Martin Delany, a
freeborn black, publishes Advice To
Former Slaves:
It was only a War policy
of the Government, to declare the slaves of the South free, knowing that the
whole power of the South, laid in the possession of the Slaves.
But I want you to
understand, that we would not have become free, had we not armed ourselves and
fought out our independence....
If I had been a slave, I
would have been most troublesome and not to be conquered by any threat or
punishment. I would not have worked, and no one would have dared to come near
me, I would have struggled for life or death, and would have thrown fire and
sword between them. I know you have been good, only coo good. I was told by a
friend of mine that when owned by a man and put to work on the field, he laid
quietly down, and just looked out for the overseer to come along, when he
pretended to work very hard. But he confessed to me, that he never had done a
fair day's work for his master. And so he was right, so I would have done the
same, and all of you ought to have done the same.
People say that you are
too lazy to work, that you have no intelligence to get on for yourselves,
without being guided and driven to the work by overseers. I say it is a lie,
and a blasphemous lie, and I will prove it to be so.
I am going to tell you
now, what you are worth. As you know Christopher Columbus landed here in 1492.
They came here only for the purpose to dig gold, gather precious pearls,
diamonds and all sorts of jewels, only for the "proud Aristocracy of White
Spaniards'' and Portuguese, to adorn their persons, to have brooches for their
breasts, earrings for their ears, Bracelets for their ankles and rings for
their limbs and fingers. They found here... Indians whom they obliged to dig
and work and slave for them—but they found out that they died away too fast and
cannot stand the work. In course of time they had taken some blacks... along
with them and put them to work— they could not stand it—and yet the Whites say
they are superior to our race, though they could not stand it....
The work was so
profitable which those poor blacks did, that in the year 1502 Charles the V
gave permission to import into America yearly 4,000 blacks. The profit of these
sales was so immense, that afterwards even the Virgin Queen of England and
James the II took part in the Slave trade and were accumulating great wealth
for the Treasury of the Government. And so you always have been the means of
riches.
I tell you I have been
all over Africa (I was born there) and I tell you (as I could to the
Geographical Faculty of London) that those people there, are a well-driving
class of cultivators, and I never saw or heard of one of our brethren there to
travel without taking seeds with him as much as he can carry and to sow it
wherever he goes to, or to exchange it with his brethren.
So you ought further to
know, that all the spices, cotton, rice, and coffee has only been brought over
by you, from the land of our brethren.
Your masters who lived
in opulence, kept you to hard work by some contemptible being called
overseer—who chastised and beat you whenever he pleased—while your master lived
in some Northern town or in Europe to squander away the wealth only you
acquired for him. He never earned a single Dollar in his life. You men and
women, every one of you around me, made thousands and thousands of dollars for
your master. Only you were the means for your masters to lead the ideal and
inglorious life, and to give his children the education, which he denied to
you, for fear you may awake to conscience. If I look around me, I tell you all
the houses of this Island and in Beaufort, they are all familiar to my eye,
they are the same structures which I have met with in Africa. They have all
been made by the Negroes, you can see it by such exteriors.
I tell you they cannot
teach you anything, and they could not make them because they have not the
brain to do it. At least I mean the Southern people; Oh the Yankees they are
smart. Now tell me from all you have heard from me, are you not worth anything?
Are you those men whom they think, God only created as a curse and for a slave?
Whom they do not consider their equals? As I said before the Yankees are smart;
there are good ones and bad ones. The good ones, if they are good they are very
good, if they are bad, they are very bad. But the worst and most contemptible,
and even worse than even your masters were, are those Yankees, who hired
themselves as overseers.
Believe not in these
School teachers, Emissaries, Ministers, and agents, because they never tell you
the truth, and I particularly warn you against those Cotton Agents, who come
honey mouthed unto you, their only intent being to make profit by your
inexperience.
If there is a man who
comes to you, who will meddle with your affairs, send him to one of your more
enlightened brothers, who shall ask him who he is, what business he seeks with
you, etc.
Believe none but those
Agents who are sent out by Government, to enlighten and guide you. I am an
officer in the service of the U.S. Government, and ordered to aid Gen[era]l
[Rufus] Saxton, who has been only lately appointed Ass[istan]t Com[missione]r
from South Carolina. So is Gen[era]l [Edward A.] Wild Ass[istan]t
Com[missione]r for Georgia.
When Chief Justice
[Salmon P.] Chase was down here to speak to you, some of those malicious and
abominable New York papers derived from it that he only seeks to be elected by
you as President. I have no such ambition, I let them have for a President a
white or a black one. I don't care who it be—it may be who has a mind to. I
shall not be intimidated whether by threats or imprisonment, and no power will
keep me from telling you the truth. So I expressed myself even at Charleston,
the hotbed of those scoundrels, your old masters, without tear or reluctance.
So I will come to the
main purpose for which I have come to see you. As before the whole South
depended upon you, now the whole country will depend upon you. I give you an
advice how to get along. Get up a community and get all the lands you can—if
you cannot get any singly.
Grow as much vegetables,
etc., as you want for your families; on the other part of the land you
cultivate Rice and Cotton. Now for instance one acre will grow a crop of Cotton
of $90—now a land with ten acres will bring $900 every year: if you cannot get
the land all yourself,—the community can, and so you can divide the profit.
There is Tobacco for instance (Virginia is the great place for Tobacco). There
are whole squares at Dublin and Liverpool named after some place of Tobacco
notoriety, so you see of what enormous value your labor was to the benefits of
your masters. Now you understand that I want you to be the producers of this
country. It is the wish of the Government for you to be so. We will send
friends to you, who will further instruct you how to come to the end of our
wishes. You see that by so adhering to our views, you will become a wealthy and
powerful population.
Now I look around me and
notice a man, barefooted, covered with rags and dirt. Now I ask, what is that
man doing, for whom is he working. I hear that he works for that and that
farmer for 30 cents a day. I tell you that must not be. That would be cursed
slavery over again. I will not have it, the Government will not have it, and
the Government shall hear about it. I will tell the Government.
I tell you slavery is
over, and shall never return again. We have now 200,000 of our men well drilled
in arms and used to Warfare, and I tell you ... that slavery shall not come
back again, if you are determined it will not return again.
Now go to work, and in a
short time I will see you again, and other friends will come to show you how to
begin.
Have your fields in good
order and well tilled and planted, and when I pass the fields and see a land
well planted and well cared for, then I may be sure from the look of it, that
it belongs to a free Negro, and when I see a field thinly-planted and little
cared for, then I may think it belongs to some man who works it with slaves.
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