The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1879-06-25
THE EXODUS PROBLEM.
colored Mems Colonies in Kansas.
LETTING THE CoLoRED MAN SPEAK FOR
HIMSELF.
From a Cor. Of the Boston Herald.l

dIASEl<f-
From a Cor Of the Boston Herald
Topeka, Kan, June /, IS79.-Negro colo.
MES in Kansas have not heretofore been sue
cessful 1t remains to be seen whether the
Kansas Freedmen's Relief Association will
make their Waubausee colony exception to
the rule of disaster. Waubansee county Ii
the next county TO the west OF Shawnee In
which Is situated this city. A few weeks ago
Isaiah T. Montgomery one OF the confidential
servants of the late Joseph Davis, brother OF
the Southern President, came here to study
the country.
Mr. Montgomery is a very intelligent col
ored man, although of pure African type. He
! writes a fine hand, Is very clear in his ideas,
| and il an excellent book-keePer He has the
/ management at present of the Davis planta-
tons on Palmyra Island, Mississippi river.
Mr.. Montgomery, after journeying through
the State 80 well pleased with the soil
! and prospects Tor money making, that he de-
/ cided to buy a section $40 acres) in Wauban-
see county. -Four sections adjacent to Mont
/ gomerv's have been secured by the Kansas
/ Freedmens Relief Association, and Will be
divided into farms Of 40 acres each on which
colored families will be settled. John NJ.
( Brown prosperous colOred Mississppian, will
| superiutend the planting OF the colony.
/ Barracks for the accommodation of the peo-
/ will be frat built, and aftcrward shanties.
| Each colonist viii be aided in making his first
payment OF SO, and nineteen years will be
/ allowed to pay the balance, the 40 acres be-
| ing reckoned at S265 per acre. Thus the 40
/ acres will be cost each settler SlO6. Interest
will be computed at per cent Sixty-four
/ families will be able to find 40-acre farms in
/ these four sections. Mr. Montgomery will take
several families ON his own section. Upon
| the success of this colony great deal depends.
Should it do we'll, the frequently state
/ ment that the negro cannot thrive in Kansas
will be disproved. / should advise eastern
people to Withhold their contributions till
! years trial Of colonization has been made.
/ All the boarded wealth OF the opulent New
| England cities cannot make good citizens of
the great mass of exodus negroes, many Of
whom are aged and infrm people
NO HOPE FOR THE IDLE.
There Is absolutely no hope for the colored
man in Kansas, except in so far as he becomes
self-supporting. He must come on equal terms
with the hardy white settler. He has got to
| learn Industrious habits and work six DAYS a
week. There plenty OF white people here
who deserve aid TAR more than the shiftless
| darkeys, who come 10 Kansas if it were an
| excursion. Over-wrought sentimentalism has
pictured every exodus negro as the fugitive
victim of the bull-dozers. The plain truth Is
that many of these negroes are but grown-up
children who came to Kansas in a state of
religious exEltation, confidently expecting to
find Gods country" Hundreds OF them
were doing well in the Mississippi valley.
They had their neat cabins, their horses,
mules cattle and hogs. They sold everything
for a song, and took passage for this land,
where hard work Is the secret OF wealth
The best informed railroad land agents are
incredulous to the success OF any negro
colony They say that the negro is not adap-
ted to the climate the kind Of agriculture
here predominant
The Nicodemus colony is an experiment re-
gardng which doleful stories are told Last
winter the negro cOlOnists were forced to skin
and eat their starved cattle. Their only fuel
was buffalo chips.
The Hodgeman county colony was settled
by l07 Kentucky negroes in the spring of 1873.
This colony is $50 miles west Of Kansas City,
far out on the plains. The most convenient
railroad point from which to make journey
to this colony is the town of Kinsley, in Ed
wards county, about thirty miles from the
settlement. Some fifty homesteads have been
taken and a few timber claims. The colonists
live, for the greater part, in dug-outs These
are semi-subterranean habitatiOns, consisting
of a hole or cellar a few feet in depth. Sod is
piled up around to form walls, and there is
generally board roof Most of the settlers
have but few acres under cultivation, and
only those possessing teams were successful
with their crops last year. Some OF them
attempted to work the earth with hoes, but it
was labor lost Very many of the colonists
have been compelled to go to the neighbOring
kONns 10 get EN- plONiuCut, not W
subsist their farms.
WAGES IN KANSAS
are low for agricultural laborers, ranging from
IS cents a day in ordinary times to 81 90 a
day in harvest. This is hardly so good as the
wages paid day laborers on Palmyra island,
Mississippi, where there is constant employ
ment the year around, and no cold winter for
which thick and expensive clothing is necessa-
ry. The negro laborer who comes to Kansas
to better himself will find himself deceived.
Few people realize the extremely low cost of
living in the South. The negroes there are,
as a rule, shamefully lazy in regard to vege-
table gardens. Every negro has a patch OF
garden ground, and very few take the trouble
to provide their tables with the abundant veg
etables of the South. Corn bread and pork,
seems TO satisfy the negro summer and winter
He tires of -four and bacon, and gladly betakes
himself to coarser food.
Let a committee of our thrifty Massachu-
sets farmers go through the southern country
and they would be amazed at the thriftless-
ness of the negroes, who burn their fences Tor
fuel, and idle away hours that should be given
to cultivating gardens, and thus adding to
their scanty bill of fare, well as reducing
their store bills
The Hodgeman colony cannot be fairly pro-
nounced a success. A successful colony should
be self-sustaining, and this is certainly not
Mr.. Hilton of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa
Fe Railroad Company's land office, gentle
man of great experience in Kansas says that
the Hodgeman colony is a complete failure.
He does not believe that colored men are
adopted to Kansas farming or to the climate.
THE MOROCCAN HE BECOME FARMER.
The exodus problem is easily stated 1t
is TO be embodied in a single question: Can
the colored man become independent
farmer in the West? The Waubansee colony
may answer this question in the affirmative.
The Nicodemus and Hodgeman colonies are
failures Until the Waubansee colony shows
the world that the colored man. can become
a thrifty Kansas farmer it Is senseless folly to
send money to the insatiate relief committees
whose only aim is to keep up the excitement.
The negro is not starving i'll the South. he
has gone very hungry in Kansas. Every dol
lar sent West is premium put upon
pauper emigration from the South, an induce
ment to the negro tenant to violate his con-
tract with the planter.
The negro will never stand alone so long as
people North continue to send him clutches.
Massachusetts mill operatives and quarrymen
working for 90 cents day worse off than
Mississippi negro farm laborers on 60 cents
day and with free house rent and free garden
patch and no cold winters. An instructive
essay might be written on Wasted Sympa-
thy" and it might be dedicated to senti-
mentalists who weep for the poor far
away and see not the oppressed at their
doors
RELIEF THAT DOES NOT RELIEVE.
The result of my observations of the "exo-
dus" is a conviction that it will end as all
such artifeially-exeited movements invaria-
bly, do-in disaster to the credulOus victims.
The relief Committees are often in the hands
of knaves and politicians The noble, but
INSTRUCTED, charity of the East has reused
the cupidity of the white and colored rascals
who have never prospered except by "manipu-
lating" the money of the charitable. The St.
Louis and KANSAS relief committees are vital
" interested in keeping up the movement, and
they do everything possible to deter the
homesick negroes from returning to the South.
In st. Lows not a morsel of food will the re-
lief committee give the half-starved wretches
homeward bound for Kansas. / have this