Year: 1875

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in Georgia, which has stirred up the people
of that State. We are not surprised that the
confessions of negroes which our CORE
spondent sends us should have created great
excitement The counties in which the
colored demagogues operated are in the
heart of the cotton raising district, where
farmers and planters live isolated with their
families among a dense negro population.
The plantation negro is still an extremely
ignorant and gullible creature; in politics he
has been, ever since emancipation, the prey
of white and black demagogues, who led
him, in the earlier years of reconstruction,
into Union League clubs, secret and oath
bound organizations, which were used
mainly, if not altogether to enable shrewd
political leaders to manipulate the colored
vote according TO their own wishes In
Georgia the Union Leagues have for some
time, disappeared, and a new secret society,
whose members should be armed, should
hold midnight musters, should have vague
and important purposes and generals"
each with a ''staff, " was pretty certain to
draw in a good many of the ignorant
blacks, to whom anybody who will promise
'forty acres and a mule" seems to be an
angel from heaven.


The narrative of our correspondent and
the depositions he sends us all show that
only the most ignorant blacks were led into
their secret organization. The town negroes
''were too sharp" they would have nothing
to do with it When we come to read the
so-called confessions" we see what vague
and stupid ideas were disseminated by the
leaders. One says they were "going to get
equality, and explains that by this he means
they were to kill all the whites and take all
the lands which were to be divided into
forty acre patches. All the money of the
planters was to be put into common treas
ury.- Another testifes that he was told they
were to kill all the whites and then hold
mass meeting. He adds that they were to
give as little Of the crops to the whites as
they chose. This poor creature does not ap-
pear to have been able to see that after kill
ing the whites these would hardly be able to
receive a share of the crops. Another un-
derstood that they were to take axes, hoes
and brickbats, and kill all the white men
and the ugly women. He adds that the
members of the conspiracy were required to
take a secret oath, and they were assured
that if they broke this they 'would be
handed over to Grant, who would punish
them !" and several witnesses testified their
expectation that if they divulged the secrets
of the society "Grant" would punish them.
They add, also, that the leaders told them
the land belonged to the government and
the negroes had right to take possession Of
forty acres each. Some expected help from
the North or elsewhere General" Rivers,
South Carolina negro militia general, was
expected, with two thousand men, but he
publicly and emphatically denies any knowl-
edge of the affair; and he appears to
have been found quietly living on
his farm. General Morris, Geor-
gia negro, who appears to have had
a semi-idiotic passion for the splendid
uniform of a militia general and who made
an impression on the blacks by talking of his
''staff, ran off "like scared dog" when he
saw the Sheriff at distance. Finally, most
of the witnesses believed that the murder





day; but it does not appear who was to give
the order, and beyond the mass meeting to
be held in a country village there is SO far
no trace of plan for the future.


A Georgian writes us in some indignation
that the HERALD does not appear to have ap-
preciated the extreme gravity of the affair
1t is natural that he should think SO. To
IL
negroes a mere hint of an insurrectionary
plot is a serious and exciting matter. In al
most all the affairs Of life he is apt to under
value the courage and enterprise of the
negro. The lower class of Southern whites
show this constantly by their contemptuous
language, by their readiness to attack a
black man or to cheat him, and it is fact
that the negro in most cases invites such
treatment by his tame submission. But
when there is q rumor of conspiracy then
panic spreads very rapidly and often unrea-
sonably. In the present case we do not
mean to underestimate the danger from
which, fortunately, the planters Of three
counties and their families have escaped.
But what we think of even greater impor-
tance is the good conduct of the white people
in the circumstances. They have behaved
admirably. 'Not a negro has been
shot or injured" writes our CORE
spondent, and there does not ap-
pear to have been any lawlessness or
violence whatever Governor Smith and the
local authorities acted promptly and re-
mained masters of the situation. The law
has taken and is taking its course, as it
should. Nothing has happened in the South
for some time which has shown such genuine
self-restraint and respect for law among the
mass of the white people as this affair; for
the provocation to "crush out" plot or con-
spiracy among the blacks by savage butchery
is very great and very natnrnl