"The darkies and the white folks in Union County had an insurrection
over the polls about the year 1888. In them days, when you wanted to put
a Republican man in, you didn't have to do much campaigning. They
just went to the polls and put him in. Everybody that could vote was
Republican. In the fall of 1888 they had a great trouble down there, and
some of them got killed. They went around and commanded the Negroes not
to go to the polls the next day. Some of the Negroes would tell them,
'Well, I am going to the polls tomorrow if I have to crawl.' And then
some of them would say, 'I'd like to know how you goin' to vote.' The
nigger would ask right back, 'How you goin' to vote?' The white man
would say, 'I'm goin' to vote as I damn please.' Then the nigger would
say, 'I'm going to do the same thing.' That started the trouble.
"On Sunday before the election on Monday, they went around through that
county in gangs. They shot some few of the Negroes. As the Negroes
didn't have no weapons to protect theirselves, they didn't have no
chance. In that way, quite a few of the Negroes disbanded their homes
and went into different counties and different portions of the state and
different states. Henry Goodman, my grandfather, came into Hot Spring
County in this way.