Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1866-08-17

Great Work vet to be isOne-A Grow.
ing Demand for Feachers-Effccts of
my Policy upon Southern Senti-
ment.
C7peeiaI Correspondence Cleveland LEADER
Having just returned from the South,
where 1 have been spending some weeks
in business pursuits, and having visited
Selma and Montgomery in Alabama, it
may be interesting to your readers to
know something of the condition Of the
Freedmen, and of the schools which have
been established for them under the aus
piees of the Aid Commission Of your city.
The Freedmen show an Unsuitable de-
sire for knowledge, and their close and
persistent application to their studies is
the more remarkable when we consider
that their early life has been less c~alcula-
ted to form habits of studious attention,
than almost any other which could be
conceived. At Montgomery 1 saw the
three teachers from Cleveland who are
laboring there, and also a teacher from
Talladega who was spending her vaca-
ton at the Teachers Home in Montgom-
erv. It was vacation with the schools,
so that l did not see them in operation,
but an exhibition of the schools was held
on the only evening l spent there. This
was held in a church occupied by a col
ored delegation on the Sabbath, and as q
school room for freedmen on week days.
The room was decorated with boughs and
the starry flag, the symbol of their free
dom and manhood, was stretched across
the room back of the pulpit, and in front
a platform was erected for the use of the
speakers. Mr.. Silsby, the Principal Of
the freedmen's schools at Montgomery,
conducted the exercises, which consisted
Of defamation and dialogues by scholars
of both sexes and all ages, interpreted
with the singing Of appropriate pieces by
a choir of twenty or thirty scholars, who
have been in training for only some five
weeks. The time from S to II P. NJ was
fully occupied, and the house was filed
by an attentive audience. 1t is not
too much TO say that the performances
would compare f~avorably with those of
any ordinary white school and when it
il kept in mind that these scholars n
year Q did not know a letter of tue En-
glish alphabet, many of them having
never read a word till within four months,
it is doubtful if any white school can be
found which can show q proficiency
equally rapid.
There was not q single instance Of
prompting or of imperfect committal 10
n emory during the evening. One young
woman failed in her part in a dialogue,
not from imperfect preparation, but be-
cause, as she said, Her heart beat so she
couldn't speak" l saw letters and copy
books written by scholars who have been
/ writing but four months, and some of the
former could be easily and promptly read,
excelling in composition, ~penmanship and
photography many business letters and
orders for goods which l have seen in
New England and the West. The teach
ers have had much and varied experience
in white schools, and say they doubt if
any white schools, as a whole, have ever
made so rapid progress. Order Is easily
maintained, and the same tact and kind
ness which rules other schools gains en-
tire control and secures ready obedience
here.
These results are not only gratifying
but remarkable, in view Of the absence of
all stimulus TO mental exertion and APP
plication in the past Ifs Of the scholars,
and afford abundant encouragement to
give the opportunities Of education to
those who So highly enjoy them.
This is but one point in the great
South, and the work is one of great mag
nitude. To every Christian and Phi
lanthropist it must appear Of transcendent
Importance. Already the interest shown
in it by the North has attracted very GEN
| eral attention from the thinking men of
the South, and the fact that the freedmen
must and Will be educated is becoming
recognized. Applications for teachers
viii be numerous and urgent, for the fall
and wiHter and though ost-ari-m and-er-
clusion from Southern society will be the
| portion Of those who undertake this work,
still no self-sacrifcing labor to be found
in this generation can Weld, it is believed,
so large results. The field is vide, and
the harvest great. The question is often
asked, what is the feeling of Southern
people toward Northern men ~
Northern business men viii be received
! cordially in the portions of Alabama
which ! have recently visited, and their
business efforts TO reconstruct by in
PRODUCING Northern skill and capital, will
be seconded and co-operated il. The po-
litical bearing Of Southern men has ma
t%erially changed since the Presidents
"my policy course. Mr.. johnson and
his Philadelphia Convention are relied
upon to give the South all they want, and
restore them as they are to Il full share in
the government of the country.
Several months ago they appeared will
ing to accept such terms rs the North WAS
disposed to give now they confidently
declare, You would not let us 90 ont,
and now you will not let US come IN"
1t can not be denied that original Sc
c~essionists, and those who now glorlfy re-
bellion, stand today high in the estima-
ton of Southern people, and that the
feeling that this will do and can be
persisted in, receives its support from the
course of Mr.. johnson, as opposed to hat
Of Congress. The question thus raised is
a grave one, and demands q firm and IN
finching course on the part of all who
upheld the Government and the Union
against those who sought TO destroy them
both.
No., EEAKN VW..r 4 = 70 1EEn-rnr