A. B. Springs in Winter of 1867-68, York County, South Carolina

A. B. Springs in Winter of 1867-68
By: Louise Pettus

Andrew Baxter Springs (1819-1886) was one of York County’s best known and respected men in the winter of 1867-1868. He owned Springfield plantation north of the small town of Fort Mill and was one of the York County representatives in the SC legislature.

It should have been a happy time for a man in his prime but Springs’ correspondence shows that he was besieged by requests for money or favors of various kinds. Two years after the end of the Civil War, the state was in economic despair.

Baxter Springs had never believed that secession from the Union was a wise move. But when SC seceded, he had volunteered. The next year the SC legislature withdrew him from military service and drafted him for the post of Commissioner of the Soldier’s Relief Board.

Springs’ duties were to gather food and other supplies for York County men on the front and to care for the soldier’s families when in need. The state gave him only a token budget which he supplemented out of his pocket and from his plantation commissary.

One of every four York County servicemen had been killed or wounded. When the war ended, Springs did not feel that he could withdraw support for the poor widows and children of his neighborhood, so he still let them have goods for which he knew would not likely ever be repaid .

And he had numerous relatives who had needs. His Uncle Clark Springs was handicapped. Uncle Clark had spent many years as a student at the Cedar Springs School for the Deaf and Dumb, supported financially by Baxter’s father, John Springs III. Uncle Clark had become a teacher in the institution but just before the Civil War began, he left it to marry and buy a small farm that seemed sufficient to support him, his wife and her sister.

After the war there were too few pupils in the institution and the farm did not pay off. Baxter was the old man’s sole support.

While Springs was in Columbia attending sessions of the legislature, his wife, Blandie, and his overseer, Eli Bailes, tried to keep the plantation going.

One of Blandie’s letters to her husband reveals the constant demands of others on Springs’ resources. Blandie wrote that a Mr. Whitaker of York had stopped at Springfield. She started by saying that she should have charged him but he was from their district and she didn’t. “He was dreadful particular about his horse. Eli had given him as much as the other horses. He [Whitaker] said he had nothing to eat and got a great deal of corn and fodder. I did not like him much—offered to pay when he left. I said I had no change to make, he said he would rather I take a dollar.” It was a Confederate dollar, now worthless.

Blandie wrote, “Dr. W- has just come, was here three days ago. Oh, I am tired of the sight of him and he is always to dinner and I keep trotting. All the time, I believe Laura believes she cannot live without him.” Laura Springs was a niece of Baxter’s who had been at Springfield for months.

Blandie wrote that Laura was anxious to marry in the winter because she had a decent winter wardrobe and had nothing but old clothes for spring and summer. Also, there was another girl in the house. “Bennie is still here—did not want to go to the party—she is very unhappy. I really feel sorry for the child. In November, Blandie wrote, “I think it doubtful about her [Bennie] going until January.”

Besides the two girls, Blandie had 7 sons from ages 6 to 15 to look after. The oldest, Eli Baxter Springs, was away at Bingham Military Academy in NC but, still he wrote frequently, each letter stating that the food was terrible and he was hungry, would his mother please send “two cakes, some fried chicken, cherries and strawberries?”

To be continued

In 1867-68, Andrew Baxter Springs carried on an extensive correspondence with business associates (he had stocks in Graniteville Mills and in several railroads and banks) that his father, John Springs III had dealt with before his death in 1853. The younger Springs also had business associates that he had known while a student in South Carolina College or when studying law under Thomas J. Withers in Camden. Springs had never practiced law but found it useful in his business dealings and as a member of the South Carolina legislature.

Many people sought his advice. A business man wrote that he was aware that he owed Springs but had no idea how much. His account books had been burned by Sherman’s troops. He had hoped to receive dividends from his railroad stock but the shares had been burned with the account books—some had been purchased with Confederate money, some with U. S. money. “How, pray, does one deal with such? I wonder if the good old times of peace and security will once more return to us!”

In the hard winter of 1867-68 many were convinced that Northern radicals would seek revenge for the war. “The next six months will be the most momentous of this sad time since 1860.” Another friend wrote Baxter that the “state lines of the Southern states will be obliterated and from the Potomac to the Rio Grande we will become territories.” Another wrote that he could not live under the 14th Amendment.

His 15-year-old son, Eli, who was off at school in Bingham Military Academy wrote that he was hungry and please to send food and lamp wicks. How could he study without lamp wicks?

On March 26th 1867, Baxter received a letter from the governor of South Carolina, James L. Orr, appointing him as his York County deputy to distribute (without compensation) 200 bushels of corn. York County’s share came from a large shipment of corn donated to South Carolina as a gift of the Southern Relief Commission of the City of New York.

On April 26th, J. M. Cline wrote Baxter Springs, “There are some families below Rock Hill who are almost at the point of starvation.” Cline headed a Rock Hill group that had written Charleston, New York and Baltimore for aid. He informed Springs that the corn had arrived at the Rock Hill depot with most of the sacks burst open and the freight agent demanded $20 shipping charges. Cline asked if they could sell enough of the corn to pay the freight.

Springs asked Col. Cadwallader Jones, owner of Mount Gallant plantation< to take care of the corn for the people on the west side of the river and said he would take care of the Fort Mill people (presumably out of his own holdings). A second shipping of 100 sacks of corn arrived along with a freight bill of $30.

There were other problems. Governor Orr had asked the York County Clerk of Court and the Sheriff to select four men from each battallion to be managers and registrars at the polls. But only two men, Robert Ferguson and Thomas Spencer would agree to take an oath which included their swearing to uphold the 14th Amendment to the Constitution. Colonel Jones reported to Baxter Springs that there were “no suitable persons to be poll managers.”

Governor Orr wrote back that “if no will agree then strangers will be appointed.”

Back in the terrible drought of 1843-46, many small farmers left South Carolina for Arkansas and Texas. They had corresponded with the Springses for many years. Now they were writing back saying that rumors were about that every Confederate veteran, as punishment, would have his land taken.

October 14, 1867, Uncle Richard Clark Springs, a deaf mute, wrote from Spartanburg, “We are desperate. We have no meat or flour and no money since August.” Baxter Springs got together enough food to sustain his uncle and his family for a few more months.

Springs, already miserable with carbuncles, must have believed that he was living in the worst of times.