To My Old Master: A letter from former slave Jourdan Anderson to his old master, Colonel P.H. Anderson of Big Spring, Tennessee, who had the audacity to send a letter to Jourdan asking him to come back. 
"Although you shot at me twice before I left you, I did not want to hear of your being hurt, and am glad you are still living"
"(...) I would have gone back to see you all when I was working in the Nashville Hospital, but one of the neighbors told me that Henry intended to shoot me if he ever got a chance."
"(...) I want to know particularly what the good chance is you propose to give me. I am doing tolerably well here. I get twenty-five dollars a month, with victuals and clothing; have a comfortable home, and the children—Milly, Jane, and Grundy—go to school and are learning well"
"(....) We are kindly treated. Sometimes we overhear others saying, 'Them colored people were slaves down in Tennessee'. The children feel hurt when they hear such remarks."
(...) As to my freedom, which you say I can have, there is nothing to be gained on that score, as I got my free papers in 1864 from the Provost-Marshal-General of the Department of Nashville."
"(...) Mandy says she would be afraid to go back without some proof that you were disposed to treat us justly and kindly; and we have concluded to test your sincerity by asking you to send us our wages for the time we served you."
"(...) I served you faithfully for thirty-two years, and Mandy twenty years. At twenty-five dollars a month for me, and two dollars a week for Mandy, our earnings would amount to eleven thousand six hundred and eighty dollars."
"(...) Add to this the interest for the time our wages have been kept back, and deduct what you paid for our clothing, and three doctor's visits to me, and pulling a tooth for Mandy, and the balance will show what we are in justice entitled to."
"(...) Please send the money by Adams's Express, in care of V. Winters, Esq., Dayton, Ohio. If you fail to pay us for faithful labors in the past, we can have little faith in your promises in the future."
"(...) In answering this letter, please state if there would be any safety for my Milly and Jane, who are now grown up. I would rather stay here and starve—and die, if it come to that—than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters. "
"(...) You will also please state if there has been any schools opened for the colored children in your neighborhood. The great desire of my life now is to give my children an education, and have them form virtuous habits."
"Say howdy to George Carter, and thank him for taking the pistol from you when you were shooting at me.
From your old servant,
Jourdon Anderson."
From your old servant,
Jourdon Anderson."
August 7, 1865.
"Jourdan passed away in 1907, aged 81, and is buried alongside his wife who died six years later. Together they had a total of eleven children. He never returned to Big Spring, Tennessee."
"Jourdan passed away in 1907, aged 81, and is buried alongside his wife who died six years later. Together they had a total of eleven children. He never returned to Big Spring, Tennessee."
