[Footnote 1: Later "The New England Freedmen's Aid Society."]
[Footnote 2: The name Port Royal, in ante-bellum days used only of the
island on which Beaufort is situated and of the entrance to the
Beaufort River, was given by the United States Government to the
military post and the harbor at Hilton Head, and to the post-office
there. Hence the Sea Island district came to be referred to in the
North as "Port Royal."]
[Footnote 3: Collector Barney of the Port of New York.]
[Footnote 4: Edward L. Pierce (see Introduction).]
[Footnote 5: Richard Soule, Jr.]
[Footnote 6: Edward W. Hooper, afterwards for many years Treasurer of
Harvard College.]
[Footnote 7: G. is W. C. G. of these letters.]
[Footnote 8: John M. Forbes, who had hired a house at Beaufort for a
few months.]
[Footnote 9: Rev. Mansfield French had already spent some weeks at
Port Royal.]
[Footnote 10: Thrown up by the island planters after the outbreak of
the war.]
[Footnote 11: Thomas A. Coffin's large plantation at the eastern end
of St. Helena Island.]
[Footnote 12: F. A. Eustis of Milton, who was part owner of the
plantation in question.]
[Footnote 13: Mr. Philbrick had gone down to Hilton Head again to see
about his luggage.]
[Footnote 14: See page v.]
[Footnote 15: Pine Grove and Fripp Point.]
[Footnote 16: The drivers, negroes holding a position next below the
white overseers, were found by the Northerners still keeping the keys
and trying to exert their authority.]
[Footnote 17: For clothing their masters had been in the habit of
giving them material for two suits a year; a pair of blankets every
few years made up the sum of gratuities.]
[Footnote 18: Mrs. Philbrick.]
[Footnote 19: Miss Laura E. Towne of Philadelphia. She never returned
to live in the North. The school she started in 1862 is still in
existence, under the name of the Penn Normal, Industrial, and
Agricultural School.]
[Footnote 20: Known as the Smith Plantation.]
[Footnote 21: The ferry to Ladies Island, across which ran the road to
St. Helena Island and Mr. Philbrick's plantations.]
[Footnote 22: The plantation "praise-house," as the negroes' church
was called, was often merely "a rather larger and nicer negro hut than
the others. Here the master was an exemplary old Baptist Christian,
who has left his house full of religious magazines and papers, and
built his people quite a nice little house,--the best on this part of
the Island."
(Letter of W. C. G., April 22, 1862.)]
[Footnote 23: Pine Grove was in this respect an exception among the
Sea Island plantations.]
[Footnote 24: See p. 33.]
[Footnote 25: Mrs. Philbrick.]
[Footnote 26: "The true 'shout' takes place on Sundays or on
'praise'-nights through the week, and either in the praise-house or
some cabin in which a regular religious meeting has been held. Very
likely more than half the population of the plantation is gathered
together. Let it be the evening, and a light-wood fire burns red
before the door to the house and on the hearth.... The benches are
pushed back to the wall when the formal meeting is over, and old and
young, men and women, sprucely-dressed young men, grotesquely
half-clad field-hands--the women generally with gay handkerchiefs
twisted about their heads and with short skirts--boys with tattered
shirts and men's trousers, young girls barefooted, all stand up in the
middle of the floor, and when the 'sperichil' is struck up, begin
first walking and by-and-by shuffling round, one after the other, in a
ring. The foot is hardly taken from the floor, and the progression is
mainly due to a jerking, hitching motion, which agitates the entire
shouter, and soon brings out streams of perspiration. Sometimes they
dance silently, sometimes as they shuffle they sing the chorus of the
spiritual, and sometimes the song itself is also sung by the dancers.
But more frequently a band, composed of some of the best singers and
of tired shouters, stand at the side of the room to 'base' the others,
singing the body of the song and clapping their hands together or on
the knees. Song and dance are alike extremely energetic, and often,
when the shout lasts into the middle of the night, the monotonous
thud, thud of the feet prevents sleep within half a mile of the
praise-house." (New York _Nation_, May 30, 1867.)]
[Footnote 27: Miss Lucy McKim, in a letter to the Boston _Journal of
Music_, November 8, 1862.]
[Footnote 28: This old woman Mr. Philbrick had found "keeping guard
over her late master's household goods--_i. e._, selling them."]
[Footnote 29: A few weeks earlier than this, one of the drivers told
Mr. Philbrick that Washington Fripp had just been shot near Charleston
for refusing to enlist.]
[Footnote 30: A "title" was a negro surname of whatever derivation.]
[Footnote 31: The following description of Limus and his subsequent
doings is copied from a letter of W. C. G.'s (June 12, 1863), which
was printed by the Educational Commission in one of a series of
leaflets containing extracts from Port Royal letters:
"He is a black Yankee. Without a drop of white blood in him, he has
the energy and _'cuteness_ and big eye for his own advantage of a born
New Englander. He is not very moral or scrupulous, and the
church-members will tell you 'not yet,' with a smile, if you ask
whether he belongs to them. But he leads them all in enterprise, and
his ambition and consequent prosperity make his example a very useful
one on the plantation. Half the men on the island fenced in gardens
last autumn, behind their houses, in which they now raise vegetables
for themselves and the Hilton Head markets. Limus in his half-acre has
quite a little farmyard besides. With poultry-houses, pig-pens, and
corn-houses, the array is very imposing. He has even a stable, for he
made out some title to a horse, which was allowed; and then he begged
a pair of wheels and makes a cart for his work; and not to leave the
luxuries behind, he next rigs up a kind of sulky and bows to the white
men from his carriage. As he keeps his table in corresponding
style,--for he buys more sugar ... than any other two families,--of
course the establishment is rather expensive. So, to provide the
means, he has three permanent irons in the fire--his cotton, his
Hilton Head express, and his seine. Before the fishing season
commenced, a pack of dogs for deer-hunting took the place of the net.
While other families 'carry' from three to six or seven acres of
cotton, Limus says he must have _fourteen_. To help his wife and
daughters keep this in good order, he went over to the rendezvous for
refugees, and imported a family to the plantation, the men of which he
hired at $8 a month.... With a large boat which he owns, he usually
makes weekly trips to Hilton Head, twenty miles distant, carrying
passengers, produce and fish. These last he takes in an immense
seine,--an abandoned chattel,--for the use of which he pays Government
by furnishing General Hunter and staff with the finer specimens, and
then has ten to twenty bushels for sale. Apparently he is either
dissatisfied with this arrangement or means to extend his operations,
for he asks me to bring him another seine for which I am to pay $70. I
presume his savings since 'the guns fired at Bay Point'--which is the
native record of the capture of the island--amount to four or five
hundred dollars. He is all ready to buy land, and I expect to see him
in ten years a tolerably rich man. Limus has, it is true, but few
equals on the islands, and yet there are many who follow not far
behind him."]
[Footnote 32: Major-General David Hunter, who on March 31 had taken
command of the newly created Department of the South, consisting of
the states of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.]
[Footnote 33: Dr. Wakefield was physician for that end of St. Helena
Island.]
[Footnote 34: On Cockspur Island, Georgia.]
[Footnote 35: As the quarter-acre "task," which was all that the
planters had required of their slaves each day, had occupied about
four or five hours only, it will be seen that the slaves on the Sea
Islands had not been overworked, though they had been underfed. Like
the "task," the "private patches" were also an institution retained,
at E. L. Pierce's suggestion, from slavery times, with the difference
that their size was very much increased--often from a fraction of an
acre to ten times that amount.]
[Footnote 36: By the rebels.]
[Footnote 37: He had already had sent down from the North a quantity
of articles to sell to the negroes.]
[Footnote 38: Brigadier-General Isaac I. Stevens, then at Beaufort,
commanding the Second Division.]
[Footnote 39: The "Brick Church" was a Baptist Church which had always
been used by both blacks and whites. Less than a mile away stood the
"White Church," Episcopalian,--closed since the flight of the
planters.]
[Footnote 40: Issued May 9, and on May 19, nullified by President
Lincoln.]
[Footnote 41: South Carolina corn is white flint corn.]
[Footnote 42: The cotton-agent who had been at Coffin's Point.]
[Footnote 43: The Government not only had made no definite promise of
payment, but it was of course unable to bring to bear on the negroes
any compulsion of any sort. They worked or not, as they liked, and
when they liked.]
[Footnote 44: The old system of labor--the system in force in slavery
times--had been the "gang system," the laborers working all together,
so that no one had continuous responsibility for any one piece of
land.]
[Footnote 45: For Coffin's Point.]
[Footnote 46: As a result of Lincoln's proclamation of May 19 (see p.
50 n.), the regiment, all but one company, was disbanded in August.]
[Footnote 47: This burying-place was "an unfenced quarter of an acre
of perfectly wild, tangled woodland in the midst of the cotton-field,
halfway between here [the 'white house'] and the quarters. Nothing
ever marks the graves, but the place is entirely devoted to them."
(From a letter of H. W.'s, June 5, '62.)]
[Footnote 48: Saxton's first general order, announcing his arrival, is
dated June 28.]
[Footnote 49: E. L. Pierce had changed his headquarters from
"Pope's."]
[Footnote 50: From the first the anti-slavery Northerners at Port
Royal had had no hesitation in telling their employees that they were
freemen. Indeed, they had no choice but to do so, the tadpoles on
these islands, as Mr. Philbrick said, having "virtually shed their
tails in course of nature already."]
[Footnote 51: Pierce's second report to Secretary Chase on the Sea
Islands, dated June 2, 1862.]
[Footnote 52: "We have to spend more than half our time," writes Mr.
Philbrick in September, "getting our limited supplies."]
[Footnote 53: Richard Soule, Jr., was General Superintendent of St.
Helena and Ladies Islands, and was living at Edgar Fripp's
plantation.]
[Footnote 54: The first of many references to the frequent lack of
sympathy shown by army officers.]
[Footnote 55: That is, the account had been taken before he came
South.]
[Footnote 56: See page 37.]
[Footnote 57: The term "Hunting Island" was applied to several of the
outside islands collectively.]
[Footnote 58: Thomas Astor Coffin, of Coffin's Point.]
[Footnote 59: The chief "hindrance" was, of course, the late date at
which work on the cotton crop had been started; the land should have
been prepared in February, and the planting begun at the end of
March.]
[Footnote 60: The preliminary proclamation of emancipation, dated
September 22, 1862.]
[Footnote 61: It will be seen that this excellent idea was not adopted
by the authorities.]
[Footnote 62: Edward W. Hooper served on Saxton's staff, with the rank
of Captain.]
[Footnote 63: He came with authority to raise negro troops.]
[Footnote 64: See p. 58.]
[Footnote 65: As Saxton's agent to collect and ship the cotton crop.
See p. 99.]
[Footnote 66: The superintendents of the Second Division of the Sea
Islands.]
[Footnote 67: The negroes had broken the cotton-gins by way of putting
their slavery more completely behind them.]
[Footnote 68: Again the cotton-agent.]
[Footnote 69: Evidently the offer of a captaincy.]
[Footnote 70: Of Prince Rivers, who became color-sergeant and
provost-sergeant in the First South Carolina Volunteers, Thomas
Wentworth Higginson, its colonel, writes: "There is not a white
officer in this regiment who has more administrative ability, or more
absolute authority over the men; they do not love him, but his mere
presence has controlling power over them. He writes well enough to
prepare for me a daily report of his duties in the camp; if his
education reached a higher point, I see no reason why he should not
command the Army of the Potomac. He is jet-black, or rather, I should
say, _wine-black_; his complexion, like that of others of my darkest
men, having a sort of rich, clear depth, without a trace of sootiness,
and to my eye very handsome. His features are tolerably regular, and
full of command, and his figure superior to that of any of our white
officers, being six feet high, perfectly proportioned, and of
apparently inexhaustible strength and activity. His gait is like a
panther's; I never saw such a tread. No anti-slavery novel has
described a man of such marked ability. He makes Toussaint perfectly
intelligible; and if there should ever be a black monarchy in South
Carolina, he will be its king." (_Army Life in a Black Regiment_, pp.
57, 58.)]
[Footnote 71: "These heaps are, _lucus a non_, called holes." C. P.
W.]
[Footnote 72: The First South Carolina Volunteers (colored), Thomas
Wentworth Higginson, colonel.]
[Footnote 73: Usually referred to as the "Hunter Regiment."]
[Footnote 74: A town very near the extreme southern point of the
Georgia coast.]
[Footnote 75: After Mitchel's death, Brannan again acted as head of
the Department, till General Hunter's return in January, 1863.]
[Footnote 76: To the Dr. Jenkins plantation.]
[Footnote 77: Stone or seed-cotton is unginned cotton.]
[Footnote 78: Of course on almost all the plantations no taxes had
been paid, so that the Government was at liberty to sell them at
auction.]
[Footnote 79: That is, of drawing their own rations.]
[Footnote 80: General Hunter did not actually arrive until January.
See note 1, [now Footnote 75] p. 108.]
[Footnote 81: The $200,000 (mentioned on page 110) received by the
Government for the crop of 1861.]
[Footnote 82: Saxton.]
[Footnote 83: This plan of operations was adopted by General Saxton.]
[Footnote 84: Dr. LeBaron Russell, of the Committee on Teachers of the
Educational Commission.]
[Footnote 85: Taking the plantations as a whole, the Government lost
in 1862 the whole $200,000 which it had cleared from the planters' big
cotton crop of 1861.]
[Footnote 86: On Port Royal Island "whole fields of corn, fifty acres
in extent, have been stripped of every ear before hard enough to be
stored."]
[Footnote 87: Henry W. Halleck, since July 11 General-in-Chief of the
Army, with headquarters at Washington.]
[Footnote 88: Another young Harvard graduate, cousin of H. W., come to
teach the two Fripp schools.]
[Footnote 89: Mr. Philbrick had changed his residence to the Oaks.]
[Footnote 90: An institution situated in Beaufort, managed by the New
York Commission.]
[Footnote 91: Of Corporal Sutton Colonel Higginson says: "If not in
all respects the ablest, he was the wisest man in our ranks. As large,
as powerful, and as black as our good-looking Color-sergeant, but more
heavily built and with less personal beauty, he had a more massive
brain and a far more meditative and systematic intellect. Not yet
grounded even in the spelling-book, his modes of thought were
nevertheless strong, lucid, and accurate; and he yearned and pined for
intellectual companionship beyond all ignorant men whom I have ever
met. I believe that he would have talked all day and all night, for
days together, to any officer who could instruct him, until his
companion, at least, fell asleep exhausted. His comprehension of the
whole problem of slavery was more thorough and far-reaching than that
of any Abolitionist, so far as its social and military aspects went;
in that direction I could teach him nothing, and he taught me much.
But it was his methods of thought which always impressed me chiefly;
superficial brilliancy he left to others, and grasped at the solid
truth." (_Army Life in a Black Regiment_, p. 62.)]
[Footnote 92: Mr. Philbrick describes the feast: "I walked about for a
half hour watching the carving, which was done mostly with _axes_, and
the eager pressing of the hungry crowds about the rough board tables,
by which each ox was surrounded. The meat didn't look very inviting."]
[Footnote 93: Miss Forten was of partly negro blood. H. W. says of her
elsewhere: "She has one of the sweetest voices I ever heard. The
negroes all knew the instant they saw her what she was, but she has
been treated by them with universal respect. She is an educated
lady."]
[Footnote 94: When General Hunter, bent on raising his negro troops,
asked the Secretary of War for 50,000 muskets, "with authority to arm
such loyal men as I find in the country, whenever, in my opinion, they
can be used advantageously against the enemy," he added: "It is
important that I should be able to know and distinguish these men at
once, and for this purpose I respectfully request that 50,000 pairs of
scarlet pantaloons may be sent me; and this is all the clothing I
shall require for these people." (Hunter to Stanton, April 3, 1862.)
Of the privates of the First S. C. V., when clothed in these trousers,
Colonel Higginson writes: "Their coloring suited me, all but the legs,
which were clad in a lively scarlet, as intolerable to my eyes as if I
had been a turkey." (_Army Life in a Black Regiment_, p. 7.)]
[Footnote 95: On the Georgia coast.]
[Footnote 96: See p. 60.]
[Footnote 97: Mr. Philbrick was staying at Coffin's for a few days.]
[Footnote 98: The agreement made on April 8, between Mr. Philbrick and
fourteen gentlemen, all but one of Boston, provided that Mr.
Philbrick, in whose name the land should be bought and who should have
complete responsibility for managing it, should, after paying the
subscribers six per cent. interest, receive one fourth of the net
profits. Mr. Philbrick was to be liable for losses and without the
right to call for further contribution; on the other hand, no
subscription was to be withdrawn unless he ceased to superintend the
enterprise. On his closing the business, the net proceeds were to be
divided _pro rata_.]
[Footnote 99: Joe having gone back to his trade of carpenter, the
domestic force now included a boy and a girl (daughter of Abel and
sister of Hester), marvelously ignorant, even for a Sea Island
field-hand. Uncle Sam, Robert's father, was acting as cook.]
[Footnote 100: A boy lately added to the corps of house-servants at
Coffin's Point.]
[Footnote 101: From unwillingness to see the land owned by any one but
negroes.]
[Footnote 102: A detachment from the Eighteenth Army Corps, under
Major-General John G. Foster, had come to help in the operations
against Charleston.]
[Footnote 103: The new postmaster for Beaufort.]
[Footnote 104: A cousin in the 24th Massachusetts, which had come to
Land's End as part of the "North Carolina army."]
[Footnote 105: For lumber up the St. Mary's River, which separates
Georgia from Florida.]
[Footnote 106: See p. 162.]
[Footnote 107: The history of the Department had been defined as "a
military picnic."]
[Footnote 108: A paper published at Beaufort.]
[Footnote 109: Haunt of the drum-fish.]
[Footnote 110: The War Department ordered the sales to go forward,
leaving the restrictions to be arranged by Hunter, Saxton, and the
Commissioners in charge. See p. 165.]
[Footnote 111: Brigadier-General Edward E. Potter, Foster's Chief of
Staff.]
[Footnote 112: That is, hoed over again and new furrows made for the
next crop.]
[Footnote 113: Brigadier-General Thomas G. Stevenson, originally
colonel of the Twenty-Fourth Massachusetts, was arrested by General
Hunter and soon after released.]
[Footnote 114: The immediate cause of this trouble was a disagreement
about the extent of Hunter's authority over Foster and his command
while they were in the Department of the South, but the underlying
difficulty was that Foster and his officers distrusted Hunter as an
anti-slavery zealot.
Finding that the operations against Charleston could not go forward
immediately, Foster returned to North Carolina within a few days after
his arrival in the Department of the South. His troops remained, so
restive under Hunter's command that Foster's whole staff was presently
sent back to North Carolina for alleged insubordination.]
[Footnote 115: This report turned out to be a mistake.]
[Footnote 116: That is, the revenue from the cotton on certain
plantations was used for these purposes. A plantation thus devoted to
the educational needs of the people was called a School Farm.]
[Footnote 117: To capture Jacksonville, on the St. John's River,
Florida.]
[Footnote 118: Of the Second South Carolina Volunteers (colored).]
[Footnote 119: The bracket is used for unimportant dates which are out
of their chronological place.]
[Footnote 120: See p. 147.]
[Footnote 121: Two of the thirteen were merely leased.]
[Footnote 122: H. W., commenting more mildly, says (Mar. 18): "He
certainly has not a clear idea of what the superintendents and
teachers are doing, and unfortunately classes them as in opposition to
himself,--as preferring the agricultural to the military department.
This I do not think is the case, but they most of them feel his want
of wisdom in dealing with the subject, which has made his own especial
object as well as theirs harder to accomplish."]
[Footnote 123: A short-lived newspaper published in the Department.]
[Footnote 124: H. W. describes another service that was broken up by
this fear of the draft: "[May 2.] At church yesterday a squad of
soldiers with their officer came from Land's End to the service, when
a general stampede took place among the men, and women too, jumping
from the windows and one man even from the gallery into the midst of
the congregation."]
[Footnote 125: The boy.]
[Footnote 126: Captain J. E. Bryant, of the Eighth Maine.]
[Footnote 127: The Second South Carolina Volunteers (colored).]
[Footnote 128: Of the _Kingfisher_, the blockader.]
[Footnote 129: To be examined, adjudged not "able-bodied," and given
exemption-papers.]
[Footnote 130: Second South Carolina Volunteers.]
[Footnote 131: A noticeable thing about the children of slaves was
that they had no games.]
[Footnote 132: In the words of the order the command of the Department
was taken from Hunter and given to Gillmore "temporarily."]
[Footnote 133: Rhodes' _History of the United States from the
Compromise of 1850_, vol. iv, p. 332.]
[Footnote 134: Colonel Higginson had been sent up the South Edisto
River, to cut the railroad at Jacksonboro.]
[Footnote 135: Whither the wounded had been brought.]
[Footnote 136: Edward N. Hallowell and Garth Wilkinson James, Major
and Adjutant of the Fifty-Fourth.]
[Footnote 137: For the North.]
[Footnote 138: A few weeks later (July 15) General Saxton authorized
the general superintendents to appoint plantation commissions, or
courts for the administration of justice. The people eligible for
these commissions were Government plantation superintendents and Mr.
Philbrick's six plantation superintendents, and they were instructed
"that in cases where immediate arrest is in their opinion necessary,
the plantation superintendents, and the persons above named, are
hereby authorized themselves to make arrests of civilians upon the
plantations. But they must exercise this power with great discretion,
and will be held responsible for any abuse of it."]
[Footnote 139: Colonel W. W. H. Davis was in command of the post at
Beaufort during Saxton's temporary absence.]
[Footnote 140: R. Soule, Jr., now one of Mr. Philbrick's
superintendents, who, upon the departure of the Philbricks, had come
to live at Coffin's Point.]
[Footnote 141: The rebel masters had told their slaves that the
Yankees intended to sell them "South,"--that is, to Cuba or the Gulf.]
[Footnote 142: See note, p. 201.]
[Footnote 143: On board the _Kingfisher_.]
[Footnote 144: A Pennsylvanian, General Superintendent for St. Helena
and Ladies Islands, since Richard Soule had resigned that position.]
[Footnote 145: That is, gathered.]
[Footnote 146: Admiral Dupont's flag-ship.]
[Footnote 147: The Fifty-Fifth Massachusetts Volunteers (colored),
which was in camp at Port Royal.]
[Footnote 148: Meaning, of course, plantations belonging to the
Government.]
[Footnote 149: The "Mary Jenkins" place.]
[Footnote 150: Two hundred and sixty-five thousand pounds was "about
as much as there was raised in the whole Department" in 1862.]
[Footnote 151: See p. 230.]
[Footnote 152: A letter dated December 28, 1863, inclosing $100 for
the relief of families of freedmen. The letter gives figures that
prove the success of the free labor experiment on Mr. Philbrick's
plantations, and concludes as follows: "I mention these things to show
how easy it is to render the negroes a self-supporting and
wealth-producing class with proper management; and I, at the same
time, fully appreciate the duty imposed upon us as a nation to extend
the arm of charity where the unsettled state of the country renders
industry impossible until time is given to recognize and force to
protect it. We are more fortunately situated than the people of the
Mississippi valley, and have got the start of them."]
[Footnote 153: A letter dated January 25, 1864, and printed in the
Providence _Journal_ on February 6.]
[Footnote 154: Land on the Sea Islands is now worth $15 an acre,--$20
if it is near a road.]
[Footnote 155: F. J. W. was in Boston at the time.]
[Footnote 156: William Birney, Brigadier-General and Commander of the
Post at Beaufort during one of Saxton's absences, had, on March 30,
issued an order to the effect that in all cases the negroes were to be
left in possession of the land they claimed as theirs.]
[Footnote 157: An ambulance.]
[Footnote 158: Cf. E. S. P.'s letter of February 22, p. 251.]
[Footnote 159: Early in April the steamer _City of New York_, carrying
sixty-one bales of Mr. Philbrick's cotton, was wrecked in Queenstown
harbor. The cotton was insured for $1.50 a pound, but would have
brought more in the market.]
[Footnote 160: See p. 219. The idea was by no means new. Frederick Law
Olmstead had devoted a great deal of space to proving the truth of it,
and indeed had quoted many planters who admitted that, as a system of
labor, slavery was expensive.]
[Footnote 161: (Dated April 26, in the _Independent_.) On St. Helena
to-day it is always possible to hire men for common work at fifty
cents per day.]
[Footnote 162: Dated May 2.]
[Footnote 163: The National Union Convention which met on June 7.]
[Footnote 164: The hero of the _Planter_ episode; see p. 46.]
[Footnote 165: See p. 145.]
[Footnote 166: One of many minor raids, very likely up the Combahee
River.]
[Footnote 167: As General commanding the Department of the South.]
[Footnote 168: Husband of Fanny Kemble.]
[Footnote 169: Compare J. A. S. on p. 265.]
[Footnote 170: Evidently G.'s suggestion was practically for the plan
Mr. Philbrick did in fact adopt finally, that of selling some of his
land to negroes and some to white men. The price at which he sold to
the negroes was determined by the ideas here expressed.]
[Footnote 171: A mulatto, educated in the North, who had gone to help
at Port Royal.]
[Footnote 172: Colonel Milton S. Littlefield, Twenty-First United
States Colored Troops.]
[Footnote 173: Foster's order was dated August 16.]
[Footnote 174: "The First South," as the First South Carolina
Volunteers was always called by the negroes, had in the spring been
enrolled among the United States Colored Troops as the Thirty-Third
Regiment.]
[Footnote 175: See p. 187.]
[Footnote 176: Both in the Fifty-Fifth Massachusetts Volunteers
(colored).]
[Footnote 177: The battle of Honey Hill (near Grahamville), fought
November 30.]
[Footnote 178: Of the Fifty-Fifth Massachusetts.]
[Footnote 179: F. H. was to take charge of Coffin's Point on C. P.
W.'s leaving permanently for home a few weeks later. In connection
with Mr. Philbrick's words about him and in preparation for his own
letters, it is worth while to record something he had written in the
autumn:
Oct. 7. St. Helena. I am slowly recovering from my three weeks'
sickness,--more buoyant and hopeful than ever before. I seem to have a
new birth, with new aspirations, and new views--particularly in regard
to life and its duties and prospects among the freed people of South
Carolina.