American Experience; Reconstruction: The Second Civil War; Interview with James G. Marston, III, Descendant of Louisiana Planter

it's just that you remember hearing he basically i grew up with the legend the green goggles my pain was oldest was twenty years older than my father who was almost forty when i was born so that don't in fact you were born in nineteen ninety six so not too long after these events and unseen i knew a lot of the people that were involved and vito stories and i grew up on it and won't use it well when that when she would tell a story a worse way of thought the story would usually come up when there would be a political discussion are some talk

terms that we might be facing an overflow or maybe of them for the price and across and she was stored on like those times which would so much i'm not good at that so much tougher on the family and all the entire society and she would know it would always something a lot worse than what we were slicing when you think about that's the purpose i think that what the war has got here briefly overton and say oh but this poor the country were spared of the destruction that the georgian and southern part of the study head and of my live from our victory a man thing but the reconstruction followed that

and so yes i would have to say that was a tartar period on this particular part of louisiana in the war certainly hasn't and then going off to war or not going on what baird it very difficult what do you think well i wasn't there were the family here that didn't live show somebody to war in fact my great grandfather had two brothers film a war and another wounded and span and nine after one am and they won on nine four with male and wounded and the engine ended up on that a little and as a result of an operation so that affected my great grandfather very much on that he was touched by violence as a very

young man battled shallow perito and soulful and so the family home and to be are basically rational he was seventy and in his thirties when i look back and ready to go and on some of his letters and he was a it a realist he looked at things the way they were he did something about it he probably didn't spend the water cannons i would've orrin about having lost the war they just roll up a slave in what war and that was the race gotten as much at best to get in with no fly zone and the labor problems and he was and that they were and the cost of cotton and course

when you overlay all that would be a carpetbagger in reconstruction and then you might have to work on as you say so oli from reading about it begins our iowa of course we all were watching going to win and good to see you home buyer and in a noisy procession study in question completely devastating and i'm not a lot of places like birthday even when we're devastated germany and to try and more clearly been rebuilding after the war with more supplies we had no social and sounds following the civil war we would factor you had followed the newly freed men slaves and ali and completely destitute

confederates did you get that well over the course of only read about all lincoln's fly and of course it was assassinated in a new land factions in congress fighting over what did and has resulted in a motivator you did you did have the northerners common an opportunist businessman all over the south and them in a lot of instances they did well one of course where it would be a fire hazard it didn't work out real the reconstruction was a not successful i don't really i can't imagine what it was supposed to accomplish in the farcical but i would have to say that the our math or

fallen and his contemporaries one reconstruction how do you think they imagine that there's such happened after your books or did you think they had any idea of the most oddly the educated son of realized that the slavery would eventually end and although they've been expected as the center's it ended with the war as they understood this story very with love but they had also lee had surrendered and we lay down our arms and we are going to return to the union and not over or if they are are are civil unrest and again become part of the good best cyclists and so they went back to work to become good citizens of the united states and then you had this radical

re constructionist we call that i was in effect a second civil war so there is a sense though that right after the war you know months after the world is black clothes and other other interests that that happens throughout the south reinstating something that's similar i think the no i would have to say that that the jim crow all laws going into effect fallen reconstruction and just as i probably came into effect more affluent probably were tougher to deal with then a more stringent than right after the wall as cells are going through this period of

reconstruction and watch that it ended for sally the reprisals for the jim crow laws as been a lot more prohibitive than it would've been without reconstruction and then there was that and there was going to be the uncertainties that overall and that that was part of the healing process from the war but even right after the war there's this thing that the north was expecting some very humbled by it wasn't no scrap were it was a washout so severe tropical and the end we follow me only on battlefields from all across the south from texas to virginia and indifference wind and we were deflated and we accepted that this

early but still there's just more in the silent and i know that usually when you say the flags and usually that in the trunks initially southern pride in a lot of the compound southern football gangs that the south is it is still very proud people would worry almost and culture of its own and this was a natural step following complete story were in the field especially without and we're still going through it want this war to be with you well we in iraq in mostly for our family but we differ only worked a lot and what was the idea of how to create to deal with this in the new world of you know having

to deal with you know three men in a different way and the devastation around me there's a bit of a sharecropper thank you to understand everybody in the south with one word broke the complainers had no money most of the wealth an assassin with islam and it is not the lion not really made for equipment they build it would warrant was to slide and my great grandfather lived in this story his father henry morgan from boston head board money comfort

bikes in philadelphia the bath salts and we know the travel editor at a mortgage that will and being that was enforced against him his latest of a ding seventies so you had bikes in philadelphia silwan collective money they wanted and he had had no property to sell for anyone to do and so they've won the south had to deal with this was no money and so you have the rise of a sharecropping and of course you have a lot of the walls that were biased right after the war which was gray but i look at most of the problems call from the complete by province in the south and that that that left the south to open to the current irish to gonna take advantage and which i did certainly in this in our area here but how do you think they made their relationship well

this is labor issues they said that they would eventually get paid but we know from from somewhere is a very tentative about where that predictive of what would cap and just just like i and some of my my grandfather's narratives at a soyuz left the plantation that they are and can walk down the road and then they came back from my right eye interviewed a lot of them in the nineteen twenties and thirties said that they sort of celebration and then they want to know how they knew was appointed and they were kind of plant items until they'd that which of the cemeteries up their own one version of our full of

oil and a lot of a lot of them have and i'm more scared in the uk so they would know workers is getting paid more is that does that well yes in it that i know that my great grandfather planted in and this of a fire fiorina as amended the voting will and of course you in the republican field in the sideline carpetbaggers and they look down as the labor force in and listeners know and without them we couldn't write scott knew it would be a platform we're essential core of form in common and that's a fact and

without them we couldn't do it and so now it was going to have to bury and then an owner with labor force and we were going to have to devise a worry to play that live an anatomy and of course was a sharecropper coming from a lack of finance how did they feel about the idea the family trying to actually more discussions of that from henry marsh reading from boston and an area prominent service a service unmanned a slave owner but then more skin and he complained about a more imposing routines

and or fleeting and the biggest problem we hadn't taken of property and he had had a success and an end in a collision course all have property owner of audio but i do come back to that to the financial problems caution with bitterness and salazar think more than been relieved of the north could have some rules mental issues are a huge or me really couldn't impose you could you could have a decent voters that could be enforced in this area and then come up here but you can't really in for something like that on an entire cable and i think lincoln had that it was a boy and today a transitional career and we're still in it to die they at that we're a lot better off now than we were then and also have to admit that

olivas is a veil on the earth orbit there's always thought oh someone to take the lion the lion of course that we grew cotton plantation were very important to us and our family and you had of the river the river would overflow so the river was a danger new edible oils they were in danger because low prices within the quarterback and through political control locals leave the southern they're really helpful as they were momentarily for the court and the newly freed men could vote and they outnumbered the white shirt and so with that voting law they controlled and elected officials

and you have raising the taxes on tara take the line in this argument he's the morning on here and then came more troops which is just data scientists can you imagine from reading about in his barracks and family writings in my family and a playful about him that he was a very arrogant name celeste been excited when he was coming up the river and he was looking at this far more red river delta just rich farmland there for the taking and with this financial backing and his political power well they cochran legion said

go and so i imagine he was very excited about what he was going to do it you are trying to do it and politically they can live mr kohut oh the ways that the war is coming into plants in your book what you had to shake you know i'm more then going to try to straighten out or to do any line for the newly freed men he came to enrich himself and if that helps somebody gunfire and if you are somebody mr lawson for an officially the line like the real

con artist he's going to take the land which it is he did something he built up some skills and some levees and road he did sometimes the longworth they try and and that would in most societies it's it's hard to imagine somebody that does a lot of good things in america like he did so you've got to look at how we can shape but the rest of the plane now we know how you shelf very own what one from you're just now thinking about it you know when there was that search area unique and so they're saying things that make you as

it were lush lawn in order to open the river the navigation and i like it in parties and my ancestor henry marsh a nineteen forties bought land appear and land speculation and it was rich farmland be cleared and cattle and so by the end of the civil war this would only twenty five years of any type for lunch now unlike south louisiana which had been there for wonga but today the financial machinations rest more and you sound so again from your perspective is you know entering his new window well this i'm lead to earlier this for northwest louisiana was nate

milton that from for showman in this for twenty five years and again it was understated i would do my eyes was the stated of my answer you will northwest louisiana just surrender and india flag still flies at the courthouse and for reporters in nevada last confederate flag so that this area was understated and that is a lot of the thing you hear these days there and whenever they faded a war just ended an answer about a one and up into the midst of lift into it and yes it was not a civilized only be handled was more lawless and the rest of me can he could stretch the rules of thing well

later in the day i think it was started with indifference there were union soldiers they are occupying soldier right after the war and and federal officials and he was a as i understand nice looking young man and he he married a young girl a young southern girl from over and so i would imagine it was somewhat within different tunings are scarier as an official as long history denton let's get in a lot of our deck that's one agenda were actually former river parish again to use his

position to enrich himself and his final he brought his brother's and brother laws and cronies the red river character whoa all the political offices you saw not only freed men alderman's office i would just wait till and his inner circle and i held over the court record a tax assessor the sheriff the state senator and and use those positions and his position with a frame of nero the form road repair and create this or a few that they and so that he could run up a tactician type the line and that i was interviewed by the people that lived here willing but i don't like when he first went to this other bombing of a bimbo parish that they were it was just another federal official what they call it and realizing this is ambitious as it turnout today that was that initially when they when he

started you know being perceived in wages for its part of the university's approach and maybe change his ways and looking for how that was made in a national reaction that then escalated and hundreds of incidents yes per leo people in red river parrish former confederate dried work waiting in fact there you'll see all our letters are among them and business meetings he he would it was lee leo political power in the preparation if you wanted to do business here you had to work with and a lot of further is that it act it if he hadn't especially to taxes if he hadn't raised taxes over to take the land he knows someone's hat but it was a take you know why is that you really hit the heart of a servant or

when you do that and that was but that the shade s of the the great worry that said winning an issue when the troops barred from a confederate well and of course he writes how he bought it from a bitter certify that they've employed or you know pennies on the dollar or the boys but they gave her something out and i think you live in one of the ohio says so she would have somewhere to go now and next in his diaper but eventually now after so early what was the main concern is like lying we didn't have enough money to cut as you can pay the taxes low and one out for sure until the sheriff joe orton roman walls a share and guessing that were shot at by and

so that's vivid places rudimentary prof reich there's the taxes and red river prayers with direct and tired and kat over the soda snack and i'm going air and with no name for the former confederates to do anything about it they could not at mcdonald's as a control all of the former friedman the former slaves and in that area basically a solid walk a vote for him and his crimes and he kept that levy fonda that he very very good indeed and i guess he would that social early division between races were causing needed to scare black population a lot good to keep their style of the anecdote and that the team headed by soprano listening to the state legislature year after year why do you

think and one had been ahead of the frame and ann of course a northerner and he was he was associated with was far and then the shock and there were a lot of attention to right that solid block a vote but it never was successful and therefore he won election year after year but as the population again the challenge and a lot of the former confederacy but to have a nation within voters so than ex confederates democratic union to take over and it was withdrawal and that threatened point of bison which then meant that he had to be more drastic to holding the spa and then eases you can survive with unesco you can you find meaning in

yourself to sue too many sympathy for someone like him when he arrives and he brings all his family owned the dutch they must then if you you know you're doing something you support system works and so you know once you get there and you start finding that you know people are asked do you imagine i can't imagine i would never tolerate members of my family and the horns was it did and he became responsible for happened to them about that walk into places like this it was i am a new frontier town reporter staying bunch of course the river was my names of five

times all the birds and came over the reverend cotton wish it down wherever the new orange and travel was up and down the river so it was their study of course and failed buildup right there in to show it was late at about the rate of three straight mainly wouldn't know one of them down right on the river front and then it spread out but it was at the courthouse was there and it became the goal of a parachute it was formed and eviscerate government work that there were several dual storage solution for leverage that it was unstable alliance it's byzantine will fall and the war gave star been triple work with general kurdish

living alone has died and when the war was over he studied a career to look after his father's holdings weekend more land that the tang court of red river parachute at ashland plant it and that was the base of the more from holdings in north louisiana and so he was running that plant it and he'd had brought his brother james who's wounded warrior battling to help in which one man show and he struggled at the ranch he opened a store and the rice cotton and a lot of himself he kept some of the former fly higher than i like but they were in italian they had nowhere else to go and heave ho and the solos taxes on hair in her and he married his neighbor lady across or ever mary

joseph and morash mary barra nineteen sixty seven so he was married was young children about the time of this incident he was he was a community leader he was well respected can plan on men tended to fall