The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1892-06-09
A QUAINT COMMUNITY.
A Village Where Ignorance and Filth
Predominant.

Especial Washington letter.

estate, a portion of which is set aside
for the magnificent National cemetery,
is village where ignorance, squalor,
filth and famine predominant.
Immediately after the war thousands
of colored people of all ages came to
Washington with the armies which
were ordered here to participate in the
| grand review. There were gray-haired
men and women, lusty young men and
wenches, as well as children and babes
in arms. Many of them were INDECENT
and too ignorant to understand how to.
care for themselves. Hundreds of them,
however, were able to earn quarters,
half-dollars and dollars by washing for
the officers and assisting the cavalry
men in caring for their horses, while
the boys gathered great many dimes
for holding the brides of the horses of
the officers. Those of them who were,
in any sense of the word, wageearners,
settled in Washington and founded fam
lies which are to-day the nucleus of
commendable class of society.
Those of them who were absolutely
INDECENT and incapable of caring for
themselves were ultimately given
sort OF squatter sovereignty by the
Freedmen's bureau upon portion of
the Arlington estate south of the ceme-
terry and not far from the long bridge
These people have lived there from
that time to the present without pro-
crossing in any degree, save in the
multiplication of their numbers. They
are without schools, without churches,
| -
eminent and utterly devoid of any of
the natural adjuncts of human prog
ress. For number of years the men
in this community had the privilege of
voting in Alexandria county, but few
years ago an ordinance was passed pro-
hibiting that particular class of people
from exercising the right of suffrage.
Since that time they have been abso-
lutely sequestered from the rest of the
world in every sense of the word.
They are a community of pitiable crea-
lures, devoid of political power, cut off
from educational advantages, ignored
by religious teachers and no better
off in any degree than their an
cesters- in the wilds of Africa. Never
theless they are living within direct
radius of two miles from the great cap
itol building, in which the rich and the
great, in the pomp and the pride of their
worldly estate, legislate for the Gland
of the free and the home of the brave"
In this community, so near the halls of
national legislation, there is license,
but not liberty, and an utter absence of
any quality akin to bravery.
| bof fl,iu 10 ~ fl;ror, eI,o.,1J -
tain and be permitted to continue is
exceedingly lamentable, but there is no
present means apparent Of abolishing
this village. It consists of every man
ner of aboriginal abode, builded upon
one of the greatest and most important
government reservations, and can only
be abrogated or abolished, or its condi-
ton ameliorated, by congressional en-
actment. There is no disposition on
the part of either house of congress to
turn these people off of the reservation,
for they have no place to go, no visible
means of support, and would surely be-
come charitable charge upon the city
| of Alexandria or the national capital,
save those Of them who would surely be
arraigned before the police courts of
either of those two cities for crimes and
misdemeanors. Pauperism and crime
are twin children of ignorance.
The capital of the nation is reaching
out its hands and gathering in unto
itself all the valuable and available
suburban places. Many men are look
ing with avaricious eyes upon this beau
tiful spot, so miserably inhabited.
There is in contemplation magnificent
bridge across the Potomac from Wash
lngton to Arlington Heights. 1t will
soon be desirable to have this portion
of the Arlington estate segregated.
| plated, graded and builded as a beauti-
full suburb covered with cottages which
may become the homes of government
employees. Members of both houses of
congress are being daily importuned to
formulate and pass bill with this OBJ
ject in view. 1t is simply a question of
| time when this will be done, and when
that time comes the community of over
two thousand people, all of them igno-
rant and majority of them depraved,
must be cared for in some way by char
ity or by law.
The locality above described is im1ne-
diately south of the National cemetery
Directly north of that beautiful city Of
the dead on the heights overlooking the
national capital, stands Fort Meyer, for
many years the training school of the
signal service of the army. The hill
country in that section is already in the
hands of real estate dealers. Beautiful
streets and avenues have been marked
and graded, and an electric rail-
way well-nigh completed from
Georgetown which will carry it's
inhabitants swiftly to and from the very
heart of Washington, and in a few
months, like magic, there will grow
upon these hills a village of beauty, ex-
ceedingly desirable for suburban resi-
uences. real estate IN the city proper
is held at such enormous and unreason-
able figures that none but the wealthy
can hope to obtain homes therein. This
condition of affairs is causing the city
to reach out its hands for desirable 10
cations where homes can be had within
the financial reach OF all 1t is pre-
| Sl1rned that Fort. Never Hefuhts will he