Enemies and allies

William Finch & Daffodils Pt. 8

As a tour guide and frequent tour participant, I’ve thought a lot about what makes for a good historical tour. Storytelling as opposed to a simple recitation of facts and figures is a key ingredient. I’d rather know about how someone lived than their years of birth and death, their occupation, or how many children they had. Even though real people and places are the focus of a historical tour, it can help to think of people as characters, and in telling their story, consider what makes characters compelling: emotional needs, physical wants, and conflict.

When I learn about historical figures, I want answers to questions like these:

What were they passionate about? What hardships did they face? How were they influenced by the community around them, and, in turn, what impact did they have on their community? What were their eccentricities? Who did they love? Who did they hate?

Stories told relative to white people

When I began this series, William Finch & Daffodils, many months ago, my intention was to examine how stories about historical figures in Atlanta’s Black community have been told and how the content of these stories may have shifted over time.

I’ve written about William Finch’s 1911 obituary in the Atlanta Journal which named his former enslaver, talked about him serving the enslavers’ sons during the Civil War, and described him as standing “well among the white people” at the time of his death.

I’ve examined my own fascination with a story that involves Finch presenting an American flag to Union soldiers at the conclusion to the Civil War to show his true loyalty, and how his rejection of the Confederacy contrasts with stories told about Bill Yopp, another man who served his enslaver’s son during the war and later gained recognition for raising money for white men in Atlanta’s Confederate Soldiers’ Home.

At the time of Finch and Yopp’s deaths, in 1911 and 1939 respectively, their stories were shared in mainstream newspapers in a way that reinforced the myth of the loyal slave and focused on the esteem they held among white people.

Today, when I tell William Finch’s story, I invoke conflict by emphasizing his resistance to white supremacy: presenting an American flag to Union soldiers, becoming one of the first Black city council members in Atlanta, advocating for public education for Black students, etc. These stories are compelling, but I worry they still lack dimension in a sense because they only highlight Finch’s struggles relative to a white dominated society.

Finch was an important member of the Black community, but I’ve found in my research that he wasn’t necessarily beloved by all the other Black leaders. In fact, he and Bishop Wesley John Gaines, another resident of Oakland Cemetery, had a very public falling out.

“Serving satan” vs. “a vicious life”

When I was a tour guide at Oakland Cemetery, where Finch and Gaines are buried, I’d hoped to one day create a special topics tour called Enemies and Allies that would highlight fractious as well as platonic relationships between people buried at the cemetery. Landing squarely on the enemies list, at least in the winter of 1881, would be William Finch and Bishop Wesley John Gaines.

On Sunday December 18th, 1881, a letter from William Finch was published in The Atlanta Constitution wherein he stated that he “left the Big Bethel A.M.E. church last July on account of this man Gaines, who while pretending to serve the father of truth, is really serving satan.”

On Tuesday December 27th, 1881, the board of Big Bethel A.M.E. responded with their own letter in the same paper defending Gaines and saying that “the public sentiment of the church was against William Finch for living a vicious life.”

I haven’t been able to find out much about the source of the conflict between Finch and Gaines other than what is presented in these short letters in the paper, which suggest that Finch was serving as a preacher in the church and was censured by a committee for his behavior.

I’m not sure who was in the right or wrong in this conflict or even if there was a right or wrong. I’m wary of traversing from history into speculation, but what’s clear from these letters is that there was more to Finch’s struggles than what was imposed on him by a white dominated society.

What if William Finch was the father of Black public education in Atlanta and also a man who lived “a vicious life” by some definition? Does that make him less heroic or does that make his story more nuanced?

The first daffodils

I am writing this post from snowy New England where spring is still a long way off, but I know from Atlanta friends that the first daffodils of the year have already bloomed there, even though they too are currently experiencing snow.

In April of last year, I photographed some daffodils in the snow here in Amherst. I expect I have months to go until I see them here again.

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