The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-01-04
CHAPTER VII. The Political Machine Begins It's

All that has been set down thus Aar' you will say, is trihing. unimportant and wearisome. Your decision Is not 70 be disputed; but if you could throw your self back to those dread days. you Woulo understand what a diversion these trtning events and episodes created for the heart stricken and soul-weary people of thaa region. The death of Margaret Bridalpin moved them to pity and awoke in ther minds pleasing memories of happier days. The arrival of the clatbornes had mucn she same effect. It gave the community something to talk about Moreover. the Claibornes, mother and daughter, proved to be very attractive additions to the towns society. They were both bright and good humored and the daughter was very beautiful.
 The collapse of the Confederacy, conn ing when 1t did, was an event that Shady Dale least expected. The last trump will cause no greater surprise and consterna- ton than the news of Lees surrender caused in that region. The public mind had not been prepared for such an event, especially in those remote districts. All most every piece of news printed in the journals of the day was colored with the prospect of ultimate victory; and when the curtain suddenly came down and the lights went out, no language cansdescribe the grief and despair, and the feeling of abiect humiliation that fell upon the white population in the small towns and village communities. How 1t was in the cities has not been recorded, but It is to be presumed that then, as now, the de- mands and necessities of trade and bus mess were powerful enough to overcome and destroy the worst effects of calam- ity that attacked the sentiments and en1o- tions.
 As for the men. they soon recovered from the shock. They were startled and stunned, but when they opened their eyes to the situation they found themselves confronted by conditions that had no precedent or parallel in the history of the world. It is small fault if their minds failed at first to grasp the significance and the import of these conditions.
 A few years later, Gabriel Tolliver, who when the surrender came, was a lad just beyond IT.. took himself severely to task before public assemblage for his blind ness in 1865, and the years immediately following: the older men who sat in the audience rose to their feet and shook the house with their applause. They, too, had been as blind as the boy.
 It was well for Shady Dale that MT. Sanders came home when he did. He had been in the field, if not on the forum, ne DTOukuG uOAllS uu4loICOS O1 IACA anu racy anecdotes that he had picked up in the camp In those awful days when there was little ready money to be had, and business was at a standstill, and the courts demoranzed, and the whole social fabric threatening to fall to pieces, 1t was Mr. Billy Sanders who went around scat tering cheerfulness and good-humor as carelessly as the children scatter flowers they have gathered in the fields.
 MT. Sanders and Francis 'Bethune had formed a part of the escort that went with MT. Davis as far as Washington in wilkes County. On this account, Mir. Sanders boasted that at the last meeting of the Confederate Cabinet held in that town, he had elected himself a member and was duly installed. Tt was the same" he used to say, "as 'jlnin" the Free-masons. The doorkeeper gt'me the grip an the password, the head man of the War Department knocked me on the forrerd, an the thing was done When MT. Davis was ready to go, he took me by the hand, an says, William, says he, keep house for the boys till I get back, an be shore that you cheer 'em up.'"
 This sort of nonsense served It's pur- nose, as MT. Sanders intended that 1t should, and wherever he appeared on the
 
 as large a crowd as the town could fur ntsh. None the less, Mir. Sanders had cut out a very large piece of work for him seh He kept it up for some time, but be gradually allowed himself longer and longer intervals of seriousness, for the multitude of problems growing out of the new and strange conditions grew larger and more ominous as the days went by. Gabriel Tolliver might take to the woods, as the saying is, and so escape from the prevailing depression. But MT. Sanders and the rest of the men had no such re- source; responsibility sat on their shoul- ders, and they were compelled to face the conditions and study them. Gabriel could sit on the fence by the roadside and see neither portent nor peril in the z groups of negroes passing and repassing movingly restlessly to and fro. He watched them, as he afterward com plafned, with a curiosity as Idle as that which moves a little child to watch a swarm of ants. He noticed, however that the negroes were no longer cheerful Their child-like gaiety had vanished. In place of their loud laughter. their bolster ous play and their songs yelling forth and filling, the twilight places with sweet melodies, there was silence. Gabriel had no reason to regard this silence as om- inous, but it was so regarded by his elders.
 He thought that the restless and un- easy movements of the negroes were per fectly natural They had suddenly come to the knowledge that they were free, and they were testing the nature and the limits of their freedom. So much was rlear to Gabriel, but was not clear to his elders. And what pity that 1t was notl How many mistakes would have been avoided! What a dreadful tangle and turmoil would have been prevented. For the boys interpretation of the restless ness and uneasiness of the blacks was the correct one. What he scored himself for in the days to come was that his interest in the matter never rose above the idle curiosity of a boy.
 When the Clopton negroes were told that they were free. a large number of them joined the restless. migratory Throng that passed to and fro along the public highway, but all moved by the same irresistible impulse to test their freedom-to see if they really could come / and go without let or hindrance. Uncle Plato and his family, with a dozen others remained in their places and fared better than the rest.
 For time Shady Dale rested peace fully in its seclusion; but behind this ap- of restlessness and uneasinsss. Some times its bosom (so to speab) was in- famed with anger, and sometimes if would be sunk in despair. One of the events that brought Shady Dale closer to the troubles that the newspapers were full of. was a circular letter issued by wA- NGu.