The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1873-07-07

Inquest unnecessary. as the drowning was
purely accidental.
| The CoLoRED HoME-IMPoRTAST TO TIE
| CoLORED PEOPLE.-A masS-meeting of the
colored people of Richmond will be held in
the First African church tomorrow night
to consider the question of the establishment
of home for the sick, aged, and infrm Of
their race. An organization has already
been formed to promote this object, with
Rev. James H. Holmes, president Rev.
Richard Wells, vice-president; +. W. jack
son. secretary; James Allen, treasurer; DR..
VI. Burton, superintendent, and a board of
managers, who issue the following address ::
To the Colored People Of Richmond: You
number about twenty-five thousand Of the
population of Richmond. You are depend
ent upon your own resources for the care of
yourselves in sickness and in health. Many
of you are improvident, and live without
old aye. You live without reference TO the
future Many of you have no other homes
| than damp and dark cellars and confined
garrets, and many have no permanent abid-
ing place at all; and when all such are over
taken by sickness or some casualty they must
suffer, and perhaps die, for the want of pro-
per care and attention.
BY reference to the weekly morttmry re-
ports you will find that, with much less
number of the population, the mortality of
the blacks exceeds that Of the whites.
The Home, as its maine implies, will be an
asylum for the sick, the aged, and the indi-
gent; and will insure to all of you the cer-
taiuty of being cared for in sickness and old
age.
| Can it be put in operation? We will sup
pose there are ten thousand colored people
in Richmond who could pay ten cents,
twenty-five cents, or fifty cents per month
for one, two, or three years, or indefinitely,
without ever feeling the want OF it, If ten
thousand people were TO pay ten cents per
month it would amount to twelve thousand
dollars per year if twenty-five cents, thirty
thousand dollars if fifty cents, sixty thou
sand dollars. II five thousand people were
to pay ten cents per month it would amount
| TO six thousand dollars per year; if twenty
i've cents. fifteen thousand dollars; if fifty
cents, thirty thousand dollars. So it must
be plain to you that by the monthly contri-
button Of very small amount a sufficient
sum to establish and sustain the Home in
operation would speedily accumulate. If
ten thousand people were to contribute one
cent day for 4 ycar it would more than
do it.
| Your benevolent societies annually con-
tribute an amount that would not only
establish but in two or three years endow it
with fund that would make it selt-support-
| ing. There are, as we are Informed, about
one hundred benevolent societies in Rich
mond, whose members contribute monthly
fifty cents each for the support of their sick
and for funeral expenses. If the one hum
1 MA tDr thpu
number five thousand, and pay thirty thou
sand dollars year. II they average one
hundred members they pay sixty thousand
| dollars Il year.
| As the design of lie Home is purely be-
nevolent, and as the Object Of all your socic-
ties is the same, without disturbing your
distinctive organizations for all other pur-
poses. it Is proposed that you all shall unite
to form one grand consolidated benevolent
association, whose benefits shall be freely
| dispensed to all.
| We can imagine nothing more consoling
toa colored person without Il home, without
friends, and without means, as is the case
with many, than the certainty that if sick
hess or misfortune betall me / have home
| Consolidation would be cooperation, CO.
operation would be success, and success
would insure to your race an amount of
good that would be nestimable-infinitely
more than equivalent to the sum of all the
good now dispensed from all your societies.
| Consolidation offers the great advantage
of economy also. The sick of the different
societies are scattered, and the fund for their
support divided and wasted. Under union
the sick would be brought together and the
| fund concentrated upon one point, and the
saving would be immense-not less than one
| thousand or more per cent.
| This is a most praiseworthy charity; one
1 that commends itself to all good people,
easily accomplished if you go into it earn
| estly and heartily, and will have sympathy
and aid from hundreds of people in all parts
Of the country.
II any having comfortable homes should
object to going when sick to the Home hos
pital, and prefer remaining at their homes,
| they will receive the same care and ittcn-
| ton as ut the hospital, and will also receive
their weekly allowance from the common
fund.
We confidently believe that in two or three
| years fund will have been contributed the
interest upon which will support the Home
without any further contributions, and then
your societies will be relieved of all further
care for their sick, and the contributions
NAV cease or be employed in some other
| way.
We are not prepared to say what the
ground and buildings for the Home would
cost, but we are very sure they would not
cost one-third the amount annually con-
tributed by the different societies and spent
in parades, excursions, and funerals.
You could do nothing that would SO much
eyince your capacity for social improve
ment, and nothing that would SO much COM
mand the admiration of the mole fortunate
in social and mental culture.
ba