A year after Austin F. Flood‘s plea to the Freedmen’s Bureau, Van Buren Winbourn continued to terrorize African-Americans in Wilson. In this letter, a Central District superintendent directed his assistant in Goldsboro to refer this complaint to Wilson County authorities and, if they failed to act, to arrest and jail Winbourn and his gang. I have not located Jacob Barnes‘ referenced affidavit.
Office Superintendent Bureau Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, Central District
Raleigh, N.C., August 25th, 1866.
Maj. Jas. W.H. Stickney, Asst. Supt. Sub District of Goldsboro N.C.
Major
Jacob Barnes freedman of Wilson in your sub District complains that an outrage was committed upon him by “Van Winman” and seven others, citizens of Wilson with intent to kill, for full particulars in this case your attention is invited to the enclosed Affidavit taken before me — Present this case to the proper County Authorities and if upon your application in behalf of this freedman, they neglect or refuse to arrest and bring to trial the offenders, in accordance with G.O. No. 3, current series Hd.Qrs. Asst.Com. N.C. and in accordance with Genl Grants G.O. No. 44. You will arrest the offenders and send them to Raleigh to be “detained in Military confinement until such time as a proper justicial tribunal may be ready and willing to try them.”
Very respectfully, A.G. Br[illegible], Bvt. Col. and Supt.
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- Jacob Barnes — perhaps, in the 1870 census of Stantonsburg township, Wilson County: farmer Hardy Barnes, 50; wife Mary, 49; and children Alfred, 21, Riley, 24, Jacob, 22, Isaac, 19, Warren, 17, Zilly, 12, Mary, 9, and Wade, 6.
- “Genl Grants G.O. No. 44” — General Order 44 directed division and department commanders in the former Confederate states “to arrest all persons who have been or may hereafter be charged with the commission of crimes and offenses against officers, agents, citizens, and inhabitants of the United States, irrespective of color, in cases where the civil authorities have failed, neglected, or are unable to arrest and bring such parties to trial, and to detain them in military confinement until such time as a proper judicial tribunal may be ready and willing to try them.” General Orders, No. 44, Headquarters of the Army, Adjutant General’s Office, 6 July 1866, Orders & Circulars, series 44, Adjutant General’s Office, Record Group 94, National Archives.
North Carolina Freedmen’s Bureau Field Office Records, 1863-1872, Goldsboro (subassistant commissioner), Roll 16, Unregistered Letters Received Aug 1865-Feb 1868, http://www.familysearch.org