After the meeting, we were standing on the platform in front of the church, and a sprinkle of rain out of a cloudless sky fell on the platform, and on the shutters of the house.  This was nothing but a miracle, and was very astonishing to us all.  The next day the clouds began to gather in the sky, and the moisture began, at first, to fall like heavy dew.  There was no lightning or thunder and the rain came down in the gentlest manner and continued in this way three days.  With this marvelous manifestation in direct answer to prayer, many people said “we would have had the rain any way.”  “Truly the ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib, but my people doth not know, my people doth not consider.”

I began to think what I should do to fulfill my vow to God, for I vowed to return to Him something for rain, to show my gratitude that I had seen done.  There was an old man, about seventy years old, entirely destitute, whose name was Bestwick.  I went to see him, asked him to come to the hotel and make his home there.  There was also a poor German girl, named Fredricka.  I also gave her board at the hotel.  These two stayed with me free of charge as long as I lived in Richmond.

There were two political factions in Richmond at this time, one called the “Jaybirds” and the other “Peckerwoods”.  The latter were people that were in favor of the negro holding offices.  This party had control of the country for some time.  The head of this party was Garvey, the sheriff.  The head of the former was Henry Frost, a saloon-keeper, and to this belonged nearly all the young men of Richmond.

Mr. Nation was correspondent for the Houston Post and he wrote a letter speaking of the bad-influence and conduct of these young men the night before; screaming about the streets and disturbing the peace generally.  He went down to meet the trains about twelve o’clock at night.  The next night after the article appeared in the Post, he came in and woke me up saying:  “Wife get up; I have been beaten almost to death;” and lighting a lamp, I found that his body was covered with bruises.  I bathed him in cold water and otherwise tried to relieve him.  He was too faint to tell me the trouble, only the boys had beaten him.  I knelt down by the window to pray to God.  I began by calling on God to send a punishment on people that would do such a mean, cowardly act.  I prayed until I received perfect deliverance from that kind of a spirit, and when I got up from off my knees, it was four o’clock in the morning.

In this crowd was a family of Gibson boys, whose father was an infidel, and encouraged his sons in this matter and in all their bad ways.  There were also other boys, Peason, Little, Winston; twenty-one in all.  A man by the name of Henry George asked Mr. Nation to come and sit on a bale of cotton on the depot platform, and talk with him; another one of these boys came up and threw Mr. Nation backwards on the platform.  Then each one gave him a hit with a stick, or a cane.  I don’t think there are but two or three of those boys living now.  After moving to Kansas, a few months after this I returned to Texas for a visit.  I then looked, upon the graves of four of the Gibsons.  “Truly, vengeance is mine, I will repay,” saith the Lord.