Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1857-08-20


WHY A MINISTER LEFT HIS CHURCH BrH-
tai OutrGges on SlaUes.-We suppose it would
be too much to ask that those papers which
were so much shocked at the martyrdom o.
the deacon expelled from hard shell Baptist
church for voting for Buchanan, to copy this
article. 1t is not at all in their line
The Rev. Samuel Sawyer, graduate Of
the New York Theological Seminary, and for
the last nine years pastor of the Second Pres
byteriBn Church in Rogersyille, East 1ennes-
see, was recently driven from his church in
consequence of his course in regard to the
beating of a slave, named Anthony, by his
master, one Col. Netherland, an elder in his
church. Mr.. SAWYER has published nothing
in regard to the affair until driven to 1t by
slanderous reports, prejudicial to his charac-
ter as a minister, have been circulated and
forced him to his own defence. he there
fore publishes long statement in a supple
ment to the Knoxville (Tenn.) Pres6ytertan
Witness, the truth Of which is vouched for by
Messrs. Joseph Hoffmaster and j. M. john
son, elders of the Rogersville church. The
Col. Netherland, whose brutality is SO dis
gustingly shown, has been elected delegate
To the Secession Convention called by the
pro-slavery ministers Of the New School Pres
byteriad Church, 10 meet at Richmond on the
9th inst.
1t appears that slave, formerly belonging
to the children of DR.. Ross, was owned by
Col. Netherland, and was sold in 1856 to be
sent to Mississippi. Rather than go ''down
South, the negro ran off to the woods, and
remained concealed for more than year, I'M
til found and brought back by some hunters.
He was then handed over by Col. N, with
his chains on, TO the trader who bought him,
who took him back of the church, in field,
and there, in the presence OF crowd OF spec
tators, beat him with over three hundred and
thirty blows, laid on with leather strap nall
ed to board, while the slave was tied down
on his back naked and blindfolded. The ira
der whipped him to make him confess who
had harbored him, and probably would have
''beaten him till Saturday night. II such an
excitement had not been caused by the first
instalment of scourging,
But this was not the worst. Col. Neither.
land owned an old gray haired slave who had
nursed him in infancy, and suspectlng that
he knew more about the runaway and who
had harbo-ed him than he chose to tell, he
handed him over to the same negro trader, to
be taken to neighboring county and there
beaten at discretion, to make him confess.
The trader took the old man to place
called Bean Station, in the next county
Grainger-and there, on sunday morning, in
stable, on the public highway. stripped and
tied him naked on plank, strapped his feet
to a post, and tied his head forward to a
brace, and then whipped him by striking with
carpenters hand Mississippi way
which raised large blisters and burst them,
cutting the hide in pieces. He whipped him
that Sunday till all the neghbors closed
thar NH, (tll 4bo niu horn
put down their windows and closed the cur
tains-whipped him till the women, driven
wild by hearing the blows and the negro's
agonizing cries for mercy, cried out against
it'll one man declared that if he did not
stop he would return him to court-till the
landlord of the tavern, after hearing in silence
the intliction of at least three hundred blows
with the saw, went to him and told him that
he must put an end to it-that he himself
was liable to Indictment for suffering such
things on his premises, and he was unwilling
to bear it any longer. The trader became
very angry at this interference, and told the
landlord that he had sent boy to get him
bundle of whips to scourge the negro's back
whenFthe flesh should be too much cut up by
the saw; and finally, finding he could not
go on, he tumbled the negro into his wagon
in disgust at the Bean Station people, and
went to Rutledge. The slave had two fits in
conseq uence of the beating, but notwith
standing, the trader tied him up again in
Rutledge Jail, while the jailer (who would
hardly have allowed it) was away, and beat
him with three sticks from loom over the
raw flesh, until he was tired and then told
him he would try it again the next day. The
Inspectors, however, refused to let the jail be
used for such purpose, and the negro was
sent home in week, no information having
been obtained from him.
Thereupon a great excitement arose at
Rogersville, and the Church Session mildly
requested Col. Netherland to come forward
and show he was not responsible for the out
rage. He refused to do this-declaretr he
had right to beat his negroes as much as he
chose, or have it done-that churches had
nothing to do with politics-and, finally,
wound up by declaring Mr.. Sawyer an abo-
litionist, and that he must leave. Mr.. Saw
yer, thinking that the church would be di.
vided if he stayed, and his friends being too
much afraid of being called abolitionists if
they stood up for him, resigned the charge of
this church, with its most righteous elder,
and came away.