The Saline County journal. [volume] (Salina, Kan.) 1871-1893, 1877-06-14
South Carolina Society.

The great body OF the aristocracy were
ruined by the war-some stepped in pow
crty to the very lips at once. Not few
sank under the blow into insanity.
Others were seized with apathy and de-
spair. They lived on, as best they were
able, selling their lands and personal
property as necessity pressed them.
Others went Raniully 10 work. Plenty
of high-bred and naughty women, wild
owed by the recent strife, hesitated not
10 enter tho field and superntcnd their
laborers. Most gentlemen discharged
their overseers and managed their own
estate. Young scions of the aristocracy
hired out TO their moro fortunate neigh
bors as orerseers, or scrnpled not to be-
come clerks, teachers, or depot, express,
insurance and sewing machine agents.
The ladies advertised for boarders, be-
came teachers or gorernesses, or took IN
sewing. Those families who were not
Immediately FRUSTRATED contrivcd, as
have SAID, TO drag on for a while. They
persisted in retaining their carriages,
drivers and outriders, in giving stately
family dinner parties, in handing wine
TO visitors, In making formal visits.
Gradually they descended. They be-
came their own drivers, they opened
their own gates Their vehicles grew
old and dingy. Their horses, at first
kept solely for riding or driving, were
worn out at the pillow or sold mules re-
placed them in a carriage. Their din
ners were given at intervals few and far
between. Their main solicItude became
TO avoid starvation. Many were COM
PEELED TO DO their own cooking. Most
of them waited on themselves. The
merchants, after credit ng them until
ruinous amounts were lost, demanded
cash. Many were sold ont for private
debts. Their efforts to keep up appear
anccs have been often truly pitiable. I
Since the war the people of South Caro-
lima have had many old home associa-
lions broken up. Hundreds OF houses
were burned during the war; almost rs
many have since been fired by incendia- !
res. Bankruptcy was the universal or
der after the cessation Of hostilities. |
Many have been sold ont for taxes. |
Three-fourths of the whites have |
had to change either their homes or their
locality. This has caused much mental
suffering. The negroes also have been
necessarily moving. The great MAORI
~ LEFT their old owners. They are very |
troublesome servants 10 keep, SO that
they rarely remain anchored long in any
one viclnagc. Indeed, this leads me to
say that ore of the chief grievances OF
white ladies' since the war has been the |
way in which house servants who leave I
them and hire 10 others gossip about
them or SANDER them to their new en-
ployers. la old times, as every family
had certain favorite old house servants
who were never sold, and always stayed
with their owners, this annoying gossip
was thing unknown. The negroes
generally took the family names of their
owners on being set tree, though a third
or more of them, whose owners had
been cruel, adopted the name of some
former white master noted for kindness,
or picked up names anywhere, and in
the police items one reads of Arthur
Middleton being put in the guard-house
for drnnkennes,or Drayton Bull, Grimkc
Lcgare, or Preston Laurcns committed
for petit larceny.