Washington telegraph., 1853-07-06
The Negro Humbug.

lNCSEO OuSs
We cannot term the reports of what oc
Cured, night before last, anything else thar
bare, sheer, unadulterated humbug, withou
one single atom of common sense to enliyen
or give credibility to, its unutterable alb
surdity.
For the benefit of the public, outside q
Louisiana we will, very briefly, recapitulate
the incidents, as reported of night before
last, about which good deal of talk will
be had at the North. but the merest allusion
to which caused broad grin to mantle over
the countenance of every acquaintance we
met yesterday About Ii o'clock on Tues
day evening, a free negro came to the DO
lice office, and made the awful revelation
that the slaves of the city. and of the neigh
boring parishes were about to rise in insur-
rection in few hours. Shortly the Chief
of Police came in, to whom the communi-
cation of said negro was made known. He
was sensibly incredulous but finally con-
cluded to accompany the negro to house
where he alleged the ringleader was to be
found That negro was arrested, without
trouble, and on him found big knife, re-
volver, a sabre, bag of bullets, about a
pound of powder, two boxes of percussion
caps, two silver watches and eighty-six dol
lars in money. When taken to the police
office he became thoroughly scared, negro
like, and commenced making any amount
of extravagant confessions-as wild and in
credible as any story in the Arabian Nights.
lie said that grand plan of insurrection
was drawn out on paper; that twenty-five
hundred negroes were engaged in it that
the city was to be attacked at three differ
ent points; that he was on his way to Car
rollton to meet one party of the insurrec-
tionists that another party was to assemble
below the city; third somewhere between
the city and the lake that they were to
take the Powder Magazine on the other side
of the river attack the United States Bar
racks; take all the arsenals; seize the gun
smith shops; rife the Mint plunder the
banks; raise the devil generally; and that
the firing of the city in different quarters,
was to be the signal of universal saturna-
liza of riot and massacre
From these wild stories, altogether desti-
tute of probability and possibility, vast
amount of gas will be expended and we
do not think much popularity will be acquir-
ed In the first place, the whole affair bears
on its face uumistakable marks of absurdi-
ty, utter and unmitigated. In the second
there is only sixteen or eighteen thousand
slaves in New Orleans, out of population
of one hundred and fifty thousand souls
In the third, it is an insult to our people to
suppose that much less than one-seventh of
negroes could scare, run, conquer and plum
der, city like ours. In the fourth place
where would be the United States soldiers
when the negroes were taking the barracks
and arsenels, with bowie knife, sabre,
a revolver, pound of powder. bag of
bullets, two silver watches, and two boxes of
percussion caps? Where would be the cit
izens, when they were firing the city, and
plundering the Mint and the Banks p
There are not three thousand able bodied
negro slaves in the city-sevcn-eighths of
whom would die by their masters and mis-
tresses before they would see harm befall
them-not one in twenty has the slightest
knowledge of the use of arms-and yet
these were to plunder city. and massacre
its citizens, who, in such an emergency,
could in two hours raise twelve thousand
armed men. A more preposterous idea
never entered the minds of grannies, either
of the masculine OF feminine gender.
There was no danger; there has been no
danger there will be no danger: nor can
there be any danger. The slaves of New
Orleans are too well off, too happy and con-
tented, to think of any other lot
Now mark chow plain tale" shall put
all this humbuggery down. The negro man,
over whose terrific declarations SO much
fuss has been made, was undoubtedly a sus-
picious character, deserved arresting. and
most exemplary fogging. That's all
Like all petted and INDUCED negroes, he be-
came spoiled, took to drinking, gambling,
and other vices. disobeyed his master. pill
fered from him, and has been for some
time laboring under mania patti, and as
negroes always do, he became black Boab-
dill, overhowing with pot valor, and as great
a liar and coward. 1t is the emphatic opin-
ion of those who know the negro well, that
his statements at the Police Office were the
mere ebbulitions of drunken delirium.
What a "lame and impotent conclusion,
to what was intended to be a terrible affair
". o. Bulletin. 10th ult.