The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1894-07-18
Bluffton and the Red Gross.

Following the interview OF MISS
Clara Barton, president of the Red
Cross Association, published in the
News aud Courier of June 23rd,
comes letter from Messrs Thomas
Martin, Clarance B. Kirk, and John
Warnock, the duly appointed Relief
Committee of Bluf1ton Township,
in which they say, among other
things:
We say without hesitation that
Miss Barton knew at the time Of her
interview that every statement she
made about storm sufferers was false
and that they were studied false
hoods to injure our cause, or any
other honest one, simply because her
career on the sea islands was ended
by the fact that she could no longer
hide the wolf under sleeps clothing
to the eyes of every honest South
Carolinian on this seacoast, and as
she could not longer benefit her sell
fish ends she now would rather see
our people starved than be helped
We deny the truthfulness of every
statement she made and we will
prove them false to every tair-minded
person living, We assert that Miss
Barton has never been in Blufton
Township, and therefore knows moth
ing of the wants and suffering OF our
people, or that her representatives,
John Mcdonald and wife, have ever
investigated the needs Of these peo-
pie. except through negroes, nor that
are fit subjects to send among our
people, for when they came to Bluff
ton they came with negroes, they
slept eat and drank with negroes
while in the township, and visited
and associated entirely and alone
with negroes, and therefore are not
fit for such position, and our white
sufferers are accordingly left without
resource. except to the charity of our
own people, whom they honor and re-
spect.
We deny that single applicant
for help in our township owns one
third Of the $500 acres Of land that
Miss Barton says he does or that any
such person ever asked her for aid.
We refer to the Auditors books of
Beaufort County to show the land
question and we dare Miss Barton
to name the person she insinuates, and
this by the consent Of each sufferer.
1t is ungrateful and low to insinuatc
such charges against one of our suf-
ferers when she knows there is not
one word Of truth in i. We do
know, however, of poor widow on
our list with nine children. (Mrs
Jane Hodge, who owns 100 acres of
land and five old COWS and can
neither sell or borrow on same to get
meat and bread with, and who was
deeply distressed before help came,
whose condition was known by Miss
Barton's negro agent here Pompey
Riley, who recommend her to Miss
Barton in person as one is need, and
yet Miss Barton with all of her pious
and aon-partisan pretensions refused
to assist her after this poor widow
mad gone to Beaufort to beg for help,
her excuse being that she owned
land and cows, as if the whole
cyclone country was not owned by
some one.
To prove that her excuse to this
poor woman is not a principled one
we will say here that she helped a
negro, man, without children to care
for, living in this place, who is worth
and owns five times more property
than Mis-. Hodge his name is Cyrus
Garvey.
We deny that Miss Barton has
ever built one-twentieth Of the 5000
houses she claimed to have built, for
the simple reason that outside of the
town of Beaufort there are only 81
l72 houses Of every description in
Beaufort County, which covers nine
tenths of her territory. We refer to
the puclic records in the Auditors
Office of Beaufort County for the
exact figures, which are for towns
l,03l, country 3.l72 total number of
houses in county 4,203.
We deny further that Miss Barton
has ever made any effort here to re-
lieve our people, and we assert that
not only our people but the negroes
are worse off to-day than ever before,
and will be until corn and potatoes
lipen in August. It is perfect folly
to speak of their raising truck to
either eat OF sell Z; outside of town
limits there are not $500 worth raised
by them in the whole county. Miss
Barton claims that she has only re-
ceiyed about So 900. Out of this