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Samuel Tribble In the Stone Age there were many tribal wars. Quite often war captives were killed and eaten. Later, it was found useful to keep the captives alive, and put them to work. For a long time slavery existed in every land, including Egypt and the Holy Land in biblical times. Slavery was a way of life, not considered wrong, and seen as a better alternative than to the slaying of the captives. In Africa slavery lasted long after it had disappeared in Europe. Indeed, slavery is believed to exist in some remote areas of the "Dark Continent" even today. African tribes, which had a surplus of slaves quite often, sold some of their unneeded workers to professional slave traders. Some of the traders were Arabs, but many such traders were native black Africans. Those slave traders would chain their captives and march them in gangs to scaports along the African Coast. Quite often these chained captives were forced to carry goods such as elephant tusks, animal hides and other trade goods as they struggled along on their into captivity. In various old towns along the African coast there were slave-trading stations, some centuries old. The stations were strongly fortified stone fortresses containing dungeons for imprisonment. From time to time "Yankee" slave ships from New England would visit the slave stations along the coast of Africa and buy cargoes of slaves to carry back to the colonies in the West Indies or in North America. For a long time slaves inhabited every part of the English colonies in North America but the climate in the northern colonies proved unfavorable to the slavery. The short growing seasons and early frosts in the north made it impossible to grow stable crops such as cotton, rice, sugar cane and indigo plants. So the northern plantation owners started to sell their slaves to traders who took their human merchandise to the warmer colonies in the south. There the slaves were used to raise crops in longer and more favorable growing seasons. Eventually, even the slave owners in the middle colonies of Maryland and Delaware sold a large percentage of their slaves to the traders. One of the slaves had been an African King. He had taken some of his enemies down to the coast to sell to the Yankee traders but hi enemies seized him and sold him into slavery also. This erstwhile king ended his days on a rice plantation on the Edisto River, near the coast of South Carolina. On another occasion a Yankee trader bought some slaves on a plantation in Maryland and transported them southward. Among those captives were two brothers. One brother was sold to a plantation owner in Edgefield, an area today known as Saluda County SC. The other brother became the property of the Tribble plantation in Newberry County SC. The Tribble Family was moderately wealthy, owning a large area of land. The "big house" or mansion was built on a hill about a mile behind the present day Belmont Baptist Church. This is on a short road between Belfast Road and Island Ford Road. The Tribbles were pleased with their new farm hand and treated him well, calling him Samuel. The strong energetic black man proved to be a splendid and willing worker. He was very loyal to his master's family and the family developed a special liking toward him It was a great pleasure for the young white boys to take Sam with them at night when they went possum or coon hunting. Several years of contentment passed but then the terrible and ruinous War Between the States began. Samuel's "young marster" prepared to go away to join the Confederate Army in Virginia but before leaving he decided to take his servant Samuel1 with him. Several campaigns and many terrible battles occurred. During one such expedition in Maryland, the southern troops passed only a short distance from the plantation where Samuel had grown up. Then General Lee pushed northward into Pennsylvania hoping to win a victory that would bring an end to the war. But at Gettysburg the Confederate Army suffered a great defeat. Thousands of corpses in blue and gray uniforms littered the great battlefield. Samuel Tribble disappeared the night following
the battle. The southern troops naturally thought Samuel had deserted to the enemy. What happened next is a matter of controversy. Samuel again disappeared from the Southern Arm. Of course the men thought he had again deserted, but the indications are that Samuel's 'Marster' in compassion, because of the way his servant was being persecuted, gave Sam permission to go home. If this happened however, the 'Marster' made a great blunder. He should have written a letter of explanation stating his servant had permission to return home. This would have simplified matters somewhat. But 'Marster' was probably half literate. He probably did not even think of trying to write such a letter and he did not ask anyone else to write such a letter for his departing servant. This soon proved to be a great mistake. Upon leaving the Confederate Army, Samuel attached himself to an elderly General who was going southward on business. The General seemed kind enough to the black man and Samuel found it was a pleasure to do things for the general. Unfortunately, the name of the General is now forgotten. Once Charlotte, NC was reached Samuel knew where he was and so he regrettably parted company with his new-found friend and set out across the countryside. There was no trouble in reaching Newberry County and in making his way to his home on the Tribble Plantation. The family and friends welcomed him. But soon trouble again. Some meddlesome neighbor reported to the place that Samuel had deserted his Master and had slipped away from the Army in Virginia to come home. The police promptly went to visit Samuel and since Samuel had no documents to prove otherwise, it seemed certain the man was a deserter and a run-away. As was to be expected Samuel was promptly arrested and imprisioned in Newberry on a charge of desertion. When 'Marster' returned home after the War he promptly cleared his servant's record and saw to it that Samuel was released from jail. But the war had ruined the Tribble Family fortune. Mr. Tribble was not able to give Samuel the help of a mule but did give Samuel a large area of land along Machine Branch and told Samuel he was free to cultivate that farmland. A neat little cottage with a big chimney stood on the property. Samuel was told he was free to live there. Instead of a mule, Samuel was presented with a big bull, a yoke, a plow stock and the good wishes of his former master. As a freed man Samuel assumed the name Samuel Tribble. Samuel collected boards, cut posts in the woods and built a small corral for cattle and hogs. He built stables, a chicken house and a hugh pen. Later a corncrib and a cotton storage house were built. But the building of these structures was costly, difficult, and too much time. The spring plowing season arrived and Sam began rising as soon as the roosters began to crow. He would feed his bull, cook a hasty breakfast in a frying pan at the big open fireplace and head out for a day's work as soon as his bull had finished eating. Sam would put a yoke on the bull and drive it to the field, while Sam himself carried the plow on his shoulder. All morning the man and his bull would plow steadily. At noon, Sam would feed the bull, cook a hasty dinner for himself, then soon after, return to the field to plow until growing darkness forced him to quit for the day. Sam made a good cotton crop that year. With the proceeds from his crop he then purchased a good mule and turned his faithful bull out to pasture. The advantage of plowing with a mule instead of a bull was that a mule walks faster than an ox. Thus considerably more land can be plowed in a day with a mule than would otherwise be possible. However, in pulling heavy loads an ox was greatly superior to a mule. Samuel gathered posts and poles from the nearby woods and constructed a stout corral in which he could confine his mule as well as other animals that he might own later. He also built a stable, feed trough and storage area. A second year of hard work was rewarded by another good crop. Sam pulled fodder (long corn leaves) in his cornfield and tied it in bundles so that it could be stored and used as mule feed later. He harvested and stored the corn. During the following winter some of the corn would be shelled and ground into meal for use in baking corn bread or boiling of grits. Most of the corn however would be used in feeding the livestock – mules, chickens, hogs and geese. From the proceeds of the cotton crop of the second year Samuel bought land. Samuel became acquainted with a fine young woman in a nearby community and decided to get married. A local minister, probably the white minister of Mount Zion Baptist Church, performed the wedding ceremony. It soon became evident that Sam had made a very good choice in his mate. The lady was courteous and friendly. Everyone like her. Mrs. Tribble was a good cook. She also seemed to know how to do almost everything concerning the running of a household. This good wife could take cotton or wool, card it (comb it) so as to get all the fibers running in one direction. Then she would spin it into thread, using an old fashioned spinning wheel. This thread was then slowly and carefully fitted into a small loom and with much patience good cloth was woven from the thread. Various dyes were abstracted from the plants in the surrounding fields and forests and used on the homespun cloth. Mrs. Tribble was a good seamstress, making clothing for herself, husband and growing family of children. She also knew many of the wild plants as well as garden herbs that could be used for medical purposes. As a result it was seldom necessary for the Tribble family to call a doctor when someone was ill. Samuel Tribble, at an early age, had learned how to butcher hogs in winter. The animal was killed and its carcass was stretched on planks laid on the ground. Then, with the aid of scalding water and short handled hoes, all the hair was carefully scraped away. The carcass was then hung up by the hind legs. The intestines were removed and carefully saved. Then the carcass was dismembered and cut into pieces known as “ribs”, “hams”, and “shoulders”. These big chunks of meat were salted and hung up in a smoke house. There the curing process was completed by smoking the meat over a small fire of burning hickory. The entrials (intestines) were cleaned by scalding and washing them. After being dried these entrails were used as containers of grounded meat, commonly known as sausage or pudding. These two foods were considered the best part of a hog. Sorghum cane was ground with a small cane grinder powered by a mule walking in a circle. The juice from the process was cooked in a big steel vat. The tasty black molasses produced a valued and much enjoyed food for use in winter. The Tribble cows produced plenty of milk, some of which was churned into butter. Chickens and geese provided the family with plenty of eggs. When a calf was killed its hide was always carefully saved. The loose meat and all the hair were removed by scraping. Then the hide was well soaked in a small pool of water with a large quantity of red oak bark. When the hide was “cured” it was removed, washed and dried. This was leather of a quality that could be used in making hamstrings, shoelaces, harnesses, plow gears and shoes. Mrs. Tribble2 and her children harvested fruit from trees on abandoned farms. Peaches could be peeled, cut into fragments, dried in sunlight and preserved in bags for use in the winter. Cabbage was cut into fragments and packed tightly in barrels with vinegar and salt. Vinegar was made from apple juice. Cow peas and lima beans were stored in bags and hung up in the pantry for use in the following winter. Hardwood ashes, soaked in water, produced lye, which was cooked with bones and grease to make lye soap. Sweet potatoes were raised in large quantites, dug up, washed, dried and stacked in big cone-shaped mounds. These mounds were covered with layers of fine straw and cornstalks. These potato banks protected the stored vegetable from freezing during even the harshest winter. There was an endless supply of fish and rabbit from nearby sources. Occasionally a hollow tree would yield a wild bees' nest and plenty of honey. The neighbors said that Sam Tribble and his wife managed to save every penny that they ever made. Samuel Tribble continued to buy land, year after year until he owned up to 1700 acres before he died. This land extended along the Island Ford Road almost all the way from the Belfast Road to Little River. After the Civil War land had been sold at bank closures for pennies on the dollar and Samuel had taken advantage of the sales3. In those days the whites and the blacks attended the same churches. Usually the blacks sat in an elevated gallery while the whites occupied the man floor of the church. But several unscrupulous men, many of who were whites and some of who were black began to make corn liquor and sell it to the younger men. As a result, much disorder began to develop among the black members in the gallery of Mount Zion Baptist Church. Mr. Floyd, one of the leading members of the Church, set aside several acres of his plantation and announced he was donating this land to the black members of the church for the purpose of them establishing their own church. Sam Tribble, a natural leader, headed a committee, laboring hard to persuade the black people to work together in building the new house of worship. Plans were drawn, money was collected and the construction commenced. Square nails were used in the construction. The women provided noon meals for the workers and under Sam Tribble's leadership the building was completed. In those days a plantation called “Belmont' existed in the area just north of the new Church. Belmont (beautiful hill) was the name of city in northeastern France. The mebers of the new black church decided to call their new house of worship “Belmont” because of its proximity to the well-known plantation of that name. Belmont had been built from the lumber of pine trees found growing on the church grounds. Borrowed wagons were used to haul the lumber to nearby sawmills. Later the green lumber was hauled back to the building site, stacked and allowed to dry. The area, which was cleared when these trees were cut, was reserved for use as a cemetery. It was soon used, for in those days before modern medicines and vaccinations for communicable disease, most people did not live very long. Once Belmont Church was built, Sam Tribble decided he wanted to be a minister of the Gospel. He thought he ought to be permitted to preach in the new church, despite some opposition of members. Sam preached on a few occasions but he was not a good pulpit man. His lack of education was a fatal handicap along with his inability to deliver the “hell, fire, and brimstone” type of sermon that the members of Belmont wanted. On one occasion the Belmont Deacons invited a well-known minister to come for a visit. The preacher's name is now quite forgotten but a part of what he said is still remembered. During the church services, when it came time for the visiting minister to speak to the congregation, the visiting minister rose in the pulpit and in a loud, sonorous voice intoned, “Praise God from whom all blessings flow, on Sam Tribble and these Belmont Devils her below”. Sam afterward told the visitor, “I'll live to see the geese eat grass of you grave”. This however was a mistake, for the offending visitor outlived Samuel. Sam Tribble was deeply discouraged because of his mistreatment of the hands of the people of Belmont and in his anger and dismay went to a place in the woods just south of the Belfast Road, a place only a short distance from the present home of Claud Riddle. There, Sam and his friends cut poles and built a “Brush Arbor', a large framework built of poles and covered with brush. Logs were cut and rolled into position to serve as seats and a good pulpit was made of boards. In this place Sam Tribble preached to many people. Then disaster struck. A few miles away lived a middle aged black man who had a young wife. For various reasons the marriage of these two people hit upon a rocky course and the wife ran away and 'took up' with a man who was only slightly older than she was. At home the deserted husband sat grieving. One night this lonely man happened to think that his run away wife and her new man were probably seated beneath the recently constructed brush arbor, singing hymns and listening to Sam Tribble preach. This angry, aggrieved man decided on revenge. He took down his double-barreled gun, loaded it, and went furtively to the brush arbor. From a short distance away this angry rascal blazed away at the crowd seated beneath the arbor, wounding at least seven or eight people. One of these wounded people was Reason Wilson, an honest and truly worthy black man whom this writer remembers with deep respect. It happened that the home of Dr. W. D. Senn was only a short distance away. Dr. Senn had a very busy night. However, the troublemaker did not escape. Some boys had seen what he had done and as soon as his gun was empty they ran him down, took his weapon from him and gave him a good beating. Soon afterward a judge gave him a sentence that took him out of circulation for a long time. Samuel Tribble continued his efforts to preach a little longer but finally, in deep discouragement, he was forced to conclusion that the Good Lord had not given him the talents and the ability to be a minister of the Gospel. In 1882 a new white neighbor arrived in the community along the Island Ford Road. Charles Walker Senn, a gentleman of northern Swiss origin, purchased a farm, which for many years had been Floyd family property. This area of Newberry SC (Township #6) was originally called “Floyd Township” A Williams family was living on the land when Charles Walker Senn contracted to buy the farm with a down payment. In 2003 the same land is called the “Windmill Farm”. With the versatility and energy of his Swiss ancestors, Mr. Senn was a man of many skills. He was a good farmer, furniture maker, carpenter, blacksmith, tanner and shoemaker. Sam Tribble soon formed a firm friendship with this versatile and highly gifted neighbor. It was indeed a great blessing to have such a skillful man as Mr. Senn to sharpen plows, shoe horses and mules and do blacksmith work. Prior to the arrival of the Senn family,
farmers had considered it a disgrace to have plow lines or furrows in anything but straight lines. Wooden stakes
were driven in the fields and the plowboys were taught to plow by stake across level land and straight up and down
the hills. Hillside ditches carried Rainwater away. This system worked well on level lands but it resulted in severe
soil erosion on the hills of South Carolina. Then Mr. Senn showed Samuel how to use curved rows that followed the contours of the new terraces and the advantages of crop rotation instead of planting cotton on the same land year after year. Sam hauled black topsoil from the woods to enrich his land, followed his friend's example and as a result fertility and productivity gradually increased. After many years of domestic bliss and of facing the trials of a growing family, Sam's good wife died. She was buried in the graveyard of the Belmont Baptist Church4. In a Methodist community near Saluda River in lower Newberry, Samuel found a young lady whom he wanted. She was a Miss Katie Bell Waites. Her father was partly Cherokee Indian, a son of a Cherokee who had ran away from his reservation in Oklahoma. Most Cherokee run-aways returned to the Cherokee Hills in North Carolina but this particular man migrated to near a black settlement in southern Newberry County. From that place one of the sons of this half-Indian family took his family to Monrovia, in the western African country of Liberia. But the good wife could not endure the West African climate. As her health deteriorated she had to be sent home in order to save her life. The children of this “Waites” family learned to like Liberia but the grieving mother in Newberry SC succeeding in getting help to send for her family5. The returned family settled on a farm on the Belfast Road. One of the neighbors of the Waites Family was Samuel Tribble. The grieving widower was devastated by the loss of his wife, yet about a year later, he gegan courting again., seeking solace in the company of one of the pretty Waites daughters. About a year later Samuel persuaded the young lady to marry him. Sam Tribble, 65 years old, married Cora Waites6, sixteen years old, at Trinity Church on May 20, 1900 officiated by Rev. D. P. Boyd. The happy bridegroom promptly took his bride to his home near Belmont Church. There the new wife endeavored to make friends of her stepchildren and grapple with the unaccustomed problems of running her own household. Many new friendships were soon made. The young wife made a visit to a nearby home of the Senn Family to see a new baby when yours truly was born. Eventually the aging Samuel Tribble was the father of a growing second family of children. Sam Tribble appeared so vigorous and in such good health that he appeared to be destined to live a hundred years. But a rare disease struck the vigorous man. Dr. W. Senn diagnosed the ailment as cancer, which in those days was almost invariably fatal. Within a few months Sam Tribble was dead. ..in the graveyard of Belmont Church, which he helped build, Samuel Tribble lies today in his final sleep7. Beside him are the graves of his two wives8. He is almost completely forgotten now but few former residents and good citizens of Newberry County are more deserving of being remembered. One of Samuel Tribble's sons was Hilton Tribble who married Esther Speaks. They had five children of who three are still alive (2003). Hilton died a few years ago and his widow, Esther Waits Tribble, now lives in Florida with one of her children. Queen Esther's mother, “Aunt Janie” was a great turkey raiser. Queen Esther's only brother was called “Cracker” and worked for Harmon Brenmer.
1880 Federal Census Newberry SC
1 Sgt. Andrew K. Tribble, Co "B", 3rd Regt. 3 In 1877 Sam's former master, Andrew K. Tribble had 1204 acres of land with 15 buildings on the delinquent tax list 4 Headstone #108 at Belmont cemetery – Rosa belle, dau of Samuel and Julia Ann Tribble, Apr 8, 1892-May 23, 1900 Headstone #109 at Belmont Cemetery – the headstone is gone but the footstone reads J.A.T. (Julia Ann Tribble) 5 Mrs. Ollie Waits, colored, returned from Liberia some time ago. Col. C. J. Purcell is paying for the return passage of her husband and children, totaling about $200. They had left for Liberia several years ago. Newberry Observer 7/21/1897; Her husband and children are back in Newberry thanks to Col. Purcell. Newberry Observer 10/20/1897 6 Cora Waites 16 years old, colored, married Sam Tribble, colored, 65 years old, at Trinity Church on 5/20/1900 officiated by Rev. D. P. Boyd. Newberry Observer 5/24/1900 7 Died Nov 3, 1912 8 Second wife, Katie Belle Tribble died Dec 22, 1929
contributed by Donna Brummett
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