Holt Collier — Black Confederate and Bear KillerHolt Collier was born a slave on a Mississippi
Holt Collier — Black Confederate and Bear KillerHolt Collier was born a slave on a Mississippi plantation in 1846. For most of his time as a slave, he was a hunter, supplying meat for his masters. When the American Civil War broke out in 1861 Collier, believe it or not, wanted to list in the Confederate Army. However, his master said that he was too young to fight being 15 years old. Collier stowed away on a river boat along with the master’s son, Tom, and headed for Memphis. The Confederacy generally forbid African Americans from serving in the army, however individual units and commanders sometimes made exceptions. Holt was one of them. At first Collier served under General Albert Sydney Johnston, and Collier was supposedly there when he was killed at the Battle of Shiloh. Afterwards, he joined Company I of the 9th Texas Cavalry. After the Civil War Collier was wrongfully accused of the murder of a Freedman’s Bureau Agent named Captain James King. Although acquitted, Collier was essentially persona non grata in Mississippi, and thus left the state for Texas, where he would work in Texas as a cowboy. He later returned to Mississippi, taking up a job as a professional hunting guide and bear hunter. Throughout his career he is noted to have killed at least 3,000 bears. Colliers reputation grew to the point that by 1902 he was chosen by none other than President Theodore Roosevelt as a hunting guide. In a high profile hunt, Collier cornered a bear, bopped it over the head with his rifle, the lassoed it to a tree, calling Roosevelt with a bugle so that the President could kill the bear. Obviously, the concept of fair chase wasn’t quite in vogue yet. When Roosevelt arrived, he famously refused to shoot the bear. Later a cartoonist named Clifford Berryman would illustrate the event with an editorial cartoon, which would serve as origin for the name “Teddy Bear”. Interestingly, Holt Collier is depicted as a white man in the cartoon.Collier served as tracker and guide for Roosevelt on many other hunts. He died in 1936 in Grenville, Mississippi. The Holt Collier National Wildlife Refuge is named after him. -- source link
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