An essay written during the Civil War that warns that slavery has concentrated power in the slave owners in the South - those who had been able to buy slaves and expand their business. Such power was destabilizing for society as a whole and should not be permitted following the war. "A numerous and independent yeomanry - that is to say , a large class of fairly schooled, intelligent, and respectable freeholders, of moderate, yet sufficient estate - spread over the country, with an honorable share in its government, constitutes one of the most important elements of a healthful state of a nation, and is wholly indispensable to a people whose type of government is that of substantial and orderly freedom..."
African American resources in the Lancaster County Historical Society.
Maj. Ellwood Griest (1824-1900) was born to a Quaker family just across the Octoraro Creek from Lancaster County in West Nottingham, Chester County. He learned blacksmithing, moved to Christiana, and became very active in Republican politics and abolitionism. The Lancaster Intelligencer even accused him during the 1860 election campaign of "figuring somewhat prominently" in the Christiana Riot, although I haven't seen evidence. Griest also served with the Union army as a Sixth Corps commissary officer (a Quaker compromise?), and stayed in the army until 1866 witnessing early Reconstruction in Florida. After the war, he ran a newspaper in Lancaster and stayed active in politics. Lancaster's 1920s skyscraper, the Griest Building, is named after Ellwood Griest's son, Congressman William Walton Griest. [from http://www.lancasteratwar.com/2011/09/john-and-mary-tale-of-south-eastern.html]
Contents
Chapters: THE OCTORARO / THE BROWNS AND THEIR NEIGHBORS / THE FRIENDS / A VISITOR / THE FUGITIVES / PASSING EVENTS / A FOOT-RACE / THE DESERTED HOUSE / THE HUNTERS AND THEIR PREY / FOILED / DOCTOR KING / TIME'S CHANGES / KU-KLUX / LOST AND FOUND / MOTHER AND SON / HOME AT LAST
Summary
From the preface: "The following story, originally written for the LANCASTER INQUIRER, is founded on facts that came within the personal knowledge of the writer. The characters described are all real ones, as will be attested by many of the older inhabitants, yet living in the region of country where the events described occurred. Belonging to a generation of people and a condition of society that are rapidly passing away, they cannot fail to excite an interest in the minds of those who, living under totally different influences, learn of them only through others. The narrative of John and Mary, or rather of Mary and her child, is founded strictly on facts, and resulted from a state of society that has passed away forever. Whatever faithfully describes the influences and results of the institution of slavery, must become more and more interesting to the present generation, and in the hope that this little volume will in a measure meet this growing want, the writer has consented to its publication in the present form. That some pleasure and profit may result to the reader from its perusal is the earnest desire of THE AUTHOR."
This story is a border tale of southern Pennyslvania, dealing with certain phases of the Civil War and the events immediately preceding it. The historic details are based on fact.
