Monday, September 21, 2009 10:08 PM CDT
COLUMN: 'Trials, Tribulations' a polished portrayal of an historic event
By BILL LAIR, Managing Editor
blair@jg-tc.com
Congratulations to everyone involved with “Trial and Tribulations,” the story of the 1847 Matson slave trial.
The people of Oakland did an outstanding job in bringing the people, passions, morals and legalities of the time to life. Renee Henry was one of the organizers and deserves much credit but there were many volunteers who also helped.
I was involved in several of the Lincoln-related murals around Charleston. I have long felt that the Matson slave trial is needed to complete the Lincoln murals.
After spending Saturday afternoon and evening at “Trials and Tribulations,” I am even more convinced there should be a Matson case mural.
While I have known the basics of the Matson slave trial for many years, I learned so much more on Saturday.
Originally, my wife Cheryl and I thought we might just go for the meal and the play.
But the first-person interpreters really added to the understanding of the magnitude of the case.
The story, as you probably know, is that a Kentucky man, Robert Matson, owned land near Oakland. He kept one slave at the Illinois farm year-round, which meant he was free because Illinois was a non-slave state. That “free man” was named Anthony Bryant.
But Matson occasionally brought Bryant’s slave-wife Jane and their four children, also slaves, up from Kentucky to work the Illinois farm.
When Matson’s housekeeper and mistress Mary Corbin threatened to have Matson sell Mrs. Bryant and the children, Bryant sought help from the Oakland community.
Gideon Ashmore, a tavern keeper, and Dr. Hiram Rutherford agreed to help.
Coles County and much of downstate Illinois was divided on the slavery issue. A lot of people in this area had come from Kentucky and Tennessee, both slave states.
Some who opposed slavery were called abolitionists because they wanted the institution abolished throughout the United States.
O.B. Ficklin, the Charleston attorney who represented Ashmore in the suit to free the Bryants, later wrote about the trial.
Ficklin said of 1847: “Then we had 33 abolitionists in the county, worthy, substantial, social and thrifty men as a rule, nine-tenths of them from slave states.”
Several were near Goose Nest Prairie south of Charleston, where Lincoln’s family lived, Ficklin wrote, and another group in Oakland, “the Ashmores, Dr. Rutherford and a few others, men of pluck ... sober, quiet, industrious and thrifty citizens, they were lampooned....”
According to the U.S. Census, there were about 9,000 residents in Coles County in 1850.
Think of it: 9,000 people in the county; just 33 known abolitionists.
Ashmore and Dr. Rutherford did not enjoy wide support.
Roger Ashmore, a descendant of Gideon Ashmore, and Kim McGee posed as Ashmore and Rutherford outside of Dr. Rutherford’s historic home.
They did a great job of portraying the two key figures in the story and explaining their involvement and their willingness to take action on their beliefs.
Their story is as old as the parable of the Good Samaritan. They not only harbored the Bryants but, along with another resident named Isaac Rodgers and others, paid the legal fees for the Bryants in Coles County Circuit Court.
Marylee McGee, Kim’s wife, portrayed Mary Corbin. She was a hoot! It was not difficult to get a sense of the real Mary Corbin’s temper and charm when visiting with her at a cabin at Independence Pioneer Village.
The interpreters, as well as the actors in the play, all are local residents. Three performers from Indianapolis, also at Pioneer Village, portrayed freeman Anthony Bryant, Jane Bryant and Lucy Dupee, a resident of the black community that was just north of Oakland.
I don’t know their names but they brought emotion to the roles so visitors could get a sense of the misery and cruelty of slavery.
“Three Fifths of a Man” was the play written and directed by David Jorns, former president of Eastern Illinois University.
It was more like readers theater, with few props, and very fast-paced. The cast sparkled..
Three interlocutors. kind of like storytellers, were Stefanie Borntrager, Katrina Bohn and April Lee. Benjamin Ross McBurney portrayed Gideon Ashmore and O.B. Ficklin.
William McBurney played Robert Matson and attorney Usher Linder while Caleb Shaffer played Dr. Rutherford and abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison.
Robert E. Lee Jr. portrayed Justice of the Peace William Gilman and Matson hired hand Joe Dean while Robert B. Lee played a patient of Dr. Rutherford and a messenger boy.
Jacob L. Norris played the conflicted Lincoln, who was part of the legal tandem who represented Matson at trial.
Incidentally, I thought the play treated Lincoln a bit harsh but the Matson slave trial is about so much more than Lincoln.
It was a polished performance by all.
Lincoln and Linder lost the case, the Bryants were freed and Lincoln, well, we all know his story.
Again, congratulations to all involved for an interesting and educational interpretation of a major historical event in Coles County and in Illinois.
Add your comments
Not already registered?
Then click Here.
Comment policy:
JG-TC.com encourages readers to engage in civil conversation with their neighbors. Comments that are submitted are not posted to the site immediately. They go into a queue to be moderated and may take several hours to be reviewed. Comments posted on Saturday may not be reviewed until Sunday afternoon.
In order to keep the page a set width, long lines (mostly long links) will be chopped. Try putting spaces in your links or consider using tinyurl.com to make a smaller link that you can include.
We will never edit or alter your comments, but we do reserve the right to remove comments that violate our code of conduct.
No comment may contain:
* Potentially libelous statements; such as accusing somebody of a crime, defamation of character, or statements that can harm somebody's reputation.
* Obscene, explicit, or racist language.
* Personal attacks, insults, threats, harassment or inciting violence.
* Commercial product promotions.
If you have any questions, please contact our moderator.
|
|
|
|
|
