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0433

terrified them so that they fled from the place, this morning. They were advised to do so by the white lady of the house where they were hired. These are the facts as narrated by the man himself. He came to me for advice & protection. A number of circumstances induce me to suspect that the man to whom they were hired (their former owner), had a hand in this affair, & that the design of the parties last night was not to murder, but to frighten them off. It seems that they had a verbal agreement with this man, to cultivate his farm for one third of the crops & find themselves. They cultivate the crop, laid it by, & think it will yield about 20 bags of cotton. This will give them 
6⅔ bales for their share,& will probably net them $600. Now it may have been an artifice of the employer to get possession of their cotton. All sorts of tricks & chicanery have been resorted to, throughout this section to defraud the poor negroes out of the fruits of their toil. It was a touching & mournful sight to see these poor creatures trudging along foot sore & weary, with little bundles of clothes in their hands, their earthly all fleeing as for life. They have no money, no provisions, no shelter, but are either driven by a murderous crew, or frightened away by a dishonest villain to starve. The policy of the people in many places, is to free the negroes with a starving condition that they may cry out, "See what freedom has done"! Many after the crops were cultivated drove the negroes off without any pay for the service performed by them. The Bureau is in the hands of the old proslavery secessionists who look after the interest of the white man, not those of the freed men. It is so, I mean, in some places & this is one of them. Will