Forrest April 1872 Letter from Forrest to Mississippi Governor R.C. Powers

Championhilz

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While doing some research yesterday I ran across the following letter written by Nathan B. Forrest to Mississippi Governor R.C. Powers in 1872:


SELMA, MARION AND MEMPHIS RAILROAD CO.

Memphis, Tenn., April 2d, 1872

To his Excellency,

R.C. Powers

Governor of Miss.,

The last installment of convicts arrived here yesterday and I am obliged to draw your attention to the fact that they came here in a very dilapidated condition, looking as if they had been worked very hard. Several of them are no use to us in their present physical condition, & hardly will earn their board. They all need clothing very much and I will be under obligations to you, to advise me what to do in the _____. They convicts are getting along well & say they are better fed than ever before.

I expect to go to Europe in a few days for the purpose of negotiating my bonds and before I leave I would like to arrange to retain the Penitentiary force and will thank you to let me know whether this can be arranged.

Very Respectfully,

N.B. Forrest, Presdt.

(Seven of the convicts are actually no use to us)

Please let me also know how to arrange payments



(Series 794, Box 979, MDAH)
 
Very interesting letter. I knew that he had contracted with Alabama for prisoners so I guess it would make since for NBF to do the same in Miss. Here an original SM&M RR bond I have in my collection from 1869.
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Very interesting letter! Forrest and his then partner Thompson were preparing to go to Europe on the 7th to see if they could sell their railroad bonds there. The 1877 Recession was on its way and Forrest was having a hard time getting workers. That's how he became involved with the convict leasing system. It was a system that was forced on him - he didn't really want to do it but at this point he didn't have a lot of options. This labor shortage was also why he advocated immigration from China. The Chinese often had a system brought from their country whereby they looked after themselves as a group - the convicts were totally dependent on whoever hired them from the state. Forrest is roundly criticized for using this system, but he didn't invent it nor did he find it the system of choice - it was expensive for him as this letter shows. The state was dumping the care and feeding of these people on whoever hired them! At President's Island, Forrest had 117 convicts working for him, and as the letter shows they were much better off with him than elsewhere. This gruesome system lasted until 1896, when it was repealed and replaced with the chain gang...which wasn't any different!
 
Fascinating topic and something I knew very little about. Thanks for posting the letter @Championhilz
Very interesting letter. I knew that he had contracted with Alabama for prisoners so I guess it would make since for NBF to do the same in Miss. Here an original SM&M RR bond I have in my collection from 1869.
View attachment 350221View attachment 350222View attachment 350223View attachment 350224
Wow! Thanks for sharing the pictures.
The state was dumping the care and feeding of these people on whoever hired them!
Was the person who hired them responsible to clothe them? What about medical care? And the seven that were unable to work due to their depleted physical condition on arrival? Was the person who hired them obligate to feed and clothe them until they were sufficiently recovered to work? Or did the state provide for them?
 
Fascinating topic and something I knew very little about. Thanks for posting the letter @Championhilz

Wow! Thanks for sharing the pictures.

Was the person who hired them responsible to clothe them? What about medical care? And the seven that were unable to work due to their depleted physical condition on arrival? Was the person who hired them obligate to feed and clothe them until they were sufficiently recovered to work? Or did the state provide for them?

As I understand it, and it's an area I've just started looking at, most costs were on the person hiring the convicts although, as evidenced by Forrest's letter, some small state assistance was expected. Mainly it was being sent healthy persons! When he had a large number of convicts working on President's Island, it was a contract with the state but they were not all that liberal with their interpretation of what their obligations were or forthcoming with what they had. Forrest built a barracks for the convicts and a sanitation system for those barracks at his own expense, hoping to recoup some of the cost from his corn harvest. After his death, his son finished out the contract then was done with the enterprise altogether.
 
This is interesting as I did not know Bedford as appointed President of a Railroad owned by mostly Yankee out of State stockholders was already engaged in leasing state inmates from a southerner State Prison system to work the railroad as early as 1872 as per above document. Were they doing this in Alabama in 1869 at the other document? State inmate on lease were much cheaper than paying wages to free laborers. As per JACK HURST biography of Bedford, the state inmate leasing to Bedford Forrest to have prison inmates work a type of agriculture slave labor on Forrest's plantation on President's Island did not commence until 1875. It was a five year contract with Shelby County in which Forrest was to pay 10 cents a day per state inmate to the State. Bedford appear very willing to enter these contracts for cheap labor.
 
This is interesting as I did not know Bedford as appointed President of a Railroad owned by mostly Yankee out of State stockholders was already engaged in leasing state inmates from a southerner State Prison system to work the railroad as early as 1872 as per above document. Were they doing this in Alabama in 1869 at the other document? State inmate on lease were much cheaper than paying wages to free laborers. As per JACK HURST biography of Bedford, the state inmate leasing to Bedford Forrest to have prison inmates work a type of agriculture slave labor on Forrest's plantation on President's Island did not commence until 1875. It was a five year contract with Shelby County in which Forrest was to pay 10 cents a day per state inmate to the State. Bedford appear very willing to enter these contracts for cheap labor.

How so?
 
They all need clothing very much and I will be under obligations to you, to advise me what to do in the _____. They convicts are getting along well & say they are better fed than ever before.
These two lines have me confused. How much is missing in the ______? One word? One line?
And should that sentence "They convicts" read as "The convicts"?

The first sentence says the convicts are doing terrible and the 2nd one says they are doing great. What did I miss?
 
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