What happened to Henry H. Dee and Charlie Eddie Moore

Henry H. Dee

 Charlie Eddie Moore

J. Edgar Hoover had just left Jackson in mid-July 1964 when a police report came in from Tallulah, Louisiana, eighty miles west of Jackson. A fisherman had seen the lower half of a man's body snagged on a log floating in a former channel of the 

Mississippi, Old River - now a bayou. Small search vessels went into the area and two corpses were found. But they were not the bodies of the missing three civil rights workers from Mississippi. The river bottom was searched anyway by a Navy frogman squad that was flown in from Charleston, South Carolina but no other bodies were found that day.

Later, through the FBI, it was reported that the bodies of Henry H. Dee and Charlie Eddie Moore, both 19, had been targets of the Klan - Dee, simply because he had once lived in Chicago and Moore, because he was known to have participated in a protest demonstration at Alcorn A&M. Both had been taken from a country roadside and beaten to death in a remoted section of the Homochitto National Forest. 

Then several more bodies were found as the search for Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman continued. "These were the routine victims of the Mississippi police/Klan juggernaut - found and identified this particular summer only as an unintended consequence of the national attention drawn to the state.

"Apart from the Dee and Moore killings, one of the saddest discoveries of the season was the body of a never-identified boy, about fourteen, wearing a CORE T-shirt, which was found floating in the Big Black River," wrote Seth Cagin and Philip Dray in what is perhaps the most thorough book written on the Neshoba County murders, "We Are Not Afraid." (New York:Macmillan Edition, 1988, 447-449)

After 48 years,

Almost 48 years have passed since a mob of white men beat up two civil rights demonstrators at Rock Hill’s Greyhound bus station. Called “Freedom Riders,” one white man and one black man protesting segregated transportation tried to both go into a waiting room that on May 9,1961, was for “whites” only.

When asked Monday night if any of the people who beat him in 1961 in Rock Hill, or attacked the Freedom Ride bus days later in Alabama, ever apologized before, U.S. Rep John Lewis, D-Ga. said, “Never. Until now.” One of the Rock Hill mob has now apologized.

Lewis said Monday that man is forgiven.

In a telephone interview Monday night from his office in Washington, D.C., Lewis said he read about the apology of Elwin Wilson for past acts of hate published Saturday in The Herald. “I accept that apology, and would love to have the opportunity some day to talk to that man if he wants to,” Lewis said. “I have no ill feelings. No malice. This shows the distance we have come. It shows grace on his part. It shows courage.”

Last year Lewis received an apology from the current mayor of Rock Hill. But Wilson is the first to admit a role in the Rock Hill beatings.

Wilson, now 72, told Rock Hill black civil rights protesters Friday he apologized for heckling and taunting them in January 1961. Wilson also told the local protesters, known as the “Friendship Nine” and the “City Girls,” that he was one of that mob that beat up Lewis a few months later. Wilson said he was sorry.

All those Rock Hill people forgave Wilson — and now Lewis, has, too.

In 1961 Lewis was a 21-year-old seminary student. Both he and Al Bigelow, the white protester, were thumped with clouts to the head.

“The two of us got off the bus,” Lewis said. “We tried to go into the ‘white’ waiting room. And a group of young men attacked us. They left us lying in blood.”

Lewis and Bigelow declined to press charges.

“We said no, that was not why we were doing it,” Lewis said Monday.

The Freedom Rides through the South in May 1961 started days earlier in Washington, D.C., with stops through Virginia and North Carolina. A small item in “The Evening Herald” of May 9 told the Rock Hill community to expect the riders that day, too.

Elwin Wilson said Monday his father ran a service station on Main Street near the Greyhound bus station where the beatings took place. Wilson said, “the word had gotten out” among racist whites that the riders were coming to Rock Hill. But Wilson said he couldn’t remember who the other men were that came with him to the station who participated in the beating.

The Evening Herald ran a short story the day after the beatings, stating a “Negro” and a white man told police both were hit by a group of 10 white people waiting for their arrival. The headline? “Bi-racial tourists tell of scuffle at bus station.”

John Lewis was no tourist. And the nation soon noticed as the Rock Hill incident received national attention in the press. Subsequent attacks against the riders in Alabama were seen nationwide. Segregation was seen by all for its hatred, and in just a few years legal segregation would be dead.

Lewis said Monday he is “deeply touched,” by Wilson’s apology for that awful day 48 years ago.

“This apology now is the essence of what the (civil rights) movement was all about, the ability of people to change and grow,” Lewis said Monday.

Wilson said last week he hoped blacks could forgive all the hatred of his life, including the Lewis beating. That happened Monday.

“This is one of the best things I have ever done,” Wilson said of apologizing. “I am sorry. I’m just now trying to do what’s right.”

More Excerpts3

(3) W. L. Bost, aged 88 from Asheville, North Carolina, interviewed as part of the Federal Writers Project in 1937.

Plenty of the colored women have children by the white men. She know better than to not do what he say. Didn't have much of that until the men from South Carolina come up here and settle and bring slaves. Then they take them very same children what have they own blood and make slaves out of them. If the missus find out she raise revolution. But she hardly find out. The white men not going to tell and the nigger women were always afraid to. So they just go on hoping that things won't be that way always.

More Excerpts

(2) Olaudah Equiano, The Life of Olaudah Equiano the African (1789) 

While I was thus employed by my master, I was often a witness to cruelties of every kind, which were exercised on my unhappy fellow slaves. I used frequently to have different cargoes of new Negroes in my care for sale; and it was almost a constant practice with our clerks, and other whites, to commit violent depredations on the chastity of the female slaves; and these I was, though with reluctance, obliged to submit to at all times, being unable to help them. When we have had some of these slaves on board my master's vessels, to carry them to other islands, or to America, I have known our mates to commit these acts most shamefully, to the disgrace, not of Christians only, but of men. I have even known them to gratify their brutal passion with females not ten years old; and these abominations, some of them practised to such scandalous excess, that one of our captains discharged the mate and others on that account. And yet in Montserrat I have seen a Negro man staked to the ground, and cut most shockingly, and then his ears cut off bit by bit, because he had been connected with a white woman, who was a common prostitute. As if it were no crime in the whites to rob an innocent African girl of her virtue, but most heinous in a black man only to gratify a passion of nature, where the temptation was offered by one of a different color, though the most abandoned woman of her species.

More Excerpts

(1) Charles Ball was married and living in Maryland when he was sold to a master in South Carolina. 

About sunrise we took up our march on the road to Columbia, as we were told. Hitherto our master had not offered to sell any of us, and had even refused to stop to talk to any one on the subject of our sale, although he had several times been addressed on this point, before we reached Lancaster; but soon after we departed from this village, we were overtaken on the road by a man on horseback, who accosted our driver by asking him if his niggars were for sale. The latter replied, that he believed he would not sell any yet, as he was on his way to Georgia, and cotton being now much in demand, he expected to obtain high prices for us from persons who were going to settle in the new purchase. He, however, contrary to his custom, ordered us to stop, and told the stranger he might look at us, and that he would find us as fine a lot of hands as were ever imported into the country - that we were all prime property, and he had no doubt would command his own prices in Georgia.

The stranger, who was a thin, weather-beaten, sunburned figure, then said, he wanted a couple of breeding wenches, and would give as much for them as they would bring in Georgia. He then walked along our line, as we stood chained together, and looked at the whole of us - then turning to the women; asked the prices of the two pregnant ones. Our master replied, that these were two of the best breeding-wenches in all Maryland - that one was twenty-two, and the other only nineteen - that the first was already the mother of seven children, and the other of four - that he had himself seen the children at the time he bought their mothers - and that such wenches would be cheap at a thousand dollars each; but as they were not able to keep up with the gang, he would take twelve hundred dollars for the two.

Slaves Stories: Excerpts

1) Francis Fredric, Fifty Years of Slavery (1863) 

Even his own child, by a black woman or a mulatto, when the child is called a quadroon, and is very often as white as any English child, is frequently sold to degradation. There are thousands upon thousands of mulattoes and quadroons, all children of slaveholders, in a state of slavery. Slavery is bad enough for the black, but it is worse, if worse can be, for the mulatto or the quadroon to be subjected to the utmost degradation and hardship, and to know that it is their own fathers who are treating them as brutes, especially when they contrast their usage with the pampered luxury in which they see his lawful children revel, who are not whiter, and very often not so good-looking as the quadroon.

(2) Moses Roper, Adventures and Escape of Moses Roper (1838)

A few months before I was born, my father married my mother's young mistress. As soon as my father's wife heard of my birth, she sent one of my mother's sisters to see whether I was white or black, and when my aunt had seen me, she returned back as soon as she could, and told her mistress that I was white, and resembled Mr. Roper very much. Mr. Roper's wife being not pleased with this report, she got a large club stick and knife, and hastened to the place in which my mother was confined. She went into my mother's room with full intention to murder me with her knife and club, but as she was going to stick the knife into me, my grandmother happening to come in, caught the knife and saved my life. But as well as I can recollect from what my mother told me, my father sold her and myself soon after her confinement.

(3) Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)

My master was, to my knowledge, the father of eleven slaves. But did the mothers dare to tell who was the father of their children? Did the other slaves dare to allude to it, except in whispers among themselves? No, indeed! They knew too well the terrible consequences.

Southern women often marry a man knowing that he is the father of many little slaves. They do not trouble themselves about it. They regard such children as property, as marketable as the pigs on the plantation; and it is seldom that they do not make them aware of this by passing them into the slave-trader's hands as soon as possible, and thus getting them out of their sight. 

Some poor creatures have been so brutalized by the lash that they will sneak out of the way to give their masters free access to their wives and daughters. Do you think this proves the black man to belong to an inferior order of beings? What would you be, if you had been born and brought up a slave, with generations of slaves for ancestors? I admit that the black man is inferior. But what is it that makes him so? It is the ignorance in which white men compel him to live; it is the torturing whip that lashes manhood out of him; it is the fierce bloodhounds of the South, and the scarcely less cruel human bloodhounds of the north, who enforce the Fugitive Slave Law. They do the work.

(4) Elizabeth Keckley, Thirty Years a Slave (1868)

I was regarded as fair-looking for one of my race, and for four years a white man - I spare the world his name - had base designs upon me. I do not care to dwell upon this subject, for it is one that is fraught with pain. Suffice it to say, that he persecuted me for four years, and I became a mother. The child of which he was the father was the only child that I ever brought into the world. If my poor boy ever suffered any humiliating pangs on account of birth, he could not blame his mother, for God knows that she did not wish to give him life; he must blame the edicts of that society which deemed it no crime to undermine the virtue of girls in my then position.

 (5) William Wells Brown, Narrative of William W. Brown, A Fugitive Slave (1847) 

I was born in Lexington, Kentucky. The man who stole me as soon as I was born, recorded the births of all the infants which he claimed to be born his property, in a book which he kept for that purpose. My mother's name was Elizabeth. She had seven children, Solomon, Leander, Benjamin, Joseph, Millford, Elizabeth, and myself. No two of us were children of the same father. My father's name, as I learned from my mother, was George Higgins. He was a white man, a relative of my master, and connected with some of the first families in Kentucky.

Slave Stories Excerpts pt2

(6) Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845) 

My mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was the daughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey, both colored, and quite dark. My mother was of a darker complexion than either my grandmother or grandfather. My father was a white man. He was admitted to be such by all I ever heard speak of my parentage. The opinion was also whispered that my master was my father; but of the correctness of this opinion, I know nothing; the means of knowing was withheld from me.

(7) Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)

But I now entered on my fifteenth year - a sad epoch in the life of a slave girl. My master, Dr. Flint, began to whisper foul words in my ear. Young as I was, I could not remain ignorant of their import. I tried to treat them with indifference or contempt. The master's age, my extreme youth, and the fear that his conduct would be reported to my grandmother, made him bear this treatment for many months. He was a crafty man, and resorted to many means to accomplish his purposes. Sometimes he had stormy, terrific ways, that made his victims tremble; sometimes he assumed a gentleness that he thought must surely subdue. Of the two, I preferred his stormy moods, although they left me trembling. 

He tried his utmost to corrupt the pure principles my grandmother had instilled. He peopled my young mind with unclean images, such as only a vile monster could think of. I turned from him with disgust and hatred. But he was my master. I was compelled to live under the same roof with him - where I saw a man forty years my senior daily violating the most sacred commandments of nature. He told me I was his property; that I must be subject to his will in all things. My soul revolted against the mean tyranny. But where could I turn for protection? No matter whether the slave girl be as black as ebony or as fair as her mistress. In either case, there is no shadow of law to protect her from insult, from violence, or even from death; all these are inflicted by fiends who bear the shape of men. 

The mistress, who ought to protect the helpless victim, has no other feelings towards her but those of jealousy and rage. Even the little child, who is accustomed to wait on her mistress and her children, will learn, before she is twelve years old, why it is that her mistress hates such and such a one among the slaves. Perhaps the child's own mother is among those hated ones. She listens to violent outbreaks of jealous passion, and cannot help understanding what is the cause. She will become prematurely knowing in evil things. Soon she will learn to tremble when she hears her master's footfall. She will be compelled to realize that she is no longer a child. If God has bestowed beauty upon her, it will prove her greatest curse. That which commands admiration in the white woman only hastens the degradation of the female slave. I know that some are too much brutalized by slavery to feel the humiliation of their position; but many slaves feel it most acutely, and shrink from the memory of it. I cannot tell how much I suffered in the presence of these wrongs, nor how I am still pained by the retrospect. 

My master met me at every turn, reminding me that I belonged to him, and swearing by heaven and earth that he would compel me to submit to him. If I went out for a breath of fresh air, after a day of unwearied toil, his footsteps dogged me. If I knelt by my mother's grave, his dark shadow fell on me even there. The light heart which nature had given me became heavy with sad forebodings. The other slaves in my master's house noticed the change. Many of them pitied me; but none dared to ask the cause. They had no need to inquire. They knew too well the guilty practices under that roof; and they were aware that to speak of them was an offence that never went unpunished.

I longed for some one to confide in. I would have given the world to have laid my head on my grandmother's faithful bosom, and told her all my troubles. But Dr. Flint swore he would kill me, if I was not as silent as the grave. Then, although my grandmother was all in all to me, I feared her as well as loved her. I had been accustomed to look up to her with a respect bordering upon awe. I was very young, and felt shamefaced about telling her such impure things, especially as I knew her to be very strict on such subjects.

(8) Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861) 

I had entered my sixteenth year, and every day it became more apparent that my presence was intolerable to Mrs. Flint. Angry words frequently passed between her and her husband. He had never punished me himself, and he would not allow any body else to punish me. In that respect, she was never satisfied; but, in her angry moods, no terms were too vile for her to bestow upon me. Yet I, whom she detested so bitterly, had far more pity for her than he had, whose duty it was to make her life happy. I never wronged her, or wished to wrong her; and one word of kindness from her would have brought me to her feet. 

After repeated quarrels between the doctor and his wife, he announced his intention to take his youngest daughter, then four years old, to sleep in his apartment. It was necessary that a servant should sleep in the same room, to be on hand if the child stirred. I was selected for that office, and informed for what purpose that arrangement had been made.

(9) Henry Bibb, The Life and Adventures of an American Slave (1851)

A poor slave's wife can never be true to her husband contrary to the will of her master. She can neither be pure nor virtuous, contrary to the will of her master. She dare not refuse to be reduced to a state of adultery at the will of her master.

Slave Stories Excerpts conclusion

(10) Ida Wells, Crusade for Justice (1928) 

All my life I had known that such conditions were accepted as a matter of course. I found that this rape of helpless Negro girls and women, which began in slavery days, still continued without let or hindrance, check or reproof from the church, state, or press until there had been created this race within a race - and all designated by the inclusive term of "colored".

I also found that what the white man of the South practiced as all right for himself, he assumed to be unthinkable in white women. They could and did fall in love with the pretty mulatto and quadroon girls as well as black ones, but they professed an inability to imagine white women doing the same thing with Negro and mulatto men. Whenever they did so and were found out, the cry of rape was raised, and the lowest element of the white South was turned loose to wreak its fiendish cruelty on those too weak to help themselves. 

No torture of helpless victims by heathen savages or cruel red Indians ever exceeded the cold-blooded savagery of white devils under lynch law. This was done by white men who controlled all the forces of law and order in their communities and who could have legally punished rapists and murderers, especially black men who had neither political power nor financial strength with which to evade any justly deserved fate. The more I studied the situation, the more I was convinced that the Southerner had never gotten over his resentment that the Negro was no longer his plaything, his servant, and his source of income.

Slavery Facts

Child-bearing amongst slaves started around the age of thirteen, and by twenty the women would be expected to have four or five children. To encourage child-bearing some population owners promised women slaves their freedom after they had produced fifteen children. 

The fathers of these children were sometimes the slave-owner or his white friends. As slaves were the property of the plantation owner, the rape of a black woman by whites was not considered a crime. First-generation children of mixed race were called mulattoes. 

Some of the most important slave narratives were written by mulattoes. This included Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, Moses Roper,Lewis Clarke and William Wells Brown.

Freedom Shanty

Ain't no whip on my back,

ain't no sack held in my hand 

I can come n' go when I want's to.

Oh Lawd' yes I can 

I can look you in the eye

n' I can tell you where to go 

and you cain't beat me massah,

no sir, not no more

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

Yo' cain't take my chil'ren

Yo' cain't hang me from no tree

Yo' cain't force yo' self up on me

and plant yo' master seed

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

I ain't no more yo' brood mare.

I can run and jump and sing

I can sleep long as I want to.

I can do most any thing

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

Go'an build my own plantation.

Got's forty acres and a mule

in a place called Nova Scotia

far nuff away from you

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

I can lay down my burden,

down by the river side

don't have to bow and scrape no more,

don't have to run and hide

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

Go'an create me my own eden 

with honest sweat and my bare hands 

and leave it for my chil'ren 

when I goes to the promised land

Cuz I free now, Lord' Lord' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lord' Lord' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lord' Lord' free now

You cain't rape my daughters 

or lynch my only son 

Cuz I'll kill you DEAD on my land 

and it sho' won't hurt me none

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now 

Cuz I free now, Lawd Lawd' free now

[excerpt from companion poetry book]

Black Orchids On The Vine A Black Girls Anthology

Ships Log From The Book of Negroes

Diva note; This is a list of names and descriptions of Negroes on board a ship bound for Nova Scotia, that had to be made where each one had to be accounted for. the names in brackets including  John Boggs are those of the owners of each one, where noted

The Book of Negroes

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Cesar Williams, 41, stout fellow, (Alexander Grant). Says he was born free and produces Gen. Birch's Certificate of his being free.

Thomas Jackson, 40, feeble old fellow, (Alexander McDonald). Says he was born free and produces Gen. Birch's Certificate of his being free.

John Upham, 62, feeble, (Alexander McDonald). Produces a Certificate from John Upham of the Island of Barbadoes of his being free.

Hagar Upham, 42, feeble, (Alexander McDonald). Produces a Certificate from John Upham of the Island of Barbadoes of his being free.

Nancy Williams, 29, stout wench, (Alexander Grant). Says she is free and produces General Birch's Certificate.

Fanny her daughter, 5 mo., fine child, (Alexander Grant). Goes with her mother.

Lucy Bloom, 40, stout wench, (James Dunn). Formerly slave to Michael Bloom of Charlestown, South Carolina; left him 3 years ago.

Dinah, 13, likely girl, (James Dunn). Formerly slave to Michael Bloom of Charlestown, South Carolina; goes with her mother Lucy.

Ben, 11, fine boy, M James Dunn of Port Roseway, claimant. (James Dunn). Was born & brought up in the family of James Dunn.

Robert Pleasant, 30, stout fellow (Alexander Grant). Formerly slave to Thomas Pleasant of 4 Mile Creek in Virginia; left him 7 years ago. GBC.

Elizabeth bound for River St. John's John Watson

Abraham Mifflin, 42, stout fellow, (John Boggs). Formerly the property of Charles Mifflin of Philadelphia; came in with his widow who married Capt. Roberts. GBC.

Nancy, 40, stout wench. John Boggs of River St. John's, claimant. (John Boggs). Says she is his property having purchased her 11 years ago.

David, 7, an idiot. (John Boggs of River St. John's, claimant. (John Boggs). Born in the family of John Boggs.

Walley Waring, 23, stout fellow, (John Boggs). Formerly slave to Joseph Waring of Stono, South Carolina; left him 3 years ago. GBC.

Toney, 10, fine boy, (Dugal McPherson). Indented to Dugal McPherson for 7 years by his own consent.

Prince Royal, 26, stout fellow (Nathan Horton). Formerly the property of John Tollman of Charlestown, South Carolina, left him 3 years ago. GBC.

 In pursuance of two orders from His Excellency Sir Guy Carleton K. B. General and Commander in Chief of His Majesty's Forces from Nova Scotia to West Florida inclusive, both dated Head Quarters, New York, the one 15 April 1783 and the other 2nd May, We whose names are hereunto subscribed do certify that we did carefully inspect the aforegoing Vessels on the 13th June 1783 and that on board the said vessels we found the Negroes mentioned in the foregoing List amounting to forty four men, twenty nine Women and thirty two Children and to the best of our Judgment believe them to be all the Negroes on board the said vessels and we enquired of the Master of each Vessel whether he had any Records, Deeds, Archives or papers or other property of the Citizens of the United States on board and to each Enquiry We were answered in the negative. And we further certify that We furnished each master of a Vessel with a Certified List of the Negroes on board the Vessel and informed him that he would not be permitted to Land in Nova Scotia any other Negroes than those contained on the List and that if any other Negroes were found on board the Vessel he would be severely punished and that We informed the Agent for the Transports of this matter and desired him to use means for returning back to this place all Negroes not mentioned in the List.

[Signed]: W.S. Smith, colonel; Samuel Jones, Secretary; Wilbar Cook, Capt 37th Reg't; Nathaniel Phillips; T. Gilfillan.

The Walk

On their broken blistered feet

On their whipped and weary backs

I walked to freedom,

On their callused hands

And battered souls

I walked to civil rights,

On their blood

Bleached bones and dust

I walked out of Jim Crows doors

Into once segregated stores,

hotels and restaurants of choice.

And so today, on their faith

and hope of a better tomorrow

Some day, some day

I walk in Honour

I walk in Reverence

I walk in Thanksgiving

Black history Nova Scotia: Prejudice

Those who had risked everything for their freedom and equality soon realized that neither would be easily obtained. Many saw blacks as inferior creatures; meant only for the most menial tasks and deserving only of the most insulting wages. Others saw blacks as weak people with few resources or friends, who could easily be exploited. Prejudice took many forms, from unjust laws to low wages to outright violence.

Slavery in Nova Scotia

Although it was not as common as in the southern colonies, slavery was an accepted fact in Nova Scotia, made much more common by the influx of white loyalists and their hundreds of Black slaves. Even those who possessed their own freedom could not escape the constant reminder that their colour was a mark of bondage.

Frolicking and Other Crimes

Blacks could not even expect equal treatment before the law. Denied the right to vote and to be tried by jury, blacks were subject to arbitrary judgments and discriminatory laws against their social gatherings. Re-enslavement and public whipping were standard punishments for any transgression.

Fair Pay?

Poor, without legal rights, and lacking friends, blacks were subject to the crudest exploitation. In most jobs, they received only a quarter of what an equally skilled white man would earn. Of course, this made the blacks very useful to certain elements in society.

Last in Line

In a time of chaos and scarcity, the blacks were always the last to receive what had been promised to all loyalists: food, land, and tools. In a crowd of 30 000 refugees, this often meant that backs received nothing at all beyond basic rations, and sometimes not even that.

The Shelburne Riot

As poor white soldiers were forced out of the labour market by blacks, they blamed those same blacks for their continuing poverty. Their resentment exploded into violence in the summer of 1784, when they rampaged through the streets of Shelburne, beating blacks, tearing down their houses, and forcing them to flee for Birchtown. Even when some civility was returned to Shelburne, some continued to attack the blacks in Birchtown for months afterward.

The Real Book of Negroes

Diva Note: A few months ago in a rather interesting comment thread Sally mentioned a book titled 'The Book of Negroes.' I cannot recall now if she was speaking of the fiction novel or the true book that it was based upon.  Well having finally settled on what I want to write for NANO I went on a search for more information on Nova Scotia to add to what I have already gathered and low n behold what should come up but the entire true accounting Book of Negroes is online for all to read and to share provided we also put a link to their site with whatever we use. I was fascinated by some of the personal accounts that are there and the fact is some of those people are my ancestors I am just floored by all that has been gathered. This is an excerpt from Boston King's Memoirs he was an ex slave.

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Soon after I went to Charlestown, and entered on board a rum of war. As we were going to Chesepeak Bay, we were at the taking of a rich prize. We stayed in the bay two days, and they sailed for New-York, where I went on shore. Her I endeavoured to follow my trade, but for want of tools was obliged to relinquish it, and enter into service. But the wages were so low that I was not able to keep myself in clothes, so that I was under the necessity of leaving my master and going to another. I stayed with him four months, but he never paid me, and I was obliged to leave him also, and work about the town until I was married. A year after I was taken very ill, but the Lord raised me up again in about five weeks. I then went out in a pilotboat. We were at sea eight days, and had only provisions for five, so that we were in danger of starving. On the 9th day we were taken by an American whaleboat. I went on board them with a cheerful countenance, and asked for bread and water, and made every very free with them. They carried me to Brunswick, and used me well. Notwithstanding which, my mind was fairly distressed at the thought of being again reduced to slavery, and separated from my wife and family; and at the same time it was exceeding difficult to escape from my bondage, because the river at Amboy was above a mile over, and likewise another to cross at Staten-Island. I called to remembrance the many great deliverance's the Lord had wrought for me, and besought him to save me this once, and I would serve him all the days of my life. While my mind was thus exercised, I went into the jail to see a lad whom I was acquainted with at New-York. He had been taken prisoner, and attempted to make his escape, but was caught 12 miles off: They tied him to the tail of a horse, and in this manner brought him back to Brunswick. When I saw him, his feet were fastened in the stocks, and at night both his hands. This was a terrifying sight to me, as I expected to meet with the same kind of treatment, if taken in the act of attempting to regain my liberty. I was thankful that I was not confined in a jail, and my master used me as well as I could expect; and indeed the slaves about Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New-York, have as good victuals as many of the English; for they have meat once a day, and milk for breakfast and supper; and what is better than all, many of the masters send their slaves to school at night, that they may learn to read the Scriptures. This is a privilege indeed. But alas, all these enjoyments could not satisfy me without liberty! Sometimes I thought, if it was the will of God that I should be a slave, I was ready to resign myself to his will; but at other times I could not find the least desire to content myself in slavery.

Being permitted to walk about when my work was done, I used to go to the ferry, and observed, that when it was low water the people waded across the river; tho' at the same time I saw there were guards posted at the place to prevent the escape of prisoners and slaves. As I was at prayer on Sunday evening, I thought the Lord heard me, and would mercifully deliver me. Therefore putting my confidence in him, about one o'clock in the morning I went down to the river side, and found the guards were either asleep or in the tavern. I instantly entered into the river, but when I was a little distance from the opposite shore, I heard the sentinels disputing among themselves: One said "I am sure I saw a man cross the river." Another replied, "There is no such thing." It seems they were afraid to fire at me, or make an alarm, left they should be punished for their negligence. When I had got a little distance from the shore, I fell down upon my knees, and thanked God for the deliverance. I traveled till about five in the morning, and then concealed myself till seven o'clock at night, when I proceeded forward, thro' bushes and marshes, near the road, for fear of being discovered. When I came to the river, opposite Staten-Island, I found a boat; and altho' it was very near a whaleboat, yet I ventured into it, and cutting the rope, got safe over. The commanding officer, when informed of my case, gave me a passport, and I proceeded to New-York.

La. Judge Denies Marriage License to Interracial Couple

The groom-to-be Terence McKay, 32.

And, as if he forgot the background of the America’s most high-profile success story – President Obama – Keith Bardwell pointed to his concerns over the future of children who might come from the union of White and Black parents. Obama is the son of a White woman from Kansas and a Black Kenyan father.

"I'm not a racist," Bardwell, justice of the peace of Tangipahoa Parish, told The Hammond (La.) Daily Star. "I do ceremonies for Black couples right here in my house. My main concern is for the children." He also said that most interracial marriages don’t last.

But the NAACP and other civil-rights advocates in the state aren’t so sure that racism wasn’t behind his decision. "He's an elected public official and one of his duties is to marry people. He doesn't have the right to say he doesn't believe in it," Patricia Morris, president of the NAACP branch of Tangipahoa Parish, said Thursday. "If he doesn't do what his position calls for him to do, he should resign from that position."

Morris said that the case was referred to her office, near the Mississippi line, after Bardwell denied the marriage license to Beth Humphrey, 30, and her boyfriend, Terence McKay, 32, both of Hammond. Morris has forwarded the matter to the national office of the civil rights organization.

Humphrey said she was “really shocked, because he's an elected official." It’s clearly a case of racial discrimination, she told CNN. She said that when she contacted Bardwell’s office on Oct. 6 to request the license, she was told by his wife that he does not sign off on interracial marriages. They received their marriage license three days later from another justice of peace in the same parish, which is about 70 percent White and 30 percent Black, CNN reports.

"We would like him to resign," she said. "He doesn't believe he's being racist, but it is racist."

Without Sanctuary

I need not add any words,

or shout my hearts deep pain

for herein lay the legacy

of the n words cruel refrain

'Diva'

http://withoutsanctuary.org/main.html

Juneteenth

Celebrated on June 19, Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day or Emancipation Day, commemorates the announcement of the abolition of slavery in Texas since 1865.