Viewing page 285 of 295

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

both classes, of Refugees and Freedmen who are helpless from age and infirmities, who have no one to look to for subsistence; many of these it is feared must perish, as there is no provision made or contemplated by the local authorities so far as I can learn, throughout the State of Arkansas, to provide for these unfortunate classes.

On the 1st inst I made a special report of Freedmen murdered in the State of Arkansas, which occurred mainly in the months of July and August. The numbers of murders reported was Twenty nine; it is not probable that more than one half such cases were reported as there are large districts of the State where we have no Agents. From the number of murders committed some idea can be formed of other outrages and atrocities committed against Freedmen; all these things are untouched by the Civil Authorities. These things necessarily tend to make Freedmen suspicious of the Whites and give them a feeling of insecurity and thus render them less efficient and faithful as laborers. 

Under the old system of slavery the negro was forced to do the will of his master; it seems now to never enter into the