The State of Jones (57 page)

248
working on his farm:
U.S. Federal Census, 1870.

249
ashes of his first home:
Ibid.

249
“We had 12 weeks of drought”:
B. D. Graves, address to the Hebron Community, June 17, 1926, Lauren Rogers Museum, Laurel, Miss.

249
by virtue of “his will”:
Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, p. 285. Ethel Knight claimed to have gotten much of the material for her book from Tom Knight and likely understood his feelings about Rachel and her children. See Bynum’s notes on her interview with Ethel Knight, Mississippi Oral History Project, University of Southern Mississippi.

249
trade them for sugar or coffee:
Knight,
Mississippi Girl
, pp. 18-19.

250
persimmons, and hickory nuts:
Ibid., p. 12.

250
“live peaceful with men”:
The description of the Knight homestead is from Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, pp. 263-69, and from Knight,
Mississippi Girl
, pp. 11-14, as well as the authors’ visit to the site. According to Ethel, Newton “was forever having business” at Rachel’s house and Serena voiced her suspicions that Newton was “keeping her,” pp. 264-66. On Newton’s forgiving frame of mind after the war, see Knight,
The Life and Activities of Captain Newton Knight
, p. 82.

250
federal military rule again:
Oshinsky, “Worse than Slavery,” p. 22.

251
“to protect niggers”:
Foner,
Reconstruction
, p. 276.

251
“have cast our anchor out”:
Oshinsky, “Worse than Slavery,” p. 22; Foner,
Reconstruction
, p. 280.

251
“high water mark of political insanity”:
Oshinsky, “Worse than Slavery,” pp. 22-25; Eric Foner and Olivia Mahoney,
America’s Reconstruction
(New
York: HarperCollins, 1995), p. 88; Dona Broom and John Wood, “Outlaw Days,” WPA files, Covington County, MDAH.

252
agents of change:
Oshinsky, “Worse than Slavery,” pp. 25-26.

252
“They were all that saved it”:
B. D. Graves, address to the Hebron Community, June 17, 1926, Lauren Rogers Museum, Laurel, Miss.

252
under the sheet:
Broom and Wood, “Outlaw Days,” unpublished WPA Collection, Covington County, MDAH.

252
“no sire we ain’t”:
Rawick,
The American Slave
, supplement, series 1, vol. 9,
Mississippi Narratives
, part 4, pp. 1573-75.

253
“actual enfranchisement”:
Testimony of W. D. Gibbs, Congressional Records, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Report 521, pp. XLIX-LI.

253
whittled out of a tree branch:
Foner,
Reconstruction
, pp. 281-85; Albion Tourgée,
A Fool’s Errand
, John Hope Franklin, ed. (1879; reprint, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1961), pp. 113-27; Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 134; McPherson,
Ordeal by Fire
, p. 523; Steven Hahn,
A Nation Under Our Feet
, pp. 177-98.

254
“Battle Cry of Freedom”:
Foner,
Reconstruction
, pp. 281-85; Tourgée,
A Fool’s Errand
, pp. 113-27; Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 134; McPherson,
Ordeal by Fire
, p. 523; Hahn,
One Nation Under Our Feet
, pp. 177-98.

254
old Vinson Collins:
B. D. Graves, address to the Hebron Community, June 17, 1926, Lauren Rogers Museum, Laurel, Miss.

255
“without distinction to race or color”:
Statistics and quotation from Foner,
Reconstruction
, pp. 344-45.

255
became a probate judge:
Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 160.

255
The other was Adelbert Ames:
Foner,
Reconstruction
, pp. 352-53.

255
short, inglorious reign:
Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 135.

256
helped Newton pursue the claim:
Four bills with identical wording were introduced in the U.S. Congress on behalf of Newton Knight from 1871 to 1873. H.R. 2775 was introduced on January 16, 1871, by Representative George Washington Whitmore. H.R. 1814 was introduced on March 4, 1872, by Representative Legrand W. Perce. And H.R. 822 was introduced by Albert Howe on December 18, 1873. In addition, Ames introduced the same bill in the U.S. Senate on December 18, 1873, S. 219. All bills available at NARA. Quotation is from the Letter of B. A. Mathews to Rep. L. W. Perce, December 7, 1870, Accompanying Papers, H.R. 1814, Newton Knight file, record group 233, box 16, NARA.

257
without formal charges or trial:
New York Times
, March 18, 1911, obituary of Legrand W. Perce; biographical information on George Washington Whitmore is from his entry in The Handbook of Texas Online, Texas State Historical Association,
http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/WW/fwh43.html
.

257
“You may rely upon any statement”:
Letter from Wm. Hancock to Legrand Perce, December 10, 1870, Accompanying Papers, H.R. 1814, Newton Knight file, record group 233, box 16, NARA.

257
Southern farmers had aided the Union:
Similar skepticism would doom
Newton’s future attempts with the Southern Claims Commission. Ames’s and Perce’s communications with B. A. Mathews can be found in the Ames Family Papers, Smith College, collection number MS-3. A copy of Newton’s roster and Mathews’s notation with McMillen’s address can be found in the Accompanying Papers, H.R. 1814, Newton Knight file, record group 233, box 16, NARA.

258
Hinchie:
Interview with Knight genealogist Ken Welch; Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, genealogical chart on pp. 205-6; interview with Newton and Rachel’s great-granddaughter, Barbara Knight Blackledge, March 28, 2008.

258
“A monkey with his tail off”:
Lord, “Mississippi: The Past That Has Not Died.”

258
round up Klanners for arrest:
Stephen Budiansky,
The Bloody Shirt: Terror after Appomattox
(New York, Viking Penguin, 2008), p. 2.

259
“during these reconstruction days”:
A copy of the certificate is in the collection of Knight archivist Ken Welch, and also of Jim Kelly, Knight scholar and vice president of instructional affairs at Jones County Junior College, who shared it with the authors.

259
“the school doesn’t accept Negroes”:
Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 145; Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, p. 266.

260
“he wished the Negroes to have equal opportunity”:
Bynum,
The Free State of Jones
, p. 145; Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, p. 266.

260
“he had been instrumental in building”:
Rawick,
The American Slave
, supplement, series 1, vol. 10,
Mississippi Narratives
, part 5, pp. 2268, 2269; Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, pp. 266-72.

260
“in securing their actual freedom”:
Nicholas Lehmann,
Redemption
(New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006), p. 55.

261
twenty-five black corpses in the street:
Oshinsky, “Worse than Slavery,” pp. 27-28.

261
“The negros did go up there and vote”:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 49; B. D. Graves, address to the Hebron Community, June 17, 1926, Lauren Rogers Museum, Laurel, Miss.; Foner,
Reconstruction
, pp. 538-39.

262
“in the form of a request”:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 32; Budiansky,
The Bloody Shirt
, p. 66.

262
“All are lynx-eyed”:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 64. 262
“blackest tyranny”:
Ibid., p. 69.

262
“first time he leaves his home”:
Lord, “Mississippi: The Past That Has Not Died.”

263
“we children did not know him”:
Knight,
The Life and Activities of Captain Newton Knight
, pp. 5-6; Tom Knight does not name Ames, he merely states that Newton went to see the “Governor” on state business and told him of the assassination attempt. Ames appears to be the only Mississippi governor with whom Newton corresponded.

263
pool of oil in the morning sun:
Knight,
The Echo of the Black Horn
, pp. 245-46, quotation from p. 246.

264
“your sort of cattle”:
Frost, “The South’s Strangest Army Revealed by Chief.”

265
“do you harm and deceive you”:
Knight,
The Life and Activities of Captain Newton Knight
, pp. 11-12.

265
“a few of his old gang”:
Ibid., p. 6. 265
“when it’s too late”:
Ibid.

265
“Mr. Alebert Ames, to your honor, Dear Sir”:
Letter from N. B. Blackman to Adelbert Ames, October 16, 1875, in George Sewel Boutwell,
Report of the Select Committee to Inquire into the Mississippi Election of 1875, with the testimony and documentary evidence
, vol. 2 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, August 1876), p. 44.

266
“Mississippi Plan”:
For the most in-depth description of the Mississippi Plan and James Z. George’s role, see Lehmann,
Redemption
, pp. 100-155; for a briefer summary see Oshinsky,
“Worse than Slavery,”
pp. 37-40.

267
“‘the color line’”:
William C. Harris,
The Day of the Carpetbagger: Republican Reconstruction in Mississippi
(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1979), p. 626; Bradley Bond,
Political Culture in the 19th Century South, Mississippi 1830-1900
(Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1995), pp. 174-75; Cash and Howorth,
My Dear Nellie
, pp. 240-41. Nugent would become president of the state bar in 1887.

267
they would never recover:
Walter Lord, writing from the perspective of 1965 and in the midst of the civil rights movement, makes a compelling case for the worthiness of Ames’s administration in “Mississippi: The Past That Has Not Died” and even argues that the victory of the Democrats over Ames left the state locked in an isolated past and impoverished for years to come. “The state’s landed leaders,” he observes, “… owed their authority to an odd combination of ante-bellum nostalgia and redemption heroics—certainly not new ideas.”

267
Grant effectively returned the city:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, pp. 73-75; Oshinsky,
“Worse than Slavery,”
p. 38.

268
too afraid to claim them:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 91.

268
“absence of all the elements of real authority”:
Oshinsky,
“Worse than Slavery,”
p. 38; Foner,
Reconstruction
, p. 558.

268
four Gatling guns:
Congressional Record
, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Report 521, pp. XLIX-LI; 465-66.

268
about half the companies:
Ibid.; copy of Newton Knight’s appointment is in the possession of the authors, courtesy of the files of Jim Kelly, Vice President of Instructional Affairs, Jones County Junior College.

268
“appoint good men”:
Ames Letter Books, letter to Newton Knight from Lt. Gov. A. K. Davis, series 802, box 986, Letter Box C, #757, MDAH.

269
“Dear Sir: I write you a few lines:”
Congressional Record
, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Report 521, p. LXXIII.

270
would not return to Mississippi:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 147.

270
“be butchered here by this mob”:
As quoted in Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 111.

270
“their votes have established”:
Budiansky,
The Bloody Shirt
, p. 200.

271
pleaded for protection:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 116-20.

271
“untrammeled Commonwealth”:
As quoted in Oshinsky,
“Worse than Slavery,”
p. 39.

271
without direct orders from Grant:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, p. 121.

272
more important than black Mississippi:
Ibid., pp. 136-37.

272
disband the black militia:
Ibid., pp. 114-27.

273
“beat him dead with a mall”:
B. D. Graves, address to the Hebron Community, June 17, 1926, Lauren Rogers Museum, Laurel, Miss.

273
“a good many colored people out to hear me”:
Testimony of W. D. Gibbs,
Congressional Record
, 44th Congress, 1st Session, Senate Report 521, pp. XLIX-LI.

274
“but fo’cibly if we must”:
Albert T. Morgan,
Yazoo; or, On the Picket Line of Freedom in the South: A Personal Narrative
(1884; reprint, Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2000), pp. 451, 452. In the narrative, Morgan refers to Gibbs as “Major,” and in his chapter descriptions in the table of contents, he includes the heading: “What Major Gibbs said about it—‘Peaceably if we can, fo’cibly if we must’” (p. x).

274
“have it all their own way”:
Boutwell,
Report of the Select Committee to Inquire into the Mississippi Election of 1875
, vol. 2, pp. 44, 53, 70.

274
“shape our course accordingly”:
Ibid., p. 70.

275
shattered the windows:
Lehmann,
Redemption
, pp. 147-48. 275
“their own counties”:
Ibid., p. 148.