Another Passenger on a Train

It has been said that “thank you” may be the hardest word in the English Language to say.  I don’t know if I agree, but it certainly has caused me some hardship in expressing my gratitude at times.  I know for certain it is not social etiquette that prevents us from expressing our gratitude, but it has more to do with how we decide to express gratitude appropriately.  Too often we fall short of the true depth of our gratitude and leave the impression that we are really not grateful at all for something that has been done without any thought of compensation.  Often the road that leads to the best outcome starts off as a contract with complications, but in the end, we become just another passenger on the train. 

I was taught to be thankful by my tutor.  Her name was Miss Turk, and she was an older spinstress who taught me the values I now carry with me.  Both my parents were successful in their fields; my father James Oglivie Sr. was a businessman who helped settlers claim 160 acres of land if they had not taken up arms against the United State government during the Civil War while my mother Jane Sistron Oglivie, provided midwife services to women in need of assistance during their pregnancies.  Together they were well known Braham professionals in upstate New York during the Civil War.  

While the war raged in places with names that I would forget as I grew older, Miss Turk taught me reading and math in my father’s study.  

“James, please pay attention.” She would whack her wooden ruler on the table where I was doing my best to keep awake.

“Yes, ma’am.” I would open my eyes and pick up my pen.  

“Today we will have a test on the words we have gone over during the week.” She would whack the ruler on the table a couple more times to ensure I was not nodding off. I dipped my pen in the inkwell and got ready to write the words she would read aloud. 

During a break, I asked her a question that had been on my mind for quite some time. “Where are you from, Miss Turk?”

“I was born in Savanna, South Carolina.” She answered as she tilted her head, “And why is this any of your biz’ness, Master James?”

“Were you a slave?” I asked hoping she would answer.

“Yessit.  Born in 1834.” She raised an eyebrow.

“How did you get here? Being a slave and all?” I decided to push ahead with my questioning even though it appeared to bother her a bit.  

“I met me a saint from Heaven.” She declared.

“I’ve never seen a saint.” I smiled, “Reverend McEntyre spoke about them in a Sunday sermon. Said they were with Jesus in Heaven.  How did you meet one here on earth?” 

“Her name was Harriet Tubman and she told me if I come with her on the Underground Railroad, I’d be free.” She sighed, “I never knowed what free meant, but she tol’ me and it sounded like what I wanted.  I be picking cotton with no shoes.  My feet always hurt me with hundreds of thorns sticking me from the cotton I was picking. Now doncha be going tellin’ forks none of this, you hear?”

I shook my head.  I like her and didn’t want to see anything happen to her on account of her color.  Her skin was deep and very dark, but she knew how to read and write and do arithmetic like nobody’s business.  My parents did not trust some of the schoolhouses in the local area, so they decided to hire Miss Turk.  This was before I had ever heard the word abolitionist and she was the first colored person I had ever met.  Since the start of Lincoln's War, more and more Negroes came up here from the south.

“Lemme tell ya, Master James, I never had the chance to say thank you to that woman and I prayed every night to have that chance.” She pointed her index finger at me. “People like me owe that woman for our freedom and now that the war has done started, we all know how much we owes her.” I took a rag and wiped the tears from her eyes.  I had never seen a grown-up cry before, so this had a very profound impact on the lessons I would learn that day.  

We went back into the study, but I could see my questions had shaken her quite a bit.  I had no idea of what her life had been like before Harriett had found her and put her on the railroad.  I was just twelve years old during this time and in my mind, I saw her as a passenger on a train without realizing that she had not ridden a train.  

My cousin Bradley Grapple had enlisted in the New York infantry under the command of Colonel Cooper.  Their first duty was to put down some of the riots in New York City over the draft that the government had instated.  He wrote my Aunt Cornelia Cooper, who was my mother’s older sister, saying that the people in New York City threw bricks at them when they came marching down the street.  She was in tears and on the verge of fainting. My mother got her some tea with Irish Whiskey mixed in to revive her.  She did a lot of talking really fast once she had drunk her tea. 

“Damn lyin’ fools.” I heard my father swear in his study as he went over the contracts for settlers trying to avoid the war and go west to claim their 160 acres of land that belonged to the Indians. “They are claiming land that belongs to the Injuns. We’ve had problems over this before Syd.” 

“I know Mr. Oglivie.  We are trying to get a treaty signed by Black Kettle, but we’ve run into a snag.” I could hear Syd O’Connell’s voice in the study behind closed doors.

“James Harris!” I heard my mother’s voice gasp upon seeing me with an ear to the door of my father’s study. 

“I was just-” I tried to think of a lie that would serve me, but I could see that nothing I could say would save me.

“To bed now.” She pointed her finger in the direction of my room.

“Yes mother.” I bowed my head in shame and walked to my room.  

In September of 1862, my mother came running down the hallway crying out, “Bradley Grapple has been killed at a place called Antietam!”

Everyone spilled out into the parlor as mother read the telegram her sister had sent her concerning my cousin Bradley.  She wept openly as my father put his arm around her shoulders whispering in her ear.

Bradley was so excited to put on his blue uniform with the gold buttons.  We had a lawn going-away party for him at his home.  It was hard to imagine him dead, but we went to Elmira where he was in his closed casket with an American flag draped over his wooden box.  The church smelled of burning wax as the minister said some prayers and read from the Bible about some valley of death which I’m sure Antietam was to a lot of soldiers.

Miss Turk was smoking her pipe the next morning before lessons.

“Sorry to hear about your cousin.” She nodded.

“Me too.” I stuffed my hands in my pockets.

“This road we’s on is gonna be hard.” She shook her head.

“What road?” 

“This road we’s on to save this country.” She sighed. “Good mens is goin’ to their graves like yawr cousin.” 

“How come?” 

“Cause things we’s fightin’ for don’t come easy.” She spit off the porch, “Do ya know what we’s fightin’ for?”

I shook my head.

“We’s tryin’ to keep this country together in the name of freedom.” She looked up at the sky as if she was about to pray, “If we stay together, we might give the slaves their freedom too.  Slavery is wrong in so many ways, Master James.” 

“If I have to go fight, I will fight for the president.” I declared.

She put her hands on my cheek, “You a good son, Master James.” 

I felt my heart skip a beat with her warm soothing touch on my tender cheek. “Yes Miss Turk.” 

My mother took a leave of absence from her business, but Hostice Maynard came over the day she announced her leave. 

“Please Jame, you can’t take leave now.” I heard Hostice tell my mother behind the closed doors of my father’s study.  

“My heart is in tatters.” I could hear my mother answer.

“We have some many patients.” Hostice retorted. 

“My sister has buried her only son in a cemetery near their home.” Mother sniffed. “I need to take some time.”

As it turned out my mother never went back to her business.  Her depression as Dr. Scofield called it, was deeper than a well.

“Your mama’s gonna need you, Master James.” Miss Turk told me when I asked why she was still in bed at this hour. “You go give her a kiss on the cheek.” 

“Kissing girls.” I scowled.

“She ain’cha girl.” Her voice was sharp, “She’s yawr mama.  Go on now give her a kiss.” 

She put her hands firmly on my shoulders and directed me inside, “Go on now.” 

I climbed the long twisting staircase up to my mother’s room.  I knocked on the closed door.

“Who is it?” I heard a weak voice from behind the closed door.

“It’s me, James.” I answered.

“Oh, dear boy, please come in.” 

I opened the door and could not believe the person laying in the canopied double bed was my mother.  She waved me to her bedside.  Keeping the image of Miss Turk in my mind, I leaned over and gave my mother a kiss on her cheek. 

“My what was that for?” She was delighted.

“To tell you I am worried about you.” I inhaled deeply.

“Don’t worry about me James.  I will be fine.” She smiled.

A week before Christmas, my mother passed away in her sleep.

“Aren’t you glad I told you to kiss her while you still had the chance?” Miss Turk whispered to me during the service.  

“Yes.” I thought to myself, “I am.” 

“I can barely do lessons today.” Miss Turk informed me in early spring 1863.  My father was out of town helping to get some contracts completed in Chicago, so I was left on my own or at least until Miss Turk showed up for lessons. 

“Why not?” I was awestruck at the confession.

“Frederick Douglass is coming here to speak.” She fanned herself with her hands.

“Who?” 

“The man who talked Harriett into starting the railroad.” She could barely contain her excitement. 

“Oh.” I was not impressed, but when we went to Sunday service Reverend Olsen spoke about this man as if he was an angel sent from Heaven.  When I tried talking to Miss Turk, she would shush me.  

“I would give anything to speak to him.” She told me as we exited the church. 

“He will be here.” I shrugged.

“Yes down at city hall.” 

“So?” 

“Ain’t never seen no Negroes allowed in City Hall.” She said in a quiet voice.

“Is there a law?” I asked with one eye open.

“Not as far as I know, but there are unspoken rules.  Only Negroes know about ‘em.” 

“How come?” I kept the other eye open this time.

“You don’ know the ways of the world sometimes, Master James.” She shook her head like I had given her an incorrect answer during one of our lessons. “I never seen no Negroes go in the City Hall.”

I did not wish to argue with her, because whatever I would say would be wrong.  

This man called Frederick Douglass was coming to support President Lincoln in the war effort.  The union armies had turned the tide of the way at Gettysburg and Vicksburg, but there was still a lot to do.  Having Frederick Douglass speak would be boon to those who had lost faith in the war effort that was a lot more costly than first imagined.  Between the expense and the loss of lives, the war had become unpopular even though the victories began to mount in the Union’s favor.  Since Douglass was a lightning rod for the freedom of those in slavery, he was sent to speak out on behalf of those still in the shackles of slavery.  It was no longer a secret that President Lincoln was going to sign an executive order known as the Emancipation Proclamation that would only protect those colored living in union states, because the Confederate States of America did not recognize the laws of the Federal Government under President Lincoln.  The executive order would have no impact on the southern states. Slavery would continue until the war was over. 

He was a big man with hair that seemed to be out of control.  His voice was deep and seemed to have hidden scars that only showed when he spoke.  Miss Turk decided not to come, because she feared she would not be welcome here.  As I looked around the crowded congregation, I did not see a dark face in the room.  Maybe she was right about City Hall not welcoming the colored.  

Frederick Douglass opened with some of the words he had written in his biography about the cruelty and inhumanity of the institution of slavery.  His own experience had been awful if what he was attesting to be the truth.  I had no reason to believe otherwise.  He spoke about the war and how the army had enlisted colored soldiers to fight for the union.  He spoke about how the command of the Confederate armies considered this treason and would hang any captive colored soldier caught in a union uniform.  

During his speech, many of the congregation would mutter when he spoke of the unjust things the Negroes had to go through in slavery. When he put up his hands, the crowd cheered.  They began to abandon their seats and migrate toward the famous speaker.  

I pushed through the mass of humanity, because I was given strict instructions.  There were gentlemen like my father who introduced themselves as they surged forward toward the famous man.   I made a couple of moves hoping to get close to him, but I was just a boy, no match for those who were bigger and bulkier than I was.  

“Mr. Douglass, that was quite an impressive speech.” I heard one of the men wearing a fine black jacket and tophat tell the speaker who smiled and shook the man’s hand. “We are doing our best to make sure we get the job done.” 

“I appreciate that.” He managed to say before another man pushed his way into the crowd.  I was rapidly becoming discouraged, but I was given clear instructions.

“Mr. Douglass.” I managed to say using my smaller size to weave my way through the crowd.  Unexpectedly the big man looked down into my eyes.  I held out the letter I had been given before I got shoved aside by some of the men eager to have Mr. Douglass’ attention.  Much to my surprise, I watched as he opened the envelope and removed the letter inside.  I watched him read it as the crowd surged forward, pushing me further and further away.  As I nearly lost sight of him, he raised his hands and deliberately stood over me.

“What is your name?” He asked, holding the letter.

“James Oglivie, sir.” I answered. 

“Make way.” I heard one of his bodyguards push some of the crowd away.

“This is a thank you letter for Miss Tubman.” He shook his head.

“Yes…” 

“I will make sure Harriett gets this letter.” He nodded with a smile, “I remember what Harriett told me about Miss Emma Turk. She said Emma was one of the bravest passengers she had ever had.”

“She’s, my teacher.” I said as I was pulled away from him by the crowd.

“You are a lucky boy, indeed.” These would be the last words I would hear him say to me.

When I got home, I was able to tell Miss Turk what he said to me.  Tears filled her eyes and she kissed me on the top of my head, “Thank you Master James, you have made me very happy.”