Unnamed Negroes in Episcopalian Church

Character Key Number: 
499
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Unnamed Negroes in Episcopalian Church
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Unnamed Negroes in Episcopalian Church
Ever Present in Yoknapatawpha?: 
Yes
Biography: 

In both the short story and the novel titled "The Unvanquished," these Negroes are among the people in attendance at the secular service in the Episcopal Church when Rosa distributes money and mules to the needy people of Yoknapatawpha. In his narrative, Bayard indicates that at the beginning of the Civil War they were enslaved, but now, presumably because their former masters are gone because of the War, Bayard calls them "the dozen niggers that had got free by accident and didn't know what to do about it" (84). Along with Ringo, they sit in the church's "slave gallery," which was built to hold 200 slaves, but now is otherwise deserted.