_Coffin's Point, Nov. 10._ Arrived here about 6. I found people in the
field picking cotton at R.'s places, and found on nearly all my fields
the cotton still green and blossoming, while on most of the Government
plantations the grass had stopped its growth long ago and the crop was
about over. I find old Frank (the wily) in confinement in the
harness-room for some row among the people last Sunday, awaiting
trial. Oh, the horses, how they do look! A few months among our
Northern fixings make everything look so wretched down here.
There is a circular just issued by General Saxton, pointing out the
plantations which are to be sold to the negroes, and advising them to
stake out their claims and build cabins on them as preëmptors, which
will not attract many of my people, I think. The McTureous places, T.
B. Fripp's, Hamilton Fripp's, and others are to be so sold, as soon as
the necessary surveys are made. I doubt the policy of this sort of
thing until the time shall have passed for the redemption of the land
by the old owners, though none may ever appear to redeem. I am afraid
some rows may arise from the difficulty of fixing and recording
boundaries among a lot of negro squatters, should there be many such.
These plantations, about to be sold at auction to negro
preëmptors, were those which had been reserved for this
purpose from the sale of March 9, 1863 (see p. 171). The
order of the President (dated September 16), from which
General Saxton got authority for his circular just
mentioned, also provided for the sale at auction of about
twenty plantations in lots not to exceed three hundred and
twenty acres. This latter provision, which might possibly
result in preventing many negroes from owning any land at
present,--since the plantations reserved for them alone were
not large enough for all,--presently brought about infinite
trouble, through disagreement among the authorities.