So eloquent.... So on point!
Thanks for sharing.

On 1/31/12 4:20 PM, "Harris, Yvette R. Dr." <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>Wow....
>
>
>
>Yvette R Harris, PhD
>Associate Professor of Psychology
>Department of Psychology
>210 Psychology Building
>Miami University
>Oxford, Ohio 45056
>513-529-2009
>________________________________________
>From: The Drum: A Community of Scholars [[log in to unmask]] On
>Behalf Of Othello Harris [[log in to unmask]]
>Sent: Tuesday, January 31, 2012 1:31 PM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: [THEDRUM] To my Old Master..a word for today
>
>Wow!  This is stunning. Old Jourdan's letter brought tears to my eyes!!!
>
>Sent from my iPhone
>
>On Jan 31, 2012, at 12:48 PM, "Coates, Rodney D. Dr."
><[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
>
>Monday, 30 January 2012
>To My Old 
>Master<http://www.lettersofnote.com/2012/01/to-my-old-master.html>
><image001.jpg>
>
>In August of 1865, a Colonel P.H. Anderson of Big Spring, Tennessee,
>wrote to his former slave, Jourdan Anderson, and requested that he come
>back to work on his farm. Jourdan ‹ who, since being
>emancipated<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation>, had
>moved to Ohio, found paid work, and was now supporting his family ‹
>responded spectacularly by way of the letter seen below (a letter which,
>according to newspapers at the
>time<http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7035/6790780585_466117fe88_o.jpg>, he
>dictated).
>
>Rather than quote the numerous highlights in this letter, I'll simply
>leave you to enjoy it. Do make sure you read to the end.
>
>(Source: The Freedmen's
>Book<http://www.gutenberg.org/files/38479/38479-h/38479-h.htm#Page_265>;
>Image: A group of escaped slaves in Virginia in 1862, courtesy of the
>Library of Congress<http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/cwp2003000055/PP/>.)
>Dayton, Ohio,
>
>August 7, 1865
>
>To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee
>
>Sir: I got your letter, and was glad to find that you had not forgotten
>Jourdon, and that you wanted me to come back and live with you again,
>promising to do better for me than anybody else can. I have often felt
>uneasy about you. I thought the Yankees would have hung you long before
>this, for harboring Rebs they found at your house. I suppose they never
>heard about your going to Colonel Martin's to kill the Union soldier that
>was left by his company in their stable. Although you shot at me twice
>before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad
>you are still living. It would do me good to go back to the dear old home
>again, and see Miss Mary and Miss Martha and Allen, Esther, Green, and
>Lee. Give my love to them all, and tell them I hope we will meet in the
>better world, if not in this. I would have gone back to see you all when
>I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me
>that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance.
>
>I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give
>me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month,
>with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home for Mandy,‹the folks
>call her Mrs. Anderson,‹and the children‹Milly, Jane, and Grundy‹go to
>school and are learning well. The teacher says Grundy has a head for a
>preacher. They go to Sunday school, and Mandy and me attend church
>regularly. We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying,
>"Them colored people were slaves" down in Tennessee. The children feel
>hurt when they hear such remarks; but I tell them it was no disgrace in
>Tennessee to belong to Colonel Anderson. Many darkeys would have been
>proud, as I used to be, to call you master. Now if you will write and say
>what wages you will give me, I will be better able to decide whether it
>would be to my advantage to move back again.
>
>As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained
>on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the
>Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville. Mandy says she
>would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to
>treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity
>by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you. This will
>make us forget and forgive old scores, and rely on your justice and
>friendship in the future. I served you faithfully for thirty-two years,
>and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two
>dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand
>six hundred and eighty dollars. Add to this the interest for the time our
>wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and
>three doctor's visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the
>balance will show what we are in justice entitled to. Please send the
>money by Adams's Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If
>you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little
>faith in your promises in the future. We trust the good Maker has opened
>your eyes to the wrongs which you and your fathers have done to me and my
>fathers, in making us toil for you for generations without recompense.
>Here I draw my wages every Saturday night; but in Tennessee there was
>never any pay-day for the negroes any more than for the horses and cows.
>Surely there will be a day of reckoning for those who defraud the laborer
>of his hire.
>
>In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for
>my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up, and both good-looking girls. You
>know how it was with poor Matilda and Catherine. I would rather stay here
>and starve‹and die, if it come to that‹than have my girls brought to
>shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. You will
>also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored
>children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give
>my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits.
>
>Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you
>when you were shooting at me.
>
>From your old servant,
>
>Jourdon Anderson.
><image002.gif><http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=47011664414702245
>25&postID=2145951744727257326&from=pencil>
>
>
>For more of my work please check me out at -
>http://redroom.com/member/rodney-d-coates
>
>
>
>
>
>The song that lies silent in the heart of a mother sings upon the lips of
>her child..
>Kahlil Gibran
>
>
><image003.jpg>
>
>Rodney D. Coates
>Professor and Interim Director of Black World Studies