Our friend E. of New Castle tells us the following good one. During the late gubernatorial election, the fever raged high at LaGrange, Fayette county. Many freedmen crowded the streets and elbowed themselves up to the polls. As a matter of course, the radical ticket prevailed. Among the “Legers” for Brownlow as an old negro named Emanuel POTTS. As an electioneering trick, Emanuel had been promised by the radicals 40 acres and a mule, plow, and seeds. Time passed and with its flight disappointment. At the end of the year the freedman was without shelter for himself and family. He went to the New Castle neighborhood and applied for labor at the hands of a substantial citizen. Here he was asked where he had lived and for whom he had voted in the last election. POTTS was quick to answer the questions truthfully and had this to say, ” Masa, if I live, I sware fore God and man dat I neber will go with dem radicals agin; deys the most deceiving white trash dat I eber seed; all the niggers goin to see the pint just like I has and deys mighty sorry dat dey allowed de ‘humbuggers’ to do wid dem as dey did. At dis time, I wouldn’t give shucks for de radicals.” Emanuel was employed and is now directed by a gentleman.
The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.), 29 Feb. 1868, Page 2. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.
