“Kindness is wisdom. There is none in life but needs it and may learn.”

Shortly after my arrival in Louisville, Kentucky, true to the promise I made myself in Cleveland, I sent the Navigation Company the cash due them for my passage. I felt exceedingly happy that it could not be said of me that I had stolen my journey.

In Louisville, as in every other city of the Union I have visited, I found it very hard work to get employment. I found the white man working for the same wage as the black man, the black man working for just one-third of what he ought to have been paid. This is true all through the South. I found the white men greatly embittered against the black men and declaring that the negroes kept wages down by being willing to work for far less than the white workers. This was not true. The negroes were just as restless as the white men because of the small pay for labor. If the black workers were willing, or seemed willing, to work for less pay than the white workers, it was because they were forced to do so to keep from starving.

As the night came down I was forced to seek shelter at an Associated Charities lodging house, in front of which was an open surface sewer, so vile that it was nauseating, the disease-breeding odor penetrating the dormitory all through the night. I was met so gruffly that I felt as if I had offended someone by my application for shelter even though I was given to understand that I was expected to saw five barrels of wood for it. I asked for the privilege of washing my hands and face; for a sheet of paper and an envelope that I might write a letter home; for something to read, and a place to read it. All these little benefits, which meant just then so much to me and which cost nothing, were bluntly denied. I was told to go out in the rear yard among stacks of rubbish, where it was cold and damp, until the time arrived for offering the hospitality of the place. Before going to bed I was obliged to take a shower bath, which I thoroughly enjoyed, but which was spoiled by a small, dirty, rough towel to dry myself with. The bed, filthy, wretched and uncomfortable, I could scarcely have endured had I not been so bruised and weary.

The usual charity breakfast dope of water soup, water coffee, and coarse bread was given, for which I worked three hours. Edgeless tools made the work extremely difficult. Many of the men worked half a day for the night’s shelter. I would have enjoyed the exhilarating work on the wood for an hour if I had been given a breakfast. Any man would who was able, and who wanted to keep his self-respect. I left the place embittered. I felt that I had been robbed, as others did who were forced into it, but it was a shelter.

The needs of another night were near at hand, and I had a half-day left in which to look for work. I passed a fine restaurant where I noticed the windows needed polishing up a bit. I stepped inside and asked the privilege of cleaning them for a meal. My wish was granted. For my hour’s work I was given a delicious, wholesome meal and twenty-five cents besides. I felt like doing a great deal for myself and something for others. I was in luck.

After many trials I found work in a business place at five dollars per week and board, for seven days in the week. I was to begin the next morning. From exposure on the deck of the steamer I had contracted a severe cold which settled into neuralgia, and one of my teeth was aching beyond endurance. My twenty-five cents, which I was saving for a bed, I was now obliged to spend in having the distracting molar extracted. The first dentist to whom I described my pain and possessions, refused to pull the tooth for less than fifty cents, but the next man did it, and I was soon on the street feeling actually happy,—but my bed money was gone. I could not have returned to the Charity lodging house even if I had cared to, as I was obliged to be at work at seven in the morning. As it was now growing cold and dark, I was told by another “under-dog” of the Hope Rescue Mission. I followed his suggestion by going there. Entering, I registered my name, and discovered that my presence at the evening meeting was demanded before I was eligible for a bed. I attended the meeting and discovered that one must experience a change of heart before he is actually certain of shelter, for the leader of this heavenly mansion said in his address, “You fellers need not think you can come here and make a big spiel, and get a bed unless you mean what you say.” Immediately after the service of song and praise, we were shown to bed. The door of this “heavenly refuge” was locked at ten o’clock for the night, and going to bed at this hour was compulsory.

As we entered, the light, which was so dim that we could scarcely distinguish one cot from the other, and which hid the filth in which we were to rest, was in a moment turned out and all was darkness. Without undressing, I fell upon my bunk exhausted and was soon sound asleep, but at some unknown hour in the night I awakened. Notwithstanding my precaution in not undressing I realized that I was covered with vermin. The filthy odor of sewer gas pervaded the place and poisoned every breath of air we breathed. My first impulse was to get out of the place, but where would I go? To go out onto the street at this time of the night would probably mean arrest. I slid down from my bunk to the floor and forced myself to remain there until we were called at daylight.

All of these houses where a pretense is made of caring, perhaps, for “angels unawares,” are run with the greatest saving of expense. They usually have a number of physically weak dependents who volunteer their services for an existence. While we were lined up in a room next to the eating place, we had prayer. As all the guests did not feel inclined to kneel, one of the religious attaches who seemed to regard it a religious duty to uphold the spirit of the institution demanded,

“What is the matter with you fellows, can’t you kneel?”

This demand caused some back talk and probably would have ended in a rough house if at that moment the names of the worthy for breakfast had not been called. The breakfast consisted of luke-warm brown water, called coffee, and coarse bread, lacking in quality and quantity. A number of the men received nothing, and as we sat down before this prepared infusion of warm water, one of the volunteers looked straight at me and angrily said,

“Say, can’t you ask the blessing?”

Before I could, with resentment, ask what for, a man opposite looked at the fellow and said: “Gwan, I’ll put a lump on your thinker in a minute. Can’t you see this feller ain’t no mission stiff?”

It was now six o’clock. I had just one hour before going to work. I realized that the annoyances I had contracted at this Rescue Hope Mission, which each moment seemed to increase with startling force and demand immediate action, must be gotten rid of. There was but one way open and that was the river. While hurriedly going there, I searched for some sort of vessel adequate to “boil up” with. Luckily I found a five gallon Standard Oil can, and reaching a secluded spot with available waste at hand for a fire, I hastily “boiled up.” I also took a bath in the icy waters of the Ohio. Using my jeans for underclothing, and rolling in a bundle my now-purified wet garments, which in the rear of the business house where I had been engaged I hung on some boxes to dry, I entered, serene and smiling and started to work just as the clock struck seven.

After working twelve long hours, which included time to eat two meals, I asked the manager if he would kindly advance me the seventy-one cents due for my day’s work.

“No, it is impossible,” he said. “It is not our custom. We pay only when the week’s work is done. If you have no place to sleep that is your affair, not ours.”

The reason the employer will not pay by the day is the same here as elsewhere,—because all working men are regarded as drinkers and they are fearful of losing the worker. I realized that I could not work without rest. Louisville offered such a privilege to no one without money, although I had become one of her army of toilers.

I strolled down to the river thinking of my objective point, the government works below Memphis, which would afford me both shelter and food. I decided to reach there as soon as possible. The steamer, Lucille Knowland, running between Louisville and Evansville, was then loading freight and was scheduled to leave the next day at two P. M. Approaching a pompous, uniformed officer I asked if there was an opportunity for a man to work his way to Evansville. “I don’t know,” he replied, “Ask the cook.” I left at once for the kitchen where I found a large, robust colored man,—the man I was looking for. In reply to my inquiry for the privilege of working my passage he kindly answered, “I think so, Jack. Come around at one o’clock to-morrow and see me.”

Going up the street I met another unlucky, a young man twenty-five years of age, a cabinet finisher by trade. We exchanged stories of woe, and unconsciously entered into a partnership of ideas for a resting place that night. While we sat on the stringer of a coal chute, a poor unfortunate victim of alcohol came drifting near. Overhearing our plans, he stopped and told us of a barber who was down and out when he first came to Louisville, and that he never refused an honest, homeless man the privilege of sleeping in a room in the rear of his shop. We followed the dissipated fellow’s advice. After asking the barber for a night’s resting place, he showed us the room. There were only a few old quilts on the floor, to be sure, but the place was very clean and a good shelter. When we awoke the next morning, the first words with which my companion greeted me were, “When I dropped to sleep last night, I almost wished I would never wake up. To-day is as yesterday,—the same uncertain struggle.” Then he whistled a little and hopefully said, “But I may get work to-day.”

We parted, and I never saw him again. I left for my place of work. At one o’clock sharp I was on hand at the kitchen on the Lucille Knowland. The big cook took me and I was soon busily preparing vegetables for my passage.

My day and a half of work I donated to the establishment I had just left. I have thought of writing them that they might use it as an advancement to some homeless man for a place to sleep for a week until he could draw his five dollars for seven days’ work twelve hours a day.

Just before the boat left, a negro boy, the second cook, appeared on the scene and I discovered that John Ray (that was the head cook’s name) was not taking me because he needed me, but simply because he wanted to help me. When night came he spoke to one of the officers who gave me as fine a state room as there was in the officers’ cabin. I fell asleep, but at midnight I was suddenly awakened by a black face thrust in at the door and a voice excitedly crying, “Get up! The boat is on fire!” In another instant I was out. I saw the darkies, with trousers in one hand and shoes in the other, scared speechless, skidding to the fore part of the boat. There was a fire down in the hold, but it was quickly extinguished without disturbing a passenger, and we of the crew were simply called to fight fire if necessary. I returned to my berth. It was the first time for many a night that I had enjoyed the comforts of a bed. I slept unruffled and refreshingly until morning.

The second morning we were in Evansville, and as I left John Ray I took him by the hand and said, “John Ray, if I ever get to Heaven I will surely find you there, for Heaven is made up of hearts like yours!”

In Evansville I got work with the hope of being able to save my railroad fare to Memphis but the pay was so meager I could scarcely exist. On the return of the man whose place I was temporarily filling, I found myself, one Sunday the last of October, almost broke and a long way from Memphis. As I was walking that day I met a young carpenter standing on a corner with all he possessed on this earth in a suitcase, and moneyless. He told me briefly his situation. He was married,—had a beautiful wife and a little golden-haired baby girl. But his wife—Ah, well, why go into details! Circumstances made a tramp of him. That was enough. It was the old story of poverty, fatal to the American home. He was unable to get work in Evansville and was going on to Birmingham, Alabama, where he was sure of employment. He had spent the past night in an office chair, with the permission of the night clerk of a hotel. Several times he had dropped asleep and been awakened (although he was not on the street) by the police with insulting inquiries. I discovered that we were of the same mind in many things. He did not want to beat or steal from the railroad by riding a blind or a box car. Both of us wanted to work our way, if possible. He decided to peddle or pawn his suit case and clothes. Not being able to sell them, he was obliged to let a second-hand dealer have them for two dollars. Their value was fully thirty-five.

We were directed two miles out of town to a place called Howe, where we might be able to catch a local freight, but we were disappointed in an opportunity to work for our passage. There was the great Ohio river, spanned by a ponderous iron bridge, miles long, which must be crossed, and as no one was allowed to walk this bridge, our only alternative was to steal a ride. Many trains passing through Howe were obliged to slow up and soon we were safely ensconced in a side-door Pullman and swinging far out on the mighty trestle of iron which arched the stream. I had broken my contract. We soon discovered that we were in a car which had been in a wreck and was probably on its way to the shops. The ponderous sides and great heavy roof were held up and in place temporarily by two-by-fours. After we crossed the bridge, the train seemingly attained a never-ending mile-a-minute speed, over cross roads, switches and springing piles. The roof and sides of the huge car would bend down and groan and tremble and swerve. We were positive that the next instant we would be crushed to death, from which there seemed absolutely no retreat. To have leaped from the fast-moving train among the rocks which lined the right of way, would have been fatal. So having nothing else to hang to, we hung to each other. This was the only available car. A submarine boat or an aeroplane was a life preserver compared to our vehicle. But a shrill, sharp whistle, coming at that time, was music. We were actually stopping. The train pulled out and left us at a water-tank, happy in our release. We might have been in Kansas for all we knew, but looking up and across the fields we saw a big house with a huge sign, “Whiskey Distillery.” We knew we were still in Kentucky.

A track man told us all trains stopped there, which was encouraging. It was now late in the day and there would be no more trains until morning. The track man told us of an inn not far away. We went there and spent the night.

The next morning we found ourselves waiting at the track, broke, except that I had a nickel and the carpenter a dime. Soon a train swung into sight, and not having time to ask permission to work our way, we quickly boarded an empty gondola. It was a mixed train and we discovered that it was a freight which was very late. Immediately at the first station, we did not wait for the train crew to hunt us out and probably shovel us off, but leaping out, we ran ahead. Scarcely before either the crew or ourselves knew it, we were helping to carry sacks of oats, and what not, from a car into the station. The conductor looked at us curiously. When the work at that point was done, he said, “Come on back, boys, and ride in the caboose. No use of you fellers sitting out there in the cold.” When dinner time came, the train crew shared with us their dinners, and so we worked along with hand and heart, laughing and singing, until ten o’clock found us in Princeton, Kentucky.

While sitting in the depot, with no place to sleep, one of the station employees, kindly inclined and suspecting our position, said, “Boys, if you think of trying to spend the night here you had better not try it, for you are liable to be picked up. They arrested a bunch of out-of-work men here just the other night.” We then crept up into the railroad yards, to a cheap, all-night lunch place where the owner kindly allowed us to lie down in a dark corner until morning. Then my pal decided to take another and a quicker route to Birmingham than the one I had planned, which was to go by way of Paducah. So we separated, he to find his desired train, I to find mine. I was told by a switchman that by walking out about a mile to the signal-tower I could catch a freight. What I did catch was a ponderous coal train, and mounting a gondola which was loaded with fine nut coal heaped up very high in the center, I was soon off.

Custom had not filled me, as yet, with courage sufficient to ride the bumpers between the cars where the slightest accident meant instant death. I crawled on top of the coal and into a small vacuum in one corner which was caused by heaping the coal high in the center. I felt very comfortably fixed and everything worked smoothly up the long steep grade we were climbing until we began to descend. When we commenced plunging like a cyclone through woods and fields, down hills and hollows, I saw that the coal was fast shifting down, seeking its level and crowding me out of my pocket. I finally reached a point where I was hanging on to the corner of the car by my fingers and toes and feeling every moment that I would be dashed to the earth, for my strength was almost gone. Then we began to slow down.

When we reached the end of a thirty-mile run we stopped for water. I had about decided to walk to Memphis, but just then an old darkey came along with a span of mules hitched to the running gears of a wagon, who was going five miles on my way. I asked could I ride. “Sho’ nuff, sho’ nuff,” was the answer, and we were soon astride the reach, exchanging black and white thoughts. Everything was serenely pleasant. The old darkey had just been praising his mules for the virtue of being reliable when an automobile hove into sight, coming directly toward us. Those mules jumped straight up in the air, plunged past the automobile, and with the swiftness of a scared wolf ran down the road to the first turn to the right, which they took in spite of the old darkey. In turning they tipped the skeleton of the wagon to such a degree that we were both spilled by the roadside. Luckily the earth was deep and soft, and we escaped injury except a few bruises, but it was a sudden parting of the ways. I caught a last glimpse of the old negro at the brow of the hill, on the run after the mules, just as I reached the railroad track, quite content to try walking again for awhile.

I kept near to my beaten path, the railroad, and was told that five miles beyond was a point where all trains stopped. I discovered I could not walk much further. I was lame and sore and my shoes were worn out. I had now become, in the eyes of both the railroad and myself, a hardened criminal and could steal a ride without self-imputation. After walking what seemed to me a very long way I found myself exhausted. Having eaten nothing since the noon before, that which I had then being given me from the dinner pail of the railroad man, I felt the need of food. Seeing a large Kentucky farm house crowning a hill not far away, I approached it.

Sitting on the wide piazza, in struggling rays of sunlight which played through golden autumn leaves and vines festooned with an aftermath of purple blossoms, sat an elderly gentleman whose very mien seemed bubbling over with good nature. Beside him sat his motherly-looking wife.

“Will you give me the privilege of working for something to eat?” I asked.

“Ma, can you give this hungry man something to eat?” But Ma was already up and half way to the kitchen. They gave me all I could eat and a nicely tied-up lunch, as they said, “for a time of need.” When I had eaten I asked,

“Now what can I do for you?”

“I have nothing for you to do. You are very welcome. We are always glad to help a tired man. No one is ever turned away from the door of old Colonel Chandler’s.” Then, in response to a question of mine, he replied, “No; Ma, there, is the Christian side of the house. With me it is just a spiritual law, I guess.”I caught a train of empty flat stone cars. Lying prone on one of these I rode five miles. We stopped. It was the terminal for that train, and a stopping place for all trains. I waited. In a short time another freight pulled in. From an empty box car came a familiar voice, “Hello!”

I sought the voice and found it was my pal, the carpenter, who had not succeeded in going his way and so had decided to come mine. He was famished from hunger. The lunch from Colonel Chandler’s was already needed to raise a man from the dust. “The time of need” had come. The night was upon us, and we were yet twenty-two miles from Paducah. We were suffering intensely from the cold, and while we waited for a relief train we built a fire by the track. No sooner had we done so than from out of the darkness somewhere we were joined by three other destitute men, bound our way.

Immediately a train came in sight. It was made up mostly of oil tanks and the only possible way to ride, except on the rods and brake beams, was to lie flat down under one of the huge oil tanks and hang on. But it had rained somewhere and the rain had frozen as it fell. The train was covered with ice. The three other men took the advantage offered, regardless of all danger, but my pal and I, both novices, had not the courage, and as one of the men swung on, cognizant of our fear, he called out, “Oh, come on. You can’t beat a train and be an old woman.”

I began to realize the physical courage necessary in the make-up and character of the man obliged to work and wander, to beat a railroad, braving dangers which from 1901 to 1905, inclusive, killed twenty-three thousand, nine hundred trespassers, and injured twenty-five thousand, two hundred and thirty-six, and each year shows no decrease. In this wonderful example of physical courage in these migratory workers, worthy of our deepest concern, we cannot help but catch the spirit of a greater courage in other workingmen—of one who freed four million slaves; of one who, nearly two thousand years ago, dared to enter the temple and cast out the thieves and the money-changers.

We had not long to wait. A moment later my companion and I were hidden in a box car of a following train. After an hour’s ride in the darkness, we found ourselves seeking in a strange city (Paducah, Kentucky), a place of rest. As we passed through the yards we saw a policeman striking matches or throwing bulls’ eyes into empty cars, looking for such men as we were.

Aimlessly we wandered into the city. Just as the clock in the city hall tower was striking the hour of nine, we passed a window on which was lettered, “Charity Club Rest Room.” The name looked good to us and we went in. A pleasant woman in charge told us she could not do anything then, but gave us a note to the police station, telling us that Captain Doran had a few beds for homeless men, and that we might also try the Salvation Army, telling us how to find it. We felt that it would be preferable to the jail, and after another two-mile walk we found the Army headquarters. We shouted, called, whistled, and even rattled the doors, but no response. That cry in the night was a familiar one to them. It had become common and the bruised in Paducah could go elsewhere—so far as they were concerned. Retracing our steps, we sought Police Headquarters. There was no other way. Our little note from the Charity Rest Room engendered a feeling of security, and we felt that, though helpless, we would not be committed to prison and the chain gang. The captain had no beds, but we were told to go into the police court room and lie on the benches. Broken, famished, exhausted, we lay down on the three-slat benches and were soon lost in a profound slumber from which we were only once disturbed when the chief of city detectives came in and turned on the lights, exercising what we supposed was his prerogative, and obliged us to tell him our pedigrees from Adam down. But we, undoubtedly, looked all right to him, for we were left to our rest until the sweepers came at five o’clock. The slats were cutting and hard. I awoke several times and in my wakeful moments heard the carpenter murmur the name of a little golden-haired baby girl, away up in a northern Indiana home. We left, unmolested. My pal was staked to a breakfast by a brother craftsman and told where he could find work in a nearby town. I cut wood for a good woman for half an hour with a stone hammer, for one of the best breakfasts cooked that morning in Paducah. She was the wife of a man who was employed in the railroad shops. Here the carpenter and I parted, not to meet again. He never learned my identity.

I preferred river travel, if possible, and applied to the steamer Dick Fowler for the privilege of working my way to Cairo, but was emphatically refused. The boat was due to leave. Deck fare was seventy-five cents, which I did not have. But I noticed a man,—apparently a business man of Paducah, who wore a fraternity badge of an order to which I belonged, in conference with the Captain. I showed my color in good standing and asked the loan of seventy-five cents. He gave me a dollar. Again I had broken my contract,—at least I had begged a loan.

Reaching Cairo, I walked a mile to a point where without difficulty I could catch a freight on the I. C., bound south. But this freight train ran no farther than Fulton, a town a hundred and forty miles from Memphis. It was nine o’clock when I reached there, and was exceptionally cold for that time of the year. I still had the remaining quarter of my dollar. Although the demands of hunger were strong and I was so broken for rest, I decided in favor of a bed. I was told where I could find one for that price. It was a clean, comfortable, soft bed. In an instant I was lost in deep slumber and my aches and pains were being cured, my cares forgotten. Work even for breakfast was not to be had in Fulton, at least in all the places I had tried. I perhaps could stand it until reaching Memphis if I could get away quickly. Going out to a point where all trains would slow up, I found two negroes, waiting with the same object in view. Seated on the ground by a camp fire they were actually eating breakfast, consisting of some late corn, pretty old and tough, yet full of milk, which they had plucked from a nearby field and roasted on the bright coals. The moment I joined them, one inquired,

“Yo’all had breakfast?”

To my negative answer, he said, “Hep yo’sef, man.” They had salt, and there and at that time it was the most refreshing green corn ever roasted. It satisfied me. I was ready to continue the battle.

The weather grew colder. It began to spit snow. Presently a mixed freight train hove in sight and my black friends made a dash for the forward cars. I chose what seemed to be an empty gondola about midway of the train, but it proved to be about two-thirds full of Portland cement. After the train started the brakeman came back over the train and seeing me, asked, “Where are you going?”

“To Memphis.”

“Got any money?”

“No.”

“Well, you’ll have to see the flagman then.”

“All right, at the first stop.”

“No, you will have to do it now.”

“I am not used to walking mixed freight trains in motion. I can’t do it.”

“Yes, you can too.”

“You go to the devil.”

He passed on. I would not have run that train for ten thousand dollars. When we got full under way, I almost wished I had tried to do so for the ever-increasing wind caught the cement and hurled it into clouds of dust which enveloped me in a dense, fine powder, filling my eyes, nose, mouth and ears. Several times I was positive my respiration had ceased. It was with no small degree of joy, therefore, that I hailed the first stop. Whooping, coughing, sneezing, I got out of there and crept into an empty box car a little farther back. I congratulated myself on this shelter and good luck, when the flagman, who was on the lookout for me, stuck his head in the door saying, “Hello, old timer. Where are you going?” I thought I was a novice, and here I was being hailed as an old timer. My head swelled as big as a Superintendent of the Pullman Company.

“I am going to Memphis if God and this traincrew will let me.”

“Have you any money?”

“No.”

“Have you a card?”

“No.”

“Well, you can’t ride this train.”

The train was moving. “Let me ride to the next stop.”

“Well, if you do, you will get off in the woods.”

Half believing he meant it I leaped from the train. I did not have long to wait, for very soon another mixed train came thundering along. As it slacked up, the only advantage offered was another of the Standard Oil tank cars. However, it was not covered with ice. I crawled in under the huge tank, lay flat down on my belly, and hung on to the rods. As yet I had only made about twelve miles. As we sped on, I felt relieved that we were cutting down the miles. At the first stop, a voice greeted me.

“Hello.” It was one of my negro friends. He also had been ditched from the first train and had caught this one. His black pal was lost in the scuffle somewhere, and we did not see him again. Just as the negro spoke to me the conductor and brakeman came rushing up to the car. Just ahead of our tank car, was a carload of valuable horses. After looking them over, as they turned to go back, the conductor spied us, and with stress, shaded with oratory of brilliant hue, he ordered us off. Because the train was moving, however, he did not wait to see if we obeyed.

At the next stop, I leaped from my position and began looking over the horses. Three of them were down. I immediately ran to the side of the right of way and getting a long reed began to prod them up. The darkey, seeing the crew coming, hid on the opposite side of the train. The conductor coming up said, “That’s right. I wish you would keep your eye on those horses into Memphis,” and I knew I was secure for a ride.

“Where is that nigger?” asked the conductor with emphasis.

“I don’t know,” was all I said. But I did know that he would be on the train as soon as it started, and he was. At the next stop, I said to him, “Get a rod and help me with the horses.” This he did. There were four of them down, but before the conductor could get to us, we had them all up. He saw us at work and called from two car-lengths away,

“Are they all right, boys?”

“All right,” we answered back. It was “boys” now, and I knew that the black, too, was safe.

At nine o’clock, having been joined by three more white men, we finally rolled into Memphis.