The Abolition Raid in Texas.
Now that the election is over, doubtless the vast majority of our people can regard dispassionately the course pursued by the Opposition party and Governor of Texas, relative to the recent incendiary movements in this State. They have contended through the press, in their public speeches, and by every means through which the public mind could be reached, that the reports of an abolition raid in Texas were without foundation; that there was not a particle of proof to justify such a belief, and that these reports were originated and circulated for no other design than to make political capital for Breckinridge. Gen. Houston in his Austin speech, which was republished in the Flag, to the surprise of every right-thinking, intelligent man in the State, made the same statement, denying that there had been, at any time, cause for alarm. Judge Evans, we learn from our exchanges, occupied similar ground, assuming the position that the numerous fires which have occurred in Texas were the result of accident, and out of these causalities, the Breckinridge party set afloat thousands of unfounded rumors calculated and designed to influence the public mind, with a view to manufacture political capital.
What are the facts? The fires alluded to commenced in July last, and, in the short period of one month, property to the amount of over a million of dollars, was destroyed, including two of the largest and most flourishing towns in Eastern Texas. Eleven fires occurred in Northern Texas in one week, involving a loss of upwards of seven hundred thousand dollars. There was scarcely a county in the State that claimed an immunity from these outrages. Farm houses, gins, mills, and stores were destroyed in almost every county. Every newspaper that reached us during those exciting times, contained from one to a half dozen accounts of these burnings.
The people became alarmed, and, as we contend, there was just reason for the liveliest apprehensions. Vigilance committees were formed in every neighborhood. No one ever thought then of denying that it was necessary to adopt measures for our safety. Men met without distinction of party. That there should have been a great deal of excitement, that many reports should have been circulated having no foundation and that acts of unjustifiable violence should have taken place, were perfectly natural. Such results have followed similar excitements everywhere else, and why should Texas prove different from the rest of the world?
But if the number, frequency, and the accounts given of these fires were insufficient to dispel the idea that they were [illegible line] elicited by committees appointed to examine into the facts, is sufficient to show that that they were caused by incendiaries. We are free to admit that testimony elicited by violence or fright is not to be depended on, but, in this case, it is a noted fact, that negroes, over a hundred miles apart, in a number of counties, all concurred in the general outlines of this abolition movement. In addition to this, we have the Bailey letter which the notorious abolitionist Buley who was hung near Fort Worth, acknowledged to be a genuine document. At the time that letter was published in our columns, it was regarded as a document that had been manufactured. Now that it is known to have been written by an active abolitionist, who was in Texas, it may not be uninteresting to give it a more searching examination. It here follows:
___________________________
David Upton