Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1907-09-06
EDUCATED NEGROES.
UZZLE AND BURToR BELONG TO THE
NEW SCHOOL OF COLORED
PEOPLE.

UZZLE AND BURTOR BELONG TO THl
NEW SCHOOL OF CoLoRED
PEOPLE.
A correspondent in arecent issue OF
the Richmond Times Dispatch, express
es exactly the opinion before set fortl
by US. He says:
Touching the se.called race riO
that recently occurred in the beautiful
town of Onancock, on the Eastern
Shore of Virginia, one would naturally
like to know something about the an
tecedents of the two negroes Burton
and UZzel-who are said to have insti
gated the unfortunate outbreak, and
whose places of business, contiguous tC
each other, had been the rendezvous
If those whose murderous assault on
the whites precipltated the trouble
| This inquiry is rendered all the more
pertinent because III these latter days,
education has been recon- lended by
| certain doctrinaires as a cure-all for
the race troubles that infest the South
ern States.
ION Investigation it is found out
hat Burton and Uzzel are educated
regroes; that Burton was for FEARS a
teacher in the coloTed public schools
If Accomac before be entered the
mercantile business; and that UzzeI, in
addition to his WORK as editor and
publisher of a newspaper. has for the
past several years been principal OF the
colored public schools at OnancOck
and belwether of the negro educational
forces ON the Eastern Shore.
1.-The result of all this is that these
two negroes, educated and teaching in
'he public schools of Virginia, schools
maintained in great part, might say
almost entirely, by taxes paid by the
white people of the Commonwealth,
have been enabled to acquire such in
fuence over the baser elements Of their
race as to incite them to make a muir
derous attack from ambush upon un
offending and unsuspecting white men
under the cover of night. This mur
derous gang, instigated by Burton and
UZzeI, fired upon hack filled with
passengers leaving Onancock, and for
no other reason than because they were
white people.
1--WE would not be understood as in
dorsing the action of the mob of infu-
rated white men in burning down the
store of Burton and the print og office
of Uzzel. So far as we can certain,
that was not only unnecesf ~, nut
was lawless vandalism, pure and sim
pie; and the men who did this should
be punished fOr it. That they had
great provocatiOn cannot ba denied;
but they had no right to des oy pri-
vate property, which even the Com
cannot destroy or c0nfiscate
without just compensation to the own
ers. Neither had the Town Council
the authority to issue decree of ban
lshment against certain suspected
uegro families. All this was not only
but was wrong in law
and morals.
1.-THE facts. however, to be empha-
sized are: that Burton and Uzzel were
educated negroes; that they have both
been teachers in the public schools Of
that the store of the one and
ihe printing office of the other have
been the resorts of the turbulent, un
rnly and lawless negroes living in and
around Onancock, and that these tW o
so.called educated negroes were the
of race hatred and the in
stigators of the murderous attack on
unOffending and unarmed
white men. Uzzel himself being the
first to fire shot, wOunding young
Belote.
''Two days after the riot the Times
Dispatch quoted remark made by
some one here who had once lived in
saying that be knew one
negro in that town who had nothing
to do with the disturbance, and that
WAS Abel Upshur, negro of the olden
time. Few, indeed, are these negroes
of the olden time, and they are grow
ing fewer every year; but those of us
who grew up with them on the old Vii.
gihia plantations know that the school
that turned out the honest, faithful,
law-abidiDg negroes of the olden time
was far better school for the mem.
bers of that race than the school that
turns out such fomentors of race hatred
and such lnstigatOrs OF murderous
deeds as Burton and Uzzel.
"Thls unfortunate occurrence on the
Eatern Shore Is enough to make us
pause and cause even the boldest and
most sanguine among us doubt the
wisdom of the rainbow policy and
sugar coated remedy of the Ogden
Frizeell- Booder Washington cOmbina-
tion. Aye, more than this, it makes us
strongly distrust the wisdom of the
policy that Virginia has been pursuing
for more than thirty years in regard {
the education of her negro population
''Are we not storing up material fol
a social volcano that will one day reno
;jthe Commonwealth ? VIRGINIAN. p"
a Humane Anne3l