Broken Branches: Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Angus’ first assignment after completing his training was a mission 100 miles into the interior from the west coast of Africa, and all was going very well in the beginning.  For Angus liked the other workers and loved the people they were caring for.

Angus was more interested in feeding bellies than souls, however.  This greatly rankled the sentiments of the monsignor in charge of the mission, but he was gentle in his dealings with Angus.

Others were not so gentle—neither with Angus or the natives.  For they considered it to be their sacred duty to make the salvation of savage souls their highest priority.

However, most of the natives at the mission were actually refugees from various tribal wars in the area, and even though they were all very grateful to receive food and shelter, very few showed any genuine interest in abandoning their traditional religious beliefs.  This did not bother Angus, but it infuriated several of his brethren.

As time went by, Angus started noticing a great discrepancy between the number of children and adults at the mission.  Since it was not at all unusual to see two or three adults show up with a dozen or more of the children from their village after it had been attacked, he did not think much of it at first.  However, when the ratio started approaching 100 children to each adult, Angus started wondering if there was something else going on.

When Angus went to the monsignor with his concerns, it was explained that with several thousand savages flowing in and out of the mission each week, children were bound to be left behind from time to time.  The callousness of the answer disturbed Angus, but he gave no indication of it to the monsignor.

As Angus was heading to the chapel to observe mass the next morning, the monsignor walked up and instructed him to take a group of thirty adult natives not in attendance of the mass to harvest some wheat from the fields to the north of the mission.  Angus went to do as he was told without giving it a second thought, but the look of great fear in the eyes of the natives he asked to go along troubled him greatly.

A couple of hours after arriving at the first field, Angus discovered why there were so many more children than adults at the mission.  For a band of five Arabs and at least fifty tribal warriors came out of the jungle and immediately started putting the natives with him in chains.  When three of the natives tried to escape, two were shot dead by the Arabs, and the other was clubbed to death by five of the tribal warriors.

As Angus screamed at the abusers to stop, one of the Arabs walked up to him.  With a big smile on his face, he asked Angus if he thought Jesus would come to their rescue.  Angus offered nothing in reply, and he remained silent as he was led away in chains with the rest of his group.

They were marched several miles to where they joined a much larger group of captives, and then they were off again.  This repeated several times, and by the time they reached the coast, there were close to 1,000 captives in the group.

Angus kept his mouth shut along the way, but he held his ears wide open.  From his voyages with his father, Arabic was one of many languages he had developed a fair understanding of, and little by little, he learned that an American slave-trader had contracted for the purchase of as many slaves as possible, which the Arabs were very happy to accommodate.

Immediately on arrival of Angus’ group at the port, 987 captives were stuffed into the cargo holds of three docked ships.  Angus found the number of ships rather ironic, and he almost fainted when he saw what looked like a MacTavish flag flying from the main mast of each ship.  He felt better when a closer view revealed that it was a fake.

While down in the cargo hold of the middle ship in line, Angus thought about how different his life would have been if he had of just followed in the footsteps of his father.  What was done was done, but he still wanted to believe that he had a lot of life left to live.

Angus survived the voyage, along with 315 other captives.  Most the dead and obviously dying had been tossed overboard along the way.  For it was considered not good for business to dock with more dead than alive onboard.

Pierre Chastaigner was the contracting American slave-trader, and he had his men herd the captives into his warehouse on Sullivan Island in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina.  The captives were then inspected and categorized in preparation for their auction to the highest bidder.

Most of the men would be sold as slaves to work in the fields throughout the south, along with some western states and territories.  Higher bids went for those who looked like they had a lot of work in them, of course.

Many of the women were also consigned to that fate, but the better-looking ones could fetch a higher price if they showed some aptitude for domestic duties, such as cooking and cleaning.  Teenaged girls often fetched even higher prices as potential breeders.

Not unlike a cattle auction, the highest prices went for the male breeders.  Speaking of such, when Angus told one of Chastaigner’s men what he name was, he was told that he would be hereby known as Bull, and the owner of a large plantation near Pearl, Mississippi paid a record amount for him at the auction.

It made sense that Angus’ new owner would want to transport him on a train from Charleston to New Orleans.  For this would cut several days off of the trip to his plantation in a horse-drawn vehicle, but he wanted to show off his new prized-Bull along the way in the hope of receiving a faster return on his investment.

Fancying himself as being quite a showman, Angus’ owner had him transported in an eight-foot square cage on a flatbed wagon.  This placed Angus in full view of the crowds that often lined the streets after his owner sent two of his men to ride ahead on horseback to announce their approach whenever coming up to a town.  With him standing well over six feet in height—not to mention his broad shoulders and slim waist, Angus was indeed a very impressive physical specimen to behold, and it was almost like the carnival had come to town in some places.

Each night was spent as the guest of honor in the main house of a nearby plantation.  That is, it was Angus’ owner who was received as the guest of honor while Angus was kept in his cage.  Nonetheless, Angus was afforded the shelter of a barn to protect him from facing too much exposure to the elements.

No, it was not all non-stop partying at the plantations for Angus’ owner.  Although, it could be argued that it really was.  For he was there to secure contracts for Angus servicing what they considered to be their prime female breeding stock, and business was good at $100 for three sessions per turn, with no guarantee of pregnancy.

No, Angus’ owner had no intention of putting him out to work in the fields.  Well, at least not until he could no longer perform.

When they finally made it back to his plantation, Angus’ owner had him placed in a fairly large room that had a bed on one side and a set of heavy wooden stocks on the opposite side.

Some might think that Angus had it made, but I was there to see it all.  By the way, the stocks were there to facilitate the breeding process while the bed was for Angus to rest in between sessions.

Angus’ room was large enough to allow for the owners of the girls/women to watch in order to make sure of receiving what they had paid for.  Angus’ owner, or at least one of his trusted men, was always also in attendance, of course.

No, there was nothing romantic about a breeding session.  For a girl/woman would be led into the room, stripped naked and secured in the stocks.  An incredibly beautiful light-skinned black woman was there to orally-stimulate Angus when it was needed.  Her teeth had been pulled for this purpose after her womb had proven to be barren, and despite Angus’ best efforts, he could never resist her expert manipulations.

At the risk of being too graphic, the light-skinned black woman was there to also help the girls/women to prepare for a successful copulation when it was needed.  For Angus was very well-endowed.

Whenever it was the first turn for a teenaged girl, her mouth would be gagged and a thick cloth sack was placed over her head before she was led into the room.  The sack would be removed to ensure enough air after Angus had entered her, but several fainted as soon as they felt him start.  A sawhorse would be placed under the belly of those who went especially limp.

As contracted, the girls/women had three sessions with Angus to increase the probability of them becoming pregnant.  The first session would occur around mid-morning, the second in the afternoon and the third in the evening of the same day.  Amazingly, Angus never failed to perform.

The sessions were held on six days of every week, with only Sundays being an off-day so that the owner and his family could attend services at the Southern Baptist church his grandfather had arranged to be built by his slaves on the edge of the plantation.  This schedule was maintained for two years without any interruptions.

Oh, but Sundays were not a day-off for Angus.  For while the owner and his family were at church, some of the hired-hands would tie Angus to the bedposts and let lustful white women have their way with him.  The plantation foreman actually became somewhat wealthy from these arrangements.

Those arrangements ultimately cost both the foreman and the owner of the plantation everything, though.  For Angus contracted syphilis from one of the white women, and when several of the girls/women he serviced also came down with the disease, their owners came looking for blood.