Excerpts from requests for interventions sent to Freedman’s Bureau, June 1865
Army Chaplain William A. Green and several missionaries requested help when a reduction in rations on Roanoke Island created a crisis.
Roanoke Island. N.C. June 5” 1865
General In behalf of suffering humanity which it is not within our power to relieve, we appeal to you trusting that the necessity of the case may be sufficient reason for addressing you personally and directly
There are about thirty five hundred blacks upon this island, the larger part of whom are dependents of the following classes, viz. Aged and Infirm, Orphan children and soldiers wives and families. Of these about twenty seven hundred have (including children) drawn rations from the Government, and by this assistance and the exertions of benevolent Societies they have been cared for, though not without extreme suffering in many instances up to the present time.
Those who are able to work have proved themselves industrious and would support themselves, had they the opportunity to do so, under favorable circumstances. The able bodied males with few exceptions are in the army, and there are not many families on the Island that have not furnished a father, husband or son, and in numerous instances, two and three members to swell the ranks of our army. And these left their families and enlisted with the assurance from the Government that their families should be cared for, and supported in their absence.
The issue of rations has been reduced, so that only about fifteen hundred now receive any subsistence from the Government. The acre of ground allotted to each family has been cleared and tilled, to the best of their ability – but this has only produced a very small part of what has been, and is required for family consumption. . . .
There are numerous cases of orphan children who have been taken in and afforded shelter while subsistence was furnished, who are now cast off because they have nothing to eat.
There are many who are sick and disabled whose ration has been cut off, and these instances are not isolated, but oft recurring and numerous. It is a daily occurrence to see scores of women and children crying for bread, whose husbands, sons and fathers are in the army today, and because these things are fully known, and understood by those whose duty it is to attend to, and remedy them and disregarded by them. we appeal to a Source more remote and out of the ordinary channel.
We do this with a feeling that the emergency demands immediate action to prevent suffering which justice, humanity, and every principle of christianity forbids.
With the hope of immediate investigation which Shall bring with it a Speedy relief, We remain Your Obt Ser’ts [Obedient Servants]
Wm A Green Susan Odell
Caroline A Green Mrs. R.S.D. Holboro
Amasa Walker Stevens Ella Roper
Mrs. S.P. Freeman E.P. Bennett
Esther A. Williams Kate L. Freeman
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Black soldiers wrote to the commissioner of the bureau seeking assistance for their families who lived on Roanoke Island.
City Point Va. May or June 1865
General
We the soldiers of the 36 U.S. Col[ored] Regiment humbly petition to you to alter the Affairs at Roanoke Island. We have served in the US Army faithfully and done our duty to our Country, for which we thank God (that we had the opportunity) but at the same time our family’s are suffering at Roanoke Island N.C.
1st When we were enlisted in the service we were promised that our wives and family’s should receive rations from the government. The rations for our wives and families have been (and are now cut down) to one half the regular ration. Consequently three or four days out of every ten days, they have nothing to eat. At the same time our rations are stolen from the ration house by Mr. Streeter the Assistant Superintendent at the Island (and others) and sold while our families are suffering for something to eat.
2nd Mr. Streeter the Assistant Superintendent of Negro Affairs at Roanoke Island is a througher Cooper head* a man who says that he is no part of a Abolitionist, takes no care of the colored people and has no Sympathy with the colored people. A man who kicks our wives and children out of the ration house or commissary, he takes no notice of their actual suffering and sells the rations and allows it to be sold, and our families suffer for something to eat.
3rd Captain James the Suptn in charge has been told of these facts and has taken no notice of them. So has Colonel Lahman the Commander in charge of Roanoke, but no notice is taken of it, because it comes from Contrabands or Freedmen. The cause of much suffering is that Captain James has not paid the Colored people for their work for near a year and at the same time cuts the rations off to one half so the people have neither provisions or money to buy it with. There are men on the Island that have been wounded at Dutch Gap Canal, working there, and some discharged soldiers, men that were wounded in the service of the U.S. Army, and returned home to Roanoke that cannot get any rations and are not able to work, some soldiers are sick in Hospitals that have never been paid a cent and their families are suffering and their children going crying without anything to eat.
4th Our families have no protection. The white soldiers break into our houses act as they please, steal our chickens, rob our gardens and if any one defends their selves against them they are taken to the guard house for it. So our families have no protection when Mr. Streeter is here to protect them and will not do it.
5th General, we the soldiers of the 36 U.S. Colored Troops having familys at Roanoke Island humbly petition you to favor us by removing Mr. Streeter the present Assistant Superintendent at Roanoke Island under Captain James.
General, perhaps you think the Statements against Mr. Streeter too strong, but we can prove them.
General, order chaplain Green to Washington to report the true state of things at Roanoke Island, with Mr. Holland Streeter and he can prove the facts. and there are plenty of white men here that can prove them also, and many more thing’s not mentioned. Signed in behalf of humanity
Richard Etheredge
William Benson
Source: Reprinted in Berlin, Ira and Leslie S. Howland, eds. Families and Freedom: A Documentary History of African American Kinship in the Civil War Era. New York: New Press, 1997. 125. (Document 4.12.2)