operation of the United States direct tax act, and were in time sold
for United States taxes to whoever would buy them. They were mainly
bought in by the United States and were subsequently re-sold to
soldiers, army followers and Negroes. Towards the close of the war,
having concluded my service under the government, I resolved to settle
in the South, and purchased in 1864, a plantation on St. Helena, one
of these islands, with the intention of becoming a Southern planter. I
was thus engaged when Andrew Johnson began his reconstruction efforts
and appointed Benjamin F. Perry provisional governor. This was the
first attempt at the reconstruction of the South, and South Carolina
was the first state called upon to resume its relations with the
Union, as she had been the first to go out. In October, 1865, the
provisional governor issued a proclamation setting a day for an
election of delegates to a

CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION

His Proclamation called upon the people to repeal the ordinances of
secession form a constitution and make such preparations as were
necessary to obtain admission into the Union. St. Helena parish was
entitled to one delegate to that constitutional convention.

All the original inhabitants of the parish, upon the approach of the
Federal forces, had fled. There was but one man left in the whole
parish when the United States took possession of the town of Beaufort,
and he was found in a garret dead drunk. Consequently when the
convention was called the question arose who were citizens of the
parish. There were few white natives of South Carolina in the parish.
The managers of election were not present. Governor Perry had named
the managers of the previous elections held under the confederate
government as the ones to conduct the election now to be held, but
none of these people were there. So a town meeting in the New England
style was called to consider the situation, at which the colored
people were in a large majority. Probably one hundred white
ex-soldiers, army officers, settlers, clerks, quartermasters,
employes, etc., came to the meeting. An examination of the law of
South Carolina as to

WHAT CONSTITUTED CITIZENSHIP

showed that it required a three years' residence to be a citizen, and
that no person then a soldier of the United States could vote in the
state at any election. A long discussion followed, whether to nominate
a candidate or not, which ended in a decision to nominate. Then