American Dreams Trilogy
Page 46
Twenty-Four
*The first two sentences of this paragraph, and the last two, as well as certain other statements in this section not specifically related to this fictionalized converation with Richmond Davidson, are direct historical quotes made by Lee himself. Lee was given a number of slaves in the will of his father-in-law. When his wife’s father died and the slaves became Lee’s property, he granted them their freedom.
Part III: All Aboard
Twenty-Eight
*“The Southerner’s perpetually reiterated defense of slavery was that the slaves themselves accepted their status and were, in the main, carefree, happy creatures, devoted to their kindly masters and mistresses. Every black man or woman who escaped gave the lie to the story of the contented slave, and gave it in a peculiarly striking fashion by enduring great hardship and danger, including cruel punishment and even mutilation if caught and returned to his/her master. The so-called Underground Railroad, one of the most remarkable clandestine operations in all history, grew up gradually to assist fugitive slaves to reach freedom. Each year, as the moral outrage over slavery grew in the North, new recruits were added until the Railroad had thousands of conductors and hundreds of escape routes that reached from the Pennsylvania and the Ohio borders to Canada.”—Page Smith, The Nations Comes of Age, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981, p. 625.
Thirty-Two
* “On September 18, 1850, Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Law. This law allowed a former slave owner to recapture a runaway slave even in a free state… Because of the Fugitive Slave Law, a runaway could not truly be free in America. Canada did not allow slavery and wouldn’t return escaped slaves to their masters. Hundreds of runaways made the long, hard journey to freedom in Canada.”—Angela Medearis, Come This Far to Freedom. New York: Atheneum, 1993, p. 32.
“In 1850, Congress passed a new Fugitive Slave Law [Following original Fugitive Slave Law of 1793] that imposed severe penalties for aiding runaways, denied the accused any right to testify, and required citizens to help catch runaways. Slavery’s violence spilled into Northern streets. Whites who had believed that slavery would not touch them now faced jail and fines if they refused to follow the commands of slave-hunters.
“Black communities prepared for battle. Former slave Reverend Jarmain Loguen announced, ‘I don’t respect this law—I don’t fear it—I won’t obey it! It outlaws me and I outlaw it!’ Fugitive Lewis Hayden, who hid runaways in his Boston home, announded that he had placed two kegs of explosives in his basement and would blow up his house rather than surrender to anyone….
“Slave-hunters rode into the North and civilian forces were deployed and ready.”—William Karz, Breaking the Chains. New York: Atheneum, 1990, pp. 130-31.
Thirty-Six
* “A Tobacco planter named Colonel Hardy in the District of Columbia had lost five slaves… and although ‘they were pursued by an excellent slave catcher,’ they disappeared….
“The experience of Colonel Hardy’s slaves was a kind of textbook study of the way the Underground Railroad functioned. Jo Norton, one of the fugitives, told the story of the escape to a reporter for an abolitionist journal. Norton had been determined for some time to try to escape north with his wife and child. One night Norton met on a dark road a man whom he identified by his voice as a Northerner. Several weeks later he met the man again and told him of his desire to escape and was informed of the facilities of the Underground Railroad. He was told to return in three weeks to a certain spot late at night. At the rendezvous he met his ‘conductor’ and four other slaves—two men and two women—of Colonel Hardy’s, all terrified at the prospect of going under the ground. They were to follow the road some thirty miles in the direction of the north star until it came to a railroad and walk along the tracks until they encountered a man. If he said ‘Ben,’ they were to accompany him. They found Ben just as dawn was breaking, and he hid them in bundles of cornstalks. That night someone appeared and led the two women to a road where a carriage waited to take them to Baltimore, where they were hidden. The men were fed by Ben, a free black, and remained concealed in his corncrib. Meanwhile the item in the abolitionist journal describing their arrival in Albany was printed and sent to Colonel Hardy, who called off his slave hunters on the assumption that their quarry was out of reach. Only then did the flight continue. In Baltimore the fugitives were supplied with pocket money and told to behave naturally, mingling with the crowds and keeping track of a thirteen-year-old black boy who was to act as their guide. The boy led them to the edge of the city just at nightfall and from there they traveled by night, staying during the daytime at the homes of Quakers along the route. From Philadelphia they went by fishing boat to Bordentown, New Jersey, and from there on a train to New York, the women dressed in handsome clothes with veils to conceal their faces and riding first class, the men hidden in the baggage car. Jo Norton returned later to lead his wife and child to freedom.”—Page Smith, The Nation Comes of Age. New York: McGraw Hill, 1981, pp. 628-29.
Part IV: River Jordan
Thirty-Nine
*“To avoid the danger of blacks being employed as spies, each fugitive slave had to deliver a note from the conductor at the previous station to the conductor of the next. Needless to say, the ‘trains’ on the Underground Railroad ran irregularly. A light tap on a door or window any hour of the night or early morning might announce the arrival of a new ‘shipment of black wool.’”—Page Smith, The Nation Comes of Age, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981, pp. 628-29.
*“Levi Coffin was a North Carolina Quaker who moved to Newport, Indiana, where he became a prosperous businessman, president of the town bank, and one of the most active conductors on the road—so much so, indeed, that he became known as ‘the President of the Underground Railroad.’ He turned his business talents to improving the organization of the escape routes. His home in Newport became a kind of switching yard for refugees coming up from the South as well as those moving east and west seeking refuge in New York state or Canada. One night seventeen runaway slaves were brought to his home in two wagonloads by agents. They had hardly been fed and sent on their way before word reached Coffin that fifteen Kentucky slave hunters were on their track. Coffin arranged for the fugitives to be scattered across a number of tracks and the slave hunters, after three or four fruitless days, gave up and recrossed the Ohio.”—Page Smith, The Nation Comes of Age, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1981, pp. 628-29.
Dream of Life
Michael Phillips
Copyright
Dream of Life
Copyright © 2006 by Michael Phillips
Cover art to the electronic edition copyright © 2012 by Bondfire Books, LLC.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
See full line of eBook originals at www.bondfirebooks.com.
Author is represented by Alive Communications, Inc., 7680 Goddard St., Suite 200, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.
Electronic edition published 2012 by Bondfire Books LLC, Colorado.
ISBN e-Pub edition: 9780795326400
Dedication
To the Cherokee People and their noble ancestry, to my “one-fourth” Cherokee mother-in-law, Cherokee, to my “one-eighth” Cherokee wife, Judy, and to our three “one-sixteenth” Cherokee sons Patrick, Robin, and Gregory.
Contents
Prologue: From the Old Books—America
Seven Americans in the Royal Court
Part One: Troublesome Times for a Proud People
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Part Two: The Harvest Brings Life
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
&nb
sp; Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
Seventeen
Eighteen
Nineteen
Twenty
Twenty-One
Twenty-Two
Twenty-Three
Twenty-Four
Twenty-Five
Twenty-Six
Twenty-Seven
Part Three: Season of Unrest
Twenty-Eight
Twenty-Nine
Thirty
Thirty-One
Thirty-Two
Thirty-Three
Thirty-Four
Thirty-Five
Thirty-Six
Thirty-Seven
Thirty-Eight
Thirty-Nine
Forty
Forty-One
Forty-Two
Forty-Three
Part Four: A Nation Explodes
Forty-Four
Forty-Five
Forty-Six
Forty-Seven
Forty-Eight
Forty-Nine
Fifty
Fifty-One
Fifty-Two
Fifty-Three
Fifty-Four
Fifty-Five
Fifty-Six
Fifty-Seven
Fifty-Eight
From the Old Books—America
A hunter, a woman, a child
Ani-Yunwiya—The People
Attacullaculla, Chief of the White Feather
Nanye’hi Ward, Beloved Woman of the Cherokee
Long Canoe and the Secret of the Cave
Secret Mission
Trail of Tears
Notes from the Old Books
Bibliography and Source Materials
Families in Dream of Life
Endnotes
PROLOGUE
From the Old Books
—America—
Seven Americans in the Royal Court
1730
In the year 1729, the Scottish trader Ludovick Grant, enlisted by London adventurer Sir Alexander Cuming, a Scotsman by birth, ventured with Cuming through the rugged wooded region and along the trail over Ooneekawy Mountain into the heart of Cherokee land in the new world called America.
The idea for a voyage to the colonies to meet with native tribes had actually come to Cuming’s wife in a dream back at their home in England. A daring man by nature, Cuming had endorsed the prospect with enthusiasm. It would be an adventure, as well as a chance to help solidify relations with the Indians for the English over the French. Most of all it would increase his standing in the eyes of the English court.
Grant had been into Cherokee territory many times. He had traded with the Cherokee and knew both the settlement of Telliquo as well as that of Tannassy, named for the river, some sixteen miles away. Reaching some lasting agreement with the Cherokee was imperative. Their mission was all the more critical in light of evidence that the Indians were showing more favor toward the French. If another war broke out, the French could take control of all Carolina. Cuming hoped to prevent that by allying the Cherokee with England once and for all.
He had not exactly been sent by King George. But he was loyal to the Crown, and if he could win the Indians over, the English colonies would benefit enormously from the alliance. If it earned him the king’s favor, what Englishman would turn away kindness from the king’s eye?
When asked by Cuming to take him to the chief of the Cherokee, Grant had replied that the Cherokee had many chiefs.
“How many?” asked Cuming.
“Several for each village, and they have more than forty towns—there may be over a hundred chiefs, several hundred. I don’t know.”
“Then take me to the most important of them,” replied Cuming.
“I will take you to Moytoy,” replied Grant in thick Scottish brogue. “He is called the headman of Great Telliquo. But there are other powerful chiefs as well.”
Cuming was amazed at what he saw as they entered what was a village of remarkable size, with dozens of lodges of wood, bark, and mud, a variety of growing crops, and beasts of many kinds, the whole surrounded by a palisade perimeter of vertical logs bound side by side to a height of eight feet or more. He had heard that the Cherokees of DeSoto’s time had lived in sizeable cities. But he had envisioned something far more primitive than this. These people were obviously living a structured, semicivilized, community form of life.
Grant exchanged greetings in the native tongue. He was quickly speaking English again with a young man in his late teens or early twenties, anxious to try out his own broken English. Grant introduced him to Cuming as Ukwaneequa, nephew to the chief, a slight but engaging and personable young man of scarcely more than five feet in height but of keen intellect. His English was sufficient to quickly communicate Sir Alexander’s mission to his fellow villagers.
“And here is the chief’s son, my cousin Oconostota.”
Again Cuming offered his hand in friendship. The young warrior just introduced, however, neither took it nor betrayed any hint of welcoming expression. A momentary shudder went through Cuming’s frame as he glanced at the sheathed knife at his side. He would not want to meet this fellow alone in the forest on a dark night!
He turned again to the short and friendly Ukwaneequa, who now spoke to his cousin in the Cherokee tongue. Oconostota nodded, answered him a few words, then turned and left the group.
“My cousin says his mother is not well,” said the personable youth. “But I will tell my uncle that you are here, and that you come with greetings from the English king. In the meantime, be welcome in our village.”1
He turned and spoke to some of the others gathered around in his native tongue. While he went in search of his uncle, the rest of the villagers eagerly crowded about their visitors and made them to understand where they would stay. As they made their way through the village to the accompaniment of a growing throng of curious natives, Cuming could not help noticing the scalps of dead enemies hanging from poles in front of warrior houses. The Cherokee may have been one of the advanced tribes in this land, but he shuddered at this visual display of one of their customs.
When at last Moytoy made his appearance, warmly greeting Grant and speaking to Cuming through his nephew, he gave the British a tour of the palisaded town. After being introduced to the powerful priest Jacob the Conjurer, as the English called him, the village priest led them to several nearby caves of stunning beauty, where crystals of unmatched color and clarity grew out of the ground amid hundreds of stalactites and stalagmites. Neither Cuming nor any of his party had seen the like before.
“This is why they are sometimes called the cave people,” said Grant to Cuming. “This region is full of caves, and they make full use of them.”
By many signs and with the help of the chief’s nephew, the priest asked which color of crystal they fancied.
“The light purple,” replied Cuming. “It is the color of royalty.”
“He says for me to tell you,” said Ukwaneequa, “that it will be done, that he will find one the spirit of the cave will allow him to give as a gift to your king.”
Cuming nodded to the priest in gratitude.
“And there, at the far end of the great room of the cave is the great Uktena crystal. The blood of small animals must be fed it twice a week, and the blood of a deer twice a year.”
“Why?” asked Cuming.
“The crystal protects the tribe, as do the caves,” answered the chief’s nephew. “In times of war we hide our treasures, as well as our women and young, in the caves.”
“What kind of treasures?” asked Cuming.
“The yellow stones that come from the earth,” replied Ukwaneequa, “our paint and skins and royal feathers, and of course the crystals from the caves.”
Cuming and Grant exchanged glances but said nothing. Had they just heard what they thought they heard—yellow stones! Had DeSoto’s fabled quest for Cherokee gold actually been based on fact!
Back in the village,
after a meal of roasted rabbit and venison, Cuming and his two servants were invited to the headman’s lodge. At last Cuming got down to the business for which he had come so far into the wilds, to gain favor with the Cherokee over the French.
“We come in peace, Great Chief,” he began, “in the name of our king across the water. You are a mighty people whose fame travels far. It is our desire to make alliance between you—your chief and all your people—and my king and his people.”
Ukwaneequa turned to his uncle Okoukaula, Moytoy the younger, and, with occasional help from Grant, gave his uncle to understand Cuming’s words.
“We have many chiefs,” said Moytoy.
“I have heard of this—red chiefs and white chiefs.”
Moytoy nodded. “We have chiefs for war and for peace, and others as well.”
“But it is said that you are chief among your chiefs.”
“Perhaps, but only because I am the great Moytoy’s son. I am still only one among many.”
“You have no emperor, no headman among headmen?”
“I do not know this word. What is an emperor?”
“The ruler of all people.”
“I do not rule all our people. The council rules, not a single chief.”
Cuming thought a moment. “Perhaps you, great headman called Moytoy, shall become king of the chiefs. I shall appoint you emperor.”
Again it was silent. Now it was the Cherokee’s turn to revolve much in his mind.
“The War Chief of Tannassy, the other chiefs of the great council,” said Moytoy. “It may not be that all would agree.”
“But if I could persuade them to give their allegiance to you?” suggested Cuming.
“How would you do such a thing?”
“Give your allegiance to my king,” said Cuming, “and I will see that many gifts come to your people. You will be wealthy among the tribes, with blankets and beads and knives, perhaps even guns. For this would not the rest of the Cherokee give you their allegiance?”