[n.b. - page numbers refer to printed text. Available at https://archive.org/details/blackmansburden0000will ] CHAPTER XIII Our work and influence were increasing every year, and in our present quarters we were beginning to feel cramped in many ways. Mr. Ferguson, president of the Bank of Utica and treasurer of our Board of Trustees, opened up negotiations with a wealthy white planter who owned a plantation five miles south of the town, consist- ing of 1,500 acres,—property that was to be bought for about fifteen dollars an acre. It was improved land and contained some of the best soil in that section. Just as the trade was almost settled it became noised about that some of the white people living in that immediate neigh- borhood began to feel that the school was better off where it was, and that it might prove a bad addition to their side of the village. About that time I received through the mail an ultimatum signed by possibly one hundred and fifty white men, not one of whom I knew. The ulti- matum, short and to the point, was as follows: “W.H. Hoitzcraw, Utica, Miss.: “We, the undersigned, demand that you do not build a school or college near this community.” As no addresses were given, I could make no reply. Inasmuch as the trade had been practically completed, 160 THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN with the exception of paying the money, I had a meeting of my local board to see what should be done. When I read the ultimatum to them they stampeded, and of the nine seven voted to call off the trade. I had always been guided largely by what they said, but in this case I be- lieved that they were wrong. However, I meant to go slowly. I consulted Mr. Ferguson and my other white friends, and they suggested that I should go and see some of the men that had signed the ultimatum. I called on one or two of them,—those that I thought were the leaders,—and asked them what were their objections to our having the land. They said the plantation was so situated that they thought that if the present owner was going to get rid of it, they ought to have it themselves; and that they had determined to buy it. In deference to their wishes, I agreed that if they wished to buy it, I would have nothing more to do with it. They were getting together for the purpose of pur- chasing it, but before they could make their arrange- ments the financial panic of 1906 came on and they aban- doned the idea of buying the plantation. The way then seemed clear for me to purchase the place, and the owner was urging the trade with all his might. I did not have sufficient money at the time to make the purchase, but my friend, Mr. Ferguson, president of the bank of the town, had agreed to furnish me any amount of money necessary to secure the property, at reasonable interest. But the purchase money, including the appar- atus to be bought with the plantation, amounted to about $25,000, while I had only a few thousand dollars, which friends had contributed for the other trade that had THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN 161 failed, and which they had allowed me to hold, pending some solution of the land problem. Meantime, although many of the white people who lived only a mile away from the plantation had assured me that as they did not care to buy under the present financial conditions they were perfectly willing that I should buy, the colored people throughout the community had worked themselves up to a high pitch of excitement. They declared that the white people would never allow us to buy that plantation. But the white men on the local Board of Trustees were ready to accept the responsibility, and were urging me to go forward. This was a case, however, where I felt it necessary to go slowly, as my white friends all advised me to do. Five of the colored trustees owned land by this time, and had it paid for. In order to borrow sufficient money from the bank to carry out the purchase, we thought that it might be necessary to give some kind of security, so that loyal band of Trustees, finally convinced that I was going forward, agreed in one of our meetings that each man should mortgage his plantation. I shall never forget the enthusiasm with which they made their offers. I carefully explained to them that if I should fail ultimately to raise the money necessary to finish paying for the plantation, each of them would lose his property and would again be at the bottom. But their faith never wavered. ‘They still pleaded for the opportunity to mort- gage their little plantations and homes that the trade might be put through. Iyeported this to the bank, which promptly refused to accept the collateral, agreeing to let me have the money all the same. 162 THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN Among those earnest farmer-trustees was one, Harri- son Flanders, who owned a little plantation very near the edge of town. He had several sons to be educated and was eager for the school to be properly established. So eager was he that he offered, if we could not get more land, to sell us half of his own little plantation, to be added to the little that we already had and in this way make room for the growing school. Everybody felt that this was so supreme a sacrifice that none of us could afford to accept it, even though he urged it with all his heart. Excitement in regard to the purchase of the plantation ran high, and meetings were being held among the col- ored people in which they thoroughly discussed the matter and appointed committees to warn me not to go forward with the purchase. It is difficult for one not acquainted with the situation to understand the state of panic that possessed the colored people at this time. All the day before the time for concluding the bargain my friends called upon me and urged me not to go down to the plantation the next day, saying that if I did so the chances were that I should never get back alive. To save me, I could not conscientiously share their feeling in the matter. On the morning of the day when I was to go down and finish the trade and make the first payment, while I was at the breakfast table, a Negro man came down the pub- lic road on horseback, at full speed, jumped off at my gate, and ran in, without taking time to hitch his horse. He said he had something to tell me, and that he did not want to tell it in the presence of my wife. I urged him to sit THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN 163 down at the table and say what he had to say, as I pre- ferred for my wife to hear anything he had to tell. I had guessed what was on his mind. He said that he had been asked by one of my white friends to come and warn me not to go down that road that afternoon; that if I did so, they believed my life would be in danger. The good man was greatly frightened and was panting like an overheated ox. My wife dropped her knife and fork and turned pale,—that is, as pale as she could. I thanked the man for his kindness, and refused to discuss the matter any further. He left, and I went to my office as usual, transacted a day’s work, and at half-past four got astride my little pony and made off to the plantation to complete the trade, while my wife stood on the veranda and watched me out of sight. I did not return until ten o’clock that night, and she tells me those hours were some of the most anxious of her whole life. Every person that passed along the road she expected to be someone riding up to tell her that I had been assassinated. I had to go to the plantation alone. No man, not even the old reliable trustees, would agree to accompany me. My teachers, mostly women, were all afraid. Several of them had packed their trunks and were ready to go home, and one had actually bought a ticket. When I reached the plantation the man was there ready to close the trade, and many of the white people that the Negroes thought were ready to do violence to me were only there to see that their neighbor, who was selling his plantation, came through all right. They greeted me pleasantly. Indeed, I have never met men who were more gentlemanly than 164 THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN they were. Not one sign of ill-will did I see. When the trade was finished I returned home alone. My friends were greatly surprised when I told them the next day that I did not even have a pocketknife with me. They thought surely I would have armed myself. The bank promptly paid the money, lending me $10,000 on my per- sonal note,—the same bank that five years before had refused, and with good reason, because they did not know me, to lend me $300 to purchase forty acres. The task now before us was to pay for that land and move over onto it the few temporary structures that we had built at the original site. Therefore I left the school in charge of Mr. D. W. L. Davis, Superintendent of In- dustries, my most trusted lieutenant, and made a cam- paign for funds. From September to the 23d of December I worked in various states as I had never done before. On December 23d I returned, lacking seventeen thousand dollars, in spite of the fact that the twenty-five thousand dollars was to be paid December 26. I think the bankers themselves began to feel a little uneasy, and perhaps began to doubt my ability to raise the money in time. The night I reached home I was so worn out that I was unable to get about and was confined to my room. About eleven o’clock that night the president and the cashier of the bank called on me to see how I had succeeded on my money-raising trip. When I told them that I still Jacked $17,000 of having sufficient money I was surprised that they showed no signs of displeasure, but rather seemed to be pleased that I had got together $8,000, and after a short conversation they assured me that if the $25,000 THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN 165 was not ready at the proper time, I need not be uneasy: the bank would carry it as long as I desired. I could not feel quite discouraged, though I must con- fess I was almost disheartened at this time, but the atti- tude of the bankers strengthened me, and I telegraphed to some of the subscribers asking if, under the circum- stances, they would not allow us the use of their pledges, even if I had not quite met the conditions. On Christmas Day, at eight o’clock in the morning, I received a message from one of the subscribers in which he said he did not care to change the original plans. Two hours later I received another telegram from him in which he said he had changed his mind, and that he was mailing a check for the amount of his pledge. Then I began to feel encouraged. Twenty minutes later I re- ceived another telegram from a lady in Boston who said that although she was on her sick bed, from which she never expected to rise (she was 96 years old), she was writing me perhaps the last check she would ever write, —for five hundred dollars,—and that I might expect it in due time. My dejected spirits were now rising by leaps and bounds. Two hours later a fourth telegram came, this time from Mrs. Leavitt, saying she had been notified that a legacy had been left as an endowment,—to be used in the purchase of the land. I now needed but fifteen hundred dollars more. I called the teachers and students together in the chapel and told them the situation, whereupon the teachers rose in a body and said they would contribute one month’s sal- ary each toward the balance. The students ran to their 166 THE BLACK MAN’S BURDEN rooms, got out their Christmas money, which consisted of about twenty-five cents apiece, and contributed from one to five cents each. Our assistant treasurer, Mr. Smith, counted it all up and found that still about thir- teen hundred dollars was needed. The mail came then, and I went down to open it. There was that thirteen hundred, contributed by several dozen different individuals, with a few dollars over. So I was ready to “take Christmas,’ even though mine lasted only one-fourth of a day.