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SHADOW AND LIGHT
[Illustration: Very truly yours, M. W. Gibbs]
SHADOW AND LIGHT
An Autobiography
With Reminiscences of the Last and Present Century.
by
MIFFLIN WISTAR GIBBS
With an Introduction by Booker T. Washington
A Fatherless Boy, Carpenter and Contractor, Anti-Slavery Lecturer,
Merchant, Railroad Builder, Superintendent of Mine, Attorney-at-Law,
County Attorney, Municipal Judge Register of United States Lands,
Receiver of Public Monies for U. S., United States Consul to
Madagascar--Prominent Race Leaders, etc.
Washington, D. C.
1902.
Copyright, 1902.
PREFACE.
During the late years abroad, while reading the biographies of
distinguished men who had been benefactors, the thought occurred that I
had had a varied career, though not as fruitful or as deserving of
renown as these characters, and differing as to status and aim. Yet the
portrayal might be of benefit to those who, eager for advancement, are
willing to be laborious students to attain worthy ends.
I have aimed to give an added interest to the narrative by embellishing
its pages with portraits of men who have gained distinction in various
fields, who need only to be seen to present the career of those now
living as worthy models, and the record of the dead, who left the world
the better for having lived. To enjoy a life prominent and prolonged is
a desire as natural as worthy, and there have been those who sought to
extend its duration by nostrums and drinking-waters said to bestow the
virtue of "perpetual life." But if "to live in hearts we leave behind is
not to die," to be worthy of such memorial we must have done or said
something that blessed the living or benefited coming generations. Hence
autobiography is the record, for "books are as tombstones made by the
living, but destined soon to remind us of the dead."
Trusting that any absence of literary merit will not impair the author's
cherished design to "impart a moral," should he fail to "adorn a tale."
Little Rock, Ark., January, 1902.
INTRODUCTION.
By BOOKER T. WASHINGTON.
It is seldom that one man, even if he has lived as long as Judge M. W.
Gibbs is able to record his impressions of so many widely separated
parts of the earth's surface as Judge Gibbs can, or to recall personal
experiences in so many important occurrences.
Born in Philadelphia, and living there when that city--almost on the
border line between slavery and freedom--was the scene of some of the
most stirring incidents in the abolition agitation, he was able as a
free colored youth, going to Maryland to work, to see and judge of the
condition of the slaves in that State. Some of the most dramatic
operations of the famous "Underground Railroad" came under his personal
observation. He enjoyed the rare privilege of being associated in labor
for the race with that man of sainted memory, the Hon. Frederick
Douglass. He met and heard many of the most notable men and women who
labored to secure the freedom of the Negro. As a resident of California
in the exciting years which immediately followed the discovery of gold,
he watched the development of lawlessness there and its results. A few
years later he went to British Columbia to live, when that colony was
practically an unknown country. Returning to the United States, he was a
witness to the exciting events connected with the years of
Reconstruction in Florida, and an active participant in the events of
that period in the State of Arkansas. At one time and another he has met
many of the men who have been prominent in the direction of the affairs
of both the great political parties of the country. In more recent years
he has been able to see something of life in Europe, and in his official
capacity as United States Consul to Tamatave, Madagascar, adjoining
Africa, has resided for some time in that far-off and strange land.
It would be difficult for any man who has had all these experiences not
to be entertaining when he tells of them. Judge Gibbs has written an
interesting book.
Interspersed with the author's recollections and descriptions are
various conclusions, as when he says: "Labor to make yourself as
indispensable as possible in all your relations with the dominant race,
and color will cut less figure in your upward grade."
"Vice is ever destructive; ignorance ever a victim, and poverty ever
defenseless."
"Only as we increase in property will our political barometer rise."
It is significant to find one who has seen so much of the world as Judge
Gibbs has, saying, as he does: "With travel somewhat extensive and
diversified, and with residence in tropical latitudes of Negro origin,
I have a decided conviction, despite the crucial test to which he has
been subjected in the past, and the present disadvantages under which he
labors, that nowhere is the promise along all the lines of opportunity
brighter for the American Negro than here in the land of his nativity."
I bespeak for the book a careful reading by those who are interested in
the history of the Negro in America, and in his present and future.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
CHAPTER I 3
Parents, School and Teacher--Foundation of
the Negroes' Mechanical Knowledge--First
Brick A. M. E. Church--Bishop Allen--Olive
Cemetery--Harriet Smith Home--"Underground
Railroad"--Incidents on the Road--William
and Ellen Craft--William Box Brown.
CHAPTER II 15
Nat Turner's Insurrection--Experience on a
Maryland Plantation--First Street Cars in
Philadelphia--Anti-Slavery Meetings--Amusing
Incidents--Opposition of Negro Churches--Kossuth
Celebration, and the Unwelcome
Guest.
CHAPTER III 29
Cinguez, the Hero of Armistead Captives--The
Threshold of Man's Estate--My First Lecturing
Tour with Frederic Douglass--His "Life
and Times"--Pen Picture of George William
Curtis of Ante-Bellum Conditions--Harriet
Beecher Stowe, Lucretia Mott, and Frances E.
Harper, a Noble Band of Women--"Go Do
Some Great Thing"--Journey to California--Incidents
at Panama.
CHAPTER IV 40
Arrival at San Francisco--Getting Domiciled
and Seeking Work--Strike of White Employees--Lester
& Gibbs, Importers--Assaulted
in Our Store--First Protest from the
Colored Men of California--Poll Tax.
CHAPTER V 51
"Vigilance Committee" and Lynch Law at
"Fort Gunny"--Murder of James King, of William--A
Paradox to Present Conditions.
CHAPTER VI 59
Gold Discovery in British Columbia--Incidents
on Shipboard and Arrival at Victoria--National
Unrest in 1859--"Irrepressible Conflict"--Garrison
and Douglass--Harriet Beecher
Stowe and Frances Ellen Harper--John Brown
of Harper's Ferry--"Fugitive Slave Law"--Flight
to Canada.
CHAPTER VII 74
Abraham Lincoln President--Rebellion Inaugurated--Success
of the Union Army--Re-Election
of Lincoln--Bravery and Endurance of
Negro Soldiers--Assassination of Lincoln--Lynching
Denounced by Southern Governors
and Statesmen--Words of Wisdom from
St. Pierre de Couberton.
CHAPTER VIII 85
My First Entry Into Political Life--Intricacies
of the Ballot--Number of Negro Schools,
Pupils and Amount of School Property in 1898--Amendment
to Constitution and Interview
with Vice-President Schuyler Colfax at Victoria,
B. C.--William Lloyd Garrison, Jr., and
James Russell Lowell on the Right to Vote.
CHAPTER IX 93
Philip A. Bell, a Veteran Editor of the "Negro
Press"--British Columbia, Its Early History,
Efforts for Annexation to the United States--Meeting
with Lady Franklin, Widow of Sir
John Franklin, the Arctic Explorer, in 1859--Union
of British Columbia with the Dominion
of Canada in 1868, the Political Issue--Queen
Charlotte Island--Anthracite Coal Company--Director,
Contractor and Shipper of First
Cargo of Anthracite Coal on the Pacific
Coast--Indians and Their Peculiarities.
CHAPTER X 107
An Incident of Peril--My Return to the United
States in 1869--Thoughts and Feelings En
Route--Entered Oberlin Law College and
Graduated--Visit to my Brother, J. C. Gibbs,
Secretary of State of Florida--A Delegate to
the National Convention of Colored Men at
Charleston, S. C.--"Gratitude Expensive"--The
Trend of Republican Leaders--Contribution of
Southern White People for Negro Education--Views
of a Leading Democrat.
CHAPTER XI 122
President of National Convention at Nashville,
Tenn., in 1876--Pen and Ink Sketch by H. V.
Redfield of "Cincinnati Commercial"--Colored
Leaders Desire to Fraternize for Race Protection--William
H. Grey, H. B. Robinson, and
J. H. Johnson, of Arkansas, Leaders and
Planters--My Arrival at Little Rock, May,
1871--Reading of Local Statutes in the Law
Office of Benjamin & Barnes--"Wheeler &
Gibbs," Attorneys-at-Law.
CHAPTER XII 134
Politics and Politicians--Disruption of the Republicans
in Arkansas--"Minstrels and Brindle
Tails"--Early Canvassing in the South,
with Its Peculiarities--Ku Klux Visits--My
Appointment as County Attorney and Election
as Municipal Judge--Hon. John Allen, of Mississippi,
His Descriptive Anecdote.
CHAPTER XIII 145
Lowering Cloud on Righteous Rule--Comparison
of Negro Progress--Sir Walter Scott in His
Notes on English History--George C. Lorimer,
a Noted Divine--Educational Solution of the
Race Problem--Baron Russell, Lord Chief Justice
of England--Civil War in Arkansas--Expulsion
of Governor Baxter and Instalment
of Governor Brooks at the State Houses--Stirring
Episodes--"Who Shall Bell the
Cat?"--Extraordinary Session of the Legislature--My
Issue of a Search Warrant for the
Seal of the State--Recognition of Baxter by
the President.
CHAPTER XIV 158
Arkansas Constitutional Convention and New
Constitution Adopted--Augustus H. Garland
Elected Governor--My Letter from Madagascar
on Learning of His Demise--General
Grant's Nomination in 1872 at the Academy of
Music, Philadelphia--Oliver P. Morton, of Indiana--William
H. Gray, of Arkansas--R. B.
Elliot, of South Carolina--"Henry at Ajincourt"--Study
of Obsolete Languages Versus
Industrial Education--Views of Lord Rosebery,
ex-Premier of England--Also of Washington
Post--United States Have Supreme
Advantages for the Negro.
CHAPTER XV 173
Presidential Elector in 1876, Receiving the
Highest Vote--President Hayes, His Yearnings
and Accomplishments--Protest Against
Lawlessness by the Negroes in State Conventions--Negro
Exodus from the Southern to the
Western States in 1878--Secretary William
Windom's Letter--Hon J. C. Rapier, of Alabama,
and Myself Appointed by Secretary
Windom to Visit Western States and Report.
CHAPTER XVI 185
Appointed by the President in 1877 Register
of U. S. Lands--Robert J. Ingersoll on the
Benignity of Homestead Law--General
Grant's Tour Around the World and His
Arrival at Little Rock, 1879--A Guest at the
Banquet Given Him--Response to the Toast,
"The Possibilities of American Citizenship"--Roscoe
Conkling's Speech Nominating General
Grant for Third Term--Bronze Medal as one of
the Historic "306" at the National Convention
of 1880--The Manner of General Grant's Defeat
for Nomination and Garfield's Success--Character
Sketches of Hon. James G. Blaine,
Ingersoll's Mailed Warrior and Plumed Knight--Hon
Grover Cleveland.
CHAPTER XVII 195
Honorary Commissioner for the Colored Exhibits
of the World's Exposition at New Orleans,
La.--Neglected Opportunities--Important
Factors Necessary to Recognition.
CHAPTER XVIII 201
Effort of Henry Brown, of Oberlin, Ohio, to
Establish "Schools of Trade"--Call for a Conference
of Leading Colored Men in 1885--Industrial
Fair at Pine Bluff, Ark.--Captain
Thompson, of the "Capital Guards," a Colored
Military Company--Meeting of Prominent
Leaders at New Orleans--The Late N. W.
Cuney, of Texas--Contented Benefactions
from Christian Churches.
CHAPTER XIX 215
The Reunion of General Grant's "306"--Ferdinand
Havis, of Pine Bluff--Compromise and
Disfranchisement--Progress of the Negro--"Decoration
Day"--My Letter to the "Gazette"--Commission
to Sell Lots of the Hot
Springs Reservation--Twelve Years in the
Land Service of the United States.
CHAPTER XX 223
My Appointment as U. S. Consul to Tamatave,
Madagascar--My Arrival in France En Route
to Paris--Called on Ambassador Porter and
Consul Gowdy Relative to My "Exequator"--Visited
the Louvre, the Famous Gallery of
Paintings--"Follies Bergere," or Variety
Theater--The "Dome des Invalids" or the
Tomb of the Great Napoleon--Mrs. Mason, of
Arkansas and Washington, in Paris--Marseilles
and "Hotel du Louvre"--Embarkation
on French Ship "Pie Ho" for Madagascar--Scenes
and Incidents En Route--"Port Said"--Visit
to the "Mosque," Mohammedan Place of
Worship.
CHAPTER XXI 236
Suez Canal--The Red Sea--Pharaoh and His
Hosts--Their Waterloo--Children of Israel--Travel
by Sea--Arrival and Landing at Madagascar--Bubonic
Plague--My Letter From
Madagascar.
CHAPTER XXII 250
Island of Madagascar--Origin and Character
of the Inhabitants--Their Religion and Superstitions--Physical
Appearance of Madagascar--A
Word Painting of Antananarivo, the
Capital, by Cameron--Forms of Government--Queens
of Madagascar--Slavery and Forced
Labor.
CHAPTER XXIII 265
Introduction of the Christian Religion--Printing
the Bible, Edict by Queen Ranavalona
Against It--The New Religion "a Cloth of a
Pattern She Did Not Like"--Asked the Missionaries,
"Can You Make Soap?"--"Dark
Days"--Persecutions and Executions for a
Quarter of a Century--Examples of Christian
Martyrs--Death of Queen Ranavalona--Permanent
Establishment of the Christian Religion--Self-denial
and Heroic Service of the Roman
Catholics--Native Race Protection Committee--Forced
Labor Abolished.
CHAPTER XXIV 282
Cuba and the Philippines--Their Acquisition
Under the Plea of Relief From Spanish Misrule--Aguinaldo,
Leader of the Filipinos--The
Fidelity and Bravery of the American Negro
in the Spanish War--Attestation by Many Witnesses--Industrial
Education--Othello's Occupation
Gone When Polls are Closed.
CHAPTER XXV 298
Opposition Possibly Beneficent--President McKinley's
Order for Enlistment of Colored Soldiers--General
Grosvenor's Tribute--Fifteen
Thousand in the Spanish War--U. S. Supreme
Court vs. The Negro--The Basis of Congressional
Representation.
CHAPTER XXVI 306
Departure from Madagascar--Memories--Governor
General's Farewell Letter--Madagascar
Branch of the Smithsonian Institute--Wild
Animals, a Consul's Burden--Descriptive Letter
to State Department.
CHAPTER XXVII 312
Leave-taking, its Jollity and Sadness--Arrival
at Camp Aden, Arabia--An Elysium for the
Toper--Whisky Was Plenty, But the Water
Was Out--Pleasant Visit to U. S. Consul Cunningham,
of Knoxville, Tenn.--Arrival at
Suez--My Visit to the U. S. Cruiser "New
York"--The Urbanity of Captain Rogers--Suez
Canal--Port Said--"Mal de Mer"--Marseilles
to Paris--Across the English Channel to
London.
CHAPTER XXVIII 320
My First Visit to the Land of Wilberforce
and Clarkson--Excursion on the Thames--Bank
of England--Visited Towers of London--Beauchamp
Tower With Its Sad Inscriptions--Arrival
at New York--National Negro Business
Men's League Convention at Chicago--Booker
T. Washington President--Many Talented
Business Men in Attendance.
CHAPTER XXIX 327
Visit to President McKinley at Canton, Ohio--His
Assassination at Buffalo--The Assassin
Struck Down by James Parker--President's
Death--The Nation in Tears--A Christian
Statesman--A Lover of Justice--Crucial
Epochs of Our Country's History, the Negro
at the Fore.
CHAPTER XXX 336
President Roosevelt--His Imperial Honesty--Ex-Governor
Jones, of Alabama--Advance of
Justice in Our Country--Status a Half-Century
Ago--Theodore Parker's Arraignment--Eulogy
by Ralph Waldo Emerson.
CHAPTER XXXI 343
Booker T. Washington a Guest at the White
House--Northern and Southern Press Comments--The
Latter Not Typical of the Best
Element of Southern Opinion.
CHAPTER XXXII 361
Washington City, the American Mecca--Ante-room
at the White House--The Diary of
an Office Seeker--William, the Innocent--William,
the Croker--Colored People of the
District of Columbia--Colored Press of the District.
CHAPTER XXXIII 269
Howard University--Public Schools--R. H.
Terrell Appointed to a Judgship of the District--Unlettered
Pioneers--Conclusions.
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
1. M. W. Gibbs Frontispiece.
2. Richard Allen 8
3. Wm. Lloyd Garrison 18
4. Frederick Douglass 32
5. Booker T. Washington 44
6. H. M. Turner 50
7. Geo. H. White 58
8. J. M. Langston 70
9. Abraham Lincoln 74
10. W. B. Derrick 80
11. Alexander Walters 92
12. H. P. Cheatham 104
13. Edward E. Cooper 118
14. Judson Lyons 128
15. Powell Clayton 140
16. P. B. S. Pinchback 149
17. A. H. Garland 158
18. J. A. Booker 172
19. I. G Ish 175
20. J. P. Green 183
21. P. L. Dunbar 199
22. B. K. Bruce 204
23. T. T. Fortune 210
24. W. A. Pledger 220
25. John C. Dancy 228
26. Abram Grant 253
27. J. E. Bush 263
28. J. P. Robinson 272
29. Martyrs 274
30. Chester W. Keatts 284
31. J. T. Settle 294
32. Justice Harlan 302
33. Charles W. Chestnut 312
34. William McKinley 327
35. James B. Parker 331
36. President Roosevelt 336
37. Secretary Cortelyou 341
38. W. Calvin Chase 367
39. R. H. Terrill 370
CHAPTER I.
In the old family Bible I see it recorded that I was born April 17,
1823, in Philadelphia, Pa., the son of Jonathan C. Gibbs and Maria, his
wife. My father was a minister in the Wesleyan Methodist Church, my
mother a "hard-shell" Baptist. But no difference of religious views
interrupted the even tenor of their domestic life. At seven years of age
I was sent to what was known as the Free School, those schools at that
time invaluable for colored youth, had not graded studies, systematized,
and with such accessories for a fruitful development of the youthful
mind as now exist. The teacher of the school, Mr. Kennedy, was an
Irishman by birth, and herculean in proportions; erudite and severely
positive in enunciation. The motto "Spare the rod and spoil the child"
had no place in his curriculum. Alike with the tutors of the deaf and
the blind, he was earnest in the belief that learning could be
impressively imparted through the sense of feeling. That his manner and
means were impressive you may well believe, when I say that I yet have a
vivid recollection of a bucket with an inch or two of water in it near
his desk. In it stood an assortment of rattan rods, their size when
selected for use ranging in the ratio of the enormity, of the offence
or the age of the offender.
Among the many sterling traits of character possessed by Mr. Kennedy was
economy; the frequent use of the rods as he raised himself on tiptoe to
make his protest the more emphatic--split and frizzled them--the
immersion of the tips in water would prevent this, and add to the
severity of the castigation, while diminishing the expense. A policy
wiser and less drastic has taken the place of corporal punishment in
schools. But Mr. Kennedy was competent, faithful and impartial. I was
not destined to remain long at school. At eight years of age two events
occurred which gave direction to my after life. On a Sunday in April,
1831, my father desired that the family attend his church; we did so and
heard him preach, taking as his text the 16th verse of Chapter 37 in
Genesis: "I seek my brethren; tell me, I pray thee, where they feed
their flocks."
On the following Sunday he lay before the pulpit from whence he had
preached, cold in death, leaving my mother, who had poor health, with
four small children, and little laid by "for a rainy day." Unable to
remain long at school, I was "put out" to hold and drive a doctor's
horse at three dollars a month, and was engaged in similar employment
until I reached sixteen years of age. Of the loving devotion and
self-sacrifice of an invalid mother I have not words to express, but
certain it is, that should it ever appear that I have done anything to
revere, or aught to emulate, it should be laid on the altar of her
Christian character, her ardent love of liberty and intense aspiration
for the upbuilding of the race. For her voice and example was an
educator along all the lines of racial progress.
Needing our assistance in her enfeebled condition, she nevertheless
insisted that my brother and myself should learn the carpenter trade. At
this period in the career of youth, the financial condition of whose
parents or sponsors is unequal to their further pursuit of scholastic
studies, it is not without an anxious solicitude they depart from the
parental roof. For the correct example and prudent advice may not be
invulnerable to the temptation for illicit pleasures or ruinous conduct.
Happy will he be who listens to the admonitions of age. Unfortunately by
the action of response, sad in its humor, too often is: I like the
advice but prefer the experience.
The foundation of the mechanical knowledge possessed by the Negro was
laid in the Southern States. During slavery the master selecting those
with natural ability, the most apt, with white foremen, had them taught
carpentering, blacksmithing, painting, boot and shoe making, coopering,
and other trades to utilize on the plantations, or add to their value as
property. Many of these would hire themselves by the year from their
owners, contract on their own account, and by thrift purchase their
freedom, emigrate and teach colored youths of Northern States, where
prejudice continues to exclude them from the workshops, while at the
South the substantial warehouse and palatial dwelling from base to dome,
is often the creation of his brain and the product of his handiwork.
James Gibbons, of the class above referred to, and to whom we were
apprenticed, was fat, and that is to say, he was jolly. He had ever a
word of kind encouragement, wise counsel or assistance to give his
employees. Harshness, want of sympathy or interest is often the
precursor and stimulator to the many troubles with organized labor that
continue to paralyze so many of our great industrial concerns at the
present time, resulting in distress to the one and great material loss
to the other. Mr. Gibbons had but a limited education, but he possessed
that aptitude, energy, and efficiency which accomplishes great objects,
that men call genius, and which is oftimes nothing more than untiring
mental activity harnessed to intensity of purpose. These constituted his
grasp of much of the intricacies of mechanical knowledge. His example
was ever in evidence, by word and action, that only by assidious effort
could young men hope to succeed in the battle of life.
Mr. Gibbons was competent and had large patronage. We remained with him
until we reached our majority. During a religious revival we both became
converted and joined the Presbyterian Church. My brother entered
Dartmouth College, under the auspices of the Presbyterian Assembly,
graduated and ministered in the church at Philadelphia. After a brief
period as a journeyman, I became a contractor and builder on my own
account. It is ever a source of strength for a young person to have
faith in his or her possibilities, and as soon as may be, assume
mastership.
While remaining subject to orders, the stimulus is lacking for that
aggressive energy, indispensable to bring to the front. Temporary
failure you may have, for failure lies in wait for all human effort, but
sneaks from a wise and unconquerable determination. We read of the
military prisoner, alone, dejected, and despairing, looking to the walls
of his cell; he watches a score of attempts and failure of a spider to
scale the wall, only to renew an attempt crowned with success. The
lesson was fruitful for the prisoner.
Mr. Gibbons built several of the colored churches in Philadelphia, and
in the early forties, during my apprenticeship, he was a bidder for the
contract to build the first African Methodist Episcopal brick church of
the connection on the present site at Sixth and Lombard streets in
Philadelphia. A wooden structure which had been transformed from a
blacksmith shop to a meeting house was torn down to give place to the
new structure. When a boy I had often been in the old shop, and have
heard the founder, Bishop Allen, preach in the wooden building. He was
much reverenced. I remember his appearance, and his feeble, shambling
gait as he approached the close of an illustrious life.
The A. M. E. Church was distinctively the pioneer in the career of
colored churches; its founders the first to typify and unflinchingly
assert the brotherhood of man and the Fatherhood of God. Dragged from
their knees in the white churches of their faith, they met exclusion by
cohesion; ignorance by effort for culture, and poverty by unflinching
self-denial; justice and right harnessed to such a movement, who shall
declare its ultimatum.
Out from that blacksmith shop went an inspiration lifting its votaries
to a self-reliance founded on God, a harbinger of hope to the enslaved.
From Allen to Payne, and on and on along lines of Christian fame, its
missionaries going from triumph to triumph in America, and finally
planting its standard on the isles of the sea.
A distinct line is ever observable between civilization and barbarism,
in the regard and reverence for the dead, the increase of solicitude is
evidence of a people's advancement. Until the year 1848 the colored
people of Philadelphia used the grounds, always limited, in the rear of
their churches for burial. They necessarily became crowded, with
sanitary conditions threatening, without opportunity to fittingly mark
and adorn the last resting place of their dead.
[Illustration: RIGHT REV. RICHARD ALLEN.
First Bishop of the A. M. E. Church.
Founder of that Faith That Once Nestled in a Blacksmith Shop, But Now
Encircles the World.]
In the above year G. W. Gaines, J. P. Humphries, and the writer
purchased a tract of land on the north side of Lancaster turnpike, in
West Philadelphia, and were incorporated under the following act by the
Legislature of the State of Pennsylvania: "An Act to incorporate the
Olive Cemetery Company," followed by the usual reservations and
conditions in such cases provided. Among reasons inducing me to refer to
this are, first, to give an idea of the propriety and progress of the
race fifty years ago, and secondly, for the further and greater reasons,
as the following will show, that the result of the project was not only
a palladium for blessed memory of the dead, but was the nucleus of a
benefaction that still blesses the living.
The land was surveyed and laid out in lots and avenues, plans of gothic
design were made for chapel and superintendent's residence, and contract
for construction was awarded the writer. The project was not entirely an
unselfish one, but profit was not the dominating incentive. After
promptly completing the contract with the shareholders as to buildings
and improvements of the ground, the directors found themselves in debt,
and welcomed the advent of Stephen Smith, a wealthy colored man and
lumber merchant, to assist in liquidating liabilities. To him an
unoccupied portion of the ground was sold, and in his wife's heart the
conception of a bounteous charity was formed. The "Old Folks' Home," so
beneficent to the aged poor of Philadelphia, demands more than a passing
notice.
"The Harriet Smith Home for Aged and Infirm Colored Persons" is a
continuation of a charity organized September, 1864, and the first board
of managers (a noble band of humanitarians) elected. The preamble was as
follows: "For the relief of that worthy class of colored persons who
have endeavored through life to maintain themselves, but who, from
various causes, are finally dependent on the charity of others, an
association is hereby organized." The work of this home was conducted in
a large dwelling house on South Front street until the year 1871, when,
through the munificence of Stephen Smith and his wife, the land on the
corner of Belmont and Girard avenues, previously purchased from the
Olive Cemetery Company, together with a large four-story building,
valued at $40,000, was given to the Board. In 1871 it was opened as the
"Harriet Smith Home," where it still stands as an enduring monument to
the original donors, and other blessed friends of the race, who have
continued to assist with generous endowments. Edward T. Parker, who died
in 1887, gave $85,000 for an annex to the building. Colored people since
its incipiency have given $200,000. The board is composed of white and
colored persons. On a recent visit I found the home complete,
convenient, and cleanly in all its appurtenances, with an air of
comfort and contentment pervading the place. From many with bent and
decrepit bodies, from wrinkled and withered faces, the sparkling eye of
gratitude could be seen, and prayer of thankfulness read; for this
product of a benign clemency that had blessed both the giver and
receiver. There can be no one with filial affection happy in the thought
that it is in their power to assuage the pain or assist the tottering
steps of their own father or mother, but will recognize the humanity,
Christian character, and unselfishness of the men and women organized
for giving the helping hand to the "unfortunate aged, made dependent by
blameless conditions."
During my apprenticeship, aware of my educational deficiencies, having
been unable to pursue a consecutive course of study in earlier life, I
spent much of the night and odd times in an endeavor to make up the
loss. In joining the Philadelphia Library Company, a literary society of
colored men, containing men of such mental caliber as Isaiah C. Wear,
Frederick Hinton, Robert Purvis, J. C. Bowers, and others, where
questions of moment touching the condition of the race were often
discussed with acumen and eloquence, I was both benefited and
stimulated. It was a needed help, for man is much the creature of his
environments, and what widens his horizon as to the inseparable
relations of man to man and the mutuality of obligation, strengthens
his manhood in the ratio he embraces opportunity.
Pennsylvania being a border State, and Philadelphia situated so near the
line separating the free and slave States, that city was utilized as the
most important adjunct or way-station of the "underground railroad," an
organization to assist runaway slaves to the English colony of Canada.
Say what you will against old England, for, like all human polity, there
is much for censure and criticism, but this we know, that when there
were but few friends responsive, and but few arms that offered to succor
when hunted at home, old England threw open her doors, reached out her
hand, and bid the wandering fugitive slave to come in and "be of good
cheer."
As one of the railroad company mentioned, many cases came under my
observation, and some under my guidance to safety in Canada. One of the
most peculiar and interesting ones that came under by notice and
attention, was that of William and Ellen Craft, fugitives from the State
of Georgia. Summoned one day to a colored boarding house, I was
presented to a person dressed in immaculate black broadcloth and silk
beaver hat, whom I supposed to be a young white man. By his side stood a
young colored man with good features and rather commanding presence. The
first was introduced to me as Mrs. Craft and the other as her husband,
two escaped slaves. They had traveled through on car and boat, paying
and receiving first-class accommodations. Mrs. Craft, being fair,
assumed the habit of young master coming north as an invalid, and as she
had never learned to write, her arm was in a sling, thereby avoiding the
usual signing of register on boat or at hotel, while her servant-husband
was as obsequious in his attentions as the most humble of slaves. They
settled in Boston, living very happily, until the passage of the
fugitive slave law in 1850, when they were compelled to flee to England.
The civil war of 1861 and proclamation of freedom followed. In 1870,
arriving in Savannah, Georgia, seeking accommodation, I was directed to
a hotel, and surprised to find the host and hostess my whilom friends of
underground railroad fame. They had returned to their old home after
emancipation. The surprise was pleasant and recognition mutual.
One other, and I shall pass this feature of reminiscence. It was that of
William Brown, distinguished afterward as William Box Brown, the
intervening "Box" being a synonym of the manner of his escape. An agent
of the underground railroad at Richmond, Virginia, had placed him in a
box two feet wide and four feet long, ends hooped, with holes for air,
and bread and water, and sent him through the express company to
Philadelphia. On the arrival of the steamboat the box was roughly
tumbled off as so much dead freight on the wharf, but, unfortunately
for Brown, on the end, with his feet up and head down. After remaining
in such position for a time which seemed to him hours, he heard a man
say to another, "Let's turn that box down and sit on it." It was done,
and Brown found himself "right side up," if not "with care." I was
called to the anti-slavery office, where the box was taken. It had been
arranged that when he arrived at his destination, three slow and
distinct knocks should be given, to which he was to respond. Fear that
he was crippled or dead was depicted in the faces of Miller McKim,
William Still and a few others that stood around the box in the office.
Hence it was not without trepidation the agreed signal was given, and
the response waited for. An "all right" was cheerily given; the lifting
of suspense and the top of the box was almost simultaneous. Out sprang a
man weighing near 200 pounds. Brown, though uneducated, it is needless
to say, was imbued with the spirit of liberty, and with much natural
ability, with his box he traveled and spoke of his experience in
slavery, the novelty of his escape adding interest to his description.
Many similar cases of heroism in manner of escape of men and women are
recorded in William Still's "Underground Railroad."