Transcript
Slave letter
Source:
Cincinnati Commercial, reprinted in New York Tribune, August 22, 1865.
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 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 Col. 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 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 $25 a month, with
victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy (the folks
here 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, "The 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 Col. Anderson.
Many darkies would have been proud, as I used to was, 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 are
sincerely 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 $25 a month for me, and $2 a week for Mandy, our earnings would
amount to $11,680. Add to this the interest for the time our wages
has 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 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 Matilda and Catherine. I would rather
stay here and starve and die if it comes 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.
From your old servant,
Jourdon Anderson
P.S. -- Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the
pistol from you when you were shooting at me.
