Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1878-09-05
A ROMANCE OF SLAVERY.
Hotc Too Missouri Dorzcies Raa 4,cdy and
Made Their Way to Canada, Returning |
after. EigIateer Years to See cold Muss0" /

III OaU 11CO Missouri DUTIcieS Kan 4fc0Y ana
Made Their Way to Canada, Returning
litter Eighteen Years to See cold 1ussa"
and "1Iasss1s."
lSt. Louis Special to Chicago Tribune.
No better illustration of the peculiar re-
lationship of the past and present can be
found than that afforded by the appearance
to-day of a gray haired negro in the city
looking for his relatives of eighteen years
ago. Your correspondent met the ancient
darkey this morning in an attorneys office,
and ascertained from him that he was Bev
Strother, who, with his half-brether, JEFF
Murray, ran away in 1860, and had never
been heard of by their friends since. Bey's
face relaxed into broad grin as he told how
"me and jeff run away, and the awful time
we had.'' It seems that Bev and JEFF were
slaves in 1860, the former belonging to
Travis Murphy, and the latter to DR.. J. L.
Overall, of st. Charles county, Mo-; that Bev
was threatened with ''sale down de riber,'' the
terror of all darkies, and SO persuaded
jeff to run away with him. Through an old
darby at st. Charles they found white man
who agreed to pilot them 100 miles for 500,
and on the night of June 30, 1860, the trio
met and started on runaway sure enough"
They travelled nights and lay in the brush
by day, the white man being used to pilot
the way and buy provisions. The negroes
had very shrewdly provided themselves with
compass, to be sure they were being piloted
to the .'far- off land ratLer than to Dixie. -
They also took pistols to defend themselves
with, and always, after they had hid for the
day and sent the man for provisions, moved
their hiding place and watched ''dat ar white
man. from long way off to see that he did
not bring any nigger-catchers with him. On
the evening of the second day out, the white
man, while out foraging, saw DIR. Overall
and pursuing party, and heard him describe
the negroes, and offer a reward for their APP
prehension. 81 tell you, massa," said Ben,
as he rubbed his gray head, "them was hot
times" They travelled at right angles to
their general course that night, and the pur-
suing party never heard of them again.
The "white pilot and nigger-stealer' was
given away by a pretended would-be run
away about three weeks later, captured
by DR.. Overall, and sentenced, after a plea
of guilty, by Judge King, of the St. Charles
circuit court, to six years in the Pen.
Two years later Bev and JEFF turned up at
Lafayette, Ind, with mighty little faith of
there being an end to the world or anything
for runaway negroes but sore feet and empty
stomachs. On the night of their arrival
there they were followed by a negro man
who accused them of being runaways and
rendered his services to show them the
underground railway They denied the
first and refused the last, but when the
would-be guide was reinforced by zone of
dem real old honest rigger mothers,'' the
runaways acknowledged the soft impeach-
ment and were provided for.
At Detroit they jumped off the train a
mile from the depot, and following the beck
oning of 'sBlack Hand" without inquiry
or explanation, and were locked up in lit
tie room, way up on the top of a boat. The
next day Canada received two citizens and
the United States was out $4,000 worth of
niggers.
Both negroes went to work on a. farm in
the county Of Essex, at 1910 per year, and
at the end Of five years had saved 81 900,
with which they purchased two farms. jeff
acquired limited education, and, in addi-
ton to attending to his own matters, became
foreman on large farm. In June last jeff
was poisoned by his wife, who bids fair to
hang. AS jeff had no children, Bev came
back to hunt up his heirs. Bev found his
mother, Emily Murray, negress rs years
old, still living.
AS her children, twelve in number, are all
illegitimate, they cannot inherit from each
other, and hence she gets Jeff's entire estate
worth some $4,000, subject to the dover
rights of the wife.
Bev found his old master, who is 81 years
of age, still living on the old place, and was
made happy by the kindly manner in which
he was received and treated by the massa
ana missus of his boyhood days, and thinks
he will sell out and move his family of seven
back to "de ole Missouri shore''