" Old Abe,'' and fired his navy-revolver six
times in rapid succession, without a single ball
coming out of the muzzle, although the smothered

SCENE THE SECOND. DO

reports were all heard. Upon examination, it was
discovered that the weapon had burst at the side.
This event brought an expression of dismal augury
upon the face of the crowd. " Old Abe*' seemed
to chuckle inwardly at the cont re-temps, as much
as to say : '* Young man, you are spared to die bv

»/ O ' */ v

a /Htlhr, not a lire-arm, while 1 am destined to'
outlive this miserable farce/' The next time 1
heard the report of gunpowder in commemoration
of a president's inauguration, was when, standing
on the levee of Cincinnati, an exile as I was, a few
weeks afterward, I heard the mighty voices of
cannon announcing the accession to the presiden
tial chair of the nation, of that man, who, once a
conservative patriot, has had the folly to yield to
the pressure of radicalism, and who, confused by
the clash of arms, has forgotten his letter to Horace
Greeley, wherein he promises that he u would save
the Union" "Lincoln-powder1' no longer means
any thing. It should signify the u Union of our
forefathers," it should mean that all who resist
the restoration of the American Union, whether!
they swear by the Ivichmond Examiner or the
New York Tribune, whatever be their motive,
must be classed in the same black category of
treason and of crime.

The would-be inauguration of Davis occurred
on the ISth, or llHh of February, 18(51. The
dramatic scene of my life was, in a few days, to
begin.

I had next to combat the long-standing preju-

100 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

dices and secession proclivities of my uncle. I
was very earnest in my advocacy of my correct
views of " Southern Rights." These views were
and are defensive of the white n on slaveholders of
the South ; first, by restoring the Union through
their votes, "by means of previous secret organiza
tion ; and then, by confining slave-labor to the
cotton-fields exclusively, leaving the anvil and the
work-bench, and the trades of life under the con
trol of the poor white population.

The abuse of the " peculiar institution," I ar
gued, had overshadowed and destroyed all other
institutions of the country. The institutions of
free-press, free-speech, and represented taxation,
for which last the war of Independence had been
waged — where were they ? The Legislature, which
framed the artful call for a Secession Convention
consisted only of cotton-planters, the represent
atives, lond fide, of cotton-planters, and there
fore of their " peculiar institution." The perjured
governor of the State, himself a cotton-planter, of
course, had convoked the Legislature and, through
it, the Convention, for the avowed supremacy of
" King Cotton." The election of delegates to the
Convention was an insult to every man in Alaba
ma who planted no cotton, who owned no slave,
or who thought he was a freeman. In almost
every county in South Alabama, the cotton-
planters permitted no one to be nominated who
did not support Secession. In middle and north
ern Alabama, the candidates were all secretly

SCENE TiLE -&ECt>ND. I'Ol

agreed on precipitation. Cotton-planters ^>Y>, and
cotton-planters con. The people elected Union
men, as thev thought, but the Union men voted

t>

disunion, according to previous agreement ; and
the people, accustomed to be " sold/' were told
that the measure was imperative to save Alabama
from "invasion," and, in the next breath, prom
ised them that Secession would be "peaceable."
Coosa and Tallapoosa counties, adjoining each
other, sent men to the Convention, who denounced
Secession from every stump; and " pledged their
counties to Secession," when overawed by the pres
ence of King Cotton. Tom Wats — who " planted
cotton'' in Alabama and Texas, and who, by es
pousing the cause of Bell and Everett, had gained
tremendous power in Alabama — showed why he
had once advocated the " Union, the Constitution,
and the enforcement of the laws/' Mr. Yancey
moved that the Secession flag (the State flag he,
called it) should be raised, each day at certain
hours, from the dome of the State capitol. Tom
AVats moved as an amendment, that it " float"
therefrom " forever." My uncle listened with a
saddened, but acquiescent expression, when I
proved that the cotton-planters alone had gotten
up this revolution and that they were preparing
to rivet the chains which they had already thrown
upon the people of the State.

These conversations I purposely held in the
presence of some poor non-slaveholders, who loved
the Union, and who, for the first time, had met

102 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

one of its friends, who dared to vindicate it.
Gradually I began to suggest the repeal of the
ordinance of Secession by means of a secret so
ciety. A small, but patriotic association was the
result, to which my uncle declined to belong, but
which began to take form as an outpost of that
which I had already originated in Coosa county.
I denominated the Collirene Society, the " TEUE
SOUTHEEN RIGHTS CLUB."

The purpose of this association was to "fight
fire with fire," — -to band together all who con
fessed other interests than those of "King Cotton,"
and, at the maturity of the plan, to elect a Union
governor, pledged to call a convention of the
people, and, by the votes of the non-slaveholding
population, to repeal the infamous ordinance of
Secession, which had been passed, as I have before
intimated, without the presence in Convention of
a single non-slaveholder, as the representative of,
by far, the most numerous class in the State — in
the United States — in the world !

But, there was a traitor in that devoted little
band, who, owning neither slave nor cotton, but
willing to sell his little soul for a nigger — and he
could not but have been the gainer in such a bar
gain — betrayed his birthright for a mess of pot
tage.

John Y. Buford, having become the recipient
of the Secret, and having become a subscriber to
the Non-slaveholder, which I was, in the fullness
of time, to have published in Montgomery, in ad-

SCENE THE SECOND. 103

vocacy of the rights' of the " poor white trash,''
impeached me before the so-called " LEGAL VIGI
LANCE COMMITTEE OF COLLLRENE BEAT, LOWNDES
COUNTY, ALABAMA," and, one fine morning, while
at breakfast, I was informed that five gentlemen
of the vigilance committee desired to see me.

At that dreadful announcement an ominous
silence brooded over the scene. The suspended
fork remained rigid in mid-air ; the viand, un-
tasted, was slowly redeposited upon the plate
from which it had just been lifted ; the distended
eye glanced from face to face, only to grow more
awe-struck from the view.

AVitli compressed lip and beating heart, I said :
" Ask them to walk in.''

In a few moments the shuffling of feet in the

passage and the movincr of chairs in an adjoining
ft «>

room gave token of the commencement of an
ordeal from which an escape was, at that period,
an unrecorded phenomenon.

On my way from one room to the other, a
lifetime of thought passed through my mind.
My oath — Franklin Vcitcli, " defenseless and op
pressed" — William S. Middlebrooks, "oppressed
and defenseless'' — and now their unperjured
champion — all three of us seemed clanking our
chains in a vain chorus to assail the ear of nar
cotized Liberty. I could not feel my situation as
keenly as prudence might require. My indigna
tion for a moment overpowered every other feel
ing, and I had to curb my wrath in order to enter

104: THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

the room. My partial success was increased by
my mother's hand and voice, the one laid on my
shoulder, the other breathing in my ear —

" Robert ! Robert ! for my sake !"

I entered the room with outward composure.
The sub-committee, all strangers, exchanged salu
tations with me, and a silence of several minutes
reigned throughout the apartment.

SCENE THE THIRD.

"THE VIGILANCE COMMITTEE."

"What are fifty, what a thousand slaves,
Matched to the sinews of a single arm
That strikes for liberty'.'" — J>r<mke.

" MK. THARIX," said their spokesman, " we have
"been appointed by the vigilance committee of this
heat to request your presence hefore them, because
of certain charges which have been laid against
you. The committee is now in session, awaiting
your presence;, at the Old Academy/'

I repressed an imprudent outburst of indigna
tion, and then, in the calmest tones I could com
mand, I asked—

" I*y what authority does a vigilance committee
summon a free-born c'd'izen of Alabama before
tin r:i to answer charges, and so forth '?"

" By their own authority!" was the fierce and
insulting reply.

" A civil question deserves a civil answer. I
am about to show, sirs, that your vigilance com
mittee has no authority in the premises, and that
its members lay themselves open to an action at
law."

10G THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

"What use, Mr. Tharin. in arffiiinu this ques-

' ' O O "1

tion ? If you are innocent, you ought to have no
objection to appear before any tribunal."

"That's so!" exclaimed the Hercules of the
crowd, who sported an immense white cowhide,
white pants, white hair, white eyebrows, eyelashes,
eyes — the incarnation of his dreaded " king."

"That's so !" reiterated the others, in sycophan
tic chorus.

"It is not always right," I rejoined, "for inno
cent individuals to appear, at their summons,
before every unauthorized tribunal.* Innocence
would be unavailing, if it did not exempt its pos
sessor from illegal and unauthorized restraint.
Even guilt is exempt from illegal arrest.

" Besides, gentlemen, I have taken an oath to
sustain tJte Constitution of Alabama, which denies
to you such powers as you assume.^

" Again : you believe in ' State sovereignty.'
You would consider any man worthy of execration
(and so do I) who would deny legitimate State
sovereignty. ' State-sovereignty,' c State-equality'

* In any section of my country, let me add.

f " No person shall be acc-ufnd, arrested, or detained, ex
cept in cases ascertained by law, and according to the forms
which the same has prescribed: and no person shall be pun
ished but in virtue of a laic established and promulgated prior
to the offence and legally applied." — Constitution of Alabama,
Art. I., § 2.

Also : " No person shall be deprived, of life, liberty, or prop-
erty, but by due course of law." — Id., § 10.

SCENE THE THIRD. 307

— these are the great war-cries of the da}'. It is
the very foundation-stone of the coining revolution.
Xow, on page 113, Hoffman's Chancery Practice,
volume i., you will find substantially these words:
' A State is not sovereign, unices she afford perfect
immunity to all her citizens against every species
of arrest, except by her own officers and according
to her own laws.' You are, therefore, invited,
gentlemen, to produce your legal warrant, in the
hands of a legal '>/#'> /', containing a xjx-cijir chary*',
and appointing a stated day of public trial, in the
2>roi>t'r p'a<-c, and by a jury of my peers.* To
such an officer, and to no other, can 1 surrender
the sacred person of an American citizen, consist
ently with my oath to support the Constitution of
Alabama, consistently with my convictions of that
personal equality, which is not inferior to even the
State equality you boast, or consistently with that
view of State sovereignty which ynu and / enter
tain, although from different points of view.
AVith whatever force, therefore, an American citi
zen, claiming for his justification and protection
the laws of his nation and the laws of his State,
can enunciate such a conclusion, I must decline
your invitation to answer 'charges' before the
vigilance committee, which you, in part, repre
sent/1

* " The right of trial by jury shall remain inviolate." —
Constitution of Alabama, Art. I., ^ 28.

"No power of suspending; laws shall be exercised, except
bv the general assembly or its authority." — Id., § 15.

108 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" What are we to do, Tharin, with such, doc
trines, in times like these ?"

" The revolutionary period in every country is
tlie period most in need of the observance of con
stitutional law. The innocent could quite easily
be made the victims of proscription, and even of
mobocratic violence, were it not for the aegis of the
sacred law, which was intended to shelter all per
sons in times like these, unless and until repealed
by the proper authority. The laws which protect
me are beyond the reach of your vigilance commit
tee, and even of change, being ' forever ' excepted
from all legislation infiduro, by the first article,
or c declaration of rights,' as it is called, of the
Constitution of Alabama.''*

" Gentlemen," cried their chairman, " we have
been commanded to take this man, dead or alive,
before the legal vigilance committee of Collircne
Beat, Lowndes county, Alabama : we have ac
cepted the commission. Shall we proceed at once
to the discharge of our duties ?"

The speaker and the "accused" simultaneously
started to their feet, the former to offer, the latter
to repel, violence. While thus they stood at op
posite sides of the circle confronting each other,
a voice struggled up through a cloud of cigar

* " Every thing in this article is excepted out of the general
powers of government, and shall forever remain inviolate, and
all laws contrary thereto shall be void." — Const. Ala.> Art. I.,
part of § 30.

SCENE THE THIRD. 109

smoke in the corner, and "Williams, the irate
chairman, obeyed the injunction :

" Sit down, gentlemen."

The smoker then continued thus :

" Xo man can listen to Mr. Tharin and not be
impressed with the fact that he has studied this
whole question better than we have. But' only to
a certain extent, Mr. Tharin, will our course be
imperative. Have you any suggestion, through us,
to make to the vigilance committee '( If so, we
can carry it up, unless the majority here dissent.
If the latter, you must go, nolens vole us"

The prisoner (for such evidently I was), after a
moment's reflection, said :

u It' the vigilance committee will resolve them
selves into an assemblage of citizens, without or
ganization, I will add/'cM them on subjects of in
terest which occupy the universal mind."

A majority of the sub-committee were found
willing to carry up the proposition, and, leaving a
guard over their prisoner — their prisoner in avowed
defiance of all law — national, State, and even CON
FEDERATE — the others departed.

Four hours of keenest suspense elapsed, and the
committee of live reassembled to inform the pris
oner that his proposition was acceded to by a ma
jority of — three!

The uncle of the accused, who had formerly

been a member of the vigilance committee, and

who remained present, as a member, so long as

he thought good might be eil'ected, when the

10

1 1 0 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

small majority of three was reported in favor OT
a measure which, conscience dictated, ought to
have received unanimous o/pprobation, — resigned!

Poor old man ! He had never been of them, al
though with them.

He declared himself " ashamed" of having been,
at any time, a member of so merciless and un
authorized a body of men. He reported after
ward, that knives and revolvers were freely drawn
in the heat of debate, and that not a few insisted
that the only balsam for the wounded dignity of
the vigilance committee, would be the uncondi
tional surrender of the person of the accused.
Put, by the most cunning brains present, it was
urged that they did not know how large a party
in other counties Mr. Thar in might have; that,
since he had appealed to law, a seeming acqui
escence on their part would disarm popular ob
jection and forestall organized opposition; that lie-
was an outspoken man, and would implicate him
self before the assembly he had convoked, by de
fending, instead of denying his acts and opinions,
and that their future course, as an organization,
would be based upon his admissions in his speech,
which were sure to be on the side of the Union,
and hostile to the " Confederate States of America."

In custody of his guard (it is best to call things
by their right names), in custody of his guard the
" orator of the day" advanced into the midst of
his enemies, saluting the few whom he knew, and
compressing under his arm the Code of Alabama

SCKXE THE THIRD. Ill

and Hoffman's Chancery Practice, the former of
which contained (contains!) enough to consign to
the penitentiary, or to a fine of one thousand dol
lars, one or both, each of the party who had al-
readv invaded his rights by brininnij; him before

f O «/ o O

an unauthorized body.

The eyes of that crowd of semi-barbarians in
voluntarily turned upon the slight figure, who,
walking through their midst, entered the building,
in and around which they were assembled. ^Num
bers were too much enraged to enter the apartment ;
but all l«:<ti'<l what followed. The largest part of
the crowd was without.

The glances of the Unionist traveled around the
host of his enemies. The very large majority of
youtJis, the general expression of their countenan
ces, were unfavorable indications. The building
was small, the seats consisting of loose boards
laid over pine logs, and at right angles with
them.

The horses of the crowd were tied by their
bridles to swinging limbs on the skirts of the hill.
Their stolid indifference was in marked contrast
to the interest — the excitement — of the human
brutes in their vicinity.

The day was lovely, the air transparent, reveal
ing, far out through the sentinel pines that line
the summit of " Collirene Hill,'' one of the most
Eden-like countries on the globe. Here and there,
from the lovely valley rose grouped or solitary
hills, embosomed in lields ju.-t losing the russet of

112 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

winter in the buds of early spring. In that val
ley, as in countless others in that State, slumbered
the unappropriated wealth of inexhaustible mines
and quarries of almost every species of metalifer-
ous and rupiferous deposit. Fountains of medi
cinal value gushed from the gorgeous hill-sides —
"vitiferi collet — which, at the proper season,
presented their luscious clusters to unrealized
vintages. Above them all, obscuring the purple
sky, towered the colossal, almost palpable form
of " King Cotton," who, monopolizing with des
potic sway the whole surface of the earth, locked
up her recesses from the miner's shaft, the geolo
gist's hammer ; denouncing all such "new-fangled
notions" as among the " encroachments of the
North."

The Unionist was disagreeably aroused from
his reverie, which had not consumed the time
necessary for this allusion, by the harsh voice of
"Williams :

" Mr. Tharin is present," he announced, " and
I move that Dr. Dunklin take the chair."

The motion was carried, nemine contradicente.

The "object" of the meeting having been suc
cinctly stated by the chairman, at once the most
passionless, the most unscrupulous, the most in
telligent, and, therefore, the most degraded of that
assembly, " Mr. Tharin, was permitted to speak,
but to speak to the point, without preface or cir
cumlocution."

" Mr. Chairman : According to the permission

SCENE THE THIRD. 113

of this assembly I am here to speak — perhaps to
die ! I know not and — were it not for my family,
whom God preserve — I care not which ; for 1
have lived to see the day in American history
when whosoever would save his life — all that
makes life endurable in the pursuit of true happi
ness — shall lose it ; when truth must be spoken
with cautious smoothness ; when freedom of
speech — once a right of American citizens, and
still theoretically granted all over the land — must
be begged as a boon, is extended as an unmerited
favor, and received as an undeserved privilege ;
when secret associations—

Xow bolted upright an uncouth barbarian
by the name of CARSON, by former occupation an
overseer, and newly promoted by testamentary
benevolence to the proud position of a cotton
planter.

"Mr. Chairman," he screamed, "I move that
Mr. Tharin be required to make no such allusions,
but to defend himself from charges made against
him, and in the briefest manner possible."

"That's so!" "That's it!" traveled from lip
to lip around the room, and echoed from many of
the crowd without, until the president, rapping
with his knuckles, obtained (what he called) " or
der," and, smiling sarcastically, sneered :

" Friends, we are here to listen to a speech from

the ' orator of the day' (laughter). One at a time

if you please (laughter). You put the culprit (!)

on his guard by these unseasonable interruptions.

10*

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Besides we — all of us — are here as members of the
vigilance committee ; therefore his polluting and
anti-southern doctrines can demoralize (!) none of
us. I feel great curiosity to hear him through."

" As I was saying, sir, when interrupted, I have
lived to see secret associations usurp the functions
of the outraged law, and mobs imprison and even
execute innocent persons without a trial, judge, or
jury ! Alas ! I have lived to see the day—

" You wouldn't live to see many more if I had
the will of you," growled Carson.

"When all the dearest privileges and time-
honored rights of Americans are practically de
nied ; when 'taxation without representation'
oppresses God's poor, for the "benefit of the rich,
in every State in this Union, and the non-slave
holders of my native section, although a very
large majority of the population, are compelled
to pay their tribute into the treasury for the ben
efit of the cotton planters, who monopolize as,
jure divino, their own, all the offices, honors,
and emoluments of government, in direct viola
tion of the very first section of the very first Ar
ticle of the Constitution of Alabama."*

* "ARTICLE I. — Declaration of Rights. (Constitution of
Alabama.)

" That the general, great, and essential principles of liberty
and free government may be recognized and established, we
declare :

" SEC. 1. That all freemen, when they form a social com
pact, are equal in rights ; and that no man, or set of men are

SCENE THE THIRD. 115

"All white men in Alabama, arc declared unal
terably free and coital. But, under the name of
Secession, a Iteign of Terror lias already over
turned the «iual'd<j of white men, and is rapidly
degrading, below the level of the negro, every
free-born voter who prefers not Secession before
liis chief joy. Where now are demoeratical insti
tutions ^ Where now is the Democratic Party '?
Kiven in twain, — powerless to save the Union, or
even itself, — trampled into dust and mockery!
On its ashes Aristocracy has reared a throne,
upon whose downy summit reclines a d<spot
whom 1 am commanded to obey as ?//// sove
reign! 'King Cotton' is his terrible name, lie
flourishes his bloody sceptre over the 'poor white
trash' who encumber the soil sacred to the patent
leathers of the 'patriarchs' of the 'peculiar in
stitution.' '

"Why, Dunklin, he's a damned Abolitionist,''
exclaimed Carson, who could not contain himself
another minute.

" Hush, Carson," hissed the irate president
through his clenched teeth, at the same time
rolling his basilisk eyes askance at the speaker.

"If I speak at all, Mr. Chairman, I will speak
as a free white citizen of Alabama should speak.
I am coerced into speaking thus by my solemn

entitled to exclusive, separate public emoluments or privi
leges, but in consideration of public services." — Constitution
of Alabama.

118 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

trayed by your passions, and the excitements of
the hour, into lending yourselves to a movement
fraught with dangers to the State, of which you
took no cognizance in the hurry and turmoil of
the times. I do not believe now that you will at
tempt to carry out any infamous measure upon
myself. I am a native of the Southern portion of
these United States (sensation), and you had better
beware, if such be your intention, lest, in harming
me, you show your enmity to ' Southern Rigid*?
(sensation), of which you constitute yourselves
the 'peculiar' guardians. I have friends in Ala
bama and South Carolina who will avenge my
fall by the utter abolition of the illegal tribunals
which now burden the country with their dia
bolical and unconstitutional oppressions, and who
will call to a strict account the human instru
mentalities through whom ' King Cotton' conducts
his despotic usurpations. The people of the South,
although now unprepared to see in me their best
friend, will one day do justice to my patriotism,
while that ' small but artful and enterprising mi
nority,'* the cotton planters of the South, will
receive the execrations of civilized mankind !

* "All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combi
nations and associations, under whatever plausible character,
with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the
regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities,
are destructive of this fundamental principle (loyalty) and of
fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an
artificial and extraordinary force, to put in place of the dele-

SCENE THE THIRD. 119

"I have only to demand, in conclusion, that,
for the sake of public justice, and, in order to give
a citizen his right of self-justification, you abstain
from all manifestations of mobocracy toward un
person, and that you obtain a warrant for my ar
rest from the proper legal authority, containing
specific charges, — if there be any, really, — with a
notice of time and place of trial, by a legally im
paneled and sworn jury of my peers.

"This right 1 claim, together with the right to
retire, at once, to my present abode, unmolested
and undetained."

The "orator of the day'' then sat down, while a
deathlike silence pervaded the apartment. His
excited vision traveled resolutely — if not calmly
—over that throng, noting the effect of his re
marks, and weighing his chances of escape. No
word being spoken, he rose, took his books from
the bench, and, taking his hat in his hand, looked
toward his uncle, who, sitting with bent head,
seemed frozen to apprehensive silence. Touch
ing him upon the shoulder, he ejaculated,
"Come!"

As the two were proceeding toward the door,
one of the banditti, Col. ROBERT RIVES, rose, and,
in a voice almost inarticulate with passion, moved
that the vigilance committee " now 2:0 into secret

gated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but
artful and enterprixiny -minority "f the community," etc. —
Farewell Address of Georye Washington, 17tk fccptonbcr, 179G.

118 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

trayed by your passions, and the excitements of
the hour, into lending yourselves to a movement
fraught with dangers to the State, of wliicli you
took no cognizance in the hurry and turmoil of
the times. I do not believe now that you will at
tempt to carry out any infamous measure upon
myself. I am a native of the Southern portion of
these United States (sensation), and you had better
beware, if such be your intention, lest, in harming
me, you show your enmity to ' Southern Rights'
(sensation), of which you constitute yourselves
the 'peculiar' guardians. I have friends in Ala
bama and South Carolina who will avenge my
fall by the utter abolition of the illegal tribunals
which now burden the country with their dia
bolical and unconstitutional oppressions, and who
will call to a strict account the human instru
mentalities through whom ' King Cotton' conducts
his despotic usurpations. The people of the South,
although now unprepared to see in me their best
friend, will one day do justice to my patriotism,
while that ' small but artful and enterprising mi
nority,'* the cotton planters of the South, will
receive the execrations of civilized mankind !

* " All obstructions to the execution of tlie laws, all combi
nations and associations, under whatever plausible character,
with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the
regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities,
are destructive of this fundamental principle (loyalty) and of
fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an
artificial and extraordinary force, to put in place of the dele-

SCENE THE THIRD. 119

"I have only to demand, in conclusion, that,
for the sake of public justice, and, in order to give
a citizen his right of self-justification, you abstain
from all manifestations of mobocracy toward my
person, and that you obtain a warrant for my ar
rest from the proper legal authority, containing
specific charges, — if there be any, really, — with a
notice of time and place of trial, by a legally im
paneled and sworn jury of my peers.

"This right 1 claim, together with tlie right to
retire, at once, to my present abode, unmolested
and undetained/'

The "orator of the day'' then sat down, while a
deathlike silence pervaded the apartment. 11 is
excited vision traveled resolutely — if not calmly
— over that throng, noting the effect of his re
marks, and weighing his chances of escape. No
word being spoken, he rose, took his books from
the bench, and, taking his hat in his hand, looked
toward his uncle, who, sitting with bent head,
seemed frozen to apprehensive silence. Touch
ing him upon the shoulder, he ejaculated,
"Come!"

As the two were proceeding toward the door,
one of the banditti, Col. ROBERT KIVKS, rose, and,
in a voice almost inarticulate with passion, moved
that the vigilance committee " now £ro into secret

O O

gated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but
artful and enterprising -minority <-,f the community," etc. —
Farewell Address of George Washington, 17lh ftcptoubcr, 179G.

120 THE ALABAMA KEFUGEE.

session"* As the nephew, with his uncle, was
departing, he heard the question seconded, put,
and carried. Here was palpable proof of decep
tion and design. The settled purpose of many of
them was traceable in their tones, which were
" still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm."

* This was contrary to promise, of course, but the whole
course of Rives, from beginning to end, was characterized with
a fell and rabid spirit of destruction. He was eager to procure
my murder, guilty or not guilty. He had already made up
his mind, and regarded no pledges or promises whatever

SCENE THE FOURTH.

THE MOB.

"Ali! can you bear contempt? the venomed tongue
Of those, whom ruin pleases? the keen sneer,
The rude reproaches of the rascal herd, —
"Who, for the self-same actions, if successful,
Would be as grossly lavish in your praise?"

THOMPSON.

" They praise and they admire they know not what,
And know not whom, but as one leads the other;
And what delight to be, by *//r//, extolled,
To live upon their tongues and be? their talk,
Of whom to be dixpraixed, iccre no small praise?"

MILTON.

"The good old rule
SufTiceth them, the simple plan,
That they should take, irho Jttirc the pmccr,
And they should keep, who can."

SCOTT.

AT the door and front yard of my uncle's hum
ble abode, we found assembled the whole house
hold, who welcomed us back with joy. To their
congratulations Uncle Daniel responded in tones
of encouragement. My mother wept for joy upon
my shoulder. My cousins, with whom " Cousin
Robert'' was no slight favorite, clasped my hands
and rejoiced over me. In the vicinity of this
touching scene, my aunt and uncle talked in low

122 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

tones, while Tenah, the mulatto servant, and con
stant attendant of my mother, retreated kitchen-
ward, muttering, u I wonder wlia' Mass. Robert
been do to gib de wite folks so much trouble."

I could not find it in my heart to lessen the
brightness of that hour by a single desponding syl
lable; but the cloud, that overhung my spirit,
flung its shadow on my brow. The magnetic ef
fect of that secret session thrilled me with instinc
tive prescience. I knew my reprieve was not a
permanent release ; but a mere lull in the storm
which was even then collecting its electricity for
another and more formidable outburst.

The next day was one of unusual quiet at Colli-
rene. The male inhabitants were at a muster in
Ben ton, where Col. Hives, arrayed in his military
trappings, I afterward learned, rendered himself
very conspicuous in his efforts to get a mob to
visit me forthwith ; but he was dissuaded by Wil
liams for the present, as the culprit (!) had already
appealed to law. So they repaired to a justice of
the peace, who to their excited complaints made
the following answers in substance, which ought
to be kept in everlasting remembrance as an evi
dence of the " chivalry" of perjury :

1. The culprit could not be found guilty of any
crime according to law.

2. Tie had rightly construed the spirit and letter
of the law, which contains no language to de-

' O O

scribe his acts and intentions, except to justify
them.

SCENE THE FOURTH. 123

3. The vigilance committee, therefore, could not
act, but the people (meaning *ome people, I sup
pose, in sufficient numbers) could visit him in
such a way as to render the punishment of their
acts light upon each, on account of. the responsi
bility of all.

4-. The justice of the p'-ac<^ who was sworn to
support the State law*, — being a Secessionist, from
interest, and by nature a tiger, — after having ad
mitted that the laws were explicitly on the victim's
side, wlcixcd his illegal arrest.

"And Felix willing to show the Jews a favor,
left Paul bound.''

Of all this I was at the time profoundly ignorant,
for I was in an agony of suspense at Collirene.

What to do? Flight would involve me in dis
grace, perhaps in death. Every man's hand would
be against me, and suspicion would gain boldness
from any apparent unwillingness to sustain legal
measures. Xo ! I would await, in agonized sus
pense, the trial of law, which I had challenged.
This, I felt apprehensive, would never be accorded.
I knew the tiger-nature of a mob, which, disap
pointed of its prey, crouches immediately for an
other spring at the throat of its selected victim.
Should the fiendish leaders of the vigilance com
mittee appeal to that tiger propensity by artfully
playing upon their prejudices and fears, no power
in law could *w/v?, although should law-abiding
times be ever known in Alabama, it might accnye
me.

124: THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

On the second day after the scenes just recorded,
as I was endeavoring to soothe my spirit with a
Look, my uncle, pale as death, rushed into the
room, exclaiming :

" Robert, I see a body of men approaching from
the side of Benton, whose infuriated gestures are
suggestive of any thing rather than of safety to
yourself. They are on their way toward the new
academy, where many others are awaiting them."

"Uncle Daniel, where is your gun?"

aln the back room, leaning up in a corner."

"Loaded?"

" Loaded."

" Have you any extra caps ?"

"Yes — here are a few."

" Uncle Daniel, take your stand at your shop
and forbid them entering your house. Tell them
there \vill be bloodshed, if violence be attempted."

" Courage, my boy, and hope for the best."

The ladies were at the windows for several min
utes watching the signs of the multitude. Speak
ing their wishes, rather than their belief, they
would exclaim excitedly from time to time :

THE AUNT.* " Margaret, they are going away !"

THE MoTHER.f " No, no ! they are stationing
themselves in the wood to prevent escape — don't
you see?"

* Mrs. Martha Tharin, wife of Daniel C. Tharin.
f Mrs. Margaret E. Tharin, relict of William C. Tharin, de
ceased.

SCENE THE FOURTH. 125

THE AUNT. " There are enough of them — the
cowards !"

THE MOTHER. " O my God ! save my poor
boy !"

THAT PRAYER AVAR HEARD !

"Take heart, mother — let me know when they
are coming," I said, and stationed myself in a
corner, gun in hand, in terrible expectation. Xor

had I Ion0" to wait. A " committee"1 of about

o

twenty-jive was dispatched to '-bring the culprit,
dead or alive, into the; presence of the mob.

A shriek from the women and children, and a
tumult without, drew me toward a chink between
the logs, whence, nnperceived, I peeped out upon
a wild and exciting scene.

Right in their path stood my uncle, who warned
the liends against approaching his premises with
violent intent, as there would, in such a case, be
bloodshed. 1'rnt on. on they swept, brandishing
their revolvers and unsheathed knives, swearing
windv, but not meaningless oaths, as to their de
termination to ''take the traitor, dead or alive ;*'
while a bloodhound, which they had brought to
render retreat impossible, barked and gamboled
in demoniac delight, anxious for some victim upon
whom to exert his sanguinary instinct.

Daniel Tharin now showed himself, every inch,
a nidn. Throwing himself before the assassins, by
every possible exertion, he endeavored to dissuade
or frighten them from their diabolical and unlaw
ful designs.

11*

126 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

But not long did they parley at the door, which
soon gave way beneath reiterated blows — the
shrieks of the women and children arising in wild
accompaniment to the ferocious onslaughts.

Then ensued a scene which beggars description.
Those two heroic daughters of South Carolina,
the mother and the aunt of the imperiled Union
ist, re-enacted the celebrated deeds of their re
nowned Union mothers of 1776. They placed
themselves before the door of the apartment in
which the son and nephew was awaiting certain
death — with the excusable resolution, however,
not to die alone / they denied the right of way to
the monsters before them, unless their fangs should
first drink their blood ! The voice of the mother,
in tones of mingled reproach and intercession, the
rebukes and withering denunciations of the aunt,
the unhesitating manly warnings of the uncle, the
cries of the children, — these, interwoven with the
bloodthirsty shouts of the frenzied " committee,"
produced an appalling medley, which was any
thing but intelligible to the ears of the only silent
individual on the premises.

In the midst of the confusion, the little cousin
of the " culprit,'' Sallie Tharin, entered the room
wherein "cousin Robert" was awaiting his fate.
She heard him breathe the words, " O God !
take care of my family ! Lord Jesus, receive my
spirit !" This completely overcame the sweet
child, and she commenced weeping and wringing
her hands. This recalled me to mvself, and, turn-

SCENE THE FOURTH. . 127

ing to her, I said, with such calmness as I could
command,

"Sallie dear, you had hotter retire, and take all
the children out of the line of my fire ; fur this
gun will discharge its contents in that direction"-
pointing toward the door. "Take the children
with you, and get your mother and mine, and the
rest, to leave the doorway as soon as the ruiHans
enter; fur I'll kill as many as possible, and this
gun will scatter."

It was a double-barreled fowling-piece, one
barrel of which was loaded with buck and the
other with duck shot.

Controlling her emotion, the child retired, and
was making the arrangements, I verily believe,
when the voice of Williams, raised to its highest
pitch, and evidently intended for me, reached my
ears :

" Mrs. Tharin, we intend no violence to your
son ; we only want to afford him that trial he dc-
'i/ia))d<d day In fore yesterday"

This //vVi1 — for it proved to be nothing better-
succeeded. Uncocking the gun, I leaned it care
fully up in the corner, and, to the astonishment
of all, advanced into their tumultuous midst, and
exclaimed — while my aunt struck up a revolver
which was aimed at my head— u / again appeal
to tht- law ! I d< lutind a Jcyal trial /" *

* No person unlawfully arrested, North or South, should
omit to demand, before witnesses, a le^al trial.

128 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Several revolvers were leveled at the prisoner,
who said, with folded arms —

" Fire away, gentlemen ! I am an unarmed pris
oner, entirely at your mercy. You are numerous
and well armed — I am single-handed and weapon
less. If you are cowardly enough to fire now—
' it is allotted to all men once to die.' ':

They now commenced dragging me away, when
my mother rushed forward to embrace me. She
was restrained by the brutal crowd. I saw it all,
and, by a sudden force, hurling Williams to the
right and Rives to the left, sprang to her side,
and caught her to my breast, exclaiming —

" I will embrace my mother. Mother, if I sec
you on earth no more, I beg you to remember I
die a victim to my patriotism f"

" And for your father's principles," groaned the
mother.

Some of the crowd had dashed forward, with
ready weapons, to pi-event that embrace — perhaps
the last on earth of the mother and her first-born ;
but the majesty of Nature restrained their hands,
and in confusion they turned away, while their
victim handed his fainting mother to his aunt,
who was sobbing in the wildest emotion near by.

This, dear mother, perhaps was our last em
brace ;* but what cares Secession for the dearest

* The last time the Unionist heard from his only surviving
parent, he was at Cincinnati, an exile from his native South.
Her letter was dated March olst, 1861. Whether it will ever
again be permitted them to look on each other in this Avorld

SCENE THE FOURTH. 129

of human tics ? Tlie man who would violently sun
der this glorious Union, would ruthlessly trample
upon all humanities, and even mock at God! The
man who would fight in hattle for any other pur
pose than to restore it, is a murderer !

of storm, is a subject for conjecture only. An extract hero
may not be quite out of place. It will illustrate the plans
of the vigilance committee, and the manner in which they
finish up the work they once undertake — hesitating at no
falsehoods to sustain their " party," as Mrs. Tharin shrewdly
suggests :

" Kobert Rives, who appears to be very busy in saying any
thing that has a tendency to save his party, told your uncle
Daniel that he heard that you were writing and speaking on
the horrors of slavery. I, for one, cannot, neither will I, be
lieve such a report ; but misrepresentation and misunderstand
ing have caused much real sorrow to us already. Yes! 1 as
sure you that after you left, the anguish I felt is indescribable.
1 thought I should have died. I could neither eat nor sleep.
When I received your letter, and found that you, my deal-
persecuted child, were safe and well, and among friends, I felt
most grateful to kind Providence for guiding you safelv from
cruel foes and a bitter-hearted set of men, who have not (iod
before their eyes. If there is any justice in lair, it is my desire
and request to you, that you will not suffer these men to go
unpunished. You can make every one of them suffer for their
unlawful seizure and detention of you. You must vindicate
your character, as it is and ought to be dear to us all." (Pear
mother, am I not n»w and here vindicating my character? I
hope this may reach your eye — even if its writer never more
behold your venerated face.) " You have friends suflicient to
help you in the case, and who, 1 feel satisfied, will do so. This
case is one in a thousand. Persons all around here are crying
shame upon such unlawful and mean conduct.

" Your aunt Martha and myself were sitting in the room the
other day, sewing, when t\vo gentlemen of very respectable

130

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

The children, led by their father, now pressed
forward to kiss " Cousin Eobert," and, after the
touching parting, I said, smiling sadly—

" Don't be frightened, little ones : I'll be back
soon. The law will vindicate my innocence. —
Now, sirs, I am ready for trial !"

appearance rode up to the gate, and, after bowing very respect
fully, asked us if this was Mr. D. C. Tharin's hoiise that was
broken open to get at Mr. R. S. Tharin ? We told them it was.
They then asked ' if we knew any of their names.' Martha
called some names, which they took down in their pocket-
Look." . . . . " We do not know who these gentlemen can he.
They said something about Wetnmpka, whither they were
going, or where they had been, I can't say which, but they
mentioned Wetumpka."

Again she writes in the same letter : " I really think this
piece of business is already stirring ; therefore, my dear son,
I think it advisable that you should remain quiet. Write or
say nothing at all on the subject of slavery, as you may again
be misrepresented. Brother Edward wrote (from Charleston,
S. C.) to In-other Daniel, inclosing a piece, which he cut from a
paper, which states that you intended publishing an Abolition
paper, to be called the Non-slaveholder — leaving out, to suit its
own views, that it was to have been published at Montgomery,
as the editor knew a paper published in a Southern city could
not be one of thai sort. The piece Edward sent to Daniel, said
the above was communicated by Robert JUres. I have no faith
in that man. They are nil trembling for FEAR. Therefore I
say again, be cautious. The piece I allude to says also that
' the punishment, though physically slight, was degrading.'
Edward also inclosed to Daniel another piece. Both of the
pieces are headed, ' ORDERED OFF,' &c."

Asa proper comment on this letter, I will here add the 27th
section of Art. I. of Alabama's Constitution (Bill of Rights) :

" Emigration from this State shall not be prohibited, nor
shall any citizen be exiled.'1 — Art. I., £ 27.

SCENE THE FOURTH. 131

"Trial — TIcll !'' slioutcd an infuriated mobocrat;
"you've had your trial, and now you will suffer
your punishment !"

" Hold that dog !" cried a voice ; " or he'll ren
der a trial a useless formality."

"Down! down, sir!"' commanded the hound's
owner, at the same time grasping him hy the collar
and calling for assistance. The dog hud eyed the
prisoner, as if to make sure that he was the object
of all this hubbub, and, having seen the frantic
movements of those who were dragging him along,
had crouched for a spring at his throat, when the
intervention of Williams prevented a catastrophe.

As the guard and their prisoner approached
the "?><//•'- academy," a barbaric; scene burst upon
their view. About two hundred and iifty planters,
-Teat and small (manv of whom claimed to beloner

O v

to the iirst families i, and their sycophants, are con
gregated around the building, awaiting in various
attitudes and occupations the return of their mes
sengers. As the latter approach, a voice, from the
midst of the expecting crowd, demands—

" Have you got the d— d rascal f

" Got him ! 1 reckon we have."

A shout ascends from the assembly, who, from
their recumbent or obli<jue attitudes, start into
bustling activity. Some replenish their mouths
with new supplies of tobacco ; some ignite fresh

* It will be remembered that the vigilance committee had
met in the old ueudemv.

132 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

cigars, or throw away old ones ; some fire their
pistols in the air ; some rush into the building,
and some apply themselves to their whisky bot
tles, with hilarious enjoyment.

Carson, who had been quite demonstrative,
waiting until the prisoner drew near enough to
be seen and recognized, exclaimed—

"Tharin, see hov? popular you are, and how we
rejoice at your advent !"

" Good ! Good ! Bully for you, Carson ; try it
again !" shouted the crowd.

The "prisoner," "traitor," "rascal,*' or "cul
prit," as I was variously denominated, being con
ducted into the house, the others tumultuously
followed, and took the seats which ought to have
remained sacred to Education and Liberty, but
which were now prostituted to the unhallowed
and murderous designs of the ringleaders of that
tiger-mob.

"I move," said Williams, "that this meeting
appoint Dr. Dunklin our president."

" Second the motion," said a voice.

Upon taking his seat, the chairman thanked the
meeting for the distinguished honor it had done
him in appointing him to preside over so intelli
gent and patriotic a body. lie would have pre
ferred that some more distinguished gentleman
had been elevated to the honorable but respon
sible duty of presiding over their deliberations.
The great events that were daily transpiring in
the South would soon be read in Europe, and

SCENE THE FOURTH. 133

bring down the applause of kings and princes.
Among the most dangerous enemies of the South
were those who, in her very midst, grew dissatis
fied with her peculiar and patriarchal institutions,
and, of course, -with the rate of thoxe who ailm
ent* d and up/« !</ their extension. These men were
the more hateful because they considered King
Cotton a despot, and his followers, rebels. The
misguided vounir man who was to be arraigned

o \j o r^

that day before the majestic, tribunal of public
opinion, merited public vengeance, and would
doubtless receive it."

Amid great applause, the "honors" were shared
with a secretary, " Professor"' Harris, of Virginia,
the teacher who daily presided over that very
academy; and the meeting was formally declared
readv for the transaction of business.

A lawyer of Monterey, Alabama, named Pow-
KI.I., who, like the prisoner, had xwnrn, when
admitted to practice law in the' courts of the
State, to "support the Constitution of the United
States and the Constitution of Alabama, and
never, for considerations personal to himself, to
neglect the cause of the defenseless and op
pressed,7' demanded of the committee, "whether
Mr. Tharin had come willingly, or unwillingly,
with his captors."

Mr. Williams answered, that the prisoner cer
tainly gave himself up, but that it was very un
willingly indeed ; and that he believed the pris
oner was still dissatisfied with the course of the

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

people (!),* and that his mother had denominated
the committee a brutal mob"

"The prisoner" here rose and asked Mr. Wil
liams if I did not surrender myself in consequence
of Mr. Williams' own promise that I should have
a legal trial, and immediately on receiving that
assurance.

This produced great commotion. Some person
shouted, "Shut up, damn you!" The president
called " order," and Williams sat down ; while
Powell, anxious to increase the excitement, and
raging with ebullient fury, demanded of Williams
whether the prisoner had not behaved insolently
to the committee.

"Rather so," admitted Williams.

POWELL. "How did Old-man Tharin behave?"

WILLIAMS. " I regret to say that Mr. Daniel
Tharin being unwilling that the committee should
enter his house, we had to do so by force."

THE PRISONER. "It was natural for my uncle to
be excited, under the circumstances. As he acted
according to my own suggestions, I hope no one
save myself will be held responsible for my acts,
/am not ashamed of them."

THE PRESIDENT (xaraycJy). "Silence, Mr. Tha
rin ! You will find it dangerous to interrupt
these proceedings again !"

The applause that greeted this unparliamentary

* I beg the reader to discriminate between the people and
some people.

SCENIC THE FOUliTIT. 135

act was absolutely deafening. The prisoner sat
down, and almost gave up all for lost.

This desultory discussion was intended to work
up the passions of the illiterate mob to the highest
pitch, and continued so long as to involve great
peril to the prisoner. At length, some one,* pre
mising that "'since Mr. Tharin had demanded a
legal trial, and since the justice of the peace at
Benton had told the committee, who had been
appointed to see him vesterdav, k tfmt //v/i/w///-v
were )iot 'IM liable for 1h< <>ffense\ committed In/ j\Ir.
TJiarin, or ttitjyjosed t<> h<irc_ b<>n committed l>y
/untj and since we cannot wait for \\\QfslowpTO-
ceedtiiys oj~ court-house machinery^ — he suggested,
therefore, that a jury of twelve should proceed to
try Mr. Tharin, t/n-n ami tlt<-r<', and that the meet
ing pledge itself to abide by its verdict"— which
motion, without division or repetition, was vocif
erously carried.

\\\ another vote, the chair was authorized to
nominate the ''jury," who iv< re not to l>e sworn,
when the miserable caricature of justice com
menced, the president, I suppose, being t\\cju<l<jr,

* I was not in a situation to ask for names.

\ " The people shall be secure in their persons, houses, pa
pers, and possessions, from unreasonable sei/ures or searches;
and no warrant to search any place, or xdze (tiry person or tiling,
shall issue, without describing them as nearly as may be, nor
without probable, cause, supported by oath or affirmation." —
Constitution <>f Alul/nim, Art. I., sec. 9.

\ The (juneral excuse all over the whole1 country for arbitrary
arrests.

136 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

but the prisoner being refused the privilege of
challenging a single juror, — if a man not bound
by oath can be considered a juror, — and the pris
oner, on motion of the chivalrous Carson, being
also denied any speech before the "jury."*

The prisoner demanded time to summon wit
nesses from Wetumpka, and procure other testi
mony. But this was, of course, refused. *

" May I ask one favor, Mr. President ?" respect
fully demanded the prisoner.

PitKSinKNT. " Well ! what do you want ?"

" I want Mr. Powell, who is a lawyer, sworn,
like myself, to sujyw/'t the Constitutions of this
State, and of the United States, and who also, like
myself, recorded his oath, when admitted to prac
tice law, that ' never, for considerations personal
to himself, would he neglect the cause of the de
fenseless and oppressed' — to defend my cause be
fore this 'jury."

"Keally, Mr. Tharin," said Powell, "I start for
home immediately, as I have business there."

* " In all criminal prosecutions, the accused lias a right to
be heard by himself and counsel ; to demand the nature and
cause of the accusation, and have a copy thereof; to be con
fronted with the witnesses against him ; to have compulsory
process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and, in all prose
cutions by indictment, or information, a speedy public trial by
an impartial jury of the county, or district, in which the offense
shall have been committed ; he shall not be compelled to give
evidence against himself, nor shall he be deprived of his life,
liberty, or property, but by due course of law." — Count. Ala.,
Art. I., § 10.

SCENE THE FOURTH. 137

Saying this, lie left the apartment, but, return
ing, five minutes afterward, took the side of the
prosecution , and was peculiarly unlawyerlike and
violent from beginning to end.

What a demon is the spirit of Radicalism !
whose votaries jw/'ji.rre- themselves willingly, wn
proudly, whenever their oaths to support their
own State Constitutions, or the national Constitu
tion itself come in conflict with their interests or
passions! uState /vy///*/"* " individual rights!**
Republicanism ! — awav witli the hypocritical
cant of Treason. The non-slaveholders— the peo
ple Xorth and South, who love the Union more
than sectionalism, — might well exclaim :

" We've had wronyxto stir a fever in the blood of
age, and make the infant's sinews strong as steel!"

There is not a single sworn lawyer or official
Xorth or South, who sustains the right of Radicals
to mob, punish, or arrest Unionists, to rob the
public, treasury, to suppress free speech, or to in
dulge; in amj unconstitutiunalities whatever, who
is not a perjurer before (iod, and deserving of the
reprobation of all honest men !

Powell but imitated, on a small scale, the
leaders of Secession in his own State and else
where, and deserves no more reprobation, and no
/rw?, than the Yanceys, the Rhetts, the Davises,
the Stephenses, the Floyds, the Masons and Sli-
dells, ct id oinnc g<n>f*< whose opportunities, or
talents, afford them a wider field fur the display of

i •>

138 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

The right of Secession, as it is called, even if it
exist in a State, separately, and without the con
sent of all her co-States, to dissolve the Union,
can not, even in the opinion of its warmest advo
cate, — if he he a gentleman, not to say patriot,
which no Radical can be considered, — legalize
robbery, false imprisonment, perjury, unlawful
duress, murder, exile, libel, and slander. A man
may possibly arrive at an honest conviction that
this or that State, or even section is wronged, but
two wrongs not makiiuj a rujJd, — still it becomes
him to express himself without mendacity, and to
conduct himself without dishonor and dishonesty.

Political honesty had become so unfashionable
in Alabama, that I was about to suffer for being
true to my oath, and to my own convictions of
duty under that oath.

Villains seize the darkness of midnight for the
perpetration of their rascalities.

Political villains had seized upon the darkness
produced by their own diabolisms, to aim the
assassin's dagger at the heart of political honesty
and truth. Rioting in the licentiousness of the
mob they had engendered, they fattened, like
blo\v-flies, upon the garbage which is their natural
element.

Like all noxious vermin, they should have been
gotten rid of before the body politic became in
fested with their presence, and all its members
gre\v rotten with the ulceration of their incisive

SCENE THE FOURTH. 139

II ad President Buchanan possessed either hon
esty or courage, this necessary cautery would have
been practiced.

Powell being the only — at least, the most noisy
• — lawyer in the mob. managed to browbeat "the
prisoner" into a submission, which he could never
have obtained, if, man to man, we had met. Hut
as the crowd of Radicals silenced me whenever 1
attempted to speak, and encouraged Powell, it
was very easy to establish the following facts :*

1. L had <-onc< r*<<l with several /^^-slavehold
ers in the neighborhood on the subject of 1h> ir
Southern I tights !

2. 1 was about to establish, at "Montgomery, a
newspaper to be called Th<- Non-slaveholder.

3. 1 was organizing the people into secret asso
ciations, for the i'<j_n-<d, Ly <•<>,, r.ntion* of the ( )rdi-
nance of Secession.

Hut the malignity of the mob was not satisfied
with thesc/<2r/.y, not one of which was denied by
their victim. The measure of their ini<|uitous
proceedings could not be full, until they had
dragged in the " everlasting nigger.'' Otherwise,
incompleteness would be stamped upon their meet
ing, and even reaction might ensue, honorable to
the captive and dangerous to themselves.

.Radicalism in both sections feeds upon only one
idea— niyy<-'r. Take the in<j<j<r out of the dump
ling, and Radicalism dies for want of appetite.

Vide pp. 144-152, inclusive.

14:0 T1IK ALABAMA KKKUGKK.

Iii spite, therefore, of the. palpable absurdity of
supposing that the Secret Uni'on Association was
an Abolition movement, or that &\Q " Non-slave-
lioldo'^ to be published at Montgomery, was to
have been an open advocate of Abolition, these
tilings were charged upon the Unionist, because
thus alone could they get rid of him and his Con
servative doctrines on the great national question
of Union or Disunion.

The r/tarf/c of being an Abolitionist was, there-
lore, inevitable. /Yr>^\ were not absolutely ne
cessary — the muiw -itself was enough lor any
Southern mob to grow wild on.

A witness, previously suborned, viz., the same,
John Y. Buford, or Beaufort, who had impeached
him before the vigilance committee, was intro-

O

duoed. Powell led the witness to the, declaration
that Tharin was a " rank Abolitionist,"' because
he had heard the latter say he wanted to "abolish
monopolies" and that that inuxt hare meant slav
ery, in his (Beaufort's) opinion.

PKISONKR. " May I not ask the witness one
question ?"

Much discussion ensued as to whether this poor
privilege should be granted, and finally it was ac
corded with a very bad grace.

PKISONKR. "Mr. Beaufort,"

The witness, who had risen respectfully to an
swer Powell, obstinately retained his seat.

.PKISOXKK (fixing his eye iinnly on the witness).
"Mr. Beaufort P

SCENIC THE FOURTH. 141

~No better result.

PRISONER (with a stamp of his foot). " Witness !
rlw when I speak to you!"

'Poor Beaufort was absolutely galvanized to liis
i'eet. Trembling all over, and pale as death, IK,'
gasped, with blanched lips and husky throat —

"Sir!"

" Beaufort, don't answer the d — d traitor,"
shouted Powdl, who was joined by many others
with loud shouts, oaths, and threatening gestures.

The u traitor," as ///ry called the loyal man, still
kept his eye upon Beaufort, who had sat down,
overwhelmed with shame and the stings of a
guilty conscience.

" Mi1. Thar'm, do not intimidate the witness,"
bawled the inevitable Carson.

u Do not be alantwtl, Mr. Beaufort; I shall ask
vou no question. ^ our in<i/tn<'r can not i'ail to
convince anv one of common sense that you have

-

Here the confusion became terrific. Some " grit
ted" their teeth, others cursed and swore ; but
others still seemed disposed to disbelieve Beau
fort, exclaiming — "Very strange!" One man
made bold to say —

""Why, John Beaufort looks a d — d sight more-
guilty than Tharin !"

Seizing upon this opportunity, the beleaguered
man sprang to his feet, and exclaimed —

" Fellow-citizens, judge, yourselves, between us!
.Here is a man larger than 1, who trembles at my

THE ALABAMA EEFUGEE.

glance, although lie has two hundred and fifty
armed men to "back him. If you take his evi
dence against me after that, it is because you thirst
for my Uood '/"

A witness was admitted to the stand, who testi
fied that Mr.'Tharin had met him on the road,
asked him if he had any negroes, received an
affirmative reply, and remarked to him that he
had better sell them quickly, because that kind
of property was valueless in civil war, and that
Abolition and Secession were identical in their
effects.

One of the "poor white trash," who had agreed
to subscribe to the Non-slaveholder, was made to
testify, much to the amusement of the crowd, in
opposition to his own views and feelings :

POWKLL (([iiictly). " Mr. Eddings, were you ever
down at Monterey?"

EDDINGS (nervously). " Monterey ! — Do you
mean Monterey in Mexico?"

POWELL (sarcastically). "No! Monterey in Ala
bama."

EODINGS (blandly). « AVcll, yes !"

POWELL (courteously). " Have you any objection
to say why you left Monterey?"

EDDINGS (excitedly). " That's my business !"

POWELL (coolly). " Did you ever know of a man
named Powell down there ?"

EDDTNGS (alarmed). "Mr. Powell, I thought you
wanted me here as a witness in this trial !"

POWELL (insinuatingly). " So we do ! and rf

SCENE THE FOFRTIT. 143

you'll testify rigid In this trial, I'll say no more
about that other matter"

EDDINGS (briglitening). " Oh ! certainly !"

POWELL. kt Xow, Mr. Eddings, do you not un
derstand ^(^-slaveholder to mean — Abolitionist?"

EDDIXGS. " Xow you speak of it, I begin to see
it in that light/'

POWELL. " Did not Tharin tell you his paper
would destroy shivery ?"

EDDINGS. " Yes — slavery of white people."

POWELL (peremptorily). u Answer my questions
as f a*L' tJion. Do you think Mr. Tharin cares a
damn for the institution of slavery ?"

EDDINGS. "Xo — not for them that own it"

POWELL. " "Would you like to go to Monterey
with me ?"

Eimixos (alarmed). " Good God ! no ! sir."

POWKLL. u Does Tharin care a damn for the in
stitution of slavery?''

EDDIXUS. " Xo sir-ree !"

Here the crowd commenced cheering Powell,
and, amid much laughter, prepared themselves for
the next funny scene.

THE SKCRETAIIY (Prof. Harris) testified that Mr.
Tharin had told him he did not care a cent for any
ik peculiar" institution.

" Big Dudley," a young cotton-planter, a fran
tic Secessionist, a member of that dignified body,—
the unsworn jury of twelve, — objected to the ad
mission of " old man Tharin on the stand ; be
cause," he said, " old Tharin (had) behaved scan-

14-i THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

dalous in not admitting them into his house, with
out making such a d — d fuss about it."

But, at length, after much stupid opposition, the
prisoner's uncle was admitted as a witness, mainly
because he was a member of the same church with
some of the "jury"

Daniel Tharin testified to facts diametrically
at variance with the testimony of the crest-fallen
Beaufort, who was so completely disconcerted that
he did not even raise his eyes, and, when the cross-
examination was over, hope began to return to the
prisoner's heart.

The sketch, which lias just been given, of that
long trial, is short, in comparison, it is true ; but,
from its commencement to its conclusion, it occu
pied nearly nine hours of keen suspense to the
captive, but of keen enjoyment to his persecutors.
As soon as the " testimony" was concluded, at
about 7 P. M., it was moved that the " audience"
retire, while the "jury," in secret session, should
consult as to their verdict.

A committee of three was appointed to guard
the prisoner, and the "jury" was left alone with
the president of the meeting.

SCENE THE FIFTH.

THE VERDICT.

"What can innocence hope for,
When such as sit her judges are corrupt?"

MASSINGER.

"Man is unjust; but (}od is just, and finally justice tri
umphs." LONGFELLOW.

As soon as the recess was known in the village,

O '

trays, tilled with coffee and eatables, approached
upon the heads of female slaves, with the compli
ments of " missis," to refresh the gentle men after
their patriotic labors.

I swallowed some coifee, but abstained from
eating. Although I felt my life hung upon a
single thread, I perceived that thread to be pres
ence of mind! That lost, /was lost. I found
that many of the mob were departing, and that
those who remained were worn out with the
tedium of the trial. I perceived that my only
hope of saving my life (should the " verdict" of
the ''jury" demand it) was, by at once creating
a reaction in the minds of the bystanders. I
commenced by praising the coffee, complained
of the cramped condition of my limbs, after sit-

1-16 TIIK ALABAMA REFUGEE.

ting so long in one position, proposed a short
walk to the committee, which was willin<rlv

£"} *J

agreed to, and joined in the conversation with
my guard, until their interest was excited against
their will.

I told them how I loved the whole nation, —
North, South, East, and West, — too much to see
with pleasure the severance of a Union, that
Washington had described as the " palladium of
our safety ;" that, when war too soon should
drench the land with kindred blood, and when
each family was mourning some loved and lost
one, — when the full consequences of Secession
were upon the State of Alabama, they would
know, what now they were determined to ignore,
that

"TiiE UNION is TIIK PALLADIUM OF THEIR SAFETY !"
I had not ceased talking when we returned to
the mob, and I had won the committee, or guard,
to a better understanding of my views and feel
ings. One by one the crowd gradually collected
around us, and listened to the conversation. One
of the Dudleys said he believed that Mr. Thariii
was in correspondence with Northern Abolition
societies. The prisoner stated that, situated as he
then was, he could not resent this intended insult ;
but that he never saw or communicated with
Abolitionists in his life, and that the charge origi
nated in either a culpable mistake, or else in the
unscrupulous misrepresentations of his Disunion
calumniators, who hesitated at no means to de-

SCKNK THE FIFTH. 147

stroy a man whose views on the subject of " Union''
were so well defined as his own.

In this way, although my thoughts were neces
sarily more with the future than with the present,
I sustained a desultory conversation for (what
seemed to me) four or five hours, which, however
tedious, I would willingly have prolonged.

The Southern mind is peculiarly susceptible to
change. It admires courage, and despises the
reverse. "We do not acknowledge a consciousness

o

of fear, and detest those who manifest it. AVe
respect even our victims who conceal their appre
hensions. It would be an empty panegyric to say
that the subject of this sketch /c/*! no fcai\ for he
writhed in his inmost soul under the inflictions of
suspense ; but, says Shakspeare —

"The brave man is not he who^<7x no f»-ar,
For that were foolish and irrational ;
But he whose steadfast soul despises fear,
And nobly dares the danger nature shrinks from."

The secret session of the "jury" was protracted
to a late hour, and the patience of the outsiders
was taxed to its utmost. At length the doors
were thrown open, and the eager throng resumed
the benches.

A sepulchral silence pervaded the assembly.
The "president" called the meeting to order, and
announced that the jury would read their verdict
through their secretary, "the professor."

With pedantic emphasis, " Professor" Harris
pronounced the following

118 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

"YEKDICT.

"We, the 'jury,' find the defendant guilty, and
decide that his punishment shall be as follows :

" 1. He shall receive thirty-nine lashes, as a
disgrace.

"2. As soon as this shall be concluded, he shall
be escorted, by a committee of five, to Benton, and
placed in charge of the captain of the first boat
which stops there.

" 3. Should he ever return to this community, he
shall be hanged.

"4. The proceedings of this meeting shall be
published in the Montgomery Advertiser and
Post."

A profound hush attended and followed the
sonorous enunciation of the sentence. With a
calmness that astonished myself no less than my
audience, I said :

" This, then, is your decision. It would be as
unmanly for me to ask any commutation of this
'punishment,' as it is unmanly in you to meditate
so gross an outrage. But I do not suppose you
make war upon defenseless ivomen and children.
The immediate publication in the papers of your
proceedings will probably kill my wife, who, I
learn, is very sick ; I, therefore, move that a post
ponement of four weeks be granted, for the benefit
of persons whom even you acknowledge innocent."

No word was spoken for some time, when a fee
ble voice said, "I second the motion."

SCENE THE FIFTH.

" We don't war on women ; but we don't intend
you to escape that way. You wish to cxcapc ux ;
but you can't, and you shan't !" Thus spoke
Itives, who, from the same "jury," was followed
by Carson, who thus relieved himself :

"Mr. President, the papers found on this man's
person show his statement to be a fact. But I
may as well state that his papers also show that
lie took a case fur a "William S. Middlebrooks, of
Wetumpka, accused of ' Lincolnisrn /' :

" I will also state,'' cried the blood-thirsty Itives,
"that live of this 'jury,' myself among the num
ber, voted to hang the traitor, and only gave way
because we could not convince the others that
death was not too severe a punishment.'' Then
turning to the victim of mobocracy, he exclaimed,
at the same time shaking his list: " \Ve know our
rights, and, knowing, <i<ir< maintain !"

"Considering the disparity of numbers, sir." I
retorted, "that is a very cheap declaration. It is
my own opinion, there is very little daring in your
present course. But, .Mr. President, I insist on
my motion, which has received a second."

Here a Doctor (Somebody) moved that the mo
tion be amended, by inserting */,/• instead of four
weeks, adducing medical reasons to show that
ladies are liable to serious injury by any shock to
the nervous system under six weeks.

By an overwhelming vote the amendment was
lost, Riv<s voting In tin: negative.

This was his chivalry!

150 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

The original motion was barely carried, Rives
a gain voting in the negative.

It was moved that the chairman appoint a com
mittee of three to cany into effect the first article
of the verdict.

Messrs. Carson, Dudley, and " Big Dudley" (we
know not their Christian names) were honor< d
with the appointment, and proceeded to its dis
charge with evident trepidation. They were told
not to hurt the prisoner, but merely to disgrace
him. Remembering the fable of the "Oak and
the Reed," I bowed before the storm I could not
resist, in order to rise upright after the storm
should have passed. This was all I had left to
do. Had I resisted those light and harmless
blows, which were intended only to "disgrace"'
me, I would have been murdered, weaponless as
I was, in cold blood. Over my grave would have
settled the night of oblivion. Calumniators would
have detracted from my reputation unchecked, and
no one could have defended my memory from their
violent attacks. This has been. the fate of hun
dreds, thousands ! of Unionists. I submitted to
the dreadful ordeal, therefore, because I knew the
effects of that outrage would not disgrace me,
while my enemies were engraving upon their
souls the red stripes of guilt which " all the drops
in Neptune's ocean" could not efface. Sustained
by a sense of right, — even proud to receive the
" stripes" for my defence of the " stars," — I could
almost see the tearful face of Washington leaning

SCENE THE FIFTH. 151

from heaven and bidding me, "in patience possess
tliou thy soul I7' I felt not the blows, I saw not
the forms of my persecutors ; a sarcastic smile
rested on my lip, while a peace of mind, which was
as incomprehensible as it was grateful, stole over
my interiors. I remembered who was scourged,
when Pilate yielded his own convictions to the
mob of Calvary. The crown of thorns was the
earthly portion of my Saviour. It is true, that
Saviour, being Divine, human cruelty and outrage
could not "dixy race" him. But Truth, the great
sanctifier, sustains the meanest of her disciples,
blunts the points of the thorns, heals their un
deserved stripes, and, through the conscience,
teaches them to defy the terrors of persecution.

After the outrage had been perpetrated, "7^,
I ask, was disgraced? — the martyr, or the mob '.

From a lordly height of mental, political, and
conscientious superiority, the victim looked dtnni
upon his foes. They seemed to have suddenly
become dwarfed, in the .stature of the inner man,
to Liliputian dimiiiutiveness. From the corrup
tion of their thoughts was stripped the vail of
opaque flesh. The lava waves of hell were cours
ing through their arteries. Mercy, Truth, and
Peace had fled forever from their dismantled
shrines ; and Cruelty, Perjury, and Murder chased
each other, in diabolical sport, through the corri
dors of Memory. Thereafter, from worse to worse,
the pathways of those mobocrats paralleled into
a continuous descent. For them, no more would

152 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

shine tlie sun of Truth. Gross darkness obscured
their vision, and they groped their way to ruin,
seeking their congenial Tartarus, where their law
and their gospel consist in this quintessence of
rebellion—

"Better to rule in hell than serve in heaven /"

A committee of five was next appointed, among
whom were Rush, "Big Dudley," Dr. Carver, and
Jeff. Rives, to carry out the second provision of
the verdict. These were appointed because they
w^ere well mounted, and supplied with superior
revolvers.

It was deemed a matter of importance that an
animal should be procured for the use of the pris
oner suited to the purpose. Some time was passed
in preparing a beast — and such a beast ! A mule,
of medium proportions, whose trick consisted in
stopping whenever he was urged forward.

During the interval, the victim of mobocracy
wras allowed to see his mother, who was, however,
so frantic with grief as to be unable to hold
connected conversation. Of a sanguineous tem
perament, she was naturally excitable, and the
irritating cause was of a magnitude sufficient to
overthrow stronger nerves. Clasping her son to
her bosom, she shrieked rather than said—

"Go to Charleston, my son ! go to Charles
ton ! I think your relatives there will protect
you 1"

Quick as lightning the thought flashed through
my brain that to appear to acquiesce would mis-

SCENE THE FIFTH. 153

lead my enemies who still meditated my death,
and, so, I said :

" Very well ! mother, I will go thither. Cheer
up, and you will soon hear of my safety/'

Then turning to my Aunt Martha, I said :

" If any thing should happen to me, tell my
brother to avenge my death, and, in any case, as
sure him solemnly that I never was and never can
be an Abolitionist, that my Unionism is my only
offence; that Secession — Radicalism — I hate with
a perfect hatred!'5

"And well you may !'' she replied, bursting into
tears.

The solemn leave-taking over, your fellow-citizen,
unlawfully captured, unlawfully detained, unlaw
fully dealt with, and now unlawfully driven into
exile, seized his portmanteau, packed by his
mother's trembling hands, and mounted his
'• nondescript animal" for a midnight tramp
through roads covered with a thick layer of
sticky prairie mud, and under the escort of a set
of ruffians, who discharged their pistols, drank
whisky, and " patroled for niggers" on the way.
Meeting a " nigger" on the road, they asked him
for his " pass ;" not having any, his whisky jugs
were broken, and, being stripped for the purpose,
he was laid prostrate on the earth. These pre
liminaries concluded, with a bridle-rein they whip
ped him, amid vociferous cheers on the one side
and entreaties on the other. I sat my mule like
monumental marble, without manifesting either

154 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

surprise or indignation. My own sufferings were
too fresh in my mind to permit any outward in
dication of the thoughts which were busy within
me. I wondered that the Caucasian barbarians,
who " escorted'' me, did not recur to the speech I
had made before the vigilance committee in the
old academy, when I had said :

"All white men in Alabama were born free and
equal ; but, under the name of Secession, a reign
of terror has already overturned even the nominal
equality of white men, and is rapidly degrading
to the level of the negro every free-born voter who
prefers not Secession before his chief joy. On the
ashes of democracy, ' aristocrats' have erected a
throne, upon whose downy summit reclines a des
pot, whom they call ' King Cotton,' whose in
visible \\&\\di flourishes the lash over the heads of
the ' poor while trastt who encumber the soil,
sacred to the patent-leathers of the patriarchs of
the peculiar institution !"

When our forefathers planned that proud ban
ner, the Stars and Stripes, what fiend from hell
dared to write this invisible sentence on its folds:

"The day shall come, when he who would de
fend the stars, shall receive the stripes !"

Interwoven with the stars of Independence,
were and are the stripes of despotism ! The slave
holder walks with his head among the stars — the
poor non-slaveholder sinks beneath the glorious
stripes! The cotton-planter imports every thing
except his negroes from the Xorth, and sends back

SCENE THE FIFTH. 155

in return — whipped freemen. The cotton- planter
makes his black slave a bricklayer, or a black
smith, or a wheelwright, and then insolently as
serts that the Yankees alone want nctjro e^uali1//
in the South. The great champion of the cotton-
planters, AVilliam L. Yancey, in his " great"' speech.
at Cincinnati, 24-th October, iSfiO, said:

" I3ut >/<»(* gentlemen, want to place the negro
and the white man upon a common level. You
do it by appealing to the passions ami prejudices
of the people. You will get, by this means, a
muja'to (/•/Vt-rninoit. And, when you have done
this, wlia1 <ffect </•/'/ It //,//•, <>;t tht <jre<d mas* of
free laborers. Xow it moves in a higher sphere, — •
the sphere of free-labor, the sphere Q? freedom, but,
ilit-n, this vast mas* of slave tabor will be mixed
up with it 8'> a* to co:n< in contact 1 1* if ft you daily.
They ii'iJl elbow you on, f/»/ streets, in Hi, -irurk-
X/H>J>S, on tin1 roads, and in, tie li<l<l. 7 lie/j will
underbid you for every species «j labor, for the}'
have no wish beyond the satisfaction of to-day."

See what a Jtom, -picture Mr. Yancey has drawn.
lloir did Mr. Yancey know that the negroes, if
allowed to flood Cincinnati with black mechanics,
would come daily in contact with the poor white
laborer? How did he know that they would un-
dcrlj'ul him '{

Mr. Yancey Avas drawing a home-picture! lie
had seen, all his life, in the cities, and towns, and
villages of the South, ////; very tlfhiy he described
so graphically to a Northern audience. lie had

156 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

seen the rich man's negro " come in contact" with
the poor white blacksmith, the poor white brick
layer, carpenter, wheelwright, and agriculturist.
He had seen \k& preference invariably given to the
rich man's negro in all such pursuits and trades ;
like me, lie had heard the complaints of the poor
white mechanic of the South against this very
negro equality the rich planters were rapidly
bringing about. These things he had heard and
seen in Charleston, Xew Orleans, Mobile, Mont
gomery, and Wetumpka. It was from ocular and
auricular demonstration he spoke, when he ex
claimed —

" Are you willing, my hard-handed, hard-work
ing countrymen of the North, to be placed on a
level with the black man ? Are you willing to
get on the platform prepared for you by this
fanatical party at the North ? Do you want to
compete, in your industrial pursuits, with the
black nigger?1'

Do you, ? brethren of the South, relatives and
fellow-citizens of the exile who publishes these
lines ? Have not the planters for years condemned
every mechanic in the South to negro equality ?
Does not Yancey himself confess it? Are my
hard-working, hard-handed fellow-citizens of the
South willing any longer to be placed on a level
with the black man ?

Oh ! when he asked that question of the me
chanics of Cincinnati, how Yancey sneered ! And
yet, it was a home-picture. He thought of you,

SCENE THE FIFTH. 157

non-slaveholders of Alabama, and of tlic South,
and, while he thought, he sneered !

And yet, how you cheer him, when he bids you
fight fur this n<:<jro (quality, toil for this proud
aristocracy, that despises and sneers at, while it
uses you. They think all you are fit for is to
"turn bullets" fur them — your betters, who call
you "poor white trash!"

Degraded America !

Gods! if one non-slaveholder, whum I know,
could only have his rights to-day in Alabama, I'd
stump the dear old State fur the Union unce more,
and leave the planters, whu stick to treason, to
die in the "last ditch,'' which they so cunningly
prepared for you.

And you would help me— if you deserve the
name of men, if you be worthy of the glorious
ancestry from which you sprung — if you be, in
deed, superior to the negro, who is now preferred
before you ! Yes, preferred before you ; lor, while
the rich colonel, or major, who commands a regi
ment of such men as you by hereditary right,
sends his black body-servant sweeping over the
field on his gallant steed, you — " poor buckras"-
who, owning no negroes, are not exempt, lift your
heavy knapsacks to fight for his and his negroeJ
interests, not your own rights. It is true, some of
the understrappers are put to dig your intrench-
incuts — but, too often, do they prepare your
graves !

Cuffy is not permitted to rea<l ; for his uiaster
14

158 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

says it unfits him for submission. Why do they
prevent 2/<w from reading this? If you are read
ing it now, you are doing so by stealth. You dare
not read the truth, much less speak it, while you
fight for your independence !

Oh, my down-trodden brethren of the South !
will you, too, join in the outcry of my enemies
and your enemies, who, after they have enslaved
you, have exiled your only champion, because he
loves you more than life? The Irish venerate the
name of John Mitchell; the Hungarian idolizes
his Kossuth — who, when exiled, found in this
country a welcome : has the American citizen
quite forgotten Washington? Shall it be said
that, blinded by the fruitless hope of "owning a
slave some day," or obfuscated by the aristocratic
recollection of having once owned one or more,
the non-slaveholders of the South persecute one of
their own number, who dares to reiterate the sen
timents of Washington ? Remember, it was Wash
ington, whose last public act was to admonish us
against disunion : " The Union is the palladium
of your safety /" Precious legacy to a once free
and happy people ! When will that people throw
off the yoke of bondage, and hail their only safety
in a peaceful reunion, in which, the negro slave
being confined to the cotton field, there will be no
more negro equality ! Has not the event proved
the truth of the prophecy of Washington, when
he warned us against party spirit?

One moment of true Southern Rights — one day

SCENE THE FIFTH. 150

of freedom to the non-slaveliolders of Alaoama —
one convention of the people who voted for the
Union, and whose votes were not counted, and
the remotest nation of earth would look with
astonishment upon the mighty result !

Some of the class to which I address myself,
although they cannot be ranked among the plant
ers of cotton, taking up the cry of the Charleston
Mercury, are loud in their cheers for Yancey, the
"Garibaldi" of the South. Little do they know
the man they praise. In Cincinnati he proved
himself the enemy of the South, and the trampler
upon " Southern Rights." Only three months and
eighteen days before he advocated, signed, and
rejoiced over the Secession ordinance at Mont
gomery, on which he opposed giving you and me
a ratification vote — which we never had, of course1,
or things would have been different, — only three
months and eighteen days prior to his voice and
vote in the Montgomery Convention, William L.
Yancey said :

" In the Constitution, they ordained that the
(U. S.) government was formed for themselves
and their posterity ? Who were they? There was
no slave in that Convention that formed the Con
stitution. There was no negro there ! There were
neither slaves nor negroes in that body that
wrote the Declaration of Independence. But
those men were the representatives of the slave-
holding community, — SLAVEHOLDERS TIIKMSELVKS,
who wrote it down in the Constitution, that the

1GO THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Constitution they made was for themselves and
their posterity /"

None but slaveholders — the representatives of
slaveholders — were in the Convention that formed
the Constitution of the United States, says Yan-
cey. Moreover, says he, these men " wrote it down
in the Constitution, that the Constitution they
made, was for themselves and their posterity !"

"Were they honest and sincere? No man
dare say to-night* that they were not! If honest
and sincere, and they made that Constitution to
confer the blessings of Liberty, on themselves and
their posterity, then, most assuredly," exclaimed
Yancey, " they never designed that Constitution
for the black race, and these were not the men
they declared to be free and equal."

There could not possibly have been framed
language more insulting to the great mass of
Southern white men than that used by Mr. Yan
cey at that time.

First, he asserts that all the members of the
Convention who formed the Constitution of the
United States were " slaveholders themselves."

Secondly, he asserts that they were the " repre
sentatives" of slaveholders.

These two assertions taken together are exactly
the same as to say that there were no non-slave
holders in the -Convention, either as individuals or
as a represented class.

* At Pike's Opera, Cincinnati, October 24, 1860.

SCENE THE FIFTH. 161

Third, lie says that these slaveholders wrote it
down in the Constitution, that the Constitution
they formed was for themselves and their posterity.

This third assertion is another way of saying
what he had twice said before. It also went fur
ther, and denied all participation in the " blessings
of Liberty" to the non-slaveholders, the poor white
trash who are lower than niggers.

This is again conveyed in the argument that the
negro — not being present in the Convention either
individually or by representation — were not the
men declared to be free and equal.

If the negro was excluded from Liberty, because
he was not in Convention, then the non-slavehold
er wTas excluded, because he (as Mr. Yancey ex
pressly said) was not present in that Convention.

But Mr. Yancey believes, not less than I do,
that slavery rests upon the basis of negro-inferior
ity, therefore, he spoke these words against the
equality of white men.

Nationally, then, Mr. Yancey considers the
non-slaveholders on a level with the negro. Po
litically, the " poor white trash," like myself, for
instance, were left entirely out of the Constitution
of the United States, and must give way to the
•privileged class, who intended that instrument for
the exclusive benefit of " themselves and their
posterity"

In order to show that I take no unfair advan
tage of Mr. Yancey, I will now proceed to notice
his actions subsequent to his words and their con-
14*

162 THE ALABAMA .REFUGEE.

nection with those words. As " actions speak
louder than words," the views of Mr. Yancey will
be best discovered in his actions, coupled with his
own words. If the domineering exclusiveness of
the cotton-planter be patent all over his speed),
his actions are the very quintessence of arrogance
and usurpation, and, as I will show, a downright
insult to every white man who does not plant cot
ton. Remember, too, that the "Southern Con
gress *' indorses Mr. Yancey.

Three months and eighteen days only had elaps
ed after that speech, when Mr. Yancey stood up
in the State Convention at Montgomery, Alabama,
and voted for Secession. He also voted against
leaving it to the people for a ratification. His
opinions prevailed. He has now, having returned
from Europe, taken a seat in the Southern Con
gress, where he sustains his own former course.

Let us paraphrase his own language in connec
tion with his act, substituting the Secession Con
vention for the Convention which framed the
United States Constitution :

" Who were the delegates to that (Secession,
Montgomery) Convention? There was no non-
slaveholder in that Convention which framed the
Secession ordinance. There was no hard-handed
mechanic, no hard-working non-slaveholder of
the South in that traitor crew. There was nei
ther non-slaveholder nor mechanic in that Con
vention that framed the Secession ordinance. But
these men were (most emphatically) the represent-

SCENE THE FIFTH. 163

atives of slaveholders, — slaveholders themselves!
—who wrote it down that the Secession ordinance
and constitution they made were for themselves and
their posterity !

" "Were they honest and sincere ? ~No man
(within their merciless and unauthorized control)
dare say to-night that they are not."*

If honest and sincere, and they made that or
dinance and that Constitution to confer the bless
ings of "Southern Independence'' upon themselves
and their posterity, then, most assuredly, they
never designed those documents for the non-slave
holder, and the non-slaveholder was not the man
they declared independent.

See upon what a shifting sand rests the fabric
of "Southern Independence" in a " Southern Con
federacy !"

If a negro is unequal to a white man, only he-
cause he was not represented in the Convention
that framed the United States Constitution, how
can the non-slaveholder be equal to the slave
holder, when the former was not represented in
the Secession Convention nor in the Southern Con
gress ? Mr. Yancey is a palpable advocate for
negro equality by debasing the white man, even
while he execrates those who advocate the same
t?ting by elevating the negro. I am not a politi
cal adherent of either the one or the other • but, if

* One man did and does deny their honesty, but he writes
these words in exile.

164 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

I must clioose between the degradation of my own
race, or the elevation of the black, I prefer the
latter, as the least of two evils. My conservatism,
however, causes me unequivocally to condemn
both forms of negro equality.

So well did Mr. Yancey reflect the true senti
ments and intentions, against what he calls the
" poor white trash," of the " slaveholding commu
nity," who employed him, that they sent him to
Europe to represent " themselves and their posteri
ty abroad /"

0 downtrodden, deceived, betrayed, insulted
" white people" of the South ! those of you who
have been duped into shouldering your muskets
for Secession, have, through passionate blindness,
helped to forge the chain which is, even now, eat
ing away the ankles of your liberties. Poor serfs
that you are, you have allowed yourselves to be
"precipitated into a" political hell, from which
you lack the spirit to declare yourselves and your
posterity " independent."

1 thank my God, that, when the impartial pen
of history shall record the transactions of Alabama
through the last presidential campaign and the
stormy times that succeeded it, the chronicler will
be compelled to admit that one, at least, of the
non-slave-owners of that ill-used State, true to the
principles of democracy a*nd to his solemn and re
corded oath, defended his equality with the plant
ers at the peril of his life ; and, in his speeches and
his acts, openly asserted tlie personal independence

SCES~E THE FIFTH. 165

of all white men to be preferable to sectional inde
pendence, individual equality to be better than
State equality, and the Union which combines
all the blessings Washington fought and Jefferson
thought to secure, more to be desired than all the
glittering but empty bribes of Secession ! Yes !
Heaven be praised, that the " former law-partner
of Yancey, refusing to become his partner in
crime," resisted, at the peril of his life, the uncon
stitutional encroachments of the aristocrats, as
anti- American, and hostile to the liberties of the
" people" — the " poor white trash" (as the master
of the slave calls the master of no slave) ; and,
both with pen and tongue, labored to defeat the
machinations of the resident enemies of the South,
and to overthrow the foul conspiracy of the advo
cates of " King Cotton !"

SCENE THE SIXTH,

"IN EXILIUM."

" 0 unexpected stroke, worse than of death !
And must I leave thee, Paradise ? thus leave
Thee, native soil ; these happy walks and shades,
Fit haunt of gods ? where I had hoped to spend.
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day,
That must be mortal to us both."

PARADISE LOST.

" Home, kindred, friends, and country — these

Are ties with which we never part ;
From clime to clime, o'er land and seas,

We bear them with us in our heart ;
But oh ! 'tis hard to feel resigned,
When these must all be left behind !"

J. MONTGOMERY.

IT is unnecessaiy to enumerate all the incidents
of that night's dreary tramp. At about four
o'clock, A. M., we arrived at Benton, twelve miles
from the place of starting, and awaited, at " the
tavern," the approach of dawn and of the steamer.

The steamer, as often occurs, was belated. This
fact nearly cost me my life. The news spread like
wildfire through the place that " a Lincoln-man*

* If doing all I could to defeat Mr. Lincoln's election, for the
sake of the Union, make me a Lincoln-man, what does my dis
approval of his usurpations make me?

SCENE THE SIXTH. lf>7

was in town." The population, excited by a thou
sand vague sensations, gathered in knots to discuss
the incredible occurrence. The news came to the
committee that the next boat would not pass be
fore three o'clock, P. M. They had retired to bed,
in order to sleep, after their patriotic labors of the
preceding night. At this news, I demanded that
they find some other conveyance than the steam
boat. " Why don't you swim the river, sir ?"
asked one. "Because I once tried to swim the
river of Secession, and wTas washed ashore !" The
committee laughed heartily, and sent one of their
number down-stairs on a secret mission. He soon
returned, and informed them that the request was
granted. Through the windows could be seen the
gathering mob. Their wild gestures and growing
excitement were no pleasing spectacle to me.
They pointed to the house where I wras a prisoner.
One of the committee was addressing them in
soothing tones. I could hear the words " severely
punished already," and " our county has done her
share," and " other counties must," and " let him
go to Montgomery."

At the last words, a smile spread from face to
face, and significant nods and looks sent a thrill of
horror through my veins.

A hand was laid upon my shoulder :
"Mr. Tharin, would you be willing to risk the
Montgomery stage ? You'll be in danger if you
stay here, and you will run a risk if you go to
Mon tgomery

168 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" And I'll be hanged if I venture to return to
Collirene !"

"Yes, sir, and your own choice must guide you."

" I'll take the stage."

" It is at the door."

Through the scowling throng which was collect
ing between the door and the stage, the American
exile entered the vehicle, amid the growls and
execrations of his rebellious fellow-citizens. The
driver cracked his whip, and then, as the stage
sprang forward with a bounding oscillation, —
above the roar of the wheels, above the rattling of
the strong harness, above the tramp of the horses,
above the banging of the luggage, above the wild
beating of my heart, — I heard the last shout which
ever greeted my ears, in times of peace, from a
Southern mob.

This, then, was the farewell which my native
clime breathed to my departing form — and wrhy ?

Because I had endeavored to vindicate the in
born rights of fourteen -fifteenths of that mob,
without subtracting from the equal rights of the
other fifteenth.*

In other words, I had discovered an unpopular
truth, for the reception of which the public mind
was unprepared. The mists of error were not yet
pierced by the rising sun of political enlighten
ment. But think not, misguided men, that by
driving into exile the first Southern man who ever

* See p. 48, ante.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 169

practically grasped the idea of the non-slave
holder's rights and the non-slaveholder's power,
that yon have extinguished the holy beams of
truth, or unseated from his eternal throne that
God who dwellcth in the truth ! As surely as that
God reigneth, will come a day when the clouds
will be rolled away from the door of Liberty's
temple, and the non-slaveholder shall enter there,
with the song of true Southern Rights upon his
lips. That day is not far distant, and perhaps
those very men who hissed his retiring form wTill
live to hang their heads in shame, when the re
turning footsteps of " the Alabama Refugee" shall
be pressed once more on his native soil, while the
secret conspirators, who "precipitated the Cotton
States into an (unnecessary) revolution," will hide
their diminished heads in the dens and caves of
public scorn !

There was no other passenger in the stage. It
was cold — at least, I had lost sleep, food, repose
of mind, and a chill, like death's breath, perme
ated my bones. My thoughts were busy and tu
multuous. While actual danger had confronted
me, I had, from necessity, concealed my fears,
and unflinchingly breasted my advancing fate;
but, now, the eyes of the mob and of the com
mittee no longer glaring upon me, in the ab
sence of any guard, any present peril — reaction
came !

To those, who have suffered days of intense
anxiety, nights of sleepless vigil, and hours of un-
15

170 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

ceasing suspense, tins terrible word will require no
explanation. The nerve that has met and sustain
ed a long-continued tension, then relaxes; the will
that met the crisis with unbending power, then
yields to temporary prostration ; the brain that
energized with that sudden and wonderful inspira
tion, imminent danger sometimes bestows, then
sinks into a kind of collapse, and the heart, that
seemed encased in adamant, then melts.

Through the corridors of memory rushed a host
of throng-ing: images.

o O O

I thought of my childhood's home.

In the far, far distance — beyond the tree-crown
ed hills on my right ; beyond the turgid waters of
the Alabama, now receding into the distance;
beyond the brown cotton-stalks which rotted in
their furrows, on both sides of the road ; beyond
the reach of all save imagination — was the " Queen
city of the South."

On the northern extreme of the city of Charles
ton, S. C., stands the venerable colonial farm-house
in which "the exile*' drew his first breath. In
and around that classic spot, had raged the con
flicts of " '76," and its owner, my lineal ancestor,
Col. Cunnington, had spent fortunes and poured
out his blood for the freedom and equality of the
very South Carolinians, some of whose unnatural
sons, true to the instincts of their tory progenitors,
and to the hereditary desire that " one of the royal
family of England should rule over them," hud
wantonly sacrificed all the blessings the " whigs"

SCENE THE SIXTH. 171

of '76 had won through a seven years' war with

CT> «/

the British and tories.

In the Claude-Loraine-glass of Memory, how
plainly rose iield, mill, forest, stream, and groye !
Alas! would my feet never more wander through
the " avenue," the " cottage lane *" Would the
breezes of the " Belvidere*' never inore lift these
storm-tossed locks with their perfumed wings'?
Would the jessamines still bloom where the soli
tudes speak in the diapason of waving pines — but
never more for me? Would the mocking-birds

£">

mourn my absence? Alas ! the tread of rebellion
is all over that soil which, in 1776, drank the
blood of my Union progenitors, and the tory de
scendants of tory sires will wander through the
scenes of my childhood and call it the natal place
of a — traitor!

God of lleavcn ! wither the lip that dares thus
to desecrate the grave of the Revolutionary hero
who died in the Union he helped to frame, the
cradle of my Union father, and the monument of
Francis Marion !

/—" a traitor ?" To ichat am I a traitor? To
the South? Thou liest, perjured spawn of a base
tory, or degenerate offspring of a whig patriot!
THE SOUTH CONSISTS OF IIKB SONS, and thou knowest,
and treinblest when thou knowest, that the non-
slaveholding population of her hills and her val
leys, of her cities and her villages, far outnumber
the planters, who, with brazen front, ejaculate —
u li o are the South;"* while echo, through the

172 THE ALABAMA. REFUGEE.

lungs of Jefferson Davis, consumptively re
sponds :

L'etat,— c'est MOI !

Sorrow next washed out the flush of a just in
dignation ; for I thought of my sacred dead ! The
very ashes of my father, which still repose — un
easily repose — in a Charleston sepulcher, would
probably never feel the returning presence of
these pilgrim feet. The funeral pall of Secession
had been drawn over South Carolina, and had
concealed, in a second burial, the hallowed dust
of my father. That dear father had ever been
a Union man ! In 1832, when Nullification
barricaded the streets of Charleston, that father
acted, voted, and triumphed with the Unionists —
although the only one of four brothers who was
not a Nullifier. How appropriate that his son
should be a Unionist in 1861, and sustain that
father's and his own conscientious convictions,
with the loss of every thing, save honor, men hold
dear.

I felt an invisible presence with me in the stage,
sustaining my spirit with sympathy and guardian
love. I breathed a prayer to heaven and took
fresh courage. I remembered how I had ever
been a victim of the gens patriciana of the South,
how the oligarchy had affected to despise me, or,
when compelled to admit my equality, to " damn
me with faint praise," and my soul grew stern
with a sense of wrong.

The stage was rumbling along the lonely road,

SCENE THE SIXTH. 173

but thought was traveling within it with a speed
which human ingenuity has not yet rivaled.

o t> */

Again I wandered, a buoyant youth, within the
beloved precincts of my Alma Mater.

A lovely morning beams upon the Queen city
of the South. Upon the porch of the College of
Charleston stand a throng of students. With one
exception, they are all richly dressed. The con
versation is somewhat noisy. Asks one :

"Tom, when are you going to Edisto ?"

" Whenever we can sell our land at Wadma-
law."

" How much do you ask ?"

"Fifty thousand!"

" Quite a sacrifice at that. How many negroes
do you move?"

" One hundred and ten, big and little."

lou should have witnessed his inflation when
he gave the last answer.

" John," exclaimed a well-dressed but effemi
nate youth, "let's compare 'nigger-rolls.'"

"Done!"

Each having given his numeral, there was but
one left, who had not entered at all into the com
petition. To him turned the youth, who had de
manded the comparison, and said, while his com
panions barely suppressed a titter :

"Tharin, how many niggers have you f"

The youth addressed was about eighteen years
of age. His collegiate expenses were defrayed by
his own efforts. He wrote for lawyers, and thus

174 THE ALABAMA. REFUGEE.

acquired the means to obtain his much coveted
education. He had made many sacrifices — health
amo-no" the number — for this precious boon. His
dress, although clean and neat, was unequal to
the broadcloth decorations of his bejeweled com
panions. Every student in the institution knew
that he was not wealthy, and his flushed cheek
and flashing eye sufficiently betokened the smart,
which had been wantonly, and not for the first or
last time inflicted npon his sensitive feelings.
Drawing himself up to his full height, he replied
in firm but low tones :

"I do not award the importance to " Ethiopian
attachments" which some do. I depend npon
what I am, not on what my father hax. It is a
mark of a very diminutive character to triumph
over honest men because of adventitious posses
sions. If I can but successfully imitate the deeds
of my forefathers, I do not need to inherit their
money. I can make my living."

Not many years passed away, and that same
youth discovered that success in South Carolina
intrinsically depends upon those very "Ethiopian
attachments" he so heroically despised. On this
very account he had found it advisable to emi
grate to Alabama, there to find all the pride and
arrogance of the cotton-planter, without the ex
tenuation of the refinement of the South Carolina
patrician; and, after a stern, and, of course, un
successful effort to maintain his own blood-bought
rights against their steady encroachments, was

SCENE THE SIXTH. I < O

now their persecuted victim, because lie preferred
liis privileges as an American citizen to all the
"glittering generalities" of Secession — clinging,
like a drowning man, to the former as the only
plank that could save him from the law-submer
ging billows of the latter.

"With panoramic suddenness another scene rose
before my vision :

A wife and little daughter are seated before a
fire in a neighboring town. They are alone. The
little girl sits by her mothers chair on a low stool,
which she has placed for the purpose, her black
eyes beaming with affectionate intelligence. Her
mother is telling her that her father will soon re
turn, and bring her a present, if she will be a good
little girl. The child's innocent prattle tills the
apartment. She is a sweet little thing about two
years old, her auburn hair curling around her sym
metrical bead, and her little hands gesticulating
gracefully, as, in musical syllables, she paints her
bright thoughts.

The door opens. The child springs up and ex
claims :

" Mamma, papa's come !"

But, no ! it is a pale and excited face that ap
pears at the portal — a face that brings a gloom
into the room. By the magnetism of that face
the child is silenced.

"Mother," cries the wife, "what's the mat
ter?"

" Prepare yourself, my daughter, for bad news."

176 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" Is my husband dead ?" she gasps. " Tell me !
oh, do not keep me in suspense!"

'; He is worse than dead."

The wife falls back with an agonized shriek, the
child screams and weeps with an undefined dread,
and — the occupant of the stage starts up with a
groan and recovers from his vision.

Suddenly the stage stops.

One of the two men on the driver's box, dis
mounts and comes round to the door and gazes in
tently at the sufferer. A tear starts involuntarily
to his eye as lie sees his passenger convulsively
sobbing.

Returning to his place he is heard to ejaculate,
" poor fellow," and the stage rolls on.

From my portmanteau I drew a pair of black
pants and exchanged for them the light purple
pair I then wore ; drew off iny overcoat and re
placed my beaver hat with a light blue cloth cap.

As I was replacing the articles I had removed
from the valise, my hand encountered a book,
which unknown to me, some one, probably my
dear mother, had placed therein. I drew it forth
and gazed upon a copy of the Holy Bible. "What
early associations did that book recall to my mind !
All the reverence of early youth was added to the
interest with which I looked upon the gift. It
was long before I could collect my thoughts suffi
ciently to view the inside. I felt a strange pre
sentiment that the Book would say something good
to my bleeding heart, and to myself I said that I

SCENE THE SIXTH. 177

would read whatever part I opened it at — hoping
to open it at the Psalms of David.

I opened it carefully, and was disappointed to
find before me the seventeenth chapter of the
Book of the Prophet Ezekiel, which I began to
read with impatience ; but, as I progressed, the
great significance of the chapter and its adaptation
to my own views, comforted me no little. I will
here insert what I that day read, and ask the read
er whether it be not a remarkably correct history
of this Rebellion, and a perfect description of what
I shall call

THE RISE, PROGRESS, AND FALL OF KING COTTON,
Predicted, and minutely described in the Holy Bible.

EZEKIEL, CHAPTER XVII.

PARABLE OF THE TWO EAGLES.

1 And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying,

2 Son of man, put fortli a riddle, and speak a parable
unto the house of Israel ;

1 3 And say, Thus saith the Lord God ; A great eagle
with great wings, long-winged, full of feathers, which had
divers colours, came unto Lebanon, and took the highest
branch of the cedar :

4 lie cropped off the top11 of his young twigs, and

1 3d v. A perfect description of the American Eagle — the na
tional escutcheon. Congress passed resolutions on the subject.
Lebanon, By metonomy, for the East. Cedar, commercial
prosperity.

2 The highest commercial prosperity.

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

carried it into a land of traffic1 ; he set it in a city of
merchants.

2 5 He took also of the seed3 of the land, and planted
it in a fruitful field ; he placed it by great waters, and
set it as a willow-tree.

6 And it grew, and became a spreading vine of low
stature, whose branches turned toward him, and the roots
thereof were under him : so it became a vine, and brought
forth branches, and shot forth sprigs.

4 7 There was also another great eagle with great wings
and many feathers : and behold, this vine did bend her
roots toward him, and shot forth her brandies toward him,
that he might water it by the furrows of her plantation.

8 It was planted in a good soil by great waters, that
it might bring forth branches, and that it might bear
fruit, that it might be a goodly vine.

5 9 Say them, Thus saith the Lord God ; Shall it pros
per ? shall he not pull up the roots thereof, and cut off
the fruit thereof, that it wither? it shall wither in all the
leaves of her spring, even without great power or many
people to pluck it up by the roots thereof.

10 Yea, behold, being planted, shall it prosper? shall
it not utterly wither, when the east wind toucheth it ? it
shall wither in the furrows where it grew.

1 The United States.

2 5th, 6th, and 8th v. A perfect description of the Cotton Plant,
5 Cotton seed, introduced into the country by congressional

enactment — by the American Eagle.

4 7th v. The " Confederate States" under the symbol of an
Eagle, seceded from the " divers colors" mentionee in v. 8,
but omitted in tins connection.

5 9th, 10th v. The downfall of Cotton predicted from Ang'lo-
Indian competition, and, now let me add, the blockade.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 170

111 Moreover the word of the Lord came unto m:>,
paying,

12 Say now to the rebellious house,1 Know ye not what
these things mean ? Tell them, Behold, the king of
Babylon* is come to Jerusalem? and hath taken the kiny4
thereof, and thcjprmces5 thereof, and led them with him
to Babylon.6

13 And hath taken of the king's seed,' and made a
covenant8 with him, and hath taken an oath of him ; he
hath also taken the mighty of the land,

14 That the kingdom might be base,9 that it might
not lift itself up, but that by keeping of his covenant it
might stand.

15 But he rebelled against him in sending his ambas
sadors into Egypt,™ that they might give him horses and
much people. Shall he prosper? shall he escape that
doeth such things ? or, shall he break the covenant, and
be delivered?

1G Ax I live, saith the Lord God, surely in the place11
where the king** dicclleth that made himn king, whose

1 11 tli, 12th v. Why is "the rebellious house" mentioned
here, in connection with the two Eagles and the " spreading
vine of low stature," unless the above comments be true ?

2 King Cotton. 3 Washington. 4 Buchanan.
•r> M. C. and cabinet. 8 Montgomery, Alabama.

7 John C< BreckenridgO-, Vice President.

8 Secret League. Breckenridge hesitated, but finally took
the oath.

0 This word, "base," which could not otherwise be under
stood, is now plain.

10 The House of Bondage, where the oppressed non-slave
owners dwell in all the beauty of negro equality.

11 Montgomery. ]~ King- rotten. l3 Jefferson, Davis.

180 TIIK ALABAMA REFUGEE.

oath he1 despised, and whose covenant2 he brake, even
with him in the midst of Babylon3 he4 shall die.

11 Neither shall Pharaoh5 with his mighty army and
great company, make for him in the war, by casting up
mounts, and building forts, to cut off many persons :

18 Seeing he despised the oath6 by breaking the cove
nant, when lo, he had given his hand, and hath done all
these things, he7 shall not escape.

19 Therefore, thus saith the Lord God; As I live,
surely mine oath6 that he hath despised, and my cove
nant that he hath broken, even it will I recompense upon
his own head.

20 And I will spread my net9 upon him, and he shall
be taken in my snare,10 and I will bring him to Babylon,
and will plead with him there for his trespass that he hath
trespassed against me.

21 And all his fugitives with all his bands shall fall by
the sword, and they that remain shall be scattered
toward all winds : and ye shall know that I the Lord"
have spoken it,

12 22 If Thus saith the Lord God : I will also take of

I King Cotton. ' The oath of U. S. Senator.

3 Montgomery. By 10th and llth verses of chapter xi.,
changed to Richmond, Va.
. 4 He (Breckenridge) shall die. 5 Beauregard.

6 Oath of U. B. Officer. 7 Beauregard.

8 The oaths of office end with " So help me God !"

0 See 10th verse.

10 " The wicked shall lay a snare for their own feet."

II 21st v. No party, no leader, no army, can claim the victory,
but the Lord alone will create a reaction and prove to the
world how insignificant are the rulers whom the American
people have elevated to power.

12 From the 22d to the 24th verses, inclusive, constitutes a

SCENE THE SIXTH. 181

the highest branch of the high cedar, and will set it ; I
will crop off from the top of his young twigs a tender
one, and will plant it upon an high mountain and eminent :

23 In the mountain of the height of Israel will I plant
it : and it shall bring forth boughs, and bear fruit, and
be a goodly cedar : and under it shall dwell all fowl of
every wing : in the shadow of the branches thereof shall
they dwell.

24 And all the trees of the field shall know that I the
Lord have brought down the high tree, have exalted the
low tree, have dried up the green tree, and have made
the dry tree to flourish : I the Lord have spoken and
have done it.

promise of a better day, when "peace, unity, and concord"
shall render the land again prosperous, after Radicalism shall
have been abated — and in all this the emancipation of the
negro is not once hinted at by the holy prophet.

The five last verses of the twentieth chapter of the same
Prophet, serve as a key to the above by using the very nomen
clature of these times :

" CHAP, xx., v. 45 ^ Moreover the word of the Lord came
unto me, saying,

" 46 Son of man, set thy face toward the South, and drop
thy word toward the South, and prophesy against the forest of
the South field:

" 47 And say to the forest of the South, Hear the word of the
Lord ; Thus saith the Lord God ; Behold, I will kindle a fire in
thee* and it shall devour every green tree in thce, and every
dry tree : the flaming flame shall not be quenched, and all
faces from the South to the North shall be burned therein.

" 48 And all flesh shall see that I the Lord have kindled it :
it shall not be quenched.

" 49 Then said I, Ah, Lord God ! they say of me, Doth he not
speak parables ?"

* I will fire the Southern heart. Cotton shall be consumed.

10

182 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

At a half-way station on the road, the stage
halted for the customary change of horses. Here
I found an individual emerging from the half-way
house leading a fleet-looking horse, covered with

The Book of the Prophet Ezekiel is a received portion of
the Holy Bible. The Bible is every day held up to us as a
divine book, and yet very few persons trouble themselves as
to whether this divine book relates to them. This same care
less and superficial view of Scripture leads many persons to
pass by the prophecies as already fulfilled or relating to the
Day of Judgment, but having no present signification what
ever. The Bible, on the contrary, must refer to our country
in some part of it, or else it is a defective work. The prophet
E/ekiel has certainly given some very wonderful and correct
delineations of our own times, not only in the passages just
quoted entire, but also in the whole prophecy.

The scope of the present undertaking precludes a lengthy
commentary upon a whole division of Holy Writ ; but the
reader is merely referred to the following chapters as corrob
orative of what has already been advanced. He will find that
they will richly repay scrutiny.

Chapters i. and x. describe, under the symbol of four cheru
bim, the four sections of this country ; while a wheel within a
wheel, an imperium in imperio, describes the States contained
in the Union.

Chapters ii. and iii. - The commission of Ezekiel. The roll
to be eaten was the Constitution of the United States.

Chapters iv., v., vi., vii. A miserable picture of disunion
and its bloody effects.

Chapter viii. Jealousy of the North, and mobocracy in the
South. Verse 16, foreign intervention asked. Removal of
capital from Montgomery to Richmond, Va. The punishment
*of Rebellion described.

Chapter xiii. The Secession orators rebuked.

Chapter xiv. The negro idolaters of the North rebuked.
The Nativity of the United States, and her prostitution to the

SCENE THE SIXTH. 183

foam. He rested his eyes upon me, and seemed
to approve of my general appearance, for lie smiled
and nodded kindly as lie said :

" Mister, where do you intend to go to !"

" I'm bound for Montgomery."

u Where are you from ?"

"I am from Charleston, whither I will soon re
turn."

"I have a fine horse here, you may have cheap.
Maybe you loill need Mm before you (jet -very far
from here"

a I am not prepared to purchase now. I don't
think I will need a horse very soon ; but he is a
noble animal.

" He is only six years old, and of good breed.
You may have him for ninety dollars ; I have a
strong saddle and bridle you can buy for fifteen."

" almighty dollar." Verso 46, Samaria, intended to mean
Mexico.

Chapter xviii. Repentance will be met with mercy.

Chapters xxvi., xxvii., xxviii. England's power and ruin
graphically described.

Chapters xv., xxii. Minute description of the rise, progress,
and fall of King Cotton.

Chapters xxxi., xxxii. Minute description of the power of
King Cotton, and the lamentations of his admirers over his fall.

Chapter xxxiii. An exhortation to the people of the whole
country.

Chapter xxxiv. The pulpit politicians rebuked, North and
South.

Chapter xxxv. France and her rapacious policy denounced.

Chapters xxxvi., xxxvii., xxxix. Reunion beautifully de
scribed.

184 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" A bargain, no doubt; but I am not purchas
ing tins evening."

" Any time in two days, you can find him in
Montgomery, if you want him. Enquire for John
Raymond, and you'll find me."

" Very well, I will remember that."

" You say you're from Charleston ? How are
they getting on at Fort Sumter?"

Looking with scrutiny upon my interlocutor, I
said :

"We're 'casting up mounts and building forts
to cut off' Anderson's supplies. The lighted match
is already held over the touch-hole. The first gun
of a mighty revolution may even now be booming
across the Bay. How are you affected at the
prospect out here ?"

A curious smile flitted across his face, as the
stranger said in a voice which was as much like a
taunt as a certain covert exultation could render it:

" Bully for you ! "

I felt the startled blood rush from my face to
my heart, which beat a rat-tat-too against my side
• — was I discovered f

My feelings were not rendered pleasanter by
the suppressed laughter of the two stage-drivers,
who evidently heard every word.

I was reassured, however, by the discovery that
my interlocutor seemed as much annoyed by the
eavesdropping as myself.

" Have you much experience in horses?" I de
manded, in order to escape the oppressive silence.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 185

"I used to drive the stage on tlie Nashville and
Chattanooga line."

Soon the stage was on its way Montgomery-
ward. I looked back from the window, and saw
John Eaymond saddling his horse, and gazing at
the stage with an excited air, to me inexplicable.
His motions were convulsive and hurried, and he
seemed fevered by some secret emotion which, at
times, broke out into kicks administered to his
spirited steed.

Could it be, thought I, that all this indignation
was the result of my refusal to purchase his horse?

I drew no good augury from this mental reply :

"He must be a spy !"*

After about a half-hour's ride, one of the men
in front called aloud to me to come outside, as
I would suffer, if I did not, from the rough
"puncheon" or " corduroy" road we were about
to traverse. Not desiring to be visible to passers-
by, I declined. The invitation was repeated at
various points on the road, until, finding my re
fusal annoyed the men, I went out and ran the
gauntlet of about a mile, when, complaining of
the cold, I re-entered the stage.

A significant look passed between my conduc
tors as I sprang into the coach, which was not
particularly gratifying to my feelings. I began
to doubt their disposition to serve a fellow-creature

* How often have I had the same suspicion when convers
ing with Northern Radicals !

16*

186 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

in distress ; but I resolved to show no mortification
or displeasure at their manners toward myself.

Of course, invention was busy in my brain as
to what I should do upon my arrival at the capital
of the so-called Confederate States. 1 was well
known at Montgomery among the public men ;
but these were the very men to avoid, not to ap
ply to.

To illustrate the danger I was about to encoun
ter, I must here digress from the thread of my
narrative to a scene not very long antecedent to
the point the reader has reached.

The Democratic State Convention had sent its
delegates to what many of them fondly hoped
would prove the last of the National Conventions
of that party,* and, in consequence of the prede
termined disruption of the Charleston Convention,
another Democratic Convention had been assem
bled at Montgomery, " to see what was best to be
done."

To that large Convention I was a delegate and
offered a series of resolutions to the Assembly, ad
vocating a proposition by Alabama to her sister
States, North and South, for a National Con veil,
tion, for the purpose of proposing amendments to
the Constitution of the United States.

During the speech which, in favor of peaceful
and conciliatory measures, I attempted to make,

* But, by the grace of God, that hope will doubtless be
frustrated.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 187

there was a universal confusion. The Convention
was not permitted to listen because certain emis
saries of Yaneey passed rapidly around the room,
and informed the audience in audible stage-asides
that YanceAj wanted to speak. I had not spoken
more than three minutes, when the whole Conven
tion became convulsed with stormy excitement.
Cries of "Yancey," " Yancey !" shook the dome
of the capitol. rinding it in vain to proceed
in the teeth of so strong a determination to re
ject my resolutions without a hearing, I ex
claimed :

" One word, if you please — only one ! "Words
of wisdom sometimes fall from the lips of persons
who are unblessed with plantations. If cotton
must be King here, and, if none but his courtiers
can speak (cries of "none else," and "Yancey"),
let the result be noted on the page of history. I
wash my hands of all personal responsibility.
Proceed with your wild work. Youthful pru
dence retires abashed from the presence of hoary
"precipitancy."

Mr. Yancey, amid an ovation of applause, then
rose, and advocated his own views, to the delight
of the courtiers of his " King." He was not as
happy in his speech as usual ; but he had won
the approbation of the cotton-planters by his anti-
democratical course in Charleston, and was ap
plauded to the echo by those whose unconstitu
tional power he was so ably supporting.

Having temporarily ceased to act with the

188 THE ALABAMA EEFTJGEE.

Democratic Party, which, during the period of its
dislocation, could not effect any thing for the
<Union which I had sworn to support, — hut to
which party I now publicly and solemnly renew
my adherence, as to the only one which possesses
within itself the ingredients of Nationality and
Union, — I spoke during the subsequent canvass
in Montgomery before the Bell-Everett club, and
advocated the Union as the only salvation of Ala
bama and of the South. The Montgomery Adver
tiser — Yancey's organ — had then made me the
object of spiteful vituperation, and, afterward, the
frequent contributions, over my own name, in the
Montgomery Post (Bell-Everett), and the Con
federation (Douglas), had not made me less known
than I was otherwise rendered by my former law-
partnership with Yancey himself.

I said invention was busy in my brain as to my
course after I should have found myself in the
, Confederate capital. In vain I strove to think of
a single chance of escape. To go home was out
of the question. Although but fourteen miles, by
land, from Montgomery, Wetumpka was the most
dangerous place to me in Alabama. I do not
think any of its inhabitants would have harmed
me — unless some fanatical planter like Dr. Pen-
ick, — who, of course, would seek my destruction,
seeing he had never forgiven me for my exposure
of his mobocrasy, — or some tool of King Cotton,
such as Bob Clark, — who, after inciting the youth
of Wetumpka to enlist against their government.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 189

refused to expose his forfeit life in their com
pany, — could have been so base as to perpetrate
the murderous deed. But the roads to my resi
dence were sure to be blockaded by the secret
emissaries of Robert Rives and his coadjutors,
who were evidently determined to assassinate me.

It was clear I must not remain in Alabama, be
cause, nowhere could I find adequate protection
• — not even among my Union confreres of Coosa
county, who were unarmed and unprepared tin-
self-defence. I determined not to involve my
friends in a bootless clanger. I must temporarily
leave Alabama !

But how ? My decision must be quickly formed.
My mind, it is true, did revert to scenes where a
friendship was formed which can never die. For
not asking aid of that friend, whose name, al
though -engraved upon the tablets of my heart,
must not be written here, my apology must be
that I would have perished a thousand times be
fore I would have involved my friend in danger.

And yet, thought recoiled upon itself, when
ever it essayed to discover any other means of
escape. In that modern Babylon, there was no
refuge from King Cotton, except in acknowledg
ing his omnipotent sway. This I had not done —
would never do. I was even then fleeing from
his vengeance. His dreadful form, like a modern
Colossus of Rhodes, seemed to bestride the city,
whose steeples and capitol loomed up in the dis
tance against the starlit skv. liis awful decrees

O «-'

190 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

were, even then, pronounced from the Exchange,
and fell, in thunder, upon the ears of sovereign
States, who respectfully removed their glittering
coronets and laid them at his feet. The gas-lights
of the city, becoming visible, seemed the Argus-
eyed guardians of his power. As we drew nearer,
die occasional stroke of a Sabbath bell melodiously
summoned the inhabitants to their evening praises.
The venial clergy would soon be busy in exhort
ing his subjects to obey the behests of a king, upon
whose head is denounced the vengeance of the
Most High God, in Ezekiel, xvii. 19.

There lay the great Babylon of the "Western
World, like a beast of prey crouching for a spring
at the throat of every Alabamian who still loved
the national Union, respected his oath, and reject
ed the claims of the usurper " King Cotton."

I could not but feel the awful proximity of that
city weighing upon my lite.

While filled with the most gloomy reflections,
I was roused from my meditations by the clatter
ing hoofs of an approaching horse. Xearer and
nearer came the rider, until close to the vehicle,
where he reined up for a moment, scrutinized the
stage and especially its inside occupant, when,
seeming satisfied with the survey, he again put
spurs to his horse, raised a derisive whoop, waved
aloft his cap, and darted into the city at the top
of his speed.

I recognized John Raymond on his foaming

O •/ O

steed.

SCENE THE SIXTH. 191

My position was critical in the extreme. This
man was about to rouse the town for my warm re
ception. As we rumbled into the " city of the
great kino- *' my heart fainted within me. My

o ZD/ *j j

worst enemy could not wish me to be in a more
utterly abject state of hopelessness. My friends,
alas ! knew not even where I was at that moment.
The news of my victimization could not possibly
have readied my friends even in Montgomery,
much less Wetumpka. The good, who dwelt in
the capital of King Cotton, could not — the wicked
would not — interpose the outraged law for my
protection.

The stage suddenly stopped. We had entered
the city through a suburb unseen by me before.

•/ O »/

One of the men dismounted from the driver's box,
and coming to the door, said :

" Mister, I'm going to stop here, and perhaps
you'd like to get out too. This is a private house,
and here you can be accommodated about as Avell
as anywhere else. If you don't like the place
after you get here, you can change it, you know,
and I'll help you make a selection."

There was genuine kindness in the tones. I
consented. As we entered the house, I turned
toward the street, and received a bow from the
ubiquitous John Raymond, who rode composedly
by, singing these words, which I did not then un
derstand :

" Wlien tlie devil was sick, tin; devil a saint would be,
When tlie devil was well, tlie devil a saint was lie."

102 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

A derisive laugh formed the chorus.

Was it the chilliness of the evening, or this new

o"

cause for watchfulness which sent a cold shudder
through my frame, as I drew near the blazing oak
fire?

The lady of the house, about forty years of age,
was blessed with the society of four or five hand
some daughters. Between the stage-driver and
his wife — at least his affectionate manner seemed
to point out his interlocutrix as such — was con
ducted a whispered conversation, the result of
which was a warm supper for the guest.

My respectful manner brought an astonished
expression to their faces. One of the young ladies
eat beside me, held my plate, smiled upon me, and
asked me whether " any thing ailed" me .; •" for,"
said she, " you are thoughtful and silent." Rais
ing my eyes, they encountered a pair of beautiful
brown orbs resting upon them with an expression
which caused me involuntarily to smile in return ;
but it was a sad, sad smile ; so much so that my
fair companion exclaimed :

" Something does ail you ! You look miserable."
Then, lowering her voice, she whispered : " Con
fide in me."

There was a sudden inclination in my thought
to tell her all ; to claim her sympathy as a woman,
and obtain her aid for my escape ; but, swallow
ing the sob which human sympathy was evoking,
I forced myself to say :

" Although I am much obliged to you for your

SCENE THE SIXTH. 103

sympathy, I can not tell you my troubles. They
involve important secrets."

" Well, well, your secret shall not be invaded.
But cheer up, man ! Don't look so heartbroken."

This was said with an odd admixture of play
fulness, petulance, and pity, and soon the refugee
and his pretty tormentor were conversing more
freely together.

But time was precious. Reminding William, as
the ladies called the driver, that I must be going,
I was about to leave, when the former caught
Hatty to his heart, gave her a pronounced kiss,
then started off with his quondam passenger.

" You do not seem to have been long married,
sir," I innocently remarked.

A loud laugh shook William's frame, as, slap
ping me familiarly upon the back, he exclaimed —

" Come along, man ; you're green !"

I could not forbear to mingle a smile with the
conscious flush which attended my conviction that
I had unconsciously entered one of those gilded
portals which introduce so many of our race to the
vestibule of ruin.

" Soni soit qui mal y pense"
17

SCENE THE SEVENTH.

" THE CITY OP THE GREAT KING." *

" For now I stand as one upon a rock,
Environed by a wilderness of sea,
Wlio marks the waxing tide grow, wave by wave,
Expecting ever when some envious surge
Will, in his brinish bowels, swallow him."

ON the plea of business at the Exchange hotel,
the fugitive left his companion at a crossing, and
found himself — alone !

Think of it ! a Unionist of 1861, outlawed, hunt
ed, wearied, despairing, in the streets of the Con
federate capital — alone !

Say ! can you imagine a situation of more total
abandonment? Is there, on God's green footstool,
a spot more dangerous to human tread, than the
streets of Montgomery tlien\ were to the presence
of E. S. Tharin ?

The crater of Vesuvius is not inaccessible to
human visitation, when the soft breezes whisper
through its caverns, and the vine-bearing hills lift
their summits in the purple sunset; but, when the
lav a- waves of Nature's fiercest convulsion wrap

Cotton. f Not so to be always, however.

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 195

city and forest in lurid glare, while the rocking
earth hurls fragmentary temples from their bases
—then f

"Why, then ! to tread upon the brink of that
earthly hell, is quite a different thing!

It is the holy Sabbath eve (February 24th, 1861),
and Montgomery's Christian temples are pouring
out their retiring congregations under the peaceful
stars. Reverend gentlemen, with snowy cravats
and mincing gait, walk in the midst of gayly
dressed damsels, who court their clerical smiles ;
elders and vestrymen, Sunday-school teachers and
exhorters, laymen and deacons, presbyters and
bishops— how multitudinously their feet patter,- or
strut, or stamp, or scrape, over that gas-lit pave !
To see the happy throng, you would suppose them
all to be on a starlit promenade direct to heaven,
and that this pave is the " narrow way."

But you would be mistaken ; for this — although
quiescent — is Vesuvius still !

Should that mincing Pharisee, the cut of whose
orthodox garment proclaims the clerical Brum-
inell, as he saunters by with virgin innocence
resting upon his arm, detect the presence, and its
cause, of that traveler who, portmanteau in hand,
is crossing toward the line of the Christian cara
van, his lips, yet warm with pulpit strains of peace,
and rhetorical flourishes about the vrujb of Cal
vary, would sound the tocsin of persecution ; and
his delicate hands, yet red with pummeling the
gospel according to St. Matthew, or the martyr-

196 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

dom of St. Stephen, would hold the garments of
those who would arrange the martyr's noose
around a patriot's neck, consenting to — his death !

Should that delicate female, whose intellectual
brow is crowned with golden ringlets, and whose
celestial eyes are upturned with worship to meet
the rapt glance of her spiritual guide — should she
perceive that a friend of tlie Union of her fore
fathers had just passed "by, with mingled rage and
hate she would shriek aloud, and the cry— false
as hell ! — "Abolitionist ! hang him !" would be
the chivalrous response. "At that cry accurst,"
the heavenward throng would pause, attent, upon
the " narrow way," and, catching up the celestial
sound, would spring upon the fugitive's path like
bloodhounds after their prey. Should their chase
be crowned with success, they would add another
element of thanksgiving to their next Sunday's
praises, and lift their blood-stained hands to
: heaven, in attestation of their pious devotion to
that Cotton who (for them) is supreme " in heaven
above, in earth beneath, and in the waters that
are under the earth."

Alone, then, and — fecauseloy&l and law-abiding
— outlawed and hunted — an American citizen, in
his own country, stood upon the crater of a mut
tering volcano. Humble though he was — un
blessed with wealth — is there not something anom
alous in the situation ? Can you not almost see
the forms of the great tutelaries of America, who
lived, bled, and died in and for the Union, bend-

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 197

ing from on high to keep watch over his destinies ?
And he, the father of that exile, was not excluded
from that august band, as he watched over the
steps of his persecuted son, while the enemies of
American equality were lurking in wait for his
life.

Time was precious. I felt the precarious nature
of my footing. The only visible sympathizers
with my agony were the — stars ! whose distant,
but encouraging eyes seemed to say, "Look up!"
I tried to look up, and beheld the accursed flag of
Secession, to me henceforth the detestable emblem
of strides alone, flaunting from the very building
I was about to enter ; but I was glad to see the
twinkling stars beyond and above it, shining se
renely in the " azure dome of night," out of the
reach of treason or of change. They seemed to
invite — to beckon me, saying —

" Come up hither, where the stars are free !"

Have I not obeyed their mute but eloquent
invitation? Am I not enjoying a hard-earned
semi-tranquillity in the light of that constellation
which still sheds its loyal rays upon the national
banner? When the stars of heaven fell, the pow
ers that were in heaven were only " shaken."
Passed is now the convulsion, and the pillars of
Liberty rock only on account of a recent vibration.

" It was (mirabile dicta /) into the Exchange
hotel that L was about to enter. In that hotel,
the perjured members of the illegitimate "South
ern Congress" were even then concocting then*
17*

198 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

flagitious schemes for the overthrow of that gov
ernment the loyal citizen was risking his very life
to maintain.

The editor of the Charleston Mercury and one
of the members of the " Southern Congress" are
the sole occupants of "No. 6."

A muffled knock is heard at the door, and in
response to the invitation " come in," a pallid face
and eager eyes burst upon the twain.

The member of the Southern Congress rises and

o

extends his hand :

" Mr. Tharin, how do you do ? Where have you
come from ? You look badly, but I can never for
get that face."

" Mr. Miles, I have come far to see you, and
would prefer to communicate with you alone."

Exit K. Barnwell Rhett, Jr., editor of the
Charleston Mercury.

As this man has played a conspicuous part in
hounding on his class, — the cotton aristocrats,—
advocating every species of excess in the polished
periods of a cultivated pen, it may not be amiss
to give a short sketch of his origin, of which he is
very proud.

In 1712-13 the Tuscaroras, Corees, and other
Indian tribes in North Carolina, broke out into sud
den hostilities against the white settlers along the
Neuce and Roanoke rivers. The " Palatines" of
the old North State, then under colonial vassalage
to Great Britain, could not sustain themselves
without assistance, and a swift messenger was dis-

SCE]SrE THE SEVENTH. 199

patched to Port Royal (South Carolina) for aid.
The " Lords Proprietors" sent Col. Barnwell, with
a large force (eight or nine hundred, I think),
to reduce the Indians to submission. He found
them intrenched in a fort of palisades. Being
afraid to attack them, Barnwell entered into a
treaty with them.

On his return march he invaded certain peace
able Indian villages, and, contrary to the stipula
tions of the treaty^ kidnapped not a few of the
inhabitants, whom he imported into South Caro
lina, as slaves, to till the indigo-fields of that
colony.*

R. Barnwell Smith, not more than a dozen or
two years ago, changed his name to Rhett, for an
'inheritance. R. Barnwell Rhett, Jr., — ne Smith,
—is the hopeful scion of this most illustrious house.

But all is not yet told. In consequence of the
outrage against civilization committed by Col.
Barnwell, the massacres of the Neuce river were
renewed, when the Lords Proprietors of South
Carolina sent a smaller body of men, most of them
Indians (in the whole six hundred there were not
more than fifty whites), under Col. James Moore,
afterward governor of the colony, who stormed the
same fort, under more difficult circumstances, and
reduced the Indians to complete quiescence.

lie committed no outrages on the return march,
and so the peace was lasting.

* See Carroll's Historical Collections of South Carolina.

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Barnwell, the coward, faltered in attacking the
fort ; Barnwell, the pirate, kidnapped peaceful
Indians as slaves for his indigo-fields.

From this distinguished slave-pirate is descended
the modern advocate of the world-wide execrated
" African slave-trade."

There is a wonderful persistency in blood to
betray its origin ! This is exemplified in the life
and writings of R. Barnwell Rhett, Jr.

From this short digression, begging the reader's
pardon, return we to "No. 6 Exchange Hotel,
Montgomery, after its evacuation by the editor of
the Charleston Mercury, the " organ" of the "first
families" of South Carolina.

The following conversation then took place :

THARIN. "Honorable William Porcher Miles,
once of the Federal, now of the Confederate Con
gress, have you forgotten 'auld lang syne?' Do
you remember when my class at college, the Col
lege of Charleston — your alma mater and my alma
mater — presented the assistant professor of Mathe
matics with a silver cup ?"

MILES. " I have not the bad taste to forget
it."

THARIN. "It was a handsome gift ! It ought to
be a link between the past and the present."

MILES. "It is! it is!"

THARIN. "I'm sure, professor, if you were in
danger, not one of that class would refuse to save
you if he could !"

MILES. " Ah ! I see ! I see ! You are in danger !

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 201

I perceive it in your whole manner. Dear pupil
confide in me. What can I do for you ?"

TIIAKIV. "Save me!"

MILES. " ITow ? when ? where ? why ?"

THAKIN. " By aiding me on my way to Cincin
nati, immediately !"

MILES. "But why?"

THARIN. " An infuriated mob has already visited
me with undeserved barbarities. Other mobs are
gathering for my destruction. I ain a fugitive
from mobocracy ! "Will you save me ?"

MILKS. "What have you done?"

THARIN. " Nothing wrong."

MILES. " What is the nature of your offense ?"

THAEIN. " Political !"

MILKS (with a darkening brow). " Ha !"

THARIX. " I was about publishing, in this city,
a newspaper to be called the ' Non-slavehold-

MILES (starting to his feet). "Good Heaven !"

TIIARIN. " My only object, professor, was to ad
vocate the rights of that class to representation
and equality."

MILES. "Worse and worse! — I can't help you,
Mr. Tharin, — wait here a minute or two."

The victim of mobocracy had learned, by bitter
experience, to read the dark thoughts of men by
the light of their own eyes. There was a glitter
in the glance of Miles which revealed, like the
lightning from a black sky, the abyss below.
Without awaiting his return, I made my way into

202 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

the street, and was about to proceed, with rapid
steps along the pavement, when, suddenly stepping
from the side of the door, a man lightly laid his
detaining lingers upon my arm.
"Stop, Mister!"

With a sudden movement, I was about to grasp
my captor's throat. My instantaneous discovery
of John Raymond did not diminish my energy,
when, in a conciliating tone, he said :
" Step this way, Mr Tharin."
" Who told you that was my name ?"
He drew me gently to the shade of a lamp.
Then, glancing cautiously around, he said in an
almost whisper :

" I was at Collirene both times you were mob
bed. I was not a member of the vigilance com
mittee, or of your association, but I am now, by
G- — ! I made up my mind to follow and to save
you !" Here his voice grew thick and his breath
ing hard. "I got to Benton in time to prevail on
the stage-driver to take you on. I took a short
cut across the country and met you at the half
way-house. You know the rest. To be seen in
your company now would be certain death. You
will be hung as high as Hainan if you stay in the
State. Don't think, for a moment, of going to
your own town (Wetumpka), for you are to be
waylaid. Don't stay here another moment. You
know very wrell that this hole is full of your ene
mies. Go to Montgomery Hall, register your
name, call for a room, and, to-morrow I'll call for

SCKNE THE SEVENTH. 203

you in a hack and take you to the depot of the
West Point railroad."

" Many — many thanks for your —

"Hold your — hush. You're foolish ! People"?
passing !"

We separated.

When I reached the hotel he had indicated, I
advanced, with a beating heart, to the register,
upon which I entered this fictitious name :

" B. T. Hainan, Charleston, S. C.," and called
for a room.

And now, if any Secessionist ventures to deny
my statement, thus I prove its correctness, and
the clanger to which I was subjected, on account
of my loyalty :

Take the hotel register of the Montgomery Hall
for Sunday the 24th of February, look at the end
of the arrivals for that clay, and you will find the
name " B. (better) T. (take), Hainan, Charleston,
S. C." You won't find the words " better take,'1
but you will will find their initials, " B." and " T/'

Again : in order to place the matter beyond the
possibility of a doubt, I will here describe the very
way, the surname is written

H-a-y-m-a-n .

The "y" was added, in order to prevent any
association of ideas from pointing me out until too
late to destroy me and my testimony forever.

" ISTow," — thought I, as I entered that room, from
which I might never emerge alive, — " now, if John
Raymond meant to catch me bv advising me to

20-i THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

register my own name, I have completely foiled
him — that's all ! If he be a friend indeed, to-mor
row he shall find me."

I drew off my boots, disencumbered myself of my
coat and seizing the candle approached the mirror,
with a vague notion that I must have changed
some little in the last two or three days.

I started at the spectral face which presented
itself before me. Want of rest, food, and mental
peace, nights of intense misery, doubt, anxiety,
suspense, hope, fear, unceasing thought, had done
their work. Replacing the candle, I threw myself
upon my bed, but how could I sleep ? Burying
my face in the pillow, I thus meditated :

"Had I commenced with perjury and ended
with murder ; had I been guilty of some flagrant
act of violence upon the constitutional rights of
some unprotected poor white man ; had I accom
panied the act with language of brutal contempt ;
had I precipitated the low and fiendish rabble to
persecute, upon suspicion, a helpless wretch 'for
the sake of the example' — I had, this night, been
rewarded with office, popularity, and applause.
But I have dared to do an act more just than pop
ular, to keep my heaven-registered oath, to support,
the Union, the Constitution, and the cause of the
defenseless and oppressed, and - - here am I! a
violent death closing upon me from a circumfer
ence of horror. In the center of that circle, al
most overpowered with the mightiness of the cri
sis — too soon to 2:1 ve wav beneath a load of woe

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 205

and distress, growing, every moment, more and
more intolerable, I must not make a single false
step. My wife and daughter, only fourteen miles
off, I may never more behold ! Little do they
think to-night how much I suffer. May God pro
tect my Mollie ; may he watch my little Claudia's
unfolding heart and mind. O God ! save us all
to meet in other lands, where barbarism has given
place to an enlightened civilization !"

Just then, through the corridor, I heard the ap
proach of trampling feet.

" Suppose," said Apprehension, " suppose John
Raymond should prove false. Suppose he should
bring with him a brutal mob, and betray the fugi
tive with a kiss."

The feet came to the very door — they stopped—
there came a loud rap, which was echoed in the
caverns of my bosom.

" Is Mr. Hainan in ?"

With the inward ejaculation, " If I die for my
principles, it shall not be by the felon's rope !" I
opened wide the door and approached the open
window as the party entered.

First appeared a negro waiter, candle in hand ;
then a well-dressed, but not prepossessing, gentle
man ; and then slowly, but excitedly, John Ray
mond himself.

" That will do, boy," said Raymond, and the
negro retired.

With one bound he put down the window, with
his back to which lie stood confronting me.
is

206 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

" Tharin, put on your coat and boots ; here,
take your luggage, let me have your money, and
• — follow me."

I watched the quivering muscles of his face, and
said :

" Do you come as a friend, or as an enemy ?"

" As a friend. Follow me !"

" Your hand, in token of honest friendship, and
I'll go."

Raymond saw my emotion and nervously whis
pered :

" Quick, quick man, we're loosing precious mo
ments—follow me !"

" How do I know your intentions ?"

Here Raymond could stand it no longer. He
not only clasped my hand but my form ; he wept,
as a strong manly heart alone could weep.

" D — n you ! come, be quick ! My heartstrings
are breaking for you ! I will save you ! D — ri me
if I don't. But I'm afraid you'll be recognized
down-stairs. Your excited appearance has created
a great deal of gossip down there already. Give
me your money ! I'll pay the bill, while you, with
Mark here, slip out."

Was it a dream ? Was I awake ? Would I be
permitted to again behold God's beautiful world?
to see in it those I loved ? It was too much. For
one brief moment, consciousness almost forsook
me in my delirious joy !

Almost without knowing how, I again found
myself in the gas-lit streets of the Confederate

SCKNK THE SEVENTH. 54U<

capital, with my two companions, one on each
side of me. We soon arrived at a place which I
will not here describe, on account of the persecu
tions to which my friends might be subjected.
Up stairs we groped, through the darkness, to a
comfortable room, where we found ourselves soon
in one bed. There were other beds in the room,
but we wished to converse.

The first word I had ever heard Raymond's sin
gular companion sa-y was, after we were under the
coverlid,

"Fools!"

" Who f ' asked Raymond.

" You, and this other man. Why the devil
couldn't you leave Montgomery Hall without
hugging and crying like women ?"

u Never mind, Mark ; you go to sleep, now."

" Well, don't cry any more, John."

" You be d— d !" said the latter.

That was their " good-night !"

George was soon snoring in the most unequiv
ocal manner.

I was myself rapidly sinking into the deep sleep
of exhaustion, when a hand shook my shoulder,
and Raymond's voice whispered,

" Are you asleep ?"

" Almost."

" Wake up !"

"What's the matter?"

" When George and I leave you in the morning,
he will £0 to his work — I'll come back with a

208 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

hack ; step boldly into it and ride to the depot,
buy a ticket — it will be early. Take your place in
the car, and then — take care of yourself 1"

" I will do as yon tell me."

" And now go to sleep. Feel no dread — you're
safe. Yon need sleep — take it while yon can !"

These refreshing words added fragrance to my
slumber. My visions were the thoughts of Inno
cence, as my actions had been her suggestions.
No Abolition incendiarism filled my dreams with
the charred remains of conflagrated houses ; but
the white dove of returning peace nestled over the
land, the curtain of futurity lifted, and Alabama
emerged upon the stage of action, crowned with
the star-spangled glories of her first love, and
purified from her sin !

The next morning, two persons stood together
in a chamber in the " City of the Great King." A
hack wras at the door, its negro driver composedly
seated in front, its door open, and clouds of vapor
rising from the expanding nostrils of its bay horses.
The hands of the two men were warmly inter-
clasped. He who held a portmanteau was say
ing—

" And we may never, on earth, meet again ; but
as you have done to me, in this awful crisis of my
life, may God do to you, in your greatest need,
and more too. Never — never will I forget you !
Good-by!"

The sincere warmth with, which this was said
brought a quiver to the other's lip. With elo-

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 209

quent eyes, but silent lips, lie pressed the Refugee's
hand, then vanished out of the door. As he went
noisily, but rapidly, down the steps, his voice was
overheard exclaiming —

" D— n it all ! I'm getting fond of the fel
low!"

JSToble ! kind -hearted ! patriotic man ! Avhen God
shall number his jewels, many a wealthy and re
fined cotton-planter, who, by virtue of a fortunate
marriage or a lucky descent, noAV lords it over
God's green heritage, shall be weighed in the
balances and found wanting; while tliou, the poor
neglected stage-driver, whose earthly opportuni
ties never equaled theirs, will hear these gracious
words from a King more to be dreaded than King1

O O

Cotton :

u Come, thou blessed of my Father, inherit the
kingdom prepared for thee from the foundation of
the world ; for I was an hungered, and thou gav-
edst me meat ; I was thirsty, and thou gavedst me
drink ; I was naked, and thou clothedst me ; I was
sick, and in prison, and thou didst minister unto

ME."

Then, covered with modest confusion, thou shalt
say:

" Lord, when saw I thee an-hungered, or a-thirst,
or naked, or sick, or in prison, and ministered unto

thee?"

Then shall the King of kings reply :

" Inasmuch as thou didst it to this, the least of

these my brethren, thou didst it unto ME."
18*

210 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

Where, then, shall the conspirator, William
Porcher* Miles, appear?

Methinks I hear the thunder-tones of the last
Judge pronouncing these words :

" Depart from me, accursed, into everlasting
fire, prepared for the devil and his angels" (i. e.,
for the first Seceder and his followers) ; " for I
was hungry, and tliou gavedst me no meat ; I was
thirsty, and tliou gavedst me no drink ; I was sick
and in prison, and tliou visitedst me not. Inas
much as tliou didst it not to this, the least of these,
my brethren, tliou didst it not to ME !"

Then, while the humble stage-driver shall be
carried to the skies in a triumphal procession of
the holy angels, the crest-fallen ex-congressman,
arm in arm with Jefferson Davis and William L.
Yancey, will secede into that outer darkness con
genial to their political antecedents.

Reader, do you want a friend ?

Go not to the proud Pharisee, who stands at the
corners of the streets that men may see him pray ;
but betake yourself to the stall and the shamble,
where honest poverty wrestles with fate, and from
her reluctant palm extorts a scanty subsistence.
Go not to the happy and the refined / the cry of
anguish, shocks their delicate ears, and their hearts

o

prefer to break over the imaginary sufferings of
" Uncle Tom," rather than to " minister to minds
diseased, pluck from the soul a rooted sorrow, and

Pronounced PorsJidy.

SCKNE THE SEVENTH. 211

rid the spirit of that perilous stuff that weighs
upon the heart." Above all, go not to a perjured,
partisan demagogue ; for, if a man be untrue to
his country and his oath, how can he be true to
the dictates of humanity ?

We may never meet again on earth, but the
daguerreotype of John Raymond shall ever re
main bright in the picture-gallery of memory.

Having run the gauntlet of Main-street in the
hack, I approached the depot. A gilded sign,
reddening in the rays of morning, met my view.
In mocking syllables, its ample letters arranged
themselves before my eyes :

CHILTON & YANCEY.

Yancey ! the ablest and the most unscrupulous
man that ever plotted the overthrow of popular
rights ! The cotton aristocracy could not, by any
possibility, have produced such a man. Originally
created in God's own image, with qualities the
most engaging, powers the most wonderful, genius
the most transcend ant, he seemed one of those
whom nature throws off in her most inspired
moods, and crowns with every talent that can add
dignity to the forum or enthusiasm to the popu
lace. But she had not adjusted her gifts with
that nice equipoise which is essential to harmony
and perfection. His ambition she made greater
than his love of truth, and just a fraction larger
than his vanity. Mr. Yancey commenced his po
litical career at Cahawba. and afterward removed

212 THE ALABAMA JRKFDGEE.

to Wetumpka, wliere lie became the editor of the
Wetumpka Argus, Working his way to Con
gress by means of that paper, he placed himself
among the " yeas and nays" in favor of the annex
ing of the " Wilmot Proviso" to the admission of
Oregon. Reflecting afterward the political sen
timents of the men upon whom he depended for
promotion, nothing became too self-contradictory
for him to do, if it but served his ultimate end.
I have heard him say (at the Commercial Conven
tion at Montgomery, Alabama, in 1858) that he
resigned his place in Congress, in consequence of
his inability to support his family at Washington.
This proves that the cotton aristocracy did not
produce him, as I have already intimated.

His inventive genius being ever on the alert
for his own aggrandizement, the coronation of
Cotton soon placed him in the category of the
" King's" most humble subjects. Uncottoned him
self, he paid his court to the wealthy courtiers of
the woolly monarch, and, by his unscrupulous ad
hesion to His Majesty, won the post of Grand Cham
pion of his throne. Inflated by the popularity
which he received from the dispensers of public
favor, — the planters, — there was no deed too black,
no means too corrupt for the achievement of his
ends.* What wrould have been in a good cause,

* " MONTGOMERY, June 15, 1858.
"DEAR Sin: —

" Your kind letter of the 15th is received. I hardly agree
with you that a general movement can be made that will clean

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 213

sustained by truth, a divine enthusiam, was in
the mind of a perjurer, but the excitement of am
bition in its hot pursuit of personal success.

It is my firm conviction that Mr. Yancey s am
bition aspires to the throne itself. What easier
lor an eloquent man, after filling the public tongue
with the enthusiastic monosyllable " King," ap
plied to an invisible but omnipresent idea, than to

out tlie Augean Stable. If the Democracy were overthrown, it
would result in giving place to a greater and a hungrier sicarm
of flies.

" The remedy of the South is not in such a process. It is in
a diligent organization of her true men for the prompt resist
ance of the next aggression. It must come in the nature of
things. No national party can save us, no sectional party can
ever do it. But, if we should do as our fathers did — organize
committees of safety all over the Cotton States (and it is only in
them we can hope for any effective movement), — we shall fire
the Southern heart, instruct the Southern mind, give courage
to each other, and, at the proper moment, by one organized,
concerted action, we can precipitate the Cotton States into a
revolution.

" The idea has been shadowed forth in the South by Mr.
Ruffin, — has been taken up and recommended by the Adver
tiser under the name of ' League of United Southerners/ who,
keeping up the old party relations on all other questions, will
hold the Southern issue paramount, and will influence parties,
Legislatures, and statesmen. I have no time to enlarge, but to
suggest merely.

" In haste, Yours, &c.,

"W. L. YANCEY.

"To JAMES SLAUGHTER, Esq."

Dr. Slaughter, having published the above "private letter,"
as Mr. Yancey afterward called it, was found dead in his bed
from the 'effects of poison !

21-1: THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

fill that same tongue with his own name, as the
main prop of the monarchy, and, in the absence
of any tangible superstructure, to become the
very " King'' in name he had already become in
substance. There is no question in my mind that
Jefferson Davis also beholds the same glittering
vision. Alexander II. Stephens, had retired to
private life, until the mandate of " King Cotton"
called him forth to contradict himself, for a pro
motion higher than any he had ever before dream
ed of.

The abilities of William L. Yancey will ulti
mately make him the first in the Confederacy,
unless a reaction occurs, which could easily be pro
duced by the rise of a National party in the North.
From the non-slaveholders he has stolen their
rights ; but he has made the slaveholders his
dupes, his instruments — for they are his only
beneficiaries. He is ever wedded to their in
terests, and they to his by the base disintegration
of the Democratic party, at Charleston. The res
toration of Nationality to that party would be his
greatest punishment.

The subject — however interesting — must be, for
the present, abandoned, as the personal narrative
of one of Mr. Yancey's many victims progresses.

The depot is reached — a ticket purchased — the
car is entered — a rear seat occupied — a newspaper
unfolded, and the persecuted, but guiltless citizen,
apparently engrossed in its contents, keeps a con
tinual scrutiny upon the persons entering the train.

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 215

Soon, the gathering feet of incomers, the musi
cal voices of women, the harsher tones of men, all
commingling in denunciation of the Union, are
the sounds ; Secession cockades, blue ribbons, in
scribed with " Resistere Lincolni est obedientia
Deo" Secession newspapers — these are the sights.

It wras, of course, a relief to me, when the
whistle blew, and, with its living freight, the loco
motive started. The rattling of the cars soon
drowned all voices save that of Memory.

Whither was I going ? Should I successfully
run the gauntlet of the State — of the South — what
spot of earth could I call home f Where could I
find a mother — brother — wife? Was I leaving
my children, my home, forever ? What eyes
would weep at my departure, outside of my own
immediate family ? I had friends in Montgom
ery — would they dare to defend the exile f Would
they, without a single exception, unite their voices
in reproach of my oath-keeping actions ? or would
some unquenchable spirit vindicate my name,
cherish my memory, and await the day of my
return f

Such was the agony of my mind, that I almost
resolved to return to the city and to invite my
fate. It would have been a consolation, at that
moment, if, devoting myself for the good of my
fellow- citizens, 1 could have seen on? soulful face
catch my spirit as it ascended and beam it upon
the crowd. If there was in the " City of the Great
King," a soul attuned to the music of true South-

216 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

ern Rights, that soul knew not the fate of him who
was being so rapidly hurried away from the pos
sibility of communication !

The cars stopped, as if merely to breathe, at a
station. The whistle blew, again we started in the
race (of life for some, of death for others), and
against the background of the forest which lined
the railroad, the following lines, from Moore,
seemed traced in one lonec telegram :

O O

" Far lie fled — indignant fled,

The pageant of his country's shame ;
While every tear her children shed

Fell on his soul like drops of flame ;
And, as a lover hails the dawn

Of a first smile, so welcomed he
The sparkle of the first sword drawn — "

For non-slave-owners' Liberty.

Alas ! I have not yet seen, although I feel assured
I will some time see, that bright day-spring from
on high, when my country's flag will be the
cherished emblem of true Southern Rights !

O

The " nigger" can not long continue to be the all
absorbing idea ! There must soon come a day when
the poor white men of this whole country will
come in for their rights.

So deeply has the administration party become
infatuated with one idea, that it hesitates at no
constitutional obstacle for the perpetration of its
single design. He who refuses to go to the ultima
thule of their desperation, and to advocate the in
discriminate massacre of every loyal and disloyal

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 217

man, woman, and child of the whole South, is
denominated a traitor ; and, whatever may be his
love of the flag of our common country, whatever
his devotion to the name and the written prin
ciples of Washington, he is tormented with the
suspicion of those whose unpatriotic aspiration is
the subjugation to provincial vassalage of the
Southern States, rather than their restoration to
the Union.

Borne, the greatest military despotism ever
known on earth, after conquering a nation, per
mitted it to become an honored part of her em
pire ; but the Sumners and the Greeleys would
be unsatisfied with any thing short of the per
petual vassalage (if they could only secure it) of
every white person of the South. A loyal South
ern man they hate and despise, unless he be also
a greater friend to 'the black man than to his own
downtrodden race. I speak solemnly and truly,
when I profess my incompetency to discover any
other future for the poor African than utter exter
mination, if the exasperating policy of the admin
istration be persisted in.

The Southern people (and I know them well)
will never permit the negroes to live among them,
nominally their equals. They will make the South
too hot for them, even if this war were to become a
nigger-success, and the protegees of " Massa Gree-
ley " would precipitate themselves like an avalanche
upon Northern communities — naturally expecting
fraternization and protection. These, everybody

19

THE ALABAMA UEKUGKiO.

knows, would be peremptorily denied them, and
thus they would become a race of vagabond ma-
rauders upon society, until mobocracy, that cruel
scourge of our country, would perpetuate itself
upon their destruction. If wholesome laws were
enacted for their regulation, their antecedents
would render it necessary to coerce them into an
involuntary obedience. Negro equality in the
North, as well as in the South, is an ethnological
impossibility. In saying this, I pay the same
compliment to the white men of the North as to
those of the South, Then would cc me the next
danger. Those who say the negro is superior to
the white man would, of necessity, join him in his
resistance of law, which his white friends would
call another kind of slavery. This would increase
the numbers of the negroes, but not their respecta
bility, and scenes of horror would be the result,
which would render the brutalities of Southern
mobs no longer a " peculiar institution."

The proposition I made to the non-slaveholders
of Alabama, to confine, by law, the institution to
the cotton-fields, including, of course, the menial
offices of the household, and thus to rescue in the
South lier mechanical pursuits from the hated
negro equality, while it would not have impaired
the intrinsic value of the property of the planters,
would have restored the "poor white trash," or
Southern " mudsills," to their long-lost Southern
Eights. This moderate course was one of the
causes of my banishment; and yet, were I to

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 210

suggest the same thing as the best policy of the
United States Government, Kadicals of all kinds
would be ready to re-echo the old cry, " Crucify
him !"

A proclamation by the President, rescinding
the emancipation proclamation, and declaring all
mechanical pursuits in the South to be sacred to
the white man's free labor, at the same time
confining the negroes in the Gulf States to the
cultivation of cotton, sugar, and rice, and to
menial household occupations; while, in the Bor
der States, the mechanical pursuits being made
equally free, the slaves shall be confined to the
culture of tobacco and hemp, and to menial
household employments, would create an awaken
ing and a revulsion in the South wThich would
restore the Union and save the administration.

The looms of manufacturing cities, domestic and

O

foreign, would then be better than ever supplied,
the planters would be reduced from their aristo
cratic 'pretensions, while not the least of its bless
ings would be the disinthrallinent of the non-
slave-owners, and, at the same time, the Union
feeling of the South, so long held in check by the
un-national, un-Caucasian, and un-constitutional
course of the present infatuated administration.

After what seemed to be an age, I arrived at
West Point, Georgia, whence I dispatched several
letters to my brother, Marion C. Tharin, an engi
neer on the Charleston and Hamburgh railroad,

220 THE ALABAMA HOT GEE.

requesting him to bring, or send, some money to
me, as I was fleeing from Mobocracy, and had left,
in my haste, all save a few dollars.

Two days of suspense elapsed hut no letter came.
Not only was my money ebbing away but my ex
posure was becoming imminent. To earn enough
to bear me away was my first thought. I am an
excellent penman, and my previous occupation of
teaching suggested something in that line as the
proper mode.

I saw some young ladies amusing themselves
on the green, in front of a long, low, white
building, which I judged to be the seminary.
I approached the building and inquired whether
it was an academy. I was politely informed,
by a young lady, that it was, and that its pre
ceptress was then expected every moment — that,
if I would walk in and be seated, she would be in
formed, upon her arrival, that some one wished to
see her.

I entered the building and sat down in a kind of
parlor, where I had not long to wait before the in
tellectual face of the principal was presented at the
door. I rose respectfully, bowed profoundly, and
gave my name as Percy. Presenting the lady a
chair, wre were soon immersed in a conversation,
which I am afraid detained her from more import
ant, if not more interesting occupations.

After a pleasant and rather discursive conversa
tion, I bowed myself out of the door, hat in hand,
with a vague presentiment that, unless relief came

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 221

soon, my failure to obtain a writing-class in that
seminary would result in the most disastrous fail
ure of my life.

Turning away I was proceeding toward the
hotel, when a beautiful and intelligent face beamed
a recognition upon me. For one brief moment
I stood transfixed with incertitude, not knowing
whether or not to speak. The last time I had seen
that face was in "Wetumpka, Alabama, where a
frequent visitor at the house of Col. Saxon, a
staunch Democrat of the Senator Fitzpatrick
School, I was often thrown, before and since my
marriage, into her company.

My hesitation was but momentary, however.
For the first time in my life, I purposely turned
away without speaking, from a lady of my ac
quaintance. Assuming the disguises of a stoop
and a limp — neither of which is even remotely
characteristic of my ordinary mode of procedure,—
I hobbled away to the infinite surprise of Miss
Charlotte Cherry, whose wonder-stricken counte
nance had not yet recovered its wonted expression,
when I threw a retrospective glance over my
shoulder.

The presence of an acquaintance in the Cotton
State of Georgia, who knew me to be in West
Point — if she had recognized me, and who, if she
had not, would, woman-like, inform her friends in
Alabama of the singular likeness between me and
the gentleman who had visited the school — was a
spur to my speed. The idea of remaining there
19*

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

was simply ridiculous. I might have applied,
with impunity, to Miss Cherry for aid in pro
curing a situation in that academy ; but I would
not involve her young life in the mesh of ruin in
which King Cotton had involved me.

I had already suffered considerable anxiety, on
account of the manner toward me of the railroad
conductor from Montgomery, who rested each day
a scrutinizing glance upon me, and, even, at last,
asked me whether we had met before. There had
been no previous acquaintance, and so 1 said. The
man looked dissatisfied.

As soon as the return train started for Mont
gomery, I repaired to a teacher of the town, and
laid my case before him. The good Christian
heard me with tears, and invited me to dinner.
There I was introduced to his family, who seemed
very kind and sympathizing, although no word
from the reverend gentleman described my pre
dicament. The next northward train approaching,
that true Christian gentleman went to the cars in
company with his guest whom he had furnished
with money to Chattanooga, Tennessee.

The reader will remember the great excitement
of that time, the hatred of the cotton-planters to
myself and my cause, and will not fail to see how
important to the subsequent advantage of the
non-slaveholding whites of the South was my
escape — that is, the preservation of my testi
mony.

Arrived at Chattanooga, I registered my name

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 223

as R, Seymour (which is a part of my name); I

was about seeking my apartment when I was

"brought up all standing'' at the door by the

familiar sound :
" Robert!"
I turned and beheld a fair complected youth

standing in the " passage."

REFUGEE. " You have the advantage, sir."
YOUTH. "Don't you remember me, Robert?"
REFUGEE. " I expect you make a mistake."
YOUTH. " Don't you remember Joseph Ren-

ard ?"

REFUGEE. " You still have the advantage, sir."
YJOUTH. "Did you not attend the Sunday-school

at St. John's Chapel, Charleston, many years

REFUGEE. " I did."

YOUTH. " I was a pupil in the class taught by
your ' Uncle Edward.' >:

We shook hands where we had conversed, full
in view and hearing of the book-keeper.

We took a walk together. Renard was an en
gineer on the Charleston and Chattanooga rail
road. He expressed great sympathy for the
nephew of his former Sunday school teacher, and
offered to procure me a free passage on the engine
to Nashville, the engineer being his friend. But,
repenting of his shallow impulse, the backslidden
Sunday-scholar left his "friend" to his fate. I
blush to admit that Renard is a non-slave
owner.

22-i THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

No time was to be lost. The mob feeling had
not yet culminated at Chattanooga ; but to my
eye — which was somewhat initiated, I may say-
there were unmistakable signs in the political
horizon. Again betaking myself to a clergyman
I wras aided on my way to Cincinnati.

Not feeling secure in the fidelity of Joseph Een-
ard, I returned to the hotel, paid my bill, and
started for the Lookout station on foot. As I was
leaving the desk, the bookkeeper said :

"Good morning, Mr. Tharin."

I suppose I owe that salutation and its accom
panying wink to Joseph Renard, or else to him
and my interlocutor together. The clerk looked
surprised, when, with a calm smile, I returned his
salutation.

I was completely exhausted when I arrived at
the station. Some workmen were employed in
bringing clay in cars, and emptying it along the
road. Upon inquiry I found that some time would
elapse before the train would pass. A gentle
manly person approached and invited me to sup
per. I accepted ; but much did I wish afterward
that I had declined. The language of the host
consisted in an interminable panegyric on Jeffer
son Davis. Several times I was on the eve of be
traying myself by an imprudent outburst. I took
good care seemingly to agree with mine host, and
evinced an intimate knowledge of the late move
ments of his pet, to the great delight of himself,
and of his gaping family. But, even the most

SCENE THE SEVKNTH.

unpleasant circumstances have an end, and the
whistle of the locomotive cheered the sinking
heart of the impatient traveler.

Of my arrival at Cincinnati I have already
treated in the Introduction to this personal narra
tive, to which the reader's attention is again invited
for any personal testimonials he may have lost sight
of. It will be remembered that in that chapter are
set forth the proofs of my statements from the Ca-
hawba Gazette (Dallas county, Ala.), as dictated by
one of the mob, Kobert Eives, and of the Mays-
ville (Ky.) Eagle. In that chapter also are contained
letters from Hon. Milton Sayler and Samuel Low-
ry, Esq., of Cincinnati, establishing my identity;
from Judge Stallo and Rev. E. G. Robinson, of
the ^nth-street Baptist Church, as to my habits
and character; from William L. Yancey, dated
1859, in relation to our former law-partnership;
from B. P. Baker, Esq., then of Cincinnati, now of
New York, dated August 11, 1862, recommending
me for loyalty, and alluding to the Union speech
I had the honor to deliver to a large concourse of
Cincinnatians ; extracts from the Richmond (Ind.)
Palladium, and the Centerville (Tud.) True Re
publican, in relation to my (involuntary) enlist
ment, as a private in the ranks, to the credit of
which the Radicals of that little town are entitled ;
letters from Judge Perry and Benjamin Davis,
Esq., to the Colonel of the 16th Indiana; the cer
tificate of Captain Welsh, 7th Indiana, Com-

226 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

pany D., as to my actions at the Union victory at
Winchester, Mffrcli 23, 1862, and a copy of my
letter to the London Daily News, entitled " Yan-
cey and the Slave-trade," which was written in
reply to a note from Mr. Yancey to the London
Times , denying his advocacy of its renewal. My
reason for commencing this "Personal Narrative"
with the documents, alluded to above, was avow
edly to prove my claim to the attention of my
fellow-citizens — to "pave the way" to a better
understanding of the autobiography which was to
follow.

Living all my life, up to the time of my exile,
in the sunny South, I claim to be better acquaint
ed with her domestic condition than those who
have only seen the country through the eyes of
others ; and it may not be amiss for me to dwell
for a short time upon the exciting subject of this
gigantic rebellion, viewed in the general relations
of the North with the South, and vice versa.

In the second chapter of this narrative, I have
given the concluding portion of my speech to the
citizens of Buyckville and vicinity, which affords
a veracious and unanswerable exposition of the
relative number and actual condition of the twTo
classes of the Cotton States, viz., the owners of
slaves, and the owners of no slaves. In that
speech, I protested against the tyranny of King
Cotton, and contrasted the non-resident majority
of the North with the resident minority of the
South, in a manner which was by no means flat-

SCENE THE SEVENTH.

00'

tering to either the one or the other. It will he
remembered that I concluded that address with
this peroration :

" That oath is registered in heaven! I make no
lio-lit and foolish vows. That oath I intend to

o

keep always ; and, if I lose all the tranquillity
and peace of mind I possess, that oath shall never,
at God's bar, reproach me, as it will yet reproach
many other lawyers and officers of Alabama with
perjury !" Also :

" In conclusion : what I have said, I have said
in strict accordance with ' Southern Rights? If I
have the misfortune to differ with men of wealth
and influence, it shall, at least, never be said of
K. S. Tharin, that he is afraid to give a reason
for the faith that is in him !"

The reader will perceive, from this quotation,
that I feel as much bound " to support the Con
stitution and the Union'' as I ever did, and that I
am still unpledged to any other course !

From the manner in which I have already de
fended the Constitution and the Union in the
South, it is easy to see whether a radical course
can consistently be expected of me now, or at any
future time, in the North.

I have now completed a part of the undertaking
I have assumed ; and, perhaps, here I should
pause, as at the last milestone on a rough and
perilous road, but I can not. The same oath,

228 TFIE ALABAMA EEFUGKK.

which, in the sight of God and man, I registered
in the sweet spring of 1859, at Rockford court
house, Coosa county, Alabama, still animates my
conscience, and demands my activity.

In the foregoing pages, I have attempted to de
pict the atrocities of that Reign of Terror which
culminated in deeds of license and of blood, which
violated the sanctity of law, which disregarded
the awful sanction of solemn oaths, which ravened
at the throats of Justice, Mercy, and the Constitu
tion. I have "nothing extenuated, nor set down
aught in malice ;" but, were I to stop here, I would
be unworthy the martyrdom I have suffered for
the liberty of speech- — that birthright of Ameri
cans everywhere; unworthy of my whig ancestry
of 1776, who fought to insure me the rights of
Magna Charta under the Constitution of the
United States ! Action and Reaction being " equal
and in opposite directions," the scenes which filled
the South with horror and disgrace, have been,
alas ! re-enacted in the North, and, long after a
shadow of excuse seems, even to the most bigoted
Radical, to exist for the most unconstitutional pro
cedures, American citizens are, upon the slightest
pretences, hauled before military satraps, antl in
carcerated in loathsome dungeons, hopeless of re
lease, and beyond the benign reach of the Consti
tution itself.

It is the duty of every lawyer who has taken the
lawyer's oath, to remonstrate openly and at the

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 229

risk of life, if need be, against these unjustifiable
and unconstitutional usurpations!

Here, in the Northern States — here, in the na
tional capital — where armed rebellion has left no
footprint upon the soil, 'the people should be left
to discuss, in primary assemblages, their interests
as a people. The people of the Northern not less
than of the Southern Slates, are denied that right
by armed minorities, who madly persist in making
a political bias the test of loyalty. The man who
submits to such an outrage, North or South, is a
slave. The voice of Washington has long since
been drowned in the clamor of demagogues a«d
the roar of artillery. The 22d of February, 1863,
which has scarcely left the present, bears to the
record of the past only reproaches for our slavish-
ness and demands on our thoughtful and rnoet
candid consideration. Is the Union, bequeathed to
us by the Father of our country, to be lost in the
maelstrom of war, because no man dare incur the
fearful risk of proposing a plan of reconstruction ?
Are American citizens, North and South, the abject
slaves of their respective tyrannies? Why do
they not restore the democratic party to its na
tionality, and reconstruct the Union upon the
ruins of sectionalism ? "Would any humble citizen
of either section be the worse off because of the
re-establishment of law ? Are we so much at
tached to the names of our corrupters as to desire
the perpetuity of their sanguinary rule? lias
martial law done so much for the sections that both

20

230 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

preterit to the Union of our forefathers? Does a
military despotism in either section delight the
victims of an artificial crisis — on the despotic and
un-American basis of " military necessity ?" Have
the people of the " loyal North" forgotten the prin
ciple adopted by an almost unanimous Congress
for the prosecution of this war ? What were their
words ?

" That this war is not waged on their part in any
spirit of oppression, or for any purpose of over
throwing or interfering with the rights and estab
lished institutions of the States, but to defend and
maintain the supremacy of the Constitution, and
to preserve the Union with all the dignity, equality,
and rights of the several States unimpaired, and
that, as soon as these objects are accomplished,
the war ought to cease."

The duty of a State in rebellion is to return to
the Union — but radicals insinuate that, having
seceded, they have degenerated into territories
and must become subject to the will of the minor
ity who now hold the archives of the National
Government. The wildest theories and most crazy
theorists have perforated the brain of the Cabinet,
and CHASE each other, like maggots, around the
raw head and bloody bones of the Presidential
edict. The President, despairing of the support
of the conservative people of the country in car
rying out his own personal notions, has appe'aled
in " the proclamation" to the negroes, whose ante
cedents have proved them no warrior race, who,

SCRNK THE SEVENTH. 231

us a people, cannot read his decree, and whose
masters have coerced not only them, but, also, the
white Unionists who once doubted the designs of

O

the ISTorthern radicals.

In the chapter of this work, styled SCENE TIIK
FIFTH, I have shown that the non-slave-owners of
the South are doomed to a partial negro-equality
through the abuse, by the planters, of the institu
tion of Slavery, which, like all other institutions,
is subject to abuse, and that the only shadow of
superiority left them by the Rebel leaders is the
nominal and actual slavery of the inferior race.

There was — may it soon return ! — a time when
the division between the Disunionists and Unionists
of the South constituted the greatest obstacle in the
path of the Rebellion, although covered up by the
plastic hand of Deception. Skillfully and patriot
ically addressed, the old Union feeling of the
South, which for almost half a century had stood
the test of the united efforts of the Aristocrats,
would have risen in overwhelming force to
crush out rebellion in their midst; but the Ad
ministration has seen fit to address the negroes on
a subject beyond their comprehension (and their
true interests, by the by), and thus has disgusted
and alienated the conservatism of the white people
of the South, who can only be won back to their
Unionism by the wise and prudent action of the
Conservatives of the North.

The following extract from " Jeff. Davis's Mes
sage," while it confirms the historical portion of

THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

the above argument, at the same time, enforces
the conclusion by -admitting the premises:

" In its political aspects this measure possesses
great significance, and to it, in this light, I invite
your attention. It affords to our whole people the
complete and crowning proof* of the true nature of
the designs of the party which elevated to power
the present occupant of the Presidential Chair at
Washington, and which sought to conceal its pur
pose by every variety of artful device, and by the
perfidious use of the most solemn and repeated

pledges on every possible occasion The

people of the Confederacy, then, can not fail to
receive this proclamation as the fullest vindica
tion of their own sayacity in foreseeing the uses to
which the dominant party in the United States
intended from the beginning to apply their power ;
nor can they cease to remember with devout
thankfulness that it is to their own vigilance in
resisting the first stealthy progress of approaching
despotism that they owe their escape from conse
quences now apparent i>o the most skeptical^

" It is, also, in effect, an intimation to the peo
ple of the North that they must prepare to submit
to a separation, now become inevitable \\ for that
people are too acute not to understand that a resto-

* Of wliat the planters most eagerly desire of all things.

f Now apparent to those who were for the Union while
they doubted it — he means.

\ Because of the blind folly of the Administration in antag
onizing every element of the South.

SCEXE THE SEVENTH. 233

ration of the Union lias been rendered forever im
possible by the adoption of a measure which, from
its nature, neither admits of retraction nor can co
exist with them.*

"Humanity shudders at the appalling atrocities
which are being daily multiplied under the sanc
tion of those who have claimed temporary \ pos
session of the power in the United States, and who
are fast making its once fair name a by-word of
reproach among civilized men. Not even the
natural indignation inspired by this conduct
should make us, however, so unjust as to attribute
to the whole mass of the people, who are subjected
to the despotism that now reigns with unbridled
license in the city of Washington, a willing ac
quiescence in the conduct of the war. There
must necessarily exist among our enemies, very
many , perhaps a, majority, whose humanity recoils
from all participation in such atrocities, hut who
can not he held wholly guiltless, while permitting
their continuance without an effort at repression"
A bid to Northern Secessionists.

The last sentence of the above message of the

* You see lie does not desire its retraction, having labored
to produce it — but the Conservatives will yet repeal it in time
to save the Union. Foreign mediation we do not want — will
not permit — but the mediation of the common sense of the
American masses — that we will have !

f This word is used to confound the counsels of the Union
ists of the South, who are willing to return under certain
circumstances, and is used as a dissuasive argument.
20*

234: TUE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

despot of the South, is a two-edged sword which
militates against his own desires as well as against
the desires of the despot of the North. Both have
become obnoxious to the majority in both sections,
and both will perish in the indignation which, now
agitates the American blood of the "very many
(in both sections) perhaps majorities, whose hu
manity recoils from all participation in such atroci
ties, ~but who can not he held wholly guiltless while
permitting their continuance (in either section)
without an effort at repression"

Let Jeff. Davis remember that there are Con
servatives South as well as North, and in the name
of both I proclaim that " the Union must and shall
be preserved," forcibly if we must — peaceably if
we can !

The proclamation of the President is impolitic
as a "war measure," because, in theory, it removes
from the poor conscript of the South the only
proof of his superiority to the black slave, and
thus arms him with a vengeance against the Pres
ident, which, with all his vaporing, he never felt
before. It affords an excuse, also, for the con
scription of the black into the armies of Secession
to meet the " black soldiers" of the President, and
tends to the ultimate extirpation of the negro race
by a " military necessity." Such is the philan
thropy of the measure !

The duty of this Government is to weaken the
Rebels by its good policy, while it overwhelms their
armies by its power. If it fails to conquer them

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 235

by arms and good policy combined, it must be
because of their numbers, or of their intrench-
ments, or of their strategy, or of their unity, or
of some or all of these combined. If any act of
the Government, or of him who dictatorially con
stitutes himself the Government, be calculated,
proprio vigore, to increase the numbers or the
unity of the Rebels, to strengthen their intrench-
inents, to improve their strategy, or to produce
some or all of these bad results, then is that act
impolitic and unmilitary.

Now I have proved, and have made Jeff. Davis
himself an unwilling witness, that the Emancipa
tion Proclamation is the very best means of har
monizing the otherwise conflicting interests of the
Rebels, by taking away from the non-slave-owner
of the South the only proof he has of his political
superiority to the slave-owner's black serf, and his
only argument against the planter. Therefore, I
have proved from a Southern point of view, that
the proclamation is impolitic and unmilitary.

From a Northern point of view, the "imperial
policy" of the President is very poor policy, be
cause it obviously produces the most lamentable
results upon the people and the soldiery. There
fore, again I say it is impolitic and unmilitary.

But does not the President claim the right of

O

issuing his imperial edict by virtue of a " military
necessity ?"

How can that be a military necessity which is
itself ^military ?

236 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

During the Presidential contest, which resulted
in the lamentable elevation of — Jeff. Davis to the
first office in the so-called Southern Confedera
cy, it was the favorite argument of the precipita
tors in the Cotton States, that negro equality was
the intention of the Kepublican party.* It seems
to me I can see William L. Yancey addressing the
people of some Southern community in these words :

"Did we not tell you so? Compare our pre
dictions with the event, and you behold the perfect
proof of our declarations !"

Thus, the shallow policy of the Administration
is calculated to produce the result of confirming
predictions upon which the rebellion was founded !

This work was written — except a few notes and
some alterations necessitated by the last act of the
Radicals — long before September 22d, 1862, and,
therefore, is much more calm in its strictly narra
tive parts than in these concluding remarks, which
are written in alarm lest the last rail split by
" Old Abe" be the Union, for which I risked my
life in the South, and for which I risk my liberty
in the North ! But the " imperial policy," so-
called, of the radical cabinet is the very policy
most desired by the chiefs of the Rebellion, for,
while it shocks the common sense of the country,
even of Abolitionists, if they have any, and thus
divides the "loyal North," it "fires the Southern

* See p. 44, for extract of Speech of Hon. Jabez L. M. Curry,
at Wetumpka, Alabama.

SCENE THE SEVENTH.

heart*' more universally than did the mere election
of him who " presides over our destinies," but is
blind to his own !

There is, however, one aspect of this "imperial
policy," which is not calculated to soothe a spirit,
who has borne open testimony in the North* and
in the Southf to his heart-rending conviction that
.England is the fomenter of our troubles, and that
it is her imperial policy to divide and conquer this
Union, even as the two Grecian States of Athens
and Sparta were divided and conquered by the
machinations of Philip of Macedon. Our Philip
of Macedon sits (in petticoats) upon the English
throne. Hob-nobbing with the heads of rebellion,
over which she suspended glittering coronets, and
over one a vice-royal crown, she promised them
her support, and after she found them engaged as
" belligerents," she professed — through the London
Times — her willingness to "recognize'-' them, be
cause the North was upholding slavery by adher
ing to the Constitution of the country. Thus, by
skillfully manipulating her puppet vicegerents of
the North, she has inaugurated her "imperial
policy" through Mr. Chase, and scarcely waits for
the ink of the (British) proclamation of the Presi
dent to dry, before she publishes, through the Lon
don Ti'ititS) that slavery is to be justified on Scrip
tural grounds. During all this time, by her
"proclamation" of neutrality, she puts in practice

* See Introduction, p. IS. f See p. 47.

238 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

the " masterly inactivity," which the Roman his
torian Tacitus unconsciously suggested to Mr.
Calhoun, who — plagiarist as he was — appropriated
the credit due to another man.

It is the old story. " History is ever re-enacting
itself." Sparta was the enemy of Athens, even as
the Rebels of the South are the enemies of the
North, and the Macedonian monarch, seizing upon
domestic feuds, first aggravated, then dismembered
Greece, which soon fell a victim to the " imperial
policy" of a weaker but more insidious foe.

The three classes of society in Sparta, or Ancient
Secessia, were exactly similar to the three classes
of society in Modern Secessia. If the first had her
Homoii,* or Superiors, who alone held office, the
second has her First Families, or Planters, who
illegally monopolize the official honors, emolu
ments, and influence of the South ;f if the first had
her Hypomeiones4 or Inferiors, who were allowed
to vote but not hold office, 'by law, the second has
her " poor white trash," who are excluded from
office against law ;f if the first had her Helots,§ or
Slaves, who held neither office nor vote, which, as
they were white men, was wrong, the second has
her Africans, or Slaves, who, being black, right
fully hold neither vote nor office.

Thus you perceive that Philip of Macedon nat
urally sought, as allies, the Homoii or Superiors of
Sparta, who, growing tired of Grecian Union,

*'o/*o«. f See p. 70, Ante. ^'Y^/mom. §'lUor£f.

SCENE THE SEVENTH. Zo'J

manifested the spirit of " Oh ! that we had one of
the royal family (of Macedon) to rule over us!"*

Ancient Secessia had by law two kings.

Modern Secessia has " King Cotton," and longs
for a British Prince.

Thus the parallel is complete, and as Greece fell
from disunion, before the Macedonian phalanx, so
we will fall, if we remain dismembered — l>otJi
sections will fall — before European diplomacy.f

It becomes the war-ridden people of both sec
tions, therefore, to reconstruct the Union, and to
present to foreign nations, once and forever, a
front unbroken and one.

Washington was right when he said, " The
Union is the palladium of your safety" !N"or was
he wrong when he wrote :

* London Times Russell.

f The name of NAPOLEON is prophetic of his purpose. By
dropping letter by letter from the Greek name, N«*-wAiov, we
have a Greek sentence complete, which signifies — Napoleon
being a lion, is going forth from a lion, the destruction of
cities.

We all know that he took refuge, for a time, in England,
the emblem of which is a Lion ; when he went to France and
became emperor, he, therefore, went from a lion, and proved him
self a lion ; and now he roars at the cannon's mouth at Puebla
(next door to the United and Confederate States), that he has
come to devour American cities. For the information of the
curious I will here state that the Greek sentence, foreshadow
ing all this, runs thus : Ntf-oAcwv. aroAeov, TroAfuu', oAswv, ASCJV, ewv, o» .

Let my countrymen then beware of mediation from Napo
leon — and of Jewett, whose name is capable of a damaging and
ignoble construction.

94:0 THE ALABAMA KEFUGEE.

" There can be no greater error than to expect,
or calculate upon, real, favors from nation to nation.
It is an illusion which experience must cure, which
a just pride ought to discard" *

But, in these days of tumult, the radical howl-
ings, North and South, have drowned the voice of
the Father of his Country. In vain he pleads
with his disobedient children. The Radicals of
the South and of the North have alike invited
England to interfere in our troubles, the one by
bidding for recognition, and the other by bidding
against it. It is treason to the whole people to
bid for the subjugation of any part of them.

Meanwhile, the Lion of England steals through
the forest, scenting his prey. His hot breath is
almost on our faces, his inane is gradually bristling

* " FAREWELL ADDRESS" — all of which seems at this time
more like the inspiration of a prophet than the production of a
mere statesman. The reader can not too often peruse Washing
ton's Farewell Address. For instance, what can be more sub
lime than the following tearful plea : " In offering to you, my
countrymen, these counsels of an old and affectionate friend, I
dare not hope they will make the strong and lasting im
pression I could wish ; that they will control the usual current of
the passions, or prevent our nation from running the course
which has hitherto marked the destiny of nations; but if I may
even flatter myself that they may be productive of some partial
benefit, some occasional good; that they may now and then recur
to moderate, the fury of party spirit, to warn against the mischiefs
of foreign intrigues, to guard against the impostures of pretend
ed patriotism; THIS HOPE will be a full recompense for the
solicitude for your welfare by which they hav^e been dictated."

Shall that hope be disregarded?

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 241

with anticipated vengeance, his roar will soon shake
the atmosphere — will my countrymen, North and
South, permit all the blessings achieved by the
sword of our "Washington, to be lost through neg
lect of his farewell advice?

With the above pregnant question, I conclude
this work, which will soon be followed by another,
entitled " Results of my Southern and Northern
Experience," which will be presented under the
form of three historical parallels, with a proposed
plan of reconstruction.

Hoping soon to meet the reader again, I now
bid him a temporary adieu, and as I stand, pour
prendre conge, with the door-knob in my left hand,
with my right I wave him an Au revoir!

LETTER FROM THE AUTHOR TO HIS MOTHER.

NEW YORK, February 15th, 1863.
MY DEAR MOTHER:

This month, two long and dreary years ago,
I was dragged from your arms by an infuriated
mob of demons, and driven a fugitive from my
adopted State of Alabama.

Since that hour, the war, which to foretell and
endeavor to prevent was my only crime, has del
uged your native Virginia in blood, and double-
locked the portals of intelligence, at which I have
knocked and waited in vain for news of you and
my only brother.

21

242 THE ALABAMA REFUGEE.

During that fearful time, while Liberty has bid
den adieu to the whole country, and arbitrary ar
rests have filled the bastiles of the South and of
the North with victims of a duplicate despotism,
I have many times essayed to write to you and
brother Marion ; but no means of transportation
for letters has been offered, because Mr. Lincoln
was afraid I would say something revealing the
Union element of the North, which is not tainted
with Abolitionism, and Mr. Davis was afraid I
would say something appealing to the Union ele
ment of the South, which is untainted with Seces
sion ism.

The mutual jealousy of these two satraps of each
other, and of every thinking mind and speaking
tongue and pen in the Eepublic, would be amus
ing, dear mother, if it were not so dreadful in its
results. Radicalism, or Sectionalism, South and
North, delighting in extremes and rioting in an
archy, has planted the dagger into our bleeding
hearts, and then commands the mother and her
persecuted son to hold no intercourse in a country
once free to the feet and the lips of millions of now
trampled serfs.

Having failed so often in getting news of you
or to you by the ordinary modes of communica
tion, I include this letter in my book, hoping that
some good soul will convey the whole work to
your hand and thus soothe your sorrows by this
fleeting glimpse of your exiled son.

I am agonized with the unwelcome but often

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 243

recurring thought that, perhaps, we are never
more to see each other in the flesh. The fearful
vision of your decease is even now rending asunder
the chords of my heart. The shroud and the cof
fin may, ere this, have intervened their spectral
folds, the spring verdure may be even now waving
above a new-made grave, in which reposes the
uriwaking eyes of my aged mother ! while I am
not permitted by the fiends of mobocracy to drop a
tear, or to plant a rose upon her last resting-place.

These thoughts have preyed upon my mind and
upon my health. In addition to these reflections,
my wife and children are in very poor health, and
the former mourns, like me, over absent relations,
whom she may never more behold. Her old
mother, like you, is bereaved of a child by the
atrocious usurpations of King Cotton and Emperor
Davis. Like you, she has a son forced, by cir
cumstances beyond his control, into the armies of
Southern Despotism. Thus I carry a triple burden,
and can only see in a peaceful reconstruction of
the National Democratic Party on a constitutional
basis, and a reconstruction of the old, or a more
liberal, Union, by means of the united action of
Unionists South and North, any hope of ever see
ing again my kith and kin, any hope of civiliza
tion, or of what our Litany prays every Sabbath,
that God will give to all nations — " unity, peace,
and concord.""

If this letter ever reaches you, dear mother (and
I sometimes indulge the fond hope that it will find

THE ALABAMA KEFUGEE.

its way by some benevolent hand to your posses
sion), let it assure you, a thousand times, of my
safety, my affection, and my uncorrupted Union
ism and honor. I am still as true to my oath, as
when I resisted arbitrary arrests in the Cotton
State of Alabama. / counsel all patriots every
where to resist them, and to unite on "Washington's
Farewell Address, Magna Charta, the bills of
rights of the several States, and the Constitutional
guarantees of the whole nation, and conserve the
interests of Religion, Liberty, Law, Commerce,
and Common Sense, ere the foreign powers, see
ing our divisions to be incurable, pounce down
upon the sheepfold, and raven like wolves at the
throats of our blood-bought rights and national
glories.

You see how impossible it is for me to write
without advocating the Union before I stop. For
this I was arbitrarily arrested in Alabama, and
may be again despotically arrested in the North ;
but " sink or swim, live or die, survive or perish,
I give my hand and my heart" to the Union and
to the liberties of its oppressed citizens.

There are two parties in this country who desire
the destruction of the Union, viz. : the Abolition
ists and Secessionists. To neither of these do I
belong. " When I forget thee, O Jerusalem !
may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth !"

Remember me affectionately to all my kinsfolk
and acquaintances. God made men to differ, /Sa
tan converts differences, which are in themselves

SCENE THE SEVENTH. 245

good gifts for the enlargement of knowledge, into
hatred and war. I do not hate but love my
friends who differ rationally from me. If, under
the madness of the hour, any old friend turn
against me on account of opinion, I suppose I
must wait for the cooling of the nation in the
tears of repentance before I can win him back.

To my beloved brother convey my unwavering
love. Please, mother, plant upon dear father's
grave a rose for me. I will yet press his sacred
dust with pilgrim feet, when war shall cease and
a nation's wounds are closing up.

God bless you. Good-by.

Your affectionate son,

ROBERT.
21*

In Press,

BY THE SAME AUTHOR,

RESULTS

OP

My Southern and Northern Experience,

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