The Transplant

About the Book

The Transplant is the true story about the “other side of the coin” of slavery days in America. The Transplant derives its name from the actual experience of a twelve-year-old African boy who, in the year 1977, was one hundred and thirty-five years old. In his lifetime he was able to view a copy of the original “Transplant” book published by this author in 1978. Charlie Smith passed away in 1979 at the age of 137.

From his experience the facts reveal that he was uprooted from the shores of Liberia, West Africa, placed on Captain Legree’s wooden slave ship, and transplanted to American shores in 1854. This African lad, who almost did not survive the sea voyage, was rejected for sale three times when placed on the New Orleans slave-auction block.

He was finally purchased by a wealthy Texas rancher. The events that were to take place in the life of the transplanted lad, whose name was M’Icha Watkins, were indeed unique, revealing the “other side of the coin” of the American slave system.

M’Icha was a walking, living history book. From his lips flowed the many rare adventures he lived before the freeing of the slaves and during and after Reconstruction.

His relationship with his owner was unique. It was of such an unusual nature that his name was changed to his owner’s at the owner’s request. He was reared as a son of his master, and, though he never was a field hand, he was never unaware of the bad times slavery imposed upon his brothers and sisters.

He was one of the first, if not the first, black cowboy in the pioneer days. He describes his riding days with Jesse James, Billy the Kid, as a bounty hunter, United States detective, and in many, many other escapades that characterized the real Charlie Smith, the “Transplant.”

Never before in the history of America have the American people had the privilege of listening to an account of a person who was also a living testimony to the entire role of the slave system, from the time the African was captured until the days of freedom and Reconstruction days up to modern times.

Only Charlie Smith, who lived until 1979, was alive to tell the story. This is not a story based on something passed from generation to generation but a one-hundred-thirty-five-year-old story from a man who was there and was involved when it was happening.

When this book was first published in 1978 M’Icha Watkins was alive and had the opportunity to see the published project that told the story he had told the author, S. Clifton Byrd. He passed away on Friday, October 5, 1979. His obituary is included in this publication.

About the Author

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dr. Sherman Clifton Byrd began his life on an East Texas sharecropper cotton farm. He put himself through school, attending St. Philips College in San Antonio, Texas, and graduated from the San Antonio Police Academy. He was the first Black to become a criminal investigator in the Bexar County (Texas) District Attorney’s Office. In 1975, he was awarded the Doctor of Divinity degree from Guadalupe Theological College and is presently the pastor of the First Providence Baptist Church in San Antonio. Byrd himself is the grandson of a former slave; his grandmother was a slave. His grandfather was the victim of the last lynching in Caldwell County, Texas.