The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-11-13
VIRGINIA'S RACE FIGHT.
Colonel Burr's Response to the Criti-
cisms of Democratic Editors.
Riddleberger and Malone in Harmony-The
Funder Fight Struggle for Caste
and Special Privilege.

The Democratic press of Richmond having
denounced the statements OF Colonel Il. A.
Burr in the Philadelphia Press as false, that
gentleman responds as follows showing that
he obtained his information from prominent
Funders. OF his work in Richmond he says:
Upon my arrival went Immediately to
call upon several gentlemen to ascertain the
real situation in that State. Every man
whom | approached was a bitter, uncompro-
missing enemy of the CoalitionisJs. I did not
see or converse upon the political situation
at any length whatever with a single gentle
man allied to the movement General Malone
is leading. l got all my information and i'm
-pressions from his enemies From everyone
with whom 1 ceuversed 1 got the same state
ment, which may thus be epitomized:
Virginia is sitting in the shadow of great
danger. Every man you meet is we'll armed,
and a single incident may provoke more
bloodshed. The white people are determined
10 rule Virginia. Nothing like the present
determination of the educated and intelli-
gent classes of white people to control this
State has ever been known. The
temper of reconstruction days is
outdone a hundred fold. Ii more
bloodshed occurs, the intention is to
shoot over the niggers, and kill the white
people who are leading them. If there is
anything we are determined upon, it is that
if We have to shoot the life out of this
Malone movement"
Upon these gentle, good-tempered toler-
ant expressions, | made the conservative
statement that Virginia was in danger of
renewal of the turbulent scenes in South
Carolina after reconstruction and said that
the opponents of General Malone had raised
the race issue and were fighting their battle
upon the caste line. Pursuing my inquir-
les among the enemies of the Coalitionists, /
learned from State Senator Atkinson, who
represents the city of Richmond in the Vir-
ginia Legislature, as we'll as other leading
Democrats, that the real facts as to the ex-
tent of the slaughter at Danvile could not
then be obtained. Senator Atkinson had
gust returned from Danville an hour before,
and he kindly gave me all the facts he had
been able to gather there. From him, as
well as other leaders, learned that the riot
had no political significance. From all the
testimony | could gather from this class it
appeared that the murders were committed
in the heat of passion.
Saturday evening is great occasion in
Danville. The colored people receive their
pay from the tobacco factories, and the mar.
ket place during afternoon of that dav is an
interesting feature of that beautiful town.
The negroes gather there by the thousand to
buy their supplies for Sunday When the
marketing was at its height, a colored man
and a white man got into an alteration.
whereupon a crowd of whites rushed in and
onened indscriminate fire upon the defense
less negroes. The assailing party and those
in sympathy with them say that seven were
killed outright and twenty more were
wounded, but testimony is abundant that
this number does not represent one-haf the
harvest of death that afternoon. Not white
man was hurt by a colored person, and only
two were injured and they by accident in
the random firing of their own friends.
These facts l state entirely upon the highest
authority from the friends of those who
committed the assault. The Coalitionists
claim very much more serious things but
che admissions of their opponents are bad
enough,
never said that the best people of V1r-
ginia, in either party, approved such crimes
as have characterized the recent campaign in
the "Old Dominion" but passion has run so
high that many of them have assumed the
attitude of expressing sympathy with it, and
been so excited with the desperate game of
politics, that they have not only refused to
raise their voices against it, but really sane
toned it by their words and acts. In long
and earnest conversation with a Virginia gen.
tleman opposed to Malone he went over
these facts with me, attested their truth, and
deprecated them with great warmth. | asked
permission to quote him upon the subject,
when he said:
mo man can tell the facts of the situation
and live here without ostracism."
1t would be impossible for me to employ
words to express the real temper and spirit
of the successful element of Virginia. l have
heard much for fifteen years of the intoler-
ance of the Southern people. This is the first
time l have ever had occasion to write of it;
l hope it will be the last. Time will doubt
less soften the asperities of the present stua-
ton, SO that a man can live there and enjoy
his own opinions and expressions, without
being an outcast 1t is not so now.