The Ocala banner. (Ocala, Marion County, Fla.) 1883-194?, 1917-09-07
Mr.. HARRIS ARTICLE ON THE.
NEGRO NORTH AND SOUTH.


Madison, Maine, Aug. 10, 1917.
Frank Harris:
Dear Sir:-Your article On the
negro, which came TO me via FLA
Chief Winter Haven, and I write 10
thank you for the very. best article
have read on that subject. You ought
to print it in booklet form so it could
be sent in a letter,
l appreciate it all the more because
have lived in Florida many years
and know it is a fine square state
ment of facts without any shading.
! lived near Micanopy in the sos
at Winter Haven eight years, at Or
lando (where / live now five years.
Have spent winters in Tampa, ST.
Petersburg, and other places where |
had no permanent home.
If you exchange with the Orlando
Sentinel you have often seen my
name.
" = nave q AA~AC
where We live four months in sum-
mer, June, July, Aug, and Sept.
We get the Boston daily papers and
one article written by a Unitarian
preacher in the Boston Journal 1 got
hot in the collar over. He told how
we used the negro in the south-that
same old story I have heard for fifty
years, Il am 72). taken from Uncle
Toms Cabin"
7 wrote this preacher a personal let
ter of several pages and send you
his reply I have since wrote him
again and sent your article request
ing its return TO me. ! reminded him
that the first negro regiment formed
at Beaufort, s. c., was organized in
the spring of 1863 by Col Higginson,
a Unitarian clergyman who gave it up
as bad job This regiment after
wards, under Col. Montgomery, in an
expedition to Darien were disgrace
to the flag and the nation.
When Mrs. Stowe wrote Uncle
Toms Cabin" they were at Bruins
wick, Maine, Her husband was a pro-
lessor in Bowdoin college there. Thos.
NJ Crocker (whom I knew well in
late years. was the caretaker of the
college buildings and grounds. Mrs,
Stowe at that time had never been in
a southern state, and hod no personal
knowledge of the negro or his sur
roundings.
As I remember about 1880 Mrs.
Stowe went to Florida and had a
home on the st. Johns river few
miles below Jacksonville, and while
there Mr.. Crocker visited her (By
the way, he once owned property
near Ocala). Mr.. Crocker asked Mrs.
Stowe what she thought of the negro
at close range. Her answer was, IF
had ever lived in the south. I should
never have written Uncle Toms
Cabin but I am not sorry I wrote
it for it helped TO abolish slavery"
There is a certain class in the
north that are down on the southern
people. Those civil war prejudices still
linger with them I wrote this Rev.
Pinkham if he wanted to know what
the negro would do when in power. to
read Samuel W McCalIs book on the
reconstruction period following the
civil war Mccall was always G.
o. party man, and is now governor
of the state Of Massachusetts,
It's true the negro has made great
progress, but very few are qualified
70 vcte. vas one who helped make
the laws when the town Of White:
Haven was incorporated by special
act of the legislature, and one Of
my suggestions was that no man
should vote who did not own in nic
own name $500 of real estate. It
went through all right, but was op-
posed by the CRATER and poll tax man
But I must stop here before I get
into deep water and can't taper off
Respectfully,
CHAS. Fl. WHITTIER,