Although the Emancipation Proclamation was delivered on January 1st,
1863 it was not until Lee's final surrender that most of the negroes
knew they were free. The Freedman's Bureau in Augusta gave out the news
officially to the negroes, but in most cases the plantation owners
themselves summoned their slaves and told them they were free. Many
negroes stayed right with their masters.
Carrie Lewis, a slave on Captain Ward's plantation in Richmond County,
said, when asked where she went when freedom came, "Me? I didn't went
nowhere. Da niggers come 'long wid de babies and dey backs, and say I
wus free, and I tell 'em I was free already. Didn't make no diffunce to
me--freedom."
Old Susannah from the Freeman plantation said, "When freedom come I got
mad at Marster. He cut off my hair. I was free so I come from Ca'lina to
Augusta to sue him. I walk myself to death! Den I found I couldn't sue
him over here in Georgia! I had to go back. He was jus' nachally mad
'cause we was free. Soon as I got here, dere was a lady on de street,
she tole me to come in, tek a seat. I stayed dere. Nex' mornin' I
couldn't stand up. My limbs was hurtin' all over."
Tim from the plantation in Virginia remembers distinctly when freedom
came to his people. "When we wus about to have freedom," he said, "they
thought the Yankees was a-goin' to take all the slaves so they put us on
trains and run us down south. I went to a place whut they call 'Butler'
in Georgia, then they sent me on down to the Chattahoochee, where they
were cuttin' a piece of railroad, then to Quincy, then to Tallahassee.
When the war ended I weren't 'xactly in 'Gusta, I was in Irwinville,
where they caught Mars. Jeff Davis. Folks said he had de money train,
but I never seed no gold, nor nobody whut had any. I come on up to
'Gusta and jined de Bush Arbor Springfield Church.
"When freedom came they called all the white people to the court house
first, and told them the darkies ware free. Then on a certain day they
called all the colored people down to the parade ground. They had a big
stand," explained Eugene Wesley Smith, whose father was a slave in
Augusta. "All the Yankees and some of our leading colored men got up
there and spoke, and told the negroes: "You are free. Don't steal! Now
work and make a living. Do honest work, make an honest living and
support yourself and children. There are no more masters. You are free!"
"When the colored troops came in, they came in playing:
'Don't you see the lightning?
Don't you hear the thunder?
It isn't the lightning,
It isn't the thunder
But the buttons on the Negro uniform!'
"The negroes shouted and carried on when they heard they were free."
This story of freedom was told by Edward Glenn of Forsythe County: "A
local preacher, Walter Raleigh, used to wait by the road for me every
day, and read the paper before I give it to Mistis. One day he was
waiting for me, and instead of handing it back to me he tho'wed it down
and hollered, 'I'm free as a frog!' He ran away. I tuk the paper to
Mistis. She read it and went to cryin'. I didn't say no more. That was
during the week. On Sunday morning I was talking to my brother's wife,
who was the cook. We were talking about the Yankees. Mistis come in and
say, 'Come out in the garden with me.' When we got outside Mistis said:
'Ed, you suppose them Yankees would spill their blood to come down here
to free you niggers?'
"I said, 'I dunno, but I'se free anyhow, Miss Mary.'"
"'Shut up, sir, I'll mash your mouth!"
"That day Marster was eating, and he said, 'Doc' (they called me Doc,
'cause I was the seventh son). 'You have been a good boy. What did you
tell your Mistis?'"
"I said, 'I told her the truth, that I knowed I was free.'
"He said, 'Well, Doc, you aren't really free. You are free from me, but
you aren't of age yet, and you still belong to your father and mother.'
"One morning I saw a blue cloud of Yankees coming down the road. The
leader was waving his arms and singing:
'Ha, ha, ha! Trabble all the day!
I'm in the Rebel's Happy Land of Caanan.
Needn't mind the weather,
Jump over double trouble,
I'm in the Rebel's Happy Land of Caanan.'
"The Yankee captain, Captain Brown, gathered all us negroes in the fair
ground, July or August after freedom, and he made a speech. Lawsy! I can
see that crowd yet, a-yelling and a-stomping! And the captain waving his
arms and shouting!
"'We have achieved the victory over the South. Today you are all free
men and free women!'
"We had everybody shouting and jumping, and my father and mother shouted
along with the others. Everybody was happy."
Janie Satterwhite's memories were very vivid about freedom. "Oh yas'm,"
she said, "my brudder comed fer me. He say, 'Jane, you free now. You
wanna go home and see Papa?' But old Mars say, 'Son, I don' know you and
you don' know me. You better let Jane stay here a while.' So he went
off, but pretty soon I slip off. I had my little black bonnet in my
hand, and de shoes Papa give me, and I started off 'Ticht, ticht; crost
dat bridge.
"I kept on till I got to my sister's. But when I got to de bridge de
river wus risin'. And I hadder go down de swamp road. When I got dere,
wus I dirty? And my sister say, 'How come you here all by yourself?' Den
she took off my clo'es and put me to bed. And I remember de next mornin'
when I got up it wus Sunday and she had my clo'es all wash and iron. De
fus' Sunday atter freedom."