Hilton Head, S. C.
Aug 10th 1865

Friend Fuller,

Your letter reached me at last safely, by way of home. I have not been there yet, & shall now, I think, weather the warm season. It agrees with me tolerably, & as I am needed here now, I have given up breathing Northern air for the present.

I am glad you find anything in my letters entertaining. They look miserably dull to me. Life here is so monotonous, the days so nearly all alike, the rows of black faces so exactly similar, that it seems as if one letter must tell all there is to be told. Unless indeed I get to prosing upon the future of the black man & his enfranchisement.

I like what you say of our personal influence. I know that to many of my acquaintance, a letter from here, written by me whom they know of things which I know, will have far greater effect in "stirring them up" upon the negro question than a pamphlet written by a stranger, with infinitely more power. I have tried to exert this influence to its utmost, & have written unsparingly to all those with whom I correspond urging them to be alive to the necessity of awakening earnest public sentiment in behalf of the freedmen. Once arouse that as it is capable of being aroused at the North & legal justice may be done; then social justice will follow in time; not sooner, perhaps not for generations, but in time. That secure, every exertion must be made to educate the people, to give them not book-knowledge only, but knowledge of moral & social duties. I am appalled at the hugeness of this work. What is one, what am I, before such an Herculean task! I tremble & shrink, & want to run away. And it must be done, or the consequences will be terrible beyond conception. Why, why is such wickedness & sin permitted--such oppression as not only has existed but still exists on the part of the strong, forcing the week into ignorance & sin? I am weary of it; weary of the world; weary of life. Is existence a blessing? Happy Carrie, whose faith is changed so early into sight. Mine sometimes fails.

The educated blacks are I think invariably good citizens. Of course they must be possessed of a certain amount of energy & perseverance to have acquired an education under the circumstances of their lot. I was talking with one last week, who was on his way to Richmond from Augusta, to bring his wife. He gave me a little history of the last few years. He was married about the time of the rebellion, & in '62 ran away to the Yankee lines. He was however retaken & sold down in Georgia. He had a hard master, but succeeded in hiring his time--he is a shoemaker--for eighteen dollars a month, & the next year for two hundred & eight dollars, confederate currency. Now he had a flourishing business in Augusta, & was going to bring his family. Said I, "You think you can take care of yourself & support your family without your master's help?" He looked at me a moment to see what I meant, & then bursting into his negro "yah-yah" he said, "Yes missis, I tinks I can." I said he had had a pretty hard time since he was taken prisoner."Yes, missis, but I neber sorry for it. It done made a man of me. Neber anything before, neber should 'a been. Now I kin take

 

PS: You do not say anything of your mother's health. I hope therefore that she is better. My love to her if you please.