The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer

by Oscar Micheaux

  CHAPTER I

  DISCONTENT--SPIRIT OF THE PIONEER

  Good gracious, has it been that long? It does not seem possible; but itwas this very day nine years ago when a fellow handed me this littlewhat-would-you-call-it, Ingalls called it "Opportunity." I've a notionto burn it, but I won't--not this time, instead, I'll put it down hereand you may call it what you like.

  Master of human destinies am I. Fame, love, and fortune on my footsteps wait. Cities and fields I walk. I penetrate Deserts and seas remote, and passing by Hovel, and mart, and palace--soon or late I knock unbidden once at every gate. If sleeping, wake--if feasting, rise before I turn away. It is the hour of fate, And they who follow me reach every state Mortals desire, and conquer every foe Save death; but those who doubt or hesitate, Condemned to failure, penury, and woe Seek me in vain and uselessly implore, I answer not, and I return no more.

  Yes, it was that little poem that led me to this land and sometimes Iwonder well, I just wonder, that's all. Again, I think it would besomewhat different if it wasn't for the wind. It blows and blows untilit makes me feel lonesome and so far away from that little place and thecountry in southern Illinois.

  I was born twenty-nine years ago near the Ohio River, about forty milesabove Cairo, the fourth son and fifth child of a family of thirteen, bythe name of Devereaux--which, of course, is not my name but we will callit that for this sketch. It is a peculiar name that ends with an "eaux,"however, and is considered an odd name for a colored man to have, unlesshe is from Louisiana where the French crossed with the Indians andslaves, causing many Louisiana negroes to have the French names and manyspeak the French language also. My father, however, came from Kentuckyand inherited the name from his father who was sold off into Texasduring the slavery period and is said to be living there today.

  He was a farmer and owned eighty acres of land and was, therefore,considered fairly "well-to-do," that is, for a colored man. The countyin which we lived bordered on the river some twenty miles, and took itsname from an old fort that used to do a little cannonading for theFederal forces back in the Civil War.

  The farming in this section was hindered by various disadvantages and atbest was slow, hard work. Along the valleys of the numerous creeks andbayous that empty their waters into the Ohio, the soil was of a richalluvium, where in the early Spring the back waters from the Ohiocovered thousands of acres of farm and timber lands, and in recedingleft the land plastered with a coat of river sand and clay which greatlyadded to the soil's productivity. One who owned a farm on these bottomswas considered quite fortunate. Here the corn stalks grew like saplings,with ears dangling one and two to a stalk, and as sound and heavy asgreen blocks of wood.

  The heavy rains washed the loam from the hills and deposited it on thesebottoms. Years ago, when the rolling lands were cleared, and before theexcessive rainfall had washed away the loose surface, the highlands wereconsidered most valuable for agricultural purposes, equally as valuableas the bottoms now are. Farther back from the river the more rolling theland became, until some sixteen miles away it was known as the hills,and here, long before I was born, the land had been very valuable. Largebarns and fine stately houses--now gone to wreck and deserted--stoodbehind beautiful groves of chestnut, locust and stately old oaks, whererabbits, quail and wood-peckers made their homes, and sometimes araccoon or opossum founded its den during the cold, bleak winter days.The orchards, formerly the pride of their owners, now dropped theirneglected fruit which rotted and mulched with the leaves. The fields,where formerly had grown great crops of wheat, corn, oats, timothy andclover, were now grown over and enmeshed in a tangled mass of weeds anddew-berry vines; while along the branches and where the old rail fenceshad stood, black-berry vines had grown up, twisting their thorny stemsand forming a veritable hedge fence. These places I promised mother toavoid as I begged her to allow me to follow the big boys and carry theirgame when they went hunting.

  In the neighborhood and throughout the country there had at one timebeen many colored farmers, or ex-slaves, who had settled there after thewar. Many of them having built up nice homes and cleared the valley oftough-rooted hickory, gum, pecan and water-oak trees, and the highlandsof the black, white, red or post oak, sassafras and dogwood. They latergrubbed the stumps and hauled the rocks into the roads, or dammedtreacherous little streams that were continually breaking out andthreatening the land with more ditches. But as time wore on and theolder generation died, the younger were attracted to the towns andcities in quest of occupations that were more suitable to theirincreasing desires for society and good times. Leaving the farms to carefor themselves until the inevitable German immigrant came along andbought them up at his own price, tilled the land, improved the farm androads, straightened out the streams by digging canals, and grewprosperous.

  As for me, I was called the lazy member of the family; a shirker whocomplained that it was too cold to work in the winter, and too warm inthe summer. About the only thing for which I was given credit was inlearning readily. I always received good grades in my studies, but wascontinually criticised for talking too much and being too inquisitive.We finally moved into the nearby town of M--pls. Not so much to get offthe farm, or to be near more colored people (as most of the youngernegro farmers did) as to give the children better educationalfacilities.

  The local colored school was held in an old building made of plainboards standing straight up and down with batten on the cracks. It wasinadequate in many respects; the teachers very often inefficient, andbesides, it was far from home. After my oldest sister graduated she wentaway to teach, and about the same time my oldest brother quit school andwent to a near-by town and became a table waiter, much to thedissatisfaction of my mother, who always declared emphatically that shewanted none of her sons to become lackeys.

  When the Spanish-American War broke out the two brothers above meenlisted with a company of other patriotic young fellows and were takento Springfield to go into camp. At Springfield their company wasdisbanded and those of the company that wished to go on were acceptedinto other companies, and those that desired to go home were permittedto do so. The younger of the two brothers returned home by freight; theother joined a Chicago company and was sent to Santiago and later to SanLuis DeCuba, where he died with typhoid pneumonia.

  M--pls was an old town with a few factories, two flour mills, two orthree saw mills, box factories and another concern where veneering waspeeled from wood blocks softened with steam. The timber came from up theTennessee River, which emptied into the Ohio a few miles up the river.There was also the market house, such as are to be seen in towns of theSouthern states--and parts of the Northern. This market house, orplace, as it is often called, was an open building, except one endenclosed by a meat-market, and was about forty by one hundred feet withbenches on either side and one through the center for the convenience ofthose who walked, carrying their produce in a home-made basket. Those invehicles backed to a line guarded by the city marshall, forming analleyway the width of the market house for perhaps half a block,depending on how many farmers were on hand. There was always a rush toget nearest the market house; a case of the early bird getting the worm.The towns people who came to buy, women mostly with baskets, would fileleisurely between the rows of vehicles, hacks and spring wagons ofvarious descriptions, looking here and there at the vegetablesdisplayed.

  We moved back to the country after a time where my father complained ofmy poor service in the field and in disgust I was sent off to do themarketing--which pleased me, for it was not only easy but gave me achance to meet and talk with many people--and I always sold the goodsand engaged more for the afternoon delivery. This was my firstexperience in real business and from that time ever afterward I couldalways do better business for myself than for anyone else. I was notgiven much credit for my ability to sell, however, until my brother, whocomplained that I was given all the easy work while he had to labor anddo all the heavier farm work, was sent to do the marketing. He
was not asalesman and lacked the aggressiveness to approach people with a basket,and never talked much; was timid and when spoken to or approachedplainly showed it.

  On the other hand, I met and became acquainted with people quitereadily. I soon noticed that many people enjoy being flattered, and howpleased even the prosperous men's wives would seem if bowed to with apleasant "Good Morning, Mrs. Quante, nice morning and would you care tolook at some fresh roasting ears--ten cents a dozen; or some nice ripestrawberries, two boxes for fifteen cents?" "Yes Maam, Thank you! and O,Mrs. Quante, would you care for some radishes, cucumbers or lettuce fortomorrow? I could deliver late this afternoon, you see, for maybe youhaven't the time to come to market every day." From this association Isoon learned to give to each and every prospective customer a differentgreeting or suggestion, which usually brought a smile and a nod ofappreciation as well as a purchase.

  Before the debts swamped my father, and while my brothers were still athome, our truck gardening, the small herd of milkers and the chickenspaid as well as the farm itself. About this time father fell heir to apart of the estate of a brother which came as a great relief to his everincreasing burden of debt.

  While this seeming relief to father was on I became very anxious to getaway. In fact I didn't like M--pls nor its surroundings. It was a rivertown and gradually losing its usefulness by the invasion of railroads upand down the river; besides, the colored people were in the most partwretchedly poor, ignorant and envious. They were set in the ways oftheir localisms, and it was quite useless to talk to them of anythingthat would better oneself. The social life centered in the two churcheswhere praying, singing and shouting on Sundays, to back-biting,stealing, fighting and getting drunk during the week was common amongthe men. They remained members in good standing at the churches,however, as long as they paid their dues, contributed to the numerousrallies, or helped along in camp meetings and festivals. Others wereregularly turned out, mostly for not paying their dues, only to warm upat the next revival on the mourners bench and come through converted andbe again accepted into the church and, for awhile at least, live anear-righteous life. There were many good Christians in the church,however, who were patient with all this conduct, while there were andstill are those who will not sanction such carrying-on by staying in achurch that permits of such shamming and hypocrisy. These latter oftenleft the church and were then branded either as infidels or human devilswho had forsaken the house of God and were condemned to eternaldamnation.

  My mother was a shouting Methodist and many times we children would slipquietly out of the church when she began to get happy. The old and lessreligious men hauled slop to feed a few pigs, cut cord-wood at fiftycents per cord, and did any odd jobs, or kept steady ones when suchcould be found. The women took in washing, cooked for the white folks,and fed the preachers. When we lived in the country we fed so many ofthe Elders, with their long tailed coats and assuming and authoritativeairs, that I grew to almost dislike the sight of a colored man in aPrince Albert coat and clerical vest. At sixteen I was fairly disgustedwith it all and took no pains to keep my disgust concealed.

  This didn't have the effect of burdening me with many friends in M--plsand I was regarded by many of the boys and girls, who led in thewhirlpool of the local colored society, as being of the"too-slow-to-catch-cold" variety, and by some of the Elders as beingworldly, a free thinker, and a dangerous associate for young Christianfolks. Another thing that added to my unpopularity, perhaps, was mypersistent declarations that there were not enough competent coloredpeople to grasp the many opportunities that presented themselves, andthat if white people could possess such nice homes, wealth and luxuries,so in time, could the colored people. "You're a fool", I would be told,and then would follow a lecture describing the time-worn long and cruelslavery, and after the emancipation, the prejudice and hatred of thewhite race, whose chief object was to prevent the progress andbetterment of the negro. This excuse for the negro's lack of ambitionwas constantly dinned into my ears from the Kagle corner loafer to theminister in the pulpit, and I became so tired of it all that I declaredthat if I could ever leave M--pls I would never return. More, I woulddisprove such a theory and in the following chapters I hope to show thatwhat I believed fourteen years ago was true.