A more complicated story involved a Virginian, Philip Grey, and his wife, Willie Ann. Philip and Willie Ann had married before the war and had one child, Maria. Willie Ann and Maria were then taken to Kentucky. Philip never remarried, but Willie Ann married a Federal soldier who was killed in battle; three children were born to this union. After the war, Philip searched for his wife and daughter. It was obvious that Philip wanted his daughter back, but he was less sure about Willie Ann, although she still loved him and wanted to return to him. In an impassioned letter to Philip, Willie Ann wrote, “I know that I have lived with you and loved you then and I love you still... every time I hear from you my love grows stronger.” Nonetheless, Willie Ann insisted that Philip accept her now-fatherless other three children: “You must not think my family to large and get out of heart for if you love me you will love my children and you will have to promise me that you will provide for them all as well as if they were your own.”88 It is not clear whether Philip and Willie Ann Grey ever lived again together as husband and wife.
Cases involving two spouses and two sets of children were especially troubling and difficult to settle. James McCullum of North Carolina married again four years after his wife and two children were sold. Two children were also born to him and his second wife. When the war ended, McCullum’s first wife and children returned to him, and he now had two wives and two sets of children to choose from. Although he believed that only his first marriage was valid, McCullum sought a ruling from the Freedmen’s Bureau in Lumberton, North Carolina.89 Similarly, Elizabeth Botume reported the case of a woman whose husband was first sold away and then went into the army. Since she was again single, the woman took a second husband. Once the war concluded, the regiment of husband number one disbanded, and he returned to claim his wife. The woman had given birth to two boys with him, and a girl with husband number two. Both men wanted their own children. The poor woman was in a quandary. 90 Even more heart-wrenching was the experience of Laura Spicer and her slave husband, who had been separated for many years. The husband, assuming that Laura was dead, remarried and established a new family. After the war, he was shocked to learn that Laura was still alive. Although he decided to stay with his second wife, Anna, and refuse Laura, he reached that decision with great difficulty. In a series of letters to Laura, he wrote out his feelings:
I would come and see you but I know you could not bear it.... You know it never was our wishes to be separated from each other, and it never was our fault.... I had rather anything had happened to me most than ever have been parted from you and the children. As I am, I do not know which I love best, you or Anna.... I do not think I would die satisfied till you tell me you will try and marry some good, smart man that will take good care of you and the children; and do it because you love me; and not because I think more of the wife I have got than I do of you. The woman is not born that feels as near to me as you do.91
Sometimes freedmen and women found their relatives without at first knowing it. Since as slaves blacks were often separated from family at an early age, mothers sometimes did not recognize their children as adults and brothers and sisters did not recognize each other. As a result, they might marry each other without being aware of their kinship. William Mathews recalled, “After de war when dey was all free, dey marry who dey want to an’ sometime a long time after dat dey find out dat brothers had married dere siters an’ mothers had married dere sons, an’ things like dat.”92 Richard Carruthers maintained that he knew of many cases where brothers and sisters married. He offered the following scenario of how they usually found out that they were siblings: “One night they gits to talking. She say, ‘One time my brother had fight and he git a awful scar over his left ear. It long and slick and no hair grows there.’ He say, ‘See this scar over my let ear? It long and slick and no sign of a hair.’ Then she say, ‘Lawd God help us po’ niggers. You is my brother.’ ”93
The sad story of Bess, told by Tom Epps, further illustrates the painful consequences of slavery. When she was a little girl, Bess was sold from City Point, Virginia. Her mother was sold to a second trader, and her brother to a third one. Separated by many miles, they were unlikely to meet again. After the Civil War concluded, Bess walked all the way from Georgia to Richmond looking for her mother and her older brother but failed to locate them. While in Richmond searching for her family, Bess met and married a man, and two boys were born to this union. One day, Bess’s husband came home extremely happy because he had found his mother. The next day his mother came to live with him and Bess. The older woman knew right away that Bess was her daughter but only said, I am glad to know you. However, it bothered the woman so much that she could not keep it to herself. She “tole ‘em dat she was de mother to dem both, an’ dey was brother an’ sister.” Of course, both were very upset, “but dey was really in love so dey ‘cided to stay married.” This was too much for their mother to bear, and it was not long before she died, “ ‘cause she couldn’t stan’ seein’ her son and daughter livin’ wid each other.”94
THE QUEST TO FREE THEIR FAMILIES FROM WHITE CONTROL
Slave families, many of whom were divided because their members belonged to different owners, could now live together without the fear of forced separation. Parents began to assert the right to raise their own children. After the war, one mother reclaimed her child, Sarah Debro, whom the former mistress, Miss Polly, had been rearing in her own house. When the mother came to get her, Sarah did not want to leave, and Miss Polly said, “Let her stay with me.” But Sarah’s mother was defiant: “You took her away from me an’ didn’ pay no mind to my cryin’, so now, I’s takin’ her back home. We’s free now, Mis’ Polly. We ain’ gwine be slaves no more to nobody.”95 In most cases, however, black men and black women were not able to reclaim their children on their own and had to solicit the assistance of law enforcement officials or the Freedmen’s Bureau. Millie Randall remembered, “After Freedom ol’ marster wouldn’ ‘low my maw to hab us chillen. My maw hatter git de Jestice of de Peace to go mek him t’un us a-loose.”96
Lucinda Jacoway sought the aid of the Bureau in February 1866 to force William Bryant to release her four-year-old daughter, Jane Ellen. Bryant demanded that he be paid fifty dollars for the child. A Freedmen’s Bureau agent in Arkansas, John Vetter, directed a letter to Bryant on Jacoway’s behalf: “You are hereby instructed to surrender said child to the complainant.” He added, “and that immediately.” 97 In late 1867, Mary Brown returned from Canada to claim her two children whom she had left behind when she fled slavery. One of her daughters, Dinah, still lived as a slave in Nicholasville, Kentucky, and the other daughter, Mary Jane, was held in Fleming County in the same state. Brown was forced to seek redress through the Bureau since in each instance the former owner refused to give up the child.98 Even a woman who was considered insane appealed to the Bureau to force her former mistress to return her child. Mollie Williams’s mother had repeatedly tried to get Miss Marguerite to free Mollie, but efforts on her own proved futile. Then, according to Williams, “Nex’ time she come, she brung a written letter to Miss Marqurite frum de Free Man’s Board an’ taken me wid her.”99
The system of apprenticeship was more threatening to black families than the random refusal, which had no legal basis, of some former owners to release black children. Apprenticeships, on the other hand, were legal. Under the system, some Southern states allowed “responsible” employers to capitalize on the labor of minor children until they reached eighteen or twenty-one years of age, depending on gender. Wholesome food, suitable clothing, and medical care along with training in industry, housekeeping, or husbandry were to be provided to those apprenticed. Moreover, it was also understood that they were to be taught to read and write. Although children allegedly could not be apprenticed without parental consent, they frequently were. Ages were sometimes falsified to retain apprentices for longer periods of time. And, since many parents were not present when slavery ended, many former owners took advantage of their absen
ce by apprenticing the children before parents could return to claim them. Owing to the fact that there was not yet any protection of legal marriages, any child born in slavery could be considered an orphan and subject to apprenticeship. Indeed, postwar apprenticeship laws allowed former slaveholders to salvage much of the old labor system. At the same time, it divested parents of the labor useful to a family’s stride toward economic independence.100
Understandably, since blacks possessed a fierce attachment to family and were determined to take back control of the lives of kinfolk now that they were free, they waged intense battles against apprenticeship laws. They either defied the system on their own, used legal means through the hiring of lawyers, or sought the aid of the Freedmen’s Bureau. When Jane Kamper, for example, learned that her former master regarded her children’s apprenticeships as the price of her freedom, she took their recovery into her own hands. Kamper wrote in a letter to the Bureau that her former owner, William Townsend, “told me that I was free but that my children should be bound to me [him]. He locked my children up so that I could not find them. I afterwards got my children by stealth and brought them to Baltimore.” Townsend pursued her to the wharf in an effort to seize her children, but Kamper “hid them on the boat.” Although she made a successful escape, Kamper had to leave her bedclothes and furniture and requested the aid of the Bureau in retrieving them.101 In an effort to get his son released from an apprenticeship under W. R. Holt, his former owner, Orange Holt hired a lawyer to represent him and argued that his son had been neglected in W. R.’s care. Orange maintained that his son had become ill because of insufficient clothing. Harriet Holt also hired a lawyer to present her argument against W. R. Holt. Her attorney argued that Harriet’s two sons had been apprenticed to W. R. against her will and then contracted to another party. As a consequence of the strenuous efforts made by parents and relatives to regain their children, by January 1867, W. R. Holt asked to be released from his obligation for all but six of the eighteen children. 102 In another case, Henry Walton’s father went to court to have his apprenticeship to Mrs. Miller nullifed.103
While some Freedmen’s Bureau officials were reluctant to interfere with contracts, others showed some sensitivity toward blacks who were concerned about the welfare of their children and relatives. As a result, they sometimes tried to ferret out thinly disguised ruses that were used to reenslave children.104 Certainly, the Bureau was beseiged by letters seeking help in getting children released from apprenticeships. In Florence, Alabama, Martin Lee asked for assistance in getting custody of his nephew from his former owner, Sebe Burson, in Georgia. Lee could not understand why his family could not have custody of his nephew since “the law in our State is that a childe cannot be bounde when the[y] have mother father brother sistter uncl or Aunt that can take care of them.”105 Sallie Harris, a Virginian, wrote the Bureau requesting that her cousin Wilson, who was apprenticed to Mr. Jefferson, be released from his contract and allowed to come stay with her and her brother Albert. In a letter full of concern, Harris said, “I have a house for him and will take care of him and do all I can for him.” She wanted to take Wilson from Jefferson “because he is not treated well and as he is my cousin I think it my duty to see to him.”106 Another Virginian, Wister Miller, wrote to the Bureau asking that Charles Ganaway, his eleven-year-old brother-in-law, who was parentless and without a permanent home, be bound to him: “As I married his sister I feel it my duty to take care of him.”107 Moreover, Penny Barksdale also appealed to the Bureau for the return of her two grandchildren. Bureau officials ruled that Barksdale’s grandchildren be sent back to her because the teenagers were nearly old enough to support themselves and could help their aging grandmother.108 And, if they could, their help would free the government from having to take care of her.
Both those who held young blacks under apprenticeship and those working to nullify contracts claimed to represent the interest of the child. But how did the children themselves feel about apprenticeship? Apparently, many were opposed to the system. Their opposition was expressed through their refusal to return to their employers after visiting their families at Christmas or by fleeing to relatives. For example, Alfred, a twelve-year-old, left his master after two years and made his way to South Carolina. Although Alfred’s owner decided not to retrieve him, and to cancel the indenture, in many other cases the Bureau ordered the children returned to their lawful masters. Not only did some children resist apprenticeship for themselves but they fought on behalf of their siblings as well. In March 1867, five brothers filed for a writ of habeas corpus to release their sisters, aged eighteen, sixteen, twelve, and eight, all orphans held as apprentices.109
ADDITIONAL STEPS TO PROMOTE THE INTERESTS OF FAMILIES AND COMMUNITIES
Concern for the welfare of family members was also reflected in the attitudes of black soldiers in the post-Civil War period. A large number were not mustered out of service at the conclusion of the war but instead were retained as a part of the army’s occupation force in the South. This job fell on black troops to a large extent because they had not been allowed to join the armed services until well into the war, and, of course, many whites had enrolled from the start. Thus, black troops were required to serve out their terms. As expected, many of the black soldiers still on duty after the war were very worried about their families. After all, their relatives often had to depend on them for survival. Black soldiers from a Virginia regiment on garrison duty in Texas were so desperate to return home after receiving discouraging news from their loved ones that they offered to buy their way out of their enlistments. In a candid letter to army officials, the men spelled out their concern: “Wee have been on Dayley fetig [fatigue] from the last of Juli up to this Day without a forlough or any comfort what ever and our wives sends Letters stateing thir suferage saying that they are without wood without wrashions [rations] without money and no one to protect them.” Rather than allow their families to continue to suffer without their aid, the men argued that they would “pay for our next years serviss and be turned out then to stay in and no pertecttion granted to our wife.”110 Black soldiers from a South Carolina regiment pointed out that they “was expected to get out at the closing of the war, and then go back over the Rebels lands to look and seek for our wives and mother and father.” They were especially concerned because “we hadent nothing atall and our wifes and mother most all of them is aperishing.”111
Throughout the South, blacks extended bonds of kinship to nephews, nieces, and cousins. For example, Adam Woods of Kentucky rushed home from Kansas to take care of his three nephews when he found out that his brother, who was their father, had died. Woods indicated “that he is married and has an industrious wife and a good manager, and that he owns two houses and lots in Leavenworth and has no children and is well able to raise and educate the children of his deceased Brother.” Furthermore, in order to convince Freedmen’s Bureau officials that he had access to additional support if he needed it, he added that he “has Four sisters living and they are all doing well” together with two brothers who were doing superbly. All six of them “are able and willing to assist in raising and educating these children,” he noted. 112 In Florida, Dave Waldrop invited a female cousin in Montgomery, Alabama, who was struggling by herself to raise her three children, to come and live with him and his family. Waldrop promised her, “if you will come down here to me I will take care of you and your children and you and children shall never want for anything as long as I have anything to help you with... it is hard enough for a woman to get along that has a husband to help her and one that has not I do not know how they do to get a living these times.” With open arms, Waldrop wrote, “Cousin I want you to be shure and come down if you possibly can and stay here as long as you want to if it is three or four year it will not make a bit of difference to me.”113 Moreover, after the parents of Sally Porter, a former Virginia slave, died, Washington Brown, her uncle, took her into his household.114
Many freedmen took it upon themse
lves to adopt kin and non-kin children, again demonstrating not only a commitment to family but also a determination to protect children. Hannah Allen and her husband had no youngsters of their own but adopted a little boy who was born to her husband’s sister. The lad came to live with them when he turned three years of age and remained in their household until the age of nine. Hannah and her husband also adopted the biracial daughter of a black man and a white woman who was not related to them. After the woman and the girl’s father separated, the woman remarried, this time to a white man. Her new husband, however, did not want the child since its father was black. This couple went on to help raise about one dozen children.115 Although adoptions were acceptable to many African-American freedmen and women, some adoptive parents were guarded and sensitive. While Evangeline Banks grew up as the adopted daughter of Anna DeCosta Banks, her grandmother, Elizabeth DeCosta, allowed no one to refer to her adopted status. Anna still had not informed Evangeline when she died in 1930. Nevertheless, Evangeline had discovered her adoption several years earlier, but she refused to allow it to emotionally disrupt the pleasant life given to her by Anna Banks.116
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