“Well-worn textbooks, bearing his name written in his own scrawling handwriting, and well-filled copy-books found in his trunk, showed that he had burned the midnight oil, and desired to improve himself intellectually in order that he might conquer the hated white race.”  From this quotation it will be seen that he spent the hours after days of hard toil in trying to improve himself, both in the study of textbooks and in writing.

He knew that he was a student of a problem which required all the intelligence that a man could command, and he was burning his midnight oil gathering knowledge that he might better be able to come to an intelligent solution.  To his aid in the study of this problem he sought the aid of a Christian newspaper, the Voice of Missions, the organ of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.  He was in communication with its editor, who is a bishop, and is known all over this country as a man of learning, a lover of justice and the defender of law and order.  Charles could receive from Bishop Turner not a word of encouragement to be other than an earnest, tireless and God-fearing student of the complex problems which affected the race.

For further help and assistance in his studies, Charles turned to an organization which has existed and flourished for many years, at all times managed by men of high Christian standing and absolute integrity.  These men believe and preach a doctrine that the best interests of the Negro will be subserved by an emigration from America back to the Fatherland, and they do all they can to spread the doctrine of emigration and to give material assistance to those who desire to leave America and make their future homes in Africa.  This organization is known as “The International Migration Society.”  It has its headquarters in Birmingham, Alabama.  From this place it issues pamphlets, some of which were found, in the home of Robert Charles, and which pamphlets the reporters of the New Orleans papers declare to be incendiary and dangerous in their doctrine and teaching.

Nothing could be further from the truth.  Copies of any and all of them may be secured by writing to D.J.  Flummer, who is President and in charge of the home office in Birmingham, Alabama.  Three of the pamphlets found in Charles’s room are named respectively: 

First, Prospectus of the Liberian Colonization Society; which pamphlet in a few brief pages tells of the work of the society, plans, prices and terms of transportation of colored people who choose to go to Africa.  These pages are followed by a short, conservative discussion of the Negro question, and close with an argument that Africa furnishes the best asylum for the oppressed Negroes in this country.

The second pamphlet is entitled Christian Civilization of Africa.  This is a brief statement of the advantages of the Republic of Liberia, and an argument in support of the superior conditions which colored people may attain to by leaving the South and settling in Liberia.