Off The Same Plantation, but Not A Relative

Eliza was also owned by Col. Harrison.  Her mother, Annie Williams, was born in Virginia. I am trying to figure out if any information in this article can help me in my research.
The Montgomery Advertiser, Wednesday Morning, November 14, 1917

“Old Charles,” Faithful Servant For Almost a Century, Passes Away

 Charles Leftwich, born into slavery in “Old Virginny,” at Lynchburg in 1831, in early manhood sold to a new master and carried to bondage to Lowndes County, Ala. died here November 7 at four score years and six.  His death was mourned by white and black alike.  He heard the “angel voices calling”, and in death as in life, ever obedient, he answered the call.  In youth, In young manhood, in middle life, and finally while body was bent and head hung low, as those who knew him say, he was loving, faithful, and true.  “Old Charles” is no more, but through the avenue of almost a century he walked among friends he made because of his deeply affectionate nature and entire faithfulness.

Servant of Col. Harrison

As a slave and faithful and devoted servant of Colonel Edmund Harrison, of Lowndes County, when the war broke out Charles was selected by his master as a body guard for the latter’s son-in-law Winston Hunter, when the young man began his service in the Confederate States Army.

Through the blazing heat of Summer, in the sleet, slush, ice, and bitter winds of Winter, for four long and trying years, while the confederacy’s fortunes lay in the troubled balance of the great Civil War, steadfast and true the faithful negro served his warrior master.  It was but natural that a peculiarly strong affection bound the two together, a bond of attachment none the less strong because of any difference of color, it is said.

Return To Old Home

After the war and Charles was free, he returned to the plantation of Colonel Harrison as to his natural home, and there remained until the death of the older master.  Throughout the trying days of the reconstruction immediately following the war there was no change in the former slave.  Day and night he remained true to those who had been good to him, an every ready protector of the women and children in the times that tried men’s souls.

Sorrow stricken after the death of others to whom he was so attached, after the death of “ol morster”, Charles came to Montgomery.  Events changed others – but not Charles, for into life, in ease and in plenty, in privation and in misery, this man with a black skin but a spotless character plodded his humble way as nobly within the city’s gates as he had for many years out where the birds twittered and the balm of the Southern sunshine itself ever the silken corn and fields of snowy cotton.

Served in Kessler Family

About ten years before his death “old Charles” began service with Mr. And Mrs. W.D.C. Kessler.  He soon became so attached to the Kesslers’ first born, then a baby boy, that he was installed as a nurse.  Then this splendid character proved as good a nurse as the gentlest woman.  To other boys were born to the Kesslers, and as each came Charles took him in charge, and guarded them as only he could do.  all of the children were devoted to him and his pride and affection for them were beautiful evidences of his own great goodness.  He wold often say that it was his only desire that he should live long enough for “his boys” to remember him so well that never would they forget him.  That this wish is daily gratified there are several who will attest.

Dollhouse Fireplace and the Real Thing

This dollhouse is turning out to have features from several of our real houses. Yesterday I made a fireplace modeled after the fireplace in our Idlewild house.  I still need to add the mantel and the picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe and logs, of course.

I used a modeling compound made from toothpaste, white glue, corn starch and water. I got the color with food coloring added to the compound and then rubbed some paint that we used to do the dollhouse roof to make it look more stone like.  And threw in a few real ashes for realism.

Jim has been painting and cutting and nailing and there will be more photos soon.

Bigger Photos!

Yesterday I received a very important hint in the comment section from Angella Lister of 37 Paddington.  She suggested that I post my photographs larger. I responded that I had tried but they would overlap the other column if I made them x-large. She pointed out that I could make the columns wider by going to design/columns. Voila, bigger columns and bigger photos! I’ve spent today going back to older posts and enlarging the photographs.  I love it!

Me at age 3, 1949.  Photograph taken by Henry Cleage.

 

Interview with Henry Cleage about the Freedom Now Party

After writing about politics in my childhood yesterday, I remembered this interview I did with Henry in 1993 about the Freedom Now Party and decided to run it today.  Scroll down for an easier to read transcription of the article. There are several corrections.  Did I not fact check in those days?!

This article first appeared in 1993 in “Umoja * Unidad *Unity, A Newsletter for Homeschoolers of Color”

Our Stories

Freedom Now Party – 1963 – 1964

In the last several weeks black “leaders” have been speaking out against the treatment of Lani Guinier while at the same time saying they had to stick with the Democratic Party because “there’s nowhere else to go.” Aside from the obvious answer that they could go fishing and do the Race less harm, it brought to mind 1964, the year the Freedom Now Party got on the ballot in Michigan.  I was a freshman at Wayne State University that year.  The year before, the six children (Correction: 4 girls were killed, not 6) had been murdered during Sunday school in Birmingham, Alabama and over 100,000 had marched through downtown Detroit in protest. (Correction: the march took place before the bombing.) The March on Washington had taken place. The movement against the war in Vietnam was growing.  That summer, one of the first riots had rocked New York and the Freedom Democrats from Mississippi were not seated at the Democratic Convention.  Malcom X had spoken in Detroit at the Grass Roots Conference.  Ossie Davis, James Baldwin, Odetta and others called for a boycott of Christmas gift buying to protest the violence in the south.  Atty. Henry Cleage, along with family members and several friends had put out the Illustrated News for four years.  It was a biweekly Black Nationalist paper that was distributed through churches, baber shops and other places black people gathered.  Recently, I asked him to tell me about the founding of the Freedom Now Party.

Interview – Henry Cleage

Kristin: Henry, I’ve been trying to remember how the Freedom Now Party started.

Henry: Well, do you remember Worthy?  William Worthy was in New York with those two brothers, I can’t remember their names, and they started talking about the Freedom Now Party.  That was about the time the group in Detroit began to be black and quit trying to integrate.  I remember sitting in my office talking about it.  The question everyone had, you know, there weren’t enough Negroes to win.  The answer that was being made by Rev. (Note: Rev. A.B. Cleage Jr.) was you can’t win anyway.  The point was you could punish the Democratic Party.  And that’s the way it started. Then they sent Worthy and those two brothers, they were all over New York hollering about freedom, they came and we started the Freedom Now Party.

The important thing about it, I think, was after all that, it was supposed to be nationwide, but Michigan was the only place it got on the ballot.  Getting on the ballot in different states had different rules. In Michigan we had the Struther sisters and Boggs and one or two others.  You had to get so many names from different counties – so they went up to the counties and got them.  You know the way women will do, they just do stuff.  And, of course, they had yours truly pointing out the laws and stuff – they did it and they got on the ballot.  Of course they stole all our votes though.

Dunbar worked at the county building.  He got drunk at one of the parties and he said, “If you knew what they did with your votes…!”

You know, the votes come in at night.  It was on the radio.  The Freedom Now Party had 40,000 votes. Next day, they didn’t have but about 200, you know.

He, Dunbar, said, “If you knew what happened to your votes, you would really be drugged!”

I said, “Well, you’re black, tell us what happened.”

“No, no, I’m not gonna mess up my job.” And, of course, he wouldn’t tell.

The FNP had challengers at the precinct, but Dunbar worked down at headquarters, at the Clerks office, where the votes would come in.  I don’t know if we could have had somebody down there we didn’t.  The votes came there from all over the state.  There were Flint votes and Grand Rapids and…I remember that night they reported so many votes for the Freedom Now Party, on the radio, and we figured out that it was 5%, which means you get on the ballot next year without getting the petitions.  The next morning they said we didn’t have 1/2 of a percent.

Kristin:  Did the Freedom Now Party just go to pieces after that?

Henry: Yes.  After that it generally fell to pieces.  I think it finally dawned on everybody, like it dawned on me with the court case, we aren’t going to do anything quoting law here. Like Lani Guiner.  She said something with a whole lot of sense to it, you know, and they act like she’s crazy.

For another post – The Freedom Now Party Convention.

To read more about Lani Guinier and the 1993 controversy read “‘Quota Queen’ or Misquoted Queen?”.

Politics – Earliest Memories 1952

Week 46. Politics. What are your childhood memories of politics? Were your parents active in politics? What political events and elections do you remember from your youth?

My sister  and I – 1952
 

My first memory of politics is the 1952 presidential campaign.  My parents supported Adlai Stevenson and I remember waking up the day after the election and asking who won.  I was quite disappointed when I found it was not Stevenson.  

For more about my family and politics, click on these – 1965 Cleage for Congress and Elections Past.

Dollhouse update

Sanded and spackled.
Roof and rafters.
Rafters notched and in place.

Hopefully it’ll get a coat or two of  paint tomorrow. Maybe Monday the floors will get done.  I’ve got to decide where the inside walls and the stairs will go.

A brass bed that I got this week because…

It looks like the brass bed that Poppy bought soon after he married.  He was, the story goes,  he was walking down the street when he saw a brothel being evicted and the belongings being set out on the street.  This wonderful brass bed was among the items and he bought it on the spot. Growing up we – sister and cousins – spent many happy hours playing in my grandfather’s room. We used to be able to slip between those brass bars at the foot of the bed.  My sister Pearl has the big bed now.  That’s my mini brass bed on the pillow.

Veteran’s Day – James E. Williams

James E. Williams. Coast Guard 1964. 

His brother, Harold, always calls my husband, James, on Veterans Day.  Harold said that it was a long time ago and the memories almost don’t bother him now. Almost.  Harold’s hands still bleed sometimes from the Agent Orange. Both agreed they’d take “Option B” if they had it to do over again.

100 Years – 100 Photos – 100 Sepia Saturdays #100

In 2009 Alan Burnett  and Kate Mortensen founded Sepia Saturday. This week we celebrate it’s 100th week of existence.   I contributed my first post to Sepia Saturday #48 on November 7, 2010.  Since then I have usually been a  “themer” and enjoy coming up with something from my family photograph collection related to whatever theme Alan comes up with each week.  I also enjoy seeing what others come up with.  I have chosen to celebrate the occasion by posting 100 photographs of my father, who would have been 100 years old this year.

Obituary from:  The New York Times – U.S.

______________________________________

Albert Cleage is Dead at 88; Led Black Nationalist Church

Published February 27, 2000

Bishop Albert B. Cleage, who after the urban riots of the 1960’s built his Detroit church, the Shrine of the Black Madonna, into an important center for black theology and political power, died on Feb. 20 in Calhoun Falls, S.C. He was 88.

Bishop Cleage died while visiting Beulah Land, his church’s new farm, where he planned to raise food for the needy and give city youths peaceful summer vacations.

The bishop, who changed his name in the early 1970’s to Jaramogi Abebe Agyeman, presided for more than three decades at the Shrine of the Black Madonna, originally a Congregational church.  The change came in the late 1960’s.

There were other black secessionist churches but Bishop Cleage’s became one of the biggest and most influential emphasizing black interpretations but retaining some traditional Protestant teachings.

Bishop Cleage was also drawn to politics.  in 1973, Black Slate Inc., his political organization, helped Coleman A. Young become the first black mayor of Detroit, and the bishop was important in the careers of United States Representative Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, Democrat of Michigan; former United States Representative Barbara-Rose Collins; and blacks who ran for smaller offices.

“He taught me the importance of organizing,” Ms. Kilpatrick said, “and he created networks of political activists that continue to have a profound impact on Detroit’s political landscape.”

Bishop Cleage became a focus of national attention during the 1967 Detroit riot, when 43 people were killed, and in the turbulent years afterward.  Splitting with both the white power structure and more moderate black leaders, he emphasized black separatism in economics, politics and religion.

“The basic problem facing black people is their powerlessness,” he said. “You can’t integrate power and powerlessness.”

Trying to counter what he saw as white domination of religion, Mr. Cleage espoused a gospel of black nationalism.  He installed a larger-than-life painting of a black Madonna holding a black baby Jesus, radical for its time, and preached that Jesus was a black revolutionary whose identity as such had been obscured by whites.

“That was the beginning of a whole new religious iconography” said Menelik Kimathi, chief executive officer of the Shrine of the Black Madonna.  Mr. Kimathi, who joined a shrine youth group 30 years ago, added, “I think his legacy will be that he founded black liberation theology, the idea that the church could be more relevant to the day-to-day concerns of the community.”

The Rev. Jim Holley, pastor of Little Rock Baptist Church in Detroit, said: “He brought a black consciousness to the church community like it never had been brought before.  And it translated into politics.”

In 1968, Life magazine called Bishop Cleage one of “the men who are speaking to black America,” along with Jesse Jackson, Julian Bond, Eldridge Cleaver and Dick Gregory.

The bishop was national chairman of the Black Christian Nationalist Church, an umbrella organization for similar churches, and he wrote “The Black Messiah” (1969) and “Black Christian Nationalism”(1972).

Albert Cleage was born in Indianapolis on Jun 13, 1911.  his physician father moved the family to Detroit, and in 1937 the son received a sociology degree from Wayne State University.  He received a divinity degree from Oberlin College, then served churches in Lexington Ky.; San Francisco; and Springfield, Mass.  In 1951, he became pastor of St. Mark’s Community Church in Detroit, and two years later he formed the Central United Church of Christ, which later became the shrine.

Though he had believed in integration — some of the churches he served were racially mixed — Bishop Cleage came to despair of the hope that whites would ever willingly help blacks advance.  He also befriended Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, who had Michigan roots.

Bishop Cleage’s vision of a church reemphasized social service programs reached out to young people and marched for civil rights.  He organized black-owned businesses like grocery stores and bookstores, and built hundreds of units of housing.

All this activity made him frightening to many whites.

“When we take over, don’t worry,” he once responded. “We’ll treat you like you treated us.”

He later founded other shrines, including major ones in Atlanta and Houston.  Today, Mr. Kimathi said, the church has about 50,000 members nationally.

In the 1970’s, Bishop Cleage backed out of the national spotlight to concentrate more on church programs and working with young people.  In the late 80’s and much of the 90’s, he lived in Houston, then returned to Detroit.

Bishop Cleage married Doris Graham in 1943; they divorced in 1955.  His survivors include their two daughters, Pearl Cleage of Atlanta and Kristin Williams of Idlewild, Mich.; three sisters; a brother; seven grandchildren, and one great-grandchild.

The Devilish Ghost – by Henry Cleage

Mercedes Gamble and Henry Cleage 1943

It was a marvelous party.  It had that nebulous, dreamlike quality that is so mellow. I was tripping daintily across the floor with this mellowness of aspect, when a small table sprang upon my person and bore me to the floor. It was pleasantly surprised to find that the lower level was as thickly populated and as chummy as the upper.  George was lying right next to me.

“Isn’t it though” said George raising his head to look about.

“Everyone seems to be having a very enjoyable time,” I said.

“Except Snuffy,” said George pointing towards a neglected part of the establishment.

He was right.  Snuffy was peering wildly out from behind some draperies.

He obviously wasn’t up to snuff.

“Soon as I rest up,” said George, “I’m gonna crawl over and see what’s up.”  He leaned back, tucked a bottle under his head and closed his eyes.

“Allow me,” I said, “I’m rested.

It was a gloomy hole that Snuffy had wormed into. Separated from the larger room by draperies.  It was dark and full of shadows.  Snuffy was sitting on a couch near the opening so that he could keep an eye on the party.  But his eyes had a haunted look, like they had seen too much.  Of course I knew personally that they had been around plenty, his eyes I mean, but there was definitely more here than met the eye, speaking of eyes that is to say.

“I’ve got a ghost,” said Snuffy.

“Female?” I asked.

“But talented,” said Snuff looking at me with respect.

I must admit that I was pleased.  One must be of a sensitive nature to delve into the mysteries with the nonchalance I had shown.  One must have imagination and faith.  Also one must have a particularly fine edge on.

“Behold,” said Snuff gesturing largely across the little room.

And there she was, a genuine ghost of absolutely the first water.  She was sitting across the room drinking a mellowroony.

She was, as far as I could see, a luscious piece of plunder too.  Of course it was all dark and shadows, but her robes and things were draped where they should be draped.  It was quite a ghost gown too.  Slit up one side about to her… It was beastly dark, as I say, and I couldn’t just say for sure.  The gown was very form fitting though and the ghost had no less a fitting form.  As a matter of fact, the tiny shaft of light that lay across that slit in her gown rested upon a limb that was surprisingly lifelike. But that cape gave her away.  That was a ghost cape if I ever saw one.

Immediately I realized the dire potentialities of the situation.  At a party like this where all is fellowship and noble sentiment, a ghost with a silted ghost gown has no place, especially if she also has a genuine ghost cape with a hood, yet.  Snuffy and I must protect the party, or vice versa.

But I wasn’t happy.  The party was showing admirable reserve strength as it swung into the stretch.  A lovely thing was doing a picturesque number on top of the piano.  Across the room George, apparently refreshed, was reaching great heights with his speech on fellowship.  Louis was standing before an Italian mirror, in a Mexican Sombrero, reciting German poetry.  And I was tied up, in a manner of speaking, with a ghost.  Giving my all—understand—for the group.

To top it all, Snuffy was well in was well in his cups and having difficulty remaining awake.  The ghost was not far behind, speaking of cups.  I was desperate.  That beautiful bit of talent on top of the piano needed me, I felt.  I couldn’t place her but that gown fascinated me.  A bit of ribbon here, a bit there and neither definitely here or there – understand.

I took desperate measures.  I marched right up to the ghost.

“Pffft, disappear,” I intoned whilst making mysterious motions with my hands.  Motions a ghost would understand, mind.

But she wasn’t having any.  She offered me a drink of mellowroony, which I accepted with a certain dignity and toddled back to my seat.

I was about to descend into a quandary when a nudge from Snuffy rescued me. I looked up.  Our ghost was upon us.

“She must not pass,” said Snuff.

The ghost had no intentions of passing.  She fixed us with those eyes and slowly raised her arms.

In those ghost capes and hoods she presented a most disheartening picture.  The room was full of darkness and despair with her just sitting there, but now it had gone hog wild.  It was as if some giant vulture had come among us.  As she hovered there she seemed to expand until she filled every corner of the room.  I was about to give her more room by leaving, when she spoke.

“Pfffffft,” she said.  She looked like the devil.

“Vamoose,” she hissed.

It was rather a nasty shock.  Being uncertain as to the powers of ghosts filled with mellowroonys, I quickly looked to see if Snuffy was still one of us.  He was and I was relieved.  Snuffy seemed relieved too.  We three looked at each other.  An impasse seemed to be reached.

Our ghost took in her stride though.  She sad down between us and cuddled up against my shoulder.  Snuffy cuddled against hers.  I was perturbed.

“Snuff,” I bellowed, thinking to keep him awake with conversation.

“Ummmm,” he replied.

“That girl on the piano with that gown, who is she?”

Snuffy and the ghost leaned forward to the opening and directed four beery eyes upon the piano and then fell back heavily to their former positions.

“Girl from the show,” said Snuff “George brung em.”

“Oh. And it ain’t no gown,” said Snuff fast loosing consciousness.

No?”

“It’s her costume, they didn’t change”.

“They?” I asked pointedly.

“Two girls,” he said heavily, “From a skit called Flesh and …” here Snuff gave it up.  He snuggled close to the ghost and put that devilish cape over his head and began to snore softly.

“Flesh and what,” I shouted hoping to arouse him. But I was let alone with a ghost with a slit in her gown.

I was beat – in a quandary-frantic.  This ghost was so permanent and so heavy.  The way she was leaning on my shoulder it wouldn’t be long before she had overcome me with sheer weight.  What to do?  Would I have to scream for help?

I was interrupted from my fast approaching neurosis by a giggle erupting from my left ear.

 “Flesh and the Devil,” my ghost confided in rare good humor.

“Didn’t you notice my devil’s costume?”

She held up that devilish cape.

*****

Henry wrote this story about 1943.  I looked up the drink “Mellowroony” and came up with the song “Cement Mixer” which you can hear near the end of the clip below.  I had never heard of Slim Gaillard before but I think his performance fits in with the story. And he grew up in Detroit.