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By Root 1279 0

attain a greater degree of privacy, the slaves might assemble “down in the hollow” or in the “hush-harbors,” secluded meeting spots away from the Big House where the slaves would employ various devices to absorb the sounds. What transpired at such gatherings appears to have been a mixture of prayer, singing, and candid discussions (often whispered) about subjects that had to be repressed in the presence of the whites. On some plantations, it provided slaves with an opportunity to relieve themselves of the tensions and physical exhaustion that had accumulated over a long day and evening of hard labor. During the war, these gatherings took on even greater importance, serving not only to allow personal release and expression but also to convey and discuss the most recent news about the military situation, the proximity of Union troops, the prospect of emancipation, and the master’s intentions. Traveling in the interior of Virginia, an “unobserved spectator” who happened upon such a gathering heard them pray for the success of the North, and one old woman wept for joy when told that the Yankees were soon coming to set them free. “Oh! good massa Jesus,” she shouted, “let the time be short.” After the white preacher on the Davis plantation in Texas led the slaves in prayers for the Confederacy, he left apparently confident of their faithfulness. That night, however, the slaves met secretly “down in de hollow” and Uncle Mack entertained them with a story.

One time over in Virginny dere was two ole niggers, Uncle Bob and Uncle Tom. Dey was mad at one ’nuther and one day dey decided to have a dinner and bury de hatchet. So dey sat down, and when Uncle Bob wasn’t lookin’ Uncle Tom put some poison in Uncle Bob’s food, but he saw it and when Uncle Tom wasn’t lookin’, Uncle Bob he turned de tray roun’ on Uncle Tom, and he gits de poison food.

Looking out at the assembled group, Uncle Mack concluded: “Dat’s what we slaves is gwine do, jus’ turn de tray roun’ and pray for de North to win.”55

When the wartime experience began to reveal a diversity of slave response and behavior, whites were sometimes too incredulous to concede that they might have overextended themselves in the praise and confidence they had earlier lavished upon “the faithful slave.” Victims of their own self-assurances, they seemed incapable of dealing with reality, refusing to believe that their slaves understood the implications of the war. “The truth is,” Henry W. Ravenel of South Carolina insisted to the very end, “the negroes know but little of the cause & issues of the war.” That assumption would enable Ravenel to blame the Yankee invaders for turning the heads of the blacks, leading them into acts of mischief and betrayal. But the impact of the war was simply too pervasive, and the sources of information too plentiful, to have kept the slaves in total ignorance of its meaning. As early as the election of 1860, in fact, several white observers had noted how slaves were “the most interested and eager listeners” at political gatherings, and numerous blacks recalled how their own masters had voiced fears that the election of Abraham Lincoln would doom slavery.56

Although slaves were reticent about openly revealing their feelings, they found it increasingly difficult to mask them. Even as their muscles remained faithful to the master, raising the crops that were both indispensable for the war effort and necessary for survival in the quarters, their faces and sometimes their words and actions threatened to betray their inner thoughts, particularly when the prospect of emancipation became clearer and the outcome of the war more predictable. The slaves appeared to sense when that turning point had been reached. “Damn the niggers,” a Louisiana planter exclaimed, “they know more about politics than most of the white men. They know everything that happens.” To a newspaper editor in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the progress of the war could be discerned by simply watching the faces of the local blacks: “The spirits of the colored citizens rise and fall with the ebb and