A Woman's Life-Work-Labors and Experiences of Laura S. Haviland Part 16

With several fugitives, I started on my way to Toledo from Cincinnati, and spent a day at our friend William Beard's. From thence we were taken to Newport, Indiana, where was a meeting appointed in behalf of Calvin Fairbanks, in which I gave a sketch of my visit to Louisville jail in his behalf. I read the letter I had received from his lawyer on leaving Cincinnati, containing a proposition to do the best he could for him, and with that object in view he staved off the case to the next session of their court. At the close of the meeting fifteen dollars were raised, Bishop Quinn, of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, giving one-third of it. As there was a fall of snow a foot deep, the friends concluded to take us across a swamp, which would save a number of miles; and as there were indications of a thaw, one man offered his team and double sleigh if a certain colored man would go that night and drive it. We were soon well protected from the prospective inclement weather, with the buffalo-robe presented to me, and quilts around the balance of our load.

The s.h.i.+fting wind brought quite a snow-storm, that covered us over about three inches deep. My company being very cold, I advised to stop at a house, the dim light of which was so tempting to the s.h.i.+vering company. I went to the door and asked permission to enter, giving our number, and our object in going through the swamp before a break-up.

The two old people granted the favor; but when the old lady saw the color of my company she became rather suspicious. Said she, "If these are slaves we don't want any trouble, because you know the Fugitive-slave Law makes a deal of trouble in some places." I a.s.sured her they would have none of that character on our account, for these young people were going with me to attend my school. When we were warmed and the horses fed, we left our kind friends to borrow no more trouble for fear of being disturbed with slave-hunters.

About three o'clock we came to a large half-finished frame house, brilliantly lighted, and the man seemed to be preparing his team for leaving. I called with our driver to see if we could warm ourselves and feed the team, giving our reason for crossing the swamp to save distance, and as there were indications of a thaw in the afternoon, we chose to come through that night. The man said that was his reason for going for a load of lumber so early--he fearing a break-up. They were very kind, and insisted on our resting till daylight, and taking a warm breakfast. The invitation was accepted with grat.i.tude. I spent my time in conversing with our kind hostess, while my company slept an hour.

At nine o'clock we reached Carthaginia. The first one we met was a colored woman, of whom I inquired where we could find a place to tarry for a night, and find provender for our horses. She took in our situation at once, and pointed to a large frame house in sight, the house of Samuel Jones, half a mile distant. While she was giving this information, a man ahead of us, with his carriage, stopped and turned back, saying, "There is Mr. Jones now, coming to see you, I reckon." As he came to us, I told him of the inquiry I made for a resting-place.

"And that is my house for you and barn for your horses," he said. After giving each of us a shake of the hand, he said, turning to me, "I know you, though I never saw you before, and I will tell you of a circ.u.mstance, after we get home, whereby you will recognize me." We followed him to his very comfortable home. We were soon seated at a luxurious table. Breakfast being over, he related a circ.u.mstance in which I had taken a deep interest, and by corresponding, the release from slavery of his relative was effected.

Brother Jones gave me ten dollars for brother Fairbanks, in the Kentucky prison. Here we took leave of our conductor, Henry Marshal, and a team and teamster were provided to take us on by way of Bellefontaine. The antic.i.p.ated warmer weather overtook us, and with a wagon we left Carthaginia. Streams with floating ice made fording difficult, especially Mosquito Creek; but our driver and Simon measured the depth of water, and with rails pushed the floating ice from the ford, to enable me to drive through. Working as they did with all their might to keep the cakes of ice from running against the horses and from impeding the wheels, when we reached the swift current of the stream a cake blocked the wagon so as to stop the horses a few moments. One horse became discouraged and began to lie down. At this the three women jumped upon a large floating cake, from which they reached the sh.o.r.e with the help of the men. Our teamster found his way into the wagon; and by pus.h.i.+ng and crowding this way and that he loosened the wheel, and with continued urging and Simon's wading to the horses' heads, they finally pulled through. We drove to a house, where the men changed their socks, and rubbed their horses with straw, they said, two hours, and then fed them. We pursued our journey without further difficulties to our school in Toledo.

Often did my whilom slave scholars refer to the excitement at Mosquito Creek ford. I found the prejudice here very bitter against a colored school; but the colored people had combined their weak forces and built a church, designed for school, as well as their occasional meetings. My school averaged nearly twenty scholars during the term, at the close of which we put in a pet.i.tion for a support from the school fund. But a majority of two ruled against us; for, although the State law required them to support this school, they had already complied with the requirement.

Although I had designed to return home and re-open Raisin Inst.i.tute, yet to press the board of education into its duty I reopened their school for the second term; and every time that board met I met with them with my pet.i.tion, informing them, at their first refusal to adopt the school, that this pet.i.tion of the importunate widow would stand before them until it was granted. They frequently inquired of the colored people how long I was going to teach for them. The answer every time was, as I told them, until the board of education took it. In their discussions in the board I understood it was frequently remarked by our opposers "that the end of that negro school would be when Mrs.

Haviland left, and that wouldn't be long, for the negroes were too poor to pay her." But it was not for money that I taught their school, but to see justice meted out to them.

There were fifteen families of the lower cla.s.s of Irish who lived in shanties near the ca.n.a.l that ran within a few rods of our school-house, and as the most of our school pa.s.sed them, or would have to go half a mile farther, we got from one man in particular a systematic cursing; beginning with cursing my feet, and cursing every toe on them, and cursing every nail on every toe, and so on, to cursing my head, and cursing every hair on it. This regular set of curses were for me every time I pa.s.sed when he was in his cabin, and frequently a number of others standing by would join him. But as he or some of the others were so often drunk, it was a long time before I could find the suitable opportunity to go to their cabins and have a talk with them, as I desired. As some of their company were so boisterously furious, the children did not dare pa.s.s them unless I was with them, for in addition to cursing they were stoned.

When the second term was two-thirds through I proposed a picnic for the school and its friends, and had the scholars declaim a few pieces. An eloquent speech delivered in the House of Lords, when immediate emanc.i.p.ation was discussed in the English parliament, was well committed and declaimed by one of the young men. A number of the colored people feared a mob, but the majority were willing to risk any measure I thought best to adopt. I trained them thoroughly in speaking, and they trained themselves in singing, and the school selected a little girl to be crowned as their queen of May, and on the 25th of May we marched through town to a grove, with two beautiful banners. The one borne by the young woman who walked by my side bore the motto, "G.o.d is love," and next to it all the girls followed in couples. Then followed the young men and boys in the same manner, headed by the banner, upon which was inscribed, "Knowledge is power." I instructed the children and young people to walk straight forward, and not even turn their heads to the right or left, and not to notice by look or word any remark that might be made, not even to talk to each other until we reached our little stand in the woods. Not a word of disrespect was heard, and some of the white people who drove out with their carriages told me they had not seen such order in marching in any of the May picnics that the white schools had had that Spring. They were highly delighted with our exercises. At the next session of the board my school was recognized as a public one, and the chairman, Rev. Dr.

Smyth, was authorized to hire me to teach the next term. He met me on the street and said, "Mrs. Havilland, the importunate widow's prayer is answered; your pet.i.tion is granted at last, and I am instructed to hire you for the next term."

"Then my work is finished with this term," said I. "My object is accomplished. I have business at home that I hoped to have entered upon when I closed last term; but as your board refused to do its duty I continued, although I have not averaged twenty-five cents a week during the six months, as a large majority of the colored people here are very poor."

"I know that, and I have contended from the first that they ought to have a school; but I am surprised at your not remaining in the school, as you shall have a fair compensation now."

I told him I would give him the name of a competent teacher, who was now working himself through college at Oberlin--John Mitchel--a worthy Christian young man of their own color, with whom they could correspond and secure his services. His parents were living in Toledo, and he would be pleased to accept the position. I thanked the board through their chairman for the favor they had granted in behalf of the colored people in Toledo.

It being the seventh day of the week, as I was pa.s.sing my Irish friends, and all quiet, and a company sitting on the gra.s.s in the shade of their cabins, I accepted this as my long-sought opportunity to talk with them. Addressing a group of half a dozen women, I said: "I have long desired to talk with you, as I am confident you do not understand me in teaching this colored school. I have felt it my duty to aid the most neglected cla.s.s of people. We are apt to indulge in prejudices against certain cla.s.ses or nations of people. Some people are prejudiced against the German people. They'll say he's n.o.body but a Dutchman, he's not worth noticing; and others are prejudiced against the Irish, and will say, 'They are n.o.body but Irish people, they are not worth noticing;' and others are prejudiced against black people: 'They are n.o.body but negroes, and they are not worth noticing. And then there are some who are prejudiced against soldiers, or sailors, as cla.s.ses of men. People are too apt to despise other nations and cla.s.ses of men. All this is wrong; G.o.d made us all as it pleased him, and it is not for us to find fault with our Heavenly Father, who loves all the human family alike. As we acknowledge the fatherhood of G.o.d, we should also acknowledge the brotherhood of man in all nations and cla.s.ses."

Said one man to his friend sitting by, "In faith, Pat, that's good doctrine." "Yes, indade, that's the doctrine Father Mathew prached, ye know." "Jamie, that's all right," said another. One of the women concluded she would know the truth of the reports they had gotten up among themselves.

"An' did ye not marry a nagur?"

"Why, no! my husband was a white man, who died a number of years ago."

"And was he a black man?"

"He was a white man, and he left me with eight children, all under age, and the youngest and the oldest have followed their father."

"In fath, ye've seen a dale of trouble, I'm sure; and we heard that black man we often saw comin' from schule with ye an' that yellow la.s.s an' boy was your chilther."

"That mulatto girl and boy live near my boarding-place, and they generally come and go with me to school and return; and that black man is a young man who has never had the privilege of going to school and learning to read and write and the use of figures, until I opened this school. Now he can read, write, and can use figures to good advantage."

"But it's a pity we didn't know ye before. We've been hearin' all this about ye, an' not a bit of it true. Our people was about to set fire to your schule-house--in faith, they said they'd give ye a dressin' of tar an' fithers, an' our praste forbid it."

"I knew nothing of that," said I; "but I wanted you to understand me before I left, which will be in four weeks. Then they will have a fine young colored man from Oberlin College to teach their school."

"But what a pity that is, for I'm sure they'll not get another such a tacher as you. Indade, I'm sorry to hear you're to lave us; I'd like to have my little gal go to your schule, if ye'll take 'er."

The man who was the systematic curser came to his door: "Indade, missus, we didn't know ye; an' now we'll fight for ye, an' we are sorry we didn't know ye for so long."

When I left them I shook hands with them all, for by the time our conversation closed about all their little community had convened, and I took occasion to speak highly of Father Mathew, the great temperance reformer of Ireland; and my little congregation p.r.o.nounced as strong blessings upon me as they had curses. Even my systematic curser was among my best friends after that, and my scholars, as well as myself, were treated with the utmost respect ever after, and two of them sent for me when very sick and not expected to live, one of whom died a few days after. As she was in great distress of mind, I read to her some of those precious promises of our Savior, from which she drew great consolation. It would seem to many like casting pearls before swine to turn aside to present the truth to such ignorant and disliking people, but it is ours to obey these little impressions, and leave the result with the All-wise Director.

During my work in Toledo I called on a colored woman to solicit a little change for a very sick man who was very low with consumption, and was being cared for by a very poor family, and as she gave me twenty-five cents a beautiful white girl was sitting by, who gave another quarter. After school I called again and inquired for that young woman who gave for that sick man, without giving me time to ask for her mite, and to my surprise, found she was an inmate of a house of ill-fame, and tried to make Mrs. Buck promise not to tell me where she was living; for if I knew it I would never speak to her. I sent for her to meet me the following day after school, at her house. I found her sitting in the parlor waiting for me. As I took her by the hand, placing the other on her head, I said, "My dear girl, you are an unhappy child." And she burst into a flood of tears, and as soon as she could sufficiently command her feelings to relate her history I found she was compelled by her stepfather to live away from home. She had lived a year or more with a worthy woman, who kept a boarding-house in Cleveland; and there came to board a few weeks a fine appearing young man, who professed great affection for her, and proposed marriage. He told her his father was a very wealthy merchant in Toledo, and he was there on business for his father. After he had won her affections he proposed to take her to Toledo, and place her in a boarding-house until she could make up two rich silk dresses and other clothing suitable for her, as he was not willing his folks should know he was marrying a poor girl. He could easily take a dress pattern from each bolt of silk and his father never know it, and any other goods she needed. As his father was going to New York for a new supply of goods, he would supply her with other goods to make up until his father's new goods came, then he would hire a dressmaker to make up her silk dresses. All this she fully believed, as from a true and faithful lover, to whom she had given her heart's best and purest affections. She said, "A number of days I hesitated, because I wanted to tell my mother all about it, but he persisted in leaving Cleveland secretly, and return on our bridal trip to surprise my mother and that cruel stepfather. At last I foolishly consented, to my ruin and sorrow, for I haven't seen one moment of peace since I was deserted by that man;" and again bathed herself in tears. Recovering herself, she continued, "I wouldn't have my mother know this for the world. She is a good Christian woman. She's a Methodist, and has seen a sight of trouble with my stepfather; and, if she knew this, it would break her heart." On further inquiry I found he brought her to this house as an excuse to keep her secluded until they were about to be married, when he would pay her board a few days in the finest hotel in the city. "The next day after our arrival he brought me a beautiful lawn dress-pattern and a package of other material for me to make up while waiting for his father's goods. And not till then had he offered in word or act any thing amiss from a perfect gentleman. It was the next day after our arrival in this city, and to this house, that he proposed to live two weeks as if we were married, as it would be about a week or two at longest when the goods would be here, and he would get one of two dressmakers to prepare me for my wedding. I cried two days over this proposition, and by this time I had learned the character of this house. Here I was, a stranger to every body, but still had confidence in my new friend; and again, to my bitter sorrow, I yielded. But day after day of anxious waiting pa.s.sed until two weeks expired, and no new goods yet, but another lawn dress-pattern came for me to make for myself, and another two weeks rolled away with only hearing (he said) that the goods were on the way. But at the close of the third two weeks he was missing. Daily I waited his coming. At length I went on the street. I inquired for his name and the name of his father's store, when, to my utter astonishment, no such store or names were found in the city. Here in a strange place, deserted, ruined, and filled with shame, I had no heart to go to my friends." She had been here six months. I advised her not to remain in this house another twenty-four hours.

"But what shall I do? Mrs. Ca.s.saday will lock me up if she knows I am going to leave her. She called me a fool for giving you that quarter; she says these Christians are down on us; and if any of us should die, there wouldn't one of them come to pray for us. I told her I believed you would," I told her to pack her trunk, and if she was down town near the time for the boat to leave for Cleveland, to call a drayman to take her trunk to the boat and follow it, if possible, before Mrs. Ca.s.saday came in. I told her how to manage in going to her old employer, and to tell her you were deceived by that young man, but you found him untruthful. "As you say Mrs. Ca.s.saday kept you sewing most of the time, you can tell her you were employed most of time in sewing; but do not, at present, tell her or your mother of the life you have lived, and place of your residence while here." She promised she would gladly take my advice, and leave for Cleveland the first opportunity. As we parted she leaned her head upon my shoulder, with fast dropping tears, and said, "I shall always thank you for acting the part of a mother in helping me away from this horrible place." The following morning she called to leave word with Mrs. Buck, that fortunately for her Mrs.

Ca.s.saday was out just in time for her to call a drayman, that had just gone with her trunk to the boat, and she was now on her way to Cleveland, happier than she had been in six months, and that she should do, in all respects, as I had advised. Here was a beautiful girl decoyed and led from the paths of virtue by an artful, designing, and licentious young man, who basely sought her ruin by winning the affections of an innocent girl. Hundreds and thousands of these girls are in like manner led astray, and might be saved if mothers in Israel would take them by the hand of sympathy and lift them from the mire of this moral pollution.

At another time a request was left with my hostess to go to see a very sick woman, who was thought nigh unto death; but for a little girl that heard the request I should not have received it. She said, these poor white trash would curse me in health, and when they thought they were going to die, they were ready then to send for me to pray for them; and, as I was tired enough to rest after teaching all day, she did not think I ought to go for their calls. I told her if she would be so kind as to deliver all errands of that character I would be very thankful, and hastened to the bedside of an old soldier of the cross, who, with her aged companion, were visiting their children. She said she did not expect to remain much longer in this world of checkered scenes; but her son had been here a short time only, and had not formed any acquaintances among Christian people, and their hired girl said "she was pa.s.sing your school-house one morning and heard you opening your school with prayer, and I told her to find your boarding-place, and leave word for you to come after your school closed, as I wanted to hear the voice of prayer once more." I read a chapter and offered prayer by her bedside. She and her weeping husband and children thanked me for the call, and desired me to call the day following, after school. I found her somewhat improved, and the next door neighbor said Dutch Mary was in the adjoining room, and seemed much affected, and said that was the first she heard read from the Bible in seven years, and the first prayer she had heard in that time, and she would be glad to see me, but she would not disgrace me by coming to her house. Then the woman told her she would ask me to see her in her room, and send for her when I came to see the sick woman.

I met her in great distress of mind. She told me of the wicked life she had spent during the last seven years of her widowhood, and wanted to know if I thought there was any hope whatever for her. "Do you think G.o.d can forgive me? I have never so much as opened my Bible that lies in the bottom of my chest all these seven years, until yesterday I went home and took my Bible for the first time to read in these years; and I felt so condemned after I read awhile that I laid it back, and didn't know whether it was of any use; for I have lived such a wretched life so long I doubt whether G.o.d can forgive me, for I feel worse and worse.

Do you believe he can?"

"Certainly he is able to save to the uttermost. It is the enlightening influence of G.o.d's Holy Spirit that is showing you the exceeding sinfulness of sin."

I read to her the readiness of the Lord Jesus to forgive sin. "How ready to bless the humble and contrite heart! Only believe this with all thy heart, and the blood of Jesus is sufficient to wash away every stain that sin has made. Though they be as scarlet, he will make them white as snow." We knelt together, and she too offered earnest prayer for strength to live the new life, which she firmly resolved to do.

I saw her a week later, and she said she informed those men with whom she had committed those darkest of sins of her firm resolution to live a virtuous life, and she locked her door; but they persisted in troubling her through the night, threatening to tear her house down or burn it.

"Three nights I suffered from them. But by constant prayer, believing G.o.d would take care of me, I was delivered from them. And I have plenty of was.h.i.+ng, ironing, and house-cleaning to do; and I get along so much better than I expected I could. I do want to go to meeting; but so many know of my wicked life I am afraid to go inside of a church."

I told her to go to whichever Church she felt most at home, and the Lord would open the way for her, and enable her to bring up her little girl of eight years in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

At the close of my school I left this field, so white to the harvest, to enter, as I supposed, upon a field of home missions. At the expiration of a year I visited Toledo, and inquired of one who occasionally employed Dutch Mary, but knew nothing of my experience with her, how she was prospering. The cheering reply was, "Splendidly; I haven't heard a disparaging word of her for months, and there used to be hard stories about her." I heard she had united with the Baptist Church, and I think she is trying to live a Christian. If she had not left town on a visit to her friends I should have seen her, but the report I heard of her was heart-cheering. May G.o.d bless her, and all who are receiving life-giving power who were dead in trespa.s.ses and sin.

CHAPTER VIII.

FUGITIVES IN CANADA.

While visiting friends in Detroit and Canada previous to reopening Raisin Inst.i.tute, as I designed, I was earnestly solicited by Henry Bibb, Horace Hallack, and Rev. Chas. C. Foote, the committee authorized to employ a teacher, to open a school in a new settlement of fugitives, eight miles back of Windsor, where the Refugee a.s.sociation had purchased government land, on long and easy terms, for fugitive slaves.

They had erected a frame house for school and meeting purposes. The settlers had built for themselves small log-houses, and cleared from one to five acres each on their heavily timbered land, and raised corn, potatoes, and other garden vegetables. A few had put in two and three acres of wheat, and were doing well for their first year.

After prayerful consideration, I reached the conclusion to defer for another year my home work, and enter this new field.

In the Autumn of 1852 I opened school, and gave notice that at eleven o'clock the following Sunday there would be a Sabbath-school for parents and children, after which a little time would be spent in other religious exercises, pursuing the same course I did in Toledo, Ohio.

This drew a number of callers who had no children to see if any could come to my Sabbath-school; and when I told them it was for every body of any age who desired to come, my school-house was filled to its utmost capacity. Many frequently came five or six miles with their ox-teams to attend these meetings, with their families. Every man, woman, and child who could read a verse in the Testament, even with a.s.sistance, took part in reading the lesson, and liberty was given to ask questions. It was not strange to listen to many crude ideas, but a more earnest, truth seeking congregation we seldom find. An aged couple, past eighty, missed very few Sabbaths during the year I spent there. The man was a fugitive slave, and his companion was an Indian woman, converted under the preaching of a missionary among the Indians.

She had taken great pains to talk and understand the English language, and was an interesting woman.

As there was an increasing interest both in day and Sabbath schools, I give liberty for all who wished to enjoy a sort of cla.s.s or inquiry meeting, following half an hour's service for exhortation after Sabbath school.

One couple desired a private interview with me, as they had been married only after "slave fas.h.i.+on." They said "It is not right to live this way in a free country. Now we wants you to marry us."

"I am not legally authorized," I said, "but I will send a note to brother Foote, and he will come at once and marry you legally."