Democratic Sentinel, Volume 7, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 October 1883 — “OLD GREENBACKS HISSELF.” [ARTICLE]

“OLD GREENBACKS HISSELF.”

An Old Darky's Story of an Interview with Chief Justice Chase. [Ben: Perley Poore.] “Old Greenbacks” was the political appellation given to Chief Justice Chase when he was Secretary of the Treasury, by the enthusiastic clique which tried so hard to secure for him the Republican nomination for the Presidency. Among other stories told by the Chase men, by way of proving his popularity at the South, was one of his visits to a leading free negro in Florida, Uncle Solomon. Uncle Solomon had collected a good many war relics and Indian curiosities, which Mr. Chase inspected with interest, listening meanwhile to the old darky’s anecdotes relative to the war in Florida, and its effect Doth on the planters and negroes, as seen from his own peculiar standpoint, that of a free colored man cultivating some thirty or forty acres of His own land. After an hour thus pleasantly spent Mr. Chase thanked his entertainer, and, as he was about stepping into the ambulance which had conveyed him thither, for the purpose of returning, produced a new $1 bill and placed it in the astonished hands of Uncle Solomon. “What for dat?” asked Uncle Sol., holding out the bill indignantly at arm’s length. “Golly, massa, ’twasn’t for dat old uncle toted you round dis place. Fee got all I want, God be blessed for it!” and the old darky’s feelings appeared to have been really hurt. “Why, uncle, you mistake,” said the Chief Justice, kindly, stepping back out of his ambulance and pointing one finger to the vignette in the corner of the bill, “I knew you better, Uncle Sol, than to offer you money; and it is as a picture to remember me by, not as money, that I give you that bill. ” For a moment Uncle Sol was stupified, but, observing Mr. Chase still pointing with one hand to the vignette, while removing his broad-brimmed straw hat with the other, some glimmer of the truth began to break slowly in upon old uncle’s mind. Once or twice his eyes rolled between the face of the Chief Justice and the portrait in the corner of the crisp paper he was holding, a light of new intelligence every moment spreading over his features, and rapidly expanding into the broadest and happiest of grins. At length, throwing up his hands and bringing them down on his knees—a gesture many times repeated old Uncle Sol commenced shouting aloud : “Oh, golly, massa, if you ain’t Ole Greenbacks hisself! Golly, golly, if you ain’t Ole Greenbacks. I’se so glad to see you, massa, I’se so glad to see you! Oh, golly, massa, God be blessed dis old nigger has lived to see dis day!” The dollar bill was not returned, but enshrined in a neatly-carved frame of red cedar over the chimney-piece of Uncle Solomon’s best room, the mostprized and most-adored relic of all his odd museum. The old man never wearied of relating every minutest incident of that one bright, happy day, when his farm was made glorious and his life was ennobled through all future time by actual contact for an hour “with Old Greenbacks hisself.”