But What Interested Me Most, Was A Visit To A Cotton Mill In The
Neighborhood, - A Sample Of A Class
Of manufacturing establishments, where
the poor white people of this state and of South Carolina find occupation.
It is a
Large manufactory, and the machinery is in as perfect order as in
any of the mills at the north. "Here," said a gentleman who accompanied
us, as we entered the long apartment in the second story, "you will see a
sample of the brunettes of the piny woods."
The girls of various ages, who are employed at the spindles, had, for the
most part, a sallow, sickly complexion, and in many of their faces, I
remarked that look of mingled distrust and dejection which often
accompanies the condition of extreme, hopeless poverty. "These poor
girls," said one of our party, "think themselves extremely fortunate to be
employed here, and accept work gladly. They come from the most barren
parts of Carolina and Georgia, where their families live wretchedly, often
upon unwholesome food, and as idly as wretchedly, for hitherto there has
been no manual occupation provided for them from which they do not shrink
as disgraceful, on account of its being the occupation of slaves. In these
factories negroes are not employed as operatives, and this gives the
calling of the factory girl a certain dignity. You would be surprised to
see the change which a short time effects in these poor people. They come
barefooted, dirty, and in rags; they are scoured, put into shoes and
stockings, set at work and sent regularly to the Sunday-schools, where
they are taught what none of them have been taught before - to read and
write.
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