Whitelaw Reid: “Whatever the fortune of South Carolina, the Sea Islands must henceforth be flourishing.”

But why should a sensible man deal with such folly?

I would rather give up my crop to the negroes than the lives of my wife and children.

Above all, if there is a trace of politics in their work, or of seeking for political effect at home, they will fail, and deserve to fail.

Extravagant living left nearly every planter enormously in debt when the war came.