William Still, as secretary, kept a record of all the fugitive slaves Walker, David.-First Negro to attack slavery through the press. Born free at Wilmington, North Carolina, 1785. Walker early went to Boston and began business. In 1829 he published an anti-slavery pamphlet, "Walker's Appeal," which was widely circulated and stirred the South as no other anti-slavery pamphlet up to that time had done. Governor Giles of Virginia, in a message to the Legislature, referred to the appeal as “a seditious pamphlet sent from Boston." Gibbs, Mifflin Wistar.-Lawyer and anti-slavery agitator; born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, April, 1823. His home is in Little Rock, Ark. Mr. Gibbs gained a good common school education and was then apprenticed to a carpenter, and finally became a contractor and builder. He was actively connected with the anti-slavery movement and the underground railroad. In 1849 he lectured on the anti-slavery platform, concluding his tour about the time of the discovery of gold in California. He immediately started for the Pacific coast and reached San Francisco in 1850. Here, with another Negro, Peter Lester, he engaged in the dry goods business. On the discovery of gold in British Columbia, in 1858, Mr. Gibbs went to Victoria and established there the first mercantile house other than that of the Hudson Bay Company. In 1868, after having read law with an English lawyer at Victoria, he returned to the United States and entered the law department of Oberlin College, from which he was graduated in 1870. He settled in Little Rock, Arkansas, and was admitted to the bar. In 1873 he was elected city judge, being the first Negro to hold such an office in the United States. In 1877 he was appointed register of the United States land office at Little Rock. In 1897 he was appointed United States Consul to Tamatave, Madagascar. He has written an autobiography under the title of "Lights and Shadows." EMANCIPATION PRELIMINARY PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION I, Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States of America, and Commander-in-chief of the army and navy thereof, do hereby proclaim and declare that hereafter as heretofore, the war will be prosecuted for the object of practically restoring the constitutional relation between the United States and each of the States, and the people thereof, in which States that relation is or may be suspended or disturbed. That it is my purpose, upon the next meeting of Congress to again recommend the adoption of a practical measure tendering pecuniary aid to the free acceptance or rejection of all slave States, so called, the people whereof may not then be in rebellion against the United States, and which States may then have voluntarily adopted, or thereafter may voluntarily adopt, immediate or gradual abolishment of slavery within their respective limits; and that the effort to colonize persons of African descent, with their consent, upon this continent or elsewhere, with the previously obtained consent of the governments existing there, will be continued. That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any State or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom. That the Executive will, on the first day of January aforesaid, by proclama. tion, designate the States and parts of States if any, in which the people thereof respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented in the Congress of the United States, by members chosen thereto at elec tions wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have partic ipated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the United States. That attention is hereby called to an act of Congress entitled "An Act to make an additional Article of War," approved March 13th, 1862, and which act is in the words and figures following: Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That hereafter the following shall be promulgated as an additional article of war for the government of the army of the United States, and shall be obeyed and observed as such: Section 1. All officers or persons in the military or naval service of the United States are prohibited from employing any of the forces under their respective commands for the purpose of returning fugitives from service or labor who may have escaped from any persons to whom such service or labor is claimed to be due; and any officer who shall be found guilty by a court-martial of violating this article shall be dismissed from the service. Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That this act shall take effect from and after its passage. Also, to the ninth and tenth sections of an act entitled "An Act to Suppress Insurrection, to Punish Treason and Rebellion, to Sieze and Confiscate Property of Rebels, and for other Purposes," approved July 16, 1862, and which sections are in the words and figures following: Sec. 9. And be it further enacted, That all slaves of persons who shall here. after be engaged in rebellion against the Government of the United States or who shall in any way give aid or comfort thereto, escaping from such persons and taking refuge within the lines of the army; and all slaves captured from such persons, or deserted by them and coming under the control of the Government of the United States; and all slaves of such persons found on (or) being within any place occupied by rebel forces and afterwards occupied by forces of the United States, shall be deemed captives of war, and shall be forever free of their servitude, and not again held as slaves. Sec. 10. And be it further enacted, That no slave escaping into any State, Territory, or District of Columbia, from any other State, shall be delivered up, or in any way impeded or hindered of his liberty, except for crime, or some offense against the laws, unless the person claiming said fugitive shall first make oath that the person to whom the labor or service of such fugitive is alleged to be due is his lawful owner, and has not borne arms against the United States in the present rebellion, nor in any way given aid and comfort thereto: and no person engaged in the military or naval service of the United States shall, under any pretense whatever, assume to decide on the validity of the claim of any person, to the service or labor of any other person, or surrender up any such person to the claimant, on pain of being dismissed from the service. And I do hereby enjoin upon and order all persons engaged in the military and naval service of the United States to observe, obey, and enforce, within their respective spheres of service, the act and sections above recited. And the Executive will in due time recommend that all citizens of the United States who shall have remained loyal thereto throughout the rebellion, shall (upon the restoration of the constitutional relation between the United States and their respective States and people, if that relation shall have been suspended or disturbed) be compensated for all losses by acts of the United States, including the loss of slaves. In witness whereof, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed. Done at the City of Washington, this twenty-second day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the eighty-seventh. By the President: WILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State. ABRAHAM LINCOLN. EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION Whereas, on the 22nd day of September, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two, a proclamation was issued by the President of the United States, containing, among other things, the following, to wit: That on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, all persons held as slaves within any States or designated part of a State, the people whereof shall then be in rebellion against the United States shall be then, thenceforward, and forever free; and the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authority thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of such persons, and will do no act or acts to repress such persons, or any of them, in any efforts they may make for their actual freedom. That the Executive will, on the first day of January, aforesaid, by proclamation, designate the States and parts of States, if any, in which the people thereof respectively shall then be in rebellion against the United States; and the fact that any State, or the people thereof, shall on that day be in good faith represented in the Congress of the United States, by members chosen thereto at elections wherein a majority of the qualified voters of such State shall have participated, shall, in the absence of strong countervailing testimony, be deemed conclusive evidence that such State, and the people thereof, are not then in rebellion against the United States. Now, therefore, I, ABRAHAM LINCOLN, President of the United States, by virtue of the power in me vested as Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States in time of actual armed rebellion against the authority and Government of the United States, and as a fit and necessary war measure for suppressing said rebellion, do, on this first day of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty-three, and in accordance with my purpose so to do, publicly proclaimed for the full period of one hundred days from the day first above mentioned, order and designate as the States and parts of States, wherein the people thereof respectively are this day in rebellion against the United States, the following, to wit: "Arkansas, Texas, Louisiana (except the parishes of St. Bernard, Plaquemine, Jefferson, St. John, St. Charles, St. James, Ascension, Assumption, Terre Bonne, Lafourche, St. Mary, St. Martin, and Orleans, including the city of New Orleans) Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia (except the forty-eight counties designated as West Virginia, and also the counties of Berkley, Accomac, Northampton, Elizabeth City, York, Princess Anne, and Norfolk, including the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth), and which excepted parts are, for the present, left precisely as if this proclamation were not eted. "And, by virtue of the power and for the purpose aforesaid, I do order and declare that all persons held as slaves within sail designated States and parts of States, are and henceforward shall be free; and that the Executive Government of the United States, including the military and naval authorities thereof, will recognize and maintain the freedom of said persons. "And I hereby enjoin upon the people so declared to be free, to abstain from all violence, unless in necessary self-defense; and I recommned to them that, in all cases when allowed, they labor faithfully for reasonable wages. "And I further declare and make known that such persons, of suitable condi tions, will be received into the armed service of the United States to garrison forts, positions, stations, and other places, and to man vessels of all sorts in said service. "And upon this act, sincerely believed to be an act of justice, warranted by the Constitution upon military necessity, I invoke the considerate judgment of mankind, and the gracious favor of Almighty God. "In testimony whereof, I have hereunto set my name and caused the seal of "Done at the City of Washington, this 1st day of January, in the year of our /ILLIAM H. SEWARD, Secretary of State 13th AMENDMENT TO CONSTITUTION Sec. 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Sec. 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. Adopted December 18,1865. NEGRO ANTI-SLAVERY NEWSPAPERS In connection with the anti-slavery movement a number of papers were published by Negroes. A list of papers published by Negroes before the Civil War follows: |