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Reconstruction: The Second Civil War | Primary Source


ACCESS TO LEARNING

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National Archives

Carrying Light and Knowledge

Edmonia Highgate, the daughter of freed slaves, grew up and was educated in New
York. During the Civil War, in 1864, she traveled South to establish schools for
the American Missionary Association (A.M.A.). This letter describes her
experience with eager students and hostile surroundings.

Louisiana,
Lafayette Parish
Vermillionville, Dec. 17th, 1866

Rev. M. E. Strieby, Sec. A.M.A.:

Dear Friend:

Perhaps you may care to know of my work here for the Freed people. After the
horrible riots in New Orleans in July, I found my heart getting impaired from
hospital visiting and excitement so I came here to do what I could and to get
stronger corporally, that I might enter fully into carrying light and knowledge
into dark places. The Lord blessed me and I have a very interesting and
constantly growing day school, a night school, and, a glorious Sabbath School of
near one hundred scholars. The school is under the auspices of the Freedman's
Bureau, yet it is wholly self-supporting. The majority of my pupils come from
plantations, three, four and even eight miles distant. So anxious are they to
learn that they walk these distances so early in the morning as never to be
tardy. Every scholar buys his own book and slate, etc. They, with but few
exceptions are french Creoles. My little knowledge of French is just in constant
rise in order to instruct them in our language. They do learn rapidly. A class
who did not understand any English came to school last Monday morning and at the
close of the week they were reading "Easy Lessons." The only church of any kind
here is Catholic and any of the people that incline to any belief are that
denomination. It has not been safe to have a church of Protestant faith for the
colored people. The priest talks of having a Catholic Church built for them. If
he succeeds, I fear my efforts will for a while be lost. There is but little
actual want among these freed people. The corn, cotton and sugar crops have been
abundant. Most of the men, women and large children are hired by the year "on
contract" upon the plantations of their former so called masters. One of the
articles of agreement is that the planter shall pay "a five percent tax for the
education of the children of his laborers." They get on amicably. The adjustment
of relations between employer and former slaves would surprise our northern
politicians. Most all of them are trying to buy a home of their own. Many of
them own a little land on which they work nights in favorable weather and
Sabbaths for themselves. They own cows and horses, besides their raising
poultry.

The great sin of Sabbath breaking I am trying to make them see in its proper
light. But they urge so strongly its absolute necessity in order to keep from
suffering -- that I am almost discouraged of convincing them. They are given
greatly to the sin of adultery. Out of three hundred I found but three couples
legally married. This fault was largely the masters' and it has grown upon the
people till they cease to see the wickedness of it. There has never been a
missionary here to open their eyes. I am doing what I can but my three schools
take most of my time and strength. I am trying to carry on an Industrial School
on Saturday, for that I greatly need material. There are some aged ones here to
whom I read the bible. But the distances are so great I must always have
conveyance and although I ride horseback I can seldom get a horse.

There is more than work for two teachers yet I am all alone, God has wonderously
spared me. There has been much opposition to the School. Twice I have been shot
at in my room. Some of my night-school scholars have been shot but none killed.
A week ago an aged freedman was shot so badly as to break his arm and leg — just
across the way. The rebels here threatened to burn down the school and house in
which I board before the first month was passed. Yet they have not materially
harmed us. The nearest military Jurisdiction is two hundred miles distant at New
Orleans. Even the J. M. Bale agt has not been about for near a month. But I
trust fearlessly in God and am safe. Will you not send me a package of "The
Freedmen" for my Sunday School? No matter how old they are, just send them by
mail, for there has never been a Sunday School paper here. Please send me the
American Missionary for six months enclosed please find 25 cents commencing with
January. Please remember me to Bros. Whipple and Whiting and any others who may
remember me. I should be very glad to hear from you.

Yours for Christ's poor,

Edmonia G. Highgate

P.S. I notice by your Annual report that you have two missionaries in this
state. Please tell me who they are and where located.

Source:
Amistad Research Center, American Missionary Association Archives, Tulane
University, New Orleans, Louisiana.

Were You Ever a Colored Boy?

Many textbooks of the era offered a negative view of African Americans. A
contributor to the journal of the freedmen, The New National Era, describes a
typical black boy's experience at school.

Reader, were you ever a colored boy? Have you ever gone to school and been
obliged to walk around a crowd of white boys because they put themselves right
in your path, and had "cuff that nigger!" yelled into your ears, and after doing
all that one pair of fists could do against half a dozen pairs, were you
unmercifully beaten (two or three policemen passing meanwhile) until some old
woman came along and rescued you?

Released at length, have you made your appearance just in time to "hold out your
hand, sir" for the reception of six or eight stinging blows from a heavy rattan
in the hands of a white teacher whose one article of faith was "spare the rod
and spoil the child"?

Have you ever studied Smith's Geography with that very worst type of Negro
presented in painful contrast to the most perfect of the Caucasian on the
opposite page? Have the words "superior to all others," referring to the latter,
ever stuck in your throat and defiant pride made you "go down" while some other
boy, no more ambitious but less sensitive, "went up"?

Have you ever tased the sweet revenge of sticking pins into the eyes of the
soul-driver in the picture of a cotton field at the head of the lesson on
Georgia? No! Then you don't know what a jolly experience belongs to nine-tenths
of the colored men in this land of liberty.

Excerpt from Dorothy Sterling, ed., Trouble They Seen: The Story of
Reconstruction in the Words of African Americans. New York: Da Capo Press, 1994.

The People Are Daily More Enlightened

House Speaker S. J. Lee lists improvements to the state education system in this
report to the nine black and thirty-four white members of the South Carolina
House of Representatives at the close of the 1874 session.

Permit me, now to refer to our increased educational advantages. It is very
pleasing, gentlemen, to witness how rapidly the schools are springing up in
every portion of our State, and how the number of competent, well trained
teachers are increasing.... Our State University has been renovated and made
progressive. New Professors, men of unquestionable ability and erudition, now
fill the chairs once filled by men who were too aristocratic to instruct colored
youths. A system of scholarships has been established that will, as soon as it
is practically in operation, bring into the University a very large number of
students.... The State Normal School is also situated here, and will have a fair
attendance of scholars. We have, also, Claflin University, at Orangeburg, which
is well attended, and progressing very favorably; and in the different cities
and large towns of the State, school houses have been built, and the school
master can be found there busily instructing "the young idea how to shoot." [a
quotation from poet James Thomson. He uses "shoot" to mean grow or advance.] The
effects of education can also be perceived; the people are becoming daily more
enlightened; their minds are expanding, and they have awakened, in a great
degree, from the mental darkness that hitherto surrounded them....

Excerpt from Final Report to the South Carolina House, 1874. Journal of the
House of Representatives of the State of South Carolina, for the Regular Session
of 1874-1874 (Columbia, 1874), 549-53. Reprinted in William Loren
Katz, Eyewitness. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995.

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 * Reconstruction: The Second Civil War | Primary Source
   
   
   IN GOD WE TRUST
   
   
   
   Excerpts from the Reverend Edward Scott, who had run away from slavery and
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   Faced with the growing threat of African American political, economic and
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