Jubilee

Randall Ware is walking barefoot on a dusty road, looking for work. He’s running out of money. He finds farm work with a white family, and they allow him to sleep in their barn. He remains for a week before moving on to Ohio. He is there when the Civil War breaks out and hears much talk about “putting down the Rebellion” (255). Still, Ware finds that his quality of life isn’t much better up North, where he can barely find work.

He hears about General Dodge, “an engineer and a professional railroad man” working for General Grant and “now in command of all the Union Armies in the West, to repair the road from Stevenson, Alabama, into Chattanooga, Tennessee” (257). After five days, Ware makes it through Missouri and catches up with General Dodge. He offers his services as a blacksmith. After being given a meal and a place to sleep, Ware proves himself to the general the next morning, and is officially working toward the freedom of his people. 

In the Big House, they are unaware of Kevin’s fate and eagerly prepare for his homecoming. A wagon one day comes up the road, and strangers exit. Miss Lillian immediately senses that something is wrong. She becomes hysterical even before she sees her husband in the wagon. He’s still alive and in great pain. His children look at him and also begin to cry. Though the surgeon general sewed up Kevin’s wound, “the sutures [are] not strong” and “could burst the wound open again” (286). A doctor arrives and examines Kevin. He cries out from excruciating pain, which is only relieved when he finally dies. Missy Salina and Miss Lillian bury him on a cold, windy day. Miss Lillian visits her husband’s grave every day after his burial. Meanwhile, Missy Salina distracts herself from grief by sewing the Confederate flag that she later hangs over her front door.

Back at Shady Oaks Plantation, Lillian and Missy Salina are talking about the Emancipation Proclamation. Salina refuses to acknowledge Lincoln, whom she refers to as “that boor in Washington,” “that gorilla Lincoln,” and “Ape Lincoln” as her president (263). Jefferson Davis, she insists, is her leader. She reminds Lillian of how Davis asserted that “the whole thing is a question of superior white people and inferior black people” (263). She also reinforces the paternalistic belief that only “good southern white people would nurse and take care of slaves,” citing black people’s poor treatment at the hands of Northern whites during a recent riot in New York.

They haven’t heard from John Jr. in some time, but his mother assumes that he’s fine. Meanwhile, Jim experiences numerous delays on his way back to Shady Oaks from Chickamauga. They’re unable to follow the river back home, due to the presence of Union soldiers. The season also brings the possible problem of frostbite, given that neither Jim nor John Jr. have proper shoes. Though they have enough to eat, John Jr. is weakening and coming down with a fever.

When they finally get to Shady Oaks, Missy Salina “[orders] Jim and Caline to get help quickly and to get Marster Johnny upstairs” (266). Once her son is rested, she updates him on the conditions on the plantation. She mentions that only 20 field hands remain. Of the 20 who went to work in the munitions factory in Macon, five escaped. Five more than ran away from the plantation. Grimes is too overwhelmed to keep everyone under control, now that the guards and patter-rollers are fighting in the war.

After three days, Fanny Crenshaw visits. John Jr. tells her about how the Confederacy won the Battle of Chickamauga, thereby preventing the Union soldiers from entering Georgia. Fanny talks about life on her own family’s plantation, how many of her slaves have run away, and that she and her mother are managing the place alone. She also “[rolls] bandages, and [sews] packets for the soldiers” (270). She then has a moment of distress in which she complains about how “the war has spoiled everything” and destroyed all of “[their] good times” (270). John Jr. thinks that, under normal circumstances, he might have married Fanny. She then announces that she must leave and quickly leaves the room, with her riding crop in hand.

Jim spends most of his time talking to Vyry in the kitchen. He’s exhausted and anxious. He finds it difficult to “settle down again into the routine of the plantation” (270-71). He tells her about all the fighting he’s witnessed and all of the jobs that he performed for the Confederate camp. He says that the Confederacy is clearly fighting against black people. He admits that he doesn’t like young Marster John, and knows that the young man doesn’t like him either, but that doesn’t prevent Jim from pitying him.

Fanny returns to visit John Jr. She brings “home-made wine, fresh huckleberries put down in sugar, and pressed chicken jelly she had made herself” (271). She is also wearing a very beautiful but outdated dress. John Jr. mentions how impressed he is, having always thought pretty girls like fanny “were light-headed and just ornamental” (271), unable to perform tasks like cooking.

It pleases Salina to see Fanny around, knowing that it’s good for John Jr.’s spirits. In the final week of November John Jr. insists on sitting on the veranda, though Missy Salina worries about the impact of the strong winds. He eventually goes inside the house but remains on the first floor. Fanny doesn’t prepare to leave until it’s nearly dusk. When she does, John Jr. grabs her wrist and strongly suggests that he loves her.

Later that night, John coughs incessantly. Missy Salina goes to his room and sees him coughing up torrents of blood. She sends for Old Doc, but nothing can be done. John Jr. dies early the next morning. The slaves bury him on a rainy autumn day. Missy Salina, Miss Lillian, and Fanny dress in black and wear veils. The slaves hold umbrellas over their heads to protect them from the downpouring rain. Missy Salina enters a period of grief that prevents her from eating and sleeping.