The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1866-06-08

HOW YANKEES TREAT NEGROES.

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HOW YANKEES TREAT NEGROES.
The correspondent of the New York
Herald, who is travelling with Gener-
ais Steednlan and Fullerton, continues
TO expose the pecuIati0n and oppres-
sion which characteristics the conduct of
such Northern menas have undertaken
70 cultivate plantations in the South.
He says:
In nine cases out Of ten where we
have come across a plantation poorly
cultivated, the negroes hardly worked
and miserably fed, that plantation has
been leased for year or two by man
from Massachusetts.
We met with a marked case of this
Kind on Wadmalaw Island. Driving
over plantation we halted at a store
round which group of forty or fifty
squa!id negroes We're gathered, receiv-
ing their days wages. There wereno
contracts on this farm. Thehands were
engaged from day to day at fifty cents
d task" The stoi oiekeeper was paying
them when we came up, and was Civ
ing them, not money, but tickets for
provisions. lie explained that he oft
en had no money WhereWith TO pay
them, so he gave them their earnings
in goods. We inquired the prices at
which the stores were sold. We found
that corn, which sells in Charleston
market at a dollar and thirty cents a
bushel, and is worth in Wadmalaw Is
land, with transportation added, GER
tainly less thana dollar and fifty cents,
was being dcled out to them at three
dollars buoHel. twenty-five cents
was charged for a package containing
twenty-five biscuits, such as might be
bou2htin New York three for a cent,
ana everything else was in proportion.
Should there be anything still due to
the negroes, after they had purchased
the necessary meal and bacon, there
were beads aud cheap jeWelry-sure to
attract the negro's eye-displayed IN
the store to absorb the balance of his
earnings. Thus, while they were ap-
parentiy paid fair wages for their work,
more than half their earnings were eV-
cry day taken back from them in the
shape of profit on the goods in which
they were paidin lieu Of money. Gen.
Steedman asked who leased the plan
tation. He was told Mr.. Underwood,
/ Of Boston. This Mr.. Underwood does
not reside on the plantation. ltisman-
aged by his storekeeper also a North
erner, with the assistance of aresident,
to whom five hundred dollars year is
paid for his advice. The poor creatures
employed on the farm gathered round
Gen. Steedman and bitterly complain
ed that their days work barely sutficed
10 provide for them more than their
days provisions. 1t was evident that
rs things are going on, when winter
comes they will be left penniless and
starving.
( On Edisto Island we came across a
similar case, in which another North
erner was involved. Some negroes
F commenced the cultivation of an unOc-
cupied plantation. In March last up
came New York Dutchman and told
them he had leased the farm. and they
must contract with him. They repli-
! ed, reasonably enough, that if he desi-
red to contract with them he ought to
have done so in January, before they
had commenced tolay down their crops.
The man WentaWay, and the freedmen
resumed their work and toiied early
and tate for their own benefit as they
supposed. 4 day or two since, when
they were hoeing their cotton and when
any cessation of labor would destroy
all their prospects. up came this same
DutChman, bringing with him six or
seven negro soldiers, and compelled the
freedmen. at the point OF the bayonet,
To sign contract to give him 0ne-third
Of their cotton and pay him an eXorbi-
tant rent for the cabins in which they
lived. ThecCntract signed, the Dutch
man went away, leaving them no copy
OF the document. and giving them no
proof thatthe plantation had ever been
restored to its former owner or that he
had leased it.