Manuel Pereira; Or, The Sovereign Rule of South Carolina. F. Colburn Adams

to the last stage of cast-off misery. And yet, so openly tolerated and countenanced by leading men are these things, that on the 31st of July, 1852, this mother of crime appeals to the honorable board of aldermen, as appeared in the “Proceedings of Council” in the Charleston Courier of that date, in the following manner:

      “Laid over until a monied quorum is present.

      “Letter from Mrs. G. Pieseitto, informing Council that having recessed her new brick building in Berresford street at least two feet, so as to dedicate it to the use of the citizens of Charleston, if they will pave with flag-stones the front of her lot, respectfully requests, that if accepted, the work may be done as soon as possible. Referred to the Aldermen, Ward No. 4.” The street is narrow and little used, except for purposes known to the lanterns, when honest people should sleep. The information might have been couched with more modesty, when the notoriety of the woman and the dedication of her tabernacle of vice was so public. How far the sensitive aldermen of the fourth ward have proceeded in the delicate mission, or how much champagne their modest consideration has cost, the public have not yet been informed. Rumor says every thing is favorable. We are only drawing from a few principal points, and shall leave the reader to draw his own inference of the moral complexion of our social being. We make but one more view, and resume our story.

      An office connected with the judiciary, so long held as one of high responsibility and honorable position, is now held merely as a medium of miserable speculation and espionage. It is an elective office, the representative holding for four years. The present incumbent was elected more through charity than recompense for any amiable qualities, moral worth, or efficient services to party ends. A more weak man could not have been drawn from the lowest scale of party hirelings, though he had abdicated the office once before to save his name and the respectability of the judiciary. It may be said, he was elected in pity to speculate on misery; and thus it proved in the case of MANUEL PEREIRA. This functionary was elected by a large majority. Could his moral worth have been taken into consideration? We should think not! For several times have we been pointed to two interesting girls—or, if their color was not shaded, would be called young ladies—promenading the shady side of King street, with their faces deeply vailed, and informed who was their father. The mother of these innocent victims had been a mother to their father, had nursed him and maintained him through his adversity, and had lived the partner of his life and affections for many years, and had reared to him an interesting but fatal family. But, no sooner had fortune begun to shed its smiling rays, than he abandoned the one that had watched over him for the choice of one who could boast no more than a white skin.

      If men who fill high places live by teaching others to gratify their appetites and pleasures alone, instead of setting a commendable example for a higher state of existence, by whom can we expect that justice and moral worth shall be respected?

      Connected with the city constabulary are two men whose duty it is to keep a sharp lookout for all vessels arriving, and see that all negroes or colored seamen are committed to prison. One is a South Carolinian, by the name of Dusenberry, and the other an Irishman, by the name of Dunn. These two men, although their office is despicable in the eyes of many, assume more authority over a certain class of persons, who are unacquainted with the laws, than the mayor himself. The former is a man of dark, heavy features, with an assassin-like countenance, more inclined to look at you distrustfully than to meet you with an open gaze. He is rather tall and athletic, but never has been known to do any thing that would give him credit for bravery. Several times he has been on the brink of losing his office for giving too much latitude to his craving for perquisites; yet, by some unaccountable means, he manages to hold on. The other is a robust son of the Emerald Isle, with a broad, florid face, low forehead, short crispy hair very red, and knotted over his forehead. His dress is usually very slovenly and dirty, his shirt-collar bespotted with tobacco-juice, and tied with an old striped bandana handkerchief. This, taken with a very wide mouth, flat nose, vicious eye, and a countenance as hard as ever came from Tipperary, and a lame leg, which causes him to limp as he walks, gives our man Dunn the incarnate appearance of a fit body-grabber. A few words will suffice for his character. He is known to the official department, of which the magistrates are a constituent part, as a notorious——l; and his better-half, who, by-the-way, is what is called a free-trader, meaning, to save the rascality of a husband, sells liquor by small portions, to suit the Murphys and the O'Neals. But, as it pleases our Mr. Dunn, he very often becomes a more than profitable customer, and may be found snoring out the penalty in some sequestered place, too frequently for his own character. Between the hours of ten and twelve in the morning, Dunn, if not too much incapacitated, may be seen limping his way down Broad street, to watch vessels arriving and departing, carrying a limp-cane in one hand, and a large covered whip in the other. We were struck with the appearance of the latter, because it was similar to those carried in the hands of a rough, menial class of men in Macon, Georgia, who called themselves marshals, under a misapplication of the term. Their office was to keep the negro population “straight,” and do the whipping when called upon, at fifty cents a head. They also did the whipping at the jails, and frequently made from five to six dollars a day at this alone; for it is not considered fashionable for a gentleman to whip his own negro. We noticed the universal carrying of this whip, when we first visited Macon, some four years ago, and were curious to know its purport, which was elucidated by a friend; but we have since seen the practical demonstrations painfully carried out. Those who visited Boston for the recovery of Crafts and Ellen—whose mode of escape is a romance in itself—were specimens of these “marshals.” How they passed themselves off for gentlemen, we are at a loss to comprehend.

      During the day, the Messrs. Dusenberry and Dunn may be seen at times watching about the wharves, and again in low grog-shops—then pimping about the “Dutch beer-shops and corner-shops”—picking up, here and there, a hopeful-looking nigger, whom they drag off to limbo, or extort a bribe to let him go. Again, they act as monitors over the Dutch corner-shops, the keepers of which pay them large sums to save themselves the heavy license fine and the information docket. When they are no longer able to pay over hush-money, they find themselves walked up to the captain's office, to be dealt with according to the severe penalty made and provided for violating the law which prohibits the sale of liquor to negroes without an order. The failure to observe this law is visited with fine and imprisonment—both beyond their proportionate deserts, when the law which governs the sale of liquor to white men is considered. Things are very strictly regulated by complexions in South Carolina. The master sets the most dissipated and immoral examples in his own person, and allows his children not only to exercise their youthful caprices, but to gratify such feelings as are pernicious to their moral welfare, upon his slaves. Now, the question is, that knowing the negro's power of imitation, ought not some allowance to be made for copying the errors of his master? Yet such is not the case; for the slightest deviation from the strictest rule of discipline brings condign punishment upon the head of the offender.

CHAPTER V. MR. GRIMSHAW, THE MAN OF THE COUNTY.

       Table of Contents

      ON the 22d of March last, about ten o'clock in the morning, a thin, spare-looking man, dressed in a black cashmeret suit, swallow-tail coat, loose-cut pants, a straight-breasted vest, with a very extravagant shirt-collar rolling over upon his coat, with a black ribbon tied at the throat, stood at the east corner of Broad and Meeting street, holding a very excited conversation with officers Dusenberry and Dunn. His visage was long, very dark—much more so than many of the colored population—with pointed nose and chin, standing in grim advance to each other; his face narrow, with high cheek-bones, small, peering eyes, contracted forehead, reclining with a sunken arch between the perceptive and intellectual organs—or, perhaps, we might have said, where those organs should have been. His countenance was full of vacant restlessness; and as he stared at you through his glasses, with his silvery gray hair hanging about his ears and neck in shaggy points, rolling a large quid of tobacco in his mouth, and dangling a little whip in his right hand, you saw the index to his office. As he raised his voice—which he did by twisting his mouth on one side, and working his chin to adjust his enormous quid—the drawling tone in which he spoke gave a picture not