It Happened in Memphis: First Installment
As the national holiday observing what some mark as the end of slavery in the U.S., June 19, 1865, approaches, I will offer in the coming weeks several stories taking place between 1862 and 1865 in Memphis, Tennessee, an essential site of African-American Emancipation.
In this first installment, I include two historical images: one, a story that appeared in the Cleveland Leader in February of 1864. The story was about the decision of then Commander at Memphis Gen. Ralph Buckland who, influenced by the appeal of a nearby slave owner, returned three young children to their master after their father, John Christian, with help from fellow soldiers, absconded with his offspring, taking them to one of the city’s contraband (refugee) camps.
The second image is a map of Civil War-era Memphis that identifies the general location of the camps along the Mississippi River, as well as the location of the plantation to which the children were returned and the location of an abandoned plantation used by the Union army in perpetuation of the cotton economy.
March 4, 1864 — the third year of the U.S. Civil War — Gen. Ralph Buckland wrote home to his older son Horace, who had sent his father an article published in the Cleveland Leader about Buckland’s surrender of three black children to their master.
In the letter of response, Buckland explained the situation that resulted in the children’s return, denying any suggestion that he had acted entirely from his own judgement or power, or in the interest of the slave owner, Dr. Wheaton of Memphis.
Buckland maintained that, as the paper also indicated, he had only followed the instruction of his superior, Gen. Stephen A. Hurlbut. Buckland informed Horace that, in fact, Hurlbut, as well as Gen. James C. Veatch, had forbidden the children being taken away from Wheaton’s home in the first place. Not only that but that their father’s retrieval of his children, in and of itself, constituted a crime — in Buckland’s words — armed “invasion” of Wheaton’s property.
…being personally acquainted with family of Dr. Wheaton and the manner in which the children are treated and cared for, I was satisfied that it would be better for the children to remain in Dr. Wheaton’s care than to be taken to a contraband camp where they would necessarily secure poor care and be exposed to all sorts of diseases, Buckland stated.
Whoever had written the article becrying the matter did not, could not, understand such matters, not having seen the condition of the camps, Buckland continued. Because of the alleged condition of the camp in which John and Pauline Christian were living — a site toured by no lesser figure than the Adjutant Gen. Lorenzo Thomas even as the affair was unfolding, Buckland generally advised blacks to remain on plantations with their masters if they were there well treated.
Buckland thanked his son for alerting him to the article and stated that he would himself follow up on the matter beginning with writing the Leader to determine its author. The spirit of Buckland’s response to Horace was that it was Buckland himself who had been wronged in this matter, his good name maligned for what he believed others in the camp agreed was “an act of humanity towards the children.”
Confident that his explanation, indeed his judgement in the case, was sensible and just, Buckland indicated that he had little time for reading articles about his conduct and on-the-ground policies at the camp and that if friends at home were concerned about his actions Horace could share his father’s written response.
Buckland closed the letter with a combination of formalcy and fatherly sentiments —
My love to all. Tell George I am sorry that he is sick and hope he will soon be well again. Give many kisses for me.
Yours &c.
R.P. Buckland.
As it turned out, there was in fact cause for concern regarding how Buckland’s friends would view the situation. Close to three months following the news article, Buckland wrote D.T. Stillwell informing him of a letter received from J.H. Pittinger of Tiffin, Ohio. Pittinger, desiring to support Buckland for Congress, asked for explanation of the “matter of the colored children.”
At this juncture, Buckland did not rely on the letter written his son. Rather, he wrote at least one other letter offering explanation, one to “June.”
You may see the letter and advise the publication of so much of the letter as you may think advisable. I also send you the letter of Dr. Wheaton which the Leader refused to publish. It was published in the Ohio State Journal and it is singular that Keeler or someone in Fremont has not seen it. You can have this published if you think best.
In the letter to Stillwell, Buckland admitted not being very interested in serving in Congress but stated that he was ready to end his service, a goal which election to Congress would help him to achieve. “Being elected to Congress would aid me in this object, and be gratifying to an endorsement of my services in the Army,” the general wrote.
How shall Gen. Buckland be judged? As an inhumane racist, caring about his own children while unable to extend parental sentiment to other people’s blood bonds?
It is unknown whether the Christians were reunited with their children before the end of the war, or if any of the family survived these years. It is unfortunate, if not surprising, that John’s military service, his most likely being enlisted in the 64th USCT, a regiment that spent a good deal of time at Memphis, was of little help in protecting the children. How many others, adults and children, were returned at the whim of a white commander? And what relationship between this one story and the thousands more whose brief time in camp ended in labor on abandoned plantations?
Buckland would be elected to the 39th and 40th Congresses. But while still in Memphis he lost his own child, a daughter, suddenly while she was on a visit there. Death most certainly was a constant in wartime and in the nineteenth century in general. And possibly for Buckland, as for others, the surrender of a child, was simply one kind of loss that belonged to the time. We can wonder the nature of Wheaton’s private conference with Buckland, who was, among other things, a politician and a hard businessman. Perhaps we must study how the general’s moral domain was mapped. Such study is not beyond reach.
Buckland’s papers are housed at the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library and Museums.
