Strange True Stories of Louisiana
Page 29
VII.
MILLER _versus_ BELMONTI.
In 1843 Frank and Eva Schuber had moved to a house on the corner ofJackson and Annunciation streets.[27] They had brought up sons, two atleast, who were now old enough to be their father's mainstay in hisenlarged business of "farming" (leasing and subletting) the Poydrasmarket. The father and mother and their kindred and companions in longpast misfortunes and sorrows had grown to wealth and standing among theGerman-Americans of New Orleans and Lafayette. The little girl cousin ofSalome Mueller, who as a child of the same age had been her playmate onshipboard at the Helder and in crossing the Atlantic, and who looked somuch like Salome, was a woman of thirty, the wife of Karl Rouff.
One summer day she was on some account down near the lower limits of NewOrleans on or near the river front, where the population was almost whollya lower class of Spanish people. Passing an open door her eye was suddenlyarrested by a woman of about her own age engaged in some humble servicewithin with her face towards the door.
Madame Karl paused in astonishment. The place was a small drinking-house,a mere _cabaret_; but the woman! It was as if her aunt Dorothea, who haddied on the ship twenty-five years before, stood face to face with heralive and well. There were her black hair and eyes, her olive skin, andthe old, familiar expression of countenance that belonged so distinctly toall the Hillsler family. Madame Karl went in.
"My name," the woman replied to her question, "is Mary." And to anotherquestion, "No; I am a yellow girl. I belong to Mr. Louis Belmonti, whokeeps this 'coffee-house.' He has owned me for four or five years. Beforethat? Before that, I belonged to Mr. John Fitz Mueller, who has thesaw-mill down here by the convent. I always belonged to him." Her accentwas the one common to English-speaking slaves.
But Madame Karl was not satisfied. "You are not rightly a slave. Your nameis Mueller. You are of pure German blood. I knew your mother. I know you.We came to this country together on the same ship, twenty-five years ago."
"No," said the other; "you must be mistaking me for some one else that Ilook like."
But Madame Karl: "Come with me. Come up into Lafayette and see if I do notshow you to others who will know you the moment they look at you."
The woman enjoyed much liberty in her place and was able to accept thisinvitation. Madame Karl took her to the home of Frank and Eva Schuber.
Their front door steps were on the street. As Madame Karl came up to themEva stood in the open door much occupied with her approach, for she hadnot seen her for two years. Another woman, a stranger, was with MadameKarl. As they reached the threshold and the two old-time friends exchangedgreetings, Eva said:
"Why, it is two years since last I saw you. Is that a German woman?--Iknow her!"
"Well," said Madame Karl, "if you know her, who is she?"
"My God!" cried Eva,--"the long-lost Salome Mueller!"
"I needed nothing more to convince me," she afterwards testified in court."I could recognize her among a hundred thousand persons."
Frank Schuber came in, having heard nothing. He glanced at the stranger,and turning to his wife asked:
"Is not that one of the girls who was lost?"
"It is," replied Eva; "it is. It is Salome Mueller!"
On that same day, as it seems, for the news had not reached them, MadameFleikener and her daughter--they had all become madams in CreoleAmerica--had occasion to go to see her kinswoman, Eva Schuber. She saw thestranger and instantly recognized her, "because of her resemblance to hermother."
They were all overjoyed. For twenty-five years dragged in the mire ofAfrican slavery, the mother of quadroon children and ignorant of her ownidentity, they nevertheless welcomed her back to their embrace, notfearing, but hoping, she was their long-lost Salome.
But another confirmation was possible, far more conclusive than mererecognition of the countenance. Eva knew this. For weeks together she hadbathed and dressed the little Salome every day. She and her mother and allHenry Mueller's family had known, and had made it their common saying, thatit might be difficult to identify the lost Dorothea were she found; but ifever Salome were found they could prove she was Salome beyond the shadowof a doubt. It was the remembrance of this that moved Eva Schuber to sayto the woman:
"Come with me into this other room." They went, leaving Madame Karl,Madame Fleikener, her daughter, and Frank Schuber behind. And when theyreturned the slave was convinced, with them all, that she was the youngerdaughter of Daniel and Dorothea Mueller. We shall presently see what fixedthis conviction.
The next step was to claim her freedom. She appears to have gone back toBelmonti, but within a very few days, if not immediately, Madame Schuberand a certain Mrs. White--who does not become prominent--followed downto the cabaret. Mrs. White went out somewhere on the premises, foundSalome at work, and remained with her, while Madame Schuber confrontedBelmonti, and, revealing Salome's identity and its proofs, demanded herinstant release.
Belmonti refused to let her go. But while doing so he admitted his beliefthat she might be of pure white blood and of right entitled to freedom. Heconfessed having gone back to John F. Mueller[28] soon after buying her andproposing to set her free; but Mueller, he said, had replied that in such acase the law required her to leave the country. Thereupon Belmonti haddemanded that the sale be rescinded, saying: "I have paid you my money forher."
"But," said Mueller, "I did not sell her to you as a slave. She is as whiteas you or I, and neither of us can hold her if she chooses to go away."
Such at least was Belmonti's confession, yet he was as far from consentingto let his captive go after this confession was made as he had beenbefore. He seems actually to have kept her for a while; but at length shewent boldly to Schuber's house, became one of his household, and with hisadvice and aid asserted her intention to establish her freedom by anappeal to law. Belmonti replied with threats of public imprisonment, thechain-gang, and the auctioneer's block.
Salome, or Sally, for that seems to be the nickname by which her kindredremembered her, was never to be sold again; but not many months were topass before she was to find herself, on her own petition and bond of$500, a prisoner, by the only choice the laws allowed her, in the famouscalaboose, not as a criminal, but as sequestered goods in a sort ofsheriff's warehouse. Says her petition: "Your petitioner has good reasonto believe that the said Belmonti intends to remove her out of thejurisdiction of the court during the pendency of the suit"; wherefore not_he_ but _she_ went to jail. Here she remained for six days and was thenallowed to go at large, but only upon _giving still another bond andsecurity_, and in a much larger sum than she had ever been sold for.
The original writ of sequestration lies before me as I write, indorsed asfollows:
No. 23,041.
Sally Miller ) Sequestration. ) vs. ) Sigur, Caperton ) Louis Belmonti. ) and Bonford.
Received 24th January, 1844, and on the 26th of the same month sequestered the body of the plaintiff and committed her to prison for safe keeping; but on the 1st February, 1844, she was released from custody, having entered bond in the sum of one thousand dollars with Francis Schuber as the security conditioned according to law, and which bond is herewith returned this 3d February, 1844.
B.F. LEWIS, d'y sh'ff.
Inside is the bond with the signatures, Frantz Schuber in German script,and above in English,
THE COURT PAPERS.]
handwritten text]
Also the writ, ending in words of strange and solemn irony: "In the yearof our Lord one thousand eight hundred and forty-four and in thesixty-eighth year of the Independence of the United States."
We need not follow the history at the slow gait of court proceedings. AtBelmonti's petition John F. Miller was called in warranty; that is, madethe responsible party in Belmonti's stead. There were "prayers" and rules,writs and answers, as the cause slowly gathered shape for final contest.Here are papers of date February 24 and 29--it was leap year--and
April1, 2, 8, and 27. On the 7th of May Frank Schuber asked leave, and on the14th was allowed, to substitute another bondsman in his place in orderthat he himself might qualify as a witness; and on the 23d of May the casecame to trial.