It is encouraging to note the advancement made upon the stronghold of
ignorance, superstition and voodooism by the Colored people, since their
emancipation from the bonds of slavery, and especially is this so to
those who remember the time when a large majority of them believed
strongly in all kinds of superstition, voodooism, gophering, tricking
and conjuring.
I readily recall many instances wherein they were fleeced out of their
little valuables or money by professional humbugs, known as conjurors,
who succeeded in duping their fellow-slaves so successfully, and to such
an extent, that they believed and feared them almost beyond their
masters. I have known of cases where these conjurors held whole
neighborhoods, as it were, in such mortal fear, that they could do unto
the Colored people anything they desired, without the least fear of them
telling their masters. These conjurors made all kinds of boasts and
threats, as to what they could and would do to anyone who dared to
interfere with them, or even dispute their word, or question their
ability to carry out what they claimed to be able to do.
These conjurors claimed to be able to do almost anything in the line of
impossibilities, even to taking life by the winking of their eye, to
make a master be kind to a slave, to prevent him from selling one, even
if he desired to do so, to make a girl love a man, whether she desired
him or not, to make a man love and even marry a woman if she desired
him.
For a stipulated sum paid them, they would give what was called “a hand
or a jack,” which they claimed would enable the holder to accomplish
what he desired, and at the same time protect him from all harm,
provided always, that the holder had faith and followed instructions.
These conjurors claimed to be able to bury a hand or a jack under the
master’s door step, which would prevent him from whipping a particular
slave while it was there. Of course, if that particular slave got
whipped, and so reported to the old conjuror, he would promptly claim
one of three things, either that someone had removed the jack, or that
the fellow had failed to carry out instructions, or had no faith in the
jack, and therefore was deserving of punishment.
These conjurors claimed to be able to put pain, or even permanent
disability upon any one they desired, and could remove the trick put on
by another conjuror, could cause live scorpions to appear under the skin
of persons, and could take out those put there by other conjurors. They
claimed that nearly every pain or ache was the result of conjuration,
and the one sent for could take it off. To show to what extent these
people believed in voodooism, and could be fleeced, I will relate a
story told me by Ike Cabel, of Brunswick, Mo. He said he was out with a
surveying party about the year 1852, and camped near a large plantation
in Louisiana. He gave it out among the slaves that he was a conjuror,
and soon thereafter his camp was besieged every night by slaves with all
kinds of aches and pains, which he cured with red clay, oak leaves and
salt boiled, and collected fifty cents from each. A man came one night
claiming that he had a scorpion in his leg, and that he felt it running
up and down the leg. He told the man to come the next night, which he
did. The next day he wanted a live scorpion, and being afraid of it
himself, he got two young white men of the party to catch one for him,
promising them one-half he was to receive for the job, and of course,
let them into the secret. They captured a scorpion, wrapped it up
carefully in brown paper, so that it could not escape or bite, and
delivered it to Ike.
After rubbing the man’s leg for a while with his other trick medicine
with one hand, carefully holding his little animal in the other, and
when ready for the final act, he looked heavenward, and in a loud voice
commanded the scorpion to come out of the man’s leg. Then in a few
seconds he informed his dupe that the animal had come, and at the same
time, and by a quick motion, freed the scorpion and brushed it from the
leg to the floor, when the freed scorpion attempted to escape, and was
killed and carried away by the patient after paying the three dollars.
Now it would have been a hard job to convince that poor, innocent,
unsuspecting man, that he did not have a live scorpion taken from his
leg. His imagination was cured, and he was satisfied, and spread the
news far and wide of his wonderful cure.
It is claimed that the way scorpions and other little poisonous animals
or insects are gotten into the body is through whiskey. That the little
scorpion is killed and laid out to dry, and when thoroughly dried is
beaten into dust, and the dust put into a bottle of whiskey, and in a
short time after being drank will reproduce itself, whatever it is,
under the skin of the drinker. At any rate, I remember that conjurors
were never asked for a drink of whiskey, and people were always afraid
to take a drink from some men’s bottle until the owner had drank first,
“to take the poison off.”
These conjurors practiced with different kinds of roots, seeds, barks,
insects, and other strange ingredients, but polk root and green planten
were among their principal remedies to take off a trick or a pain. Of
course they had some queer ways of mixing things to make it appear
mysterious. A poultice made of polk root is said to be a good remedy for
rheumatism, and these conjurors probably knew that, and put in the
poultice a few harmless things to make it appear strange, and if the
rheumatic pain was removed, they would claim that they had taken off a
trick put there by some conjuror. Of course different conjurors have
different jacks and different “hands,” but the two I saw were composed
of hog-bristles, old horse shoe nails, a little red clay, salt, red
pepper, red oak leaves, soaked in vinegar, then wrapped in a roll about
three inches long and one inch thick, and tied with a yarn string very
tightly. There is a peculiar lingo to accompany the “jack,” and it
varies according to requirements.
To show how thoroughly these people believed in conjurors, and to what
extent they could be imposed upon by them, I will relate one more
instance, which was told me by an old lady whose word I cannot doubt,
and whom I have known for these many years, but to honor and cheer. She
said that she belonged to one of two brothers living on adjoining farms
in Amelia County, Va., prior to the year 1830, and that one of them was
a bachelor and the other a widower, and that they loved each other
dearly. That they owned about thirty slaves each, and that one of them
decided to break up and take his slaves to Alabama, and made all
arrangements to do so. When the day came to start, he gave the order to
load the wagons and hitch up the horses, which was done, and that they
remained standing, as did the slaves, until late in the afternoon, when
the master came to the front door and gave orders to unload and unhitch
the teams, and for the slaves to go to his brother’s field to work. On
the next day he left on horseback in company with another man bound for
Alabama.
She said that many of his slaves did not want to go, and hearing of a
great conjuror living ten miles away, made up a purse and sent for him.
He came the night previous to the time set for starting to Alabama. My
informant says, that he told them upon his arrival, that they had waited
too long in sending for him, that if they had sent for him earlier he
could have stopped all, but now he could only stop the slaves from
going, and even that would depend on whether the master walked over a
“hand,” which he was going to put under the front door steps. She says
the old conjuror went to the front door steps of the great house about
twelve o’clock that night, dug a small hole under the ground step, took
from his pocket a little ball, talked to it a while in a whisper, then
kissed it and put it in the hole, and covered it carefully and came
away. That the slaves, she among them, watched the old master next
morning, until they saw him come down the steps and walk around a while,
then go back over this particular step. That they were then satisfied
that the old master could not take them anywhere, and he did not.
I was never able to convince my dear old lady friend that all conjurors
were humbugs, and this one was among them, and that it was purely a
matter of chance so far as he was concerned. I do not want it understood
that these conjurors were believed in by all Colored people, for there
were a large number of intelligent ones, who paid no attention to
conjurors, even defied them, told them that they were humbugs and liars.
These conjurors were a shrewd set of fellows, and on that account alone
were enabled to fool the less informed. They were industrious, and hard
working, and faithful servants, and of course received no punishment,
and were keen enough to point to this fact as evidence of the power of
their jack in keeping their master under control, when, as a matter of
fact, it was their faithful service alone that protected them from the
lash.
There have been cases where Colored people took sick from some cause,
and imagined themselves tricked or poisoned by some one, and the white
doctor, unable to do them any good, gave up the case, and the patients,
believing themselves poisoned and therefore incurable, have died, when
they might have been saved, if the white doctor had only thought for a
moment, and instead of giving up the case, announced himself a conjuror,
and proceeded to doctor his patient’s mind.
Superstition in some form has always existed, especially among
illiterate people, regardless of color, and the more illiterate the
greater the amount of superstition, and as a case of strong evidence of
this, I point to the “spirit dance” by the Indians of the far West,
where the excitement created by it has been so great, that an uprising
was only kept down by the vigilance of the regular army. While
conjuring, tricking and gophering, and the like, were believed in by the
slaves, and spirit dances and other forms of superstition were practiced
by the Indians, the American white people believed as strongly in
another form of superstition called “witch craft,” that they burnt
innocent men and women at the stake.
In order to show that education and intelligence are the great powers
which have been the means of dispelling the gloom of superstition and
voodooism among the Colored people especially, I will state that the
Colored people of Missouri, particularly those of Chariton, Howard,
Carroll and Randolph counties, were above the ordinary slaves in the
more extreme Southern states in intelligence and education, and did not
believe in voodooism or conjuration nearly as much as those in old
Virginia, and when one was brought to Missouri who claimed to be able to
exercise those miraculous powers, he was immediately laughed at and
openly defied by all excepting a few of the more illiterate. I recall
one instance where a man named Magruder, who owned about forty slaves,
which he brought to Brunswick, Missouri, from Virginia, and bought land
near the town and settled thereon. Among his slaves was an old,
whiteheaded, crippled man, known as a conjuror. He claimed to be able to
do many mysterious and impossible things, and among those who belonged
to his master he was believed and feared, but the Colored people in that
vicinity laughed at him, defied his threats, and denounced him as an old
humbug, for in truth such he was, and when those who believed in him saw
him defied and denounced, and his inability to carry out his threats,
they took courage and denounced him too. When he saw his business
assailed and himself defied, with no more opportunity to gull the
people, he gave it out that his favorite plants and roots did not grow
or could not be found in that country, and that alone was the reason why
he could not practice his profession. The truth of the matter was, that
the Colored people in that state were more intelligent than those from
whence he came, and therefore could not be easily humbugged.
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