by Randy Reynolds
Bartemous Reynolds (my 4g-grandfather) helped wrest a white civilization
from the forest that covered the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in what
is now Hall County , Georgia
And he, quite possibly, did it all without personally
wielding an axe or a butcher’s blade or tilling the red clay soil with a yoke
of oxen or building a fence or barn or feeding animals or shucking corn or picking
cotton. He never personally had to draw
his own water from the well or build his own fire unless he particularly wanted to, because he was not one of those yeoman farmers who
owned or rented one or two slaves and worked in the fields beside them.
His wife, Mary Mildred Taylor Reynolds, was (again, according to family lore) related to the Zachary
Taylor who was elected President of the United States a few days before Mildred’s
72nd birthday in 1848—(the last American President who still owned
slaves while in office.) Mary Mildred
bore 11 children, but did not have to rock them through the night when they
were fretful, nor mind them during the day, nor suckle them if she chose not
to, nor wash anybody’s clothes, nor cook any meals, nor weave, nor sew, nor
start a fire in the fireplace in the morning.
They had slaves to do all that.
Bartemous Reynolds pastored the Baptist Churches that exist today as Mud Creek Baptist Church on Mud Creek Road , Cornelia , Georgia Timber Ridge Baptist Church Timber Ridge Road , Lula , Georgia
Colossians 4:9
Ephesians 6:5
Exodus 21:7-11
Exodus 21:20-32
Exodus 22:2-3
First Peter 2:18
First Timothy 6:1-5
Genesis 9:25-27
Genesis 17:12,13
Genesis
37:27,28, 36
Leviticus 25:40-46.
Luke 12:46-47
Philemon 1:10
Numbers 31:28-40.
Second Samuel 8:2
Surviving accounts of Southern sermons of the day include:
“…hear the express words of the Holy Ghost in the
Levitical law… ‘Both thy bondmen and thy bondwomen which thou shalt have, shall
be of the heathen that are round about you; of them shall ye buy bondmen and
bondmaids. And ye shall take them as an inheritance for your children after you
to inherit them for a possession; they shall be your bondmen forever.’ No law can be plainer. No instruction of truth
could more convince the Christian that he is standing upon the surest and
safest ground… while upholding a system of domestic servitude.” –Dr. Joseph R.
Wilson, Presbyterian Pastor, Jan. 6, 1861
"It was established by
decree of Almighty God ... it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments,
from Genesis to Revelation ... Slavery existed then in the
earliest ages, and among the chosen people of God; and in Revelation we are
told that it shall exist till the end of time shall come. You find it in the
Old and New Testaments—in the prophecies, psalms, and the epistles of Paul; you
find it recognized, sanctioned everywhere." –Sen. Jefferson Davis, a
devout Episcopalian, 1860
“...Jesus Christ recognized this institution
as one that was lawful among men, and regulated its relative duties... I affirm
then, first (and no man denies) that Jesus Christ has not abolished slavery by
a prohibitory command; and second, I affirm, he has introduced no new moral
principle which can work its destruction…”–Rev. Thomas Stringfellow, 1856, Culpepper, VA
“… the right of holding slaves is clearly established in
the Holy Scriptures, both by precept and example.” –Rev. Richard
Furman, President of South Carolina Convention of Baptists, 1823; namesake of
Furman University
“The servant is, like the child, to know that the
authority under which he has been placed is from above, and that the master
rules him as the agent of heaven.”. –Dr. Joseph R. Wilson, Presbyterian Pastor,
Jan. 6, 1861
Frederick Douglass testified in his NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF A SLAVE that a good dose of religion made some masters worse:
"In
August, 1832, my master attended a Methodist camp-meeting held in the Bay-side,
Talbot county, and there experienced religion. I indulged a faint hope that his
conversion would lead him to emancipate his slaves, and that, if he did not do
this, it would, at any rate, make him more kind and humane. I was disappointed
in both these respects… for I believe him to have been a much worse man after
his conversion than before. Prior to his conversion, he relied upon his own
depravity to shield and sustain him in his savage barbarity; but after his
conversion, he found religious sanction and support for his slaveholding
cruelty. He made the greatest pretensions to piety. His house was the house of
prayer. He prayed morning, noon, and night. He very soon distinguished himself
among his brethren, and was soon made a class-leader and exhorter. His activity
in revivals was great, and he proved himself an instrument in the hands of the church
in converting many souls. His house was the preachers' home. They used to take
great pleasure in coming there to put up; for while he starved us, he stuffed
them. We have had three or four preachers there at a time.” – Frederick Douglass,
1845
“I have said my master found religious
sanction for his cruelty. As an example, I will state one of many facts going
to prove the charge. I have seen him tie up a lame young woman, and whip her
with a heavy cow skin upon her naked shoulders, causing the warm red blood to
drip; and, in justification of the bloody deed, he
would quote this passage of Scripture--"He that knoweth his master's will,
and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes." Master would keep
this lacerated young, woman tied up in this horrid situation four or five hours
at a time. I have known him to tie her up early in the morning, and whip her
before breakfast; leave her, go to his store, return at dinner, and whip her
again, cutting her in the places already made raw with his cruel lash.” –
Frederick Douglass, 1845
“I am
filled with unutterable loathing when I contemplate the religious pomp and
show, together with the horrible inconsistencies, which every where surround
me. We have men-stealers for ministers, women-whippers for missionaries, and
cradle-plunderers for church members. The man who wields the blood-clotted cow
skin during the week fills the pulpit on Sunday, and claims to be a minister of
the meek and lowly Jesus.” – Frederick Douglass,
1845
“We have men sold to build churches, women
sold to support the gospel, and babes sold to purchase Bibles for the poor heathen! all for the glory of God
and the good of souls!” – Frederick Douglass,
1845
“The
slave auctioneer's bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and
the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious shouts
of his pious master. Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave-trade go
hand in hand together. The slave prison and the church stand near each other.
The clanking of fetters and the rattling of chains in the prison, and the pious
psalm and solemn prayer in the church, may be heard at the same time. The
dealers in the bodies and souls of men erect their stand in the presence of the
pulpit, and they mutually help each other. The dealer gives his blood-stained
gold to support the pulpit, and the pulpit, in return, covers his infernal
business with the garb of Christianity. Here we have religion and robbery the
allies of each other--devils dressed in angels' robes, and hell presenting the
semblance of paradise.” – Frederick Douglass, 1845
“…a very different-looking class of people
are springing up at the south, and are now held in slavery, from those
originally brought to this country from Africa; and if their increase will do
no other good, it will do away the force of the argument, that God cursed Ham,
and therefore American slavery is right. If the lineal descendants of Ham are alone
to be scripturally enslaved, it is certain that slavery at the south must soon
become unscriptural; for thousands are ushered into the world, annually, who,
like myself, owe their existence to white fathers, and those fathers most
frequently their own masters.” – Frederick Douglass,
1845
Footnote:
“Following the war, many white southerners, including Baptists, publicly
denied their earlier insistence that slavery was the cause of the war. Rather
than slavery, ‘states rights’ became the new cause of the war ‘between the
slaveholding states and the non-slaveholding states.’
“This denial remains widespread today among many white southerners of the twenty-first century. Yet the record is clear... If slavery had not existed in Antebellum America, the American Civil War would never have occurred.” —Bruce Gourley, BAPTISTS AND THE CIVIL WAR
“This denial remains widespread today among many white southerners of the twenty-first century. Yet the record is clear... If slavery had not existed in Antebellum America, the American Civil War would never have occurred.” —Bruce Gourley, BAPTISTS AND THE CIVIL WAR
