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T. SHVFTEW.
Jr (htth/u of the Oration dt/iveredty Chaplain Henry M Twrner,
* Baptist Church, M January Ist, 1866, being the
Celebration of the First Anniversary of Freedom. B
and Ladies, or Fellow Citiiens, I should haws saidj we
hare assembled today under circumstances, unlike those of any other
day in the history of our lives. We have met for the purpose of cele-
this, the first day of the New Year, not because it is the first
; New Year's day we ever f*w, but because it is the first one We ever
enjoyed. 01 how different this day from similar days of the past.
The first day of January hitherto, was one of gloom and fearful sus
pense The foundation of our social comforts hung upon the scales of.
apgfirriiension, and fate with its decisions of weal or wo looked every i
one of us in the face, and dread forebodings kept in dubius agitation,
every fleeting moment that passed. But to-day we stand upon no
such sandy foundation. Uncertainty is no more the basis of our ex
istence ; we have for our fulcrum the eternal principles of right and
equity.
Associated with the first day of January are peculiar interests,
which in their accomodation to the world of colored men, will hereafter
enshrine it in their affections with a deathless sacredness, foreveraud
ever. This day which hitherto seperated so many families, and tear
wet so many faces -heaved so many hearts, and, filled the air. with so
many groans and sighs; this of all others the most bitter. day of the,
year to our poor miserable jace, shall henceforth and forever be filled
with acclamations of the wildsi joy, and expressions of ecstacy too
numerous for augelib pens to note. Before this day, all other days
will dwindle fotp insignificance with us, and the glory that shall en
viron it, Will, compared with which, make hazy 7b appearance all other
days God’s day exempted. It has been the custom of men in all ages
to celebrate certain days in commemoration of certain achievements
or national transactions. A few out of the many which are observed in
some manner; are days which hold universal claim upon the obser
vance of slimeo, and among them we may mention the Sabbath, and
Christmas. True, the observance of those two heaven consecrated
days, follow only in the wake of religious civilization, while all nations
civilized or pagans, have their regular anniversaries, be the cause of
the observance, fictitious or real. But reverting to the customs of
civilized nations, we will only name a few. The Sabbath day
demands our attention first of all, in noticing those reckoned in the
sacred catalogue. This day was hallowed and set apart by God him*
self, to f be observed by all the inhabitants of the earth as a day of rest
and of gratitude to God for the marvelous act which his Almighty
fiat performed, in standing out upon the unfathomable abyss of an
eternal nonentity, and decorating the dismal caverns of old chaos with
burning solars and rolling worlds. This act of Almighty greatness
‘and wisdom, at first called forth the undying praises of the skies, and
God perpetuated its sanctity on earth by hallowing the day of its final
completion. That day remained sacred in the hearts of mankind for t
four thousand years. At the end of which time, God clothed his Sod,
—the brightest jewel that glittered in the courts of Heaven—in the garb
of humanity, and He 16ft that throne for a while, which had not been
vacated since the morn of eternity, and came to .earth with bis etern
al attributes circumbounded by flesh and blood, indureda miserable
life; died ah ignominious death: robed death, hell, and the eraye of
their visionary trophies; and fin tfieWsF* day oF the week rose from
the dead to the joy of earth and ecstacy of Heaven, and changed the
sanctity of the day by virtue of the greater feat performed, from the
seventh to the first day of the week, and for over eighteen hundred
years, Christians of every tongue and every clime have kept it as a
day of gratitude to Heaven for the triumphs of Emmanuel. This
day above all others, holds the first claim upon all men irrespective
of class or condition, a day upon which is stamped fadeless perpetu
ity.
2d. The next day which was important in the history of the civil
ized world was the first day of the year of Jubilee. Theologians
have differed it is true, as to whether the claims of the jubilee were
national or universal, whether its special bearings contemplated only
the house of Israel, or religious humanity at large. However, on the
day of its arrival, the blast of the trumpet and the blow of the rams
horn, sent a thrill of universal joy among all the people, which was
peculiarly intensified by the shouts of the bondman and the insolvent,
because it was the day of the release of the former, and restoration of
the property of the latter.
id. Christmas, the day on which the birth of Christ is celebrated
and his nativity recognized has also been observed for many centuries,
since the reign of Dioclesian up to the present, if not before. Chris*
tian people and Christian nations every where have made it a day of
special honor, nevertheless, thousands regard it as a day of desecra
tion and festive revelry others run wild with drunkness, and
honor it with bacchanalian retorts. They treat the birth day of Jesus
with solemn contempt, and hundreds of church members regard it as
a day to shake hands with sin, and compromise with crime.
4th. For the sake of brevity, we will only notice one or two more
days which have been honored for certain events that have changed
the order of things in the nations history. For ages Catholicism had
been the prevailing religion in England, but in consequence of some
small opposition in the executive circles of the Government, Catesby
and some other disappointed and desperate hearted Catholics, planned
a scheme known as the ‘gunpowder plot,’ for the murder of the king
and the distraction of both houses of parliament It was resolved
that Guy Fawket, one of the number should set fire to a train of pow*
der which they had. prepared ; they were all ready, and the sth, of
November 1605, was at hand, the day to which parliament was pro- '
rogued. But God averted the horrid catastrophe by its timely dis
covery, a«d gave Catholicism jts death blow, and crowned the pros
testant faith with eternal honors which ever since has gathered strength
with increasing years, till its mighty volume of sacred truths have
spaned t|»e broad Atlantic and dashed against American shores—not
broken, but divided into religious orders of different friths—and have
swelled W valley? with notes of joy, and dotted our hills with re*
bounding Thu?, the sth, of November, will ever stand
prominent among ths d?yo of English commemoration.
sth. The 4th of July js especially familiar to ,every school boy io
this owr onoe cursod, but now blessed country. The white people have
made it f day of gratitude and general rejoicing ever sinee 1776,
oonsequeptly guns are fired; bells are rung; flags are raised; speeches
are doljvered. imd every mode to express their fieri mgs of pleasureis
resorted to, because on that day they threw off the British Yoke, and
trampled underfoot theatre of de&pptw tyranny. They railed the
Btandaard of indepeudmee on that ever memorable dty, and every man
rallied to ita support by the declaration of ladtpeode nee. An aged
sire stood in toe steeple of lodependanoe Heil io tbeoity of Phila
delphia for hours with th' iron tongue ofa bellmhie hand, ahdring hie
head the assembled nuHitnde, wbrn quartered upon
relating to his miwon. As soon as every that ragust
cotlveiwd within, was appendod toJhM ndghty rteojßnent,
whickha* oteraiuo. defied the world, a iitUe boy (fronted out*fit%!
ring I’ and with all the power of a freeman, he (trade that bdttone
hundred Hows, (the tame number of day, it took Abraham Lincoln
WHMa, Saturday January 13, 1866.
fr<w£epfembet r »22d, 1862, to Janu
*** -Tri 2 ' tmimed out the irons words
f D ?J* . k U ?? n *?”’ . r °T?!? nb*rty throughout all the land, and
to the thereof’ and thus th. ‘ stone cut out of the moun*
make its first revolu
wo.rld, as then predicted, for I hold
tuat America and her Democratic principles and institutions is the
great stonewh«*#Sp(A:en df< Sherbet Daniel. I know that
peolog ans haye mteiprMedtte swipUre to mean Messiah’s king*
om on earth. But consistency must ie .the rule of all true internets*
Uen, prophetic or otherwise. Therefore jj the image will not admit
the stone that pulverised it will not.
The first, second, and <lnrd> Kingdoms represented by that Symbolic
image have junquestionaWo passed away. ><nd the fourth or the Ro
~,r. ; £
prayers of the Pnritant; MM brUlfra and inflaence. of the
pioneers of American civilization and eoweorated by the blood of the
revolutionary sires; founded, uponfrrafprinciplra apd recognising
equality m all men by the declaration of .Independence, is destined
in the event of things to dethrone monarchs of the old
world, and snatch the mace of oppreeaior from the now nerv.n.
gr‘p of every doepot in Europe, and then to teach the world that royal
blood flows unobstructed through the Verna of all men. This great
Continent slept in the cradle of undisturfaee far thousands of years.
Qod seemed to have held it back for .oiae important purpose, while
Asia, Africa and Europe were tho world’s theatres, and men of all
sizes, colors and languages were playing out the drama of life While
Mtions W. rising on the one band and crumbling on the other.
tnd for Me. they slept in peace from the band of enterprue.
N f mercena *y adveufarers from Sweden, Den*
Norway, came over here five hundred years before the
time, but God thwarted their designs, and sent them back, till
Amerim should get ripe. The Indian and the roving beasts, true,
«be Atlantic to the Pacific
Ocean, but they only fed the soil, preparatory to the introduction of
No gospel messengers went fofth to herald the claims of
he world s’Redeemer, nor summoiw men to a sense of reason. At
length Columbus came, and in his wake ten thousand followed. God
removed the obstructions on the one side, and human genius clamored
ior the world on the -other. Settlement and colony succeeded each
)ther, as they ran from the land of fettered conscience, many claim*
ng atso a desire to christianize *be Indians, the aborigines, of this
joentry. James Oglethorpe, one hundred and thirty years ago,
same over with 120 emtmgrants-his leading idea being to teach
lndian—to this-®ow Wood stained State of Georgia; But be
vas Only a drop in tfc& bucket lo the multitudes that’came to other
»rts, God saw this spirit fa them and was pleased. The pilgrims
long before that, had moored the May Flower to the ed£e of
Plymouth Kock, and with knees bent and uplifted hand, had range
irated this land to God, and to just and holy ends. The same year -
‘*2, ™**“ and f sti years ago—Mancious greed had
n old bone-bleached Virginia, that State where hardened guilt and
Hellish crime lie piled to mountain height; tbatState, like the mother
jf harlots, who has poisoned by her slave mart (Richmond, the black
est spot on God’s earth) all the other States of the South, and finally
plunged them into an inextricable Vortex, where unbridled ven
geance stalked in gigantic strides, and wrote death upon all their
institutions of injustice. However, resuming the subject again this
was the introduction of the slave trade, and for many years it was
kept up, meeting with tlfe approbation of the most prominent men of
the world. The early settlers of this country had run from outrage
themselves, and had manifested a desire to civilize the heathen, and
to build up an asylum for the oppressed of all nations, and to enact
laws which would comtemplate justice to all men. Therefore, God
seeing the African stand in need of civilization, sanctioned for a’while
the slave trade—not that it was in harmony with his fundamental
laws for one man to nde another, nor did God ever contemplate that
the negro was to be reduced to the status of a vassal, but as a sub
ject for moral and intellectual culture. So God winked* pr tided his
eye balls at the institution of slavery as a test of the white man’s
obedience, and elevation of the negro. The extremeties of two
colors, white and black, were now to meet, and embrace each other
and work out a great prob’em by the sanction of Heaven for the
good of mankind. The African was, I have no doubt, committed to
the care of the white man as a trust from God. That he should clear
up the land, and pioneer the march of civilization, by agricultural
labor and domestic pursuits, is a fact about which I have no hesi*
fancy in admitting. That the white rian should have made him work
and exacted so much daily toil as was oommeasurate with the ne*
cessities of life and the developments of the nation s resources, was all
in keeping with order and sense, for he was by virtue of his superior
advantages, thereby, his superior in intellect, and the guardian of the
negro. But that the white man should bar all the avenues of im
provement, and hold the Black as he would a horse or a cow; de
face the image of God by ignorance, which the black man was the re
presentative of, was the crime which offended Heaven. We gave tRe
white man our labor, yes I every drop, of sweat which oozed from
our face he claimed as his own. In return, he should have educated
us, taught us to read and write at least, and to have seen that Africa
was well supplied with missionaries. Their Doctors of Divinity
should have told thorn, that we had rights, and the people must re
spect vnem. Had the ministers exhausted half then 1 Earning and
study in showing the. white people their duty to the negro at a trust
from God, that they have in trying to prove the divine righit of
slavery, Africa would have been two-thirds civilized to day, and the
nation twice as wealthy, and the bones of a million of our country,
men would not now lie bleaching over every Southern State. **
The Fourth of July— memorable in the history of our nation as
the great day of independence to its countrymen—had no claims upon
our sympathies. They made a tag and threw it to the 1 heavens, and
bid it floatforever; buteVery stat fait was against us; every stripe
aghinstue f the red, white agd blge was against ua; the nation’s eon-
S =2?
rtrMe; tad wdrto erery church *s agiiifrt us; prayer ‘ and
prcaohifig wM enough to Babe to foMont with God
AUlcks, ,foH bltoded negro. A frto the pomeefo?
all through the revolutiODsry w«r to make-m trsitore to Mr oountrv
bat foiled; we stood firm then and arb firm stilk Was it
eause tiMit We haye nttljeen t&ahuet u
a mdtaber <st nation’s fomily ? Are Wt not -Wdfr 'is other meif fl
Have we not all the bones, muscles, nerves, veins, organs and fane-
A
twa« that other men have? Are there any difference in onr women ?
men am aniwer that quetlUm bitter than us. And eo far M
intellect m concerned, are we net as susceptible of improvement as
they are. Cannot we learn anything they can ? If we‘cannot, whv
“± k lite T:”L t 0 2 e { Oun t t f ,aohin e » “?» ? for it was a penitent!-
ary act in this State, though it was not unlawful to teach a horse to
read and write. But the whites not only refused to learn us them
selves, but refused to let us learn at all if they could prevent it; at
least .aw was against it, which was argument enough. They seem to
have forgotten that they were shutting up in darkness, by refusing
intellectual development, that immortal spirit; that undying princi
ple; that spark of Deity which was created with exhaustless ‘X
sources; vith a mind, though minute at present, will one day swal
low down, or comprehend the mysteries of the universe. Oh!
slavery, thou horrid jpouster! Thy days are numbered! Thou
wag t ,* to this nation; but far in the distance I hear the last
sound®lot thy rumbling departure, saying, gone! gone! forever gone!’
Had the white people treated slavery as a trust from God, it would
oever have ended in a terrible war. It would have gone on until
it became» a social burden It would have passed away so imper
ceptibly that no one would have felt the shock; more like a weary
man gmrg to deep. But the way it was treated, and the ends to
*bick it was appropriated, was an insult to God. And nothing less
than floods of his burning ire and the thunders of his scathing judge*
ment, poured out upon the guilty heads of the violators of this law.
and crimsoned acres of ground with the heart’s gore of tens of thou
sands, could satisfy divine justice, and make slavery despicable in
| the eyes of a country which had loved it so dearly and nurtured it
so long- yes—men of every rank and position—had become
darkened to the true status of manhood, because worldly gain lav at
the bottom of all his moral considerations.
08e toat should have taught the people equity, have exhausted
life m ransacking history to prove that the curse of Noah, pronounced
upon Canaan, was a legitimate assignment of the colored race to per
petual servitude. And when history failed to support that abomin
able theory—for we are not of the posterity of Canaan, if the curse
was worth anything at adl (which I emphatically deny)—it does not
effect us as a people, because we came through the lineage of Cush,
and we have no more to do with Noah’s malediction upon the pos
terity of Canaan, than we have with Isaac’s blessing upon the posteri
ty of Jacob—when all these visionary theories were blown to the
wind, they then resorted to the customs of the dark and crude ages
°i av w ? They built air kingdoms of slavery from the servants
of Abraham, not knowing that Abraham was a king or commanding
patriarch, and these 1 so called ’ servants were his subjects, and obedi*
ance to the orders of the chieftain was the rule of that age, as it was
for centuries afterwards. Others would eternally anathematize Ham
and his whole posterity, and assign them a place among chattels;
but Jet it be remembered, henceforth and forever, that they were the
men They founded the first cities and form
ed the first empires | they were the greatest generals, and the great
est mechanics; they carried the alphabet first to proud Greece, and
the mathematical problems of Eudid «tiH puzzle the world; besides,
we count three hundred black bishops in the Primitive Church,
manhood; go to the bloody fields that have Wnredened by gallX
of the richest blood that ever coursed its w*y through the vems of
maa 1 bfe ac k ,n g bones whiqh lie strewn around Petersburg
and Richmond of my own brave regiment;, then visit Port Hudson
t ort Wagoner, and a hundred other scenes of carnage,, where black
troops fought, bled and died, why are you here ? and the answer
lhat was all they wanted, and it is all we want Unlike the white
have no desire to enslave them or deprive them of their
oath, disfranchise them, or to expatriate them. All we want is our
rights in common with other men, and Jet them have theirs’. When
the nation first called upon the colored men to rally to its flag a howl
and a whine was raised North and South that, ‘lf ar ™
the negroes, you can never discipline them; they will be cannibals
kill all the women and children and eat them into the bargain ’ But
the negroes were armed, and Ethiopia stretched forth her
hands to God with a musket in thepi. Twelve hundred of us were
placed on a bend of the James River, known as Wilson’s Landin*
bbortly afterwards Gen. Fitz Hugh Lee came down upon us with
twenty-five hundred men. As soon as he drove in our pickets a
a flag of truce was sent in to demand a surrender of the place or he
would take it, and death should be the penalty of our refusal We
however defied his army, so he opened the contest, which raged in
fearful suspense for the space of four hours. He charged us three
left r leaving three hundred dead oft
the field. The segro oanmbap (for I was one) went out, took up bid
wounded, carried them to our hospital and treated them kindly
White man, show a better heart. v •
The feet is, we have a better heart than the white people. We
want thtm free and invested with all their righto. We want to treat
them kindly and live in friendship ; jet, I must ear, as I believe
that as soop as old things can be forgotten, or all things become oom
mon, that the Southern people will take us by the hand and welcome
us to their respect and regard. I look forward to the day when tZ
white, people of the South will not exhibit one half the prejudice they
do North, for they know us, and we know them: but at present they
are peevish, because they think themselves subjugated, while the
poorer class never did like ns at best. It was also said that the *
eolored people contemplated a cold blooded insurrection during the
Uhristmas holidays, and several of our white friends, I lewn had
grave apprehensions about its possibility. I knew then, as I know
now, that it was all a piece of nonsensical fiidge. What have we to
insurreot for ’ Are we not free and eternal'# free, and do we not
know it r Away with such a hallucination 1 We never insurrected
when we had something to insurrect for.
It wati also Mid, and Southern fanatics rods that hobby every
where • That if yon free the negro he will want to mrry X
daughters and sitters,' that was another fooliab dream- What do we
«at with tamr daughters and sisters? We have as mueh bounty as
they ? Look at our ladies, <J O you want more beauty than that ?
AZ? we W of the white man wto let our ladies alone* and thev
need not fear us. The difficulty has "heretofore been, our ladies were
2 always at our ow* disposal. t t M
nt we have met to day tor the purpose of mingling our congratu
na, and tendering opr gratitude to the Great Disposer of events
th.twe.to, have a day reckoned in the eatalogne*®Xiesjn’
wuicuiwt i Qa&WHBemble, rejoiee and- feel our man h nod Rravinma
kel<^S d otauned ok bodies; hot now
(CtttifiHWfttf on Fourth Page)
VOL. I.—WO, 5.
