REPORT.Office of the Board of Education for Freedmen, )Department of the Gulf,)February 28, 1865.)Major General S. A. Hurlbut,Commanding Department of the Gulf:

General--In complaince with your order, we have the honor to submit the following Report of the Board of Education for Freedmen, Department of the Gulf.

The Report relates the operations of the Board from the date of its organization, March 22d, 1864, to December 31st, same year--a period of nine months.

When, in April, 1862, the guns of Farragut transferred the city of New Orleans from rebel to national rule, no such thing as a "Public School" for colored children, was found in the schedule of the conquest.

No such thing had ever existed in the Crescent City. Even that portion of the colored population, who, for generations, had been wealthy and free, were allowed no public school, although taxed to support the school-system of the city and State. Occasionally a small donation was made from the public fund to a school for orphans, attached to the Colored Orphans' Asylum.

The children of the free colored people who were in good circumstances, known as "Creoles," generally of French or Spanish extraction, when not educated abroad, or at the North, or from fairness of complexion, by occasional admission to the white schools, were quietly instructed at home, or in a very few private schools, of their class.

Even these, although not contrary to law, were really the ban of opinion, but were tolerated, because of the freedom, wealth, respectability and light color of the parents, many of whom were nearly white, and by blood, sympathy, association, slaveholding, and other interests, were allied to the white rather than to the black.

For the poor, of the free colored people, there was no school.

To teach a slave the dangerous arts of reading and writing, was a heinous offence, having, in the language of the statute, "a tendency to excite insubordination among the servile class, and punishable by imprisonment at hard labor for not more than twenty-one years, or by death, at the discretion of the Court."

In the face of all obstacles, a few of the free colored people, of the poorer class, learned to read and write. Cases of like proficiency were found among the slaves, where some restless bondsman, yearning for the knowledge, that somehow he coupled with liberty, hid himself from public notice, to con over, in secret and laboriously, the magic letters.

In other cases, limited teaching of a slave was connived at, by a master, who might find it convenient for his servant to read.

Occasionally, the slave was instructed by some devout and sympathizing woman or generous man, who secretly violated law and resisted opinion, for the sake of justice and humanity.

A single attempt had been made to afford instruction, through a school, to the poor of the colored people, by Mrs. Mary D.Brice, of Ohio, a student of Antioch College, who, with her husband, both poor in money, came to New Orleans in December, 1858, under a sense of duty, to teach colored people.

So many and great were the obstacles, that Mrs. Brice was unable to begin her school until September, 1860. At that time she opened a "school for colored children and adults," at the corner of Franklin and Perdido streets.

The popular outcry obliged her to close the school in June, 1861.

Subsequently receiving, as she believed, a divine intimation that she would be sustained, Mrs. Brice again opened her school in November following, near the same place; afterwards removing to Magnolia street, on account of room.

Under Confederate rule, she was repeatedly "warned" to desist teaching.

The gate-posts in front of her house were covered at night by placards, threatening "death to nigger teachers."

When forced to suspend her school, Mrs. Brice stole round at night, especially on dark and rainy nights, the more easily to elude observation, to the houses or resorts of her pupils, and there taught the eager learners, under every disability of mutual poverty, often of sore need, in face of imprisonment, banishment, or possible death.

Upon the occupation of the city by our forces, her school was preserved from further molestation, rather by the moral sentiment of the army than by any direct action; for so timid or prejudiced were many of our commanders, that long after that time General Emory sent for the Rev. Thomas Conway, to admonish him not to advocate, 00045publicly, the opening of schools for colored children, as it would be very dangerous!

The school of Mrs. Brice continued to thrive, and subsequently passed under the Board of Education, in whose employ she is now an efficient and honored Principal.

The advent of the Federal army weakened slavery, and suspended the pains and penalties of its bloody code, and a few private teachers began to appear, in response to the strong desire of the colored people for instruction.

No public schools were established until October, 1863. The great work was fairly begun by the "Commission of Enrollment," created by order of Major General Banks, commanding Department of the Gulf.

In February, 1864, was published General Order No. 23, of Gen. Banks, known as the "Labor Order." That order bridged the chasm between the old and the new. By it the laborer, although a slave, was permitted to choose his employer. The governing power was shifted from the planter to the Provost Marshal.

In addition to food, clothing, quarters, fuel, medical attendance and wages, instruction for his children was promised the colored man by the Government.

In accordance with that promise, General Order No. 38, Headquarters, Department of the Gulf, was issued by Major General Banks, on March 22d, ensuing. (See Appendix B.)

That order created a "Board of Education for Freedmen, for the Department of the Gulf, with power to establish common schools, employ teachers, erect school-houses, regulate the course of studies, and have generally the same authority that Assessors, Supervisors and Trustees have, in the Northern States, in the matter of establishing and conducting common schools."

The purpose of the order is stated to be "for the rudimental instruction of the Freedmen of the Department, placing within their reach those elements of knowledge which give greater intelligence and value to labor."

Two members of the Board, under this order, held their first meeting on the day of its issue, and began their work.

On the first of April the schools conducted by the "Commission of Enrollment" were transferred to the "Board of Education." These 00056schools were seven in number, employing twenty-three teachers, with an average attendance of fourteen hundred and twenty-two pupils.

There were by that time a few colored schools in the city, under the auspices of benevolent societies. One by one these were offered to the Board and accepted; and unity of purpose and concert of action soon followed among all the friends of education for colored people.

A schedule for the weekly reports of teachers was speedily prepared and issued. (See Appendix C.)

From these reports the consolidated tabular statement for each month is made up.

A course of inspection was instituted, by which each department of the schools in this city and vicinity, embracing Algiers, Gretna, Orleans and Jefferson parishes, is visited weekly and examined.

The schools in the more distant parishes are inspected monthly--owing to the difficulty of obtaining men qualified to be school inspectors and agents, at the small salaries we pay. Although on this account the more distant schools are inspected but once a month, the teachers report weekly, which, with the correspondence maintained with the Provost Marshals, furnish the data to determine their progress.

In spite of a state of war, the fierce opposition of prejudice or passion, of all obstacles and disabilities, so really vital is this system of instruction, that at the close of the year 1864, after but nine months' existence, the Board of Education was sustaining, in successful operation, 95 schools, with 162 teachers and 9571 pupils--being an average monthly increase of 10 schools, 15 teachers and 850 pupils.

In addition, the number of colored adults of both sexes receiving instruction in night and Sunday schools, under the auspices of the Board, is over 2000.

Of the scholars in attendance in December there were--3883 writing on slates.1108 writing in copy books.283 studying Grammar.1338 studying Geography.1223 studying Practical Arithmetic.4628 studying Mental Arithmetic.7623 Reading.8301 Spelling.2103 learning the Alphabet.

Early in the spring of 1864 a census was taken by the parish Provost Marshals, of the colored children between the ages of five and twelve years, within our lines. The returns of this census indicated a school population of 15,840. Later in the season this number was swelled by the influx of hundreds of families from the Red River country, and by colored people entering our lines at all available points. 00067It is estimated that the number of colored children, of school-attending age, now within our lines of military occupation, in Louisiana, exceeds twenty thousand. Of that number we have, at this writing, over eleven thousand in school.

These accessions from beyond the lines explain the apparent discrepancy in the Provost Marshal's census with our schedule, where, in the parishes of Lafourche and Jefferson, the number of children in our schools exceeds the total, as given in the Marshal's enrollments.

It is scarcely possible to exaggerate the difficulty of establishing these schools in the country parishes.

Considering the expense and the probability of change in the school districts, the Board decided not to build school-houses at present, but to avail themselves of such accommodations as could be found.

The parish Provost Marshals were directed to seize and turn over to the Board all buildings designated by our agents as essential to the schools, taking care not to incommode or irritate any one, beyond the necessities of the case.

Any hesitancy to act, or indifference on the part of the Marshals, was met forthwith by the Provost Marshal General in the shape of a peremptory order, or by the prompt removal of the refractory subordinate. By this means the first obstacles were overcome. Had the Board received from the same office a continuance of the active interest in these schools manifested by General Bowen during his incumbency, we should have had, at this time, at least three thousand additional pupils.

Cabins, sheds, unused houses, were appropriated, roughly repaired, fitted with a cheap stove for the winter, a window or two for light and air a teacher sent to the locality, the neighboring children gathered in, and the school started.

In some of the parishes, so great was the difficulty of obtaining boarding places for our teachers--notwithstanding the efforts of agents and Provost Marshals--that a special order or circular letter was published, (see Appendix D,) by which many of the teachers were provided with temporary homes. But it frequently occurs, that in a desirable locality for a school, it is impossible to obtain boarding for the teachers. In such cases, a weather-proof shelter of some kind--very poor at best--is obtained, some simple furniture provided, and a teacher sent who is willing to undergo the privations--often hardships-of boarding herself, in addition to the fatigues of her school,

Compelled to live on the coarsest diet of corn bread and bacon; often no tea, coffee, butter, eggs, or flour; separated by miles of bad 00078roads from the nearest provision store; refused credit because she is a negro teacher, unable to pay cash because the Government is unavoidably in arrears; subjected to the jeers and hatred of her neighbors; cut off from society, with unfrequent and irregular mails; swamped in mud--the school shed a drip, and her quarters little better; raided occasionally by rebels, her school broken up and herself insulted, banished, or run off to rebeldom; under all this, it is really suprising how some of these brave women manage to live, much more how they are able to render the service they do as teachers.

Despite all the efforts of our agents, the assistance of the Provost Marshals, and the devotion of the teachers, many of these schools would have to be abandoned but for the freedmen themselves. These, fully alive to all that is being done for them, gratefully aid the teachers from their small store, and mount guard against the enemy of the schools, whether he be a rebel, a guerilla, or a pro-slavery professed unionist skulking behind the oath.

In a parish, some distance from New Orleans, a building was procured, an energetic teacher sent, scholars gathered, and the work begun. The first week brought no report. It came subsequently, as follows: "Arrived. Found a place to live a mile and a half from the school-shed! Dreadful people, dirty and vulgar, but the best I can do. Went about gathering scholars, have forty. Did well enough till it rained, since then have walked three miles a day, ankle deep in thick black mud that pulls off my shoes. Nothing to eat but strong pork and sour bread. Insulted for being a `nigger teacher.' Can't buy anything on credit, and have'nt a cent of money. The school shed has no floor, and the rains sweep clean across it, through the places where the windows should be. I have to huddle the children first in one corner and then in another to keep them from drowning or swamping. The Provost Marshal won't help me. Says 'he don't believe in nigger teachers--did'nt 'list to help them.' The children come rain or shine, plunging through the mud--some of them as far as I do. Pretty pictures they are. What shall I do? If it will ever stop raining I can get along."

Who ever has attempted to march through the adhesive mud of this delta, under a Louisiana rain-storm, will realize the accuracy of that report. It is one of a score.

Another class of obstacles is fairly indicated by the following extract from the report of a country teacher:

"I have, in vain, attempted to form a night school. I never dared take more than two pupils, because some of the officers are so opposed to the instruction of negroes. One use to let his dogs loose after 00089supper to bite the night-scholars, till I told him I would kill them if they bit my pupils. A great many would come to night-school only they are afraid.

"I had rather not contend with such people; but in a short time there will be another Provost Marshal here, and probably I can keep night-school. Capt.--never interfered with the school, but he don't approve of it, and allows others in his house to annoy it."

Where the parish Provost Marshal is indifferent or opposed to negro education, the annoyance, and even peril of the teachers, is often great, from the remains of that class from which slave drivers and negro hunters sprang. A class that does not seem to be numbered for the resurrection from this revolution, and that hastens its own destruction with the madness of men pre-ordained to perish. This class hates the district schools with all the virulence of ignorance and complexional caste.

In Thibodeaux the school-house has been broken open, on successive nights, for months past, the furniture defaced, the books destroyed and the house made untenable by nuisance. Bricks and missiles have been hurled through the windows, greatly risking limb and life, and making general commotion. Complaint after complaint has not yet afforded relief or protection.

General Cameron kindly and promptly sent a guard, on one or two occasions; but as the detection and arrest of the cowardly assailants depends upon the disposition and vigilance of the parish Provost Marshal, the outrages continue.

A Provost Marshal reported a large number of children in one locality in his parish, but no school, and very little possibility of establishing one, owing to the hostility of the residents and the proximity of the rebels.

We resolved to try it. A young lady born in Louisiana, late of slaveholding associations, agreed to attempt the opening of the school. She manage to locate herself in the district, and there began her missionary visits to collect the children, alone, on foot, through mud and dust, rain and heat, to the several plantations. She succeeded in assembling seventy scholars, in spite of the usual protests of opposers, that they were either under or over age.

Her school flourished until, by a sudden irruption of rebels, the small Federal force was captured or expelled, the post robbed, one of our best men killed, the school scattered, and the teacher driven to New Orleans.

She reported to the Board and was offered a situation in the city. "Oh no," said she with spirit, "I can't lose my little children. I'm 000910going back with the flag." The flag went and the teacher with it. At the last account she had reassembled sixty of her pupils, and was doing well.

In another instance, a school had been established by consent of the manager, upon the plantation of a gentleman of northern extraction, said to be a Unionist, but who, to some extent, is an absentee proprietor. Upon his return he complained of the school, and demanded its removal. By a singular coincidence in time with this demand, the rebels visited the plantation.

The Principal of the school, a brave woman, who has lived all her life in New Orleans, states with positiveness, of her own knowledge, that the rebels, upon the occasion of their visit, were hospitably entertained by the planter, possibly in conformity with the Christian injunction, "love thine enemies." They came to the school, warning the teacher to desist from "nigger teaching," and were about to enforce their warning. The teacher defied and shamed them, so that they left. On a day or two following they returned, broke up the school, borrowed a buggy, captured the teachers, and prepared to leave with them to Dixie, amid the clapping of hands and general acclamation of the lady spectators. The more timid of the two teachers was alarmed and distressed, but the Principal chided her companion for her fears, and vented her scorn and hatred of the cowardly ruffians in no measured terms. Laughing at her spirit, they ordered the girls into the buggy and set out, a black man driving, and a Confederate Captain and Lieutenant riding on either side of the vehicle.

The colored people were greatly agitated at the prospect of the rebels taking their teachers, and gladly obeyed the Principal's injunction to "ring the bell" and alarm our pickets. The sympathizing and vigilant Africans had already sent a messenger to the pickets, but he was stopped and ordered back by somebody.

Many threats were made by the rebels officers against the negro driver for his tardy pace, which he could not be induced to hasten.

When some miles on the way, and nearing the rebels pickets, the brave girl, who never lost her presence of mind, seeing the case hopeless and rescue impossible, except by delay, and happening to observe a weak spot in harness, snatched the lines from the driver's hands and struck the horse smartly. His sudden start broke the harness. During the delay and the hard swearing of the rebel officers, our pickets came up with the party, the rebels escaping. The teachers were restored, the school removed from the domain of the loyal planter to a confiscated plantation near by, where it has since been raided and broken up, possibly by the same influence. The teachers aver, and cannot be convinced to the contrary, that the rebels raided the school and captured them by collusion with the planter, whose hostility to 001011negro education, and to the policy of progress, may have induced him to overstep the easy barrier of quasi loyalty.

While the teachers in the city and towns are not subjected to the same sort of annoyance and outrage, they are still the objects of scorn and vituperation, from many of their early friends, who refuse to recognize them on the street, and place them under the social ban for accepting the new order of things.

The pay of the teachers is sixty dollars per month, varying to seventy dollars, and as low as fifty dollars, in exceptional cases of more or less capacity and merit.

In our efforts now making to lift up and strengthen the schools in their educational character, we are sometimes driven to the displacement or rejection of worthy men and women, who have every claim upon us for continuance or acceptance, but the essential one of being equal to the rising demands of the schools. In such cases, there is nothing left for us to do but regard as paramount the educational interests committed to our hands.

The past year has been one of great financial delays and embarrassments in this Department.

The military bureaus and offices have been largely in arrears; and even the soldiers in the field have been six or eight months without pay.

It is a matter of congratulation, that owing to the unfailing promptness and consideration with which the Major General Commanding has supplied our pecuniary needs, the employees of the Board have seldom been required to wait more than two months for their payments.

Although the occasional delay in paying the teachers embarrasses and frequently distresses many of them, we have had but one instance out of one hundred and sixty teachers, of turbulent resentment at conditions which we could neither control nor mitigate. The case was that of a Boston lady who had resided in New Orleans for some years. She was employed by this Board, more from compassion than fitness, with a clear understanding of the duties and of possible delays in payments. She was on our rolls less than three months. Not receiving her pay immediately, she publicly denounced the Board as a "swindling concern," vehemently declared that "niggers had too much freedom," and ended by addressing a letter of complaint to President Lincoln, which letter was forwarded from Washington, through official channels, to the Board, by it properly endorsed, and returned as it came. 001112The complaint had been dismissed previously for termagancy and incompetency.

The cases cited and many others have seemed to justify the Board in the adoption of the policy expressed in a previous report, and since adhered to--that of employing, not exclusively, but mainly, Southern women as teachers. They understand the negro. They have a competent knowledge of the people. Their Southern origin and education fit them to combat the prejudices of their former friends and associates against negro education.

If these women are willing to forego the hatred of race, the hostility of caste, the prejudice of education; if they are ready to bear the jeers and contempt of friends and kindred, and the practical exclusion from circles that hitherto have received them gladly, surely they are entitled to the first consideration. Therefore, of the one hundred and sixty-two teachers in the employ of the Board, in December last, one hundred and thirty are of Southern origin, thirty-two from the West and North. It has been our aim to select the most capable and worthy, but we have not been unmindful of those whose loyal antecedents and consequent suffering from the rebellion entitle them to sympathy and aid.

Whenever colored teachers, with the requisite ability, have presented themselves, we have made no distinction whatever.

A much larger per centage of absences is found in our schools during the winter than the summer months. This is owing to the very general want of warm and suitable clothing. At least one-fifth of the school children are suffering from this cause. These, for the most part, belong to those families who have entered our State within the past year.

They come to school with singular diligence, week after week, bare-footed and bare-limbed, with garments ragged and thin, shivering over their lessons from cold and wet, but still persistent to learn.

We have made our plea for bare feet and naked shoulders to Northern charitable societies, some of which may make the Board the almoner of their benefactions.

In many localities the small-pox has been making sad havoc; some schools have had one-third of their number ill at the same time. 001213Others have been forced to suspend temporarily. Our efforts to induce general vaccination have failed, in consequence of the fears of the children and the superstition of many of the parents. Owing to the severity and almost malignancy of the epidemic, about thirty per cent, of the cases die. There is reason to believe that it is still upon the increase, and that before the coming summer is over it will decimate the colored population, if it is permitted to go on unchecked.

In the country parishes where vaccination is not the custom, with no physician near, where the colored children are poorly fed and clad, and much exposed, they sicken, die, and are buried, without a record of their numbers. It is respectfully suggested that an order declaring vaccination to be a military necessity, would save many lives among these poor people. If physicians and surgeons were required to vaccinate all who apply, at a moderate public charge, and all were required to apply, it might arrest the ravages of this dreadful scourge.

By section 7th, of Order 38, the expenses of this system of education are to be "defrayed by the proceeds of a school tax, to be levied upon real and personal property sufficient in amount to meet the cost of establishing, furnishing, and conducting these schools for a period of one year."

We are preparing to levy this tax as speedily as possible, and expect by the first of May to be able to pay our expenses from said tax, and to reimburse the General Government, through the Quartermaster's Department, for money advanced for our support. Our estimate of tax needed to cover all expenses is a per centage of one mill and half on the property within our lines, which should net about one hundred and fifty thousand dollars ($150,000). By the most rigid economy the entire monthly expenditure, including the cost of instruction, supervision, books, school furniture, rents, and the needful repairs on more than a hundred buildings, is less than half the cost per month of a single regiment.

The average monthly expense of instructing each pupil, is one dollar and a half, or eighteen dollars a year.

It may be safely questioned if so great an advantage and so speedy a return was ever before realized by any people, from a like outlay. It is as great to the white as to the black. If this liberated population is to remain among us, as they surely will, by their right, and our need, then it is the interest of the State, and of society, that they should not be kept in ignorance, to swell the vice and pauperism that are the turbid issue of that stagnant pool.

The pupils, as a class, are orderly, industrious, and easily governed. They are exceedingly grateful for any interest and kindness shown to them. It is the testimony of our teachers, who have taught in both white and colored schools, that these children do not suffer in comparison with the white in the activity of most of their faculties, and in the acquisition of knowledge. They are quick-witted, excelling in those branches that exercise the perceptive and imitative powers, and the memory, while they are slower in arithmetic, and in studies that tax the reasoning powers--probably from a hereditary dormancy of those faculties under the long night and cruel weight of slavery.

A marked characteristic of these children is their genuine delight in learning, and the heartiness with which they repeat their exercises. Music is the natural expression for their spirits; the song never flags for want of voices. Some of their own irregular and plaintive melodies fall from their lips with a strange, deep pathos. They are also natural actors and natural orators. They read and declaim with ease, and just expression. They are quick in responding to the pathetic, as they are keen in discerning the ludicrous. Recently, we had twenty-four hundred of them in "Howes' Circus" at one time. Four-fifths of them had never seen any such thing. Some of the performers said, afterwards, that they never had a more appreciative audience--one that seemed to know, by intuition, where the laugh should come in, and where the applause. One of the clowns ventured upon a stale joke about "rain from the surrounding black clouds," but it fell heavily and almost in silence at the feet of an audience just realizing that they have a natural right to be black without reproach.

Another habitude of these colored children is their care of books and school furniture. There is an absence of that Young America lawlessness so common on Caucasian play grounds. The walls and fences about the colored schools are not defaced, either by violence or vulgar scratching. They do not whittle or ply the jack-knife at the expense of desks and benches. It may also be said that the imagination of these juveniles is generally incorrupt and pure, and from the two most prevailing and disgusting vices of school children, profanity and obscenity, they are singularly free.

The beneficial influence of these schools is not limited to the pupils. The children go from the school-room to their homes as Instructors. One of the immediate and visible results, is upon the colored adult and his household, in the increase of family respect, the promotion of cleanliness and thrift, and generally and in equal degree in those good effects that like influences have produced upon the populations of other races.

Another almost immediate and marked influence of these schools is seen upon the white people in the lessening prejudice, in the admission of the African's ability to learn, and his consequent fitness for places in the world, from which we have hitherto excluded him.

The following extract from the report of a teacher in one of the parishes where we have heretofore had much resistance to the schools, may serve to illustrate this statement. It is the more conclusive, as the teacher is himself an educated colored man from the State of Maine:

"Everything works harmoniously now. Even the small planters (Spanish) are giving in their adhesion to the present disposition of affairs, going so far, in some cases, as to send their own children to ask admittance into this school. I have now some half-dozen of the small planters who come to my night-school, where they recite on the same benches with the freedmen. This I consider progress."

The children are taught exclusively in English. Bound by the strong ligament of a common tongue, they will never foster the subtle enmity to National unity that lurks in diversity of speech.

The labors of the Board, composed as it is of but two members, are necessarily heavy upon them. But under our complete reorganization, with competent assistants, carefully selected, we feel equal to the duties.

Having recovered from the temporary reproach and weakness, resulting from the misconduct and consequent dismissal from this Department, by military order, of one of its members, the Board is working vigorously and well.

Gratefully we acknowledge the receipt from the "American Bible Society," through the "American Missionary Association," of the munificent gift of 7500 copies of the Sacred Scriptures, to be distributed among the Freedmen of the Department.

Said distribution is continually going on, in the spirit of the donors through our agents and teachers, to the Sunday Schools and to the Freedmen.

The Board further and cheerfully acknowledge its obligations to the extensive publishing house of Messrs. Barnes & Burr, of New York city. These gentlemen, partly from the business sagacity that measures in advance the value and extent of a new market, partly from generosity and interest in our enterprise, have contributed much to its success.

In the beginning, when we could not obtain books and school stationery, except for cash, which we had not, Messrs. Barnes & Burr 001516came forward and supplied us, as they have continued to do, at the lowest rates, patiently awaiting our ability to pay.

In nine months we have succeeded, against the grave obstacles incident to the beginning of so great an enterprise, in gathering under instruction half of the colored juvenile population of the State.

By Order 38, creating this Board, it is provided that the system of Education shall follow the flag through the Department of the Gulf.

With the continued support of the military arm, we hope to number on our rolls during the coming school year, all the colored children of suitable age, within our lines of military occupation.

Very respectfully,B. RUSH PLUMLY,Chairman Board of Education for Freedmen,Department of the Gulf. Lieut. E. M. WHEELOCK; Secretary.