The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-09-07
THE MORNING NEWS: FRIDAY. SEPTEMBER 7, 1894.


rested"
CASTOR was remanded 10 await requisi-
ton papers from Atlanta, but as none
had come by Nov - he was discharged.
He then went 70 Brooklyn, aud few
days afterwarc started on spree and
was arrested for drunkenness. The pa
pers had arrived by that time, so he was
taken south by two detectives 10 answer
the charge of swindiiug
That charge was made by Ellhu II.
Belcher, a cOlOreC attorney Of Atlanta.
in the complaint Belcher said that when
CASTOR turned up In that city he repre-
sented himself TO be the owner OF real
aud personal PROPERTY 10 Liberia worth
$1,000 He also said that he was a mem
Der of the firm Of ECcles, Dempster. &
Co., OF Liverpool, and That he had been
sent over 70 establish branch houses at
various points in the United SJates par
tlcularly In Atlanta, for the encourage
meEt of emigration 70 Liberia. He said
that by simply touching a wire he could
have $4,000 sent 10 him any day, being
the accredited agent of the Iliberian gov
eminent. Carried away by the bright
picture presented by Castor, Belcher and
he became member of "a firm called Ec-
Giles, DempSter, CASTOR * Co. A highly
cOlOred and elaborate certificate Of the
United States and Congo National Emf
grafton steamship Company was given
AAAtlA anu AOA WIS nc pau AFslH tO4 lsBg
That was as long ago as Nov. 10, 1891,
and, after keeping the stock until April /,
1893, Belcher guessed that he hal been
duped and offered TO surrender the paper
for $50 This CASTOR refused to pay.
Finally, firing of repeated fruitless efforts
to recover his money, Belcher resorted to
the law.
1t Is said that Castor. in the autumn Of
1881. announced to the heroes of North
ern Georgia that everything was in read
mess to take them wholesale to Liberia
ana that by depositing with him 81 each
they would secure passage. The refusal
Of negroes throughout the south to make
contracts for another years work, the fact
thatthey were selling out their belongings
for next TO nothing and their docking to
Atlanta in the early part of De
cember of that year were the
first intimations that the whites
had Of Gaston's movement. There was
much secrecy. Negroes who told of the
plans fort emigration were punished
by their fellows J.; some were beaten al
most to death. In Atlanta well-to-do
negroes, who had homes and business
worth from 81 600 to - GOO, sold out for
whatever they could get. Prayer meet
lngs were held nightly at which CASTOR
led, and only the initiated were adj
mitted to them 1t was secret move
ment, and the deiuded negroes were in it
by thousands. They looked upon CASTOR
as prophet The city and state author
tiles did their best to dsabuse the
negros of their delusion, but so strong
was their faith in Gaston-their new
Moses, as they called him-that nothing
could be done. The negroes endured sew
eral months of priyation in the belief that
each day would bring to savannah the
ships which were to bear them to Africa
Gradually the dupes straggled back into
the country and resumed work, buOyed
by the message from CASTOR that the
Lord was merely trying their faith; that
IN time they would come out of the
desert as did the children Of Israel.
The amount of money CASTOR raised in
this movement is variOusly estimated at
from $4,000 to $4,000. What he did with
1t nobody knows, but he probably spent
some of it for the purpose for which it
was intended, as he did really take one
party, about thirty, to Liberia. When he
got back he was arrested. He was sub
sequently put on trial in Atlanta and
served several weeks in Jail
he bObbed up in New York again last
March. Once more he had worked the
Georgia field, and with something of his
former success, for he told Daniel Bacon,
a steamship agent ia the produce ex-
change building, that he wished to en-
gage passage 10 Liberia for a party of
1bA nc BOuGllb SlttEdRE JlChetE lOf Ifle
party and second cabin passage for him
self. 1t was arranged that they were to
sail by the steamship Chester on March
10. At Liverpool they were to be trans
ferred to the African Steamship Com
pany's steamer for Grand Bassa, Liberia,
which was the place where CASTOR had
settled.
The forty colonists came in from Sa-
vannaf1 on the morning preceding that of
~
City OF Augusta. Castor was there to
meet them, and when they got hold of
him the whole forty, men, women and
children fell upon him, hugging and kiss
ing him, and Offering up mumbled prayers
of thanks. They remained on the pier all
that day and all night, hungry and sleepy,
but not utteflng a word of complaint
Gaston's influence over them seemed to
be complete. The next morning they
sailed
Castor accompanied the party to Lii
IBERIA, where they all arrived safely
since that time nothing has been heard of
him, and il was supposed here that he
was still in Grand Bassa. The dispatch
from the south telling of his fate was the
hrst iutimatiOn that he was again work
ing at his old scheme
The stories Gas ton told here were al
ways plausible, and if very few men be
heved them it was not because he did not
tell them well enough. He had one re-
gardlng an appropriation that was made
by congress just after the war, of many
thousands Of dollars to be used for the as
slstance of freedmen desiring to emigrate:
and he gravcly told how he was author
l2ed to use it for the purpose which had
been so long deferred. He had other
stories, many of which he had doubtless
told TO the negroes in the south. and he
was man full OF resource Men of his
race IN this city thought him humbug,
and he was wary of having much to do
with them. In the south it is said that
intelligent colored men discountenanced
him and his schemes altogether