in
1870, the most de ning feature of the old Cot ingham world,
Elisha, the white man who had sculpted the landscape onto which
Cooney was born and then seen it disintegrate, was dead.
Elisha was laid to rest at the top of the red-clay hil , surrounded
by what was left of the stand of beech and oak that had greeted his
arrival in the wilderness. As his life had been on the landscape
stretched out around him, Elisha's plot was squarely in the center of
the graveyard, with his wife, siblings, and kin fanning out to each
side. One body length away, just within arm's reach, lay in death a
long row of the slaves he had governed for most of a century in
life.2
Old Scip, once Elisha's most reliable slave, was not easing gently
toward his natural end. Freedom had taken tangible form for the
former slaves of the Cot ingham farm. Old Elisha's former slaves
separated into three groups. The rst, beginning with young Albert
Cot ingham, abandoned Bibb County and the place of their
enslavement as quickly as it had become clearly established that
they were in fact free to go wherever they wished.
Three other black families—each of them led by one from the
generation of middle-aged slaves who had spent the longest spans
of their lives as Cot ingham slaves—chose to remain close by the
old master, likely stil residing in the slave quarters a short distance
from Elisha's big house and later in simple tenant cabins erected to
replace them. The elder Green Cot inham , a partly white slave
now forty years old, along with his wife, Eme-line, and their baby
boy, Caesar, remained on the farm. Likely Green's mulat o line
boy, Caesar, remained on the farm. Likely Green's mulat o line
connected him directly to the white Cot inghams, but no record
survives to indicate whether that was so. Another slave father to
remain on the place was Je Cot ingham, forty-eight, who
continued to spel his name as his former master did, and who was
raising in his home an eight-year-old boy named Jonathon, who
was also partly white.3 Also staying behind was Milt, another of the
older crew of slaves.
On the other side of the big house, away from the slave cabins,
lived the youngest of Elisha's sons to reach adulthood, Harvey, also
forty years old, with his wife, Zelphia, and seven children. Slightly
farther down the wagon road, J. W. Starr's widow, Hannah,
remained in the preacher's house, though her son Lucius had
become the master of the household. Next door to them, a Starr
daughter and her family farmed on another portion of the dead
reverend's land.
A few miles away, beyond Cot ingham Loop, at the edge of the
Six Mile set lement around which the lives of al the Cot inghams
had come to orbit, Scip and the third group of former slaves set led
themselves in a life overshadowed by their former enslavement but
clearly distinct from the control ed lives they had formerly led.
At the center of those former slaves remained Scipio, stil
defiantly insistent that his birth as an African and the African origins
of his mother and father be ful y recorded whenever the census
taker or another government o cial inquired as to his provenance.
He took the name Cot inham.
Six Mile had the vague makings of a real town, with a smal
school and a weekly newspaper that boasted of a cluster of homes,
two stores, and a sawmil . On one boundary of the set lement lived
George Cot inham, now forty- ve, and next door lived Henry,
twenty-two years old, and Mary, with the lit le girl Cooney George
and Henry, as father and son, farmed rented property, probably
owned by the white Fancher family nearby.
Two houses away, Scip was ensconced with Charity, his junior by
thirty-eight years, and the ve children they had under the age of
thirty-eight years, and the ve children they had under the age of
fourteen. The e ort by General Gorgas to rebuild the Brier eld
furnaces had col apsed, and the weary Confederate industrialist
turned over the
1870, the most de ning feature of the old Cot ingham world,
Elisha, the white man who had sculpted the landscape onto which
Cooney was born and then seen it disintegrate, was dead.
Elisha was laid to rest at the top of the red-clay hil , surrounded
by what was left of the stand of beech and oak that had greeted his
arrival in the wilderness. As his life had been on the landscape
stretched out around him, Elisha's plot was squarely in the center of
the graveyard, with his wife, siblings, and kin fanning out to each
side. One body length away, just within arm's reach, lay in death a
long row of the slaves he had governed for most of a century in
life.2
Old Scip, once Elisha's most reliable slave, was not easing gently
toward his natural end. Freedom had taken tangible form for the
former slaves of the Cot ingham farm. Old Elisha's former slaves
separated into three groups. The rst, beginning with young Albert
Cot ingham, abandoned Bibb County and the place of their
enslavement as quickly as it had become clearly established that
they were in fact free to go wherever they wished.
Three other black families—each of them led by one from the
generation of middle-aged slaves who had spent the longest spans
of their lives as Cot ingham slaves—chose to remain close by the
old master, likely stil residing in the slave quarters a short distance
from Elisha's big house and later in simple tenant cabins erected to
replace them. The elder Green Cot inham , a partly white slave
now forty years old, along with his wife, Eme-line, and their baby
boy, Caesar, remained on the farm. Likely Green's mulat o line
boy, Caesar, remained on the farm. Likely Green's mulat o line
connected him directly to the white Cot inghams, but no record
survives to indicate whether that was so. Another slave father to
remain on the place was Je Cot ingham, forty-eight, who
continued to spel his name as his former master did, and who was
raising in his home an eight-year-old boy named Jonathon, who
was also partly white.3 Also staying behind was Milt, another of the
older crew of slaves.
On the other side of the big house, away from the slave cabins,
lived the youngest of Elisha's sons to reach adulthood, Harvey, also
forty years old, with his wife, Zelphia, and seven children. Slightly
farther down the wagon road, J. W. Starr's widow, Hannah,
remained in the preacher's house, though her son Lucius had
become the master of the household. Next door to them, a Starr
daughter and her family farmed on another portion of the dead
reverend's land.
A few miles away, beyond Cot ingham Loop, at the edge of the
Six Mile set lement around which the lives of al the Cot inghams
had come to orbit, Scip and the third group of former slaves set led
themselves in a life overshadowed by their former enslavement but
clearly distinct from the control ed lives they had formerly led.
At the center of those former slaves remained Scipio, stil
defiantly insistent that his birth as an African and the African origins
of his mother and father be ful y recorded whenever the census
taker or another government o cial inquired as to his provenance.
He took the name Cot inham.
Six Mile had the vague makings of a real town, with a smal
school and a weekly newspaper that boasted of a cluster of homes,
two stores, and a sawmil . On one boundary of the set lement lived
George Cot inham, now forty- ve, and next door lived Henry,
twenty-two years old, and Mary, with the lit le girl Cooney George
and Henry, as father and son, farmed rented property, probably
owned by the white Fancher family nearby.
Two houses away, Scip was ensconced with Charity, his junior by
thirty-eight years, and the ve children they had under the age of
thirty-eight years, and the ve children they had under the age of
fourteen. The e ort by General Gorgas to rebuild the Brier eld
furnaces had col apsed, and the weary Confederate industrialist
turned over the
Similar Books
