James Melville Beard

The Situation in Georgia—Bullock Usurpation—Some Things which may be Explained—Negro Criminals—Taking Refuge in the Ocmulgee Swamps—A Brutal Murder—Ku-Klux Ambushed—A Terrible Oath—Uncle Jack B.—A Brief Memoir—“Nigger Dogs” in the “Goober State”—Uncle Jack Interviewed by the Ku-Klux—What came of it—Getting Ready for the Chase—A Pack of “Negro Dogs” described—In the Swamps—The Opening Chorus—A Warm Trail—Swimming the Ocmulgee—Disappointment—The Lull is Past—The Cheering Notes of the Chase—Blood of the Martyrs! can it be?—A Last Effort—Another Crime added to the Calendar—A fresh Start—Baffled Again—At Bay—Tragical Scene.

As the K. K. K. influence was not felt in the politics of the south-west after the events which we have narrated, and the scope of this work forbids our entering into such details as comprised the Chicot county affair in Arkansas, and the Vicksburg (Miss.) emeute, which was unquestionably due in part to other influences, we yield to the eccentricities of our theme, and find ourselves under the shadow of that towering usurpation—the Bullock administration in Georgia. The organization of the Klan in this State was perhaps more extensive and efficient than elsewhere on Southern soil,—proving a complete offset to the Loyal League in the important work of influencing party discipline, and, after a time, effecting its other aim—of rendering it physically hors du combat. We shall not pretend, however, to follow it through the various stages of its development on Georgia soil, nor give what might be deemed a correct history of its movements, as we are concerned rather with the issues which grew out of the latter, and that which will prove far more interesting to the reader—the modus of its operations.

A single feature of the campaign in this region we will endeavor to make prominent, without a design of saddling its individuality on this State, or insinuating that that branch of the pet institution vulgarly known as “nigger dogs” was not as widely diffused as its popular derivative, and far too fossilized in its structure to submit to any merely sentimental changes in types of government. So far as that phase of the subject may tend to obtrude difficulties upon the reader, the writer will volunteer the information that he was recently placed by accident at a point where his sensorium covered three large well-trained kennels of these brutes; and that it has been his good fortune, on more occasions than one, since liberty resumed its old-time inheritance in the “land we love,” to follow the panting “Ketch,” where none dare go before, along the redolent trail of the criminal—black or white. Nor is there anything more remarkable about the circumstance that the body of men known as Ku-Klux should, upon certain contingencies, avail themselves of the services of this sagacious brute, than that the same men, by accident or otherwise, should be employed on a righteous mission like the following:

In the year 1862, in that portion of Telfair county where the Elk river has its confluence with the Ocmulgee, a larger stream, a negro slave of Mr. —— committed a brutal rape on one of his master’s household, and fled to the neighboring wilderness. He was not pursued at the time, as, in view of the recent conscript levies and the unsettled state of the country, there were no available means at hand; and, aided by individuals of his own color, whose race prejudices at this time had reached a state of savage excitement, he found safe harborage and a precarious livelihood in the river-swamps during the entire period of the war. Pending his exile, and soon after it began, he was joined by an only brother, a brother-criminal likewise, who had been forced to fly the settlements; and, having formed an alliance—sun and ek—the predatory excursions of this twain became thereafter the special terror of dwellers in that exposed region. Nothing, however, particularly worthy of mention marked their exploits until the year following the close of hostilities, when they emerged from their fastnesses, and having made their way to a neighboring settlement, occupied by an old gentleman and an only son, a youth of twelve years, put them both to death with every circumstance of horrible detail. This affair occurred in the latter part of the year 1865, and, as was to have been expected, created a wide-spread sensation.

Within a few hours after the deed had been committed, a well-equipped party of horsemen started in pursuit, and for more than a week conducted a thorough campaign through that division of the Ocmulgee swamps that was supposed to have furnished a retreat to the murderers. They did not succeed, however, further than to obtain a view of the refugees, and salute them with a volley at long range; and seeing that their efforts would prove fruitless, returned to their homes. Here the matter rested until the following spring, when a party of Ku-Klux, raiding in that vicinity, were fired upon from the brush, and one of their number killed, by two men who were positively recognized as the swamp-ruffians. Having buried their dead companion, in obedience to the strange ceremonies in vogue with them, the members of the Klan assembled around his grave, and recorded an oath “never to relent from their purpose of revenge, nor cease the pursuit of his murderers, while the Ocmulgee contained water, and the region fertilized by it and its tributaries supported an inch of unexplored territory.”

Not far from the scene of the last occurrence lived Uncle Jack B——, a character in the neighborhood prior to Sherman’s raid and reconstruction, but who, since those events, in view of a somewhat disproportioned record, had been singing exceedingly small. In ante bellum times, this old gentleman had been looked up to, by both whites and blacks of his vicinity, as in some sense the reigning monarch of the locality, and one between whose smiles and frowns lay considerations that might engage the attention of much weightier personages than any whom the countryside supported. In brief, Uncle Jack had been the proud proprietor of the largest and best known pack of “nigger dogs” in the “Goober State,” with all that that implied in the language of the reconstructionists; and if he did not still possess that distinction, it was altogether attributable to the circumstance that the office which it involved had ceased to be a sinecure, and the property in question was no longer quoted among commercial values. But though the old man and his beasts bowed their heads under the in terrorem of the new order of things, they well knew that this dies irÆ could not last always, and were, moreover, fully persuaded of the truth of the old proverb which insures to every well-behaved canine a “dish” in passing events. That they were not sophists in this matter will be sufficiently demonstrated by the remaining events of this chapter.

At precisely twelve o’clock on the night succeeding that which witnessed the tragical event last narrated above, Uncle Jack held a long conference, at the outer gate of his premises, with three mounted men, and shortly thereafter might have been observed to visit his stable and dog-kennel, lingering for some time in the vicinity of each. A half-hour or more was consumed by the details of a preparation from which it was plain to be seen some mystery was in course of evolution, and the old man, mounted on his now full-rigged hunter, and swept forward in a tempest of dolorous howlings, turned an angle of the close, and joined his weird visitors.

It will hardly be necessary to inform the reader that these men were K. K. K. emissaries, who had been dispatched to secure the hunter and his dogs to aid them in the difficult enterprise which they had undertaken; and looking from one to the other of the new levies, he would have no hesitancy in making up his mind that “Barkis was willin’,” and the “yaller beauties,” as he was wont to term them, “spilin’” for nigger meat. These latter were composed of a dozen brace of the best Florida breed of the hybrid blood- and sleuth-hound, fat and frolicsome, wearing sleek coats of yellow, and as to size, if put to the test, the runtiest of the runts would have kicked the beam at fifty pounds. Leashed in couples, they made rapid circuits around the now galloping horsemen, filling the night with the music of their weird chorus, and falling to an indiscriminate and discordant baying whenever hog or cow or other animate thing, startled from their covert, stood still to guess at the intrusion. Three miles from the point of starting, the main company was reached, and soon afterwards, passing into the edge of the bottom, the dogs were released from their slips, and at a word from the hunter, and directing a premonitory sniff at their surroundings, sped into the darkness. For an hour or more the hunters pressed their way through the pitchy swamps, now following a scarcely distinguishable stock trail, now lightened upon by a gleam of starlight from above, and not unfrequently committed for guidance to the instincts of the animals they bestrode, without other report from the excited yelpers than was too timidly given to be accounted much worth, or called forth the response from some guttural cavity of the forest, “a lie.” Reaching the banks of the river, at a point five miles below the swamp line at which their road had intersected the bottom, a halt was called, and the company sat peering into the darkness, for the first time doubtful of their enterprise, when lo! within ten feet of the rearmost file a welcome sound broke the stillness—at first low and doubtful, but gaining in volume and flowing into blended notes—one—two—three—and then a stunning, Wagnerian chorus, that lifted every horseman from his stirrups, and sent the wood echoes rolling in sonorous waves along the breast of the forest. A loud hurrah from the hunters attested their equal joy, and hue and cry being joined, the panic of pursuit began. Straight up the river bank the roaring pack held on their course, not once veering to the right nor left, nor never slackening speed, and timid horsemen, that erst had shivered if their steeds but stumbled in the darkness, now rode abreast of the panting “leader,” swelling the volume of sound with their loud halloos, and leaping branch and inlet sound with the agility of the frightened deer that sped before. Even the “Ketch,” usually sedate and disallowing confidences, had been momentarily thawed by the all-pervading enthusiasm, and joining the pack just where the fun grew furious, howled a dismal accompaniment to the cheering notes of the chase. On, on, into the darkness beyond, sped the tempest of pursuit—now wedged into narrow passes and involved in a hundred confused knots, now unravelling on the open plains beyond and flowing on in currents bold and free as those that kissed the shore beneath them, now leaping brake and fell, now skirting hazardous banks, now hugging obtrusive shores, and hark! at a sharp signal from the “leader” all sounds are hushed,—followed by a plunging boom, and, churned into a thousand eddies, the bold Ocmulgee supports the rout of panting men and beasts, who have no sooner recovered from the chilling baptism than each bends forward in a mad struggle to reach first the yonder shore and herald this clamorous invasion to its phantoms of darkness. But so close on the heels of the dripping “leader” pressed the frantic crew—who owed him fealty come life or death—that his opening chorus was echoed by a hundred lesser sounds that were not echoes, and with a mighty effort the panting “Ketch,” leaping sheer from the waves to the upper bank, was not too late with his base variation. And now the wild pursuit is begun anew, for the tardiest horseman is spurring into the depth of the forest beyond, and skurrying out of sight and hearing if that were possible—the wailing wood notes have a story to whisper to the deserted shore.But “the best laid plans of mice and men aft gang aglee,” and not above a half mile from their watery exodus the puzzled yelpers vary their chorus and slacken speed, and, warned by a ringing blast on the huntsman’s horn, the whole company of baffled pursuers double on their track, and by twos, and threes, and then in larger squads, rejoin their river base. Here the huntsmen consult together, and the pack renew their frenzy, frisking along the river shore, scouring the woods, and soon afterwards, indicating by a yelping chorus far down the stream that the stratagem of the refugees led them that way. The impatient horsemen soon gallop at their heels, and after one or two dissentient howls from the aged skeptics of the pack, they one and all run full upon the warm scent, with a clamor that causes the woods to “ring again,” and sends the vital current tingling along the veins of the coldest-blooded horseman. And now the lull is past, and the thunder of pursuit once more greets the forest echoes. Away, away, distancing the swamp tracts and riding into the region of the morning, for its first beams, striking through the tree-boughs, sprinkle their forms and play in feathered jets along the bosom of the forest. Away, away, riding neck and neck with the fleet-footed swamp-hare, and crossing the hurricane’s track with a rush and sound that might have been its refrain. Away, away, emerging upon the broad plateau, and yelling, yelping, whooping, cursing, but never slackening speed. Away, away, vanishing through lanes, disappearing over hill-tops, and clattering through the valleys beyond, with a mighty hubbub that jars the base of the hills, and sends the round echoes careering at their backs.

Blood of the martyrs! can it be? Just at the apex of yonder rise which the feet of the pursuers take hold upon, lives an unprotected widow and her daughter, and with ominous precision of stride the hue and cry points that way.

The instincts of both men and beasts instantly acquaint them with the situation, and, bending forward in one last despairing effort, they emulate the rush of the tornado as they bear down the enclosures and sweep up the incline, just in time to witness the most piteous spectacle that men with emotions were ever invited to commiserate. The panting pack, first on the scene, leap on the frightened and weeping women with furious growls, licking their faces and hands, sniffing at their forms, and baying from all quarters, until, driven from thence, they rush into the single apartment, leap on the beds, drag them to the floor, and falling to, with the fury of wild beasts disappointed of their prey, tear them into shreds.[A] Being expelled from thence, the hunters hear the dolorous narrative of the women, cross-question them as to particulars which may aid them in the pursuit, and having lost but little time, follow the now furious hounds in a noisy detour around the little farm. Again and again this is repeated, and men and dogs are fairly baffled. The former dismount and examine the ground for visible signs, but are unrewarded, and seem ready to despair, when one of the pack, having leaped to the close fence, follows it for some distance, and finally breaks forth into that ominous bark which criminal never heard undaunted. Instantly he is joined by his impatient companions, and the welkin rings with their loud acclaim. The hunters follow, but almost too late, as the sequel proves; for having invaded the barn, a few rods distant, and discovered there the objects of their rage, the excited pack had well-nigh ended this series of tragedies. The mangled remains of one of the criminals was dragged forth a lifeless corpse, and his associate, defending himself with a clubbed gun, had disabled half the number of his assailants when he in turn was overpowered, and but for the intervention of his pursuers must have suffered a like fate.

But the rescue proved ill-timed, in one sense at least, for no sooner had the ruffian been disengaged from his dilemma and lifted from the building, than a shot was heard from behind, and, bleeding from twenty wounds, he rolled lifeless on the sward.

Looking in the direction whence the report came, the hunters saw the form of the girl who, a little while ago, had engaged their attention as a pale and woe-begone Lucrece, now expanded into a Hebe, and, still unrevenged, levelling her smoking weapon at the form of the African.