The Roebuck plantation was one of the largest in West Georgia. It was isolated by its size; the closest plantation house was 10 miles away.
After Fort Sumter, John Ed Roebuck left his wife and two daughters to join his Confederate regiment. His older brother Lucas, who had lost his hand in a threshing accident and thus couldn't serve, brought his wife to live with Jane Roebuck so there would be a male presence at the sprawling estate.
However, in the spring of 1862, Lucas and his wife had to leave for Atlanta; Lucas' mother-in-law was ill and near death. The absence of a male presence lit the fuse on explosive events.
Jack Carpenter, the white overseer at the Roebuck plantation, had increased the level of his cruelty since John Ed's departure. Without proper supervision, unwarranted whippings increased, the quantity and quality of food provided for the slaves was reduced (with Carpenter skimming profits). But what angered the male slaves the most was how Carpenter, on a nearly daily basis, sexually availed himself of their wives and teenaged daughters.
Jane Roebuck was 34. She had married John Ed, who was eight years her elder, when she was 16. A year later she gave birth to Rose and two years after that, Rebecca. Jane Roebuck was of Irish descent; she had flame-red hair and aqua eyes. After two pregnancies, she was a bit on the plump side, but she was still the type of woman any many would lust after. She was 5-foot-5 with creamy skin. Her breasts were melon-sized and had started to sag.
Rose, who had just turned 20, took after her mother but she was more lean. She, too, had red hair but unlike her mother's often unruly locks, Rose's hair was luxurious, full and smooth. Her skin also was creamy, and her breasts were full, firm and rode high and proud on her chest.
Rebecca took after her father, who had darker features. Her hair was brownish-red and she often wore it in pig tails to keep it under control. Despite being two years younger than her sister, she already was an inch taller than her mother and sister. She had coltish, long slender legs and breasts were apple sized.
On this particular day, around late morning, Jane was reading in the mansion's upstairs study. Her daughters were sewing in a sitting room on the other end of the upstairs floor. It was mid-May, and the weather was heating up. The windows in the mansion were open to allow cross breezes. Jane looked up from her book when she heard shouts in the distance.
She went to the window and saw several house slaves heading for the storehouse. "That's strange," she thought. She called out to Tildie, the old slave mama who ran the house, but got no answer.
Jane was about to turn from the window to see where the house help was when some movement caught her eye. Running through the nearest field and toward the mansion, she saw about a dozen field workers. A cold fear started to grip her spine. The workers never came back from the field until the day was done. Here it was, just before noon, and they were not at work.
Jane was a Southern woman, and she was strong and confident. Still, she realized that other than the overseer, she and her daughters were the only whites -- the only real authority -- on the huge plantation. Her heart started to pound in her chest as she walked to the master bedroom. In a drawer in her dresser was the long-barreled Colt .45 that her husband had left for her "Just in case." She dragged the heavy revolver from the drawer and checked to see that it was loaded.
Carrying the gun in her right hand and hiding it in the folds of her floor-length dress, she started slowly walking toward the stairs. She was trying not to panic, and she deliberately slowed her pace as she tried to calm her nerves.
As Jane stepped off the last step and into the first-floor foyer, the large oak door flew open and six field hands rushed in, single file.
She recognized Buck, one of the hardest working and most reliable field workers.
"B-b-buck," she stammered as she tried to control her breathing, "uh, what are you boys doing here in the middle of the day? Shouldn't you be in the fields? Where's Mr. Carpenter?"
The six men had formed a semi-circle in front of Jane, blocking any exit she had other than back up the steps. She still had the heavy revolver hidden in her skirt but it was starting to feel like she was trying to hold a bale of cotton.
Buck grinned. "That mistah Carpenter? We done took care of that rat bastard sonovabitch. He tied up out in da field. He probly not gonna last to sundown."
The men could hear Jane's gasp. With the overseer -- what, dead? dying? -- there was no one to control the slaves. What she had witnessed from the window indicated that even the house servants were in on the uprising. Jane and her daughters were in grave danger.
Her protective, motherly instincts took over. She pulled the revolver from its hiding place and brought it in front of her. With both hands, she lifted it level and her thumb struggled to pull back the hammer.
"N-n-n-ow, y-y-you boys need to leave the house," Jane said, her voice quaking with fear as she struggled to keep breathing.
Buck grinned again but said nothing. She wasn't really aiming the gun at any of them, but it was clear that she was armed and perhaps dangerous.
Jane's knees were shaking. Feeling pressed by the six men, she started to take a step back. But her foot caught on the bottom of her dress against the first stair step. She lost her balance and started to fall back. One hand came off the pistol to try to brace her fall. The barrel raised and her panicked finger squeezed off a wild shot that put a hole in the wall just above the door.
In seconds, the men were on her. One of them easily wrestled the gun from her hand. He looked on the weapon as though he had just been granted his freedom. The other men grabbed their master's wife and yanked her to her feet, spinning her around to face the staircase. Buck had her right wrist, and he twisted her arm painfully behind her back.
"MAMA," Rose screamed from the top of the stairs. Summoned by the gun shot, Rose and Rebecca had come running. They saw the six black slaves and her mother being manhandled. Nothing in their existence prepared them for the sight of a white woman, their mother, being held roughly by a ... Negro.
Jane struggled in Buck's grip. "For God's sake, let me go, pleeeeease," she wailed. "You can take all the jewelry, all the gold and silver. Let me and my daughters go. We'll ride over to the Bentley plantation. By the time we get there, and anybody comes after you and the others, you'll be long gone."
It sounded like a perfectly reasonable request. But Buck and his five companions weren't after a reasonable settlement.
"Nah, don't think so," he whispered with his mouth close and blowing hot breath on her ear. "We gotta lotta cocks need some cunt."
