©
COPYRIGHT 2013 International Education Institute,
ATTN: Ken Harvey, 2027 W. Canal Drive, Kennewick
WA 99336, USA
written by himself PREFACE
In the
month of August, 1841, I attended an
antislavery convention in Nantucket, at which it
was my happiness to become
acquainted with FREDERICK DOUGLASS, the writer
of the following Narrative. He was
a stranger to nearly every member of
that body; but, having recently made his escape
from the southern prison-house
of bondage, and feeling his curiosity excited to
ascertain the principles and
measures of the abolitionists,--of whom he had
heard a somewhat vague
description while he was a slave,--he was
induced to give his attendance, on
the occasion alluded to, though at that time a
resident in New Bedford. Fortunate,
most fortunate
occurrence!--fortunate for the millions of his
manacled brethren, yet panting
for deliverance from their awful
thraldom!--fortunate for the cause of negro
emancipation, and of universal
liberty!--fortunate for the land of his birth,
which he has already done so much to save and
bless! --fortunate for a large
circle of friends and acquaintances, whose
sympathy and affection he has
strongly secured by the many sufferings he has
endured, by his virtuous traits
of character, by his ever-abiding remembrance of
those who are in bonds, as
being bound with them!--fortunate for the
multitudes, in various parts of our
republic, whose minds he has enlightened on the
subject of slavery, and who
have been melted to tears by his pathos, or
roused to virtuous indignation by
his stirring eloquence against the enslavers of
men!--fortunate for himself, as
it at once brought him into the field of public
usefulness, "gave the
world assurance of a MAN," quickened the
slumbering energies of his soul,
and consecrated him to the great work of
breaking the rod of the oppressor, and
letting the oppressed go free! I shall
never forget his first speech at
the convention--the extraordinary emotion it
excited in my own mind--the
powerful impression it created upon a crowded
auditory, completely taken by
surprise--the applause which followed from the
beginning to the end of his
felicitous remarks. I
think I never
hated slavery so intensely as at that moment;
certainly, my perception of the
enormous outrage which is inflicted by it, on
the godlike nature of its victims,
was rendered far more clear than ever.
There stood one, in physical proportion
and stature commanding and
exact--in intellect richly endowed--in natural
eloquence a prodigy--in soul
manifestly "created but a little lower than the
angels"--yet a slave,
ay, a fugitive slave,--trembling for his safety,
hardly daring to believe that
on the American soil, a single white person
could be found who would befriend
him at all hazards, for the love of God and
humanity! Capable
of high attainments as an intellectual
and moral being--needing nothing but a
comparatively small amount of
cultivation to make him an ornament to society
and a blessing to his race--by
the law of the land, by the voice of the people,
by the terms of the slave
code, he was only a piece of property, a beast
of burden, a chattel personal,
nevertheless! A beloved
friend from New Bedford prevailed
on Mr. DOUGLASS to address the convention: He
came forward to the platform with
a hesitancy and embarrassment, necessarily the
attendants of a sensitive mind
in such a novel position. After
apologizing for his ignorance, and reminding the
audience that slavery was a
poor school for the human intellect and heart,
he proceeded to narrate some of
the facts in his own history as a slave, and in
the course of his speech gave
utterance to many noble thoughts and thrilling
reflections.
As soon as he had taken his seat, filled
with
hope and admiration, I rose, and declared that
PATRICK HENRY, of revolutionary
fame, never made a speech more eloquent in the
cause of liberty, than the one
we had just listened to from the lips of that
hunted fugitive.
So I believed at that time--such is my
belief
now. I
reminded the audience of the peril
which surrounded this selfemancipated young man
at the North,--even in
Massachusetts, on the soil of the Pilgrim
Fathers, among the descendants of
revolutionary sires; and I appealed to them,
whether they would ever allow him
to be carried back into slavery,--law or no law,
constitution or no
constitution.
The response was unanimous
and in thunder-tones--"NO!"
"Will you succor and protect him as a
brother-man--a resident of
the old Bay State?"
"YES!" shouted the whole mass, with an
energy so startling,
that the ruthless tyrants south of Mason and
Dixon's line might almost have
heard the mighty burst of feeling, and
recognized it as the pledge of an
invincible determination, on the part of those
who gave it, never to betray him
that wanders, but to hide the outcast, and
firmly to abide the consequences. It was at
once deeply impressed upon my
mind, that, if Mr. DOUGLASS could be persuaded
to consecrate his time and
talents to the promotion of the anti-slavery
enterprise, a powerful impetus
would be given to it, and a stunning blow at the
same time inflicted on
northern prejudice against a colored complexion. I
therefore endeavored to instil hope and
courage into his mind, in order that he might
dare to engage in a vocation so
anomalous and responsible for a person in his
situation; and I was seconded in
this effort by warm-hearted friends, especially
by the late General Agent of
the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Mr. JOHN
A. COLLINS, whose judgment in
this instance entirely coincided with my own.
At first, he could give no encouragement;
with unfeigned diffidence, he
expressed his conviction that he was not
adequate to the performance of so
great a task; the path marked out was wholly an
untrodden one; he was sincerely
apprehensive that he should do more harm than
good. After much deliberation,
however, he consented to make a trial; and ever
since that period, he has acted
as a lecturing agent, under the auspices either
of the American or the
Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. In labors he
has been most abundant; and
his success in combating prejudice, in gaining
proselytes, in agitating the
public mind, has far surpassed the most sanguine
expectations that were raised
at the commencement of his brilliant career.
He has borne himself with gentleness and
meekness, yet with true manliness
of character.
As a public speaker, he
excels in pathos, wit, comparison, imitation,
strength of reasoning, and
fluency of language. There
is in him
that union of head and heart, which is
indispensable to an enlightenment of the
heads and a winning of the hearts of others.
May his strength continue to be equal to
his day! May
he continue to "grow in grace, and
in the knowledge of God," that he may be
increasingly serviceable in the
cause of bleeding humanity, whether at home or
abroad! It is
certainly a very remarkable fact,
that one of the most efficient advocates of the
slave population, now before
the public, is a fugitive slave, in the person
of FREDERICK DOUGLASS; and that
the free colored population of the United States
are as ably represented by one
of their own number, in the person of CHARLES
LENOX REMOND, whose eloquent
appeals have extorted the highest applause of
multitudes on both sides of the
Atlantic. Let
the calumniators of the
colored race despise themselves for their
baseness and illiberality of spirit,
and henceforth cease to talk of the natural
inferiority of those who require
nothing but time and opportunity to attain to
the highest point of human
excellence. It may,
perhaps, be fairly questioned,
whether any other portion of the population of
the earth could have endured the
privations, sufferings and horrors of slavery,
without having become more
degraded in the scale of humanity than the
slaves of African descent. Nothing
has been left undone to cripple their
intellects, darken their minds, debase their
moral nature, obliterate all
traces of their relationship to mankind; and yet
how wonderfully they have
sustained the mighty load of a most frightful
bondage, under which they have
been groaning for centuries! To
illustrate the effect of slavery on the white
man,--to show that he has no
powers of endurance, in such a condition,
superior to those of his black
brother,--DANIEL O'CONNELL, the distinguished
advocate of universal
emancipation, and the mightiest champion of
prostrate but not conquered
Ireland, relates the following anecdote in a
speech delivered by him in the
Conciliation Hall, Dublin, before the Loyal
National Repeal Association, March
31, 1845. "No matter," said Mr. O'CONNELL,
"under what specious
term it may disguise itself, slavery is still
hideous. ~It
has a natural, an inevitable tendency to
brutalize every noble faculty of man.~
An American sailor, who was cast away on
the shore of Africa, where he
was kept in slavery for three years, was, at the
expiration of that period,
found to be imbruted and stultified--he had lost
all reasoning power; and
having forgotten his native language, could only
utter some savage gibberish
between Arabic and English, which nobody could
understand, and which even he
himself found difficulty in pronouncing.
So much for the humanizing influence of
THE DOMESTIC
INSTITUTION!"
Admitting this to
have been an extraordinary case of mental
deterioration, it proves at least
that the white slave can sink as low in the
scale of humanity as the black one. Mr.
DOUGLASS has very properly chosen to
write his own Narrative, in his own style, and
according to the best of his
ability, rather than to employ some one else.
It is, therefore, entirely his own
production; and, considering how long
and dark was the career he had to run as a
slave,--how few have been his
opportunities to improve his mind since he broke
his iron fetters,--it is, in
my judgment, highly creditable to his head and
heart. He
who can peruse it without a tearful eye, a
heaving breast, an afflicted spirit,-without
being filled with an unutterable
abhorrence of slavery and all its abettors, and
animated with a determination
to seek the immediate overthrow of that
execrable system,--without trembling
for the fate of this country in the hands of a
righteous God, who is ever on
the side of the oppressed, and whose arm is not
shortened that it cannot
save,--must have a flinty heart, and be
qualified to act the part of a
trafficker "in slaves and the souls of men." I am
confident that it is essentially true in
all its statements; that nothing has been set
down in malice, nothing
exaggerated, nothing drawn from the imagination;
that it comes short of the
reality, rather than overstates a single fact in
regard to SLAVERY AS IT IS.
The experience of FREDERICK DOUGLASS, as a
slave, was not a peculiar one; his
lot was not especially a hard one; his case may
be regarded as a very fair
specimen of the treatment of slaves in Maryland,
in which State it is conceded
that they are better fed and less cruelly
treated than in Georgia, Alabama, or
Louisiana.
Many have suffered
incomparably more, while very few on the
plantations have suffered less, than
himself. Yet
how deplorable was his
situation! what terrible chastisements were
inflicted upon his person! what
still more shocking outrages were perpetrated
upon his mind! with all his noble
powers and sublime aspirations, how like a brute
was he treated, even by those
professing to have the same mind in them that
was in Christ Jesus! to what
dreadful liabilities was he continually
subjected! how destitute of friendly
counsel and aid, even in his greatest
extremities! how heavy was the midnight
of woe which shrouded in blackness the last ray
of hope, and filled the future
with terror and gloom! what longings after
freedom took possession of his
breast, and how his misery augmented, in
proportion as he grew reflective and
intelligent,--thus demonstrating that a happy
slave is an extinct man! how he
thought, reasoned, felt, under the lash of the
driver, with the chains upon his
limbs! what perils he encountered in his
endeavors to escape from his horrible
doom! and how signal have been his deliverance
and preservation in the midst of
a nation of pitiless enemies! This
Narrative contains many affecting
incidents, many passages of great eloquence and
power; but I think the most
thrilling one of them all is the description
DOUGLASS gives of his feelings, as
he stood soliloquizing respecting his fate, and
the chances of his one day
being a freeman, on the banks of the Chesapeake
Bay--viewing the receding
vessels as they flew with their white wings
before the breeze, and
apostrophizing them as animated by the living
spirit of freedom.
Who can read that passage, and be
insensible
to its pathos and sublimity? Compressed
into
it is a whole Alexandrian library of thought,
feeling, and sentiment--all
that can, all that need be urged, in the form of
expostulation, entreaty,
rebuke, against that crime of crimes,--making
man the property of his
fellow-man!
O, how accursed is that
system, which entombs the godlike mind of man,
defaces the divine image,
reduces those who by creation were crowned with
glory and honor to a level with
four-footed beasts, and exalts the dealer in
human flesh above all that is
called God!
Why should its existence be
prolonged one hour? Is it
not evil, only
evil, and that continually? What
does
its presence imply but the absence of all fear
of God, all regard for man, on
the part of the people of the United States?
Heaven speed its eternal overthrow! So
profoundly ignorant of the nature of
slavery are many persons, that they are
stubbornly incredulous whenever they
read or listen to any recital of the cruelties
which are daily inflicted on its
victims. They do not deny that the slaves are
held as property; but that
terrible fact seems to convey to their minds no
idea of injustice, exposure to
outrage, or savage barbarity. Tell
them
of cruel scourgings, of mutilations and
brandings, of scenes of pollution and
blood, of the banishment of all light and
knowledge, and they affect to be
greatly indignant at such enormous
exaggerations, such wholesale misstatements,
such abominable libels on the character of the
southern planters!
As if all these direful outrages were not
the
natural results of slavery! As if
it
were less cruel to reduce a human being to the
condition of a thing, than to
give him a severe flagellation, or to deprive
him of necessary food and
clothing! As if whips, chains, thumb-screws,
paddles, bloodhounds, overseers,
drivers, patrols, were not all indispensable to
keep the slaves down, and to
give protection to their ruthless oppressors!
As if, when the marriage institution is
abolished, concubinage,
adultery, and incest, must not necessarily
abound; when all the rights of
humanity are annihilated, any barrier remains to
protect the victim from the
fury of the spoiler; when absolute power is
assumed over life and liberty, it
will not be wielded with destructive sway!
Skeptics of this character abound in
society. In
some few instances, their incredulity
arises from a want of reflection; but,
generally, it indicates a hatred of the
light, a desire to shield slavery from the
assaults of its foes, a contempt of
the colored race, whether bond or free.
Such will try to discredit the shocking
tales of slaveholding cruelty
which are recorded in this truthful Narrative;
but they will labor in
vain. Mr.
DOUGLASS has frankly disclosed
the place of his birth, the names of those who
claimed ownership in his body
and soul, and the names also of those who
committed the crimes which he has
alleged against them. His
statements,
therefore, may easily be disproved, if they are
untrue. In the
course of his Narrative, he relates
two instances of murderous cruelty,--in one of
which a planter deliberately
shot a slave belonging to a neighboring
plantation, who had unintentionally
gotten within his lordly domain in quest of
fish; and in the other, an overseer
blew out the brains of a slave who had fled to a
stream of water to escape a
bloody scourging.
Mr. DOUGLASS states
that in neither of these instances was any thing
done by way of legal arrest or
judicial investigation. The
Baltimore
American, of March 17, 1845, relates a similar
case of atrocity, perpetrated
with similar impunity--as follows:--"~Shooting a
slave.~--We learn, upon
the authority of a letter from Charles county,
Maryland, received by a
gentleman of this city, that a young man, named
Matthews, a nephew of General
Matthews, and whose father, it is believed,
holds an office at Washington,
killed one of the slaves upon his father's farm
by shooting him.
The letter states that young Matthews had
been left in charge of the farm; that he gave an
order to the servant, which
was disobeyed, when he proceeded to the house,
~obtained a gun, and, returning,
shot the servant.~
He immediately, the
letter continues, fled to his father's
residence, where he still remains
unmolested."--Let it never be forgotten, that no
slaveholder or overseer
can be convicted of any outrage perpetrated on
the person of a slave, however
diabolical it may be, on the testimony of
colored witnesses, whether bond or
free. By
the slave code, they are
adjudged to be as incompetent to testify against
a white man, as though they
were indeed a part of the brute creation. Hence,
there is no legal protection
in fact, whatever there may be in form, for the
slave population; and any
amount of cruelty may be inflicted on them with
impunity. Is
it possible for the human mind to conceive
of a more horrible state of society? The
effect of a religious profession on the
conduct of southern masters is vividly described
in the following Narrative,
and shown to be any thing but salutary.
In the nature of the case, it must be in
the highest degree
pernicious.
The testimony of Mr.
DOUGLASS, on this point, is sustained by a cloud
of witnesses, whose veracity
is unimpeachable.
"A slaveholder's
profession of Christianity is a palpable
imposture.
He is a felon of the highest grade. He is
a man-stealer.
It is of no importance what you put in
the
other scale." Reader!
are you with the man-stealers in
sympathy and purpose, or on the side of their
down-trodden victims? If
with the former, then are you the foe of
God and man.
If with the latter, what
are you prepared to do and dare in their behalf? Be
faithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your
efforts to break every yoke, and let the
oppressed go free.
Come what may --cost what it
may--inscribe on
the banner which you unfurl to the breeze, as
your religious and political
motto--"NO COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY!
NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS!"
WM.
LLOYD GARRISON BOSTON, ~May~ 1, 1845. LETTER FROM
WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. BOSTON,
APRIL 22, 1845. My Dear
Friend: You
remember the old fable of "The Man
and the Lion," where the lion complained that he
should not be so
misrepresented "when the lions wrote history." I am glad
the time has come when the
"lions write history." We
have
been left long enough to gather the character of
slavery from the involuntary
evidence of the masters. One
might,
indeed, rest sufficiently satisfied with what,
it is evident, must be, in
general, the results of such a relation, without
seeking farther to find
whether they have followed in every instance.
Indeed, those who stare at the half-peck
of corn a week, and love to count
the lashes on the slave's back, are seldom the
"stuff" out of which
reformers and abolitionists are to be made. I
remember that, in 1838, many were
waiting for the results of the West India
experiment, before they could come
into our ranks.
Those
"results" have come long ago; but, alas! few of
that number have come
with them, as converts. A man
must be
disposed to judge of emancipation by other tests
than whether it has increased
the produce of sugar,--and to hate slavery for
other reasons than because it
starves men and whips women,--before he is ready
to lay the first stone of his
anti-slavery life. I was
glad to learn, in your story, how
early the most neglected of God's children waken
to a sense of their rights,
and of the injustice done them.
Experience is a keen teacher; and long
before you had mastered your A B
C, or knew where the "white sails" of the
Chesapeake were bound, you
began, I see, to gauge the wretchedness of the
slave, not by his hunger and
want, not by his lashes and toil, but by the
cruel and blighting death which
gathers over his soul. In
connection with this, there is one
circumstance which makes your recollections
peculiarly valuable, and renders
your early insight the more remarkable. You come
from that part of the country
where we are told slavery appears with its
fairest features.
Let us hear, then, what it is at its best
estate--gaze on its bright side, if it has one;
and then imagination may task
her powers to add dark lines to the picture, as
she travels southward to that
(for the colored man) Valley of the Shadow of
Death, where the Mississippi
sweeps along. Again, we
have known you long, and can put
the most entire confidence in your truth,
candor, and sincerity. Every
one who has heard you speak has felt,
and, I am confident, every one who reads your
book will feel, persuaded that
you give them a fair specimen of the whole
truth. No
one-sided portrait, --no wholesale
complaints,--but strict justice done, whenever
individual kindliness has
neutralized, for a moment, the deadly system
with which it was strangely
allied. You
have been with us, too, some
years, and can fairly compare the twilight of
rights, which your race enjoy at
the North, with that "noon of night" under which
they labor south of
Mason and Dixon's line. Tell
us whether,
after all, the halffree colored man of
Massachusetts is worse off than the
pampered slave of the rice swamps! In
reading your life, no one can say that
we have unfairly picked out some rare specimens
of cruelty. We know that the
bitter drops, which even you have drained from
the cup, are no incidental
aggravations, no individual ills, but such as
must mingle always and
necessarily in the lot of every slave.
They are the essential ingredients, not
the occasional results, of the
system. After
all, I shall read your book with
trembling for you.
Some years ago, when
you were beginning to tell me your real name and
birthplace, you may remember I
stopped you, and preferred to remain ignorant of
all. With
the exception of a vague description, so
I continued, till the other day, when you read
me your memoirs.
I hardly knew, at the time, whether to
thank
you or not for the sight of them, when I
reflected that it was still dangerous,
in Massachusetts, for honest men to tell their
names! They say the fathers, in
1776, signed the Declaration of Independence
with the halter about their necks.
You, too, publish your declaration of freedom
with danger compassing you
around. In
all the broad lands which the
Constitution of the United States overshadows,
there is no single
spot,--however narrow or desolate,--where a
fugitive slave can plant himself
and say, "I am safe." The
whole armory of Northern Law has no shield for
you. I
am free to say that, in your place, I
should throw the MS. into the fire. You,
perhaps, may tell your story in
safety, endeared as you are to so many warm
hearts by rare gifts, and a still
rarer devotion of them to the service of others. But it
will be owing only to your labors, and
the fearless efforts of those who, trampling the
laws and Constitution of the
country under their feet, are determined that
they will "hide the
outcast," and that their hearths shall be, spite
of the law, an asylum for
the oppressed, if, some time or other, the
humblest may stand in our streets,
and bear witness in safety against the cruelties
of which he has been the
victim. Yet it is
sad to think, that these very
throbbing hearts which welcome your story, and
form your best safeguard in
telling it, are all beating contrary to the
"statute in such case made and
provided."
Go on, my dear friend,
till you, and those who, like you, have been
saved, so as by fire, from the
dark prisonhouse, shall stereotype these free,
illegal pulses into statutes;
and New England, cutting loose from a
blood-stained Union, shall glory in being
the house of refuge for the oppressed,--till we
no longer merely "~hide~
the outcast," or make a merit of standing idly
by while he is hunted in
our midst; but, consecrating anew the soil of
the Pilgrims as an asylum for the
oppressed, proclaim our WELCOME to the slave so
loudly, that the tones shall
reach every hut in the Carolinas, and make the
broken-hearted bondman leap up
at the thought of old Massachusetts.
God
speed the day!
~Till then, and ever,~
~Yours truly,~
~WENDELL PHILLIPS~ FREDERICK
DOUGLASS. Frederick
Douglass was born in slavery as
Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey near Easton
in Talbot County,
Maryland. He
was not sure of the exact
year of his birth, but he knew that it was 1817
or 1818. As
a young boy he was sent to Baltimore, to
be a house servant, where he learned to read and
write, with the assistance of
his master's wife.
In 1838 he escaped
from slavery and went to New York City, where he
married Anna Murray, a free
colored woman whom he had met in Baltimore.
Soon thereafter he changed his name to
Frederick Douglass. In 1841 he
addressed a convention of the Massachusetts
Anti-Slavery Society in Nantucket
and so greatly impressed the group that they
immediately employed him as an
agent. He
was such an impressive orator
that numerous persons doubted if he had ever
been a slave, so he wrote
NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.
During the Civil War he assisted in the
recruiting of colored men for
the 54th and 55th Massachusetts Regiments and
consistently argued for the
emancipation of slaves. After
the war he
was active in securing and protecting the rights
of the freemen.
In his later years, at different times,
he
was secretary of the Santo Domingo Commission,
marshall and recorder of deeds
of the District of Columbia, and United States
Minister to Haiti.
His other autobiographical works are MY
BONDAGE AND MY FREEDOM and LIFE AND TIMES OF
FREDERICK DOUGLASS, published in
1855 and 1881 respectively. He died in 1895. CHAPTER I I was
born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough,
and about twelve miles from Easton, in Talbot
county, Maryland.
I have no accurate knowledge of my age,
never
having seen any authentic record containing it.
By far the larger part of the
slaves know as little of their ages as horses
know of theirs, and it is the
wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep
their slaves thus
ignorant. I
do not remember to have ever
met a slave who could tell of his birthday.
They seldom come nearer to it than
planting-time, harvesttime,
cherry-time, spring-time, or fall-time.
A want of information concerning my own
was a source of unhappiness to
me even during childhood. The
white
children could tell their ages. I
could
not tell why I ought to be deprived of the same
privilege.
I was not allowed to make any inquiries
of my
master concerning it. He
deemed all such
inquiries on the part of a slave improper and
impertinent, and evidence of a
restless spirit.
The nearest estimate I
can give makes me now between twenty-seven and
twentyeight years of age. I come
to this, from hearing my master say,
some time during 1835, I was about seventeen
years old. My mother
was named Harriet Bailey. She
was the daughter of Isaac and Betsey
Bailey, both colored, and quite dark. My
mother was of a darker complexion than either my
grandmother or grandfather. My father
was a white man.
He was admitted to be such by all I ever
heard speak of my parentage. The opinion was
also whispered that my master was
my father; but of the correctness of this
opinion, I know nothing; the means of
knowing was withheld from me. My
mother
and I were separated when I was but an
infant--before I knew her as my mother.
It is a common custom, in the part of Maryland
from which I ran away, to part
children from their mothers at a very early age. Frequently,
before the child has reached its
twelfth month, its mother is taken from it, and
hired out on some farm a
considerable distance off, and the child is
placed under the care of an old woman,
too old for field labor. For what this
separation is done, I do not know,
unless it be to hinder the development of the
child's affection toward its
mother, and to blunt and destroy the natural
affection of the mother for the
child. This is the inevitable result. I never
saw my mother, to know her as such,
more than four or five times in my life; and
each of these times was very short
in duration, and at night. She
was hired
by a Mr. Stewart, who lived about twelve miles
from my home.
She made her journeys to see me in the
night,
travelling the whole distance on foot, after the
performance of her day's
work. She
was a field hand, and a
whipping is the penalty of not being in the
field at sunrise, unless a slave
has special permission from his or her master to
the contrary--a permission
which they seldom get, and one that gives to him
that gives it the proud name
of being a kind master. I do
not
recollect of ever seeing my mother by the light
of day. She
was with me in the night. She
would lie down with me, and get me to
sleep, but long before I waked she was gone.
Very little communication ever took place
between us. Death soon ended
what little we could have while she lived, and
with it her hardships and suffering.
She died when I was about seven years old, on
one of my master's farms, near
Lee's Mill.
I was not allowed to be
present during her illness, at her death, or
burial. She
was gone long before I knew any thing
about it. Never
having enjoyed, to any
considerable extent, her soothing presence, her
tender and watchful care, I
received the tidings of her death with much the
same emotions I should have
probably felt at the death of a stranger. Called
thus suddenly away, she left me
without the slightest intimation of who my
father was.
The whisper that my master was my father,
may
or may not be true; and, true or false, it is of
but little consequence to my
purpose whilst the fact remains, in all its
glaring odiousness, that
slaveholders have ordained, and by law
established, that the children of slave
women shall in all cases follow the condition of
their mothers; and this is
done too obviously to administer to their own
lusts, and make a gratification
of their wicked desires profitable as well as
pleasurable; for by this cunning
arrangement, the slaveholder, in cases not a
few, sustains to his slaves the
double relation of master and father. I know of
such cases; and it is worthy of
remark that such slaves invariably suffer
greater hardships, and have more to
contend with, than others. They
are, in
the first place, a constant offence to their
mistress. She
is ever disposed to find fault with them;
they can seldom do any thing to please her; she
is never better pleased than
when she sees them under the lash, especially
when she suspects her husband of
showing to his mulatto children favors which he
withholds from his black
slaves. The
master is frequently
compelled to sell this class of his slaves, out
of deference to the feelings of
his white wife; and, cruel as the deed may
strike any one to be, for a man to
sell his own children to human flesh-mongers, it
is often the dictate of
humanity for him to do so; for, unless he does
this, he must not only whip them
himself, but must stand by and see one white son
tie up his brother, of but few
shades darker complexion than himself, and ply
the gory lash to his naked back;
and if he lisp one word of disapproval, it is
set down to his parental
partiality, and only makes a bad matter worse,
both for himself and the slave
whom he would protect and defend. Every
year brings with it multitudes of
this class of slaves. It was
doubtless
in consequence of a knowledge of this fact, that
one great statesman of the
south predicted the downfall of slavery by the
inevitable laws of
population.
Whether this prophecy is
ever fulfilled or not, it is nevertheless plain
that a very different-looking
class of people are springing up at the south,
and are now held in slavery,
from those originally brought to this country
from Africa; and if their
increase do no other good, it will do away the
force of the argument, that God
cursed Ham, and therefore American slavery is
right. If
the lineal descendants of Ham are alone to
be scripturally enslaved, it is certain that
slavery at the south must soon
become unscriptural; for thousands are ushered
into the world, annually, who,
like myself, owe their existence to white
fathers, and those fathers most
frequently their own masters. I have
had two masters.
My first master's name was Anthony. I do
not remember his first name. He was
generally called Captain Anthony--a title which,
I presume, he acquired by
sailing a craft on the Chesapeake Bay.
He was not considered a rich slaveholder. He
owned two or three farms, and about thirty
slaves. His
farms and slaves were under
the care of an overseer. The
overseer's
name was Plummer.
Mr. Plummer was a
miserable drunkard, a profane swearer, and a
savage monster.
He always went armed with a cowskin and a
heavy cudgel.
I have known him to cut
and slash the women's heads so horribly, that
even master would be enraged at
his cruelty, and would threaten to whip him if
he did not mind himself. Master,
however, was not a humane
slaveholder.
It required extraordinary
barbarity on the part of an overseer to affect
him. He
was a cruel man, hardened by a long life
of slaveholding.
He would at times seem
to take great pleasure in whipping a slave.
I have often been awakened at the dawn of
day by the most heart-rending
shrieks of an own aunt of mine, whom he used to
tie up to a joist, and whip
upon her naked back till she was literally
covered with blood. No
words, no tears, no prayers, from his gory
victim, seemed to move his iron heart from its
bloody purpose.
The louder she screamed, the harder he
whipped; and where the blood ran fastest, there
he whipped longest. He
would whip her to make her scream, and
whip her to make her hush; and not until
overcome by fatigue, would he cease to
swing the blood-clotted cowskin. I remember the
first time I ever witnessed
this horrible exhibition. I was
quite a
child, but I well remember it. I
never
shall forget it whilst I remember any thing.
It was the first of a long series of such
outrages, of which I was
doomed to be a witness and a participant.
It struck me with awful force. It
was the blood-stained gate, the entrance to the
hell of slavery, through which
I was about to pass. It was
a most
terrible spectacle. I wish
I could
commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld
it. This
occurrence took place very soon after
I went to live with my old master, and under the
following circumstances. Aunt
Hester went out one night,-where or for
what I do not know,--and happened to be absent
when my master desired her
presence. He
had ordered her not to go
out evenings, and warned her that she must never
let him catch her in company
with a young man, who was paying attention to
her belonging to Colonel Lloyd. The
young man's name was Ned Roberts,
generally called Lloyd's Ned. Why
master
was so careful of her, may be safely left to
conjecture. She
was a woman of noble form, and of graceful
proportions, having very few equals, and fewer
superiors, in personal
appearance, among the colored or white women of
our neighborhood. Aunt
Hester had not only disobeyed his
orders in going out, but had been found in
company with Lloyd's Ned; which
circumstance, I found, from what he said while
whipping her, was the chief
offence. Had
he been a man of pure
morals himself, he might have been thought
interested in protecting the
innocence of my aunt; but those who knew him
will not suspect him of any such
virtue. Before
he commenced whipping
Aunt Hester, he took her into the kitchen, and
stripped her from neck to waist,
leaving her neck, shoulders, and back, entirely
naked. He
then told her to cross her hands, calling
her at the same time a d----d b---h.
After crossing her hands, he tied them
with a strong rope, and led her
to a stool under a large hook in the joist, put
in for the purpose. He
made her get upon the stool, and tied her
hands to the hook.
She now stood fair
for his infernal purpose. Her
arms were
stretched up at their full length, so that she
stood upon the ends of her
toes. He
then said to her, "Now,
you d----d b---h, I'll learn you how to disobey
my orders!" and after
rolling up his sleeves, he commenced to lay on
the heavy cowskin, and soon the
warm, red blood (amid heart-rending shrieks from
her, and horrid oaths from
him) came dripping to the floor. I was
so terrified and horror-stricken at the sight,
that I hid myself in a closet,
and dared not venture out till long after the
bloody transaction was over. I
expected it would be my turn next. It was
all new to me.
I had never seen any thing like it
before. I
had always lived with my
grandmother on the outskirts of the plantation,
where she was put to raise the
children of the younger women. I had
therefore been, until now, out of the way of the
bloody scenes that often
occurred on the plantation. CHAPTER
II My
master's family consisted of two sons,
Andrew and Richard; one daughter, Lucretia, and
her husband, Captain Thomas
Auld. They
lived in one house, upon the
home plantation of Colonel Edward Lloyd.
My master was Colonel Lloyd's clerk and
superintendent.
He was what might be called the overseer
of
the overseers.
I spent two years of
childhood on this plantation in my old master's
family. It was here that I
witnessed the bloody transaction recorded in the
first chapter; and as I
received my first impressions of slavery on this
plantation, I will give some
description of it, and of slavery as it there
existed. The
plantation is about twelve miles north of
Easton, in Talbot county, and is situated on the
border of Miles River. The
principal products raised upon it were
tobacco, corn, and wheat. These
were
raised in great abundance; so that, with the
products of this and the other
farms belonging to him, he was able to keep in
almost constant employment a
large sloop, in carrying them to market at
Baltimore.
This sloop was named Sally Lloyd, in
honor of
one of the colonel's daughters. My
master's son-in-law, Captain Auld, was master of
the vessel; she was otherwise
manned by the colonel's own slaves.
Their names were Peter, Isaac, Rich, and
Jake. These
were esteemed very highly by the other
slaves, and looked upon as the privileged ones
of the plantation; for it was no
small affair, in the eyes of the slaves, to be
allowed to see Baltimore. Colonel
Lloyd kept from three to four
hundred slaves on his home plantation, and owned
a large number more on the
neighboring farms belonging to him. The
names of the farms nearest to the home
plantation were Wye Town and New
Design. "Wye
Town" was under
the overseership of a man named Noah Willis.
New Design was under the overseership of
a Mr. Townsend.
The overseers of these, and all the rest
of
the farms, numbering over twenty, received
advice and direction from the managers
of the home plantation. This
was the
great business place. It was
the seat of
government for the whole twenty farms.
All disputes among the overseers were
settled here.
If a slave was convicted of any high
misdemeanor, became unmanageable, or evinced a
determination to run away, he
was brought immediately here, severely whipped,
put on board the sloop, carried
to Baltimore, and sold to Austin Woolfolk, or
some other slave-trader, as a
warning to the slaves remaining. Here,
too, the slaves of all the other
farms received their monthly allowance of food,
and their yearly clothing. The
men and women slaves received, as their
monthly allowance of food, eight pounds of pork,
or its equivalent in fish, and
one bushel of corn meal. Their
yearly
clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts,
one pair of linen trousers, like
the shirts, one jacket, one pair of trousers for
winter, made of coarse negro
cloth, one pair of stockings, and one pair of
shoes; the whole of which could
not have cost more than seven dollars.
The allowance of the slave children was
given to their mothers, or the
old women having the care of them. The
children unable to work in the field had neither
shoes, stockings, jackets, nor
trousers, given to them; their clothing
consisted of two coarse linen shirts
per year. When these failed them, they went
naked until the next
allowance-day.
Children from seven to ten
years old, of both sexes, almost naked, might be
seen at all seasons of the
year. There
were no beds given the slaves, unless
one coarse blanket be considered such, and none
but the men and women had
these. This,
however, is not considered
a very great privation. They
find less
difficulty from the want of beds, than from the
want of time to sleep; for when
their day's work in the field is done, the most
of them having their washing,
mending, and cooking to do, and having few or
none of the ordinary facilities
for doing either of these, very many of their
sleeping hours are consumed in
preparing for the field the coming day; and when
this is done, old and young,
male and female, married and single, drop down
side by side, on one common
bed,--the cold, damp floor,--each covering
himself or herself with their
miserable blankets; and here they sleep till
they are summoned to the field by
the driver's horn.
At the sound of this,
all must rise, and be off to the field.
There must be no halting; every one must
be at his or her post; and woe
betides them who hear not this morning summons
to the field; for if they are
not awakened by the sense of hearing, they are
by the sense of feeling: no age
nor sex finds any favor. Mr. Severe, the
overseer, used to stand by the door of
the quarter, armed with a large hickory stick
and heavy cowskin, ready to whip
any one who was so unfortunate as not to hear,
or, from any other cause, was
prevented from being ready to start for the
field at the sound of the horn. Mr.
Severe was rightly named: he was a
cruel man.
I have seen him whip a woman,
causing the blood to run half an hour at the
time; and this, too, in the midst
of her crying children, pleading for their
mother's release.
He seemed to take pleasure in manifesting
his
fiendish barbarity. Added
to his cruelty,
he was a profane swearer. It was
enough
to chill the blood and stiffen the hair of an
ordinary man to hear him
talk. Scarce
a sentence escaped him but
that was commenced or concluded by some horrid
oath. The
field was the place to witness his
cruelty and profanity. His
presence made
it both the field of blood and of blasphemy.
From the rising till the going down of
the sun, he was cursing, raving,
cutting, and slashing among the slaves of the
field, in the most frightful
manner. His
career was short. He died
very soon after I went to Colonel Lloyd's; and
he died as he lived, uttering,
with his dying groans, bitter curses and horrid
oaths. His
death was regarded by the slaves as the
result of a merciful providence. Mr.
Severe's place was filled by a Mr.
Hopkins. He was a very different man. He
was less cruel, less profane, and made less
noise, than Mr. Severe. His
course was characterized by no
extraordinary demonstrations of cruelty.
He whipped, but seemed to take no
pleasure in it.
He was called by the slaves a good
overseer. The home
plantation of Colonel Lloyd wore
the appearance of a country village. All
the mechanical operations for all the farms were
performed here. The shoemaking
and mending, the blacksmithing, cartwrighting,
coopering, weaving, and
grain-grinding, were all performed by the slaves
on the home plantation. The
whole place wore a business-like aspect
very unlike the neighboring farms. The
number
of houses, too, conspired to give it advantage
over the neighboring farms. It was
called by the slaves the ~Great House
Farm.~ Few
privileges were esteemed
higher, by the slaves of the out-farms, than
that of being selected to do
errands at the Great House Farm. It was
associated in their minds with greatness.
A representative could not be prouder of
his election to a seat in the
American Congress, than a slave on one of the
out-farms would be of his
election to do errands at the Great House Farm.
They regarded it as evidence of
great confidence reposed in them by their
overseers; and it was on this
account, as well as a constant desire to be out
of the field from under the
driver's lash, that they esteemed it a high
privilege, one worth careful living
for. He
was called the smartest and most
trusty fellow, who had this honor conferred upon
him the most frequently. The
competitors for this office sought as
diligently to please their overseers, as the
office-seekers in the political
parties seek to please and deceive the people.
The same traits of character might be
seen in Colonel Lloyd's slaves, as
are seen in the slaves of the political parties. The
slaves selected to go to the Great
House Farm, for the monthly allowance for
themselves and their fellow-slaves,
were peculiarly enthusiastic. While
on
their way, they would make the dense old woods,
for miles around, reverberate
with their wild songs, revealing at once the
highest joy and the deepest
sadness. They
would compose and sing as
they went along, consulting neither time nor
tune. The
thought that came up, came out--if not in
the word, in the sound;--and as frequently in
the one as in the other. They
would sometimes sing the most pathetic sentiment
in the most rapturous tone,
and the most rapturous sentiment in the most
pathetic tone.
Into all of their songs they would manage
to
weave something of the Great House Farm.
Especially would they do this, when
leaving home.
They would then sing most exultingly the
following words:--
"I am going away to the Great House Farm! This they
would sing, as a chorus, to words
which to many would seem unmeaning jargon, but
which, nevertheless, were full
of meaning to themselves. I have
sometimes thought that the mere hearing of those
songs would do more to impress
some minds with the horrible character of
slavery, than the reading of whole
volumes of philosophy on the subject could do. I did
not, when a slave, understand the
deep meaning of those rude and apparently
incoherent songs.
I was myself within the circle; so that I
neither saw nor heard as those without might see
and hear. They
told a tale of woe which was then
altogether beyond my feeble comprehension; they
were tones loud, long, and
deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of
souls boiling over with the
bitterest anguish.
Every tone was a
testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God
for deliverance from
chains. The
hearing of those wild notes
always depressed my spirit, and filled me with
ineffable sadness.
I have frequently found myself in tears
while
hearing them.
The mere recurrence to
those songs, even now, afflicts me; and while I
am writing these lines, an
expression of feeling has already found its way
down my cheek.
To those songs I trace my first
glimmering
conception of the dehumanizing character of
slavery. I
can never get rid of that conception. Those
songs still follow me, to deepen my
hatred of slavery, and quicken my sympathies for
my brethren in bonds. If any
one wishes to be impressed with the
soul-killing effects of slavery, let him go to
Colonel Lloyd's plantation, and,
on allowance-day, place himself in the deep pine
woods, and there let him, in
silence, analyze the sounds that shall pass
through the chambers of his
soul,--and if he is not thus impressed, it will
only be because "there is
no flesh in his obdurate heart." I have
often been utterly astonished, since
I came to the north, to find persons who could
speak of the singing, among
slaves, as evidence of their contentment and
happiness.
It is impossible to conceive of a greater
mistake. Slaves
sing most when they are
most unhappy.
The songs of the slave
represent the sorrows of his heart; and he is
relieved by them, only as an
aching heart is relieved by its tears.
At least, such is my experience.
I have often sung to drown my sorrow, but
seldom to express my
happiness. Crying for joy, and singing for joy,
were alike uncommon to me while
in the jaws of slavery. The
singing of a
man cast away upon a desolate island might be as
appropriately considered as
evidence of contentment and happiness, as the
singing of a slave; the songs of
the one and of the other are prompted by the
same emotion. CHAPTER
III Colonel
Lloyd kept a large and finely
cultivated garden, which afforded almost
constant employment for four men,
besides the chief gardener, (Mr. M'Durmond.)
This garden was probably the greatest
attraction of the place. During
the summer months, people came from
far and near--from Baltimore, Easton, and
Annapolis--to see it. It
abounded in fruits of almost every
description, from the hardy apple of the north
to the delicate orange of the
south. This
garden was not the least
source of trouble on the plantation. Its
excellent fruit was quite a temptation to the
hungry swarms of boys, as well as
the older slaves, belonging to the colonel, few
of whom had the virtue or the
vice to resist it.
Scarcely a day
passed, during the summer, but that some slave
had to take the lash for
stealing fruit. The colonel had to resort to all
kinds of stratagems to keep
his slaves out of the garden. The last
and most successful one was that of tarring his
fence all around; after which,
if a slave was caught with any tar upon his
person, it was deemed sufficient
proof that he had either been into the garden,
or had tried to get in. In
either case, he was severely whipped by
the chief gardener. This
plan worked
well; the slaves became as fearful of tar as of
the lash. They seemed to realize
the impossibility of touching TAR without being
defiled. The
colonel also kept a splendid riding
equipage. His stable and carriage-house
presented the appearance of some of our
large city livery establishments. His horses
were of the finest form and
noblest blood. His carriage-house contained
three splendid coaches, three or
four gigs, besides dearborns and barouches of
the most fashionable style. This
establishment was under the care of
two slaves--old Barney and young Barney--father
and son. To attend to this
establishment was their sole work. But it was by
no means an easy employment;
for in nothing was Colonel Lloyd more particular
than in the management of his
horses. The
slightest inattention to
these was unpardonable, and was visited upon
those, under whose care they were
placed, with the severest punishment; no excuse
could shield them, if the
colonel only suspected any want of attention to
his horses--a supposition which
he frequently indulged, and one which, of
course, made the office of old and
young Barney a very trying one. They never knew
when they were safe from
punishment.
They were frequently whipped
when least deserving, and escaped whipping when
most deserving it.
Every thing depended upon the looks of
the
horses, and the state of Colonel Lloyd's own
mind when his horses were brought
to him for use.
If a horse did not move
fast enough, or hold his head high enough, it
was owing to some fault of his
keepers. It
was painful to stand near
the stable-door, and hear the various complaints
against the keepers when a
horse was taken out for use. "This
horse has not had proper attention. He
has not been sufficiently rubbed and curried, or
he has not been properly fed;
his food was too wet or too dry; he got it too
soon or too late; he was too hot
or too cold; he had too much hay, and not enough
of grain; or he had too much
grain, and not enough of hay; instead of old
Barney's attending to the horse,
he had very improperly left it to his son." To all
these complaints, no matter how
unjust, the slave must answer never a word.
Colonel Lloyd could not brook any
contradiction from a slave. When
he spoke, a slave must stand, listen,
and tremble; and such was literally the case.
I have seen Colonel Lloyd make old
Barney, a man between fifty and sixty
years of age, uncover his bald head, kneel down
upon the cold, damp ground, and
receive upon his naked and toil-worn shoulders
more than thirty lashes at the
time. Colonel
Lloyd had three
sons--Edward, Murray, and Daniel,--and three
sons-in-law, Mr. Winder, Mr.
Nicholson, and Mr. Lowndes. All of
these
lived at the Great House Farm, and enjoyed the
luxury of whipping the servants
when they pleased, from old Barney down to
William Wilkes, the coach-driver. I
have seen Winder make one of the house-servants
stand off from him a suitable
distance to be touched with the end of his whip,
and at every stroke raise great
ridges upon his back. To
describe the wealth of Colonel Lloyd
would be almost equal to describing the riches
of Job. He
kept from ten to fifteen
house-servants.
He was said to own a
thousand slaves, and I think this estimate quite
within the truth.
Colonel Lloyd owned so many that he did
not
know them when he saw them; nor did all the
slaves of the out-farms know
him. It
is reported of him, that, while
riding along the road one day, he met a colored
man, and addressed him in the
usual manner of speaking to colored people on
the public highways of the south:
"Well, boy, whom do you belong to?"
"To Colonel Lloyd," replied the slave. "Well,
does the colonel treat you
well?" "No,
sir," was the
ready reply.
"What, does he work
you too hard?"
"Yes, sir."
"Well, don't he give you enough to
eat?" "Yes,
sir, he gives me
enough, such as it is." The
colonel, after ascertaining where the
slave belonged, rode on; the man also went on
about his business, not dreaming
that he had been conversing with his master.
He thought, said, and heard nothing more
of the matter, until two or
three weeks afterwards. The
poor man was
then informed by his overseer that, for having
found fault with his master, he
was now to be sold to a Georgia trader.
He was immediately chained and
handcuffed; and thus, without a moment's
warning, he was snatched away, and forever
sundered, from his family and
friends, by a hand more unrelenting than death.
This is the penalty of telling the truth,
of telling the simple truth,
in answer to a series of plain questions. It is
partly in consequence of such facts,
that slaves, when inquired of as to their
condition and the character of their
masters, almost universally say they are
contented, and that their masters are
kind. The slaveholders have been known to send
in spies among their slaves, to
ascertain their views and feelings in regard to
their condition.
The frequency of this has had the effect
to
establish among the slaves the maxim, that a
still tongue makes a wise head.
They suppress the truth rather than take the
consequences of telling it, and in
so doing prove themselves a part of the human
family. If
they have any thing to say of their
masters, it is generally in their masters'
favor, especially when speaking to
an untried man.
I have been frequently
asked, when a slave, if I had a kind master, and
do not remember ever to have
given a negative answer; nor did I, in pursuing
this course, consider myself as
uttering what was absolutely false; for I always
measured the kindness of my
master by the standard of kindness set up among
slaveholders around us. Moreover,
slaves are like other people, and
imbibe prejudices quite common to others.
They think their own better than that of
others. Many,
under the influence of this prejudice,
think their own masters are better than the
masters of other slaves; and this,
too, in some cases, when the very reverse is
true. Indeed,
it is not uncommon for slaves even to
fall out and quarrel among themselves about the
relative goodness of their
masters, each contending for the superior
goodness of his own over that of the
others. At
the very same time, they
mutually execrate their masters when viewed
separately.
It was so on our plantation. When Colonel
Lloyd's slaves met the slaves of Jacob Jepson,
they seldom parted without a
quarrel about their masters; Colonel Lloyd's
slaves contending that he was the
richest, and Mr. Jepson's slaves that he was the
smartest, and most of a
man. Colonel
Lloyd's slaves would boast
his ability to buy and sell Jacob Jepson.
Mr. Jepson's slaves would boast his
ability to whip Colonel Lloyd. These
quarrels would almost always end in a
fight between the parties, and those that
whipped were supposed to have gained
the point at issue. They
seemed to think
that the greatness of their masters was
transferable to themselves. It was
considered as being bad enough to be a slave;
but to be a poor man's slave was
deemed a disgrace indeed! CHAPTER
IV Mr.
Hopkins remained but a short time in
the office of overseer. Why
his career
was so short, I do not know, but suppose he
lacked the necessary severity to
suit Colonel Lloyd. Mr.
Hopkins was
succeeded by Mr. Austin Gore, a man possessing,
in an eminent degree, all those
traits of character indispensable to what is
called a first-rate overseer. Mr.
Gore had served Colonel Lloyd, in the
capacity of overseer, upon one of the out-farms,
and had shown himself worthy
of the high station of overseer upon the home or
Great House Farm. Mr. Gore
was proud, ambitious, and
persevering. He was artful, cruel, and obdurate. He was
just the man for such a place, and it
was just the place for such a man. It
afforded scope for the full exercise of all his
powers, and he seemed to be
perfectly at home in it. He was
one of
those who could torture the slightest look,
word, or gesture, on the part of
the slave, into impudence, and would treat it
accordingly.
There must be no answering back to him;
no
explanation was allowed a slave, showing himself
to have been wrongfully
accused. Mr.
Gore acted fully up to the
maxim laid down by slaveholders,-"It is better
that a dozen slaves should
suffer under the lash, than that the overseer
should be convicted, in the presence
of the slaves, of having been at fault." No
matter how innocent a slave
might be--it availed him nothing, when accused
by Mr. Gore of any
misdemeanor.
To be accused was to be
convicted, and to be convicted was to be
punished; the one always following the
other with immutable certainty. To escape
punishment was to escape accusation;
and few slaves had the fortune to do either,
under the overseership of Mr.
Gore. He
was just proud enough to demand
the most debasing homage of the slave, and quite
servile enough to crouch,
himself, at the feet of the master. He
was ambitious enough to be contented with
nothing short of the highest rank of
overseers, and persevering enough to reach the
height of his ambition. He was
cruel enough to inflict the severest
punishment, artful enough to descend to the
lowest trickery, and obdurate
enough to be insensible to the voice of a
reproving conscience. He was, of all
the overseers, the most dreaded by the slaves.
His presence was painful; his eye flashed
confusion; and seldom was his
sharp, shrill voice heard, without producing
horror and trembling in their
ranks. Mr. Gore
was a grave man, and, though a
young man, he indulged in no jokes, said no
funny words, seldom smiled. His
words were in perfect keeping with his
looks, and his looks were in perfect keeping
with his words.
Overseers will sometimes indulge in a
witty
word, even with the slaves; not so with Mr.
Gore. He
spoke but to command, and commanded but to
be obeyed; he dealt sparingly with his words,
and bountifully with his whip,
never using the former where the latter would
answer as well.
When he whipped, he seemed to do so from
a
sense of duty, and feared no consequences.
He did nothing reluctantly, no matter how
disagreeable; always at his
post, never inconsistent. He
never
promised but to fulfil. He
was, in a
word, a man of the most inflexible firmness and
stone-like coolness. His
savage barbarity was equalled only by
the consummate coolness with which he committed
the grossest and most savage
deeds upon the slaves under his charge.
Mr. Gore once undertook to whip one of
Colonel Lloyd's slaves, by the
name of Demby.
He had given Demby but
few stripes, when, to get rid of the scourging,
he ran and plunged himself into
a creek, and stood there at the depth of his
shoulders, refusing to come out. Mr.
Gore told him that he would give him
three calls, and that, if he did not come out at
the third call, he would shoot
him. The first call was given. Demby
made no response, but stood his ground.
The second and third calls were given
with the same result. Mr.
Gore then, without consultation or
deliberation with any one, not even giving Demby
an additional call, raised his
musket to his face, taking deadly aim at his
standing victim, and in an instant
poor Demby was no more. His
mangled body
sank out of sight, and blood and brains marked
the water where he had stood. A thrill
of horror flashed through every
soul upon the plantation, excepting Mr. Gore.
He alone seemed cool and collected.
He was asked by Colonel Lloyd and my old
master, why he resorted to this
extraordinary expedient. His
reply was,
(as well as I can remember,) that Demby had
become unmanageable. He was
setting a dangerous example to the
other slaves,--one which, if suffered to pass
without some such demonstration
on his part, would finally lead to the total
subversion of all rule and order
upon the plantation. He
argued that if
one slave refused to be corrected, and escaped
with his life, the other slaves
would soon copy the example; the result of which
would be, the freedom of the
slaves, and the enslavement of the whites.
Mr. Gore's defence was satisfactory.
He was continued in his station as
overseer upon the home
plantation.
His fame as an overseer went
abroad. His
horrid crime was not even
submitted to judicial investigation. It
was committed in the presence of slaves, and
they of course could neither
institute a suit, nor testify against him; and
thus the guilty perpetrator of
one of the bloodiest and most foul murders goes
unwhipped of justice, and
uncensured by the community in which he lives.
Mr. Gore lived in St. Michael's, Talbot
county, Maryland, when I left
there; and if he is still alive, he very
probably lives there now; and if so,
he is now, as he was then, as highly esteemed
and as much respected as though
his guilty soul had not been stained with his
brother's blood. I speak
advisedly when I say this,--that
killing a slave, or any colored person, in
Talbot county, Maryland, is not
treated as a crime, either by the courts or the
community.
Mr. Thomas Lanman, of St. Michael's,
killed
two slaves, one of whom he killed with a
hatchet, by knocking his brains
out. He
used to boast of the commission
of the awful and bloody deed. I have
heard him do so laughingly, saying, among other
things, that he was the only
benefactor of his country in the company, and
that when others would do as much
as he had done, we should be relieved of "the
d----d niggers." The wife
of Mr. Giles Hicks, living but a
short distance from where I used to live,
murdered my wife's cousin, a young
girl between fifteen and sixteen years of age,
mangling her person in the most
horrible manner, breaking her nose and
breastbone with a stick, so that the
poor girl expired in a few hours afterward.
She was immediately buried, but had not
been in her untimely grave but a
few hours before she was taken up and examined
by the coroner, who decided that
she had come to her death by severe beating.
The offence for which this girl was thus
murdered was this:--She had
been set that night to mind Mrs. Hicks's baby,
and during the night she fell asleep,
and the baby cried. She,
having lost her
rest for several nights previous, did not hear
the crying.
They were both in the room with Mrs.
Hicks. Mrs.
Hicks, finding the girl slow to move,
jumped from her bed, seized an oak stick of wood
by the fireplace, and with it
broke the girl's nose and breastbone, and thus
ended her life.
I will not say that this most horrid
murder
produced no sensation in the community.
It did produce sensation, but not enough
to bring the murderess to
punishment.
There was a warrant issued
for her arrest, but it was never served.
Thus she escaped not only punishment, but
even the pain of being
arraigned before a court for her horrid crime. Whilst I
am detailing bloody deeds which
took place during my stay on Colonel Lloyd's
plantation, I will briefly narrate
another, which occurred about the same time as
the murder of Demby by Mr. Gore. Colonel
Lloyd's slaves were in the habit of
spending a part of their nights and Sundays in
fishing for oysters, and in this
way made up the deficiency of their scanty
allowance.
An old man belonging to Colonel Lloyd,
while
thus engaged, happened to get beyond the limits
of Colonel Lloyd's, and on the
premises of Mr. Beal Bondly. At
this
trespass, Mr. Bondly took offence, and with his
musket came down to the shore,
and blew its deadly contents into the poor old
man. Mr.
Bondly came over to see Colonel Lloyd
the next day, whether to pay him for his
property, or to justify himself in
what he had done, I know not. At any rate, this
whole fiendish transaction was
soon hushed up.
There was very little
said about it at all, and nothing done.
It was a common saying, even among little
white boys, that it was worth
a halfcent to kill a "nigger," and a half-cent
to bury one. CHAPTER
V As to my
own treatment while I lived on
Colonel Lloyd's plantation, it was very similar
to that of the other slave
children. I
was not old enough to work
in the field, and there being little else than
field work to do, I had a great
deal of leisure time. The
most I had to
do was to drive up the cows at evening, keep the
fowls out of the garden, keep
the front yard clean, and run of errands for my
old master's daughter, Mrs.
Lucretia Auld.
The most of my leisure
time I spent in helping Master Daniel Lloyd in
finding his birds, after he had
shot them.
My connection with Master
Daniel was of some advantage to me. He
became quite attached to me, and was a sort of
protector of me.
He would not allow the older boys to
impose
upon me, and would divide his cakes with me. I was
seldom whipped by my old master, and
suffered little from any thing else than hunger
and cold. I
suffered much from hunger, but much more
from cold.
In hottest summer and coldest
winter, I was kept almost naked--no shoes, no
stockings, no jacket, no
trousers, nothing on but a coarse tow linen
shirt, reaching only to my
knees. I
had no bed.
I must have perished with cold, but that,
the
coldest nights, I used to steal a bag which was
used for carrying corn to the
mill. I
would crawl into this bag, and
there sleep on the cold, damp, clay floor, with
my head in and feet out. My
feet have been so cracked with the frost,
that the pen with which I am writing might be
laid in the gashes. We were
not regularly allowanced. Our
food was coarse corn meal boiled. This
was called MUSH.
It was put into a large wooden tray or
trough,
and set down upon the ground. The
children were then called, like so many pigs,
and like so many pigs they would
come and devour the mush; some with
oystershells, others with pieces of
shingle, some with naked hands, and none with
spoons. He
that ate fastest got most; he that was
strongest secured the best place; and few left
the trough satisfied. I was
probably between seven and eight
years old when I left Colonel Lloyd's
plantation.
I left it with joy. I
shall never forget the ecstasy with which I
received the intelligence that my old master
(Anthony) had determined to let me
go to Baltimore, to live with Mr. Hugh Auld,
brother to my old master's
son-in-law, Captain Thomas Auld. I
received this information about three days
before my departure. They
were three of the happiest days I ever
enjoyed. I
spent the most part of all
these three days in the creek, washing off the
plantation scurf, and preparing
myself for my departure. The pride
of appearance which this would
indicate was not my own. I
spent the
time in washing, not so much because I wished
to, but because Mrs. Lucretia had
told me I must get all the dead skin off my feet
and knees before I could go to
Baltimore; for the people in Baltimore were very
cleanly, and would laugh at me
if I looked dirty.
Besides, she was
going to give me a pair of trousers, which I
should not put on unless I got all
the dirt off me. The thought of owning a pair of
trousers was great
indeed! It
was almost a sufficient
motive, not only to make me take off what would
be called by pigdrovers the
mange, but the skin itself. I went
at it
in good earnest, working for the first time with
the hope of reward. The ties
that ordinarily bind children to
their homes were all suspended in my case.
I found no severe trial in my departure.
My home was charmless; it was not home to
me; on parting from it, I
could not feel that I was leaving any thing
which I could have enjoyed by
staying. My
mother was dead, my
grandmother lived far off, so that I seldom saw
her. I
had two sisters and one brother, that lived
in the same house with me; but the early
separation of us from our mother had
well nigh blotted the fact of our relationship
from our memories.
I looked for home elsewhere, and was
confident of finding none which I should relish
less than the one which I was
leaving. If,
however, I found in my new
home hardship, hunger, whipping, and nakedness,
I had the consolation that I
should not have escaped any one of them by
staying. Having
already had more than a taste of them
in the house of my old master, and having
endured them there, I very naturally
inferred my ability to endure them elsewhere,
and especially at Baltimore; for
I had something of the feeling about Baltimore
that is expressed in the
proverb, that "being hanged in England is
preferable to dying a natural
death in Ireland."
I had the
strongest desire to see Baltimore.
Cousin Tom, though not fluent in speech,
had inspired me with that
desire by his eloquent description of the place. I
could never point out any thing at the
Great House, no matter how beautiful or
powerful, but that he had seen
something at Baltimore far exceeding, both in
beauty and strength, the object
which I pointed out to him. Even
the
Great House itself, with all its pictures, was
far inferior to many buildings
in Baltimore.
So strong was my desire,
that I thought a gratification of it would fully
compensate for whatever loss
of comforts I should sustain by the exchange.
I left without a regret, and with the
highest hopes of future happiness. We sailed
out of Miles River for Baltimore
on a Saturday morning. I
remember only
the day of the week, for at that time I had no
knowledge of the days of the
month, nor the months of the year. On
setting sail, I walked aft, and gave to Colonel
Lloyd's plantation what I hoped
would be the last look. I then
placed
myself in the bows of the sloop, and there spent
the remainder of the day in
looking ahead, interesting myself in what was in
the distance rather than in
things near by or behind. In the
afternoon of that day, we reached
Annapolis, the capital of the State. We
stopped but a few moments, so that I had no time
to go on shore. It was the
first large town that I had ever seen, and
though it would look small compared
with some of our New England factory villages, I
thought it a wonderful place
for its size--more imposing even than the Great
House Farm! We
arrived at Baltimore early on Sunday
morning, landing at Smith's Wharf, not far from
Bowley's Wharf.
We had on board the sloop a large flock
of
sheep; and after aiding in driving them to the
slaughterhouse of Mr. Curtis on
Louden Slater's Hill, I was conducted by Rich,
one of the hands belonging on
board of the sloop, to my new home in Alliciana
Street, near Mr. Gardner's
ship-yard, on Fells Point. Mr. and
Mrs. Auld were both at home, and
met me at the door with their little son Thomas,
to take care of whom I had
been given.
And here I saw what I had
never seen before; it was a white face beaming
with the most kindly emotions;
it was the face of my new mistress, Sophia Auld. I wish
I could describe the rapture that
flashed through my soul as I beheld it.
It was a new and strange sight to me,
brightening up my pathway with the
light of happiness. Little
Thomas was
told, there was his Freddy, --and I was told to
take care of little Thomas; and
thus I entered upon the duties of my new home
with the most cheering prospect
ahead. I look
upon my departure from Colonel
Lloyd's plantation as one of the most
interesting events of my life. It is
possible, and even quite probable, that
but for the mere circumstance of being removed
from that plantation to
Baltimore, I should have to-day, instead of
being here seated by my own table,
in the enjoyment of freedom and the happiness of
home, writing this Narrative,
been confined in the galling chains of slavery.
Going to live at Baltimore laid the
foundation, and opened the gateway,
to all my subsequent prosperity. I have
ever regarded it as the first plain
manifestation of that kind providence which
has ever since attended me, and marked my life
with so many favors. I
regarded the selection of myself as being
somewhat remarkable. There
were a number
of slave children that might have been sent from
the plantation to
Baltimore.
There were those younger,
those older, and those of the same age.
I was chosen from among them all, and was
the first, last, and only
choice. I may be
deemed superstitious, and even
egotistical, in regarding this event as a
special interposition of divine
Providence in my favor. But I
should be
false to the earliest sentiments of my soul, if
I suppressed the opinion. I
prefer to be true to myself, even at the
hazard of incurring the ridicule of others,
rather than to be false, and incur
my own abhorrence.
From my earliest
recollection, I date the entertainment of a deep
conviction that slavery would
not always be able to hold me within its foul
embrace; and in the darkest hours
of my career in slavery, this living word of
faith and spirit of hope departed
not from me, but remained like ministering
angels to cheer me through the
gloom. This
good spirit was from God,
and to him I offer thanksgiving and praise. CHAPTER
VI My new
mistress proved to be all she
appeared when I first met her at the door,--a
woman of the kindest heart and
finest feelings.
She had never had a
slave under her control previously to myself,
and prior to her marriage she had
been dependent upon her own industry for a
living. She
was by trade a weaver; and by constant
application to her business, she had been in a
good degree preserved from the
blighting and dehumanizing effects of slavery.
I was utterly astonished at her goodness. I
scarcely knew how to behave towards
her. She
was entirely unlike any other
white woman I had ever seen. I
could not
approach her as I was accustomed to approach
other white ladies. My
early instruction was all out of place. The
crouching servility, usually so
acceptable a quality in a slave, did not answer
when manifested toward
her. Her
favor was not gained by it; she
seemed to be disturbed by it. She
did
not deem it impudent or unmannerly for a slave
to look her in the face. The
meanest slave was put fully at ease in
her presence, and none left without feeling
better for having seen her. Her
face was made of heavenly smiles, and her
voice of tranquil music. But,
alas! this kind heart had but a short
time to remain such. The
fatal poison of
irresponsible power was already in her hands,
and soon commenced its infernal
work. That
cheerful eye, under the
influence of slavery, soon became red with rage;
that voice, made all of sweet
accord, changed to one of harsh and horrid
discord; and that angelic face gave
place to that of a demon. Very soon
after I went to live with Mr. and
Mrs. Auld, she very kindly commenced to teach me
the A, B, C.
After I had learned this, she assisted me
in
learning to spell words of three or four
letters. Just
at this point of my progress, Mr. Auld
found out what was going on, and at once forbade
Mrs. Auld to instruct me
further, telling her, among other things, that
it was unlawful, as well as
unsafe, to teach a slave to read. To use
his own words, further, he said, "If you give a
nigger an inch, he will
take an ell.
A nigger should know
nothing but to obey his master--to do as he is
told to do.
Learning would ~spoil~ the best nigger in
the
world. Now,"
said he, "if you
teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to
read, there would be no keeping
him. It
would forever unfit him to be a
slave. He
would at once become
unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As
to himself, it could do him no
good, but a great deal of harm. It
would
make him discontented and unhappy."
These words sank deep into my heart,
stirred up sentiments within that
lay slumbering, and called into existence an
entirely new train of
thought. It
was a new and special
revelation, explaining dark and mysterious
things, with which my youthful
understanding had struggled, but struggled in
vain. I
now understood what had been to me a most
perplexing difficulty--to wit, the white man's
power to enslave the black
man. It
was a grand achievement, and I
prized it highly.
From that moment, I
understood the pathway from slavery to freedom.
It was just what I wanted, and I got it
at a time when I the least
expected it.
Whilst I was saddened by
the thought of losing the aid of my kind
mistress, I was gladdened by the
invaluable instruction which, by the merest
accident, I had gained from my
master. Though
conscious of the
difficulty of learning without a teacher, I set
out with high hope, and a fixed
purpose, at whatever cost of trouble, to learn
how to read.
The very decided manner with which he
spoke,
and strove to impress his wife with the evil
consequences of giving me
instruction, served to convince me that he was
deeply sensible of the truths he
was uttering.
It gave me the best
assurance that I might rely with the utmost
confidence on the results which, he
said, would flow from teaching me to read.
What he most dreaded, that I most
desired. What
he most loved, that I most hated. That
which to him was a great evil, to be
carefully shunned, was to me a great good, to be
diligently sought; and the
argument which he so warmly urged, against my
learning to read, only served to
inspire me with a desire and determination to
learn. In
learning to read, I owe almost as much to
the bitter opposition of my master, as to the
kindly aid of my mistress. I
acknowledge the benefit of both. I had
resided but a short time in Baltimore
before I observed a marked difference, in the
treatment of slaves, from that
which I had witnessed in the country. A
city slave is almost a freeman, compared with a
slave on the plantation. He is
much better fed and clothed, and enjoys
privileges altogether unknown to the slave on
the plantation.
There is a vestige of decency, a sense of
shame, that does much to curb and check those
outbreaks of atrocious cruelty so
commonly enacted upon the plantation. He
is a desperate slaveholder, who will shock the
humanity of his non-slaveholding
neighbors with the cries of his lacerated slave. Few
are willing to incur the odium attaching
to the reputation of being a cruel master; and
above all things, they would not
be known as not giving a slave enough to eat.
Every city slaveholder is anxious to have
it known of him, that he feeds
his slaves well; and it is due to them to say,
that most of them do give their
slaves enough to eat. There are, however, some
painful exceptions to this
rule. Directly
opposite to us, on
Philpot Street, lived Mr. Thomas Hamilton.
He owned two slaves. Their
names
were Henrietta and Mary. Henrietta
was
about twenty-two years of age, Mary was about
fourteen; and of all the mangled
and emaciated creatures I ever looked upon,
these two were the most so. His
heart must be harder than stone, that
could look upon these unmoved. The
head,
neck, and shoulders of Mary were literally cut
to pieces.
I have frequently felt her head, and
found it
nearly covered with festering sores, caused by
the lash of her cruel
mistress. I
do not know that her master
ever whipped her, but I have been an eye-witness
to the cruelty of Mrs.
Hamilton. I
used to be in Mr. Hamilton's
house nearly every day. Mrs.
Hamilton
used to sit in a large chair in the middle of
the room, with a heavy cowskin
always by her side, and scarce an hour passed
during the day but was marked by
the blood of one of these slaves. The
girls seldom passed her without her saying,
"Move faster, you ~black
gip!~" at the same time giving them a blow with
the cowskin over the head
or shoulders, often drawing the blood.
She would then say, "Take that, you
~black gip!~" continuing,
"If you don't move faster, I'll move you!" Added
to the cruel
lashings to which these slaves were subjected,
they were kept nearly
half-starved. They seldom knew what it was to
eat a full meal. I have seen Mary
contending with the pigs for the offal thrown
into the street.
So much was Mary kicked and cut to
pieces,
that she was oftener called "~pecked~" than by
her name. CHAPTER
VII I lived
in Master Hugh's family about seven
years. During this time, I succeeded in learning
to read and write.
In accomplishing this, I was compelled to
resort to various stratagems. I had
no
regular teacher. My mistress, who had kindly
commenced to instruct me, had, in
compliance with the advice and direction of her
husband, not only ceased to
instruct, but had set her face against my being
instructed by any one
else. It
is due, however, to my mistress
to say of her, that she did not adopt this
course of treatment
immediately.
She at first lacked the
depravity indispensable to shutting me up in
mental darkness. It was at least
necessary for her to have some training in the
exercise of irresponsible power,
to make her equal to the task of treating me as
though I were a brute. My
mistress was, as I have said, a kind and
tenderhearted woman; and in the simplicity of
her soul she commenced, when I
first went to live with her, to treat me as she
supposed one human being ought
to treat another.
In entering upon the
duties of a slaveholder, she did not seem to
perceive that I sustained to her
the relation of a mere chattel, and that for her
to treat me as a human being
was not only wrong, but dangerously so. Slavery
proved as injurious to her as it did
to me. When
I went there, she was a
pious, warm, and tender-hearted woman. There was
no sorrow or suffering for
which she had not a tear. She
had bread
for the hungry, clothes for the naked, and
comfort for every mourner that came
within her reach.
Slavery soon proved
its ability to divest her of these heavenly
qualities.
Under its influence, the tender heart
became
stone, and the lamblike disposition gave way to
one of tiger-like
fierceness.
The first step in her
downward course was in her ceasing to instruct
me. She
now commenced to practise her husband's
precepts. She
finally became even more
violent in her opposition than her husband
himself. She
was not satisfied with simply doing as
well as he had commanded; she seemed anxious to
do better.
Nothing seemed to make her more angry
than to
see me with a newspaper. She
seemed to
think that here lay the danger. I have
had her rush at me with a face made all up of
fury, and snatch from me a
newspaper, in a manner that fully revealed her
apprehension.
She was an apt woman; and a little
experience
soon demonstrated, to her satisfaction, that
education and slavery were
incompatible with each other. From this
time I was most narrowly
watched. If
I was in a separate room any
considerable length of time, I was sure to be
suspected of having a book, and
was at once called to give an account of myself.
All this, however, was too
late. The
first step had been
taken. Mistress,
in teaching me the
alphabet, had given me the ~inch,~ and no
precaution could prevent me from
taking the ~ell.~ The plan
which I adopted, and the one by
which I was most successful, was that of making
friends of all the little white
boys whom I met in the street. As many of these
as I could, I converted into
teachers. With
their kindly aid,
obtained at different times and in different
places, I finally succeeded in
learning to read.
When I was sent of
errands, I always took my book with me, and by
going one part of my errand
quickly, I found time to get a lesson before my
return. I
used also to carry bread with me, enough of
which was always in the house, and to which I
was always welcome; for I was
much better off in this regard than many of the
poor white children in our
neighborhood.
This bread I used to
bestow upon the hungry little urchins, who, in
return, would give me that more
valuable bread of knowledge. I am
strongly
tempted to give the names of two or three of
those little boys, as a
testimonial of the gratitude and affection I
bear them; but prudence
forbids;--not that it would injure me, but it
might embarrass them; for it is
almost an unpardonable offence to teach slaves
to read in this Christian
country. It
is enough to say of the dear
little fellows, that they lived on Philpot
Street, very near Durgin and
Bailey's ship-yard. I used
to talk this
matter of slavery over with them. I
would sometimes say to them, I wished I could be
as free as they would be when
they got to be men. "You
will be
free as soon as you are twenty-one, ~but I am a
slave for life!~
Have not I as good a right to be free as
you
have?" These
words used to trouble
them; they would express for me the liveliest
sympathy, and console me with the
hope that something would occur by which I might
be free. I was now
about twelve years old, and the
thought of being ~a slave for life~ began to
bear heavily upon my heart. Just
about this time, I got hold of a book
entitled "The Columbian Orator."
Every opportunity I got, I used to read
this book.
Among much of other interesting matter, I
found in it a dialogue between a master and his
slave. The
slave was represented as having run away
from his master three times. The
dialogue represented the conversation which took
place between them, when the
slave was retaken the third time. In
this dialogue, the whole argument in behalf of
slavery was brought forward by
the master, all of which was disposed of by the
slave. The
slave was made to say some very smart as
well as impressive things in reply to his
master-things which had the desired
though unexpected effect; for the conversation
resulted in the voluntary
emancipation of the slave on the part of the
master. In the
same book, I met with one of
Sheridan's mighty speeches on and in behalf of
Catholic emancipation. These
were choice documents to me. I read
them over and over again with unabated
interest. They gave tongue to interesting
thoughts of my own soul, which had
frequently flashed through my mind, and died
away for want of utterance. The
moral which I gained from the dialogue
was the power of truth over the conscience of
even a slaveholder. What I
got from Sheridan was a bold
denunciation of slavery, and a powerful
vindication of human rights. The
reading of these documents enabled me to utter
my thoughts, and to meet the
arguments brought forward to sustain slavery;
but while they relieved me of one
difficulty, they brought on another even more
painful than the one of which I
was relieved.
The more I read, the more
I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers.
I could regard them in no other light
than a band of successful robbers,
who had left their homes, and gone to Africa,
and stolen us from our homes, and
in a strange land reduced us to slavery.
I loathed them as being the meanest as
well as the most wicked of
men. As
I read and contemplated the
subject, behold! that very discontentment which
Master Hugh had predicted would
follow my learning to read had already come, to
torment and sting my soul to
unutterable anguish. As I writhed under it, I
would at times feel that learning
to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had
given me a view of my wretched
condition, without the remedy. It
opened
my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder
upon which to get out. In moments
of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their
stupidity.
I have often wished myself a beast. I
preferred the condition of the meanest reptile
to my own.
Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of
thinking! It
was this everlasting
thinking of my condition that tormented me.
There was no getting rid of it.
It was pressed upon me by every object
within sight or hearing, animate
or inanimate.
The silver trump of
freedom had roused my soul to eternal
wakefulness.
Freedom now appeared, to disappear no
more
forever. It
was heard in every sound,
and seen in every thing. It was
ever
present to torment me with a sense of my
wretched condition. I saw
nothing without seeing it, I heard
nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing
without feeling it. It
looked from every star, it smiled in every
calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in every
storm. I often
found myself regretting my own
existence, and wishing myself dead; and but for
the hope of being free, I have
no doubt but that I should have killed myself,
or done something for which I
should have been killed. While
in this
state of mind, I was eager to hear any one speak
of slavery.
I was a ready listener. Every
little while, I could hear something
about the abolitionists. It was
some
time before I found what the word meant.
It was always used in such connections as
to make it an interesting word
to me. If
a slave ran away and succeeded
in getting clear, or if a slave killed his
master, set fire to a barn, or did
any thing very wrong in the mind of a
slaveholder, it was spoken of as the
fruit of ~abolition.~ Hearing the word in this
connection very often, I set
about learning what it meant. The
dictionary
afforded me little or no help. I
found
it was "the act of abolishing;" but then I did
not know what was to
be abolished.
Here I was perplexed. I did
not dare to ask any one about its
meaning, for I was satisfied that it was
something they wanted me to know very
little about.
After a patient waiting, I
got one of our city papers, containing an
account of the number of petitions
from the north, praying for the abolition of
slavery in the District of
Columbia, and of the slave trade between the
States. From
this time I understood the words
~abolition~ and ~abolitionist,~ and always drew
near when that word was spoken,
expecting to hear something of importance to
myself and fellow-slaves. The
light broke in upon me by degrees. I went
one day down on the wharf of Mr.
Waters; and seeing two Irishmen unloading a scow
of stone, I went, unasked, and
helped them. When we had finished, one of them
came to me and asked me if I
were a slave.
I told him I was. He
asked, "Are ye a slave for
life?" I
told him that I was. The
good Irishman seemed to be deeply
affected by the statement. He
said to
the other that it was a pity so fine a little
fellow as myself should be a
slave for life.
He said it was a shame
to hold me.
They both advised me to run
away to the north; that I should find friends
there, and that I should be
free. I
pretended not to be interested
in what they said, and treated them as if I did
not understand them; for I
feared they might be treacherous. White men have
been known to encourage slaves
to escape, and then, to get the reward, catch
them and return them to their
masters. I
was afraid that these seemingly
good men might use me so; but I nevertheless
remembered their advice, and from
that time I resolved to run away. I
looked forward to a time at which it would be
safe for me to escape. I was
too young to think of doing so
immediately; besides, I wished to learn how to
write, as I might have occasion
to write my own pass. I
consoled myself
with the hope that I should one day find a good
chance. Meanwhile, I would
learn to write. The idea
as to how I might learn to write
was suggested to me by being in Durgin and
Bailey's ship-yard, and frequently
seeing the ship carpenters, after hewing, and
getting a piece of timber ready
for use, write on the timber the name of that
part of the ship for which it was
intended. When
a piece of timber was
intended for the larboard side, it would be
marked thus--"L."
When a piece was for the starboard side,
it
would be marked thus--"S." A
piece for the larboard side forward, would be
marked thus--"L.
F." When
a piece was for starboard
side forward, it would be marked thus--"S. F." For
larboard aft, it would be marked
thus--"L. A."
For starboard
aft, it would be marked thus--"S. A."
I soon learned the names of these
letters, and for what they were
intended when placed upon a piece of timber in
the ship-yard.
I immediately commenced copying them, and
in
a short time was able to make the four letters
named. After
that, when I met with any boy who I
knew could write, I would tell him I could write
as well as he.
The next word would be, "I don't believe
you. Let
me see you try it." I
would then make the letters which I had
been so fortunate as to learn, and ask him to
beat that.
In this way I got a good many lessons in
writing, which it is quite possible I should
never have gotten in any other
way. During this time, my copy-book was the
board fence, brick wall, and
pavement; my pen and ink was a lump of chalk.
With these, I learned mainly how to
write. I
then commenced and continued copying the
Italics in Webster's Spelling Book, until I
could make them all without looking
on the book.
By this time, my little
Master Thomas had gone to school, and learned
how to write, and had written
over a number of copy-books. These
had
been brought home, and shown to some of our near
neighbors, and then laid
aside. My
mistress used to go to class
meeting at the Wilk Street meetinghouse every
Monday afternoon, and leave me to
take care of the house. When
left thus,
I used to spend the time in writing in the
spaces left in Master Thomas's
copy-book, copying what he had written.
I continued to do this until I could
write a hand very similar to that
of Master Thomas.
Thus, after a long,
tedious effort for years, I finally succeeded in
learning how to write. CHAPTER
VIII In a very
short time after I went to live
at Baltimore, my old master's youngest son
Richard died; and in about three
years and six months after his death, my old
master, Captain Anthony, died,
leavonly his son, Andrew, and daughter,
Lucretia, to share his estate. He
died while on a visit to see his daughter at
Hillsborough.
Cut off thus unexpectedly,
he left no will as to the disposal of his
property. It
was therefore necessary to have a
valuation of the property, that it might be
equally divided between Mrs.
Lucretia and Master Andrew. I was
immediately sent for, to be valued with the
other property. Here again my
feelings rose up in detestation of slavery.
I had now a new conception of my degraded
condition.
Prior to this, I had become, if not
insensible to my lot, at least partly so.
I left Baltimore with a young heart
overborne with sadness, and a soul
full of apprehension. I took
passage
with Captain Rowe, in the schooner Wild Cat,
and, after a sail of about
twenty-four hours, I found myself near the place
of my birth.
I had now been absent from it almost, if
not
quite, five years.
I, however,
remembered the place very well. I was
only about five years old when I left it, to go
and live with my old master on
Colonel Lloyd's plantation; so that I was now
between ten and eleven years old. We were
all ranked together at the
valuation.
Men and women, old and young,
married and single, were ranked with horses,
sheep, and swine.
There were horses and men, cattle and
women,
pigs and children, all holding the same rank in
the scale of being, and were
all subjected to the same narrow examination.
Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth,
maids and matrons, had to
undergo the same indelicate inspection.
At this moment, I saw more clearly than
ever the brutalizing effects of
slavery upon both slave and slaveholder. After the
valuation, then came the
division. I
have no language to express
the high excitement and deep anxiety which were
felt among us poor slaves
during this time.
Our fate for life was
now to be decided. we had no more voice in that
decision than the brutes among
whom we were ranked. A
single word from
the white men was enough--against all our
wishes, prayers, and entreaties--to
sunder forever the dearest friends, dearest
kindred, and strongest ties known
to human beings.
In addition to the pain
of separation, there was the horrid dread of
falling into the hands of Master
Andrew. He
was known to us all as being
a most cruel wretch,--a common drunkard, who
had, by his reckless mismanagement
and profligate dissipation, already wasted a
large portion of his father's
property. We
all felt that we might as
well be sold at once to the Georgia traders, as
to pass into his hands; for we
knew that that would be our inevitable
condition,--a condition held by us all
in the utmost horror and dread. I
suffered more anxiety than most of my
fellowslaves.
I had known what it was to
be kindly treated; they had known nothing of the
kind. They
had seen little or nothing of the world. They
were in very deed men and women of
sorrow, and acquainted with grief. Their
backs had been made familiar with the bloody
lash, so that they had become
callous; mine was yet tender; for while at
Baltimore I got few whippings, and
few slaves could boast of a kinder master and
mistress than myself; and the
thought of passing out of their hands into those
of Master Andrew-a man who,
but a few days before, to give me a sample of
his bloody disposition, took my
little brother by the throat, threw him on the
ground, and with the heel of his
boot stamped upon his head till the blood gushed
from his nose and ears--was
well calculated to make me anxious as to my
fate. After he had committed this
savage outrage upon my brother, he turned to me,
and said that was the way he
meant to serve me one of these days,--meaning, I
suppose, when I came into his
possession. Thanks to
a kind Providence, I fell to the
portion of Mrs. Lucretia, and was sent
immediately back to Baltimore, to live
again in the family of Master Hugh.
Their joy at my return equalled their
sorrow at my departure. It was
a glad day to me.
I had escaped a worse than lion's jaws. I was
absent from Baltimore, for the purpose
of valuation and division, just about one month,
and it seemed to have been
six. Very soon
after my return to Baltimore, my
mistress, Lucretia, died, leaving her husband
and one child, Amanda; and in a
very short time after her death, Master Andrew
died. Now
all the property of my old master, slaves
included, was in the hands of
strangers,--strangers who had had nothing to do
with accumulating it. Not a
slave was
left free.
All remained slaves, from the
youngest to the oldest. If any
one thing
in my experience, more than another, served to
deepen my conviction of the
infernal character of slavery, and to fill me
with unutterable loathing of
slaveholders, it was their base ingratitude to
my poor old grandmother. She
had served my old master faithfully from
youth to old age.
She had been the
source of all his wealth; she had peopled his
plantation with slaves; she had
become a great grandmother in his service.
She had rocked him in infancy, attended
him in childhood, served him
through life, and at his death wiped from his
icy brow the cold death-sweat,
and closed his eyes forever. She
was
nevertheless left a slave--a slave for life--a
slave in the hands of strangers;
and in their hands she saw her children, her
grandchildren, and her
great-grandchildren, divided, like so many
sheep, without being gratified with
the small privilege of a single word, as to
their or her own destiny. And,
to cap the climax of their base
ingratitude and fiendish barbarity, my
grandmother, who was now very old,
having outlived my old master and all his
children, having seen the beginning
and end of all of them, and her present owners
finding she was of but little
value, her frame already racked with the pains
of old age, and complete
helplessness fast stealing over her once active
limbs, they took her to the
woods, built her a little hut, put up a little
mud-chimney, and then made her
welcome to the privilege of supporting herself
there in perfect loneliness;
thus virtually turning her out to die!
If my poor old grandmother now lives, she
lives to suffer in utter
loneliness; she lives to remember and mourn over
the loss of children, the loss
of grandchildren, and the loss of
greatgrandchildren. They
are, in the language of the slave's
poet, Whittier,-- "Gone,
gone, sold and gone The
hearth is desolate. The
children, the unconscious children, who
once sang and danced in her presence, are gone.
She gropes her way, in the darkness of
age, for a drink of water. Instead
of the voices of her children, she
hears by day the moans of the dove, and by night
the screams of the hideous
owl. All is gloom.
The grave is at the
door. And
now, when weighed down by the
pains and aches of old age, when the head
inclines to the feet, when the
beginning and ending of human existence meet,
and helpless infancy and painful
old age combine together--at this time, this
most needful time, the time for
the exercise of that tenderness and affection
which children only can exercise
towards a declining parent--my poor old
grandmother, the devoted mother of
twelve children, is left all alone, in yonder
little hut, before a few dim
embers. She
stands-she sits--she
staggers--she falls--she groans--she dies --and
there are none of her children
or grandchildren present, to wipe from her
wrinkled brow the cold sweat of
death, or to place beneath the sod her fallen
remains. Will
not a righteous God visit for these
things? In about
two years after the death of Mrs.
Lucretia, Master Thomas married his second wife. Her
name was Rowena Hamilton. She
was the eldest daughter of Mr. William
Hamilton. Master
now lived in St.
Michael's.
Not long after his marriage,
a misunderstanding took place between himself
and Master Hugh; and as a means
of punishing his brother, he took me from him to
live with himself at St.
Michael's.
Here I underwent another most
painful separation. It,
however, was not
so severe as the one I dreaded at the division
of property; for, during this
interval, a great change had taken place in
Master Hugh and his once kind and
affectionate wife.
The influence of
brandy upon him, and of slavery upon her, had
effected a disastrous change in
the characters of both; so that, as far as they
were concerned, I thought I had
little to lose by the change. But it
was
not to them that I was attached. It was to those
little Baltimore boys that I
felt the strongest attachment. I had
received many good lessons from them, and was
still receiving them, and the
thought of leaving them was painful indeed.
I was leaving, too, without the hope of
ever being allowed to
return. Master
Thomas had said he would
never let me return again. The
barrier
betwixt himself and brother he considered
impassable. I then
had to regret that I did not at
least make the attempt to carry out my
resolution to run away; for the chances
of success are tenfold greater from the city
than from the country. I sailed
from Baltimore for St. Michael's
in the sloop Amanda, Captain Edward Dodson.
On my passage, I paid particular
attention to the direction which the
steamboats took to go to Philadelphia. I
found, instead of going down, on reaching North
Point they went up the bay, in
a north-easterly direction. I
deemed
this knowledge of the utmost importance.
My determination to run away was again
revived. I
resolved to wait only so long as the
offering of a favorable opportunity.
When that came, I was determined to be
off. CHAPTER
IX I have
now reached a period of my life when
I can give dates.
I left Baltimore, and
went to live with Master Thomas Auld, at St.
Michael's, in March, 1832. It was
now more than seven years since I
lived with him in the family of my old master,
on Colonel Lloyd's
plantation.
We of course were now almost
entire strangers to each other. He was
to me a new master, and I to him a new slave. I
was ignorant of his temper and
disposition; he was equally so of mine.
A very short time, however, brought us
into full acquaintance with each
other. I was made acquainted with his wife not
less than with himself. They
were well matched, being equally mean
and cruel.
I was now, for the first time
during a space of more than seven years, made to
feel the painful gnawings of
hunger--a something which I had not experienced
before since I left Colonel
Lloyd's plantation. It
went hard enough
with me then, when I could look back to no
period at which I had enjoyed a
sufficiency.
It was tenfold harder after
living in Master Hugh's family, where I had
always had enough to eat, and of
that which was good. I have
said Master
Thomas was a mean man. He was so. Not to
give a slave enough to eat, is regarded as the
most aggravated development of
meanness even among slaveholders. The
rule is, no matter how coarse the food, only let
there be enough of it. This
is the theory; and in the part of
Maryland from which I came, it is the general
practice,--though there are many
exceptions.
Master Thomas gave us enough
of neither coarse nor fine food. There
were four slaves of us in the kitchen--my sister
Eliza, my aunt Priscilla,
Henny, and myself; and we were allowed less than
a half of a bushel of
corn-meal per week, and very little else, either
in the shape of meat or
vegetables.
It was not enough for us to
subsist upon.
We were therefore reduced
to the wretched necessity of living at the
expense of our neighbors. This
we did by begging and stealing,
whichever came handy in the time of need, the
one being considered as
legitimate as the other. A
great many
times have we poor creatures been nearly
perishing with hunger, when food in
abundance lay mouldering in the safe and
smoke-house, and our pious mistress
was aware of the fact; and yet that mistress and
her husband would kneel every
morning, and pray that God would bless them in
basket and store! Bad as
all slaveholders are, we seldom meet
one destitute of every element of character
commanding respect. My
master was one of this rare sort. I do
not know of one single noble act ever
performed by him.
The leading trait in
his character was meanness; and if there were
any other element in his nature,
it was made subject to this. He was
mean; and, like most other mean men, he lacked
the ability to conceal his
meanness. Captain
Auld was not born a
slaveholder.
He had been a poor man,
master only of a Bay craft. He
came into
possession of all his slaves by marriage; and of
all men, adopted slaveholders
are the worst.
He was cruel, but
cowardly. He commanded without firmness.
In the enforcement of his rules, he was
at times rigid, and at times
lax. At
times, he spoke to his slaves
with the firmness of Napoleon and the fury of a
demon; at other times, he might
well be mistaken for an inquirer who had lost
his way. He
did nothing of himself. He
might have passed for a lion, but for his
ears. In
all things noble which he
attempted, his own meanness shone most
conspicuous.
His airs, words, and actions, were the
airs,
words, and actions of born slaveholders, and,
being assumed, were awkward
enough. He was not even a good imitator.
He possessed all the disposition to
deceive, but wanted the power.
Having no resources within himself, he was
compelled to be the copyist of many,
and being such, he was forever the victim of
inconsistency; and of consequence
he was an object of contempt, and was held as
such even by his slaves. The
luxury of having slaves of his own to
wait upon him was something new and unprepared
for. He
was a slaveholder without the ability to
hold slaves.
He found himself incapable
of managing his slaves either by force, fear, or
fraud. We
seldom called him "master;" we
generally called him "Captain Auld," and were
hardly disposed to
title him at all.
I doubt not that our
conduct had much to do with making him appear
awkward, and of consequence
fretful. Our
want of reverence for him
must have perplexed him greatly. He wished to
have us call him master, but
lacked the firmness necessary to command us to
do so. His
wife used to insist upon our calling him
so, but to no purpose. In
August, 1832,
my master attended a Methodist camp-meeting held
in the Bay-side, Talbot
county, and there experienced religion.
I indulged a faint hope that his
conversion would lead him to emancipate
his slaves, and that, if he did not do this, it
would, at any rate, make him
more kind and humane. I was
disappointed
in both these respects. It
neither made
him to be humane to his slaves, nor to
emancipate them.
If it had any effect on his character, it
made him more cruel and hateful in all his ways;
for I believe him to have been
a much worse man after his conversion than
before. Prior
to his conversion, he relied upon his
own depravity to shield and sustain him in his
savage barbarity; but after his
conversion, he found religious sanction and
support for his slaveholding
cruelty. He
made the greatest
pretensions to piety. His
house was the
house of prayer.
He prayed morning,
noon, and night.
He very soon
distinguished himself among his brethren, and
was soon made a class-leader and
exhorter. His
activity in revivals was
great, and he proved himself an instrument in
the hands of the church in
converting many souls. His
house was the
preachers' home.
They used to take great
pleasure in coming there to put up; for while he
starved us, he stuffed
them. We
have had three or four
preachers there at a time. The
names of
those who used to come most frequently while I
lived there, were Mr. Storks,
Mr. Ewery, Mr. Humphry, and Mr. Hickey. I have
also seen Mr. George Cookman at
our house. We slaves loved Mr. Cookman.
We believed him to be a good man.
We thought him instrumental in getting
Mr. Samuel Harrison, a very rich
slaveholder, to emancipate his slaves; and by
some means got the impression
that he was laboring to effect the emancipation
of all the slaves.
When he was at our house, we were sure to
be
called in to prayers. When
the others
were there, we were sometimes called in and
sometimes not.
Mr. Cookman took more notice of us than
either of the other ministers. He
could
not come among us without betraying his sympathy
for us, and, stupid as we
were, we had the sagacity to see it. While I
lived with my master in St.
Michael's, there was a white young man, a Mr.
Wilson, who proposed to keep a
Sabbath school for the instruction of such
slaves as might be disposed to learn
to read the New Testament. We met
but
three times, when Mr. West and Mr. Fairbanks,
both class-leaders, with many
others, came upon us with sticks and other
missiles, drove us off, and forbade
us to meet again.
Thus ended our little
Sabbath school in the pious town of St.
Michael's. I have
said my master found religious
sanction for his cruelty. As an
example,
I will state one of many facts going to prove
the charge.
I have seen him tie up a lame young
woman,
and whip her with a heavy cowskin upon her naked
shoulders, causing the warm
red blood to drip; and, in justification of the
bloody deed, he would quote
this passage of Scripture--"He that knoweth his
master's will, and doeth
it not, shall be beaten with many stripes." Master
would keep this lacerated young
woman tied up in this horrid situation four or
five hours at a time. I have
known him to tie her up early in the
morning, and whip her before breakfast; leave
her, go to his store, return at
dinner, and whip her again, cutting her in the
places already made raw with his
cruel lash.
The secret of master's
cruelty toward "Henny" is found in the fact of
her being almost
helpless. When
quite a child, she fell
into the fire, and burned herself horribly.
Her hands were so burnt that she never
got the use of them. She
could do very little but bear heavy
burdens. She
was to master a bill of
expense; and as he was a mean man, she was a
constant offence to him. He
seemed desirous of getting the poor girl
out of existence. He gave her away once to his
sister; but, being a poor gift,
she was not disposed to keep her.
Finally, my benevolent master, to use his
own words, "set her
adrift to take care of herself."
Here was a recently-converted man,
holding on upon the mother, and at
the same time turning out her helpless child, to
starve and die!
Master Thomas was one of the many pious
slaveholders who hold slaves for the very
charitable purpose of taking care of
them. My master
and myself had quite a number of
differences.
He found me unsuitable to
his purpose. My city life, he said, had had a
very pernicious effect upon
me. It
had almost ruined me for every
good purpose, and fitted me for every thing
which was bad.
One of my greatest faults was that of
letting
his horse run away, and go down to his
father-inlaw's farm, which was about
five miles from St. Michael's. I
would
then have to go after it. My
reason for
this kind of carelessness, or carefulness, was,
that I could always get
something to eat when I went there.
Master William Hamilton, my master's
father-in-law, always gave his
slaves enough to eat. I never left there hungry,
no matter how great the need
of my speedy return. Master
Thomas at
length said he would stand it no longer.
I had lived with him nine months, during
which time he had given me a
number of severe whippings, all to no good
purpose. He
resolved to put me out, as he said, to be
broken; and, for this purpose, he let me for one
year to a man named Edward
Covey. Mr.
Covey was a poor man, a
farm-renter.
He rented the place upon
which he lived, as also the hands with which he
tilled it.
Mr. Covey had acquired a very high
reputation
for breaking young slaves, and this reputation
was of immense value to
him. It
enabled him to get his farm
tilled with much less expense to himself than he
could have had it done without
such a reputation.
Some slaveholders
thought it not much loss to allow Mr. Covey to
have their slaves one year, for
the sake of the training to which they were
subjected, without any other
compensation. He could hire young help with
great ease, in consequence of this
reputation.
Added to the natural good
qualities of Mr. Covey, he was a professor of
religion--a pious soul--a member
and a class-leader in the Methodist church.
All of this added weight to his
reputation as a
"nigger-breaker."
I was aware
of all the facts, having been made acquainted
with them by a young man who had
lived there.
I nevertheless made the
change gladly; for I was sure of getting enough
to eat, which is not the
smallest consideration to a hungry man. CHAPTER
X I had
left Master Thomas's house, and went
to live with Mr. Covey, on the 1st of January,
1833. I
was now, for the first time in my life, a
field hand.
In my new employment, I
found myself even more awkward than a country
boy appeared to be in a large
city. I
had been at my new home but one
week before Mr. Covey gave me a very severe
whipping, cutting my back, causing
the blood to run, and raising ridges on my flesh
as large as my little finger.
The details of this affair are as follows: Mr.
Covey sent me, very early in the
morning of one of our coldest days in the month
of January, to the woods, to
get a load of wood. He
gave me a team of
unbroken oxen.
He told me which was the
in-hand ox, and which the off-hand one.
He then tied the end of a large rope
around the horns of the in-hand ox,
and gave me the other end of it, and told me, if
the oxen started to run, that
I must hold on upon the rope. I had
never driven oxen before, and of course I was
very awkward.
I, however, succeeded in getting to the
edge
of the woods with little difficulty; but I had
got a very few rods into the
woods, when the oxen took fright, and started
full tilt, carrying the cart
against trees, and over stumps, in the most
frightful manner.
I expected every moment that my brains
would
be dashed out against the trees. After
running thus for a considerable distance, they
finally upset the cart, dashing
it with great force against a tree, and threw
themselves into a dense
thicket. How
I escaped death, I do not
know. There
I was, entirely alone, in a
thick wood, in a place new to me. My
cart was upset and shattered, my oxen were
entangled among the young trees, and
there was none to help me. After
a long
spell of effort, I succeeded in getting my cart
righted, my oxen disentangled,
and again yoked to the cart. I now proceeded
with my team to the place where I
had, the day before, been chopping wood, and
loaded my cart pretty heavily,
thinking in this way to tame my oxen. I
then proceeded on my way home. I had
now
consumed one half of the day. I got
out
of the woods safely, and now felt out of danger. I
stopped my oxen to open the woods gate; and
just as I did so, before I could get hold of my
ox-rope, the oxen again
started, rushed through the gate, catching it
between the wheel and the body of
the cart, tearing it to pieces, and coming
within a few inches of crushing me
against the gate-post. Thus
twice, in
one short day, I escaped death by the merest
chance. On
my return, I told Mr. Covey what had
happened, and how it happened. He
ordered me to return to the woods again
immediately. I did so, and he followed
on after me.
Just as I got into the
woods, he came up and told me to stop my cart,
and that he would teach me how
to trifle away my time, and break gates.
He then went to a large gum-tree, and
with his axe cut three large
switches, and, after trimming them up neatly
with his pocketknife, he ordered
me to take off my clothes. I made
him no
answer, but stood with my clothes on. He
repeated his order. I
still made him no
answer, nor did I move to strip myself.
Upon this he rushed at me with the
fierceness of a tiger, tore off my
clothes, and lashed me till he had worn out his
switches, cutting me so
savagely as to leave the marks visible for a
long time after.
This whipping was the first of a number
just
like it, and for similar offences. I lived
with Mr. Covey one year. During
the first six months, of that year,
scarce a week passed without his whipping me.
I was seldom free from a sore back.
My awkwardness was almost always his
excuse for whipping me. We
were worked fully up to the point of
endurance.
Long before day we were up,
our horses fed, and by the first approach of day
we were off to the field with
our hoes and ploughing teams. Mr.
Covey
gave us enough to eat, but scarce time to eat
it. We
were often less than five minutes taking
our meals.
We were often in the field
from the first approach of day till its last
lingering ray had left us; and at
saving-fodder time, midnight often caught us in
the field binding blades. Covey
would be out with us. The
way he used to stand it, was this. He
would spend the most of his afternoons in
bed. He
would then come out fresh in the
evening, ready to urge us on with his words,
example, and frequently with the
whip. Mr.
Covey was one of the few
slaveholders who could and did work with his
hands. He
was a hard-working man. He knew by himself
just what a man or a boy could do. There
was no deceiving him. His
work went on
in his absence almost as well as in his
presence; and he had the faculty of
making us feel that he was ever present with us. This
he did by surprising us. He seldom approached
the spot where we were at work openly, if he
could do it secretly. He
always aimed at taking us by
surprise. Such
was his cunning, that we
used to call him, among ourselves, "the snake." When
we were at work in the cornfield, he
would sometimes crawl on his hands and knees to
avoid detection, and all at
once he would rise nearly in our midst, and
scream out, "Ha, ha! Come,
come! Dash
on, dash on!"
This being his mode of attack, it was
never
safe to stop a single minute. His
comings were like a thief in the night. He
appeared to us as being ever at
hand. He
was under every tree, behind
every stump, in every bush, and at every window,
on the plantation.
He would sometimes mount his horse, as if
bound to St. Michael's, a distance of seven
miles, and in half an hour
afterwards you would see him coiled up in the
corner of the wood-fence,
watching every motion of the slaves. He
would, for this purpose, leave his horse tied up
in the woods.
Again, he would sometimes walk up to us,
and
give us orders as though he was upon the point
of starting on a long journey,
turn his back upon us, and make as though he was
going to the house to get
ready; and, before he would get half way
thither, he would turn short and crawl
into a fence-corner, or behind some tree, and
there watch us till the going
down of the sun. Mr.
Covey's FORTE consisted in his power to
deceive. His
life was devoted to
planning and perpetrating the grossest
deceptions.
Every thing he possessed in the shape of
learning or religion, he made conform to his
disposition to deceive. He
seemed to think himself equal to deceiving
the Almighty. He would make a short prayer in
the morning, and a long prayer at
night; and, strange as it may seem, few men
would at times appear more
devotional than he. The
exercises of his
family devotions were always commenced with
singing; and, as he was a very poor
singer himself, the duty of raising the hymn
generally came upon me. He
would read his hymn, and nod at me to
commence. I
would at times do so; at others,
I would not.
My non-compliance would
almost always produce much confusion. To
show himself independent of me, he would start
and stagger through with his
hymn in the most discordant manner. In
this state of mind, he prayed with more than
ordinary spirit.
Poor man! such was his disposition, and
success at deceiving, I do verily believe that
he sometimes deceived himself
into the solemn belief, that he was a sincere
worshipper of the most high God;
and this, too, at a time when he may be said to
have been guilty of compelling
his woman slave to commit the sin of adultery.
The facts in the case are these:
Mr. Covey was a poor man; he was just
commencing in life; he was only
able to buy one slave; and, shocking as is the
fact, he bought her, as he said,
for A BREEDER.
This woman was named
Caroline. Mr.
Covey bought her from Mr.
Thomas Lowe, about six miles from St. Michael's. She
was a large, able-bodied woman, about
twenty years old.
She had already given
birth to one child, which proved her to be just
what he wanted. After buying
her, he hired a married man of Mr. Samuel
Harrison, to live with him one year;
and him he used to fasten up with her every
night! The
result was, that, at the end of the year,
the miserable woman gave birth to twins.
At this result Mr. Covey seemed to be
highly pleased, both with the man
and the wretched woman. Such
was his
joy, and that of his wife, that nothing they
could do for Caroline during her
confinement was too good, or too hard, to be
done. The
children were regarded as being quite an
addition to his wealth. If at any
one time of my life more than
another, I was made to drink the bitterest dregs
of slavery, that time was
during the first six months of my stay with Mr.
Covey. We
were worked in all weathers. It was never too
hot or too cold; it could never rain, blow,
hail, or snow, too hard for us to
work in the field.
Work, work, work, was
scarcely more the order of the day than of the
night. The
longest days were too short for him, and
the shortest nights too long for him. I
was somewhat unmanageable when I first went
there, but a few months of this
discipline tamed me. Mr.
Covey succeeded
in breaking me.
I was broken in body,
soul, and spirit.
My natural elasticity
was crushed, my intellect languished, the
disposition to read departed, the
cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died;
the dark night of slavery
closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed
into a brute! Sunday
was my only leisure time. I
spent this in a sort of beast-like stupor,
between sleep and wake, under some large tree.
At times I would rise up, a flash of
energetic freedom would dart
through my soul, accompanied with a faint beam
of hope, that flickered for a
moment, and then vanished. I sank
down
again, mourning over my wretched condition. I
was sometimes prompted to take my
life, and that of Covey, but was prevented by a
combination of hope and
fear. My
sufferings on this plantation
seem now like a dream rather than a stern
reality. Our house
stood within a few rods of the
Chesapeake Bay, whose broad bosom was ever white
with sails from every quarter
of the habitable globe. Those beautiful vessels,
robed in purest white, so
delightful to the eye of freemen, were to me so
many shrouded ghosts, to
terrify and torment me with thoughts of my
wretched condition. I have
often, in the deep stillness of a
summer's Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty
banks of that noble bay, and
traced, with saddened heart and tearful eye, the
countless number of sails
moving off to the mighty ocean. The
sight of these always affected me powerfully.
My thoughts would compel utterance; and
there, with no audience but the
Almighty, I would pour out my soul's complaint,
in my rude way, with an
apostrophe to the moving multitude of ships:-- "You are
loosed from your moorings,
and are free; I am fast in my chains, and am a
slave! You
move merrily before the gentle gale, and
I sadly before the bloody whip! You
are
freedom's swift-winged angels, that fly round
the world; I am confined in bands
of iron! O
that I were free!
O, that I were on one of your gallant
decks,
and under your protecting wing! Alas!
betwixt me and you, the turbid waters roll.
Go on, go on. O that
I could also
go! Could I but swim! If I
could
fly! O,
why was I born a man, of whom to
make a brute!
The glad ship is gone; she
hides in the dim distance. I am
left in
the hottest hell of unending slavery. O
God, save me!
God, deliver me! Let me
be free! Is
there any God?
Why am I a slave? I will
run away. I
will not stand it.
Get caught, or get clear, I'll try it. I had
as well die with ague as the
fever. I
have only one life to lose. I had
as well be killed running as die
standing. Only
think of it; one hundred
miles straight north, and I am free! Try
it? Yes!
God helping me, I will. It
cannot
be that I shall live and die a slave. I
will take to the water. This
very bay
shall yet bear me into freedom. The
steamboats steered in a north-east course from
North Point.
I will do the same; and when I get to the
head of the bay, I will turn my canoe adrift,
and walk straight through
Delaware into Pennsylvania. When I get there, I
shall not be required to have a
pass; I can travel without being disturbed.
Let but the first opportunity offer, and,
come what will, I am off. Meanwhile,
I will try to bear up under the
yoke. I
am not the only slave in the
world. Why
should I fret?
I can bear as much as any of them.
Besides, I
am but a boy, and all boys are bound to some
one. It
may be that my misery in slavery will only
increase my happiness when I get free.
There is a better day coming." Thus I
used to think, and thus I used to
speak to myself; goaded almost to madness at one
moment, and at the next
reconciling myself to my wretched lot. I have
already intimated that my condition
was much worse, during the first six months of
my stay at Mr. Covey's, than in
the last six.
The circumstances leading
to the change in Mr. Covey's course toward me
form an epoch in my humble
history. You have seen how a man was made a
slave; you shall see how a slave
was made a man.
On one of the hottest
days of the month of August, 1833, Bill Smith,
William Hughes, a slave named
Eli, and myself, were engaged in fanning wheat.
Hughes was clearing the fanned wheat from
before the fan.
Eli was turning, Smith was feeding, and I
was
carrying wheat to the fan. The
work was
simple, requiring strength rather than
intellect; yet, to one entirely unused
to such work, it came very hard. About
three o'clock of that day, I broke down; my
strength failed me; I was seized
with a violent aching of the head, attended with
extreme dizziness; I trembled
in every limb.
Finding what was coming,
I nerved myself up, feeling it would never do to
stop work.
I stood as long as I could stagger to the
hopper with grain. When I could stand no longer,
I fell, and felt as if held
down by an immense weight. The
fan of
course stopped; every one had his own work to
do; and no one could do the work
of the other, and have his own go on at the same
time. Mr. Covey
was at the house, about one
hundred yards from the treading-yard where we
were fanning. On hearing the fan
stop, he left immediately, and came to the spot
where we were.
He hastily inquired what the matter was. Bill
answered that I was sick, and there was
no one to bring wheat to the fan. I had
by this time crawled away under the side of the
post and rail-fence by which
the yard was enclosed, hoping to find relief by
getting out of the sun. He
then asked where I was. He was
told by one of the hands. He
came to the spot, and, after looking at me
awhile, asked me what was the matter. I
told him as well as I could, for I scarce had
strength to speak.
He then gave me a savage kick in the
side,
and told me to get up. I
tried to do so,
but fell back in the attempt. He
gave me
another kick, and again told me to rise.
I again tried, and succeeded in gaining
my feet; but, stooping to get
the tub with which I was feeding the fan, I
again staggered and fell. While
down in this situation, Mr. Covey took
up the hickory slat with which Hughes had been
striking off the half-bushel
measure, and with it gave me a heavy blow upon
the head, making a large wound,
and the blood ran freely; and with this again
told me to get up.
I made no effort to comply, having now
made
up my mind to let him do his worst. In a
short time after receiving this blow, my head
grew better.
Mr. Covey had now left me to my fate. At
this moment I resolved, for the first
time, to go to my master, enter a complaint, and
ask his protection. In
order to do this, I must that afternoon
walk seven miles; and this, under the
circumstances, was truly a severe
undertaking.
I was exceedingly feeble;
made so as much by the kicks and blows which I
received, as by the severe fit
of sickness to which I had been subjected.
I, however, watched my chance, while
Covey was looking in an opposite
direction, and started for St. Michael's.
I succeeded in getting a considerable
distance on my way to the woods,
when Covey discovered me, and called after me to
come back, threatening what he
would do if I did not come. I
disregarded both his calls and his threats, and
made my way to the woods as
fast as my feeble state would allow; and
thinking I might be overhauled by him
if I kept the road, I walked through the woods,
keeping far enough from the
road to avoid detection, and near enough to
prevent losing my way. I had
not gone far before my little strength
again failed me.
I could go no
farther. I
fell down, and lay for a
considerable time.
The blood was yet oozing
from the wound on my head. For a
time I
thought I should bleed to death; and think now
that I should have done so, but
that the blood so matted my hair as to stop the
wound. After
lying there about three quarters of an
hour, I nerved myself up again, and started on
my way, through bogs and briers,
barefooted and bareheaded, tearing my feet
sometimes at nearly every step; and
after a journey of about seven miles, occupying
some five hours to perform it,
I arrived at master's store. I then
presented an appearance enough to affect any but
a heart of iron.
From the crown of my head to my feet, I
was
covered with blood. My
hair was all
clotted with dust and blood; my shirt was stiff
with blood.
I suppose I looked like a man who had
escaped
a den of wild beasts, and barely escaped them.
In this state I appeared before
my master, humbly entreating him to interpose
his authority for my protection. I told
him all the circumstances as well as I
could, and it seemed, as I spoke, at times to
affect him.
He would then walk the floor, and seek to
justify Covey by saying he expected I deserved
it. He
asked me what I wanted. I told
him, to let me get a new home; that as
sure as I lived with Mr. Covey again, I should
live with but to die with him;
that Covey would surely kill me; he was in a
fair way for it.
Master Thomas ridiculed the idea that
there
was any danger of Mr. Covey's killing me, and
said that he knew Mr. Covey; that
he was a good man, and that he could not think
of taking me from him; that,
should he do so, he would lose the whole year's
wages; that I belonged to Mr.
Covey for one year, and that I must go back to
him, come what might; and that I
must not trouble him with any more stories, or
that he would himself GET HOLD
OF ME. After
threatening me thus, he
gave me a very large dose of salts, telling me
that I might remain in St.
Michael's that night, (it being quite late,) but
that I must be off back to Mr.
Covey's early in the morning; and that if I did
not, he would ~get hold of me,~
which meant that he would whip me. I
remained all night, and, according to his
orders, I started off to Covey's in
the morning, (Saturday morning,) wearied in body
and broken in spirit. I got
no supper that night, or breakfast that
morning. I
reached Covey's about nine
o'clock; and just as I was getting over the
fence that divided Mrs. Kemp's
fields from ours, out ran Covey with his
cowskin, to give me another
whipping. Before
he could reach me, I
succeeded in getting to the cornfield; and as
the corn was very high, it
afforded me the means of hiding. He
seemed very angry, and searched for me a long
time. My
behavior was altogether
unaccountable.
He finally gave up the
chase, thinking, I suppose, that I must come
home for something to eat; he
would give himself no further trouble in looking
for me. I
spent that day mostly in the woods, having
the alternative before me,--to go home and be
whipped to death, or stay in the
woods and be starved to death. That
night, I fell in with Sandy Jenkins, a slave
with whom I was somewhat
acquainted.
Sandy had a free wife who
lived about four miles from Mr. Covey's; and it
being Saturday, he was on his
way to see her.
I told him my
circumstances, and he very kindly invited me to
go home with him.
I went home with him, and talked this
whole
matter over, and got his advice as to what
course it was best for me to pursue.
I found Sandy an old adviser. He
told
me, with great solemnity, I must go back to
Covey; but that before I went, I
must go with him into another part of the woods,
where there was a certain
~root,~ which, if I would take some of it with
me, carrying it ~always on my
right side,~ would render it impossible for Mr.
Covey, or any other white man,
to whip me.
He said he had carried it
for years; and since he had done so, he had
never received a blow, and never
expected to while he carried it. I at
first rejected the idea, that the simple
carrying of a root in my pocket would
have any such effect as he had said, and was not
disposed to take it; but Sandy
impressed the necessity with much earnestness,
telling me it could do no harm,
if it did no good.
To please him, I at
length took the root, and, according to his
direction, carried it upon my right
side. This
was Sunday morning. I
immediately started for home; and upon
entering the yard gate, out came Mr. Covey on
his way to meeting. He
spoke to me very kindly, bade me drive the
pigs from a lot near by, and passed on towards
the church.
Now, this singular conduct of Mr. Covey
really made me begin to think that there was
something in the ROOT which Sandy
had given me; and had it been on any other day
than Sunday, I could have
attributed the conduct to no other cause than
the influence of that root; and
as it was, I was half inclined to think the
~root~ to be something more than I
at first had taken it to be. All
went
well till Monday morning. On
this
morning, the virtue of the ROOT was fully
tested. Long
before daylight, I was called to go and
rub, curry, and feed, the horses. I obeyed, and
was glad to obey.
But whilst thus engaged, whilst in the
act of
throwing down some blades from the loft, Mr.
Covey entered the stable with a
long rope; and just as I was half out of the
loft, he caught hold of my legs,
and was about tying me. As
soon as I
found what he was up to, I gave a sudden spring,
and as I did so, he holding to
my legs, I was brought sprawling on the stable
floor. Mr. Covey seemed now to
think he had me, and could do what he pleased;
but at this moment-from whence
came the spirit I don't know--I resolved to
fight; and, suiting my action to
the resolution, I seized Covey hard by the
throat; and as I did so, I
rose. He
held on to me, and I to
him. My
resistance was so entirely
unexpected that Covey seemed taken all aback.
He trembled like a leaf. This gave me
assurance, and I held him uneasy,
causing the blood to run where I touched him
with the ends of my fingers. Mr.
Covey soon called out to Hughes for
help. Hughes
came, and, while Covey held
me, attempted to tie my right hand.
While he was in the act of doing so, I
watched my chance, and gave him a
heavy kick close under the ribs. This kick
fairly sickened Hughes, so that he
left me in the hands of Mr. Covey. This
kick had the effect of not only weakening
Hughes, but Covey also. When he saw
Hughes bending over with pain, his courage
quailed. He
asked me if I meant to persist in my
resistance.
I told him I did, come what
might; that he had used me like a brute for six
months, and that I was
determined to be used so no longer. With
that, he strove to drag me to a stick that was
lying just out of the stable
door. He
meant to knock me down. But
just as he was leaning over to get the
stick, I seized him with both hands by his
collar, and brought him by a sudden
snatch to the ground. By
this time, Bill
came. Covey
called upon him for
assistance.
Bill wanted to know what he
could do. Covey
said, "Take hold of
him, take hold of him!" Bill
said
his master hired him out to work, and not to
help to whip me; so he left Covey
and myself to fight our own battle out.
We were at it for nearly two hours.
Covey at length let me go, puffing and
blowing at a great rate, saying
that if I had not resisted, he would not have
whipped me half so much. The
truth was, that he had not whipped me at
all. I
considered him as getting
entirely the worst end of the bargain; for he
had drawn no blood from me, but I
had from him.
The whole six months
afterwards, that I spent with Mr. Covey, he
never laid the weight of his finger
upon me in anger.
He would occasionally
say, he didn't want to get hold of me again.
"No," thought I, "you need not; for you
will come off
worse than you did before." This
battle with Mr. Covey was the
turningpoint in my career as a slave. It
rekindled the few expiring embers of freedom,
and revived within me a sense of
my own manhood.
It recalled the departed
self-confidence, and inspired me again with a
determination to be free. The
gratification afforded by the triumph was
a full compensation for whatever else might
follow, even death itself. He
only can understand the deep satisfaction
which I experienced, who has himself repelled by
force the bloody arm of
slavery. I
felt as I never felt before.
It was a glorious resurrection, from the tomb of
slavery, to the heaven of
freedom. My
long-crushed spirit rose,
cowardice departed, bold defiance took its
place; and I now resolved that,
however long I might remain a slave in form, the
day had passed forever when I
could be a slave in fact. I did
not
hesitate to let it be known of me, that the
white man who expected to succeed
in whipping, must also succeed in killing me. From this
time I was never again what might
be called fairly whipped, though I remained a
slave four years afterwards. I had
several fights, but was never whipped. It was
for a long time a matter of surprise
to me why Mr. Covey did not immediately have me
taken by the constable to the
whipping-post, and there regularly whipped for
the crime of raising my hand
against a white man in defence of myself.
And the only explanation I can now think
of does not entirely satisfy
me; but such as it is, I will give it.
Mr. Covey enjoyed the most unbounded
reputation for being a first-rate
overseer and negro-breaker. It was
of
considerable importance to him. That
reputation was at stake; and had he sent me--a
boy about sixteen years old--to
the public whipping-post, his reputation would
have been lost; so, to save his
reputation, he suffered me to go unpunished. My term
of actual service to Mr. Edward
Covey ended on Christmas day, 1833. The
days between Christmas and New Year's day are
allowed as holidays; and,
accordingly, we were not required to perform any
labor, more than to feed and
take care of the stock. This
time we
regarded as our own, by the grace of our
masters; and we therefore used or
abused it nearly as we pleased. Those
of
us who had families at a distance, were
generally allowed to spend the whole six
days in their society. This
time,
however, was spent in various ways. The
staid, sober, thinking and industrious ones of
our number would employ
themselves in making corn-brooms, mats,
horse-collars, and baskets; and another
class of us would spend the time in hunting
opossums, hares, and coons. But by
far the larger part engaged in such
sports and merriments as playing ball,
wrestling, running foot-races, fiddling,
dancing, and drinking whisky; and this latter
mode of spending the time was by
far the most agreeable to the feelings of our
masters. A
slave who would work during the holidays
was considered by our masters as scarcely
deserving them.
He was regarded as one who rejected the
favor
of his master.
It was deemed a disgrace
not to get drunk at Christmas; and he was
regarded as lazy indeed, who had not
provided himself with the necessary means,
during the year, to get whisky
enough to last him through Christmas. From what
I know of the effect of these
holidays upon the slave, I believe them to be
among the most effective means in
the hands of the slaveholder in keeping down the
spirit of insurrection. Were
the slaveholders at once to abandon this
practice, I have not the slightest doubt it
would lead to an immediate
insurrection among the slaves. These
holidays serve as conductors, or safety-valves,
to carry off the rebellious
spirit of enslaved humanity. But
for
these, the slave would be forced up to the
wildest desperation; and woe betide
the slaveholder, the day he ventures to remove
or hinder the operation of those
conductors!
I warn him that, in such an
event, a spirit will go forth in their midst,
more to be dreaded than the most
appalling earthquake. The
holidays are part and parcel of the
gross fraud, wrong, and inhumanity of slavery.
They are professedly a custom established
by the benevolence of the
slaveholders; but I undertake to say, it is the
result of selfishness, and one
of the grossest frauds committed upon the
down-trodden slave. They
do not give the slaves this time because
they would not like to have their work during
its continuance, but because they
know it would be unsafe to deprive them of it.
This will be seen by the fact, that the
slaveholders like to have their
slaves spend those days just in such a manner as
to make them as glad of their
ending as of their beginning. Their
object seems to be, to disgust their slaves with
freedom, by plunging them into
the lowest depths of dissipation. For
instance, the slaveholders not only like to see
the slave drink of his own
accord, but will adopt various plans to make him
drunk. One
plan is, to make bets on their slaves, as
to who can drink the most whisky without getting
drunk; and in this way they
succeed in getting whole multitudes to drink to
excess. Thus,
when the slave asks for virtuous
freedom, the cunning slaveholder, knowing his
ignorance, cheats him with a dose
of vicious dissipation, artfully labelled with
the name of liberty. The most of
us used to drink it down, and the result was
just what might be supposed; many
of us were led to think that there was little to
choose between liberty and slavery. We
felt, and very properly too, that we had
almost as well be slaves to man as to rum.
So, when the holidays ended, we staggered
up from the filth of our
wallowing, took a long breath, and marched to
the field,--feeling, upon the
whole, rather glad to go, from what our master
had deceived us into a belief
was freedom, back to the arms of slavery. I have
said that this mode of treatment is
a part of the whole system of fraud and
inhumanity of slavery. It is
so.
The mode here adopted to disgust the
slave with freedom, by allowing him
to see only the abuse of it, is carried out in
other things.
For instance, a slave loves molasses; he
steals some. His master, in many cases, goes off
to town, and buys a large
quantity; he returns, takes his whip, and
commands the slave to eat the
molasses, until the poor fellow is made sick at
the very mention of it. The
same mode is sometimes adopted to make
the slaves refrain from asking for more food
than their regular allowance. A
slave runs through his allowance, and
applies for more.
His master is enraged
at him; but, not willing to send him off without
food, gives him more than is
necessary, and compels him to eat it within a
given time.
Then, if he complains that he cannot eat
it,
he is said to be satisfied neither full nor
fasting, and is whipped for being
hard to please!
I have an abundance of
such illustrations of the same principle, drawn
from my own observation, but
think the cases I have cited sufficient.
The practice is a very common one. On the
first of January, 1834, I left Mr.
Covey, and went to live with Mr. William
Freeland, who lived about three miles
from St. Michael's. I soon
found Mr.
Freeland a very different man from Mr. Covey.
Though not rich, he was what would be
called an educated southern
gentleman.
Mr. Covey, as I have shown,
was a well-trained negro-breaker and
slave-driver.
The former (slaveholder though he was)
seemed
to possess some regard for honor, some reverence
for justice, and some respect
for humanity.
The latter seemed totally
insensible to all such sentiments. Mr.
Freeland had many of the faults peculiar to
slaveholders, such as being very
passionate and fretful; but I must do him the
justice to say, that he was
exceedingly free from those degrading vices to
which Mr. Covey was constantly
addicted. The
one was open and frank,
and we always knew where to find him.
The other was a most artful deceiver, and
could be understood only by
such as were skilful enough to detect his
cunningly-devised frauds. Another
advantage I gained in my new master
was, he made no pretensions to, or profession
of, religion; and this, in my
opinion, was truly a great advantage. I
assert most unhesitatingly, that the religion of
the south is a mere covering
for the most horrid crimes,--a justifier of the
most appalling barbarity,--a
sanctifier of the most hateful frauds,--and a
dark shelter under, which the
darkest, foulest, grossest, and most infernal
deeds of slaveholders find the
strongest protection. Were I
to be again
reduced to the chains of slavery, next to that
enslavement, I should regard
being the slave of a religious master the
greatest calamity that could befall
me. For
of all slaveholders with whom I
have ever met, religious slaveholders are the
worst. I
have ever found them the meanest and
basest, the most cruel and cowardly, of all
others. It
was my unhappy lot not only to belong to a
religious slaveholder, but to live in a
community of such religionists. Very
near Mr. Freeland lived the Rev. Daniel
Weeden, and in the same neighborhood lived the
Rev. Rigby Hopkins. These
were members and ministers in the
Reformed Methodist Church. Mr. Weeden owned,
among others, a woman slave, whose
name I have forgotten. This
woman's
back, for weeks, was kept literally raw, made so
by the lash of this merciless,
~religious~ wretch. He
used to hire
hands. His
maxim was, Behave well or
behave ill, it is the duty of a master
occasionally to whip a slave, to remind
him of his master's authority. Such was his
theory, and such his practice. Mr.
Hopkins was even worse than Mr. Weeden.
His chief boast was his ability to manage
slaves. The peculiar feature of his
government was that of whipping slaves in
advance of deserving it. He
always managed to have one or more of his
slaves to whip every Monday morning. He
did this to alarm their fears, and strike terror
into those who escaped. His
plan was to whip for the smallest offences, to
prevent the commission of large
ones. Mr.
Hopkins could always find some
excuse for whipping a slave. It would astonish
one, unaccustomed to a slaveholding
life, to see with what wonderful ease a
slaveholder can find things, of which
to make occasion to whip a slave. A mere
look, word, or motion,--a mistake, accident, or
want of power,--are all matters
for which a slave may be whipped at any time.
Does a slave look dissatisfied?
It is said, he has the devil in him, and
it must be whipped out. Does
he speak loudly when spoken to by his
master? Then
he is getting high-minded,
and should be taken down a button-hole lower.
Does he forget to pull off his hat at the
approach of a white
person? Then
he is wanting in reverence,
and should be whipped for it. Does
he
ever venture to vindicate his conduct, when
censured for it?
Then he is guilty of impudence,--one of
the
greatest crimes of which a slave can be guilty.
Does he ever venture to suggest a
different mode of doing things from
that pointed out by his master? He is
indeed presumptuous, and getting above himself;
and nothing less than a
flogging will do for him. Does
he, while
ploughing, break a plough,--or, while hoeing,
break a hoe?
It is owing to his carelessness, and for
it a
slave must always be whipped. Mr.
Hopkins could always find something of this sort
to justify the use of the
lash, and he seldom failed to embrace such
opportunities. There was not a man
in the whole county, with whom the slaves who
had the getting their own home,
would not prefer to live, rather than with this
Rev. Mr. Hopkins.
And yet there was not a man any where
round,
who made higher professions of religion, or was
more active in revivals,--more
attentive to the class, love-feast, prayer and
preaching meetings, or more
devotional in his family,-that prayed earlier,
later, louder, and longer,--than
this same reverend slave-driver, Rigby Hopkins. But to
return to Mr. Freeland, and to my
experience while in his employment. He,
like Mr. Covey, gave us enough to eat; but,
unlike Mr. Covey, he also gave us
sufficient time to take our meals. He
worked us hard, but always between sunrise and
sunset. He
required a good deal of work to be done,
but gave us good tools with which to work.
His farm was large, but he employed hands
enough to work it, and with
ease, compared with many of his neighbors.
My treatment, while in his employment,
was heavenly, compared with what
I experienced at the hands of Mr. Edward Covey. Mr.
Freeland was himself the owner of but
two slaves.
Their names were Henry
Harris and John Harris. The
rest of his
hands he hired.
These consisted of
myself, Sandy Jenkins,* and Handy Caldwell.
Henry and John were quite intelligent,
and in a very little while after
I went there, I succeeded in creating in them a
strong desire to learn how to
read. This
desire soon sprang up in the
others also. They very soon mustered up some old
spelling-books, and nothing
would do but that I must keep a Sabbath school.
I agreed to do so, and accordingly
devoted my Sundays to teaching these
my loved fellow-slaves how to read.
Neither of them knew his letters when I
went there.
Some of the slaves of the neighboring
farms
found what was going on, and also availed
themselves of this little opportunity
to learn to read.
It was understood,
among all who came, that there must be as little
display about it as possible. It was
necessary to keep our religious
masters at St. Michael's unacquainted with the
fact, that, instead of spending
the Sabbath in wrestling, boxing, and drinking
whisky, we were trying to learn
how to read the will of God; for they had much *This is
the same man who gave me the roots
to prevent my being whipped by Mr. Covey.
He was "a clever soul." We used
frequently to talk about the
fight with Covey, and as often as we did so, he
would claim my success as the
result of the roots which he gave me.
This superstition is very common among
the more ignorant slaves. A
slave seldom dies but that his death is
attributed to trickery. rather see us engaged in
those degrading sports, than
to see us behaving like intellectual, moral, and
accountable beings. My
blood boils as I think of the bloody
manner in which Messrs. Wright Fairbanks and
Garrison West, both class-leaders,
in connection with many others, rushed in upon
us with sticks and stones, and
broke up our virtuous little Sabbath school, at
St. Michael's--all calling
themselves Christians! humble followers of the
Lord Jesus Christ!
But I am again digressing. I held my
Sabbath school at the house of a
free colored man, whose name I deem it imprudent
to mention; for should it be
known, it might embarrass him greatly, though
the crime of holding the school
was committed ten years ago. I had
at
one time over forty scholars, and those of the
right sort, ardently desiring to
learn. They
were of all ages, though
mostly men and women. I look
back to
those Sundays with an amount of pleasure not to
be expressed.
They were great days to my soul. The
work of instructing my dear fellow-slaves
was the sweetest engagement with which I was
ever blessed.
We loved each other, and to leave them at
the
close of the Sabbath was a severe cross indeed.
When I think that these precious souls
are to-day shut up in the
prison-house of slavery, my feelings overcome
me, and I am almost ready to ask,
"Does a righteous God govern the universe? and
for what does he hold the
thunders in his right hand, if not to smite the
oppressor, and deliver the
spoiled out of the hand of the spoiler?"
These dear souls came not to Sabbath
school because it was popular to do
so, nor did I teach them because it was
reputable to be thus engaged. Every
moment they spent in that school, they
were liable to be taken up, and given thirtynine
lashes. They
came because they wished to learn. Their
minds had been starved by their cruel
masters. They
had been shut up in mental
darkness. I taught them, because it was the
delight of my soul to be doing
something that looked like bettering the
condition of my race. I kept
up my school nearly the whole year I
lived with Mr. Freeland; and, beside my Sabbath
school, I devoted three
evenings in the week, during the winter, to
teaching the slaves at home. And I
have the happiness to know, that
several of those who came to Sabbath school
learned how to read; and that one,
at least, is now free through my agency. The year
passed off smoothly. It
seemed only about half as long as the year
which preceded it. I went through it without
receiving a single blow. I will
give Mr. Freeland the credit of being the best
master I ever had, ~till I
became my own master.~ For
the ease with
which I passed the year, I was, however,
somewhat indebted to the society of my
fellow-slaves.
They were noble souls;
they not only possessed loving hearts, but brave
ones. We
were linked and interlinked with each
other. I
loved them with a love stronger
than any thing I have experienced since.
It is sometimes said that we slaves do
not love and confide in each
other. In
answer to this assertion, I
can say, I never loved any or confided in any
people more than my fellowslaves,
and especially those with whom I lived at Mr.
Freeland's.
I believe we would have died for each
other. We
never undertook to do any
thing, of any importance, without a mutual
consultation. We never moved
separately.
We were one; and as much so
by our tempers and dispositions, as by the
mutual hardships to which we were
necessarily subjected by our condition as
slaves. At the
close of the year 1834, Mr. Freeland
again hired me of my master, for the year 1835.
But, by this time, I began to want to
live ~upon free land~ as well as
~with freeland;~ and I was no longer content,
therefore, to live with him or
any other slaveholder. I
began, with the
commencement of the year, to prepare myself for
a final struggle, which should
decide my fate one way or the other. My
tendency was upward. I was
fast
approaching manhood, and year after year had
passed, and I was still a
slave. These
thoughts roused me--I must
do something.
I therefore resolved that
1835 should not pass without witnessing an
attempt, on my part, to secure my
liberty. But
I was not willing to
cherish this determination alone. My
fellow-slaves
were dear to me.
I was anxious to have
them participate with me in this, my life-giving
determination.
I therefore, though with great prudence,
commenced early to ascertain their views and
feelings in regard to their
condition, and to imbue their minds with
thoughts of freedom. I bent
myself to devising ways and means for
our escape, and meanwhile strove, on all fitting
occasions, to impress them
with the gross fraud and inhumanity of slavery.
I went first to Henry, next to John, then
to the others.
I found, in them all, warm hearts and
noble
spirits. They
were ready to hear, and
ready to act when a feasible plan should be
proposed. This
was what I wanted. I talked to them of
our want of manhood, if we submitted to our
enslavement without at least one
noble effort to be free. We met
often,
and consulted frequently, and told our hopes and
fears, recounted the
difficulties, real and imagined, which we should
be called on to meet. At
times we were almost disposed to give up,
and try to content ourselves with our wretched
lot; at others, we were firm and
unbending in our determination to go.
Whenever we suggested any plan, there was
shrinking--the odds were
fearful. Our
path was beset with the
greatest obstacles; and if we succeeded in
gaining the end of it, our right to
be free was yet questionable--we were yet liable
to be returned to
bondage. We
could see no spot, this side
of the ocean, where we could be free. We
knew nothing about Canada. Our
knowledge
of the north did not extend farther than New
York; and to go there, and be
forever harassed with the frightful liability of
being returned to
slavery--with the certainty of being treated
tenfold worse than before--the
thought was truly a horrible one, and one which
it was not easy to overcome.
The case sometimes stood thus: At every gate
through which we were to pass, we
saw a watchman --at every ferry a guard--on
every bridge a sentinel-and in
every wood a patrol. We
were hemmed in
upon every side.
Here were the
difficulties, real or imagined--the good to be
sought, and the evil to be
shunned. On
the one hand, there stood
slavery, a stern reality, glaring frightfully
upon us,--its robes already
crimsoned with the blood of millions, and even
now feasting itself greedily upon
our own flesh. On the other hand, away back in
the dim distance, under the
flickering light of the north star, behind some
craggy hill or snow-covered
mountain, stood a doubtful freedom--half
frozen--beckoning us to come and share
its hospitality.
This in itself was
sometimes enough to stagger us; but when we
permitted ourselves to survey the
road, we were frequently appalled. Upon
either side we saw grim death, assuming the most
horrid shapes.
Now it was starvation, causing us to eat
our
own flesh;--now we were contending with the
waves, and were drowned; --now we
were overtaken, and torn to pieces by the fangs
of the terrible
bloodhound.
We were stung by scorpions,
chased by wild beasts, bitten by snakes, and
finally, after having nearly
reached the desired spot,--after swimming
rivers, encountering wild beasts,
sleeping in the woods, suffering hunger and
nakedness,--we were overtaken by
our pursuers, and, in our resistance, we were
shot dead upon the spot! I say,
this picture sometimes appalled us, and made us
"rather bear those ills we had, In coming
to a fixed determination to run
away, we did more than Patrick Henry, when he
resolved upon liberty or
death. With
us it was a doubtful liberty
at most, and almost certain death if we failed.
For my part, I should prefer
death to hopeless bondage. Sandy,
one of our number, gave up the
notion, but still encouraged us. Our
company then consisted of Henry Harris, John
Harris, Henry Bailey, Charles
Roberts, and myself. Henry
Bailey was my
uncle, and belonged to my master.
Charles married my aunt: he belonged to
my master's father-in-law, Mr.
William Hamilton. The plan
we finally concluded upon was, to
get a large canoe belonging to Mr. Hamilton, and
upon the Saturday night
previous to Easter holidays, paddle directly up
the Chesapeake Bay. On our
arrival at the head of the bay, a
distance of seventy or eighty miles from where
we lived, it was our purpose to
turn our canoe adrift, and follow the guidance
of the north star till we got
beyond the limits of Maryland. Our
reason for taking the water route was, that we
were less liable to be suspected
as runaways; we hoped to be regarded as
fishermen; whereas, if we should take
the land route, we should be subjected to
interruptions of almost every kind.
Any one having a white face, and being so
disposed, could stop us, and subject
us to examination. The week
before our intended start, I wrote
several protections, one for each of us.
As well as I can remember, they were in
the following words, to wit:-- "This is
to certify that I, the
undersigned, have given the bearer, my servant,
full liberty to go to
Baltimore, and spend the Easter holidays.
Written with mine own hand, &c.,
1835.
"WILLIAM
HAMILTON, "Near St.
Michael's, in Talbot county,
Maryland." We were
not going to Baltimore; but, in
going up the bay, we went toward Baltimore, and
these protections were only
intended to protect us while on the bay. As the
time drew near for our departure,
our anxiety became more and more intense.
It was truly a matter of life and death
with us. The
strength of our determination was about to
be fully tested.
At this time, I was
very active in explaining every difficulty,
removing every doubt, dispelling
every fear, and inspiring all with the firmness
indispensable to success in our
undertaking; assuring them that half was gained
the instant we made the move;
we had talked long enough; we were now ready to
move; if not now, we never
should be; and if we did not intend to move now,
we had as well fold our arms,
sit down, and acknowledge ourselves fit only to
be slaves.
This, none of us were prepared to
acknowledge.
Every man stood firm; and
at our last meeting, we pledged ourselves
afresh, in the most solemn manner,
that, at the time appointed, we would certainly
start in pursuit of
freedom. This
was in the middle of the
week, at the end of which we were to be off.
We went, as usual, to our several fields
of labor, but with bosoms
highly agitated with thoughts of our truly
hazardous undertaking. We
tried to conceal our feelings as much as
possible; and I think we succeeded very well. After a
painful waiting, the Saturday
morning, whose night was to witness our
departure, came.
I hailed it with joy, bring what of
sadness
it might. Friday night was a sleepless one for
me. I
probably felt more anxious than the rest,
because I was, by common consent, at the head of
the whole affair. The
responsibility of success or failure lay heavily
upon me. The
glory of the one, and the confusion of
the other, were alike mine. The
first
two hours of that morning were such as I never
experienced before, and hope
never to again.
Early in the morning, we
went, as usual, to the field. We
were
spreading manure; and all at once, while thus
engaged, I was overwhelmed with
an indescribable feeling, in the fulness of
which I turned to Sandy, who was
near by, and said, "We are betrayed!"
"Well," said he, "that thought has this
moment struck
me." We said no more. I was
never
more certain of any thing. The horn
was blown as usual, and we went up
from the field to the house for breakfast.
I went for the form, more than for want
of any thing to eat that
morning. Just
as I got to the house, in
looking out at the lane gate, I saw four white
men, with two colored men. The
white men were on horseback, and the
colored ones were walking behind, as if tied. I
watched them a few moments till
they got up to our lane gate. Here
they
halted, and tied the colored men to the
gate-post.
I was not yet certain as to what the
matter
was. In
a few moments, in rode Mr.
Hamilton, with a speed betokening great
excitement.
He came to the door, and inquired if
Master
William was in.
He was told he was at
the barn. Mr.
Hamilton, without
dismounting, rode up to the barn with
extraordinary speed. In a
few moments, he and Mr. Freeland
returned to the house. By
this time, the
three constables rode up, and in great haste
dismounted, tied their horses, and
met Master William and Mr. Hamilton returning
from the barn; and after talking
awhile, they all walked up to the kitchen door.
There was no one in the kitchen but
myself and John.
Henry and Sandy were up at the barn. Mr.
Freeland put his head in at the door, and
called me by name, saying, there were some
gentlemen at the door who wished to
see me. I
stepped to the door, and
inquired what they wanted. They
at once
seized me, and, without giving me any
satisfaction, tied me--lashing my hands
closely together. I insisted upon knowing what
the matter was.
They at length said, that they had
learned I
had been in a "scrape," and that I was to be
examined before my
master; and if their information proved false, I
should not be hurt. In a few
moments, they succeeded in tying
John. They then turned to Henry, who had by this
time returned, and commanded
him to cross his hands. "I won't!" said Henry,
in a firm tone,
indicating his readiness to meet the
consequences of his refusal. "Won't
you?" said Tom Graham, the constable.
"No, I won't!" said Henry, in a still
stronger tone.
With this, two of the constables pulled
out
their shining pistols, and swore, by their
Creator, that they would make him
cross his hands or kill him. Each
cocked
his pistol, and, with fingers on the trigger,
walked up to Henry, saying, at
the same time, if he did not cross his hands,
they would blow his damned heart
out. "Shoot
me, shoot me!"
said Henry; "you can't kill me but once.
Shoot, shoot,--and be damned! ~I
won't be tied!~"
This he said in a
tone of loud defiance; and at the same time,
with a motion as quick as
lightning, he with one single stroke dashed the
pistols from the hand of each
constable.
As he did this, all hands
fell upon him, and, after beating him some time,
they finally overpowered him,
and got him tied. During
the scuffle, I managed, I know not
how, to get my pass out, and, without being
discovered, put it into the
fire. We
were all now tied; and just as
we were to leave for Easton jail, Betsy
Freeland, mother of William Freeland,
came to the door with her hands full of
biscuits, and divided them between
Henry and John.
She then delivered
herself of a speech, to the following
effect:--addressing herself to me, she
said, "~You devil!
You yellow
devil!~ it was you that put it into the heads of
Henry and John to run
away. But
for you, you long-legged
mulatto devil! Henry nor John would never have
thought of such a
thing." I
made no reply, and was
immediately hurried off towards St. Michael's.
Just a moment previous to the scuffle
with Henry, Mr. Hamilton suggested
the propriety of making a search for the
protections which he had understood
Frederick had written for himself and the rest.
But, just at the moment he was about
carrying his proposal into effect,
his aid was needed in helping to tie Henry; and
the excitement attending the
scuffle caused them either to forget, or to deem
it unsafe, under the
circumstances, to search. So we
were not
yet convicted of the intention to run away. When we
got about half way to St.
Michael's, while the constables having us in
charge were looking ahead, Henry
inquired of me what he should do with his pass.
I told him to eat it with his biscuit,
and own nothing; and we passed
the word around, "~Own nothing;~" and "~Own
nothing!~" said
we all. Our confidence in each other was
unshaken. We
were resolved to succeed or fail together,
after the calamity had befallen us as much as
before. We
were now prepared for any thing. We
were to be dragged that morning fifteen
miles behind horses, and then to be placed in
the Easton jail.
When we reached St. Michael's, we
underwent a
sort of examination. We all
denied that
we ever intended to run away. We did
this more to bring out the evidence against us,
than from any hope of getting
clear of being sold; for, as I have said, we
were ready for that. The
fact was, we cared but little where we
went, so we went together. Our
greatest
concern was about separation. We
dreaded
that more than any thing this side of death.
We found the evidence against us to be
the testimony of one person; our
master would not tell who it was; but we came to
a unanimous decision among
ourselves as to who their informant was.
We were sent off to the jail at Easton.
When we got there, we were delivered up
to the sheriff, Mr. Joseph
Graham, and by him placed in jail.
Henry, John, and myself, were placed in
one room together--Charles, and
Henry Bailey, in another. Their
object
in separating us was to hinder concert. We had
been in jail scarcely twenty
minutes, when a swarm of slave traders, and
agents for slave traders, flocked
into jail to look at us, and to ascertain if we
were for sale.
Such a set of beings I never saw before! I felt
myself surrounded by so many fiends
from perdition.
A band of pirates never
looked more like their father, the devil.
They laughed and grinned over us, saying,
"Ah, my boys! we have got
you, haven't we?"
And after
taunting us in various ways, they one by one
went into an examination of us,
with intent to ascertain our value. They would
impudently ask us if we would
not like to have them for our masters.
We would make them no answer, and leave
them to find out as best they
could. Then
they would curse and swear
at us, telling us that they could take the devil
out of us in a very little
while, if we were only in their hands. While in
jail, we found ourselves in much
more comfortable quarters than we expected when
we went there.
We did not get much to eat, nor that
which
was very good; but we had a good clean room,
from the windows of which we could
see what was going on in the street, which was
very much better than though we
had been placed in one of the dark, damp cells.
Upon the whole, we got along very well,
so far as the jail and its
keeper were concerned. Immediately after the
holidays were over, contrary to
all our expectations, Mr. Hamilton and Mr.
Freeland came up to Easton, and took
Charles, the two Henrys, and John, out of jail,
and carried them home, leaving
me alone. I
regarded this separation as
a final one.
It caused me more pain than
any thing else in the whole transaction.
I was ready for any thing rather than
separation.
I supposed that they had consulted
together,
and had decided that, as I was the whole cause
of the intention of the others
to run away, it was hard to make the innocent
suffer with the guilty; and that
they had, therefore, concluded to take the
others home, and sell me, as a
warning to the others that remained. It
is due to the noble Henry to say, he seemed
almost as reluctant at leaving the
prison as at leaving home to come to the prison. But we
knew we should, in all probability, be
separated, if we were sold; and since he was in
their hands, he concluded to go
peaceably home. I was now
left to my fate.
I was all alone, and within the walls of
a
stone prison.
But a few days before, and
I was full of hope. I
expected to have
been safe in a land of freedom; but now I was
covered with gloom, sunk down to
the utmost despair. I thought the possibility of
freedom was gone.
I was kept in this way about one week, at
the
end of which, Captain Auld, my master, to my
surprise and utter astonishment,
came up, and took me out, with the intention of
sending me, with a gentleman of
his acquaintance, into Alabama. But,
from some cause or other, he did not send me to
Alabama, but concluded to send
me back to Baltimore, to live again with his
brother Hugh, and to learn a
trade. Thus,
after an absence of three years and
one month, I was once more permitted to return
to my old home at
Baltimore.
My master sent me away,
because there existed against me a very great
prejudice in the community, and
he feared I might be killed. In a few
weeks after I went to Baltimore,
Master Hugh hired me to Mr. William Gardner, an
extensive ship-builder, on
Fell's Point.
I was put there to learn
how to calk.
It, however, proved a very
unfavorable place for the accomplishment of this
object. Mr.
Gardner was engaged that spring in
building two large man-of-war brigs, professedly
for the Mexican
government.
The vessels were to be
launched in the July of that year, and in
failure thereof, Mr. Gardner was to
lose a considerable sum; so that when I entered,
all was hurry.
There was no time to learn any thing. Every
man had to do that which he knew how to
do. In
entering the shipyard, my orders
from Mr. Gardner were, to do whatever the
carpenters commanded me to do. This
was placing me at the beck and call of
about seventy-five men. I was
to regard
all these as masters. Their
word was to be
my law. My
situation was a most trying
one. At
times I needed a dozen pair of
hands. I was called a dozen ways in the space of
a single minute.
Three or four voices would strike my ear
at
the same moment.
It was--"Fred.,
come help me to cant this timber here."--"Fred.,
come carry this
timber yonder."--"Fred., bring that roller
here."-"Fred.,
go get a fresh can of water."--"Fred., come help
saw off the end of
this timber."--"Fred., go quick, and get the
crowbar."--"Fred., hold on the end of this
fall."--"Fred.,
go to the blacksmith's shop, and get a new
punch."--"Hurra, Fred.!
run and bring me a cold chisel."--"I say, Fred.,
bear a hand, and get
up a fire as quick as lightning under that
steam-box."--"Halloo,
nigger! come, turn this grindstone."--"Come,
come! move, move! and
BOWSE this timber forward."--"I say, darky,
blast your eyes, why
don't you heat up some pitch?"--"Halloo! halloo!
halloo!" (Three
voices at the same time.) "Come
here!--Go there!--Hold on where you are! Damn
you, if you move, I'll knock your
brains out!" This was
my school for eight months; and I
might have remained there longer, but for a most
horrid fight I had with four
of the white apprentices, in which my left eye
was nearly knocked out, and I
was horribly mangled in other respects.
The facts in the case were these: Until a
very little while after I went
there, white and black ship-carpenters worked
side by side, and no one seemed
to see any impropriety in it. All
hands
seemed to be very well satisfied. Many
of the black carpenters were freemen. Things
seemed to be going on very
well. All
at once, the white carpenters
knocked off, and said they would not work with
free colored workmen. Their
reason for this, as alleged, was, that
if free colored carpenters were encouraged, they
would soon take the trade into
their own hands, and poor white men would be
thrown out of employment. They
therefore felt called upon at once to
put a stop to it.
And, taking advantage
of Mr. Gardner's necessities, they broke off,
swearing they would work no
longer, unless he would discharge his black
carpenters.
Now, though this did not extend to me in
form, it did reach me in fact. My
fellow-apprentices very soon began to feel it
degrading to them to work with
me. They
began to put on airs, and talk
about the "niggers" taking the country, saying
we all ought to be
killed; and, being encouraged by the journeymen,
they commenced making my
condition as hard as they could, by hectoring me
around, and sometimes striking
me. I,
of course, kept the vow I made
after the fight with Mr. Covey, and struck back
again, regardless of
consequences; and while I kept them from
combining, I succeeded very well; for
I could whip the whole of them, taking them
separately.
They, however, at length combined, and
came
upon me, armed with sticks, stones, and heavy
handspikes.
One came in front with a half brick.
There
was one at each side of me, and one behind me.
While I was attending to those in front,
and on either side, the one
behind ran up with the handspike, and struck me
a heavy blow upon the head. It
stunned me.
I fell, and with this they
all ran upon me, and fell to beating me with
their fists.
I let them lay on for a while, gathering
strength. In
an instant, I gave a sudden
surge, and rose to my hands and knees.
Just as I did that, one of their number
gave me, with his heavy boot, a
powerful kick in the left eye. My
eyeball
seemed to have burst. When
they saw my
eye closed, and badly swollen, they left me.
With this I seized the handspike, and for
a time pursued them. But
here the carpenters interfered, and I
thought I might as well give it up. It
was impossible to stand my hand against so many. All
this took place in sight of not less than
fifty white ship-carpenters, and not one
interposed a friendly word; but some
cried, "Kill the damned nigger!
Kill him! kill him! He
struck a
white person."
I found my only chance
for life was in flight. I
succeeded in
getting away without an additional blow, and
barely so; for to strike a white
man is death by Lynch law,--and that was the law
in Mr. Gardner's ship-yard;
nor is there much of any other out of Mr.
Gardner's ship-yard. I went
directly home, and told the story of
my wrongs to Master Hugh; and I am happy to say
of him, irreligious as he was,
his conduct was heavenly, compared with that of
his brother Thomas under
similar circumstances. He
listened
attentively to my narration of the circumstances
leading to the savage outrage,
and gave many proofs of his strong indignation
at it. The
heart of my once overkind mistress was
again melted into pity. My
puffed-out
eye and blood-covered face moved her to tears.
She took a chair by me, washed the blood
from my face, and, with a
mother's tenderness, bound up my head, covering
the wounded eye with a lean
piece of fresh beef. It was
almost
compensation for my suffering to witness, once
more, a manifestation of
kindness from this, my once affectionate old
mistress. Master
Hugh was very much enraged. He
gave expression to his feelings by pouring
out curses upon the heads of those who did the
deed. As
soon as I got a little the better of my
bruises, he took me with him to Esquire
Watson's, on Bond Street, to see what
could be done about the matter. Mr.
Watson inquired who saw the assault committed.
Master Hugh told him it was done in Mr.
Gardner's ship-yard at midday,
where there were a large company of men at work.
"As to that," he
said, "the deed was done, and there was no
question as to who did
it." His
answer was, he could do
nothing in the case, unless some white man would
come forward and testify. He
could issue no warrant on my word. If I
had been killed in the presence of a
thousand colored people, their testimony
combined would have been insufficient
to have arrested one of the murderers.
Master Hugh, for once, was compelled to
say this state of things was too
bad. Of
course, it was impossible to get
any white man to volunteer his testimony in my
behalf, and against the white
young men.
Even those who may have
sympathized with me were not prepared to do
this. It
required a degree of courage unknown to
them to do so; for just at that time, the
slightest manifestation of humanity
toward a colored person was denounced as
abolitionism, and that name subjected
its bearer to frightful liabilities. The
watchwords of the bloody-minded in that region,
and in those days, were,
"Damn the abolitionists!" and "Damn the
niggers!" There
was nothing done, and probably nothing
would have been done if I had been killed.
Such was, and such remains, the state of
things in the Christian city of
Baltimore. Master
Hugh, finding he could get no
redress, refused to let me go back again to Mr.
Gardner. He
kept me himself, and his wife dressed my
wound till I was again restored to health.
He then took me into the ship-yard of
which he was foreman, in the
employment of Mr. Walter Price. There
I
was immediately set to calking, and very soon
learned the art of using my
mallet and irons.
In the course of one
year from the time I left Mr. Gardner's, I was
able to command the highest
wages given to the most experienced calkers.
I was now of some importance to my
master. I
was bringing him from six to seven dollars
per week. I
sometimes brought him nine
dollars per week: my wages were a dollar and a
half a day.
After learning how to calk, I sought my
own
employment, made my own contracts, and collected
the money which I earned. My
pathway became much more smooth than
before; my condition was now much more
comfortable.
When I could get no calking to do, I did
nothing. During
these leisure times,
those old notions about freedom would steal over
me again. When
in Mr. Gardner's employment, I was kept
in such a perpetual whirl of excitement, I could
think of nothing, scarcely,
but my life; and in thinking of my life, I
almost forgot my liberty. I have
observed this in my experience of
slavery,--that whenever my condition was
improved, instead of its increasing my
contentment, it only increased my desire to be
free, and set me to thinking of
plans to gain my freedom. I have
found
that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary
to make a thoughtless
one. It
is necessary to darken his moral
and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to
annihilate the power of
reason. He
must be able to detect no
inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to
feel that slavery is right; and
he can be brought to that only when he ceases to
be a man. I was now
getting, as I have said, one
dollar and fifty cents per day. I
contracted for it; I earned it; it was paid to
me; it was rightfully my own;
yet, upon each returning Saturday night, I was
compelled to deliver every cent
of that money to Master Hugh. And why?
Not because he earned it,--not because he
had any hand in earning
it,--not because I owed it to him,--nor because
he possessed the slightest
shadow of a right to it; but solely because he
had the power to compel me to
give it up.
The right of the
grim-visaged pirate upon the high seas is
exactly the same. CHAPTER
XI I now
come to that part of my life during
which I planned, and finally succeeded in
making, my escape from slavery. But
before narrating any of the peculiar
circumstances, I deem it proper to make known my
intention not to state all the
facts connected with the transaction. My
reasons for pursuing this course may be
understood from the following: First,
were I to give a minute statement of all the
facts, it is not only possible, but
quite probable, that others would thereby be
involved in the most embarrassing
difficulties.
Secondly, such a statement
would most undoubtedly induce greater vigilance
on the part of slaveholders
than has existed heretofore among them; which
would, of course, be the means of
guarding a door whereby some dear brother
bondman might escape his galling
chains. I
deeply regret the necessity
that impels me to suppress any thing of
importance connected with my experience
in slavery.
It would afford me great pleasure
indeed, as well as materially add to the
interest of my narrative, were I at
liberty to gratify a curiosity, which I know
exists in the minds of many, by an
accurate statement of all the facts pertaining
to my most fortunate escape. But I
must deprive myself of this pleasure,
and the curious of the gratification which such
a statement would afford. I
would allow myself to suffer under the
greatest imputations which evil-minded men might
suggest, rather than exculpate
myself, and thereby run the hazard of closing
the slightest avenue by which a
brother slave might clear himself of the chains
and fetters of slavery. I have
never approved of the very public
manner in which some of our western friends have
conducted what they call the
~underground railroad,~ but which I think, by
their open declarations, has been
made most emphatically the ~upperground
railroad.~
I honor those good men and women for
their
noble daring, and applaud them for willingly
subjecting themselves to bloody
persecution, by openly avowing their
participation in the escape of
slaves. I,
however, can see very little
good resulting from such a course, either to
themselves or the slaves escaping;
while, upon the other hand, I see and feel
assured that those open declarations
are a positive evil to the slaves remaining, who
are seeking to escape. They
do nothing towards enlightening the
slave, whilst they do much towards enlightening
the master. They stimulate him
to greater watchfulness, and enhance his power
to capture his slave. We owe
something to the slave south of the
line as well as to those north of it; and in
aiding the latter on their way to
freedom, we should be careful to do nothing
which would be likely to hinder the
former from escaping from slavery. I
would keep the merciless slaveholder profoundly
ignorant of the means of flight
adopted by the slave. I
would leave him
to imagine himself surrounded by myriads of
invisible tormentors, ever ready to
snatch from his infernal grasp his trembling
prey. Let
him be left to feel his way in the dark;
let darkness commensurate with his crime hover
over him; and let him feel that
at every step he takes, in pursuit of the flying
bondman, he is running the
frightful risk of having his hot brains dashed
out by an invisible agency. Let us
render the tyrant no aid; let us not
hold the light by which he can trace the
footprints of our flying brother. But
enough of this.
I will now proceed to the statement of
those
facts, connected with my escape, for which I am
alone responsible, and for
which no one can be made to suffer but myself. In the
early part of the year 1838, I
became quite restless. I
could see no
reason why I should, at the end of each week,
pour the reward of my toil into
the purse of my master. When I
carried
to him my weekly wages, he would, after counting
the money, look me in the face
with a robber-like fierceness, and ask, "Is this
all?" He
was satisfied with nothing less than the
last cent.
He would, however, when I
made him six dollars, sometimes give me six
cents, to encourage me. It had
the opposite effect. I
regarded it as a sort of admission of my
right to the whole. The
fact that he
gave me any part of my wages was proof, to my
mind, that he believed me
entitled to the whole of them. I
always
felt worse for having received any thing; for I
feared that the giving me a few
cents would ease his conscience, and make him
feel himself to be a pretty
honorable sort of robber. My
discontent
grew upon me.
I was ever on the look-out
for means of escape; and, finding no direct
means, I determined to try to hire
my time, with a view of getting money with which
to make my escape.
In the spring of 1838, when Master Thomas
came to Baltimore to purchase his spring goods,
I got an opportunity, and
applied to him to allow me to hire my time.
He unhesitatingly refused my request, and
told me this was another
stratagem by which to escape. He
told me
I could go nowhere but that he could get me; and
that, in the event of my
running away, he should spare no pains in his
efforts to catch me. He
exhorted me to content myself, and be
obedient. He
told me, if I would be
happy, I must lay out no plans for the future.
He said, if I behaved myself
properly, he would take care of me.
Indeed, he advised me to complete
thoughtlessness of the future, and
taught me to depend solely upon him for
happiness.
He seemed to see fully the pressing
necessity
of setting aside my intellectual nature, in
order to contentment in
slavery. But
in spite of him, and even
in spite of myself, I continued to think, and to
think about the injustice of
my enslavement, and the means of escape. About two
months after this, I applied to
Master Hugh for the privilege of hiring my time. He was
not acquainted with the fact that I
had applied to Master Thomas, and had been
refused. He
too, at first, seemed disposed to refuse;
but, after some reflection, he granted me the
privilege, and proposed the
following terms: I was to be allowed all my
time, make all contracts with those
for whom I worked, and find my own employment;
and, in return for this liberty,
I was to pay him three dollars at the end of
each week; find myself in calking
tools, and in board and clothing. My
board was two dollars and a half per week.
This, with the wear and tear of clothing
and calking tools, made my
regular expenses about six dollars per week.
This amount I was compelled to make up,
or relinquish the privilege of
hiring my time.
Rain or shine, work or
no work, at the end of each week the money must
be forthcoming, or I must give
up my privilege.
This arrangement, it
will be perceived, was decidedly in my master's
favor. It
relieved him of all need of looking after
me. His
money was sure.
He received all the benefits of
slaveholding
without its evils; while I endured all the evils
of a slave, and suffered all
the care and anxiety of a freeman. I
found it a hard bargain. But,
hard as it
was, I thought it better than the old mode of
getting along.
It was a step towards freedom to be
allowed
to bear the responsibilities of a freeman, and I
was determined to hold on upon
it. I
bent myself to the work of making
money. I
was ready to work at night as
well as day, and by the most untiring
perseverance and industry, I made enough
to meet my expenses, and lay up a little money
every week.
I went on thus from May till August. Master
Hugh then refused to allow me to hire
my time longer.
The ground for his
refusal was a failure on my part, one Saturday
night, to pay him for my week's
time. This
failure was occasioned by my
attending a camp meeting about ten miles from
Baltimore.
During the week, I had entered into an
engagement with a number of young friends to
start from Baltimore to the camp
ground early Saturday evening; and being
detained by my employer, I was unable
to get down to Master Hugh's without
disappointing the company. I knew
that Master Hugh was in no special
need of the money that night. I
therefore
decided to go to camp meeting, and upon my
return pay him the three dollars. I
staid at the camp meeting one day longer than I
intended when I left. But as
soon as I returned, I called upon him
to pay him what he considered his due. I
found him very angry; he could scarce restrain
his wrath.
He said he had a great mind to give me a
severe whipping.
He wished to know how I
dared go out of the city without asking his
permission.
I told him I hired my time and while I
paid
him the price which he asked for it, I did not
know that I was bound to ask him
when and where I should go. This reply troubled
him; and, after reflecting a
few moments, he turned to me, and said I should
hire my time no longer; that
the next thing he should know of, I would be
running away.
Upon the same plea, he told me to bring
my
tools and clothing home forthwith. I did
so; but instead of seeking work, as I had been
accustomed to do previously to
hiring my time, I spent the whole week without
the performance of a single
stroke of work.
I did this in
retaliation.
Saturday night, he called
upon me as usual for my week's wages. I
told him I had no wages; I had done no work that
week. Here
we were upon the point of coming to
blows. He
raved, and swore his
determination to get hold of me. I did
not allow myself a single word; but was
resolved, if he laid the weight of his
hand upon me, it should be blow for blow.
He did not strike me, but told me that he
would find me in constant
employment in future. I
thought the
matter over during the next day, Sunday, and
finally resolved upon the third
day of September, as the day upon which I would
make a second attempt to secure
my freedom.
I now had three weeks during
which to prepare for my journey. Early on Monday
morning, before Master Hugh
had time to make any engagement for me, I went
out and got employment of Mr.
Butler, at his ship-yard near the drawbridge,
upon what is called the City
Block, thus making it unnecessary for him to
seek employment for me. At the
end of the week, I brought him between
eight and nine dollars. He
seemed very
well pleased, and asked why I did not do the
same the week before. He
little knew what my plans were. My
object in working steadily was to remove
any suspicion he might entertain of my intent to
run away; and in this I
succeeded admirably. I
suppose he
thought I was never better satisfied with my
condition than at the very time
during which I was planning my escape.
The second week passed, and again I
carried him my full wages; and so
well pleased was he, that he gave me twentyfive
cents, (quite a large sum for a
slaveholder to give a slave,) and bade me to
make a good use of it. I told him
I would. Things
went on without very smoothly
indeed, but within there was trouble. It
is impossible for me to describe my feelings as
the time of my contemplated
start drew near.
I had a number of
warmhearted friends in Baltimore,--friends that
I loved almost as I did my
life,--and the thought of being separated from
them forever was painful beyond
expression.
It is my opinion that
thousands would escape from slavery, who now
remain, but for the strong cords
of affection that bind them to their friends.
The thought of leaving my friends was
decidedly the most painful thought
with which I had to contend. The
love of
them was my tender point, and shook my decision
more than all things else.
Besides the pain of separation, the dread and
apprehension of a failure
exceeded what I had experienced at my first
attempt. The
appalling defeat I then sustained returned
to torment me.
I felt assured that, if I
failed in this attempt, my case would be a
hopeless one--it would seal my fate
as a slave forever. I
could not hope to
get off with any thing less than the severest
punishment, and being placed
beyond the means of escape. It
required
no very vivid imagination to depict the most
frightful scenes through which I
should have to pass, in case I failed.
The wretchedness of slavery, and the
blessedness of freedom, were
perpetually before me. It was life and death
with me. But
I remained firm, and, according to my
resolution, on the third day of September, 1838,
I left my chains, and
succeeded in reaching New York without the
slightest interruption of any
kind. How
I did so,--what means I
adopted,--what direction I travelled, and by
what mode of conveyance,--I must
leave unexplained, for the reasons before
mentioned. I have
been frequently asked how I felt
when I found myself in a free State. I
have never been able to answer the question with
any satisfaction to
myself. It
was a moment of the highest
excitement I ever experienced. I
suppose
I felt as one may imagine the unarmed mariner to
feel when he is rescued by a
friendly man-of-war from the pursuit of a
pirate. In writing to a dear friend,
immediately after my arrival at New York, I said
I felt like one who had
escaped a den of hungry lions. This
state of mind, however, very soon subsided; and
I was again seized with a
feeling of great insecurity and loneliness.
I was yet liable to be taken back, and
subjected to all the tortures of
slavery. This
in itself was enough to
damp the ardor of my enthusiasm. But
the
loneliness overcame me. There
I was in
the midst of thousands, and yet a perfect
stranger; without home and without
friends, in the midst of thousands of my own
brethren--children of a common
Father, and yet I dared not to unfold to any one
of them my sad condition. I was
afraid to speak to any one for fear of
speaking to the wrong one, and thereby falling
into the hands of money-loving
kidnappers, whose business it was to lie in wait
for the panting fugitive, as
the ferocious beasts of the forest lie in wait
for their prey.
The motto which I adopted when I started
from
slavery was this--"Trust no man!"
I saw in every white man an enemy, and in
almost every colored man cause
for distrust.
It was a most painful
situation; and, to understand it, one must needs
experience it, or imagine
himself in similar circumstances. Let
him be a fugitive slave in a strange land--a
land given up to be the
huntingground for slaveholders--whose
inhabitants are legalized
kidnappers--where he is every moment subjected
to the terrible liability of
being seized upon by his fellowmen, as the
hideous crocodile seizes upon his
prey!--I say, let him place himself in my
situation--without home or
friends--without money or credit--wanting
shelter, and no one to give
it-wanting bread, and no money to buy it,--and
at the same time let him feel
that he is pursued by merciless men-hunters, and
in total darkness as to what
to do, where to go, or where to stay,--perfectly
helpless both as to the means
of defence and means of escape,--in the midst of
plenty, yet suffering the
terrible gnawings of hunger,--in the midst of
houses, yet having no
home,--among fellow-men, yet feeling as if in
the midst of wild beasts, whose
greediness to swallow up the trembling and
half-famished fugitive is only
equalled by that with which the monsters of the
deep swallow up the helpless
fish upon which they subsist,--I say, let him be
placed in this most trying
situation,--the situation in which I was placed,
--then, and not till then,
will he fully appreciate the hardships of, and
know how to sympathize with, the
toil-worn and whip-scarred fugitive slave. Thank
Heaven, I remained but a short time
in this distressed situation. I was
relieved from it by the humane hand of Mr. DAVID
RUGGLES, whose vigilance,
kindness, and perseverance, I shall never
forget. I
am glad of an opportunity to express, as
far as words can, the love and gratitude I bear
him. Mr.
Ruggles is now afflicted with blindness,
and is himself in need of the same kind offices
which he was once so forward in
the performance of toward others. I had been in
New York but a few days, when
Mr. Ruggles sought me out, and very kindly took
me to his boarding-house at the
corner of Church and Lespenard Streets.
Mr. Ruggles was then very deeply engaged
in the memorable ~Darg~ case,
as well as attending to a number of other
fugitive slaves, devising ways and
means for their successful escape; and, though
watched and hemmed in on almost
every side, he seemed to be more than a match
for his enemies. Very soon
after I went to Mr. Ruggles, he
wished to know of me where I wanted to go; as he
deemed it unsafe for me to
remain in New York. I told
him I was a
calker, and should like to go where I could get
work. I
thought of going to Canada; but he decided
against it, and in favor of my going to New
Bedford, thinking I should be able
to get work there at my trade. At
this
time, Anna,* my intended wife, came on; for I
wrote to her immediately after my
arrival at New York, (notwithstanding my
homeless, houseless, and helpless condition,)
informing her of my successful flight, and
wishing her to come on
forthwith.
In a few days after her
arrival, Mr. Ruggles called in the Rev. J. W. C.
Pennington, who, in the
presence of Mr. Ruggles, Mrs. Michaels, and two
or three others, performed the
marriage ceremony, and gave us a certificate, of
which the following is an
exact copy:-- "This may
certify, that I joined
together in holy matrimony Frederick Johnson+
and Anna Murray, as man and wife,
in the presence of Mr. David Ruggles and Mrs.
Michaels. "JAMES W.
C. PENNINGTON "NEW
YORK, SEPT. 15, 1838" Upon
receiving this certificate, and a
five-dollar bill from Mr. Ruggles, I shouldered
one part of our baggage, and
Anna took up the other, and we set out forthwith
to take passage on board of
the steamboat John W. Richmond for Newport, on
our way to New Bedford. Mr.
Ruggles gave me a letter to a Mr. Shaw in
Newport, and told me, in case my money did not
serve me to New Bedford, to stop
in Newport and obtain further assistance; but
upon our *She was
free. +I had
changed my name from Frederick
BAILEY to that of JOHNSON. arrival
at Newport, we were so anxious to
get to a place of safety, that, notwithstanding
we lacked the necessary money
to pay our fare, we decided to take seats in the
stage, and promise to pay when
we got to New Bedford. We
were
encouraged to do this by two excellent
gentlemen, residents of New Bedford,
whose names I afterward ascertained to be Joseph
Ricketson and William C.
Taber. They
seemed at once to understand
our circumstances, and gave us such assurance of
their friendliness as put us
fully at ease in their presence. It was
good indeed to meet with such friends, at such a
time. Upon
reaching New Bedford, we were directed
to the house of Mr. Nathan Johnson, by whom we
were kindly received, and
hospitably provided for. Both
Mr. and
Mrs. Johnson took a deep and lively interest in
our welfare.
They proved themselves quite worthy of
the
name of abolitionists. When
the
stage-driver found us unable to pay our fare, he
held on upon our baggage as
security for the debt. I had
but to
mention the fact to Mr. Johnson, and he
forthwith advanced the money. We now
began to feel a degree of safety,
and to prepare ourselves for the duties and
responsibilities of a life of
freedom. On
the morning after our
arrival at New Bedford, while at the
breakfast-table, the question arose as to
what name I should be called by. The
name given me by my mother was, "Frederick
Augustus Washington
Bailey." I,
however, had dispensed
with the two middle names long before I left
Maryland so that I was generally
known by the name of "Frederick Bailey." I
started from Baltimore bearing the name of
"Stanley."
When I got to New
York, I again changed my name to "Frederick
Johnson," and thought
that would be the last change. But
when
I got to New Bedford, I found it necessary again
to change my name.
The reason of this necessity was, that
there
were so many Johnsons in New Bedford, it was
already quite difficult to
distinguish between them. I gave
Mr.
Johnson the privilege of choosing me a name, but
told him he must not take from
me the name of "Frederick." I must hold on to
that, to preserve a
sense of my identity. Mr.
Johnson had
just been reading the "Lady of the Lake," and at
once suggested that
my name be "Douglass." From
that time until now I have been called
"Frederick Douglass;" and as I
am more widely known by that name than by either
of the others, I shall
continue to use it as my own. I was
quite disappointed at the general
appearance of things in New Bedford. The
impression which I had received respecting the
character and condition of the
people of the north, I found to be singularly
erroneous.
I had very strangely supposed, while in
slavery, that few of the comforts, and scarcely
any of the luxuries, of life
were enjoyed at the north, compared with what
were enjoyed by the slaveholders
of the south.
I probably came to this
conclusion from the fact that northern people
owned no slaves.
I supposed that they were about upon a
level
with the non-slaveholding population of the
south. I
knew ~they~ were exceedingly poor, and I
had been accustomed to regard their poverty as
the necessary consequence of
their being non-slaveholders. I had somehow
imbibed the opinion that, in the
absence of slaves, there could be no wealth, and
very little refinement. And
upon coming to the north, I expected to
meet with a rough, hard-handed, and uncultivated
population, living in the most
Spartanlike simplicity, knowing nothing of the
ease, luxury, pomp, and grandeur
of southern slaveholders. Such
being my
conjectures, any one acquainted with the
appearance of New Bedford may very
readily infer how palpably I must have seen my
mistake. In the
afternoon of the day when I reached
New Bedford, I visited the wharves, to take a
view of the shipping. Here I
found myself surrounded with the
strongest proofs of wealth. Lying
at the
wharves, and riding in the stream, I saw many
ships of the finest model, in the
best order, and of the largest size. Upon the
right and left, I was walled in
by granite warehouses of the widest dimensions,
stowed to their utmost capacity
with the necessaries and comforts of life.
Added to this, almost every body seemed
to be at work, but noiselessly
so, compared with what I had been accustomed to
in Baltimore.
There were no loud songs heard from those
engaged in loading and unloading ships.
I heard no deep oaths or horrid curses on
the laborer.
I saw no whipping of men; but all seemed
to
go smoothly on.
Every man appeared to
understand his work, and went at it with a
sober, yet cheerful earnestness,
which betokened the deep interest which he felt
in what he was doing, as well
as a sense of his own dignity as a man.
To me this looked exceedingly strange.
From the wharves I strolled around and
over the town, gazing with wonder
and admiration at the splendid churches,
beautiful dwellings, and
finely-cultivated gardens; evincing an amount of
wealth, comfort, taste, and
refinement, such as I had never seen in any part
of slaveholding Maryland. Every
thing looked clean, new, and
beautiful.
I saw few or no dilapidated
houses, with povertystricken inmates; no
half-naked children and barefooted
women, such as I had been accustomed to see in
Hillsborough, Easton, St.
Michael's, and Baltimore. The
people
looked more able, stronger, healthier, and
happier, than those of
Maryland. I
was for once made glad by a
view of extreme wealth, without being saddened
by seeing extreme poverty. But
the most astonishing as well as the most
interesting thing to me was the condition of the
colored people, a great many
of whom, like myself, had escaped thither as a
refuge from the hunters of
men. I
found many, who had not been
seven years out of their chains, living in finer
houses, and evidently enjoying
more of the comforts of life, than the average
of slaveholders in
Maryland. I
will venture to assert, that
my friend Mr. Nathan Johnson (of whom I can say
with a grateful heart, "I
was hungry, and he gave me meat; I was thirsty,
and he gave me drink; I was a
stranger, and he took me in") lived in a neater
house; dined at a better
table; took, paid for, and read, more
newspapers; better understood the moral,
religious, and political character of the
nation,--than nine tenths of the
slaveholders in Talbot county Maryland.
Yet Mr. Johnson was a working man.
His hands were hardened by toil, and not
his alone, but those also of
Mrs. Johnson.
I found the colored people
much more spirited than I had supposed they
would be. I
found among them a determination to protect
each other from the blood-thirsty kidnapper, at
all hazards.
Soon after my arrival, I was told of a
circumstance which illustrated their spirit.
A colored man and a fugitive slave were
on unfriendly terms. The
former was heard to threaten the latter
with informing his master of his whereabouts.
Straightway a meeting was called among
the colored people, under the
stereotyped notice, "Business of importance!" The
betrayer was invited to attend. The
people came at the appointed hour, and
organized the meeting by appointing a very
religious old gentleman as
president, who, I believe, made a prayer, after
which he addressed the meeting
as follows: "~Friends, we have got him here, and
I would recommend that
you young men just take him outside the door,
and kill him!~"
With this, a number of them bolted at
him;
but they were intercepted by some more timid
than themselves, and the betrayer
escaped their vengeance, and has not been seen
in New Bedford since. I
believe there have been no more such threats,
and should there be hereafter, I doubt not that
death would be the consequence. I found
employment, the third day after my
arrival, in stowing a sloop with a load of oil.
It was new, dirty, and hard work for me;
but I went at it with a glad
heart and a willing hand. I was
now my
own master.
It was a happy moment, the
rapture of which can be understood only by those
who have been slaves. It was
the first work, the reward of which
was to be entirely my own. There
was no
Master Hugh standing ready, the moment I earned
the money, to rob me of
it. I
worked that day with a pleasure I
had never before experienced. I was
at
work for myself and newly-married wife.
It was to me the starting-point of a new
existence.
When I got through with that job, I went
in
pursuit of a job of calking; but such was the
strength of prejudice against color,
among the white calkers, that they refused to
work with me, and of course I
could get no employment.* Finding
my
trade of no immediate benefit, I threw off my
calking habiliments, and prepared
myself to do any kind of work I could get to do. Mr.
Johnson kindly let me have his wood-horse
and saw, and I very soon found myself a plenty
of work. There
was no work too hard--none too dirty. I
was ready to saw wood, shovel coal, carry wood,
sweep the chimney, or roll oil
casks,--all of which I * I am
told that colored persons can now
get employment at calking in New Bedford--a
result of anti-slavery effort. did
for nearly three years in New Bedford, before I
became known to the
anti-slavery world. In about
four months after I went to New
Bedford, there came a young man to me, and
inquired if I did not wish to take
the "Liberator."
I told him I
did; but, just having made my escape from
slavery, I remarked that I was unable
to pay for it then. I,
however, finally
became a subscriber to it. The
paper
came, and I read it from week to week with such
feelings as it would be quite
idle for me to attempt to describe. The
paper became my meat and my drink. My
soul was set all on fire. Its
sympathy
for my brethren in bonds--its scathing
denunciations of slaveholders--its
faithful exposures of slavery--and its powerful
attacks upon the upholders of
the institution--sent a thrill of joy through my
soul, such as I had never felt
before! I had not
long been a reader of the
"Liberator," before I got a pretty correct idea
of the principles,
measures and spirit of the anti-slavery reform.
I took right hold of the cause. I
could do but little; but what I could, I did
with a joyful heart, and never
felt happier than when in an anti-slavery
meeting. I
seldom had much to say at the meetings,
because what I wanted to say was said so much
better by others. But, while
attending an anti-slavery convention at
Nantucket, on the 11th of August, 1841,
I felt strongly moved to speak, and was at the
same time much urged to do so by
Mr. William C. Coffin, a gentleman who had heard
me speak in the colored
people's meeting at New Bedford. It was
a severe cross, and I took it up reluctantly.
The truth was, I felt myself a slave, and
the idea of speaking to white
people weighed me down. I
spoke but a
few moments, when I felt a degree of freedom,
and said what I desired with
considerable ease.
From that time until
now, I have been engaged in pleading the cause
of my brethren--with what
success, and with what devotion, I leave those
acquainted with my labors to
decide. APPENDIX I find,
since reading over the foregoing
Narrative, that I have, in several instances,
spoken in such a tone and manner,
respecting religion, as may possibly lead those
unacquainted with my religious
views to suppose me an opponent of all religion. To
remove the liability of such
misapprehension, I deem it proper to append the
following brief explanation.
What I have said respecting and against
religion, I mean strictly to apply to
the ~slaveholding religion~ of this land, and
with no possible reference to
Christianity proper; for, between the
Christianity of this land, and the
Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest
possible difference--so wide,
that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy,
is of necessity to reject the
other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. To be
the friend of the one, is of necessity to be the
enemy of the other. I love
the pure, peaceable, and impartial
Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the
corrupt, slaveholding,
women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and
hypocritical Christianity of
this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the
most deceitful one, for calling
the religion of this land Christianity. I look
upon it as the climax of all
misnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the
grossest of all libels. Never was
there a clearer case of "stealing the livery of
the court of heaven to
serve the devil in." I am
filled
with unutterable loathing when I contemplate the
religious pomp and show,
together with the horrible inconsistencies,
which every where surround me. We
have men-stealers for ministers,
womenwhippers for missionaries, and
cradle-plunderers for church members. The
man who wields the bloodclotted cowskin
during the week fills the pulpit on Sunday, and
claims to be a minister of the
meek and lowly Jesus. The
man who robs
me of my earnings at the end of each week meets
me as a class-leader on Sunday
morning, to show me the way of life, and the
path of salvation.
He who sells my sister, for purposes of
prostitution, stands forth as the pious advocate
of purity.
He who proclaims it a religious duty to
read
the Bible denies me the right of learning to
read the name of the God who made
me. He
who is the religious advocate of
marriage robs whole millions of its sacred
influence, and leaves them to the
ravages of wholesale pollution. The
warm
defender of the sacredness of the family
relation is the same that scatters
whole families,--sundering husbands and wives,
parents and children, sisters
and brothers,--leaving the hut vacant, and the
hearth desolate.
We see the thief preaching against theft,
and
the adulterer against adultery. We
have
men sold to build churches, women sold to
support the gospel, and babes sold to
purchase Bibles for the POOR HEATHEN! ALL FOR
THE GLORY OF GOD AND THE GOOD OF
SOULS! The
slave auctioneer's bell and
the church-going bell chime in with each other,
and the bitter cries of the
heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious
shouts of his pious
master. Revivals
of religion and
revivals in the slave-trade go hand in hand
together. The
slave prison and the church stand near
each other.
The clanking of fetters and
the rattling of chains in the prison, and the
pious psalm and solemn prayer in
the church, may be heard at the same time.
The dealers in the bodies and souls of
men erect their stand in the
presence of the pulpit, and they mutually help
each other. The dealer gives his
blood-stained gold to support the pulpit, and
the pulpit, in return, covers his
infernal business with the garb of Christianity. Here
we have religion and robbery the allies
of each other --devils dressed in angels' robes,
and hell presenting the
semblance of paradise. "Just
God! and these are they, The
Christianity of America is a
Christianity, of whose votaries it may be as
truly said, as it was of the
ancient scribes and Pharisees, "They bind heavy
burdens, and grievous to
be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders, but
they themselves will not move
them with one of their fingers. All
their works they do for to be seen of men.--They
love the uppermost rooms at
feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, .
. . . . . and to be called of
men, Rabbi, Rabbi.--But woe unto you, scribes
and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye
shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for
ye neither go in yourselves,
neither suffer ye them that are entering to go
in. Ye
devour widows' houses, and for a pretence
make long prayers; therefore ye shall receive
the greater damnation. Ye
compass sea and land to make one
proselyte, and when he is made, ye make him
twofold more the child of hell than
yourselves.--Woe unto you, scribes and
Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe
of mint, and anise, and cumin, and have omitted
the weightier matters of the
law, judgment, mercy, and faith; these ought ye
to have done, and not to leave
the other undone.
Ye blind guides! which
strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel.
Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! for ye make clean the
outside of the cup and of the platter; but
within, they are full of extortion
and excess.-Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! for ye are like
unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear
beautiful outward, but are within
full of dead men's bones, and of all
uncleanness.
Even so ye also outwardly appear
righteous
unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy
and iniquity." Dark and
terrible as is this picture, I
hold it to be strictly true of the overwhelming
mass of professed Christians in
America. They
strain at a gnat, and
swallow a camel.
Could any thing be more
true of our churches? They
would be
shocked at the proposition of fellowshipping a
SHEEP-stealer; and at the same
time they hug to their communion a MANstealer,
and brand me with being an
infidel, if I find fault with them for it.
They attend with Pharisaical strictness
to the outward forms of
religion, and at the same time neglect the
weightier matters of the law,
judgment, mercy, and faith. They
are
always ready to sacrifice, but seldom to show
mercy. They are they who are
represented as professing to love God whom they
have not seen, whilst they hate
their brother whom they have seen. They
love the heathen on the other side of the globe. They
can pray for him, pay money to have the
Bible put into his hand, and missionaries to
instruct him; while they despise
and totally neglect the heathen at their own
doors. Such is,
very briefly, my view of the
religion of this land; and to avoid any
misunderstanding, growing out of the
use of general terms, I mean by the religion of
this land, that which is
revealed in the words, deeds, and actions, of
those bodies, north and south,
calling themselves Christian churches, and yet
in union with slaveholders. It is
against religion, as presented by these
bodies, that I have felt it my duty to testify. I
conclude these remarks by copying the
following portrait of the religion of the south,
(which is, by communion and
fellowship, the religion of the north,) which I
soberly affirm is "true to
the life," and without caricature or the
slightest exaggeration. It is
said to have been drawn, several years before
the present anti-slavery
agitation began, by a northern Methodist
preacher, who, while residing at the
south, had an opportunity to see slaveholding
morals, manners, and piety, with
his own eyes.
"Shall I not visit
for these things? saith the Lord. Shall
not my soul be avenged on such a nation as
this?" A
PARODY "Come,
saints and sinners, hear me
tell How pious priests whip Jack and Nell, And
women buy and children sell, And
preach all sinners down to hell, And sing
of heavenly union. "They'll
bleat and baa, dona like goats, Gorge down black
sheep, and strain at motes,
Array their backs in fine black coats, Then
seize their negroes by their
throats, And
choke, for heavenly union. "They'll
church you if you sip a dram,
And damn you if you steal a lamb; Yet rob old
Tony, Doll, and Sam, Of human
rights, and bread and ham; Kidnapper's
heavenly union. "They'll
loudly talk of Christ's
reward, And bind his image with a cord, And
scold, and swing the lash abhorred,
And sell their brother in the Lord To
handcuffed heavenly union. "They'll
read and sing a sacred song,
And make a prayer both loud and long, And teach
the right and do the wrong,
Hailing the brother, sister throng, With
words of heavenly union. "We
wonder how such saints can sing,
Or praise the Lord upon the wing, Who roar, and
scold, and whip, and sting, And
to their slaves and mammon cling, In guilty
conscience union. "They'll
raise tobacco, corn, and rye,
And drive, and thieve, and cheat, and lie, And
lay up treasures in the sky, By
making switch and cowskin fly, In hope
of heavenly union. "They'll crack
old Tony on the skull, And preach and roar like
Bashan bull, Or braying ass, of
mischief full, Then seize old Jacob by the wool, And pull
for heavenly union. "A
roaring, ranting, sleek man-thief,
Who lived on mutton, veal, and beef, Yet never
would afford relief To needy,
sable sons of grief, Was big
with heavenly union. "'Love
not the world,' the preacher
said, And winked his eye, and shook his head; He
seized on Tom, and Dick, and
Ned, Cut short their meat, and clothes, and
bread, Yet still
loved heavenly union. "Another
preacher whining spoke Of One
whose heart for sinners broke: He tied old Nanny
to an oak, And drew the blood
at every stroke, And
prayed for heavenly union. "Two
others oped their iron jaws, And
waved their children-stealing paws; There sat
their children in gewgaws; By
stinting negroes' backs and maws, They kept
up heavenly union. "All good
from Jack another takes, And
entertains their flirts and rakes, Who dress as
sleek as glossy snakes, And
cram their mouths with sweetened cakes; And this
goes down for union." Sincerely
and earnestly hoping that this
little book may do something toward throwing
light on the American slave
system, and hastening the glad day of
deliverance to the millions of my
brethren in bonds--faithfully relying upon the
power of truth, love, and
justice, for success in my humble efforts --and
solemnly pledging my self anew
to the sacred cause,--I subscribe myself, FREDERICK
DOUGLASS LYNN, ~Mass.,
April~ 28, 1845. THE END.
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