To My Old Master

[Richard]

Something to ponder as we slog through this election cycle and the Sesquicentennial of the American Civil War - a bit of History which offers us some perspective on how far we've come as a nation...and yet, how far our journey has yet to go as may be seen in the eyes of some of our oldest citizens.

And so it goes...

Richard

The following is a genuine document. It was dictated by the old servant, and contains his ideas and forms of expressions.

Dayton, Ohio,

August 7, 1865

To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again, promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never heard about your going to Colonel Martin's to kill the Union soldier that was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.

I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,—the folks call her Mrs. Anderson,—and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, "Them colored people were slaves" down in Tennessee. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it would be to my advantage to move back again.

As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor's visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the money by Adams's Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense. Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows. Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer of his hire.

In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.

Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.

From your old servant,

Jourdon Anderson.

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7035/6...6117fe88_o.jpg

[Cobwebs]

One cannot help but marvel at this slaves impeccable grammar and advanced mathematical skills for his place in time. (Just gives me pause) There were many injustices during that time and thru out the 1960's but we have tried as a nation to right our wrongs. Each of us has to look in the mirror and live with that person. What has each of us done individually to make things right?

[PRB]

thanks for sharing that. A great portal back in time. Truley an amazing letter.
I wonder what the response was?

[craigepo]

Reminds me of reading some of Frederick Douglass' stuff. There were some absolutely brutal slave owners.

I still find it mindbending that Robert E. Lee, an abolitionist, surrendered to U.S. Grant, a slave owner.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by craigepo

I still find it mindbending that Robert E. Lee, an abolitionist, surrendered to U.S. Grant, a slave owner.

I would, too, were it so.

Freeman, Douglas (1934). R. E. Lee, A Biography (First Edition Set ed.). New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, provides one of the best explanations for Lee's personal views on the institution of slavery - which were definitely not abolitionist although he never owned slaves (they were his wife's) - as contrasted to the post-Civil War 'lost cause' interpretations which were used to create a persona of Lee as a symbol of Southern honor and national reconciliation.

http://www.arlingtonblackheritage.or...curtislee.html

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/...f-robert-e-lee

US Grant never owned slaves - although he did use slaves belonging to his father-in-law (Frederick Dent) for several years while unsuccessfully managing the Dent family farm in Missouri prior to returning to an Army career.

http://www.nps.gov/ulsg/historyculture/slaveryatwh.htm

Richard

[Remington Raidr]

The American Experience . . .

[Box]

Very interesting read.
I agree... it would be worth a few nickels to see the letter of response.
The following two lines, by todays standards sound quite comedic, but if you just sit and read them to yourself a few times, it sort of speaks to the charachter of ole' Jourdan Anderson:

"Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living."

"Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me."


Jourdan Anderson is a bigger man than I.

[Dozer523]

Originally Posted by PRB

What an amazing letter.
I wonder what the response was?

I doubt it was a cheque.

[ZonieDiver]

I wonder what the response was?

He probably had to take it to a neighbor to have them explain the big words.

[Red Flag 1]

Originally Posted by Dozer523

I doubt it was a cheque.

Concur. Perhaps the good Col. simply mailed a single black powder propelled round to Mr. Anderson.

RF 1