FEEDING THE DESTITUTE.
As I was passing Castle Thunder, I observed, besieging the doors of the
United States Commissary, on the opposite side of the street, a
hungry-looking, haggard crowd,—sickly-faced women, jaundiced old men,
and children in rags; with here and there a seedy gentleman who had seen
better days, or a stately female in faded apparel, which, like her
refined manners, betrayed the aristocratic lady whom the war had reduced
to want.
These were the destitute of the city, thronging to receive alms from the
government. The regular rations, issued at a counter to which each was
admitted in his or her turn, consisted of salt-fish and hard-tack; but I
noticed that to some tea and sugar were dealt out. All were provided
with tickets previously issued to them by the Relief Commission. One
tall, sallow woman requested me to read her ticket, and tell her if it
was a “No. 2.”
“They telled me it was, whar I got it, but I like to be shore.”
I assured her that it was truly a “No. 2,” and asked why it was
preferable to another.
“This is the kind they ishy to sick folks; it allows tea and sugar,” she
replied, wrapping it around her skinny finger.
Colored people were not permitted to draw “destitute rations” for
themselves at the same place with the whites. There were a good many
colored servants in the crowd, however, drawing for their mistresses,
who remained at home, too ill or too proud to come in person and present
their tickets.
At the place where “destitute rations” were issued to the blacks,
business appeared very dull. I inquired the reason of it, and learned
this astonishing fact.
The colored population crowded into Richmond at that time equalled the
white population; being estimated by some as high as twenty-five
thousand. Of the whites, over TWO THOUSAND were at that time receiving
support from the government. The number of blacks receiving such support
was less than two hundred.
How is this discrepancy to be accounted for?
Of the freedmen’s willingness to work under right conditions there can
be no question. It is true, they do not show a disposition to continue
to serve their former masters for nothing, or at starvation prices. And
many of them had a notion that lands were to be given them; for lands
had been promised them. At the same time, where they have a show of a
chance for themselves, they generally go to work, and manifest a
commendable pride in supporting themselves and their families. Until he
does that, the negro does not consider that he is fully free. He has no
prejudice against labor, as so many of the whites have. We must give
slavery the credit of having done thus much for him: it has bred him up
to habits of temperance and industry. Notwithstanding the example of the
superior race, which he naturally emulates, he has not yet taken to
drink; and his industry, instead of being checked, has received an
impulse by emancipation. Now that he has inducements to exert himself,
he proceeds to his task with an alacrity which he never showed when
driven to it by the whip.
Another thing must be taken into account. His feeling for those who have
liberated him is that of unbounded gratitude. He is ashamed to ask alms
of the government which has already done so much for him. No case was
known in Richmond of his obtaining destitute rations under false
pretences; but in many instances, as I learned, he had preferred to
suffer want rather than apply for aid.
The reverse of all this may be said of a large class of whites. Many,
despising labor, would not work if they could. Others, reared amid the
influences of wealth, which had now been stripped from them, could not
work if they would. Towards the United States Government they
entertained no such feeling of gratitude as animated the freedmen. On
the contrary, they seemed to think that they were entitled to support
from it during the remainder of their lives.
“You ought to do something for us, for you’ve took away our niggers,”
whined a well-dressed woman one day in my hearing. To the force of the
objection, that the South owed the loss of its slaves to its own folly,
she appeared singularly insensible; and she showed marked resentment
because nothing was done for her, although obliged to confess that she
owned the house she lived in, and another for which two colored families
were paying rent.
I was sitting in one of the tents of the Relief Commission one morning,
when a woman came to complain that a ticket issued to her there had
drawn but fifteen rations, instead of twenty-one, as she had expected.
“I didn’t think it was you all’s fault,” she said, with an apologetic
grimace; “but I knowed I’d been powerfully cheated.”
This was the spirit manifested by very many, both of the rich and the
poor. They felt that they had a sacred right to prey upon the
government, and any curtailment of that privilege they regarded as a
wrong and a fraud. So notorious was their rapacity, that they were
satirically represented as saying to the government,—
“We have done our best to break you up, and now we are doing our best to
eat you up.”
Where such a spirit existed, it was not possible to prevent hundreds
from obtaining government aid who were not entitled to it. It was the
design of the Relief Commission to feed only indigent women and
children. No rations were issued by the Commissary except to those
presenting tickets; and tickets were issued for the benefit only of
those whose destitute condition was attested by certificates signed by a
clergyman or physician.[1] To secure these certificates, however, was
not difficult, even for those who stood in no need of government
charity. Clergymen and physicians were not all honest. Many of them
believed with the people that the government was a fit object for good
secessionists to prey upon. Some were faithful in the performance of
their duty; but if one physician refused to sign a false statement, it
was easy to dismiss him, and call in another less scrupulous.
“I have just exposed two spurious cases of destitution,” said an officer
of the Relief Commission, one day as I entered his tent. “Mrs. A——, on
Fourth Street, has been doing a thriving business all summer, by selling
the rations she has drawn for a fictitious family. Mrs. B—— has been
getting support for herself, and two sick daughters, that turn out to be
two great lazy sons, who take her hard-tack and salt-fish, and exchange
them for whiskey, get drunk every night, and lie abed till noon every
day.”
“What do you do with such cases?”
“Cut them off; that is all we can do. This whole business of feeding the
poor of Richmond,” he added, “is a humbug. Richmond is a wealthy city
still; it is very well able to take care of its own poor, and should be
taxed for the purpose.” I found this to be the opinion of many
intelligent unbiased observers.
Besides the Relief Commission, and the Freedmen’s Commission, both
maintained by the government, I found an agency of the American Union
Commission established in Richmond. This Commission, supported by
private benevolence, was organized for the purpose of aiding the people
of the South, “in the restoration of their civil and social condition,
upon the basis of industry, education, freedom, and Christian morality.”
In Richmond, it was doing a useful work. To the small farmers about the
city it issued ploughs, spades, shovels, and other much needed
implements,—for the war had beaten pitchforks into bayonets, and cast
ploughshares into cannon. Earlier in the season it had distributed many
thousand papers of garden-seeds to applicants from all parts of the
State,—a still greater benefit to the impoverished people, with whom it
was a common saying, that “good seed ran out under the Confederacy.” It
had established a free school for poor whites. I also found Mr. C. the
Commission’s Richmond agent, indefatigable in assisting other
associations in the establishment of schools for the Freedmen.
The Union Commission performed likewise an indispensable part in feeding
the poor. Those clergymen and physicians who were so prompt to grant
certificates to secessionists not entitled to them, were equally prompt
to refuse them to persons known as entertaining Union sentiments. To the
few genuine Union people of Richmond, therefore, the Commission came,
and was welcomed as an angel of mercy. But it did not confine its favors
to them; having divided the city into twelve districts, and appointed
inspectors for each, it extended its aid to such of the needy as the
Relief Commission had been unable to reach.
-----
Footnote 1:
Form of certificate:—
RICHMOND, VA., ............... 1865.
I CERTIFY, on honor, that I am well acquainted with Mrs. Jane Smith,
and that she is the owner of no real estate or personal property, or
effects of any kind; and that she has no male member of her family who
is the owner of real estate or personal property or effects of any
kind, upon which there can be realized sufficient money for the
maintenance of her family; and that she has no means of support, and
is a proper object of charity; and that her family consists of four
females and five children.
Given under my hand, this 17th day of September, 1865.
JEFFERSON JONES, M. D.