Various
Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885
ANTHONY CALVERT BROWN
First, as my grandfather used to tell, there were the woods and the Oneida Indians and the Mohawks; then the forest was cleared away, and there was the broad, fertile, grassy, and entrancingly-beautiful Mohawk valley; then came villages and cities and my own unimportant existence, and at about the same time appeared the Oneida Institute. This institution of learning is my first point. The Oneida Institute, located in the village of Whitesboro, four miles from Utica, in the State of New York, consisted visibly of three elongated erections of painted, white-pine clapboards, with shingle roofs. Each structure was three stories high and was dotted with lines of little windows. There was a surrounding farm and gardens, in which the students labored, that might attract attention at certain hours of the day, when the laborers were at work in them; but the buildings were the noticeable feature. Seated in the deep green of the vast meadows on the west bank of the willow-shaded Mohawk, these staring white edifices were very conspicuous. The middle one was turned crosswise, as if to keep the other two, which were parallel, as far apart as possible. This middle one was also crowned with a fancy cupola, whereby the general appearance of the group was just saved to a casual stranger from the certainty of its being the penitentiary or almshouse of the county.
The glory of this institution was not in its architecture or lands, but in that part which could not be seen by the bodily eyes. For, spiritually speaking, Oneida Institute was an immense battering-ram, behind which Gerrit Smith, William Lloyd Garrison, and Rev. Beriah Green were constantly at work, pounding away to destroy the walls which slavery had built up to protect itself.
Mr. Green was president of the institute, and was the soul and heart and voice of its faculty. His power to mould young men was phenomenal. It was a common saying that he turned out graduates who were the perfect image of Beriah Green, except the wart. The wart was a large one, which, being situated in the centre of Mr. Green's forehead, seemed to be a part of his method to those who were magnetized by his personality or persuaded by his eloquence.
About 1845, when I began to be an observing boy, it was understood throughout Oneida County that Beriah Green was an intellectual giant, and that he would sell his life, if need be, to befriend the colored man. Oneida Institute was a refuge for the oppressed, quite as much as a place where the students were magnetized and taught to weed onions. Fifteen years before John Brown paused in his march to the gallows to kiss a negro baby I saw Beriah Green walk hand in hand along the sidewalk with a black man and fondle the hand he held conspicuously. Among his intimates were Ward and Garnet, both very black, as well as very talented and very eloquent.
When "the friends of the cause" met in convention, I sometimes heard of it, and managed, boy-like, to steal in. When I did so, I used to sit and shudder on a back seat in the little hall. The anti-slavery denunciations poured out upon the churches, and backed up and pushed home by the logic of Green and the eloquence of Smith, were well calculated to make an orthodox boy tremble. For these people brought the churches and the nation before their bar and condemned them, and some whom I have not named cursed them with a bitterness and effectiveness that I cannot recall to this day without a shiver. The dramatic effect, as it then seemed to me, has never been equalled in my experience.
That these extreme ideas did not prosper financially is not to be wondered at. The farm was soon given up, then the buildings and gardens passed into other hands, and the institution became a denominational school, known as the Whitestown Baptist Seminary. But the ideas which had been implanted there would not consent to depart with this change in the name and the methods of the institution. The fact that Beriah Green, after leaving the school, continued to reside at Whitesboro and gathered a church there rendered it the more difficult to eradicate the doctrines which he had implanted. The idea of friendship for the black man was particularly tenacious, and perhaps annoying to the new and controlling denominational interest. It clung to the very soil, like "pusley" in a garden. It had gained a strong hold throughout the county. The managers of the institution could not openly oppose it. They were compelled to endure it. And so it continued to be true that if a bright colored boy anywhere in the State desired the advantages of a superior education he would direct his steps to Whitestown Seminary.
It was during these seminary days that I became a student at the institution; and it was here that I met the hero of my story, Anthony Calvert Brown. He was as vigorous and manly a youth of seventeen as I have ever seen. We two were regarded as special friends. He had been among us nearly two months, and had become a general favorite, before it was discovered that he had a tinge of African blood. The revelation of this fact was made to us on the play-ground. A fellow student, who had come with Anthony to the school, made the disclosure. The two were comrades, and had often told us of their adventures together in the great North woods, or Adirondack forests, on the western border of which, in a remote settlement, they had their homes. Their friendship did not prevent them from falling into a dispute, and it did not prevent Anthony's comrade, who was in fact a bully, from descending to personalities. He hinted in very expressive terms that the son of a colored woman must not be too positive. The meanness of such an insinuation, made at such a time and in such a way, did not diminish its sting. Perhaps it increased it. We saw Anthony, who had stood a moment before cool and defiant, turn away cowed and subdued, his handsome face painfully suffused. His behavior was a confession.
I am sorry to say that after this incident Anthony did not hold the same position in our esteem that he had previously enjoyed. Some half-dozen of us who cherished the old Institute feeling were inclined to make a hero of him, but by degrees the sentiment of the new management prevailed, and it was understood that Anthony was to be classed with those who must meekly endure an irreparable misfortune. But Anthony did not seem to yield to this view. He was very proud, and braced himself firmly against it. He withdrew more and more from his schoolmates and devoted his time to books. In the matter of scholarship he gained the highest place, and held it to the close of our two-years' course. In the mean time, his peculiarities were often made the subject of remark among us. His growing reserve and dignity, his reputation as a scholar, and his reticence and isolation were frequently discussed. And there was the mystery of his color. It was a disputed question among us whether the African taint could be detected in his appearance. Ray, the comrade who had revealed it, claimed that it was plainly perceptible, while Yerrinton, the oldest student among us, declared that there was not a trace of it to be seen. He argued that Anthony was several shades lighter than Daniel Webster, and he asserted enthusiastically that he had various traits in common with that great statesman. But, then, Yerrinton was a disciple of Beriah Green, and his opinion was not regarded as unbiassed. For myself, I could never detect any appearance of African blood in Anthony, although my knowledge of its existence influenced my feelings toward him. To me he seemed to carry himself with a noble bearing,—under a shadow, it is true, yet as if he were a king among us. I remember thinking that his broad forehead, slightly-Roman nose, mobile lips, and full features wore a singularly mournful and benevolent expression, like the faces sometimes seen in Egyptian sculpture.
I did not discuss the matter of his peculiarities with Anthony freely until after our school-days at the seminary were ended and he had left Whitestown. His first letter to me was a partial revelation of his thoughts upon the subject of his own character and feelings. He had gone to Philadelphia to teach in a large school, while I remained with my relatives in Whitesboro. He wrote me that he was troubled in regard to certain matters of which he had never spoken to any one, not even to me, and he thought it would be a good thing for him to present them for consideration, if I was willing to give him the benefit of my counsel. In reply I urged that he should confide in me fully, assuring him of my desire to assist him to the utmost of my ability.
The communication which I received in response to my invitation was to some extent a surprise. The letter was a very long one, and very vivid and expressive. He began it by alluding to the incident upon the play-ground, which had occurred nearly two years before. He said that his life had been guarded, up to about that time, from feeling the effects of the misfortunes which attach to the colored race. Living in a remote settlement and a very pleasant home, where all were free and equal and social distinctions almost unknown, he had scarcely thought of the fact that his mother was an octoroon. He had heard her talk a great deal about those distinguished French gentlemen who had in the early part of this century acquired lands in the vicinity of his home, and he had somehow a feeling that she had been remotely connected with them, and that his own lineage was honorable. He alluded specifically to Le Ray de Chaumont and Joseph Bonaparte. These two men, and others their countrymen, who had resided or sojourned upon the edge of the great wilderness near his birthplace, had been his ideals from childhood. He had often visited Lake Bonaparte, and had frequently seen the home formerly occupied by Le Ray. While he had understood that he himself was only plain Anthony C. Brown, the son of Thomas Brown (a white man who had died some two months before his son's birth), he had yet an impression that his mother was in some vague way connected with the great personages whom he mentioned. How it was that Thomas Brown had come to marry his mother, or what the details of her early life had been, he did not know, being, in fact, ignorant of his family history. He conceded that it might be only his own imagination that had led him to suppose that he was in some indefinite way to be credited with the greatness of those wealthy landed proprietors who had endeavored to establish manorial estates or seigniories in the wilderness. He had come to understand that this unexplainable impression of superiority and connection with the great, which had always been with him in childhood and early youth, was due to his mother's influence and teaching. There was about it nothing direct and specific, and yet it had been instilled into his mind, in indirect ways, until it was an integral part of his existence. His mother had a farm and cattle and money. She was in better circumstances than her neighbors. This had added to his feeling of superiority and independence. The accident of a slight tinge of color had hardly risen even to the dignity of a joke in the freedom of the settlement and the forest. Looking back, he believed that his mother had guarded his youthful mind against receiving any unfavorable impression upon the subject. In his remote, free, wilderness home he had heard but little of African slavery, and had regarded it as a far-off phantom, like heathendom or witchcraft.
Such had been the state of mind of Anthony Brown. The light had, however, been gradually let in upon him in the course of an excursion which he and his comrade Ray had made the year previous to their appearance at Whitestown Seminary. In that excursion they had visited Chicago, Cleveland, Niagara Falls, Buffalo, Syracuse, Rochester, New York, and Albany. They had strayed into a court-room in the City Hall at Albany, where many people were listening to the argument of counsel who were discussing the provisions of the will of a wealthy lady, deceased. A colored man was mixed up in the matter in some way,—probably as executor and legatee. Anthony heard with breathless interest the legal disabilities of colored people set forth, and their inferior social position commented upon. He learned that the ancestral color descended to the children of a colored mother, although they might appear to be white. These statements had impressed him deeply. They furnished to his mind an explanation of the various evidences of the degradation of the colored people he had seen upon his journey. Talking of these matters, he had found that Ray was much better informed than himself upon the entire subject. Ray, in fact, frankly explained that a colored man had no chance in this country. This was in 1859. Anthony suggested in his letter to me that he had probably been kept from acquiring this knowledge earlier in life by his mother's anxious care and the kindness of friends and neighbors. He explained that he did not mean to be understood as intimating that he had not some general knowledge of the facts previously, but it was this experience which had made him feel that slavery was a reality and that all colored people belonged to a despised race. After his return home he had carefully refrained from imparting to his mother any hint of his newly-acquired impressions in reference to the social and legal standing of the colored race. In the enjoyment of home comforts, and in the freedom of the wild woods and waters, the shadow which had threatened in his thoughts to descend upon him passed away. He remembered it only as a dream which might not trouble him again, and which he would not cherish. Still, there was a lurking uneasiness and anxiety, born of the inexorable facts, which favorable circumstances and youthful vivacity could not wholly overcome.
In this state of mind Anthony, in accordance with the wish of his mother, came to Whitestown Seminary. His description of his first impressions there was very glowing. He wrote,—
"I cannot hope, my dear friend, to give you any adequate idea of what I then experienced. For the first time in my life I found kindred spirits. Your companionship in particular threw a light upon my pathway that made the days all bright and gave me such joy as I had never before known. And there was Ralph, so kind and true, and Henry Rose, so honest and faithful! I cannot tell you how my heart embraced them. It is a simple truth, telling less than I felt, when I say that I could scarcely sleep for thinking of my newfound treasures. You need to remember what it is to dwell in a rough country, isolated and remote from towns, to appreciate my experience. To me, coming to Whitestown was a translation to Paradise. It seems extravagant, yet it is true, that I met there those who were dearer than my life and for whom I would have died. The first warm friendships of youth are the purest and whitest flowers that bloom in the soul. If these are blighted, it is forever. Such flowers in any one life can never grow again.
"And this brings me to that sad day when on the play-ground Ray struck at me, and through me at my dear, loving mother. As he spoke those cruel words the world grew dark about me, the dread fear which I had subdued revived with tenfold power, and upon my heart came the pangs of an indescribable anguish. Oh, the chill, the death-like chill, that froze the current of my affections as I saw the faces of those I loved averted!
"I went to my room and tried to reflect, but I could not. The shock was too great. During the week that followed I was most of the time in my silent room. I may well call it silent, for the footsteps to which I had been accustomed came no more, and the comrades in whose friendship I had such delight no longer sought my company. That dreadful week was the turning-point in my life. As it drew toward its close I realized to some extent what I had been through, as one does who is recovering from a severe illness. I knew that day and night I had wept and moaned and could see no hope, no ray of light, and that I had at times forgotten my religion and blasphemed. It is true, my dear friend, that I mocked my God. Do not judge me hastily in this. I was without discipline or experience, and I saw that for all sorrow except mine there was a remedy. Even for sin there is repentance and redemption, and the pains of hell itself may be avoided. But for my trouble there could be no relief. The thought that I was accursed from the day of my birth, that no effort, no sacrifice, no act of heroism, on my part could ever redeem me, haunted my soul, and I knew that it must haunt me from that time onward and forever.
"I need hardly tell you, with your insight and knowledge, that these inward struggles led toward a not unusual conclusion. I allude to the determination to which multitudes of souls have been driven in all ages, to escape the tortures of disgrace. I turned away from humanity and sought that fearful desert of individual loneliness and isolation which is now more sad and real to me than any outward object can be. To live in the voiceless solitude and tread the barren sands unfriended is too much for a strong man with all the aids that philosophy can give him. But when we see one in the first flush of youth, wholly innocent, yet turning his footsteps to the great desert to get away from the scorn of lovers and friends, and when we realize that this which he dreads must continue to the last hour of his life, there is to my mind a ghastliness about it as if it were seen in the light of the pit which is bottomless. I have not recovered, and can never recover, from that experience. You will infer, however, that I did not remain in just the condition of mind which I have endeavored to describe. He whom I had blasphemed came to me, and I was penitent. The teachings of good Father Michael at our home, the doctrines of our Church, and the examples of the blessed saints, were my salvation. Then I felt that I would dwell alone with God. And there was something grand about that, and very noble. The purest joy of life is possible in such an experience. Yet it is not enough, especially in youth. But I think I should have continued in that frame of mind had it not been for you and Ralph. How you two came to me and besought my friendship I need not remind you. Neither need I say how my pride yielded; and if there was anything to forgive I forgave it, and felt the light of friendship, which had been withdrawn from my inner world, come back with a joy that has increased as it has continued.
"Coming to this city of 'brotherly love,' I begin my life anew, and at the very threshold a painful question meets me. No faces are averted, no one suspects my social standing. A thrill of kindness is in every voice. What can I do? Must I advertise myself as smitten with a plague? I dare not tell you of the favors that society bestows upon me. It is but little more than a month since I came to Philadelphia, and during that short period I have in some strange way become popular. My sincere effort politely to avoid society seems only to have resulted in precipitating a shower of invitations upon me. Evidently the fact that I am tinged with African blood is wholly unsuspected. You understand, I think, how I gained this place as teacher in the school. It was through the interposition of Father Michael and certain powerful Protestant friends of his who are unknown to me. It was not my own doing, and I do not feel that I am to blame. But I will frankly tell you that it seems to me cowardly to go forward under false colors. One thing I am resolved upon,—I will never be ashamed of my dear mother. Where I go she shall go, and she shall come here if she is inclined to do so. As you have never seen her, I may say that she is regarded as dark for an octoroon, and with her presence no explanation will be necessary. But ought I to wait for that? She may not choose to come. How can I best be an honest man? It seems silly, and it would be ridiculous, to give out generally here as a matter for the public that I am the son of a negro woman. Yet I think it must come to that in some way. What shall I do?"
This letter caused me to think of Anthony and his trouble much more seriously than before. It was clear to me why he was popular. I had never met any young man who was by nature more sympathetic and attractive. The reserve and sadness which had recently come upon him were not to his disadvantage socially. They rather tended to gain attention and win the kindness of strangers. The question which his position presented, and about which he desired my counsel, troubled me. But, fortunately, after thinking of it almost constantly for two days, I gave him advice which I still think correct under the circumstances. I argued that he was not under any obligation to advertise himself to the public as a colored man. The public did not expect or require this of any one. But I urged that if he made any special friends among those who entertained him socially and with whom he was intimate, he should frankly make known to them the facts in regard to his family. I thought this would be expected, and I was convinced that such a presentation of his position, made without affectation, would win for him respect even from those who might cease to court his society. I further urged that he ought not, as a teacher, to isolate himself or shun those relations with families which would place upon him the obligation to make known his parentage.
Anthony sent a brief note in reply to my letter, thanking me heartily for what he termed my convincing statement, and expressing his determination to act in accordance with it.
Nearly two months passed, and then my friend communicated the further fact that he had gone so far, in several instances, and with several families, as to carry out the suggestions I had made. He thought it was too soon to assert what the ultimate result would be, but stated the immediate effects so far as he could see them. When he first made the announcement in regard to his color, many had disbelieved it. When his persistent and repeated declarations upon various occasions had convinced his friends that it was not a jest, but a reality, they had been variously affected by it. He thought some were politely leaving him, while others seemed desirous of continuing his acquaintance.
Ten days later I was not a little surprised to receive a letter conveying the information that Anthony's mother had arrived in Philadelphia in response to his invitation. He stated, in his letter to me giving this news, that he had now carried out his entire plan and was satisfied. His mother had visited his school, and he had introduced her to his various friends in the city. It seemed to me a mistake thus unnecessarily to run the risk of offending social preferences or prejudices; but I did not feel at liberty to comment upon the matter at the time.
In addition to the information conveyed, the letter contained an invitation which delighted me. Anthony wrote that he and his mother were about returning home. The long vacation would begin in a few days, and they wished that I should go with them for a visit. Few things could have afforded me greater satisfaction than this. The wild forest-country, of which my school-mate had told me much, I regarded as peculiarly a region of romance and adventure.
It was a beautiful morning early in July when we three, with a team and a driver, left the Mohawk valley and climbed the Deerfield hills, making our way northward. On the evening of the first day we readied the hills of Steuben and gained a first glimpse of that broad, beautiful forest-level, known as the Black River country, which stretches away toward the distant St. Lawrence. The next day we descended to this level, and, following the narrow road through forests, and clearings, and little settlements, and villages, arrived just at nightfall at the home of my friends. It was a small, unpainted, wooden house, standing near the road. Back of it were barns and sheds, and I saw cattle and sheep grazing. The zigzag rail fence common to the region surrounded the cleared lots in sight, and in front of the house, across the road, were the wild woods. A wood-thrush, or veery, was pouring out his thrilling, liquid notes as we arrived. A white woman and a large, black, shaggy dog came out of the house to welcome us; and a few minutes later I had the best room, up-stairs over the front door, assigned to me, and was a guest in the domicile of my friend Anthony.
The location was a delightful one, about three miles west of the little village of Champion, near which was a small lake, where we spent many morning hours. From a height not far away we had glimpses, in clear weather, of the mountains, seen in airy outline toward the eastward.
My friend had the horses and wagons of the farm at his command, and we took many long rides to visit places of interest. On several occasions we saw the decaying chateau of Le Ray, which was but little more than an hour's ride to the northward of Anthony's home; and on one occasion we went a day's journey and saw the stony little village of Antwerp, and visited that beautiful sheet of water on the margin of the wilderness, known as Lake Bonaparte. Joseph Bonaparte frequently visited this lake, and he owned lands in its vicinity, and made some improvements upon them in 1828.
Anthony's mother was a tall, spare woman, with a wrinkled face and large, straight features. She seemed to me a curious mixture of European features with a dark skin. She used French phrases in a peculiar way, and was full of the history of Le Ray and Bonaparte and various members of the company that had undertaken to make of this section, in years gone by, a rich and fertile country like the Mohawk valley. It appeared that the name which the company had given to this region was Castorland, which she interpreted to mean the land of the beaver. She had, among other curiosities, some coins or tokens which had been stamped in Paris on behalf of the company, and on which the word "Castorland," accompanied by suitable devices, was plainly seen. The one that interested me most seemed to have as its device the representation of a small dog trying to climb a tree. I was informed, however, that the animal was a beaver, and that he was cutting down the tree with his teeth.
After talking freely with the mother, Antoinette Brown, I did not wonder that Anthony had learned to honor the gentlemen who had come from France to this region in early days as among the greatest men in the world. I did not find myself able to discredit her realistic and vivid description of the visits of Joseph Bonaparte to his wilderness domain in a six-horse chariot, followed by numerous retainers. Neither did I find myself able to disbelieve in the accuracy of her picturesque description of Joseph Bonaparte's Venetian gondola floating upon the waters of Northern New York, or her account of his dinner-service of "golden plate" spread out by the road-side on one memorable occasion when he paused in his kingly ride and dined in a picturesque place near the highway. She told in a convincing manner many traditions relating to the enterprise which was to have made of the Black-River country a rich farming region not inferior to the Mohawk Flats. The fact that nature had not seconded this undertaking had not diminished Mrs. Brown's impressions of its magnitude and importance. The great tracts which had been purchased and the great men who had purchased them were vividly impressed upon her imagination. In reference to her personal history, except for a few allusions to life in New York City, she was reticent.
I remained nearly two months at the home of my friend, and became familiar with the places of interest surrounding it. The little lake was a memorable spot, for there Anthony first told me the full story of his experiences in Philadelphia. He did not conceal the fact that an attachment was growing up between himself and the daughter of his best friend there, Mr. Zebina Allen. The way to make his permanent home in the Quaker City seemed to be opening before him. That I should go with him for a few days to Philadelphia when he returned, to "see how the land lay," as he expressed it in backwoods phrase, was one of his favorite ideas. He made so much of this point that I finally consented to accompany him.
It was a rainy day early in September when we stepped off the cars and went to Anthony's boarding-place in the good old city that held the one he loved and his fortunes. I was introduced to various friends of his, and during the first twenty-four hours of my sojourn I was delighted with all matters that came under my observation. I was especially pleased with Mr. Allen and his daughter Caroline. But within two days I saw, or fancied that I saw, a curious scrutiny and reserve in the faces of some of those with whom we conversed.
I think Anthony was more surprised than I was when he received a note from one of the trustees intimating that important changes were likely to be made in reference to the educational methods to be employed in the school, and that, in view of these changes, it was barely possible that some new arrangements in regard to teachers might be desired by the patrons of the institution. The trustee professed to have written this information in order that "Mr. Brown" might not be taken wholly by surprise in case any step affecting his position should be found advisable.
The circumlocution and indefiniteness of this letter led me to infer that there was something behind it which the writer had not stated. It soon appeared that my friend agreed with me in this inference. I could not but smile at the coolness with which he quoted the common phrase to the effect that there was an African in the fence.