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Slavery

History

They took us out of the history books

From The Literary Digest. May 16, 1925

 ‘Guanin” was the native African name of the time for pebbles or slobs of gold, the form in which it was imported to Europe from the Guinea Coast. Quite naturally, Columbus, on being handed these same things in America, pricked up his ears. For be it remembered that Columbus, like all the rovers before him, had as his primary object, not the discovery of land merely, but the discovery of gold, ivory, spices, any article sal­able at a profit at home. New lands were only a happy incident to the business. They pleased one’s king, lured new investors, and made good advertising. But gold was the thing, and Columbus lost no time in asking his Indians where they kept it.

Very troublesome to Columbus their reply must have been, for according to his own report, they told him, “From black merchants that came to us from the South­east.”

Peter Martyr, historian of Balboa’s expeditions, wrote, “Balboa in 1513 found Negroes in Panama. These were the first Negroes seen in the Indies. Balboa found them at war with the Indians and thought that they had sailed from Ethiopia.’

White nations named certain sec­tions of the African Coast after their leading export: The Grain Coast (from Sierra Leone to Cape Pal­mas); The Ivory Coast (from Cape Palmas to modern Ghana); The Gold Coast; the Slave Coast (from the Volta River to the Niger Delta).

A TYPICAL NEGRO.

 WE publish herewith three portraits, from pho­tographs by M’Therson and Oliver, of the Negro GorDor, who escaped from his master in Mississippi, and came into our lines at Baton Rouge in March last. One of these portraits represents the man as he entered our lines, with clothes torn and covered with mud and dirt from his long race through the swamps and bayous, chased as he had been for days and nights by his master with sev­eral neighbors and a pack of blood-hounds; anoth­er shows him as he underwent the surgical exam­ination previous to being mustered into the service

—his back furrowed and scarred with the traces of a whipping administered on Christmas-day last; and the third represents him in the United States States uniform, bearing the musket and prepared for duty. This negro displayed unusual intelligence and energy. In order to foil the scent of the bloodhounds that were chasing him he took from his plantation onions, which he carried in his pockets. After crossing each creek or swamp he rubbed his body freely with these onions, and thus, no doubt, frequently threw the dogs off the scent.

At one time in Louisiana he served our troops as guide, and on one expedition was unfortunately taken prisoner by the rebels, who, infuriated be­yond measure, tied him up and beat him, leaving him for dead. He came to life, however, and once more made his escape to our lines.

By way of illustrating the degree of brutality which slavery has developed among the whites in the section of country from which this negro came, we append the following extract from a letter in the New York Times, recounting what was told by the refugees from Mrs. Gillespie’s estate on the Black River;

The treatment of the slaves, they say, has been growing worse and worse for the last six or seven years.

Flogging with a leather strap on the naked body is common also, paddling the body with a handsaw until the skin is a mass of blisters, and then breaking the blisters with the teeth of the saw. They have “very often” seen slaves stretched out upon the ground with hands and feet held down by fellow-slaves, or lashed to stakes driven into the ground for “burning.” Handfuls of dry corn-husks are then lighted, and the burning members are whipped off with a stick so as to fall in showers of live sparks upon the naked back. This is continued until the victim is covered with blisters. If in his writhing of torture the slave gets his hand free to brush off the fire, the burning brand is applied to them.

Another method of punishment, which is inflicted for the higher order of crimes, such as running away, or oth­er refractory conduct, is to dig a hole in the ground large enough for the slave to squat or lie down in. The victim is then stripped naked and placed in the holee, and a cov­ering or grating of green sticks is laid over the opening. Upon this a quick lire is built, and the live embers sifted through upon the naked flesh of the slave, until his body is blistered and swollen almost to bursting. With just enough of life to enable him to crawl, the slave is then allowed to recover from his wounds if he can, or to end his sufferings by death.

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