NARRATIVE
\nOF THE LIFE OF
\nFREDERICK DOUGLASS,
\nAN AMERICAN SLAVE
\nBY
\nFREDERICK DOUGLASS
\n7^WYS`f7Taa]e<\/p>\n
NARRATIVE
\nOF THE
\nLIFE
\nOF
\nFREDERICK DOUGLASS,
\nAN
\nAMERICAN SLAVE.
\nWRITTEN BY HIMSELF.
\nBOSTON
\nPUBLISHED AT THE ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE,
\nNO. 25 CORNHILL
\n1845
\nEntered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845,
\nBY FREDERICK DOUGLASS,
\nin the Clerk\u2019s Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.
\nCOPYRIGHT INFORMATION
\nBook: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
\nAuthor: Frederick Douglass, 1817?\u201395
\nFirst published: 1845
\nThe original book is in the public domain in the United
\nStates and in most, if not all, other countries as well. Readers
\noutside the United States should check their own countries\u2019
\ncopyright laws to be certain they can legally download this
\nebook. The Online Books Page has an FAQ which gives a
\nsummary of copyright durations for many other countries, as
\nwell as links to more official sources.
\nThis PDF ebook was
\ncreated by Jos\u00e9 Men\u00e9ndez.
\nPREFACE.
\nIN the month of August, 1841, I attended an anti-slavery
\nconvention in Nantucket, at which it was my happiness to
\nbecome acquainted with FREDERICK DOUGLASS, the writer of
\nthe following Narrative. He was a stranger to nearly every
\nmember of that body; but, having recently made his escape from
\nthe southern prison-house of bondage, and feeling his curiosity
\nexcited to ascertain the principles and measures of the
\nabolitionists,\u2014of whom he had heard a somewhat vague
\ndescription while he was a slave,\u2014he was induced to give his
\nattendance, on the occasion alluded to, though at that time a
\nresident in New Bedford.
\nFortunate, most fortunate occurrence!\u2014fortunate for the
\nmillions of his manacled brethren, yet panting for deliverance
\nfrom their awful thraldom!\u2014fortunate for the cause of negro
\nemancipation, and of universal liberty!\u2014fortunate for the land
\nof his birth, which he has already done so much to save and
\nbless!\u2014fortunate for a large circle of friends and acquaintances,
\nwhose sympathy and affection he has strongly secured by the
\nmany sufferings he has endured, by his virtuous traits of
\ncharacter, by his ever-abiding remembrance of those who are in
\nbonds, as being bound with them!\u2014fortunate for the multitudes,
\nin various parts of our republic, whose minds he has enlightened
\non the subject of slavery, and who have been melted to tears by
\nhis pathos, or roused to virtuous indignation by his stirring
\neloquence against the enslavers of men!\u2014fortunate for himself,
\nas it at once brought him into the field of public usefulness,
\nvi PREFACE
\n\u201cgave the world assurance of a MAN,\u201d quickened the slumbering
\nenergies of his soul, and consecrated him to the great work of
\nbreaking the rod of the oppressor, and letting the oppressed go
\nfree!
\nI shall never forget his first speech at the convention\u2014the
\nextraordinary emotion it excited in my own mind\u2014the powerful
\nimpression it created upon a crowded auditory, completely
\ntaken by surprise\u2014the applause which followed from the
\nbeginning to the end of his felicitous remarks. I think I never
\nhated slavery so intensely as at that moment; certainly, my
\nperception of the enormous outrage which is inflicted by it, on
\nthe godlike nature of its victims, was rendered far more clear
\nthan ever. There stood one, in physical proportion and stature
\ncommanding and exact\u2014in intellect richly endowed\u2014in natural
\neloquence a prodigy\u2014in soul manifestly \u201ccreated but a little
\nlower than the angels\u201d\u2014yet a slave, ay, a fugitive slave,\u2014
\ntrembling for his safety, hardly daring to believe that on the
\nAmerican soil, a single white person could be found who would
\nbefriend him at all hazards, for the love of God and humanity!
\nCapable of high attainments as an intellectual and moral
\nbeing\u2014needing nothing but a comparatively small amount of
\ncultivation to make him an ornament to society and a blessing to
\nhis race\u2014by the law of the land, by the voice of the people, by
\nthe terms of the slave code, he was only a piece of property, a
\nbeast of burden, a chattel personal, nevertheless!
\nA beloved friend from New Bedford prevailed on Mr.
\nDOUGLASS to address the convention. He came forward to the
\nplatform with a hesitancy and embarrassment, necessarily the
\nattendants of a sensitive mind in such a novel position. After
\napologizing for his ignorance, and reminding the audience that
\nslavery was a poor school for the human intellect and heart, he
\nproceeded to narrate some of the facts in his own history as a
\nslave, and in the course of his speech gave utterance to many
\nPREFACE vii
\nnoble thoughts and thrilling reflections. As soon as he had taken
\nhis seat, filled with hope and admiration, I rose, and declared
\nthat PATRICK HENRY, of revolutionary fame, never made a
\nspeech more eloquent in the cause of liberty, than the one we
\nhad just listened to from the lips of that hunted fugitive. So I
\nbelieved at that time\u2014such is my belief now. I reminded the
\naudience of the peril which surrounded this self-emancipated
\nyoung man at the North,\u2014even in Massachusetts, on the soil of
\nthe Pilgrim Fathers, among the descendants of revolutionary
\nsires; and I appealed to them, whether they would ever allow
\nhim to be carried back into slavery,\u2014law or no law,
\nconstitution or no constitution. The response was unanimous
\nand in thunder-tones\u2014\u201cNO!\u201d \u201cWill you succor and protect him
\nas a brother-man\u2014a resident of the old Bay State?\u201d \u201cYES!\u201d
\nshouted the whole mass, with an energy so startling, that the
\nruthless tyrants south of Mason and Dixon\u2019s line might almost
\nhave heard the mighty burst of feeling, and recognized it as the
\npledge of an invincible determination, on the part of those who
\ngave it, never to betray him that wanders, but to hide the
\noutcast, and firmly to abide the consequences.
\nIt was at once deeply impressed upon my mind, that, if Mr.
\nDOUGLASS could be persuaded to consecrate his time and
\ntalents to the promotion of the anti-slavery enterprise, a
\npowerful impetus would be given to it, and a stunning blow at
\nthe same time inflicted on northern prejudice against a colored
\ncomplexion. I therefore endeavored to instil hope and courage
\ninto his mind, in order that he might dare to engage in a
\nvocation so anomalous and responsible for a person in his
\nsituation; and I was seconded in this effort by warm-hearted
\nfriends, especially by the late General Agent of the
\nMassachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Mr. JOHN A. COLLINS,
\nwhose judgment in this instance entirely coincided with my
\nown. At first, he could give no encouragement; with unfeigned
\nviii PREFACE
\ndiffidence, he expressed his conviction that he was not adequate
\nto the performance of so great a task; the path marked out was
\nwholly an untrodden one; he was sincerely apprehensive that he
\nshould do more harm than good. After much deliberation,
\nhowever, he consented to make a trial; and ever since that
\nperiod, he has acted as a lecturing agent, under the auspices
\neither of the American or the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery
\nSociety. In labors he has been most abundant; and his success in
\ncombating prejudice, in gaining proselytes, in agitating the
\npublic mind, has far surpassed the most sanguine expectations
\nthat were raised at the commencement of his brilliant career. He
\nhas borne himself with gentleness and meekness, yet with true
\nmanliness of character. As a public speaker, he excels in pathos,
\nwit, comparison, imitation, strength of reasoning, and fluency of
\nlanguage. There is in him that union of head and heart, which is
\nindispensable to an enlightenment of the heads and a winning of
\nthe hearts of others. May his strength continue to be equal to his
\nday! May he continue to \u201cgrow in grace, and in the knowledge
\nof God,\u201d that he may be increasingly serviceable in the cause of
\nbleeding humanity, whether at home or abroad!
\nIt is certainly a very remarkable fact, that one of the most
\nefficient advocates of the slave population, now before the
\npublic, is a fugitive slave, in the person of FREDERICK
\nDOUGLASS; and that the free colored population of the United
\nStates are as ably represented by one of their own number, in
\nthe person of CHARLES LENOX REMOND, whose eloquent
\nappeals have extorted the highest applause of multitudes on
\nboth sides of the Atlantic. Let the calumniators of the colored
\nrace despise themselves for their baseness and illiberality of
\nspirit, and henceforth cease to talk of the natural inferiority of
\nthose who require nothing but time and opportunity to attain to
\nthe highest point of human excellence.
\nPREFACE ix
\nIt may, perhaps, be fairly questioned, whether any other
\nportion of the population of the earth could have endured the
\nprivations, sufferings and horrors of slavery, without having
\nbecome more degraded in the scale of humanity than the slaves
\nof African descent. Nothing has been left undone to cripple their
\nintellects, darken their minds, debase their moral nature,
\nobliterate all traces of their relationship to mankind; and yet
\nhow wonderfully they have sustained the mighty load of a most
\nfrightful bondage, under which they have been groaning for
\ncenturies! To illustrate the effect of slavery on the white man,\u2014
\nto show that he has no powers of endurance, in such a
\ncondition, superior to those of his black brother,\u2014DANIEL
\nO\u2019CONNELL, the distinguished advocate of universal
\nemancipation, and the mightiest champion of prostrate but not
\nconquered Ireland, relates the following anecdote in a speech
\ndelivered by him in the Conciliation Hall, Dublin, before the
\nLoyal National Repeal Association, March 31, 1845. \u201cNo
\nmatter,\u201d said Mr. O\u2019CONNELL, \u201cunder what specious term it
\nmay disguise itself, slavery is still hideous. It has a natural, an
\ninevitable tendency to brutalize every noble faculty of man. An
\nAmerican sailor, who was cast away on the shore of Africa,
\nwhere he was kept in slavery for three years, was, at the
\nexpiration of that period, found to be imbruted and stultified\u2014
\nhe had lost all reasoning power; and having forgotten his native
\nlanguage, could only utter some savage gibberish between
\n\u0645\u0633\u0627\u0639\u062f\u0629 \u0627\u0644\u062a\u0639\u064a\u064a\u0646 – \u062e\u062f\u0645\u0629 \u0643\u062a\u0627\u0628\u0629 \u0627\u0644\u0645\u0642\u0627\u0644\u0627\u062a \u0645\u0646 \u0642\u0628\u0644 \u0643\u0628\u0627\u0631 \u0627\u0644\u0643\u062a\u0627\u0628 \u0627\u0644\u0639\u0631\u0628, Arabic and English, which nobody could understand, and which
\neven he himself found difficulty in pronouncing. So much for
\nthe humanizing influence of THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTION!\u201d
\nAdmitting this to have been an extraordinary case of mental
\ndeterioration, it proves at least that the white slave can sink as
\nlow in the scale of humanity as the black one.
\nMr. DOUGLASS has very properly chosen to write his own
\nNarrative, in his own style, and according to the best of his
\nx PREFACE
\nability, rather than to employ some one else. It is, therefore,
\nentirely his own production; and, considering how long and
\ndark was the career he had to run as a slave,\u2014how few have
\nbeen his opportunities to improve his mind since he broke his
\niron fetters,\u2014it is, in my judgment, highly creditable to his head
\nand heart. He who can peruse it without a tearful eye, a heaving
\nbreast, an afflicted spirit,\u2014without being filled with an
\nunutterable abhorrence of slavery and all its abettors, and
\nanimated with a determination to seek the immediate overthrow
\nof that execrable system,\u2014without trembling for the fate of this
\ncountry in the hands of a righteous God, who is ever on the side
\nof the oppressed, and whose arm is not shortened that it cannot
\nsave,\u2014must have a flinty heart, and be qualified to act the part
\nof a trafficker \u201cin slaves and the souls of men.\u201d I am confident
\nthat it is essentially true in all its statements; that nothing has
\nbeen set down in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn
\nfrom the imagination; that it comes short of the reality, rather
\nthan overstates a single fact in regard to SLAVERY AS IT IS. The
\nexperience of FREDERICK DOUGLASS, as a slave, was not a
\npeculiar one; his lot was not especially a hard one; his case may
\nbe regarded as a very fair specimen of the treatment of slaves in
\nMaryland, in which State it is conceded that they are better fed
\nand less cruelly treated than in Georgia, Alabama, or Louisiana.
\nMany have suffered incomparably more, while very few on the
\nplantations have suffered less, than himself. Yet how deplorable
\nwas his situation! what terrible chastisements were inflicted
\nupon his person! what still more shocking outrages were
\nperpetrated upon his mind! with all his noble powers and
\nsublime aspirations, how like a brute was he treated, even by
\nthose professing to have the same mind in them that was in
\nChrist Jesus! to what dreadful liabilities was he continually
\nsubjected! how destitute of friendly counsel and aid, even in his
\ngreatest extremities! how heavy was the midnight of woe which
\nPREFACE xi
\nshrouded in blackness the last ray of hope, and filled the future
\nwith terror and gloom! what longings after freedom took
\npossession of his breast, and how his misery augmented, in
\nproportion as he grew reflective and intelligent,\u2014thus
\ndemonstrating that a happy slave is an extinct man! how he
\nthought, reasoned, felt, under the lash of the driver, with the
\nchains upon his limbs! what perils he encountered in his
\nendeavors to escape from his horrible doom! and how signal
\nhave been his deliverance and preservation in the midst of a
\nnation of pitiless enemies!
\nThis Narrative contains many affecting incidents, many
\npassages of great eloquence and power; but I think the most
\nthrilling one of them all is the description DOUGLASS gives of
\nhis feelings, as he stood soliloquizing respecting his fate, and
\nthe chances of his one day being a freeman, on the banks of the
\nChesapeake Bay\u2014viewing the receding vessels as they flew
\nwith their white wings before the breeze, and apostrophizing
\nthem as animated by the living spirit of freedom. Who can read
\nthat passage, and be insensible to its pathos and sublimity?
\nCompressed into it is a whole Alexandrian library of thought,
\nfeeling, and sentiment\u2014all that can, all that need be urged, in
\nthe form of expostulation, entreaty, rebuke, against that crime of
\ncrimes,\u2014making man the property of his fellow-man! O, how
\naccursed is that system, which entombs the godlike mind of
\nman, defaces the divine image, reduces those who by creation
\nwere crowned with glory and honor to a level with four-footed
\nbeasts, and exalts the dealer in human flesh above all that is
\ncalled God! Why should its existence be prolonged one hour? Is
\nit not evil, only evil, and that continually? What does its
\npresence imply but the absence of all fear of God, all regard for
\nman, on the part of the people of the United States? Heaven
\nspeed its eternal overthrow!
\nxii PREFACE
\nSo profoundly ignorant of the nature of slavery are many
\npersons, that they are stubbornly incredulous whenever they
\nread or listen to any recital of the cruelties which are daily
\ninflicted on its victims. They do not deny that the slaves are
\nheld as property; but that terrible fact seems to convey to their
\nminds no idea of injustice, exposure to outrage, or savage
\nbarbarity. Tell them of cruel scourgings, of mutilations and
\nbrandings, of scenes of pollution and blood, of the banishment
\nof all light and knowledge, and they affect to be greatly
\nindignant at such enormous exaggerations, such wholesale
\nmisstatements, such abominable libels on the character of the
\nsouthern planters! As if all these direful outrages were not the
\nnatural results of slavery! As if it were less cruel to reduce a
\nhuman being to the condition of a thing, than to give him a
\nsevere flagellation, or to deprive him of necessary food and
\nclothing! As if whips, chains, thumb-screws, paddles,
\nbloodhounds, overseers, drivers, patrols, were not all
\nindispensable to keep the slaves down, and to give protection to
\ntheir ruthless oppressors! As if, when the marriage institution is
\nabolished, concubinage, adultery, and incest, must not
\nnecessarily abound; when all the rights of humanity are
\nannihilated, any barrier remains to protect the victim from the
\nfury of the spoiler; when absolute power is assumed over life
\nand liberty, it will not be wielded with destructive sway!
\nSkeptics of this character abound in society. In some few
\ninstances, their incredulity arises from a want of reflection; but,
\ngenerally, it indicates a hatred of the light, a desire to shield
\nslavery from the assaults of its foes, a contempt of the colored
\nrace, whether bond or free. Such will try to discredit the
\nshocking tales of slaveholding cruelty which are recorded in this
\ntruthful Narrative; but they will labor in vain. Mr. DOUGLASS
\nhas frankly disclosed the place of his birth, the names of those
\nwho claimed ownership in his body and soul, and the names
\nPREFACE xiii
\nalso of those who committed the crimes which he has alleged
\nagainst them. His statements, therefore, may easily be
\ndisproved, if they are untrue.
\nIn the course of his Narrative, he relates two instances of
\nmurderous cruelty,\u2014in one of which a planter deliberately shot
\na slave belonging to a neighboring plantation, who had
\nunintentionally gotten within his lordly domain in quest of fish;
\nand in the other, an overseer blew out the brains of a slave who
\nhad fled to a stream of water to escape a bloody scourging. Mr.
\nDOUGLASS states that in neither of these instances was any thing
\ndone by way of legal arrest or judicial investigation. The
\nBaltimore American, of March 17, 1845, relates a similar case
\nof atrocity, perpetrated with similar impunity\u2014as follows:\u2014
\n\u201cShooting a slave.\u2014We learn, upon the authority of a letter
\nfrom Charles county, Maryland, received by a gentleman of this
\ncity, that a young man, named Matthews, a nephew of General
\nMatthews, and whose father, it is believed, holds an office at
\nWashington, killed one of the slaves upon his father\u2019s farm by
\nshooting him. The letter states that young Matthews had been
\nleft in charge of the farm; that he gave an order to the servant,
\nwhich was disobeyed, when he proceeded to the house,
\nobtained a gun, and, returning, shot the servant. He
\nimmediately, the letter continues, fled to his father\u2019s residence,
\nwhere he still remains unmolested.\u201d\u2014Let it never be forgotten,
\nthat no slaveholder or overseer can be convicted of any outrage
\nperpetrated on the person of a slave, however diabolical it may
\nbe, on the testimony of colored witnesses, whether bond or free.
\nBy the slave code, they are adjudged to be as incompetent to
\ntestify against a white man, as though they were indeed a part of
\nthe brute creation. Hence, there is no legal protection in fact,
\nwhatever there may be in form, for the slave population; and
\nany amount of cruelty may be inflicted on them with impunity.
\nxiv PREFACE
\nIs it possible for the human mind to conceive of a more horrible
\nstate of society?
\nThe effect of a religious profession on the conduct of
\nsouthern masters is vividly described in the following Narrative,
\nand shown to be any thing but salutary. In the nature of the case,
\nit must be in the highest degree pernicious. The testimony of
\nMr. DOUGLASS, on this point, is sustained by a cloud of
\nwitnesses, whose veracity is unimpeachable. \u201cA slaveholder\u2019s
\nprofession of Christianity is a palpable imposture. He is a felon
\nof the highest grade. He is a man-stealer. It is of no importance
\nwhat you put in the other scale.\u201d
\nReader! are you with the man-stealers in sympathy and
\npurpose, or on the side of their down-trodden victims? If with
\nthe former, then are you the foe of God and man. If with the
\nlatter, what are you prepared to do and dare in their behalf? Be
\nfaithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every
\nyoke, and let the oppressed go free. Come what may\u2014cost what
\nit may\u2014inscribe on the banner which you unfurl to the breeze,
\nas your religious and political motto\u2014\u201cNO COMPROMISE WITH
\nSLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS!\u201d
\nWM. LLOYD GARRISON.
\nBOSTON, May 1, 1845.
\nLETTER
\nFROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.
\nBOSTON, April 22, 1845.
\nMy Dear Friend:
\nYou remember the old fable of \u201cThe Man and
\nthe Lion,\u201d where the lion complained that he should not be so
\nmisrepresented \u201cwhen the lions wrote history.\u201d
\nI am glad the time has come when the \u201clions write history.\u201d
\nWe have been left long enough to gather the character of
\nslavery from the involuntary evidence of the masters. One
\nmight, indeed, rest sufficiently satisfied with what, it is evident,
\nmust be, in general, the results of such a relation, without
\nseeking farther to find whether they have followed in every
\ninstance. Indeed, those who stare at the half-peck of corn a
\nweek, and love to count the lashes on the slave\u2019s back, are
\nseldom the \u201cstuff\u201d out of which reformers and abolitionists are
\nto be made. I remember that, in 1838, many were waiting for
\nthe results of the West India experiment, before they could
\ncome into our ranks. Those \u201cresults\u201d have come long ago; but,
\nalas! few of that number have come with them, as converts. A
\nman must be disposed to judge of emancipation by other tests
\nthan whether it has increased the produce of sugar,\u2014and to hate
\nslavery for other reasons than because it starves men and whips
\nwomen,\u2014before he is ready to lay the first stone of his antislavery life.
\nxvi LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.
\nI was glad to learn, in your story, how early the most
\nneglected of God\u2019s children waken to a sense of their rights, and
\nof the injustice done them. Experience is a keen teacher; and
\nlong before you had mastered your A B C, or knew where the
\n\u201cwhite sails\u201d of the Chesapeake were bound, you began, I see,
\nto gauge the wretchedness of the slave, not by his hunger and
\nwant, not by his lashes and toil, but by the cruel and blighting
\ndeath which gathers over his soul.
\nIn connection with this, there is one circumstance which
\nmakes your recollections peculiarly valuable, and renders your
\nearly insight the more remarkable. You come from that part of
\nthe country where we are told slavery appears with its fairest
\nfeatures. Let us hear, then, what it is at its best estate\u2014gaze on
\nits bright side, if it has one; and then imagination may task her
\npowers to add dark lines to the picture, as she travels southward
\nto that (for the colored man) Valley of the Shadow of Death,
\nwhere the Mississippi sweeps along.
\nAgain, we have known you long, and can put the most
\nentire confidence in your truth, candor, and sincerity. Every one
\nwho has heard you speak has felt, and, I am confident, every
\none who reads your book will feel, persuaded that you give
\nthem a fair specimen of the whole truth. No one-sided
\nportrait,\u2014no wholesale complaints,\u2014but strict justice done,
\nwhenever individual kindliness has neutralized, for a moment,
\nthe deadly system with which it was strangely allied. You have
\nbeen with us, too, some years, and can fairly compare the
\ntwilight of rights, which your race enjoy at the North, with that
\n\u201cnoon of night\u201d under which they labor south of Mason and
\nDixon\u2019s line. Tell us whether, after all, the half-free colored
\nman of Massachusetts is worse off than the pampered slave of
\nthe rice swamps!
\nIn reading your life, no one can say that we have unfairly
\npicked out some rare specimens of cruelty. We know that the
\nLETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. xvii
\nbitter drops, which even you have drained from the cup, are no
\nincidental aggravations, no individual ills, but such as must
\nmingle always and necessarily in the lot of every slave. They
\nare the essential ingredients, not the occasional results, of the
\nsystem.
\nAfter all, I shall read your book with trembling for you.
\nSome years ago, when you were beginning to tell me your real
\nname and birthplace, you may remember I stopped you, and
\npreferred to remain ignorant of all. With the exception of a
\nvague description, so I continued, till the other day, when you
\nread me your memoirs. I hardly knew, at the time, whether to
\nthank you or not for the sight of them, when I reflected that it
\nwas still dangerous, in Massachusetts, for honest men to tell
\ntheir names! They say the fathers, in 1776, signed the
\nDeclaration of Independence with the halter about their necks.
\nYou, too, publish your declaration of freedom with danger
\ncompassing you around. In all the broad lands which the
\nConstitution of the United States overshadows, there is no
\nsingle spot,\u2014however narrow or desolate,\u2014where a fugitive
\nslave can plant himself and say, \u201cI am safe.\u201d The whole armory
\nof Northern Law has no shield for you. I am free to say that, in
\nyour place, I should throw the MS. into the fire.
\nYou, perhaps, may tell your story in safety, endeared as
\nyou are to so many warm hearts by rare gifts, and a still rarer
\ndevotion of them to the service of others. But it will be owing
\nonly to your labors, and the fearless efforts of those who,
\ntrampling the laws and Constitution of the country under their
\nfeet, are determined that they will \u201chide the outcast,\u201d and that
\ntheir hearths shall be, spite of the law, an asylum for the
\noppressed, if, some time or other, the humblest may stand in our
\nstreets, and bear witness in safety against the cruelties of which
\nhe has been the victim.
\nxviii LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ.
\nYet it is sad to think, that these very throbbing hearts which
\nwelcome your story, and form your best safeguard in telling it,
\nare all beating contrary to the \u201cstatute in such case made and
\nprovided.\u201d Go on, my dear friend, till you, and those who, like
\nyou, have been saved, so as by fire, from the dark prison-house,
\nshall stereotype these free, illegal pulses into statutes; and New
\nEngland, cutting loose from a blood-stained Union, shall glory
\nin being the house of refuge for the oppressed;\u2014till we no
\nlonger merely \u201chide the outcast,\u201d or make a merit of standing
\nidly by while he is hunted in our midst; but, consecrating anew
\nthe soil of the Pilgrims as an asylum for the oppressed, proclaim
\nour welcome to the slave so loudly, that the tones shall reach
\nevery hut in the Carolinas, and make the broken-hearted
\nbondman leap up at the thought of old Massachusetts.
\nGod speed the day!
\nTill then, and ever,
\nYours truly,
\nWENDELL PHILLIPS.
\nFREDERICK DOUGLASS.
\nNARRATIVE
\nOF THE
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.
\nCHAPTER I.
\nI WAS born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and about
\ntwelve miles from Easton, in Talbot county, Maryland. I have
\nno accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any
\nauthentic record containing it. By far the larger part of the
\nslaves know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs, and
\nit is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep
\ntheir slaves thus ignorant. I do not remember to have ever met a
\nslave who could tell of his birthday. They seldom come nearer
\nto it than planting-time, harvest-time, cherry-time, spring-time,
\nor fall-time. A want of information concerning my own was a
\nsource of unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white
\nchildren could tell their ages. I could not tell why I ought to be
\ndeprived of the same privilege. I was not allowed to make any
\ninquiries of my master concerning it. He deemed all such
\ninquiries on the part of a slave improper and impertinent, and
\nevidence of a restless spirit. The nearest estimate I can give
\nmakes me now between twenty-seven and twenty-eight years of
\nage. I come to this, from hearing my master say, some time
\nduring 1835, I was about seventeen years old.
\nMy mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was the
\ndaughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey, both colored, and quite
\n2 NARRATIVE OF THE
\ndark. My mother was of a darker complexion than either my
\ngrandmother or grandfather.
\nMy father was a white man. He was admitted to be such by
\nall I ever heard speak of my parentage. The opinion was also
\nwhispered that my master was my father; but of the correctness
\nof this opinion, I know nothing; the means of knowing was
\nwithheld from me. My mother and I were separated when I was
\nbut an infant\u2014before I knew her as my mother. It is a common
\ncustom, in the part of Maryland from which I ran away, to part
\nchildren from their mothers at a very early age. Frequently,
\nbefore the child has reached its twelfth month, its mother is
\ntaken from it, and hired out on some farm a considerable
\ndistance off, and the child is placed under the care of an old
\nwoman, too old for field labor. For what this separation is done,
\nI do not know, unless it be to hinder the development of the
\nchild\u2019s affection toward its mother, and to blunt and destroy the
\nnatural affection of the mother for the child. This is the
\ninevitable result.
\nI never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than
\nfour or five times in my life; and each of these times was very
\nshort in duration, and at night. She was hired by a Mr. Stewart,
\nwho lived about twelve miles from my home. She made her
\njourneys to see me in the night, travelling the whole distance on
\nfoot, after the performance of her day\u2019s work. She was a field
\nhand, and a whipping is the penalty of not being in the field at
\nsunrise, unless a slave has special permission from his or her
\nmaster to the contrary\u2014a permission which they seldom get,
\nand one that gives to him that gives it the proud name of being a
\nkind master. I do not recollect of ever seeing my mother by the
\nlight of day. She was with me in the night. She would lie down
\nwith me, and get me to sleep, but long before I waked she was
\ngone. Very little communication ever took place between us.
\nDeath soon ended what little we could have while she lived, and
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 3
\nwith it her hardships and suffering. She died when I was about
\nseven years old, on one of my master\u2019s farms, near Lee\u2019s Mill. I
\nwas not allowed to be present during her illness, at her death, or
\nburial. She was gone long before I knew any thing about it.
\nNever having enjoyed, to any considerable extent, her soothing
\npresence, her tender and watchful care, I received the tidings of
\nher death with much the same emotions I should have probably
\nfelt at the death of a stranger.
\nCalled thus suddenly away, she left me without the slightest
\nintimation of who my father was. The whisper that my master
\nwas my father, may or may not be true; and, true or false, it is of
\nbut little consequence to my purpose whilst the fact remains, in
\nall its glaring odiousness, that slaveholders have ordained, and
\nby law established, that the children of slave women shall in all
\ncases follow the condition of their mothers; and this is done too
\nobviously to administer to their own lusts, and make a
\ngratification of their wicked desires profitable as well as
\npleasurable; for by this cunning arrangement, the slaveholder, in
\ncases not a few, sustains to his slaves the double relation of
\nmaster and father.
\nI know of such cases; and it is worthy of remark that such
\nslaves invariably suffer greater hardships, and have more to
\ncontend with, than others. They are, in the first place, a constant
\noffence to their mistress. She is ever disposed to find fault with
\nthem; they can seldom do any thing to please her; she is never
\nbetter pleased than when she sees them under the lash,
\nespecially when she suspects her husband of showing to his
\nmulatto children favors which he withholds from his black
\nslaves. The master is frequently compelled to sell this class of
\nhis slaves, out of deference to the feelings of his white wife;
\nand, cruel as the deed may strike any one to be, for a man to sell
\nhis own children to human flesh-mongers, it is often the dictate
\nof humanity for him to do so; for, unless he does this, he must
\n4 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nnot only whip them himself, but must stand by and see one
\nwhite son tie up his brother, of but few shades darker
\ncomplexion than himself, and ply the gory lash to his naked
\nback; and if he lisp one word of disapproval, it is set down to
\nhis parental partiality, and only makes a bad matter worse, both
\nfor himself and the slave whom he would protect and defend.
\nEvery year brings with it multitudes of this class of slaves.
\nIt was doubtless in consequence of a knowledge of this fact, that
\none great statesman of the south predicted the downfall of
\nslavery by the inevitable laws of population. Whether this
\nprophecy is ever fulfilled or not, it is nevertheless plain that a
\nvery different-looking class of people are springing up at the
\nsouth, and are now held in slavery, from those originally
\nbrought to this country from Africa; and if their increase do no
\nother good, it will do away the force of the argument, that God
\ncursed Ham, and therefore American slavery is right. If the
\nlineal descendants of Ham are alone to be scripturally enslaved,
\nit is certain that slavery at the south must soon become
\nunscriptural; for thousands are ushered into the world, annually,
\nwho, like myself, owe their existence to white fathers, and those
\nfathers most frequently their own masters.
\nI have had two masters. My first master\u2019s name was
\nAnthony. I do not remember his first name. He was generally
\ncalled Captain Anthony\u2014a title which, I presume, he acquired
\nby sailing a craft on the Chesapeake Bay. He was not
\nconsidered a rich slaveholder. He owned two or three farms,
\nand about thirty slaves. His farms and slaves were under the
\ncare of an overseer. The overseer\u2019s name was Plummer. Mr.
\nPlummer was a miserable drunkard, a profane swearer, and a
\nsavage monster. He always went armed with a cowskin and a
\nheavy cudgel. I have known him to cut and slash the women\u2019s
\nheads so horribly, that even master would be enraged at his
\ncruelty, and would threaten to whip him if he did not mind
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 5
\nhimself. Master, however, was not a humane slaveholder. It
\nrequired extraordinary barbarity on the part of an overseer to
\naffect him. He was a cruel man, hardened by a long life of
\nslaveholding. He would at times seem to take great pleasure in
\nwhipping a slave. I have often been awakened at the dawn of
\nday by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt of mine,
\nwhom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back
\ntill she was literally covered with blood. No words, no tears, no
\nprayers, from his gory victim, seemed to move his iron heart
\nfrom its bloody purpose. The louder she screamed, the harder he
\nwhipped; and where the blood ran fastest, there he whipped
\nlongest. He would whip her to make her scream, and whip her
\nto make her hush; and not until overcome by fatigue, would he
\ncease to swing the blood-clotted cowskin. I remember the first
\ntime I ever witnessed this horrible exhibition. I was quite a
\nchild, but I well remember it. I never shall forget it whilst I
\nremember any thing. It was the first of a long series of such
\noutrages, of which I was doomed to be a witness and a
\nparticipant. It struck me with awful force. It was the bloodstained gate, the entrance to the hell of slavery, through which I
\nwas about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I wish I
\ncould commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld it.
\nThis occurrence took place very soon after I went to live
\nwith my old master, and under the following circumstances.
\nAunt Hester went out one night,\u2014where or for what I do not
\nknow,\u2014and happened to be absent when my master desired her
\npresence. He had ordered her not to go out evenings, and
\nwarned her that she must never let him catch her in company
\nwith a young man, who was paying attention to her belonging to
\nColonel Lloyd. The young man\u2019s name was Ned Roberts,
\ngenerally called Lloyd\u2019s Ned. Why master was so careful of
\nher, may be safely left to conjecture. She was a woman of noble
\nform, and of graceful proportions, having very few equals, and
\n6 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nfewer superiors, in personal appearance, among the colored or
\nwhite women of our neighborhood.
\nAunt Hester had not only disobeyed his orders in going out,
\nbut had been found in company with Lloyd\u2019s Ned; which
\ncircumstance, I found, from what he said while whipping her,
\nwas the chief offence. Had he been a man of pure morals
\nhimself, he might have been thought interested in protecting the
\ninnocence of my aunt; but those who knew him will not suspect
\nhim of any such virtue. Before he commenced whipping Aunt
\nHester, he took her into the kitchen, and stripped her from neck
\nto waist, leaving her neck, shoulders, and back, entirely naked.
\nHe then told her to cross her hands, calling her at the same time
\na d\u2014\u2014d b\u2014\u2014h. After crossing her hands, he tied them with a
\nstrong rope, and led her to a stool under a large hook in the
\njoist, put in for the purpose. He made her get upon the stool, and
\ntied her hands to the hook. She now stood fair for his infernal
\npurpose. Her arms were stretched up at their full length, so that
\nshe stood upon the ends of her toes. He then said to her, \u201cNow,
\nyou d\u2014\u2014d b\u2014\u2014h, I\u2019ll learn you how to disobey my orders!\u201d
\nand after rolling up his sleeves, he commenced to lay on the
\nheavy cowskin, and soon the warm, red blood (amid heartrending shrieks from her, and horrid oaths from him) came
\ndripping to the floor. I was so terrified and horror-stricken at the
\nsight, that I hid myself in a closet, and dared not venture out till
\nlong after the bloody transaction was over. I expected it would
\nbe my turn next. It was all new to me. I had never seen any
\nthing like it before. I had always lived with my grandmother on
\nthe outskirts of the plantation, where she was put to raise the
\nchildren of the younger women. I had therefore been, until now,
\nout of the way of the bloody scenes that often occurred on the
\nplantation.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 7
\nCHAPTER II.
\nMY master\u2019s family consisted of two sons, Andrew and
\nRichard; one daughter, Lucretia, and her husband, Captain
\nThomas Auld. They lived in one house, upon the home
\nplantation of Colonel Edward Lloyd. My master was Colonel
\nLloyd\u2019s clerk and superintendent. He was what might be called
\nthe overseer of the overseers. I spent two years of childhood on
\nthis plantation in my old master\u2019s family. It was here that I
\nwitnessed the bloody transaction recorded in the first chapter;
\nand as I received my first impressions of slavery on this
\nplantation, I will give some description of it, and of slavery as it
\nthere existed. The plantation is about twelve miles north of
\nEaston, in Talbot county, and is situated on the border of Miles
\nRiver. The principal products raised upon it were tobacco, corn,
\nand wheat. These were raised in great abundance; so that, with
\nthe products of this and the other farms belonging to him, he
\nwas able to keep in almost constant employment a large sloop,
\nin carrying them to market at Baltimore. This sloop was named
\nSally Lloyd, in honor of one of the colonel\u2019s daughters. My
\nmaster\u2019s son-in-law, Captain Auld, was master of the vessel;
\nshe was otherwise manned by the colonel\u2019s own slaves. Their
\nnames were Peter, Isaac, Rich, and Jake. These were esteemed
\nvery highly by the other slaves, and looked upon as the
\nprivileged ones of the plantation; for it was no small affair, in
\nthe eyes of the slaves, to be allowed to see Baltimore.
\nColonel Lloyd kept from three to four hundred slaves on
\nhis home plantation, and owned a large number more on the
\nneighboring farms belonging to him. The names of the farms
\nnearest to the home plantation were Wye Town and New
\n8 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nDesign. \u201cWye Town\u201d was under the overseership of a man
\nnamed Noah Willis. New Design was under the overseership of
\na Mr. Townsend. The overseers of these, and all the rest of the
\nfarms, numbering over twenty, received advice and direction
\nfrom the managers of the home plantation. This was the great
\nbusiness place. It was the seat of government for the whole
\ntwenty farms. All disputes among the overseers were settled
\nhere. If a slave was convicted of any high misdemeanor,
\nbecame unmanageable, or evinced a determination to run away,
\nhe was brought immediately here, severely whipped, put on
\nboard the sloop, carried to Baltimore, and sold to Austin
\nWoolfolk, or some other slave-trader, as a warning to the slaves
\nremaining.
\nHere, too, the slaves of all the other farms received their
\nmonthly allowance of food, and their yearly clothing. The men
\nand women slaves received, as their monthly allowance of food,
\neight pounds of pork, or its equivalent in fish, and one bushel of
\ncorn meal. Their yearly clothing consisted of two coarse linen
\nshirts, one pair of linen trousers, like the shirts, one jacket, one
\npair of trousers for winter, made of coarse negro cloth, one pair
\nof stockings, and one pair of shoes; the whole of which could
\nnot have cost more than seven dollars. The allowance of the
\nslave children was given to their mothers, or the old women
\nhaving the care of them. The children unable to work in the
\nfield had neither shoes, stockings, jackets, nor trousers, given to
\nthem; their clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts per
\nyear. When these failed them, they went naked until the next
\nallowance-day. Children from seven to ten years old, of both
\nsexes, almost naked, might be seen at all seasons of the year.
\nThere were no beds given the slaves, unless one coarse
\nblanket be considered such, and none but the men and women
\nhad these. This, however, is not considered a very great
\nprivation. They find less difficulty from the want of beds, than
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 9
\nfrom the want of time to sleep; for when their day\u2019s work in the
\nfield is done, the most of them having their washing, mending,
\nand cooking to do, and having few or none of the ordinary
\nfacilities for doing either of these, very many of their sleeping
\nhours are consumed in preparing for the field the coming day;
\nand when this is done, old and young, male and female, married
\nand single, drop down side by side, on one common bed,\u2014the
\ncold, damp floor,\u2014each covering himself or herself with their
\nmiserable blankets; and here they sleep till they are summoned
\nto the field by the driver\u2019s horn. At the sound of this, all must
\nrise, and be off to the field. There must be no halting; every one
\nmust be at his or her post; and woe betides them who hear not
\nthis morning summons to the field; for if they are not awakened
\nby the sense of hearing, they are by the sense of feeling: no age
\nnor sex finds any favor. Mr. Severe, the overseer, used to stand
\nby the door of the quarter, armed with a large hickory stick and
\nheavy cowskin, ready to whip any one who was so unfortunate
\nas not to hear, or, from any other cause, was prevented from
\nbeing ready to start for the field at the sound of the horn.
\nMr. Severe was rightly named: he was a cruel man. I have
\nseen him whip a woman, causing the blood to run half an hour
\nat the time; and this, too, in the midst of her crying children,
\npleading for their mother\u2019s release. He seemed to take pleasure
\nin manifesting his fiendish barbarity. Added to his cruelty, he
\nwas a profane swearer. It was enough to chill the blood and
\nstiffen the hair of an ordinary man to hear him talk. Scarce a
\nsentence escaped him but that was commenced or concluded by
\nsome horrid oath. The field was the place to witness his cruelty
\nand profanity. His presence made it both the field of blood and
\nof blasphemy. From the rising till the going down of the sun, he
\nwas cursing, raving, cutting, and slashing among the slaves of
\nthe field, in the most frightful manner. His career was short. He
\ndied very soon after I went to Colonel Lloyd\u2019s; and he died as
\n10 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nhe lived, uttering, with his dying groans, bitter curses and horrid
\noaths. His death was regarded by the slaves as the result of a
\nmerciful providence.
\nMr. Severe\u2019s place was filled by a Mr. Hopkins. He was a
\nvery different man. He was less cruel, less profane, and made
\nless noise, than Mr. Severe. His course was characterized by no
\nextraordinary demonstrations of cruelty. He whipped, but
\nseemed to take no pleasure in it. He was called by the slaves a
\ngood overseer.
\nThe home plantation of Colonel Lloyd wore the appearance
\nof a country village. All the mechanical operations for all the
\nfarms were performed here. The shoemaking and mending, the
\nblacksmithing, cartwrighting, coopering, weaving, and graingrinding, were all performed by the slaves on the home
\nplantation. The whole place wore a business-like aspect very
\nunlike the neighboring farms. The number of houses, too,
\nconspired to give it advantage over the neighboring farms. It
\nwas called by the slaves the Great House Farm. Few privileges
\nwere esteemed higher, by the slaves of the out-farms, than that
\nof being selected to do errands at the Great House Farm. It was
\nassociated in their minds with greatness. A representative could
\nnot be prouder of his election to a seat in the American
\nCongress, than a slave on one of the out-farms would be of his
\nelection to do errands at the Great House Farm. They regarded
\nit as evidence of great confidence reposed in them by their
\noverseers; and it was on this account, as well as a constant
\ndesire to be out of the field from under the driver\u2019s lash, that
\nthey esteemed it a high privilege, one worth careful living for.
\nHe was called the smartest and most trusty fellow, who had this
\nhonor conferred upon him the most frequently. The competitors
\nfor this office sought as diligently to please their overseers, as
\nthe office-seekers in the political parties seek to please and
\ndeceive the people. The same traits of character might be seen
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 11
\nin Colonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves, as are seen in the slaves of the
\npolitical parties.
\nThe slaves selected to go to the Great House Farm, for the
\nmonthly allowance for themselves and their fellow-slaves, were
\npeculiarly enthusiastic. While on their way, they would make
\nthe dense old woods, for miles around, reverberate with their
\nwild songs, revealing at once the highest joy and the deepest
\nsadness. They would compose and sing as they went along,
\nconsulting neither time nor tune. The thought that came up,
\ncame out\u2014if not in the word, in the sound;\u2014and as frequently
\nin the one as in the other. They would sometimes sing the most
\npathetic sentiment in the most rapturous tone, and the most
\nrapturous sentiment in the most pathetic tone. Into all of their
\nsongs they would manage to weave something of the Great
\nHouse Farm. Especially would they do this, when leaving
\nhome. They would then sing most exultingly the following
\nwords:\u2014
\n\u201cI am going away to the Great House Farm!
\nO, yea! O, yea! O!\u201d
\nThis they would sing, as a chorus, to words which to many
\nwould seem unmeaning jargon, but which, nevertheless, were
\nfull of meaning to themselves. I have sometimes thought that
\nthe mere hearing of those songs would do more to impress some
\nminds with the horrible character of slavery, than the reading of
\nwhole volumes of philosophy on the subject could do.
\nI did not, when a slave, understand the deep meaning of
\nthose rude and apparently incoherent songs. I was myself within
\nthe circle; so that I neither saw nor heard as those without might
\nsee and hear. They told a tale of woe which was then altogether
\nbeyond my feeble comprehension; they were tones loud, long,
\nand deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of souls
\n12 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nboiling over with the bitterest anguish. Every tone was a
\ntestimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance
\nfrom chains. The hearing of those wild notes always depressed
\nmy spirit, and filled me with ineffable sadness. I have
\nfrequently found myself in tears while hearing them. The mere
\nrecurrence to those songs, even now, afflicts me; and while I am
\nwriting these lines, an expression of feeling has already found
\nits way down my cheek. To those songs I trace my first
\nglimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of
\nslavery. I can never get rid of that conception. Those songs still
\nfollow me, to deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my
\nsympathies for my brethren in bonds. If any one wishes to be
\nimpressed with the soul-killing effects of slavery, let him go to
\nColonel Lloyd\u2019s plantation, and, on allowance-day, place
\nhimself in the deep pine woods, and there let him, in silence,
\nanalyze the sounds that shall pass through the chambers of his
\nsoul,\u2014and if he is not thus impressed, it will only be because
\n\u201cthere is no flesh in his obdurate heart.\u201d
\nI have often been utterly astonished, since I came to the
\nnorth, to find persons who could speak of the singing, among
\nslaves, as evidence of their contentment and happiness. It is
\nimpossible to conceive of a greater mistake. Slaves sing most
\nwhen they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave represent
\nthe sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an
\naching heart is relieved by its tears. At least, such is my
\nexperience. I have often sung to drown my sorrow, but seldom
\nto express my happiness. Crying for joy, and singing for joy,
\nwere alike uncommon to me while in the jaws of slavery. The
\nsinging of a man cast away upon a desolate island might be as
\nappropriately considered as evidence of contentment and
\nhappiness, as the singing of a slave; the songs of the one and of
\nthe other are prompted by the same emotion.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 13
\nCHAPTER III.
\nCOLONEL LLOYD kept a large and finely cultivated garden,
\nwhich afforded almost constant employment for four men,
\nbesides the chief gardener, (Mr. M\u2019Durmond.) This garden was
\nprobably the greatest attraction of the place. During the summer
\nmonths, people came from far and near\u2014from Baltimore,
\nEaston, and Annapolis\u2014to see it. It abounded in fruits of almost
\nevery description, from the hardy apple of the north to the
\ndelicate orange of the south. This garden was not the least
\nsource of trouble on the plantation. Its excellent fruit was quite
\na temptation to the hungry swarms of boys, as well as the older
\nslaves, belonging to the colonel, few of whom had the virtue or
\nthe vice to resist it. Scarcely a day passed, during the summer,
\nbut that some slave had to take the lash for stealing fruit. The
\ncolonel had to resort to all kinds of stratagems to keep his slaves
\nout of the garden. The last and most successful one was that of
\ntarring his fence all around; after which, if a slave was caught
\nwith any tar upon his person, it was deemed sufficient proof that
\nhe had either been into the garden, or had tried to get in. In
\neither case, he was severely whipped by the chief gardener. This
\nplan worked well; the slaves became as fearful of tar as of the
\nlash. They seemed to realize the impossibility of touching tar
\nwithout being defiled.
\nThe colonel also kept a splendid riding equipage. His stable
\nand carriage-house presented the appearance of some of our
\nlarge city livery establishments. His horses were of the finest
\nform and noblest blood. His carriage-house contained three
\nsplendid coaches, three or four gigs, besides dearborns and
\nbarouches of the most fashionable style.
\n14 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nThis establishment was under the care of two slaves\u2014old
\nBarney and young Barney\u2014father and son. To attend to this
\nestablishment was their sole work. But it was by no means an
\neasy employment; for in nothing was Colonel Lloyd more
\nparticular than in the management of his horses. The slightest
\ninattention to these was unpardonable, and was visited upon
\nthose, under whose care they were placed, with the severest
\npunishment; no excuse could shield them, if the colonel only
\nsuspected any want of attention to his horses\u2014a supposition
\nwhich he frequently indulged, and one which, of course, made
\nthe office of old and young Barney a very trying one. They
\nnever knew when they were safe from punishment. They were
\nfrequently whipped when least deserving, and escaped
\nwhipping when most deserving it. Every thing depended upon
\nthe looks of the horses, and the state of Colonel Lloyd\u2019s own
\nmind when his horses were brought to him for use. If a horse
\ndid not move fast enough, or hold his head high enough, it was
\nowing to some fault of his keepers. It was painful to stand near
\nthe stable-door, and hear the various complaints against the
\nkeepers when a horse was taken out for use. \u201cThis horse has not
\nhad proper attention. He has not been sufficiently rubbed and
\ncurried, or he has not been properly fed; his food was too wet or
\ntoo dry; he got it too soon or too late; he was too hot or too
\ncold; he had too much hay, and not enough of grain; or he had
\ntoo much grain, and not enough of hay; instead of old Barney\u2019s
\nattending to the horse, he had very improperly left it to his son.\u201d
\nTo all these complaints, no matter how unjust, the slave must
\nanswer never a word. Colonel Lloyd could not brook any
\ncontradiction from a slave. When he spoke, a slave must stand,
\nlisten, and tremble; and such was literally the case. I have seen
\nColonel Lloyd make old Barney, a man between fifty and sixty
\nyears of age, uncover his bald head, kneel down upon the cold,
\ndamp ground, and receive upon his naked and toil-worn
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 15
\nshoulders more than thirty lashes at the time. Colonel Lloyd had
\nthree sons\u2014Edward, Murray, and Daniel,\u2014and three sons-inlaw, Mr. Winder, Mr. Nicholson, and Mr. Lowndes. All of these
\nlived at the Great House Farm, and enjoyed the luxury of
\nwhipping the servants when they pleased, from old Barney
\ndown to William Wilkes, the coach-driver. I have seen Winder
\nmake one of the house-servants stand off from him a suitable
\ndistance to be touched with the end of his whip, and at every
\nstroke raise great ridges upon his back.
\nTo describe the wealth of Colonel Lloyd would be almost
\nequal to describing the riches of Job. He kept from ten to fifteen
\nhouse-servants. He was said to own a thousand slaves, and I
\nthink this estimate quite within the truth. Colonel Lloyd owned
\nso many that he did not know them when he saw them; nor did
\nall the slaves of the out-farms know him. It is reported of him,
\nthat, while riding along the road one day, he met a colored man,
\nand addressed him in the usual manner of speaking to colored
\npeople on the public highways of the south: \u201cWell, boy, whom
\ndo you belong to?\u201d \u201cTo Colonel Lloyd,\u201d replied the slave.
\n\u201cWell, does the colonel treat you well?\u201d \u201cNo, sir,\u201d was the
\nready reply. \u201cWhat, does he work you too hard?\u201d \u201cYes, sir.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, don\u2019t he give you enough to eat?\u201d \u201cYes, sir, he gives me
\nenough, such as it is.\u201d
\nThe colonel, after ascertaining where the slave belonged,
\nrode on; the man also went on about his business, not dreaming
\nthat he had been conversing with his master. He thought, said,
\nand heard nothing more of the matter, until two or three weeks
\nafterwards. The poor man was then informed by his overseer
\nthat, for having found fault with his master, he was now to be
\nsold to a Georgia trader. He was immediately chained and
\nhandcuffed; and thus, without a moment\u2019s warning, he was
\nsnatched away, and forever sundered, from his family and
\nfriends, by a hand more unrelenting than death. This is the
\n16 NARRATIVE OF THE
\npenalty of telling the truth, of telling the simple truth, in answer
\nto a series of plain questions.
\nIt is partly in consequence of such facts, that slaves, when
\ninquired of as to their condition and the character of their
\nmasters, almost universally say they are contented, and that
\ntheir masters are kind. The slaveholders have been known to
\nsend in spies among their slaves, to ascertain their views and
\nfeelings in regard to their condition. The frequency of this has
\nhad the effect to establish among the slaves the maxim, that a
\nstill tongue makes a wise head. They suppress the truth rather
\nthan take the consequences of telling it, and in so doing prove
\nthemselves a part of the human family. If they have any thing to
\nsay of their masters, it is generally in their masters\u2019 favor,
\nespecially when speaking to an untried man. I have been
\nfrequently asked, when a slave, if I had a kind master, and do
\nnot remember ever to have given a negative answer; nor did I,
\nin pursuing this course, consider myself as uttering what was
\nabsolutely false; for I always measured the kindness of my
\nmaster by the standard of kindness set up among slaveholders
\naround us. Moreover, slaves are like other people, and imbibe
\nprejudices quite common to others. They think their own better
\nthan that of others. Many, under the influence of this prejudice,
\nthink their own masters are better than the masters of other
\nslaves; and this, too, in some cases, when the very reverse is
\ntrue. Indeed, it is not uncommon for slaves even to fall out and
\nquarrel among themselves about the relative goodness of their
\nmasters, each contending for the superior goodness of his own
\nover that of the others. At the very same time, they mutually
\nexecrate their masters when viewed separately. It was so on our
\nplantation. When Colonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves met the slaves of
\nJacob Jepson, they seldom parted without a quarrel about their
\nmasters; Colonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves contending that he was the
\nrichest, and Mr. Jepson\u2019s slaves that he was the smartest, and
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 17
\nmost of a man. Colonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves would boast his ability to
\nbuy and sell Jacob Jepson. Mr. Jepson\u2019s slaves would boast his
\nability to whip Colonel Lloyd. These quarrels would almost
\nalways end in a fight between the parties, and those that
\nwhipped were supposed to have gained the point at issue. They
\nseemed to think that the greatness of their masters was
\ntransferable to themselves. It was considered as being bad
\nenough to be a slave; but to be a poor man\u2019s slave was deemed
\na disgrace indeed!
\n18 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nCHAPTER IV.
\nMR. HOPKINS remained but a short time in the office of
\noverseer. Why his career was so short, I do not know, but
\nsuppose he lacked the necessary severity to suit Colonel Lloyd.
\nMr. Hopkins was succeeded by Mr. Austin Gore, a man
\npossessing, in an eminent degree, all those traits of character
\nindispensable to what is called a first-rate overseer. Mr. Gore
\nhad served Colonel Lloyd, in the capacity of overseer, upon one
\nof the out-farms, and had shown himself worthy of the high
\nstation of overseer upon the home or Great House Farm.
\nMr. Gore was proud, ambitious, and persevering. He was
\nartful, cruel, and obdurate. He was just the man for such a place,
\nand it was just the place for such a man. It afforded scope for
\nthe full exercise of all his powers, and he seemed to be perfectly
\nat home in it. He was one of those who could torture the
\nslightest look, word, or gesture, on the part of the slave, into
\nimpudence, and would treat it accordingly. There must be no
\nanswering back to him; no explanation was allowed a slave,
\nshowing himself to have been wrongfully accused. Mr. Gore
\nacted fully up to the maxim laid down by slaveholders,\u2014\u201cIt is
\nbetter that a dozen slaves should suffer under the lash, than that
\nthe overseer should be convicted, in the presence of the slaves,
\nof having been at fault.\u201d No matter how innocent a slave might
\nbe\u2014it availed him nothing, when accused by Mr. Gore of any
\nmisdemeanor. To be accused was to be convicted, and to be
\nconvicted was to be punished; the one always following the
\nother with immutable certainty. To escape punishment was to
\nescape accusation; and few slaves had the fortune to do either,
\nunder the overseership of Mr. Gore. He was just proud enough
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 19
\nto demand the most debasing homage of the slave, and quite
\nservile enough to crouch, himself, at the feet of the master. He
\nwas ambitious enough to be contented with nothing short of the
\nhighest rank of overseers, and persevering enough to reach the
\nheight of his ambition. He was cruel enough to inflict the
\nseverest punishment, artful enough to descend to the lowest
\ntrickery, and obdurate enough to be insensible to the voice of a
\nreproving conscience. He was, of all the overseers, the most
\ndreaded by the slaves. His presence was painful; his eye flashed
\nconfusion; and seldom was his sharp, shrill voice heard, without
\nproducing horror and trembling in their ranks.
\nMr. Gore was a grave man, and, though a young man, he
\nindulged in no jokes, said no funny words, seldom smiled. His
\nwords were in perfect keeping with his looks, and his looks
\nwere in perfect keeping with his words. Overseers will
\nsometimes indulge in a witty word, even with the slaves; not so
\nwith Mr. Gore. He spoke but to command, and commanded but
\nto be obeyed; he dealt sparingly with his words, and bountifully
\nwith his whip, never using the former where the latter would
\nanswer as well. When he whipped, he seemed to do so from a
\nsense of duty, and feared no consequences. He did nothing
\nreluctantly, no matter how disagreeable; always at his post,
\nnever inconsistent. He never promised but to fulfil. He was, in a
\nword, a man of the most inflexible firmness and stone-like
\ncoolness.
\nHis savage barbarity was equalled only by the consummate
\ncoolness with which he committed the grossest and most savage
\ndeeds upon the slaves under his charge. Mr. Gore once
\nundertook to whip one of Colonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves, by the name
\nof Demby. He had given Demby but few stripes, when, to get
\nrid of the scourging, he ran and plunged himself into a creek,
\nand stood there at the depth of his shoulders, refusing to come
\nout. Mr. Gore told him that he would give him three calls, and
\n20 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nthat, if he did not come out at the third call, he would shoot him.
\nThe first call was given. Demby made no response, but stood
\nhis ground. The second and third calls were given with the same
\nresult. Mr. Gore then, without consultation or deliberation with
\nany one, not even giving Demby an additional call, raised his
\nmusket to his face, taking deadly aim at his standing victim, and
\nin an instant poor Demby was no more. His mangled body sank
\nout of sight, and blood and brains marked the water where he
\nhad stood.
\nA thrill of horror flashed through every soul upon the
\nplantation, excepting Mr. Gore. He alone seemed cool and
\ncollected. He was asked by Colonel Lloyd and my old master,
\nwhy he resorted to this extraordinary expedient. His reply was,
\n(as well as I can remember,) that Demby had become
\nunmanageable. He was setting a dangerous example to the other
\nslaves,\u2014one which, if suffered to pass without some such
\ndemonstration on his part, would finally lead to the total
\nsubversion of all rule and order upon the plantation. He argued
\nthat if one slave refused to be corrected, and escaped with his
\nlife, the other slaves would soon copy the example; the result of
\nwhich would be, the freedom of the slaves, and the enslavement
\nof the whites. Mr. Gore\u2019s defence was satisfactory. He was
\ncontinued in his station as overseer upon the home plantation.
\nHis fame as an overseer went abroad. His horrid crime was not
\neven submitted to judicial investigation. It was committed in the
\npresence of slaves, and they of course could neither institute a
\nsuit, nor testify against him; and thus the guilty perpetrator of
\none of the bloodiest and most foul murders goes unwhipped of
\njustice, and uncensured by the community in which he lives.
\nMr. Gore lived in St. Michael\u2019s, Talbot county, Maryland, when
\nI left there; and if he is still alive, he very probably lives there
\nnow; and if so, he is now, as he was then, as highly esteemed
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 21
\nand as much respected as though his guilty soul had not been
\nstained with his brother\u2019s blood.
\nI speak advisedly when I say this,\u2014that killing a slave, or
\nany colored person, in Talbot county, Maryland, is not treated
\nas a crime, either by the courts or the community. Mr. Thomas
\nLanman, of St. Michael\u2019s, killed two slaves, one of whom he
\nkilled with a hatchet, by knocking his brains out. He used to
\nboast of the commission of the awful and bloody deed. I have
\nheard him do so laughingly, saying, among other things, that he
\nwas the only benefactor of his country in the company, and that
\nwhen others would do as much as he had done, we should be
\nrelieved of \u201cthe d\u2014\u2014d niggers.\u201d
\nThe wife of Mr. Giles Hicks, living but a short distance
\nfrom where I used to live, murdered my wife\u2019s cousin, a young
\ngirl between fifteen and sixteen years of age, mangling her
\nperson in the most horrible manner, breaking her nose and
\nbreastbone with a stick, so that the poor girl expired in a few
\nhours afterward. She was immediately buried, but had not been
\nin her untimely grave but a few hours before she was taken up
\nand examined by the coroner, who decided that she had come to
\nher death by severe beating. The offence for which this girl was
\nthus murdered was this:\u2014She had been set that night to mind
\nMrs. Hicks\u2019s baby, and during the night she fell asleep, and the
\nbaby cried. She, having lost her rest for several nights previous,
\ndid not hear the crying. They were both in the room with Mrs.
\nHicks. Mrs. Hicks, finding the girl slow to move, jumped from
\nher bed, seized an oak stick of wood by the fireplace, and with it
\nbroke the girl\u2019s nose and breastbone, and thus ended her life. I
\nwill not say that this most horrid murder produced no sensation
\nin the community. It did produce sensation, but not enough to
\nbring the murderess to punishment. There was a warrant issued
\nfor her arrest, but it was never served. Thus she escaped not
\n22 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nonly punishment, but even the pain of being arraigned before a
\ncourt for her horrid crime.
\nWhilst I am detailing bloody deeds which took place during
\nmy stay on Colonel Lloyd\u2019s plantation, I will briefly narrate
\nanother, which occurred about the same time as the murder of
\nDemby by Mr. Gore.
\nColonel Lloyd\u2019s slaves were in the habit of spending a part
\nof their nights and Sundays in fishing for oysters, and in this
\nway made up the deficiency of their scanty allowance. An old
\nman belonging to Colonel Lloyd, while thus engaged, happened
\nto get beyond the limits of Colonel Lloyd\u2019s, and on the premises
\nof Mr. Beal Bondly. At this trespass, Mr. Bondly took offence,
\nand with his musket came down to the shore, and blew its
\ndeadly contents into the poor old man.
\nMr. Bondly came over to see Colonel Lloyd the next day,
\nwhether to pay him for his property, or to justify himself in
\nwhat he had done, I know not. At any rate, this whole fiendish
\ntransaction was soon hushed up. There was very little said about
\nit at all, and nothing done. It was a common saying, even among
\nlittle white boys, that it was worth a half-cent to kill a \u201cnigger,\u201d
\nand a half-cent to bury one.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 23
\nCHAPTER V.
\nAS to my own treatment while I lived on Colonel Lloyd\u2019s
\nplantation, it was very similar to that of the other slave children.
\nI was not old enough to work in the field, and there being little
\nelse than field work to do, I had a great deal of leisure time. The
\nmost I had to do was to drive up the cows at evening, keep the
\nfowls out of the garden, keep the front yard clean, and run of
\nerrands for my old master\u2019s daughter, Mrs. Lucretia Auld. The
\nmost of my leisure time I spent in helping Master Daniel Lloyd
\nin finding his birds, after he had shot them. My connection with
\nMaster Daniel was of some advantage to me. He became quite
\nattached to me, and was a sort of protector of me. He would not
\nallow the older boys to impose upon me, and would divide his
\ncakes with me.
\nI was seldom whipped by my old master, and suffered little
\nfrom any thing else than hunger and cold. I suffered much from
\nhunger, but much more from cold. In hottest summer and
\ncoldest winter, I was kept almost naked\u2014no shoes, no
\nstockings, no jacket, no trousers, nothing on but a coarse tow
\nlinen shirt, reaching only to my knees. I had no bed. I must have
\nperished with cold, but that, the coldest nights, I used to steal a
\nbag which was used for carrying corn to the mill. I would crawl
\ninto this bag, and there sleep on the cold, damp, clay floor, with
\nmy head in and feet out. My feet have been so cracked with the
\nfrost, that the pen with which I am writing might be laid in the
\ngashes.
\nWe were not regularly allowanced. Our food was coarse
\ncorn meal boiled. This was called mush. It was put into a large
\nwooden tray or trough, and set down upon the ground. The
\n24 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nchildren were then called, like so many pigs, and like so many
\npigs they would come and devour the mush; some with oystershells, others with pieces of shingle, some with naked hands,
\nand none with spoons. He that ate fastest got most; he that was
\nstrongest secured the best place; and few left the trough
\nsatisfied.
\nI was probably between seven and eight years old when I
\nleft Colonel Lloyd\u2019s plantation. I left it with joy. I shall never
\nforget the ecstasy with which I received the intelligence that my
\nold master (Anthony) had determined to let me go to Baltimore,
\nto live with Mr. Hugh Auld, brother to my old master\u2019s son-inlaw, Captain Thomas Auld. I received this information about
\nthree days before my departure. They were three of the happiest
\ndays I ever enjoyed. I spent the most part of all these three days
\nin the creek, washing off the plantation scurf, and preparing
\nmyself for my departure.
\nThe pride of appearance which this would indicate was not
\nmy own. I spent the time in washing, not so much because I
\nwished to, but because Mrs. Lucretia had told me I must get all
\nthe dead skin off my feet and knees before I could go to
\nBaltimore; for the people in Baltimore were very cleanly, and
\nwould laugh at me if I looked dirty. Besides, she was going to
\ngive me a pair of trousers, which I should not put on unless I
\ngot all the dirt off me. The thought of owning a pair of trousers
\nwas great indeed! It was almost a sufficient motive, not only to
\nmake me take off what would be called by pig-drovers the
\nmange, but the skin itself. I went at it in good earnest, working
\nfor the first time with the hope of reward.
\nThe ties that ordinarily bind children to their homes were
\nall suspended in my case. I found no severe trial in my
\ndeparture. My home was charmless; it was not home to me; on
\nparting from it, I could not feel that I was leaving any thing
\nwhich I could have enjoyed by staying. My mother was dead,
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 25
\nmy grandmother lived far off, so that I seldom saw her. I had
\ntwo sisters and one brother, that lived in the same house with
\nme; but the early separation of us from our mother had well
\nnigh blotted the fact of our relationship from our memories. I
\nlooked for home elsewhere, and was confident of finding none
\nwhich I should relish less than the one which I was leaving. If,
\nhowever, I found in my new home hardship, hunger, whipping,
\nand nakedness, I had the consolation that I should not have
\nescaped any one of them by staying. Having already had more
\nthan a taste of them in the house of my old master, and having
\nendured them there, I very naturally inferred my ability to
\nendure them elsewhere, and especially at Baltimore; for I had
\nsomething of the feeling about Baltimore that is expressed in
\nthe proverb, that \u201cbeing hanged in England is preferable to
\ndying a natural death in Ireland.\u201d I had the strongest desire to
\nsee Baltimore. Cousin Tom, though not fluent in speech, had
\ninspired me with that desire by his eloquent description of the
\nplace. I could never point out any thing at the Great House, no
\nmatter how beautiful or powerful, but that he had seen
\nsomething at Baltimore far exceeding, both in beauty and
\nstrength, the object which I pointed out to him. Even the Great
\nHouse itself, with all its pictures, was far inferior to many
\nbuildings in Baltimore. So strong was my desire, that I thought
\na gratification of it would fully compensate for whatever loss of
\ncomforts I should sustain by the exchange. I left without a
\nregret, and with the highest hopes of future happiness.
\nWe sailed out of Miles River for Baltimore on a Saturday
\nmorning. I remember only the day of the week, for at that time I
\nhad no knowledge of the days of the month, nor the months of
\nthe year. On setting sail, I walked aft, and gave to Colonel
\nLloyd\u2019s plantation what I hoped would be the last look. I then
\nplaced myself in the bows of the sloop, and there spent the
\n26 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nremainder of the day in looking ahead, interesting myself in
\nwhat was in the distance rather than in things near by or behind.
\nIn the afternoon of that day, we reached Annapolis, the
\ncapital of the State. We stopped but a few moments, so that I
\nhad no time to go on shore. It was the first large town that I had
\never seen, and though it would look small compared with some
\nof our New England factory villages, I thought it a wonderful
\nplace for its size\u2014more imposing even than the Great House
\nFarm!
\nWe arrived at Baltimore early on Sunday morning, landing
\nat Smith\u2019s Wharf, not far from Bowley\u2019s Wharf. We had on
\nboard the sloop a large flock of sheep; and after aiding in
\ndriving them to the slaughterhouse of Mr. Curtis on Louden
\nSlater\u2019s Hill, I was conducted by Rich, one of the hands
\nbelonging on board of the sloop, to my new home in Alliciana
\nStreet, near Mr. Gardner\u2019s ship-yard, on Fells Point.
\nMr. and Mrs. Auld were both at home, and met me at the
\ndoor with their little son Thomas, to take care of whom I had
\nbeen given. And here I saw what I had never seen before; it was
\na white face beaming with the most kindly emotions; it was the
\nface of my new mistress, Sophia Auld. I wish I could describe
\nthe rapture that flashed through my soul as I beheld it. It was a
\nnew and strange sight to me, brightening up my pathway with
\nthe light of happiness. Little Thomas was told, there was his
\nFreddy,\u2014and I was told to take care of little Thomas; and thus I
\nentered upon the duties of my new home with the most cheering
\nprospect ahead.
\nI look upon my departure from Colonel Lloyd\u2019s plantation
\nas one of the most interesting events of my life. It is possible,
\nand even quite probable, that but for the mere circumstance of
\nbeing removed from that plantation to Baltimore, I should have
\nto-day, instead of being here seated by my own table, in the
\nenjoyment of freedom and the happiness of home, writing this
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 27
\nNarrative, been confined in the galling chains of slavery. Going
\nto live at Baltimore laid the foundation, and opened the
\ngateway, to all my subsequent prosperity. I have ever regarded
\nit as the first plain manifestation of that kind providence which
\nhas ever since attended me, and marked my life with so many
\nfavors. I regarded the selection of myself as being somewhat
\nremarkable. There were a number of slave children that might
\nhave been sent from the plantation to Baltimore. There were
\nthose younger, those older, and those of the same age. I was
\nchosen from among them all, and was the first, last, and only
\nchoice.
\nI may be deemed superstitious, and even egotistical, in
\nregarding this event as a special interposition of divine
\nProvidence in my favor. But I should be false to the earliest
\nsentiments of my soul, if I suppressed the opinion. I prefer to be
\ntrue to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of
\nothers, rather than to be false, and incur my own abhorrence.
\nFrom my earliest recollection, I date the entertainment of a deep
\nconviction that slavery would not always be able to hold me
\nwithin its foul embrace; and in the darkest hours of my career in
\nslavery, this living word of faith and spirit of hope departed not
\nfrom me, but remained like ministering angels to cheer me
\nthrough the gloom. This good spirit was from God, and to him I
\noffer thanksgiving and praise.
\n28 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nCHAPTER VI.
\nMY new mistress proved to be all she appeared when I first
\nmet her at the door,\u2014a woman of the kindest heart and finest
\nfeelings. She had never had a slave under her control previously
\nto myself, and prior to her marriage she had been dependent
\nupon her own industry for a living. She was by trade a weaver;
\nand by constant application to her business, she had been in a
\ngood degree preserved from the blighting and dehumanizing
\neffects of slavery. I was utterly astonished at her goodness. I
\nscarcely knew how to behave towards her. She was entirely
\nunlike any other white woman I had ever seen. I could not
\napproach her as I was accustomed to approach other white
\nladies. My early instruction was all out of place. The crouching
\nservility, usually so acceptable a quality in a slave, did not
\nanswer when manifested toward her. Her favor was not gained
\nby it; she seemed to be disturbed by it. She did not deem it
\nimpudent or unmannerly for a slave to look her in the face. The
\nmeanest slave was put fully at ease in her presence, and none
\nleft without feeling better for having seen her. Her face was
\nmade of heavenly smiles, and her voice of tranquil music.
\nBut, alas! this kind heart had but a short time to remain
\nsuch. The fatal poison of irresponsible power was already in her
\nhands, and soon commenced its infernal work. That cheerful
\neye, under the influence of slavery, soon became red with rage;
\nthat voice, made all of sweet accord, changed to one of harsh
\nand horrid discord; and that angelic face gave place to that of a
\ndemon.
\nVery soon after I went to live with Mr. and Mrs. Auld, she
\nvery kindly commenced to teach me the A, B, C. After I had
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 29
\nlearned this, she assisted me in learning to spell words of three
\nor four letters. Just at this point of my progress, Mr. Auld found
\nout what was going on, and at once forbade Mrs. Auld to
\ninstruct me further, telling her, among other things, that it was
\nunlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read. To use his
\nown words, further, he said, \u201cIf you give a nigger an inch, he
\nwill take an ell. A nigger should know nothing but to obey his
\nmaster\u2014to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best
\nnigger in the world. Now,\u201d said he, \u201cif you teach that nigger
\n(speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping
\nhim. It would forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once
\nbecome unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As to
\nhimself, it could do him no good, but a great deal of harm. It
\nwould make him discontented and unhappy.\u201d These words sank
\ndeep into my heart, stirred up sentiments within that lay
\nslumbering, and called into existence an entirely new train of
\nthought. It was a new and special revelation, explaining dark
\nand mysterious things, with which my youthful understanding
\nhad struggled, but struggled in vain. I now understood what had
\nbeen to me a most perplexing difficulty\u2014to wit, the white
\nman\u2019s power to enslave the black man. It was a grand
\nachievement, and I prized it highly. From that moment, I
\nunderstood the pathway from slavery to freedom. It was just
\nwhat I wanted, and I got it at a time when I the least expected it.
\nWhilst I was saddened by the thought of losing the aid of my
\nkind mistress, I was gladdened by the invaluable instruction
\nwhich, by the merest accident, I had gained from my master.
\nThough conscious of the difficulty of learning without a
\nteacher, I set out with high hope, and a fixed purpose, at
\nwhatever cost of trouble, to learn how to read. The very decided
\nmanner with which he spoke, and strove to impress his wife
\nwith the evil consequences of giving me instruction, served to
\nconvince me that he was deeply sensible of the truths he was
\n30 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nuttering. It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with the
\nutmost confidence on the results which, he said, would flow
\nfrom teaching me to read. What he most dreaded, that I most
\ndesired. What he most loved, that I most hated. That which to
\nhim was a great evil, to be carefully shunned, was to me a great
\ngood, to be diligently sought; and the argument which he so
\nwarmly urged, against my learning to read, only served to
\ninspire me with a desire and determination to learn. In learning
\nto read, I owe almost as much to the bitter opposition of my
\nmaster, as to the kindly aid of my mistress. I acknowledge the
\nbenefit of both.
\nI had resided but a short time in Baltimore before I
\nobserved a marked difference, in the treatment of slaves, from
\nthat which I had witnessed in the country. A city slave is almost
\na freeman, compared with a slave on the plantation. He is much
\nbetter fed and clothed, and enjoys privileges altogether
\nunknown to the slave on the plantation. There is a vestige of
\ndecency, a sense of shame, that does much to curb and check
\nthose outbreaks of atrocious cruelty so commonly enacted upon
\nthe plantation. He is a desperate slaveholder, who will shock the
\nhumanity of his non-slaveholding neighbors with the cries of
\nhis lacerated slave. Few are willing to incur the odium attaching
\nto the reputation of being a cruel master; and above all things,
\nthey would not be known as not giving a slave enough to eat.
\nEvery city slaveholder is anxious to have it known of him, that
\nhe feeds his slaves well; and it is due to them to say, that most
\nof them do give their slaves enough to eat. There are, however,
\nsome painful exceptions to this rule. Directly opposite to us, on
\nPhilpot Street, lived Mr. Thomas Hamilton. He owned two
\nslaves. Their names were Henrietta and Mary. Henrietta was
\nabout twenty-two years of age, Mary was about fourteen; and of
\nall the mangled and emaciated creatures I ever looked upon,
\nthese two were the most so. His heart must be harder than stone,
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 31
\nthat could look upon these unmoved. The head, neck, and
\nshoulders of Mary were literally cut to pieces. I have frequently
\nfelt her head, and found it nearly covered with festering sores,
\ncaused by the lash of her cruel mistress. I do not know that her
\nmaster ever whipped her, but I have been an eye-witness to the
\ncruelty of Mrs. Hamilton. I used to be in Mr. Hamilton\u2019s house
\nnearly every day. Mrs. Hamilton used to sit in a large chair in
\nthe middle of the room, with a heavy cowskin always by her
\nside, and scarce an hour passed during the day but was marked
\nby the blood of one of these slaves. The girls seldom passed her
\nwithout her saying, \u201cMove faster, you black gip!\u201d at the same
\ntime giving them a blow with the cowskin over the head or
\nshoulders, often drawing the blood. She would then say, \u201cTake
\nthat, you black gip!\u201d\u2014continuing, \u201cIf you don\u2019t move faster,
\nI\u2019ll move you!\u201d Added to the cruel lashings to which these
\nslaves were subjected, they were kept nearly half-starved. They
\nseldom knew what it was to eat a full meal. I have seen Mary
\ncontending with the pigs for the offal thrown into the street. So
\nmuch was Mary kicked and cut to pieces, that she was oftener
\ncalled \u201cpecked\u201d than by her name.
\n32 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nCHAPTER VII.
\nI LIVED in Master Hugh\u2019s family about seven years. During
\nthis time, I succeeded in learning to read and write. In
\naccomplishing this, I was compelled to resort to various
\nstratagems. I had no regular teacher. My mistress, who had
\nkindly commenced to instruct me, had, in compliance with the
\nadvice and direction of her husband, not only ceased to instruct,
\nbut had set her face against my being instructed by any one else.
\nIt is due, however, to my mistress to say of her, that she did not
\nadopt this course of treatment immediately. She at first lacked
\nthe depravity indispensable to shutting me up in mental
\ndarkness. It was at least necessary for her to have some training
\nin the exercise of irresponsible power, to make her equal to the
\ntask of treating me as though I were a brute.
\nMy mistress was, as I have said, a kind and tender-hearted
\nwoman; and in the simplicity of her soul she commenced, when
\nI first went to live with her, to treat me as she supposed one
\nhuman being ought to treat another. In entering upon the duties
\nof a slaveholder, she did not seem to perceive that I sustained to
\nher the relation of a mere chattel, and that for her to treat me as
\na human being was not only wrong, but dangerously so. Slavery
\nproved as injurious to her as it did to me. When I went there,
\nshe was a pious, warm, and tender-hearted woman. There was
\nno sorrow or suffering for which she had not a tear. She had
\nbread for the hungry, clothes for the naked, and comfort for
\nevery mourner that came within her reach. Slavery soon proved
\nits ability to divest her of these heavenly qualities. Under its
\ninfluence, the tender heart became stone, and the lamblike
\ndisposition gave way to one of tiger-like fierceness. The first
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 33
\nstep in her downward course was in her ceasing to instruct me.
\nShe now commenced to practise her husband\u2019s precepts. She
\nfinally became even more violent in her opposition than her
\nhusband himself. She was not satisfied with simply doing as
\nwell as he had commanded; she seemed anxious to do better.
\nNothing seemed to make her more angry than to see me with a
\nnewspaper. She seemed to think that here lay the danger. I have
\nhad her rush at me with a face made all up of fury, and snatch
\nfrom me a newspaper, in a manner that fully revealed her
\napprehension. She was an apt woman; and a little experience
\nsoon demonstrated, to her satisfaction, that education and
\nslavery were incompatible with each other.
\nFrom this time I was most narrowly watched. If I was in a
\nseparate room any considerable length of time, I was sure to be
\nsuspected of having a book, and was at once called to give an
\naccount of myself. All this, however, was too late. The first step
\nhad been taken. Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given
\nme the inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking
\nthe ell.
\nThe plan which I adopted, and the one by which I was most
\nsuccessful, was that of making friends of all the little white boys
\nwhom I met in the street. As many of these as I could, I
\nconverted into teachers. With their kindly aid, obtained at
\ndifferent times and in different places, I finally succeeded in
\nlearning to read. When I was sent of errands, I always took my
\nbook with me, and by going one part of my errand quickly, I
\nfound time to get a lesson before my return. I used also to carry
\nbread with me, enough of which was always in the house, and
\nto which I was always welcome; for I was much better off in
\nthis regard than many of the poor white children in our
\nneighborhood. This bread I used to bestow upon the hungry
\nlittle urchins, who, in return, would give me that more valuable
\nbread of knowledge. I am strongly tempted to give the names of
\n34 NARRATIVE OF THE
\ntwo or three of those little boys, as a testimonial of the gratitude
\nand affection I bear them; but prudence forbids;\u2014not that it
\nwould injure me, but it might embarrass them; for it is almost
\nan unpardonable offence to teach slaves to read in this Christian
\ncountry. It is enough to say of the dear little fellows, that they
\nlived on Philpot Street, very near Durgin and Bailey\u2019s shipyard. I used to talk this matter of slavery over with them. I
\nwould sometimes say to them, I wished I could be as free as
\nthey would be when they got to be men. \u201cYou will be free as
\nsoon as you are twenty-one, but I am a slave for life! Have not I
\nas good a right to be free as you have?\u201d These words used to
\ntrouble them; they would express for me the liveliest sympathy,
\nand console me with the hope that something would occur by
\nwhich I might be free.
\nI was now about twelve years old, and the thought of being
\na slave for life began to bear heavily upon my heart. Just about
\nthis time, I got hold of a book entitled \u201cThe Columbian Orator.\u201d
\nEvery opportunity I got, I used to read this book. Among much
\nof other interesting matter, I found in it a dialogue between a
\nmaster and his slave. The slave was represented as having run
\naway from his master three times. The dialogue represented the
\nconversation which took place between them, when the slave
\nwas retaken the third time. In this dialogue, the whole argument
\nin behalf of slavery was brought forward by the master, all of
\nwhich was disposed of by the slave. The slave was made to say
\nsome very smart as well as impressive things in reply to his
\nmaster\u2014things which had the desired though unexpected effect;
\nfor the conversation resulted in the voluntary emancipation of
\nthe slave on the part of the master.
\nIn the same book, I met with one of Sheridan\u2019s mighty
\nspeeches on and in behalf of Catholic emancipation. These were
\nchoice documents to me. I read them over and over again with
\nunabated interest. They gave tongue to interesting thoughts of
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 35
\nmy own soul, which had frequently flashed through my mind,
\nand died away for want of utterance. The moral which I gained
\nfrom the dialogue was the power of truth over the conscience of
\neven a slaveholder. What I got from Sheridan was a bold
\ndenunciation of slavery, and a powerful vindication of human
\nrights. The reading of these documents enabled me to utter my
\nthoughts, and to meet the arguments brought forward to sustain
\nslavery; but while they relieved me of one difficulty, they
\nbrought on another even more painful than the one of which I
\nwas relieved. The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and
\ndetest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a
\nband of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone
\nto Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land
\nreduced us to slavery. I loathed them as being the meanest as
\nwell as the most wicked of men. As I read and contemplated the
\nsubject, behold! that very discontentment which Master Hugh
\nhad predicted would follow my learning to read had already
\ncome, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I
\nwrithed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had
\nbeen a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of
\nmy wretched condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes
\nto the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In
\nmoments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their
\nstupidity. I have often wished myself a beast. I preferred the
\ncondition of the meanest reptile to my own. Any thing, no
\nmatter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting
\nthinking of my condition that tormented me. There was no
\ngetting rid of it. It was pressed upon me by every object within
\nsight or hearing, animate or inanimate. The silver trump of
\nfreedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness. Freedom
\nnow appeared, to disappear no more forever. It was heard in
\nevery sound, and seen in every thing. It was ever present to
\ntorment me with a sense of my wretched condition. I saw
\n36 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nnothing without seeing it, I heard nothing without hearing it,
\nand felt nothing without feeling it. It looked from every star, it
\nsmiled in every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in
\nevery storm.
\nI often found myself regretting my own existence, and
\nwishing myself dead; and but for the hope of being free, I have
\nno doubt but that I should have killed myself, or done
\nsomething for which I should have been killed. While in this
\nstate of mind, I was eager to hear any one speak of slavery. I
\nwas a ready listener. Every little while, I could hear something
\nabout the abolitionists. It was some time before I found what the
\nword meant. It was always used in such connections as to make
\nit an interesting word to me. If a slave ran away and succeeded
\nin getting clear, or if a slave killed his master, set fire to a barn,
\nor did any thing very wrong in the mind of a slaveholder, it was
\nspoken of as the fruit of abolition. Hearing the word in this
\nconnection very often, I set about learning what it meant. The
\ndictionary afforded me little or no help. I found it was \u201cthe act
\nof abolishing;\u201d but then I did not know what was to be
\nabolished. Here I was perplexed. I did not dare to ask any one
\nabout its meaning, for I was satisfied that it was something they
\nwanted me to know very little about. After a patient waiting, I
\ngot one of our city papers, containing an account of the number
\nof petitions from the north, praying for the abolition of slavery
\nin the District of Columbia, and of the slave trade between the
\nStates. From this time I understood the words abolition and
\nabolitionist, and always drew near when that word was spoken,
\nexpecting to hear something of importance to myself and
\nfellow-slaves. The light broke in upon me by degrees. I went
\none day down on the wharf of Mr. Waters; and seeing two
\nIrishmen unloading a scow of stone, I went, unasked, and
\nhelped them. When we had finished, one of them came to me
\nand asked me if I were a slave. I told him I was. He asked, \u201cAre
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 37
\nye a slave for life?\u201d I told him that I was. The good Irishman
\nseemed to be deeply affected by the statement. He said to the
\nother that it was a pity so fine a little fellow as myself should be
\na slave for life. He said it was a shame to hold me. They both
\nadvised me to run away to the north; that I should find friends
\nthere, and that I should be free. I pretended not to be interested
\nin what they said, and treated them as if I did not understand
\nthem; for I feared they might be treacherous. White men have
\nbeen known to encourage slaves to escape, and then, to get the
\nreward, catch them and return them to their masters. I was
\nafraid that these seemingly good men might use me so; but I
\nnevertheless remembered their advice, and from that time I
\nresolved to run away. I looked forward to a time at which it
\nwould be safe for me to escape. I was too young to think of
\ndoing so immediately; besides, I wished to learn how to write,
\nas I might have occasion to write my own pass. I consoled
\nmyself with the hope that I should one day find a good chance.
\nMeanwhile, I would learn to write.
\nThe idea as to how I might learn to write was suggested to
\nme by being in Durgin and Bailey\u2019s ship-yard, and frequently
\nseeing the ship carpenters, after hewing, and getting a piece of
\ntimber ready for use, write on the timber the name of that part
\nof the ship for which it was intended. When a piece of timber
\nwas intended for the larboard side, it would be marked thus\u2014
\n\u201cL.\u201d When a piece was for the starboard side, it would be
\nmarked thus\u2014\u201cS.\u201d A piece for the larboard side forward, would
\nbe marked thus\u2014\u201cL. F.\u201d When a piece was for starboard side
\nforward, it would be marked thus\u2014\u201cS. F.\u201d For larboard aft, it
\nwould be marked thus\u2014\u201cL. A.\u201d For starboard aft, it would be
\nmarked thus\u2014\u201cS. A.\u201d I soon learned the names of these letters,
\nand for what they were intended when placed upon a piece of
\ntimber in the ship-yard. I immediately commenced copying
\nthem, and in a short time was able to make the four letters
\n38 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nnamed. After that, when I met with any boy who I knew could
\nwrite, I would tell him I could write as well as he. The next
\nword would be, \u201cI don\u2019t believe you. Let me see you try it.\u201d I
\nwould then make the letters which I had been so fortunate as to
\nlearn, and ask him to beat that. In this way I got a good many
\nlessons in writing, which it is quite possible I should never have
\ngotten in any other way. During this time, my copy-book was
\nthe board fence, brick wall, and pavement; my pen and ink was
\na lump of chalk. With these, I learned mainly how to write. I
\nthen commenced and continued copying the Italics in Webster\u2019s
\nSpelling Book, until I could make them all without looking on
\nthe book. By this time, my little Master Thomas had gone to
\nschool, and learned how to write, and had written over a number
\nof copy-books. These had been brought home, and shown to
\nsome of our near neighbors, and then laid aside. My mistress
\nused to go to class meeting at the Wilk Street meetinghouse
\nevery Monday afternoon, and leave me to take care of the
\nhouse. When left thus, I used to spend the time in writing in the
\nspaces left in Master Thomas\u2019s copy-book, copying what he had
\nwritten. I continued to do this until I could write a hand very
\nsimilar to that of Master Thomas. Thus, after a long, tedious
\neffort for years, I finally succeeded in learning how to write.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 39
\nCHAPTER VIII.
\nIN a very short time after I went to live at Baltimore, my
\nold master\u2019s youngest son Richard died; and in about three
\nyears and six months after his death, my old master, Captain
\nAnthony, died, leaving only his son, Andrew, and daughter,
\nLucretia, to share his estate. He died while on a visit to see his
\ndaughter at Hillsborough. Cut off thus unexpectedly, he left no
\nwill as to the disposal of his property. It was therefore necessary
\nto have a valuation of the property, that it might be equally
\ndivided between Mrs. Lucretia and Master Andrew. I was
\nimmediately sent for, to be valued with the other property. Here
\nagain my feelings rose up in detestation of slavery. I had now a
\nnew conception of my degraded condition. Prior to this, I had
\nbecome, if not insensible to my lot, at least partly so. I left
\nBaltimore with a young heart overborne with sadness, and a
\nsoul full of apprehension. I took passage with Captain Rowe, in
\nthe schooner Wild Cat, and, after a sail of about twenty-four
\nhours, I found myself near the place of my birth. I had now been
\nabsent from it almost, if not quite, five years. I, however,
\nremembered the place very well. I was only about five years old
\nwhen I left it, to go and live with my old master on Colonel
\nLloyd\u2019s plantation; so that I was now between ten and eleven
\nyears old.
\nWe were all ranked together at the valuation. Men and
\nwomen, old and young, married and single, were ranked with
\nhorses, sheep, and swine. There were horses and men, cattle and
\nwomen, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale
\nof being, and were all subjected to the same narrow
\nexamination. Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth, maids and
\n40 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nmatrons, had to undergo the same indelicate inspection. At this
\nmoment, I saw more clearly than ever the brutalizing effects of
\nslavery upon both slave and slaveholder.
\nAfter the valuation, then came the division. I have no
\nlanguage to express the high excitement and deep anxiety which
\nwere felt among us poor slaves during this time. Our fate for life
\nwas now to be decided. We had no more voice in that decision
\nthan the brutes among whom we were ranked. A single word
\nfrom the white men was enough\u2014against all our wishes,
\nprayers, and entreaties\u2014to sunder forever the dearest friends,
\ndearest kindred, and strongest ties known to human beings. In
\naddition to the pain of separation, there was the horrid dread of
\nfalling into the hands of Master Andrew. He was known to us
\nall as being a most cruel wretch,\u2014a common drunkard, who
\nhad, by his reckless mismanagement and profligate dissipation,
\nalready wasted a large portion of his father\u2019s property. We all
\nfelt that we might as well be sold at once to the Georgia traders,
\nas to pass into his hands; for we knew that that would be our
\ninevitable condition,\u2014a condition held by us all in the utmost
\nhorror and dread.
\nI suffered more anxiety than most of my fellow-slaves. I
\nhad known what it was to be kindly treated; they had known
\nnothing of the kind. They had seen little or nothing of the world.
\nThey were in very deed men and women of sorrow, and
\nacquainted with grief. Their backs had been made familiar with
\nthe bloody lash, so that they had become callous; mine was yet
\ntender; for while at Baltimore I got few whippings, and few
\nslaves could boast of a kinder master and mistress than myself;
\nand the thought of passing out of their hands into those of
\nMaster Andrew\u2014a man who, but a few days before, to give me
\na sample of his bloody disposition, took my little brother by the
\nthroat, threw him on the ground, and with the heel of his boot
\nstamped upon his head till the blood gushed from his nose and
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 41
\nears\u2014was well calculated to make me anxious as to my fate.
\nAfter he had committed this savage outrage upon my brother, he
\nturned to me, and said that was the way he meant to serve me
\none of these days,\u2014meaning, I suppose, when I came into his
\npossession.
\nThanks to a kind Providence, I fell to the portion of Mrs.
\nLucretia, and was sent immediately back to Baltimore, to live
\nagain in the family of Master Hugh. Their joy at my return
\nequalled their sorrow at my departure. It was a glad day to me. I
\nhad escaped a worse than lion\u2019s jaws. I was absent from
\nBaltimore, for the purpose of valuation and division, just about
\none month, and it seemed to have been six.
\nVery soon after my return to Baltimore, my mistress,
\nLucretia, died, leaving her husband and one child, Amanda; and
\nin a very short time after her death, Master Andrew died. Now
\nall the property of my old master, slaves included, was in the
\nhands of strangers,\u2014strangers who had had nothing to do with
\naccumulating it. Not a slave was left free. All remained slaves,
\nfrom the youngest to the oldest. If any one thing in my
\nexperience, more than another, served to deepen my conviction
\nof the infernal character of slavery, and to fill me with
\nunutterable loathing of slaveholders, it was their base
\ningratitude to my poor old grandmother. She had served my old
\nmaster faithfully from youth to old age. She had been the source
\nof all his wealth; she had peopled his plantation with slaves; she
\nhad become a great grandmother in his service. She had rocked
\nhim in infancy, attended him in childhood, served him through
\nlife, and at his death wiped from his icy brow the cold deathsweat, and closed his eyes forever. She was nevertheless left a
\nslave\u2014a slave for life\u2014a slave in the hands of strangers; and in
\ntheir hands she saw her children, her grandchildren, and her
\ngreat-grandchildren, divided, like so many sheep, without being
\ngratified with the small privilege of a single word, as to their or
\n42 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nher own destiny. And, to cap the climax of their base ingratitude
\nand fiendish barbarity, my grandmother, who was now very old,
\nhaving outlived my old master and all his children, having seen
\nthe beginning and end of all of them, and her present owners
\nfinding she was of but little value, her frame already racked
\nwith the pains of old age, and complete helplessness fast
\nstealing over her once active limbs, they took her to the woods,
\nbuilt her a little hut, put up a little mud-chimney, and then made
\nher welcome to the privilege of supporting herself there in
\nperfect loneliness; thus virtually turning her out to die! If my
\npoor old grandmother now lives, she lives to suffer in utter
\nloneliness; she lives to remember and mourn over the loss of
\nchildren, the loss of grandchildren, and the loss of greatgrandchildren. They are, in the language of the slave\u2019s poet,
\nWhittier,\u2014
\n\u201cGone, gone, sold and gone
\nTo the rice swamp dank and lone,
\nWhere the slave-whip ceaseless swings,
\nWhere the noisome insect stings,
\nWhere the fever-demon strews
\nPoison with the falling dews,
\nWhere the sickly sunbeams glare
\nThrough the hot and misty air:\u2014
\nGone, gone, sold and gone
\nTo the rice swamp dank and lone,
\nFrom Virginia hills and waters\u2014
\nWoe is me, my stolen daughters!\u201d
\nThe hearth is desolate. The children, the unconscious
\nchildren, who once sang and danced in her presence, are gone.
\nShe gropes her way, in the darkness of age, for a drink of water.
\nInstead of the voices of her children, she hears by day the
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 43
\nmoans of the dove, and by night the screams of the hideous owl.
\nAll is gloom. The grave is at the door. And now, when weighed
\ndown by the pains and aches of old age, when the head inclines
\nto the feet, when the beginning and ending of human existence
\nmeet, and helpless infancy and painful old age combine
\ntogether\u2014at this time, this most needful time, the time for the
\nexercise of that tenderness and affection which children only
\ncan exercise towards a declining parent\u2014my poor old
\ngrandmother, the devoted mother of twelve children, is left all
\nalone, in yonder little hut, before a few dim embers. She
\nstands\u2014she sits\u2014she staggers\u2014she falls\u2014she groans\u2014she
\ndies\u2014and there are none of her children or grandchildren
\npresent, to wipe from her wrinkled brow the cold sweat of
\ndeath, or to place beneath the sod her fallen remains. Will not a
\nrighteous God visit for these things?
\nIn about two years after the death of Mrs. Lucretia, Master
\nThomas married his second wife. Her name was Rowena
\nHamilton. She was the eldest daughter of Mr. William
\nHamilton. Master now lived in St. Michael\u2019s. Not long after his
\nmarriage, a misunderstanding took place between himself and
\nMaster Hugh; and as a means of punishing his brother, he took
\nme from him to live with himself at St. Michael\u2019s. Here I
\nunderwent another most painful separation. It, however, was not
\nso severe as the one I dreaded at the division of property; for,
\nduring this interval, a great change had taken place in Master
\nHugh and his once kind and affectionate wife. The influence of
\nbrandy upon him, and of slavery upon her, had effected a
\ndisastrous change in the characters of both; so that, as far as
\nthey were concerned, I thought I had little to lose by the change.
\nBut it was not to them that I was attached. It was to those little
\nBaltimore boys that I felt the strongest attachment. I had
\nreceived many good lessons from them, and was still receiving
\nthem, and the thought of leaving them was painful indeed. I was
\n44 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nleaving, too, without the hope of ever being allowed to return.
\nMaster Thomas had said he would never let me return again.
\nThe barrier betwixt himself and brother he considered
\nimpassable.
\nI then had to regret that I did not at least make the attempt
\nto carry out my resolution to run away; for the chances of
\nsuccess are tenfold greater from the city than from the country.
\nI sailed from Baltimore for St. Michael\u2019s in the sloop
\nAmanda, Captain Edward Dodson. On my passage, I paid
\nparticular attention to the direction which the steamboats took to
\ngo to Philadelphia. I found, instead of going down, on reaching
\nNorth Point they went up the bay, in a north-easterly direction. I
\ndeemed this knowledge of the utmost importance. My
\ndetermination to run away was again revived. I resolved to wait
\nonly so long as the offering of a favorable opportunity. When
\nthat came, I was determined to be off.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 45
\nCHAPTER IX.
\nI HAVE now reached a period of my life when I can give
\ndates. I left Baltimore, and went to live with Master Thomas
\nAuld, at St. Michael\u2019s, in March, 1832. It was now more than
\nseven years since I lived with him in the family of my old
\nmaster, on Colonel Lloyd\u2019s plantation. We of course were now
\nalmost entire strangers to each other. He was to me a new
\nmaster, and I to him a new slave. I was ignorant of his temper
\nand disposition; he was equally so of mine. A very short time,
\nhowever, brought us into full acquaintance with each other. I
\nwas made acquainted with his wife not less than with himself.
\nThey were well matched, being equally mean and cruel. I was
\nnow, for the first time during a space of more than seven years,
\nmade to feel the painful gnawings of hunger\u2014a something
\nwhich I had not experienced before since I left Colonel Lloyd\u2019s
\nplantation. It went hard enough with me then, when I could look
\nback to no period at which I had enjoyed a sufficiency. It was
\ntenfold harder after living in Master Hugh\u2019s family, where I had
\nalways had enough to eat, and of that which was good. I have
\nsaid Master Thomas was a mean man. He was so. Not to give a
\nslave enough to eat, is regarded as the most aggravated
\ndevelopment of meanness even among slaveholders. The rule is,
\nno matter how coarse the food, only let there be enough of it.
\nThis is the theory; and in the part of Maryland from which I
\ncame, it is the general practice,\u2014though there are many
\nexceptions. Master Thomas gave us enough of neither coarse
\nnor fine food. There were four slaves of us in the kitchen\u2014my
\nsister Eliza, my aunt Priscilla, Henny, and myself; and we were
\nallowed less than a half of a bushel of corn-meal per week, and
\n46 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nvery little else, either in the shape of meat or vegetables. It was
\nnot enough for us to subsist upon. We were therefore reduced to
\nthe wretched necessity of living at the expense of our neighbors.
\nThis we did by begging and stealing, whichever came handy in
\nthe time of need, the one being considered as legitimate as the
\nother. A great many times have we poor creatures been nearly
\nperishing with hunger, when food in abundance lay mouldering
\nin the safe and smoke-house, and our pious mistress was aware
\nof the fact; and yet that mistress and her husband would kneel
\nevery morning, and pray that God would bless them in basket
\nand store!
\nBad as all slaveholders are, we seldom meet one destitute
\nof every element of character commanding respect. My master
\nwas one of this rare sort. I do not know of one single noble act
\never performed by him. The leading trait in his character was
\nmeanness; and if there were any other element in his nature, it
\nwas made subject to this. He was mean; and, like most other
\nmean men, he lacked the ability to conceal his meanness.
\nCaptain Auld was not born a slaveholder. He had been a poor
\nman, master only of a Bay craft. He came into possession of all
\nhis slaves by marriage; and of all men, adopted slaveholders are
\nthe worst. He was cruel, but cowardly. He commanded without
\nfirmness. In the enforcement of his rules, he was at times rigid,
\nand at times lax. At times, he spoke to his slaves with the
\nfirmness of Napoleon and the fury of a demon; at other times,
\nhe might well be mistaken for an inquirer who had lost his way.
\nHe did nothing of himself. He might have passed for a lion, but
\nfor his ears. In all things noble which he attempted, his own
\nmeanness shone most conspicuous. His airs, words, and actions,
\nwere the airs, words, and actions of born slaveholders, and,
\nbeing assumed, were awkward enough. He was not even a good
\nimitator. He possessed all the disposition to deceive, but wanted
\nthe power. Having no resources within himself, he was
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 47
\ncompelled to be the copyist of many, and being such, he was
\nforever the victim of inconsistency; and of consequence he was
\nan object of contempt, and was held as such even by his slaves.
\nThe luxury of having slaves of his own to wait upon him was
\nsomething new and unprepared for. He was a slaveholder
\nwithout the ability to hold slaves. He found himself incapable of
\nmanaging his slaves either by force, fear, or fraud. We seldom
\ncalled him \u201cmaster;\u201d we generally called him \u201cCaptain Auld,\u201d
\nand were hardly disposed to title him at all. I doubt not that our
\nconduct had much to do with making him appear awkward, and
\nof consequence fretful. Our want of reverence for him must
\nhave perplexed him greatly. He wished to have us call him
\nmaster, but lacked the firmness necessary to command us to do
\nso. His wife used to insist upon our calling him so, but to no
\npurpose. In August, 1832, my master attended a Methodist
\ncamp-meeting held in the Bay-side, Talbot county, and there
\nexperienced religion. I indulged a faint hope that his conversion
\nwould lead him to emancipate his slaves, and that, if he did not
\ndo this, it would, at any rate, make him more kind and humane.
\nI was disappointed in both these respects. It neither made him to
\nbe humane to his slaves, nor to emancipate them. If it had any
\neffect on his character, it made him more cruel and hateful in all
\nhis ways; for I believe him to have been a much worse man
\nafter his conversion than before. Prior to his conversion, he
\nrelied upon his own depravity to shield and sustain him in his
\nsavage barbarity; but after his conversion, he found religious
\nsanction and support for his slaveholding cruelty. He made the
\ngreatest pretensions to piety. His house was the house of prayer.
\nHe prayed morning, noon, and night. He very soon
\ndistinguished himself among his brethren, and was soon made a
\nclass-leader and exhorter. His activity in revivals was great, and
\nhe proved himself an instrument in the hands of the church in
\nconverting many souls. His house was the preachers\u2019 home.
\n48 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nThey used to take great pleasure in coming there to put up; for
\nwhile he starved us, he stuffed them. We have had three or four
\npreachers there at a time. The names of those who used to come
\nmost frequently while I lived there, were Mr. Storks, Mr.
\nEwery, Mr. Humphry, and Mr. Hickey. I have also seen Mr.
\nGeorge Cookman at our house. We slaves loved Mr. Cookman.
\nWe believed him to be a good man. We thought him
\ninstrumental in getting Mr. Samuel Harrison, a very rich
\nslaveholder, to emancipate his slaves; and by some means got
\nthe impression that he was laboring to effect the emancipation
\nof all the slaves. When he was at our house, we were sure to be
\ncalled in to prayers. When the others were there, we were
\nsometimes called in and sometimes not. Mr. Cookman took
\nmore notice of us than either of the other ministers. He could
\nnot come among us without betraying his sympathy for us, and,
\nstupid as we were, we had the sagacity to see it.
\nWhile I lived with my master in St. Michael\u2019s, there was a
\nwhite young man, a Mr. Wilson, who proposed to keep a
\nSabbath school for the instruction of such slaves as might be
\ndisposed to learn to read the New Testament. We met but three
\ntimes, when Mr. West and Mr. Fairbanks, both class-leaders,
\nwith many others, came upon us with sticks and other missiles,
\ndrove us off, and forbade us to meet again. Thus ended our little
\nSabbath school in the pious town of St. Michael\u2019s.
\nI have said my master found religious sanction for his
\ncruelty. As an example, I will state one of many facts going to
\nprove the charge. I have seen him tie up a lame young woman,
\nand whip her with a heavy cowskin upon her naked shoulders,
\ncausing the warm red blood to drip; and, in justification of the
\nbloody deed, he would quote this passage of Scripture\u2014\u201cHe
\nthat knoweth his master\u2019s will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten
\nwith many stripes.\u201d
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 49
\nMaster would keep this lacerated young woman tied up in
\nthis horrid situation four or five hours at a time. I have known
\nhim to tie her up early in the morning, and whip her before
\nbreakfast; leave her, go to his store, return at dinner, and whip
\nher again, cutting her in the places already made raw with his
\ncruel lash. The secret of master\u2019s cruelty toward \u201cHenny\u201d is
\nfound in the fact of her being almost helpless. When quite a
\nchild, she fell into the fire, and burned herself horribly. Her
\nhands were so burnt that she never got the use of them. She
\ncould do very little but bear heavy burdens. She was to master a
\nbill of expense; and as he was a mean man, she was a constant
\noffence to him. He seemed desirous of getting the poor girl out
\nof existence. He gave her away once to his sister; but, being a
\npoor gift, she was not disposed to keep her. Finally, my
\nbenevolent master, to use his own words, \u201cset her adrift to take
\ncare of herself.\u201d Here was a recently-converted man, holding on
\nupon the mother, and at the same time turning out her helpless
\nchild, to starve and die! Master Thomas was one of the many
\npious slaveholders who hold slaves for the very charitable
\npurpose of taking care of them.
\nMy master and myself had quite a number of differences.
\nHe found me unsuitable to his purpose. My city life, he said,
\nhad had a very pernicious effect upon me. It had almost ruined
\nme for every good purpose, and fitted me for every thing which
\nwas bad. One of my greatest faults was that of letting his horse
\nrun away, and go down to his father-in-law\u2019s farm, which was
\nabout five miles from St. Michael\u2019s. I would then have to go
\nafter it. My reason for this kind of carelessness, or carefulness,
\nwas, that I could always get something to eat when I went there.
\nMaster William Hamilton, my master\u2019s father-in-law, always
\ngave his slaves enough to eat. I never left there hungry, no
\nmatter how great the need of my speedy return. Master Thomas
\nat length said he would stand it no longer. I had lived with him
\n50 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nnine months, during which time he had given me a number of
\nsevere whippings, all to no good purpose. He resolved to put me
\nout, as he said, to be broken; and, for this purpose, he let me for
\none year to a man named Edward Covey. Mr. Covey was a poor
\nman, a farm-renter. He rented the place upon which he lived, as
\nalso the hands with which he tilled it. Mr. Covey had acquired a
\nvery high reputation for breaking young slaves, and this
\nreputation was of immense value to him. It enabled him to get
\nhis farm tilled with much less expense to himself than he could
\nhave had it done without such a reputation. Some slaveholders
\nthought it not much loss to allow Mr. Covey to have their slaves
\none year, for the sake of the training to which they were
\nsubjected, without any other compensation. He could hire
\nyoung help with great ease, in consequence of this reputation.
\nAdded to the natural good qualities of Mr. Covey, he was a
\nprofessor of religion\u2014a pious soul\u2014a member and a classleader in the Methodist church. All of this added weight to his
\nreputation as a \u201cnigger-breaker.\u201d I was aware of all the facts,
\nhaving been made acquainted with them by a young man who
\nhad lived there. I nevertheless made the change gladly; for I was
\nsure of getting enough to eat, which is not the smallest
\nconsideration to a hungry man.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 51
\nCHAPTER X.
\nI LEFT Master Thomas\u2019s house, and went to live with Mr.
\nCovey, on the 1st of January, 1833. I was now, for the first time
\nin my life, a field hand. In my new employment, I found myself
\neven more awkward than a country boy appeared to be in a
\nlarge city. I had been at my new home but one week before Mr.
\nCovey gave me a very severe whipping, cutting my back,
\ncausing the blood to run, and raising ridges on my flesh as large
\nas my little finger. The details of this affair are as follows: Mr.
\nCovey sent me, very early in the morning of one of our coldest
\ndays in the month of January, to the woods, to get a load of
\nwood. He gave me a team of unbroken oxen. He told me which
\nwas the in-hand ox, and which the off-hand one. He then tied
\nthe end of a large rope around the horns of the in-hand ox, and
\ngave me the other end of it, and told me, if the oxen started to
\nrun, that I must hold on upon the rope. I had never driven oxen
\nbefore, and of course I was very awkward. I, however,
\nsucceeded in getting to the edge of the woods with little
\ndifficulty; but I had got a very few rods into the woods, when
\nthe oxen took fright, and started full tilt, carrying the cart
\nagainst trees, and over stumps, in the most frightful manner. I
\nexpected every moment that my brains would be dashed out
\nagainst the trees. After running thus for a considerable distance,
\nthey finally upset the cart, dashing it with great force against a
\ntree, and threw themselves into a dense thicket. How I escaped
\ndeath, I do not know. There I was, entirely alone, in a thick
\nwood, in a place new to me. My cart was upset and shattered,
\nmy oxen were entangled among the young trees, and there was
\nnone to help me. After a long spell of effort, I succeeded in
\n52 NARRATIVE OF THE
\ngetting my cart righted, my oxen disentangled, and again yoked
\nto the cart. I now proceeded with my team to the place where I
\nhad, the day before, been chopping wood, and loaded my cart
\npretty heavily, thinking in this way to tame my oxen. I then
\nproceeded on my way home. I had now consumed one half of
\nthe day. I got out of the woods safely, and now felt out of
\ndanger. I stopped my oxen to open the woods gate; and just as I
\ndid so, before I could get hold of my ox-rope, the oxen again
\nstarted, rushed through the gate, catching it between the wheel
\nand the body of the cart, tearing it to pieces, and coming within
\na few inches of crushing me against the gate-post. Thus twice,
\nin one short day, I escaped death by the merest chance. On my
\nreturn, I told Mr. Covey what had happened, and how it
\nhappened. He ordered me to return to the woods again
\nimmediately. I did so, and he followed on after me. Just as I got
\ninto the woods, he came up and told me to stop my cart, and
\nthat he would teach me how to trifle away my time, and break
\ngates. He then went to a large gum-tree, and with his axe cut
\nthree large switches, and, after trimming them up neatly with
\nhis pocket-knife, he ordered me to take off my clothes. I made
\nhim no answer, but stood with my clothes on. He repeated his
\norder. I still made him no answer, nor did I move to strip
\nmyself. Upon this he rushed at me with the fierceness of a tiger,
\ntore off my clothes, and lashed me till he had worn out his
\nswitches, cutting me so savagely as to leave the marks visible
\nfor a long time after. This whipping was the first of a number
\njust like it, and for similar offences.
\nI lived with Mr. Covey one year. During the first six
\nmonths, of that year, scarce a week passed without his whipping
\nme. I was seldom free from a sore back. My awkwardness was
\nalmost always his excuse for whipping me. We were worked
\nfully up to the point of endurance. Long before day we were up,
\nour horses fed, and by the first approach of day we were off to
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 53
\nthe field with our hoes and ploughing teams. Mr. Covey gave us
\nenough to eat, but scarce time to eat it. We were often less than
\nfive minutes taking our meals. We were often in the field from
\nthe first approach of day till its last lingering ray had left us; and
\nat saving-fodder time, midnight often caught us in the field
\nbinding blades.
\nCovey would be out with us. The way he used to stand it,
\nwas this. He would spend the most of his afternoons in bed. He
\nwould then come out fresh in the evening, ready to urge us on
\nwith his words, example, and frequently with the whip. Mr.
\nCovey was one of the few slaveholders who could and did work
\nwith his hands. He was a hard-working man. He knew by
\nhimself just what a man or a boy could do. There was no
\ndeceiving him. His work went on in his absence almost as well
\nas in his presence; and he had the faculty of making us feel that
\nhe was ever present with us. This he did by surprising us. He
\nseldom approached the spot where we were at work openly, if
\nhe could do it secretly. He always aimed at taking us by
\nsurprise. Such was his cunning, that we used to call him, among
\nourselves, \u201cthe snake.\u201d When we were at work in the cornfield,
\nhe would sometimes crawl on his hands and knees to avoid
\ndetection, and all at once he would rise nearly in our midst, and
\nscream out, \u201cHa, ha! Come, come! Dash on, dash on!\u201d This
\nbeing his mode of attack, it was never safe to stop a single
\nminute. His comings were like a thief in the night. He appeared
\nto us as being ever at hand. He was under every tree, behind
\nevery stump, in every bush, and at every window, on the
\nplantation. He would sometimes mount his horse, as if bound to
\nSt. Michael\u2019s, a distance of seven miles, and in half an hour
\nafterwards you would see him coiled up in the corner of the
\nwood-fence, watching every motion of the slaves. He would, for
\nthis purpose, leave his horse tied up in the woods. Again, he
\nwould sometimes walk up to us, and give us orders as though he
\n54 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nwas upon the point of starting on a long journey, turn his back
\nupon us, and make as though he was going to the house to get
\nready; and, before he would get half way thither, he would turn
\nshort and crawl into a fence-corner, or behind some tree, and
\nthere watch us till the going down of the sun.
\nMr. Covey\u2019s forte consisted in his power to deceive. His
\nlife was devoted to planning and perpetrating the grossest
\ndeceptions. Every thing he possessed in the shape of learning or
\nreligion, he made conform to his disposition to deceive. He
\nseemed to think himself equal to deceiving the Almighty. He
\nwould make a short prayer in the morning, and a long prayer at
\nnight; and, strange as it may seem, few men would at times
\nappear more devotional than he. The exercises of his family
\ndevotions were always commenced with singing; and, as he was
\na very poor singer himself, the duty of raising the hymn
\ngenerally came upon me. He would read his hymn, and nod at
\nme to commence. I would at times do so; at others, I would not.
\nMy non-compliance would almost always produce much
\nconfusion. To show himself independent of me, he would start
\nand stagger through with his hymn in the most discordant
\nmanner. In this state of mind, he prayed with more than
\nordinary spirit. Poor man! such was his disposition, and success
\nat deceiving, I do verily believe that he sometimes deceived
\nhimself into the solemn belief, that he was a sincere worshipper
\nof the most high God; and this, too, at a time when he may be
\nsaid to have been guilty of compelling his woman slave to
\ncommit the sin of adultery. The facts in the case are these: Mr.
\nCovey was a poor man; he was just commencing in life; he was
\nonly able to buy one slave; and, shocking as is the fact, he
\nbought her, as he said, for a breeder. This woman was named
\nCaroline. Mr. Covey bought her from Mr. Thomas Lowe, about
\nsix miles from St. Michael\u2019s. She was a large, able-bodied
\nwoman, about twenty years old. She had already given birth to
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 55
\none child, which proved her to be just what he wanted. After
\nbuying her, he hired a married man of Mr. Samuel Harrison, to
\nlive with him one year; and him he used to fasten up with her
\nevery night! The result was, that, at the end of the year, the
\nmiserable woman gave birth to twins. At this result Mr. Covey
\nseemed to be highly pleased, both with the man and the
\nwretched woman. Such was his joy, and that of his wife, that
\nnothing they could do for Caroline during her confinement was
\ntoo good, or too hard, to be done. The children were regarded as
\nbeing quite an addition to his wealth.
\nIf at any one time of my life more than another, I was made
\nto drink the bitterest dregs of slavery, that time was during the
\nfirst six months of my stay with Mr. Covey. We were worked in
\nall weathers. It was never too hot or too cold; it could never
\nrain, blow, hail, or snow, too hard for us to work in the field.
\nWork, work, work, was scarcely more the order of the day than
\nof the night. The longest days were too short for him, and the
\nshortest nights too long for him. I was somewhat unmanageable
\nwhen I first went there, but a few months of this discipline
\ntamed me. Mr. Covey succeeded in breaking me. I was broken
\nin body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my
\nintellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the
\ncheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of
\nslavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a
\nbrute!
\nSunday was my only leisure time. I spent this in a sort of
\nbeast-like stupor, between sleep and wake, under some large
\ntree. At times I would rise up, a flash of energetic freedom
\nwould dart through my soul, accompanied with a faint beam of
\nhope, that flickered for a moment, and then vanished. I sank
\ndown again, mourning over my wretched condition. I was
\nsometimes prompted to take my life, and that of Covey, but was
\n56 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nprevented by a combination of hope and fear. My sufferings on
\nthis plantation seem now like a dream rather than a stern reality.
\nOur house stood within a few rods of the Chesapeake Bay,
\nwhose broad bosom was ever white with sails from every
\nquarter of the habitable globe. Those beautiful vessels, robed in
\npurest white, so delightful to the eye of freemen, were to me so
\nmany shrouded ghosts, to terrify and torment me with thoughts
\nof my wretched condition. I have often, in the deep stillness of a
\nsummer\u2019s Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty banks of that
\nnoble bay, and traced, with saddened heart and tearful eye, the
\ncountless number of sails moving off to the mighty ocean. The
\nsight of these always affected me powerfully. My thoughts
\nwould compel utterance; and there, with no audience but the
\nAlmighty, I would pour out my soul\u2019s complaint, in my rude
\nway, with an apostrophe to the moving multitude of ships:\u2014
\n\u201cYou are loosed from your moorings, and are free; I am
\nfast in my chains, and am a slave! You move merrily before the
\ngentle gale, and I sadly before the bloody whip! You are
\nfreedom\u2019s swift-winged angels, that fly round the world; I am
\nconfined in bands of iron! O that I were free! O, that I were on
\none of your gallant decks, and under your protecting wing!
\nAlas! betwixt me and you, the turbid waters roll. Go on, go on.
\nO that I could also go! Could I but swim! If I could fly! O, why
\nwas I born a man, of whom to make a brute! The glad ship is
\ngone; she hides in the dim distance. I am left in the hottest hell
\nof unending slavery. O God, save me! God, deliver me! Let me
\nbe free! Is there any God? Why am I a slave? I will run away. I
\nwill not stand it. Get caught, or get clear, I\u2019ll try it. I had as well
\ndie with ague as the fever. I have only one life to lose. I had as
\nwell be killed running as die standing. Only think of it; one
\nhundred miles straight north, and I am free! Try it? Yes! God
\nhelping me, I will. It cannot be that I shall live and die a slave. I
\nwill take to the water. This very bay shall yet bear me into
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 57
\nfreedom. The steamboats steered in a north-east course from
\nNorth Point. I will do the same; and when I get to the head of
\nthe bay, I will turn my canoe adrift, and walk straight through
\nDelaware into Pennsylvania. When I get there, I shall not be
\nrequired to have a pass; I can travel without being disturbed. Let
\nbut the first opportunity offer, and, come what will, I am off.
\nMeanwhile, I will try to bear up under the yoke. I am not the
\nonly slave in the world. Why should I fret? I can bear as much
\nas any of them. Besides, I am but a boy, and all boys are bound
\nto some one. It may be that my misery in slavery will only
\nincrease my happiness when I get free. There is a better day
\ncoming.\u201d
\nThus I used to think, and thus I used to speak to myself;
\ngoaded almost to madness at one moment, and at the next
\nreconciling myself to my wretched lot.
\nI have already intimated that my condition was much
\nworse, during the first six months of my stay at Mr. Covey\u2019s,
\nthan in the last six. The circumstances leading to the change in
\nMr. Covey\u2019s course toward me form an epoch in my humble
\nhistory. You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall
\nsee how a slave was made a man. On one of the hottest days of
\nthe month of August, 1833, Bill Smith, William Hughes, a slave
\nnamed Eli, and myself, were engaged in fanning wheat. Hughes
\nwas clearing the fanned wheat from before the fan. Eli was
\nturning, Smith was feeding, and I was carrying wheat to the fan.
\nThe work was simple, requiring strength rather than intellect;
\nyet, to one entirely unused to such work, it came very hard.
\nAbout three o\u2019clock of that day, I broke down; my strength
\nfailed me; I was seized with a violent aching of the head,
\nattended with extreme dizziness; I trembled in every limb.
\nFinding what was coming, I nerved myself up, feeling it would
\nnever do to stop work. I stood as long as I could stagger to the
\nhopper with grain. When I could stand no longer, I fell, and felt
\n58 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nas if held down by an immense weight. The fan of course
\nstopped; every one had his own work to do; and no one could
\ndo the work of the other, and have his own go on at the same
\ntime.
\nMr. Covey was at the house, about one hundred yards from
\nthe treading-yard where we were fanning. On hearing the fan
\nstop, he left immediately, and came to the spot where we were.
\nHe hastily inquired what the matter was. Bill answered that I
\nwas sick, and there was no one to bring wheat to the fan. I had
\nby this time crawled away under the side of the post and railfence by which the yard was enclosed, hoping to find relief by
\ngetting out of the sun. He then asked where I was. He was told
\nby one of the hands. He came to the spot, and, after looking at
\nme awhile, asked me what was the matter. I told him as well as
\nI could, for I scarce had strength to speak. He then gave me a
\nsavage kick in the side, and told me to get up. I tried to do so,
\nbut fell back in the attempt. He gave me another kick, and again
\ntold me to rise. I again tried, and succeeded in gaining my feet;
\nbut, stooping to get the tub with which I was feeding the fan, I
\nagain staggered and fell. While down in this situation, Mr.
\nCovey took up the hickory slat with which Hughes had been
\nstriking off the half-bushel measure, and with it gave me a
\nheavy blow upon the head, making a large wound, and the
\nblood ran freely; and with this again told me to get up. I made
\nno effort to comply, having now made up my mind to let him do
\nhis worst. In a short time after receiving this blow, my head
\ngrew better. Mr. Covey had now left me to my fate. At this
\nmoment I resolved, for the first time, to go to my master, enter a
\ncomplaint, and ask his protection. In order to do this, I must that
\nafternoon walk seven miles; and this, under the circumstances,
\nwas truly a severe undertaking. I was exceedingly feeble; made
\nso as much by the kicks and blows which I received, as by the
\nsevere fit of sickness to which I had been subjected. I, however,
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 59
\nwatched my chance, while Covey was looking in an opposite
\ndirection, and started for St. Michael\u2019s. I succeeded in getting a
\nconsiderable distance on my way to the woods, when Covey
\ndiscovered me, and called after me to come back, threatening
\nwhat he would do if I did not come. I disregarded both his calls
\nand his threats, and made my way to the woods as fast as my
\nfeeble state would allow; and thinking I might be overhauled by
\nhim if I kept the road, I walked through the woods, keeping far
\nenough from the road to avoid detection, and near enough to
\nprevent losing my way. I had not gone far before my little
\nstrength again failed me. I could go no farther. I fell down, and
\nlay for a considerable time. The blood was yet oozing from the
\nwound on my head. For a time I thought I should bleed to death;
\nand think now that I should have done so, but that the blood so
\nmatted my hair as to stop the wound. After lying there about
\nthree quarters of an hour, I nerved myself up again, and started
\non my way, through bogs and briers, barefooted and
\nbareheaded, tearing my feet sometimes at nearly every step; and
\nafter a journey of about seven miles, occupying some five hours
\nto perform it, I arrived at master\u2019s store. I then presented an
\nappearance enough to affect any but a heart of iron. From the
\ncrown of my head to my feet, I was covered with blood. My
\nhair was all clotted with dust and blood; my shirt was stiff with
\nblood. I suppose I looked like a man who had escaped a den of
\nwild beasts, and barely escaped them. In this state I appeared
\nbefore my master, humbly entreating him to interpose his
\nauthority for my protection. I told him all the circumstances as
\nwell as I could, and it seemed, as I spoke, at times to affect him.
\nHe would then walk the floor, and seek to justify Covey by
\nsaying he expected I deserved it. He asked me what I wanted. I
\ntold him, to let me get a new home; that as sure as I lived with
\nMr. Covey again, I should live with but to die with him; that
\nCovey would surely kill me; he was in a fair way for it. Master
\n60 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nThomas ridiculed the idea that there was any danger of Mr.
\nCovey\u2019s killing me, and said that he knew Mr. Covey; that he
\nwas a good man, and that he could not think of taking me from
\nhim; that, should he do so, he would lose the whole year\u2019s
\nwages; that I belonged to Mr. Covey for one year, and that I
\nmust go back to him, come what might; and that I must not
\ntrouble him with any more stories, or that he would himself get
\nhold of me. After threatening me thus, he gave me a very large
\ndose of salts, telling me that I might remain in St. Michael\u2019s that
\nnight, (it being quite late,) but that I must be off back to Mr.
\nCovey\u2019s early in the morning; and that if I did not, he would get
\nhold of me, which meant that he would whip me. I remained all
\nnight, and, according to his orders, I started off to Covey\u2019s in
\nthe morning, (Saturday morning,) wearied in body and broken
\nin spirit. I got no supper that night, or breakfast that morning. I
\nreached Covey\u2019s about nine o\u2019clock; and just as I was getting
\nover the fence that divided Mrs. Kemp\u2019s fields from ours, out
\nran Covey with his cowskin, to give me another whipping.
\nBefore he could reach me, I succeeded in getting to the
\ncornfield; and as the corn was very high, it afforded me the
\nmeans of hiding. He seemed very angry, and searched for me a
\nlong time. My behavior was altogether unaccountable. He
\nfinally gave up the chase, thinking, I suppose, that I must come
\nhome for something to eat; he would give himself no further
\ntrouble in looking for me. I spent that day mostly in the woods,
\nhaving the alternative before me,\u2014to go home and be whipped
\nto death, or stay in the woods and be starved to death. That
\nnight, I fell in with Sandy Jenkins, a slave with whom I was
\nsomewhat acquainted. Sandy had a free wife who lived about
\nfour miles from Mr. Covey\u2019s; and it being Saturday, he was on
\nhis way to see her. I told him my circumstances, and he very
\nkindly invited me to go home with him. I went home with him,
\nand talked this whole matter over, and got his advice as to what
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 61
\ncourse it was best for me to pursue. I found Sandy an old
\nadviser. He told me, with great solemnity, I must go back to
\nCovey; but that before I went, I must go with him into another
\npart of the woods, where there was a certain root, which, if I
\nwould take some of it with me, carrying it always on my right
\nside, would render it impossible for Mr. Covey, or any other
\nwhite man, to whip me. He said he had carried it for years; and
\nsince he had done so, he had never received a blow, and never
\nexpected to while he carried it. I at first rejected the idea, that
\nthe simple carrying of a root in my pocket would have any such
\neffect as he had said, and was not disposed to take it; but Sandy
\nimpressed the necessity with much earnestness, telling me it
\ncould do no harm, if it did no good. To please him, I at length
\ntook the root, and, according to his direction, carried it upon my
\nright side. This was Sunday morning. I immediately started for
\nhome; and upon entering the yard gate, out came Mr. Covey on
\nhis way to meeting. He spoke to me very kindly, bade me drive
\nthe pigs from a lot near by, and passed on towards the church.
\nNow, this singular conduct of Mr. Covey really made me begin
\nto think that there was something in the root which Sandy had
\ngiven me; and had it been on any other day than Sunday, I could
\nhave attributed the conduct to no other cause than the influence
\nof that root; and as it was, I was half inclined to think the root to
\nbe something more than I at first had taken it to be. All went
\nwell till Monday morning. On this morning, the virtue of the
\nroot was fully tested. Long before daylight, I was called to go
\nand rub, curry, and feed, the horses. I obeyed, and was glad to
\nobey. But whilst thus engaged, whilst in the act of throwing
\ndown some blades from the loft, Mr. Covey entered the stable
\nwith a long rope; and just as I was half out of the loft, he caught
\nhold of my legs, and was about tying me. As soon as I found
\nwhat he was up to, I gave a sudden spring, and as I did so, he
\nholding to my legs, I was brought sprawling on the stable floor.
\n62 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nMr. Covey seemed now to think he had me, and could do what
\nhe pleased; but at this moment\u2014from whence came the spirit I
\ndon\u2019t know\u2014I resolved to fight; and, suiting my action to the
\nresolution, I seized Covey hard by the throat; and as I did so, I
\nrose. He held on to me, and I to him. My resistance was so
\nentirely unexpected that Covey seemed taken all aback. He
\ntrembled like a leaf. This gave me assurance, and I held him
\nuneasy, causing the blood to run where I touched him with the
\nends of my fingers. Mr. Covey soon called out to Hughes for
\nhelp. Hughes came, and, while Covey held me, attempted to tie
\nmy right hand. While he was in the act of doing so, I watched
\nmy chance, and gave him a heavy kick close under the ribs.
\nThis kick fairly sickened Hughes, so that he left me in the hands
\nof Mr. Covey. This kick had the effect of not only weakening
\nHughes, but Covey also. When he saw Hughes bending over
\nwith pain, his courage quailed. He asked me if I meant to persist
\nin my resistance. I told him I did, come what might; that he had
\nused me like a brute for six months, and that I was determined
\nto be used so no longer. With that, he strove to drag me to a
\nstick that was lying just out of the stable door. He meant to
\nknock me down. But just as he was leaning over to get the stick,
\nI seized him with both hands by his collar, and brought him by a
\nsudden snatch to the ground. By this time, Bill came. Covey
\ncalled upon him for assistance. Bill wanted to know what he
\ncould do. Covey said, \u201cTake hold of him, take hold of him!\u201d
\nBill said his master hired him out to work, and not to help to
\nwhip me; so he left Covey and myself to fight our own battle
\nout. We were at it for nearly two hours. Covey at length let me
\ngo, puffing and blowing at a great rate, saying that if I had not
\nresisted, he would not have whipped me half so much. The truth
\nwas, that he had not whipped me at all. I considered him as
\ngetting entirely the worst end of the bargain; for he had drawn
\nno blood from me, but I had from him. The whole six months
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 63
\nafterwards, that I spent with Mr. Covey, he never laid the
\nweight of his finger upon me in anger. He would occasionally
\nsay, he didn\u2019t want to get hold of me again. \u201cNo,\u201d thought I,
\n\u201cyou need not; for you will come off worse than you did
\nbefore.\u201d
\nThis battle with Mr. Covey was the turning-point in my
\ncareer as a slave. It rekindled the few expiring embers of
\nfreedom, and revived within me a sense of my own manhood. It
\nrecalled the departed self-confidence, and inspired me again
\nwith a determination to be free. The gratification afforded by
\nthe triumph was a full compensation for whatever else might
\nfollow, even death itself. He only can understand the deep
\nsatisfaction which I experienced, who has himself repelled by
\nforce the bloody arm of slavery. I felt as I never felt before. It
\nwas a glorious resurrection, from the tomb of slavery, to the
\nheaven of freedom. My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice
\ndeparted, bold defiance took its place; and I now resolved that,
\nhowever long I might remain a slave in form, the day had
\npassed forever when I could be a slave in fact. I did not hesitate
\nto let it be known of me, that the white man who expected to
\nsucceed in whipping, must also succeed in killing me.
\nFrom this time I was never again what might be called
\nfairly whipped, though I remained a slave four years afterwards.
\nI had several fights, but was never whipped.
\nIt was for a long time a matter of surprise to me why Mr.
\nCovey did not immediately have me taken by the constable to
\nthe whipping-post, and there regularly whipped for the crime of
\nraising my hand against a white man in defence of myself. And
\nthe only explanation I can now think of does not entirely satisfy
\nme; but such as it is, I will give it. Mr. Covey enjoyed the most
\nunbounded reputation for being a first-rate overseer and negrobreaker. It was of considerable importance to him. That
\nreputation was at stake; and had he sent me\u2014a boy about
\n64 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nsixteen years old\u2014to the public whipping-post, his reputation
\nwould have been lost; so, to save his reputation, he suffered me
\nto go unpunished.
\nMy term of actual service to Mr. Edward Covey ended on
\nChristmas day, 1833. The days between Christmas and New
\nYear\u2019s day are allowed as holidays; and, accordingly, we were
\nnot required to perform any labor, more than to feed and take
\ncare of the stock. This time we regarded as our own, by the
\ngrace of our masters; and we therefore used or abused it nearly
\nas we pleased. Those of us who had families at a distance, were
\ngenerally allowed to spend the whole six days in their society.
\nThis time, however, was spent in various ways. The staid,
\nsober, thinking and industrious ones of our number would
\nemploy themselves in making corn-brooms, mats, horse-collars,
\nand baskets; and another class of us would spend the time in
\nhunting opossums, hares, and coons. But by far the larger part
\nengaged in such sports and merriments as playing ball,
\nwrestling, running foot-races, fiddling, dancing, and drinking
\nwhisky; and this latter mode of spending the time was by far the
\nmost agreeable to the feelings of our masters. A slave who
\nwould work during the holidays was considered by our masters
\nas scarcely deserving them. He was regarded as one who
\nrejected the favor of his master. It was deemed a disgrace not to
\nget drunk at Christmas; and he was regarded as lazy indeed,
\nwho had not provided himself with the necessary means, during
\nthe year, to get whisky enough to last him through Christmas.
\nFrom what I know of the effect of these holidays upon the
\nslave, I believe them to be among the most effective means in
\nthe hands of the slaveholder in keeping down the spirit of
\ninsurrection. Were the slaveholders at once to abandon this
\npractice, I have not the slightest doubt it would lead to an
\nimmediate insurrection among the slaves. These holidays serve
\nas conductors, or safety-valves, to carry off the rebellious spirit
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 65
\nof enslaved humanity. But for these, the slave would be forced
\nup to the wildest desperation; and woe betide the slaveholder,
\nthe day he ventures to remove or hinder the operation of those
\nconductors! I warn him that, in such an event, a spirit will go
\nforth in their midst, more to be dreaded than the most appalling
\nearthquake.
\nThe holidays are part and parcel of the gross fraud, wrong,
\nand inhumanity of slavery. They are professedly a custom
\nestablished by the benevolence of the slaveholders; but I
\nundertake to say, it is the result of selfishness, and one of the
\ngrossest frauds committed upon the down-trodden slave. They
\ndo not give the slaves this time because they would not like to
\nhave their work during its continuance, but because they know
\nit would be unsafe to deprive them of it. This will be seen by the
\nfact, that the slaveholders like to have their slaves spend those
\ndays just in such a manner as to make them as glad of their
\nending as of their beginning. Their object seems to be, to
\ndisgust their slaves with freedom, by plunging them into the
\nlowest depths of dissipation. For instance, the slaveholders not
\nonly like to see the slave drink of his own accord, but will adopt
\nvarious plans to make him drunk. One plan is, to make bets on
\ntheir slaves, as to who can drink the most whisky without
\ngetting drunk; and in this way they succeed in getting whole
\nmultitudes to drink to excess. Thus, when the slave asks for
\nvirtuous freedom, the cunning slaveholder, knowing his
\nignorance, cheats him with a dose of vicious dissipation, artfully
\nlabelled with the name of liberty. The most of us used to drink it
\ndown, and the result was just what might be supposed: many of
\nus were led to think that there was little to choose between
\nliberty and slavery. We felt, and very properly too, that we had
\nalmost as well be slaves to man as to rum. So, when the
\nholidays ended, we staggered up from the filth of our
\nwallowing, took a long breath, and marched to the field,\u2014
\n66 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nfeeling, upon the whole, rather glad to go, from what our master
\nhad deceived us into a belief was freedom, back to the arms of
\nslavery.
\nI have said that this mode of treatment is a part of the
\nwhole system of fraud and inhumanity of slavery. It is so. The
\nmode here adopted to disgust the slave with freedom, by
\nallowing him to see only the abuse of it, is carried out in other
\nthings. For instance, a slave loves molasses; he steals some. His
\nmaster, in many cases, goes off to town, and buys a large
\nquantity; he returns, takes his whip, and commands the slave to
\neat the molasses, until the poor fellow is made sick at the very
\nmention of it. The same mode is sometimes adopted to make the
\nslaves refrain from asking for more food than their regular
\nallowance. A slave runs through his allowance, and applies for
\nmore. His master is enraged at him; but, not willing to send him
\noff without food, gives him more than is necessary, and
\ncompels him to eat it within a given time. Then, if he complains
\nthat he cannot eat it, he is said to be satisfied neither full nor
\nfasting, and is whipped for being hard to please! I have an
\nabundance of such illustrations of the same principle, drawn
\nfrom my own observation, but think the cases I have cited
\nsufficient. The practice is a very common one.
\nOn the first of January, 1834, I left Mr. Covey, and went to
\nlive with Mr. William Freeland, who lived about three miles
\nfrom St. Michael\u2019s. I soon found Mr. Freeland a very different
\nman from Mr. Covey. Though not rich, he was what would be
\ncalled an educated southern gentleman. Mr. Covey, as I have
\nshown, was a well-trained negro-breaker and slave-driver. The
\nformer (slaveholder though he was) seemed to possess some
\nregard for honor, some reverence for justice, and some respect
\nfor humanity. The latter seemed totally insensible to all such
\nsentiments. Mr. Freeland had many of the faults peculiar to
\nslaveholders, such as being very passionate and fretful; but I
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 67
\nmust do him the justice to say, that he was exceedingly free
\nfrom those degrading vices to which Mr. Covey was constantly
\naddicted. The one was open and frank, and we always knew
\nwhere to find him. The other was a most artful deceiver, and
\ncould be understood only by such as were skilful enough to
\ndetect his cunningly-devised frauds. Another advantage I gained
\nin my new master was, he made no pretensions to, or profession
\nof, religion; and this, in my opinion, was truly a great
\nadvantage. I assert most unhesitatingly, that the religion of the
\nsouth is a mere covering for the most horrid crimes,\u2014a justifier
\nof the most appalling barbarity,\u2014a sanctifier of the most hateful
\nfrauds,\u2014and a dark shelter under, which the darkest, foulest,
\ngrossest, and most infernal deeds of slaveholders find the
\nstrongest protection. Were I to be again reduced to the chains of
\nslavery, next to that enslavement, I should regard being the
\nslave of a religious master the greatest calamity that could befall
\nme. For of all slaveholders with whom I have ever met,
\nreligious slaveholders are the worst. I have ever found them the
\nmeanest and basest, the most cruel and cowardly, of all others.
\nIt was my unhappy lot not only to belong to a religious
\nslaveholder, but to live in a community of such religionists.
\nVery near Mr. Freeland lived the Rev. Daniel Weeden, and in
\nthe same neighborhood lived the Rev. Rigby Hopkins. These
\nwere members and ministers in the Reformed Methodist
\nChurch. Mr. Weeden owned, among others, a woman slave,
\nwhose name I have forgotten. This woman\u2019s back, for weeks,
\nwas kept literally raw, made so by the lash of this merciless,
\nreligious wretch. He used to hire hands. His maxim was,
\nBehave well or behave ill, it is the duty of a master occasionally
\nto whip a slave, to remind him of his master\u2019s authority. Such
\nwas his theory, and such his practice.
\nMr. Hopkins was even worse than Mr. Weeden. His chief
\nboast was his ability to manage slaves. The peculiar feature of
\n68 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nhis government was that of whipping slaves in advance of
\ndeserving it. He always managed to have one or more of his
\nslaves to whip every Monday morning. He did this to alarm
\ntheir fears, and strike terror into those who escaped. His plan
\nwas to whip for the smallest offences, to prevent the
\ncommission of large ones. Mr. Hopkins could always find some
\nexcuse for whipping a slave. It would astonish one,
\nunaccustomed to a slaveholding life, to see with what wonderful
\nease a slaveholder can find things, of which to make occasion to
\nwhip a slave. A mere look, word, or motion,\u2014a mistake,
\naccident, or want of power,\u2014are all matters for which a slave
\nmay be whipped at any time. Does a slave look dissatisfied? It
\nis said, he has the devil in him, and it must be whipped out.
\nDoes he speak loudly when spoken to by his master? Then he is
\ngetting high-minded, and should be taken down a button-hole
\nlower. Does he forget to pull off his hat at the approach of a
\nwhite person? Then he is wanting in reverence, and should be
\nwhipped for it. Does he ever venture to vindicate his conduct,
\nwhen censured for it? Then he is guilty of impudence,\u2014one of
\nthe greatest crimes of which a slave can be guilty. Does he ever
\nventure to suggest a different mode of doing things from that
\npointed out by his master? He is indeed presumptuous, and
\ngetting above himself; and nothing less than a flogging will do
\nfor him. Does he, while ploughing, break a plough,\u2014or, while
\nhoeing, break a hoe? It is owing to his carelessness, and for it a
\nslave must always be whipped. Mr. Hopkins could always find
\nsomething of this sort to justify the use of the lash, and he
\nseldom failed to embrace such opportunities. There was not a
\nman in the whole county, with whom the slaves who had the
\ngetting their own home, would not prefer to live, rather than
\nwith this Rev. Mr. Hopkins. And yet there was not a man any
\nwhere round, who made higher professions of religion, or was
\nmore active in revivals,\u2014more attentive to the class, love-feast,
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 69
\nprayer and preaching meetings, or more devotional in his
\nfamily,\u2014that prayed earlier, later, louder, and longer,\u2014than
\nthis same reverend slave-driver, Rigby Hopkins.
\nBut to return to Mr. Freeland, and to my experience while
\nin his employment. He, like Mr. Covey, gave us enough to eat;
\nbut, unlike Mr. Covey, he also gave us sufficient time to take
\nour meals. He worked us hard, but always between sunrise and
\nsunset. He required a good deal of work to be done, but gave us
\ngood tools with which to work. His farm was large, but he
\nemployed hands enough to work it, and with ease, compared
\nwith many of his neighbors. My treatment, while in his
\nemployment, was heavenly, compared with what I experienced
\nat the hands of Mr. Edward Covey.
\nMr. Freeland was himself the owner of but two slaves.
\nTheir names were Henry Harris and John Harris. The rest of his
\nhands he hired. These consisted of myself, Sandy Jenkins,
\n*
\nand
\nHandy Caldwell. Henry and John were quite intelligent, and in a
\nvery little while after I went there, I succeeded in creating in
\nthem a strong desire to learn how to read. This desire soon
\nsprang up in the others also. They very soon mustered up some
\nold spelling-books, and nothing would do but that I must keep a
\nSabbath school. I agreed to do so, and accordingly devoted my
\nSundays to teaching these my loved fellow-slaves how to read.
\nNeither of them knew his letters when I went there. Some of the
\nslaves of the neighboring farms found what was going on, and
\nalso availed themselves of this little opportunity to learn to read.
\nIt was understood, among all who came, that there must be as
\n*
\nThis is the same man who gave me the roots to prevent my being
\nwhipped by Mr. Covey. He was \u201ca clever soul.\u201d We used frequently to talk
\nabout the fight with Covey, and as often as we did so, he would claim my
\nsuccess as the result of the roots which he gave me. This superstition is very
\ncommon among the more ignorant slaves. A slave seldom dies but that his
\ndeath is attributed to trickery.
\n70 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nlittle display about it as possible. It was necessary to keep our
\nreligious masters at St. Michael\u2019s unacquainted with the fact,
\nthat, instead of spending the Sabbath in wrestling, boxing, and
\ndrinking whisky, we were trying to learn how to read the will of
\nGod; for they had much rather see us engaged in those
\ndegrading sports, than to see us behaving like intellectual,
\nmoral, and accountable beings. My blood boils as I think of the
\nbloody manner in which Messrs. Wright Fairbanks and
\nGarrison West, both class-leaders, in connection with many
\nothers, rushed in upon us with sticks and stones, and broke up
\nour virtuous little Sabbath school, at St. Michael\u2019s\u2014all calling
\nthemselves Christians! humble followers of the Lord Jesus
\nChrist! But I am again digressing.
\nI held my Sabbath school at the house of a free colored
\nman, whose name I deem it imprudent to mention; for should it
\nbe known, it might embarrass him greatly, though the crime of
\nholding the school was committed ten years ago. I had at one
\ntime over forty scholars, and those of the right sort, ardently
\ndesiring to learn. They were of all ages, though mostly men and
\nwomen. I look back to those Sundays with an amount of
\npleasure not to be expressed. They were great days to my soul.
\nThe work of instructing my dear fellow-slaves was the sweetest
\nengagement with which I was ever blessed. We loved each
\nother, and to leave them at the close of the Sabbath was a severe
\ncross indeed. When I think that these precious souls are to-day
\nshut up in the prison-house of slavery, my feelings overcome
\nme, and I am almost ready to ask, \u201cDoes a righteous God
\ngovern the universe? and for what does he hold the thunders in
\nhis right hand, if not to smite the oppressor, and deliver the
\nspoiled out of the hand of the spoiler?\u201d These dear souls came
\nnot to Sabbath school because it was popular to do so, nor did I
\nteach them because it was reputable to be thus engaged. Every
\nmoment they spent in that school, they were liable to be taken
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 71
\nup, and given thirty-nine lashes. They came because they
\nwished to learn. Their minds had been starved by their cruel
\nmasters. They had been shut up in mental darkness. I taught
\nthem, because it was the delight of my soul to be doing
\nsomething that looked like bettering the condition of my race. I
\nkept up my school nearly the whole year I lived with Mr.
\nFreeland; and, beside my Sabbath school, I devoted three
\nevenings in the week, during the winter, to teaching the slaves
\nat home. And I have the happiness to know, that several of
\nthose who came to Sabbath school learned how to read; and that
\none, at least, is now free through my agency.
\nThe year passed off smoothly. It seemed only about half as
\nlong as the year which preceded it. I went through it without
\nreceiving a single blow. I will give Mr. Freeland the credit of
\nbeing the best master I ever had, till I became my own master.
\nFor the ease with which I passed the year, I was, however,
\nsomewhat indebted to the society of my fellow-slaves. They
\nwere noble souls; they not only possessed loving hearts, but
\nbrave ones. We were linked and interlinked with each other. I
\nloved them with a love stronger than any thing I have
\nexperienced since. It is sometimes said that we slaves do not
\nlove and confide in each other. In answer to this assertion, I can
\nsay, I never loved any or confided in any people more than my
\nfellow-slaves, and especially those with whom I lived at Mr.
\nFreeland\u2019s. I believe we would have died for each other. We
\nnever undertook to do any thing, of any importance, without a
\nmutual consultation. We never moved separately. We were one;
\nand as much so by our tempers and dispositions, as by the
\nmutual hardships to which we were necessarily subjected by our
\ncondition as slaves.
\nAt the close of the year 1834, Mr. Freeland again hired me
\nof my master, for the year 1835. But, by this time, I began to
\nwant to live upon free land as well as with Freeland; and I was
\n72 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nno longer content, therefore, to live with him or any other
\nslaveholder. I began, with the commencement of the year, to
\nprepare myself for a final struggle, which should decide my fate
\none way or the other. My tendency was upward. I was fast
\napproaching manhood, and year after year had passed, and I
\nwas still a slave. These thoughts roused me\u2014I must do
\nsomething. I therefore resolved that 1835 should not pass
\nwithout witnessing an attempt, on my part, to secure my liberty.
\nBut I was not willing to cherish this determination alone. My
\nfellow-slaves were dear to me. I was anxious to have them
\nparticipate with me in this, my life-giving determination. I
\ntherefore, though with great prudence, commenced early to
\nascertain their views and feelings in regard to their condition,
\nand to imbue their minds with thoughts of freedom. I bent
\nmyself to devising ways and means for our escape, and
\nmeanwhile strove, on all fitting occasions, to impress them with
\nthe gross fraud and inhumanity of slavery. I went first to Henry,
\nnext to John, then to the others. I found, in them all, warm
\nhearts and noble spirits. They were ready to hear, and ready to
\nact when a feasible plan should be proposed. This was what I
\nwanted. I talked to them of our want of manhood, if we
\nsubmitted to our enslavement without at least one noble effort
\nto be free. We met often, and consulted frequently, and told our
\nhopes and fears, recounted the difficulties, real and imagined,
\nwhich we should be called on to meet. At times we were almost
\ndisposed to give up, and try to content ourselves with our
\nwretched lot; at others, we were firm and unbending in our
\ndetermination to go. Whenever we suggested any plan, there
\nwas shrinking\u2014the odds were fearful. Our path was beset with
\nthe greatest obstacles; and if we succeeded in gaining the end of
\nit, our right to be free was yet questionable\u2014we were yet liable
\nto be returned to bondage. We could see no spot, this side of the
\nocean, where we could be free. We knew nothing about Write my essay for me – CA Essay writer Canada.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 73
\nOur knowledge of the north did not extend farther than New
\nYork; and to go there, and be forever harassed with the frightful
\nliability of being returned to slavery\u2014with the certainty of
\nbeing treated tenfold worse than before\u2014the thought was truly
\na horrible one, and one which it was not easy to overcome. The
\ncase sometimes stood thus: At every gate through which we
\nwere to pass, we saw a watchman\u2014at every ferry a guard\u2014on
\nevery bridge a sentinel\u2014and in every wood a patrol. We were
\nhemmed in upon every side. Here were the difficulties, real or
\nimagined\u2014the good to be sought, and the evil to be shunned.
\nOn the one hand, there stood slavery, a stern reality, glaring
\nfrightfully upon us,\u2014its robes already crimsoned with the blood
\nof millions, and even now feasting itself greedily upon our own
\nflesh. On the other hand, away back in the dim distance, under
\nthe flickering light of the north star, behind some craggy hill or
\nsnow-covered mountain, stood a doubtful freedom\u2014half
\nfrozen\u2014beckoning us to come and share its hospitality. This in
\nitself was sometimes enough to stagger us; but when we
\npermitted ourselves to survey the road, we were frequently
\nappalled. Upon either side we saw grim death, assuming the
\nmost horrid shapes. Now it was starvation, causing us to eat our
\nown flesh;\u2014now we were contending with the waves, and were
\ndrowned;\u2014now we were overtaken, and torn to pieces by the
\nfangs of the terrible bloodhound. We were stung by scorpions,
\nchased by wild beasts, bitten by snakes, and finally, after having
\nnearly reached the desired spot,\u2014after swimming rivers,
\nencountering wild beasts, sleeping in the woods, suffering
\nhunger and nakedness,\u2014we were overtaken by our pursuers,
\nand, in our resistance, we were shot dead upon the spot! I say,
\nthis picture sometimes appalled us, and made us
\n\u201crather bear those ills we had,
\nThan fly to others, that we knew not of.\u201d
\n74 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nIn coming to a fixed determination to run away, we did
\nmore than Patrick Henry, when he resolved upon liberty or
\ndeath. With us it was a doubtful liberty at most, and almost
\ncertain death if we failed. For my part, I should prefer death to
\nhopeless bondage.
\nSandy, one of our number, gave up the notion, but still
\nencouraged us. Our company then consisted of Henry Harris,
\nJohn Harris, Henry Bailey, Charles Roberts, and myself. Henry
\nBailey was my uncle, and belonged to my master. Charles
\nmarried my aunt: he belonged to my master\u2019s father-in-law, Mr.
\nWilliam Hamilton.
\nThe plan we finally concluded upon was, to get a large
\ncanoe belonging to Mr. Hamilton, and upon the Saturday night
\nprevious to Easter holidays, paddle directly up the Chesapeake
\nBay. On our arrival at the head of the bay, a distance of seventy
\nor eighty miles from where we lived, it was our purpose to turn
\nour canoe adrift, and follow the guidance of the north star till
\nwe got beyond the limits of Maryland. Our reason for taking the
\nwater route was, that we were less liable to be suspected as
\nrunaways; we hoped to be regarded as fishermen; whereas, if
\nwe should take the land route, we should be subjected to
\ninterruptions of almost every kind. Any one having a white
\nface, and being so disposed, could stop us, and subject us to
\nexamination.
\nThe week before our intended start, I wrote several
\nprotections, one for each of us. As well as I can remember, they
\nwere in the following words, to wit:\u2014
\n\u201cTHIS is to certify that I, the undersigned, have given the
\nbearer, my servant, full liberty to go to Baltimore, and spend the
\nEaster holidays. Written with mine own hand, &c., 1835.
\n\u201cWILLIAM HAMILTON,
\n\u201cNear St. Michael\u2019s, in Talbot county, Maryland.\u201d
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 75
\nWe were not going to Baltimore; but, in going up the bay,
\nwe went toward Baltimore, and these protections were only
\nintended to protect us while on the bay.
\nAs the time drew near for our departure, our anxiety
\nbecame more and more intense. It was truly a matter of life and
\ndeath with us. The strength of our determination was about to
\nbe fully tested. At this time, I was very active in explaining
\nevery difficulty, removing every doubt, dispelling every fear,
\nand inspiring all with the firmness indispensable to success in
\nour undertaking; assuring them that half was gained the instant
\nwe made the move; we had talked long enough; we were now
\nready to move; if not now, we never should be; and if we did
\nnot intend to move now, we had as well fold our arms, sit down,
\nand acknowledge ourselves fit only to be slaves. This, none of
\nus were prepared to acknowledge. Every man stood firm; and at
\nour last meeting, we pledged ourselves afresh, in the most
\nsolemn manner, that, at the time appointed, we would certainly
\nstart in pursuit of freedom. This was in the middle of the week,
\nat the end of which we were to be off. We went, as usual, to our
\nseveral fields of labor, but with bosoms highly agitated with
\nthoughts of our truly hazardous undertaking. We tried to
\nconceal our feelings as much as possible; and I think we
\nsucceeded very well.
\nAfter a painful waiting, the Saturday morning, whose night
\nwas to witness our departure, came. I hailed it with joy, bring
\nwhat of sadness it might. Friday night was a sleepless one for
\nme. I probably felt more anxious than the rest, because I was, by
\ncommon consent, at the head of the whole affair. The
\nresponsibility of success or failure lay heavily upon me. The
\nglory of the one, and the confusion of the other, were alike
\nmine. The first two hours of that morning were such as I never
\nexperienced before, and hope never to again. Early in the
\nmorning, we went, as usual, to the field. We were spreading
\n76 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nmanure; and all at once, while thus engaged, I was
\noverwhelmed with an indescribable feeling, in the fulness of
\nwhich I turned to Sandy, who was near by, and said, \u201cWe are
\nbetrayed!\u201d \u201cWell,\u201d said he, \u201cthat thought has this moment
\nstruck me.\u201d We said no more. I was never more certain of any
\nthing.
\nThe horn was blown as usual, and we went up from the
\nfield to the house for breakfast. I went for the form, more than
\nfor want of any thing to eat that morning. Just as I got to the
\nhouse, in looking out at the lane gate, I saw four white men,
\nwith two colored men. The white men were on horseback, and
\nthe colored ones were walking behind, as if tied. I watched them
\na few moments till they got up to our lane gate. Here they
\nhalted, and tied the colored men to the gate-post. I was not yet
\ncertain as to what the matter was. In a few moments, in rode
\nMr. Hamilton, with a speed betokening great excitement. He
\ncame to the door, and inquired if Master William was in. He
\nwas told he was at the barn. Mr. Hamilton, without
\ndismounting, rode up to the barn with extraordinary speed. In a
\nfew moments, he and Mr. Freeland returned to the house. By
\nthis time, the three constables rode up, and in great haste
\ndismounted, tied their horses, and met Master William and Mr.
\nHamilton returning from the barn; and after talking awhile, they
\nall walked up to the kitchen door. There was no one in the
\nkitchen but myself and John. Henry and Sandy were up at the
\nbarn. Mr. Freeland put his head in at the door, and called me by
\nname, saying, there were some gentlemen at the door who
\nwished to see me. I stepped to the door, and inquired what they
\nwanted. They at once seized me, and, without giving me any
\nsatisfaction, tied me\u2014lashing my hands closely together. I
\ninsisted upon knowing what the matter was. They at length said,
\nthat they had learned I had been in a \u201cscrape,\u201d and that I was to
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 77
\nbe examined before my master; and if their information proved
\nfalse, I should not be hurt.
\nIn a few moments, they succeeded in tying John. They then
\nturned to Henry, who had by this time returned, and
\ncommanded him to cross his hands. \u201cI won\u2019t!\u201d said Henry, in a
\nfirm tone, indicating his readiness to meet the consequences of
\nhis refusal. \u201cWon\u2019t you?\u201d said Tom Graham, the constable.
\n\u201cNo, I won\u2019t!\u201d said Henry, in a still stronger tone. With this,
\ntwo of the constables pulled out their shining pistols, and swore,
\nby their Creator, that they would make him cross his hands or
\nkill him. Each cocked his pistol, and, with fingers on the trigger,
\nwalked up to Henry, saying, at the same time, if he did not cross
\nhis hands, they would blow his damned heart out. \u201cShoot me,
\nshoot me!\u201d said Henry; \u201cyou can\u2019t kill me but once. Shoot,
\nshoot,\u2014and be damned! I won\u2019t be tied!\u201d This he said in a tone
\nof loud defiance; and at the same time, with a motion as quick
\nas lightning, he with one single stroke dashed the pistols from
\nthe hand of each constable. As he did this, all hands fell upon
\nhim, and, after beating him some time, they finally overpowered
\nhim, and got him tied.
\nDuring the scuffle, I managed, I know not how, to get my
\npass out, and, without being discovered, put it into the fire. We
\nwere all now tied; and just as we were to leave for Easton jail,
\nBetsy Freeland, mother of William Freeland, came to the door
\nwith her hands full of biscuits, and divided them between Henry
\nand John. She then delivered herself of a speech, to the
\nfollowing effect:\u2014addressing herself to me, she said, \u201cYou
\ndevil! You yellow devil! it was you that put it into the heads of
\nHenry and John to run away. But for you, you long-legged
\nmulatto devil! Henry nor John would never have thought of
\nsuch a thing.\u201d I made no reply, and was immediately hurried off
\ntowards St. Michael\u2019s. Just a moment previous to the scuffle
\nwith Henry, Mr. Hamilton suggested the propriety of making a
\n78 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nsearch for the protections which he had understood Frederick
\nhad written for himself and the rest. But, just at the moment he
\nwas about carrying his proposal into effect, his aid was needed
\nin helping to tie Henry; and the excitement attending the scuffle
\ncaused them either to forget, or to deem it unsafe, under the
\ncircumstances, to search. So we were not yet convicted of the
\nintention to run away.
\nWhen we got about half way to St. Michael\u2019s, while the
\nconstables having us in charge were looking ahead, Henry
\ninquired of me what he should do with his pass. I told him to eat
\nit with his biscuit, and own nothing; and we passed the word
\naround, \u201cOwn nothing;\u201d and \u201cOwn nothing!\u201d said we all. Our
\nconfidence in each other was unshaken. We were resolved to
\nsucceed or fail together, after the calamity had befallen us as
\nmuch as before. We were now prepared for any thing. We were
\nto be dragged that morning fifteen miles behind horses, and then
\nto be placed in the Easton jail. When we reached St. Michael\u2019s,
\nwe underwent a sort of examination. We all denied that we ever
\nintended to run away. We did this more to bring out the
\nevidence against us, than from any hope of getting clear of
\nbeing sold; for, as I have said, we were ready for that. The fact
\nwas, we cared but little where we went, so we went together.
\nOur greatest concern was about separation. We dreaded that
\nmore than any thing this side of death. We found the evidence
\nagainst us to be the testimony of one person; our master would
\nnot tell who it was; but we came to a unanimous decision
\namong ourselves as to who their informant was. We were sent
\noff to the jail at Easton. When we got there, we were delivered
\nup to the sheriff, Mr. Joseph Graham, and by him placed in jail.
\nHenry, John, and myself, were placed in one room together\u2014
\nCharles, and Henry Bailey, in another. Their object in
\nseparating us was to hinder concert.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 79
\nWe had been in jail scarcely twenty minutes, when a swarm
\nof slave traders, and agents for slave traders, flocked into jail to
\nlook at us, and to ascertain if we were for sale. Such a set of
\nbeings I never saw before! I felt myself surrounded by so many
\nfiends from perdition. A band of pirates never looked more like
\ntheir father, the devil. They laughed and grinned over us,
\nsaying, \u201cAh, my boys! we have got you, haven\u2019t we?\u201d And after
\ntaunting us in various ways, they one by one went into an
\nexamination of us, with intent to ascertain our value. They
\nwould impudently ask us if we would not like to have them for
\nour masters. We would make them no answer, and leave them
\nto find out as best they could. Then they would curse and swear
\nat us, telling us that they could take the devil out of us in a very
\nlittle while, if we were only in their hands.
\nWhile in jail, we found ourselves in much more
\ncomfortable quarters than we expected when we went there. We
\ndid not get much to eat, nor that which was very good; but we
\nhad a good clean room, from the windows of which we could
\nsee what was going on in the street, which was very much better
\nthan though we had been placed in one of the dark, damp cells.
\nUpon the whole, we got along very well, so far as the jail and its
\nkeeper were concerned. Immediately after the holidays were
\nover, contrary to all our expectations, Mr. Hamilton and Mr.
\nFreeland came up to Easton, and took Charles, the two Henrys,
\nand John, out of jail, and carried them home, leaving me alone.
\nI regarded this separation as a final one. It caused me more pain
\nthan any thing else in the whole transaction. I was ready for any
\nthing rather than separation. I supposed that they had consulted
\ntogether, and had decided that, as I was the whole cause of the
\nintention of the others to run away, it was hard to make the
\ninnocent suffer with the guilty; and that they had, therefore,
\nconcluded to take the others home, and sell me, as a warning to
\nthe others that remained. It is due to the noble Henry to say, he
\n80 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nseemed almost as reluctant at leaving the prison as at leaving
\nhome to come to the prison. But we knew we should, in all
\nprobability, be separated, if we were sold; and since he was in
\ntheir hands, he concluded to go peaceably home.
\nI was now left to my fate. I was all alone, and within the
\nwalls of a stone prison. But a few days before, and I was full of
\nhope. I expected to have been safe in a land of freedom; but
\nnow I was covered with gloom, sunk down to the utmost
\ndespair. I thought the possibility of freedom was gone. I was
\nkept in this way about one week, at the end of which, Captain
\nAuld, my master, to my surprise and utter astonishment, came
\nup, and took me out, with the intention of sending me, with a
\ngentleman of his acquaintance, into Alabama. But, from some
\ncause or other, he did not send me to Alabama, but concluded to
\nsend me back to Baltimore, to live again with his brother Hugh,
\nand to learn a trade.
\nThus, after an absence of three years and one month, I was
\nonce more permitted to return to my old home at Baltimore. My
\nmaster sent me away, because there existed against me a very
\ngreat prejudice in the community, and he feared I might be
\nkilled.
\nIn a few weeks after I went to Baltimore, Master Hugh
\nhired me to Mr. William Gardner, an extensive ship-builder, on
\nFell\u2019s Point. I was put there to learn how to calk. It, however,
\nproved a very unfavorable place for the accomplishment of this
\nobject. Mr. Gardner was engaged that spring in building two
\nlarge man-of-war brigs, professedly for the Mexican
\ngovernment. The vessels were to be launched in the July of that
\nyear, and in failure thereof, Mr. Gardner was to lose a
\nconsiderable sum; so that when I entered, all was hurry. There
\nwas no time to learn any thing. Every man had to do that which
\nhe knew how to do. In entering the shipyard, my orders from
\nMr. Gardner were, to do whatever the carpenters commanded
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 81
\nme to do. This was placing me at the beck and call of about
\nseventy-five men. I was to regard all these as masters. Their
\nword was to be my law. My situation was a most trying one. At
\ntimes I needed a dozen pair of hands. I was called a dozen ways
\nin the space of a single minute. Three or four voices would
\nstrike my ear at the same moment. It was\u2014\u201cFred., come help
\nme to cant this timber here.\u201d\u2014 \u201cFred., come carry this timber
\nyonder.\u201d\u2014\u201cFred., bring that roller here.\u201d\u2014\u201cFred., go get a
\nfresh can of water.\u201d\u2014\u201cFred., come help saw off the end of this
\ntimber.\u201d\u2014\u201cFred., go quick, and get the crowbar.\u201d\u2014 \u201cFred.,
\nhold on the end of this fall.\u201d\u2014\u201cFred., go to the blacksmith\u2019s
\nshop, and get a new punch.\u201d\u2014\u201cHurra, Fred.! run and bring me
\na cold chisel.\u201d\u2014\u201cI say, Fred., bear a hand, and get up a fire as
\nquick as lightning under that steam-box.\u201d\u2014\u201cHalloo, nigger!
\ncome, turn this grindstone.\u201d\u2014\u201cCome, come! move, move! and
\nbowse this timber forward.\u201d\u2014\u201cI say, darky, blast your eyes,
\nwhy don\u2019t you heat up some pitch?\u201d\u2014\u201cHalloo! halloo! halloo!\u201d
\n(Three voices at the same time.) \u201cCome here!\u2014Go there!\u2014
\nHold on where you are! Damn you, if you move, I\u2019ll knock your
\nbrains out!\u201d
\nThis was my school for eight months; and I might have
\nremained there longer, but for a most horrid fight I had with
\nfour of the white apprentices, in which my left eye was nearly
\nknocked out, and I was horribly mangled in other respects. The
\nfacts in the case were these: Until a very little while after I went
\nthere, white and black ship-carpenters worked side by side, and
\nno one seemed to see any impropriety in it. All hands seemed to
\nbe very well satisfied. Many of the black carpenters were
\nfreemen. Things seemed to be going on very well. All at once,
\nthe white carpenters knocked off, and said they would not work
\nwith free colored workmen. Their reason for this, as alleged,
\nwas, that if free colored carpenters were encouraged, they
\nwould soon take the trade into their own hands, and poor white
\n82 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nmen would be thrown out of employment. They therefore felt
\ncalled upon at once to put a stop to it. And, taking advantage of
\nMr. Gardner\u2019s necessities, they broke off, swearing they would
\nwork no longer, unless he would discharge his black carpenters.
\nNow, though this did not extend to me in form, it did reach me
\nin fact. My fellow-apprentices very soon began to feel it
\ndegrading to them to work with me. They began to put on airs,
\nand talk about the \u201cniggers\u201d taking the country, saying we all
\nought to be killed; and, being encouraged by the journeymen,
\nthey commenced making my condition as hard as they could, by
\nhectoring me around, and sometimes striking me. I, of course,
\nkept the vow I made after the fight with Mr. Covey, and struck
\nback again, regardless of consequences; and while I kept them
\nfrom combining, I succeeded very well; for I could whip the
\nwhole of them, taking them separately. They, however, at length
\ncombined, and came upon me, armed with sticks, stones, and
\nheavy handspikes. One came in front with a half brick. There
\nwas one at each side of me, and one behind me. While I was
\nattending to those in front, and on either side, the one behind
\nran up with the handspike, and struck me a heavy blow upon the
\nhead. It stunned me. I fell, and with this they all ran upon me,
\nand fell to beating me with their fists. I let them lay on for a
\nwhile, gathering strength. In an instant, I gave a sudden surge,
\nand rose to my hands and knees. Just as I did that, one of their
\nnumber gave me, with his heavy boot, a powerful kick in the
\nleft eye. My eyeball seemed to have burst. When they saw my
\neye closed, and badly swollen, they left me. With this I seized
\nthe handspike, and for a time pursued them. But here the
\ncarpenters interfered, and I thought I might as well give it up. It
\nwas impossible to stand my hand against so many. All this took
\nplace in sight of not less than fifty white ship-carpenters, and
\nnot one interposed a friendly word; but some cried, \u201cKill the
\ndamned nigger! Kill him! kill him! He struck a white person.\u201d I
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 83
\nfound my only chance for life was in flight. I succeeded in
\ngetting away without an additional blow, and barely so; for to
\nstrike a white man is death by Lynch law,\u2014and that was the
\nlaw in Mr. Gardner\u2019s ship-yard; nor is there much of any other
\nout of Mr. Gardner\u2019s ship-yard.
\nI went directly home, and told the story of my wrongs to
\nMaster Hugh; and I am happy to say of him, irreligious as he
\nwas, his conduct was heavenly, compared with that of his
\nbrother Thomas under similar circumstances. He listened
\nattentively to my narration of the circumstances leading to the
\nsavage outrage, and gave many proofs of his strong indignation
\nat it. The heart of my once overkind mistress was again melted
\ninto pity. My puffed-out eye and blood-covered face moved her
\nto tears. She took a chair by me, washed the blood from my
\nface, and, with a mother\u2019s tenderness, bound up my head,
\ncovering the wounded eye with a lean piece of fresh beef. It was
\nalmost compensation for my suffering to witness, once more, a
\nmanifestation of kindness from this, my once affectionate old
\nmistress. Master Hugh was very much enraged. He gave
\nexpression to his feelings by pouring out curses upon the heads
\nof those who did the deed. As soon as I got a little the better of
\nmy bruises, he took me with him to Esquire Watson\u2019s, on Bond
\nStreet, to see what could be done about the matter. Mr. Watson
\ninquired who saw the assault committed. Master Hugh told him
\nit was done in Mr. Gardner\u2019s ship-yard at midday, where there
\nwere a large company of men at work. \u201cAs to that,\u201d he said,
\n\u201cthe deed was done, and there was no question as to who did
\nit.\u201d His answer was, he could do nothing in the case, unless
\nsome white man would come forward and testify. He could
\nissue no warrant on my word. If I had been killed in the
\npresence of a thousand colored people, their testimony
\ncombined would have been insufficient to have arrested one of
\nthe murderers. Master Hugh, for once, was compelled to say
\n84 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nthis state of things was too bad. Of course, it was impossible to
\nget any white man to volunteer his testimony in my behalf, and
\nagainst the white young men. Even those who may have
\nsympathized with me were not prepared to do this. It required a
\ndegree of courage unknown to them to do so; for just at that
\ntime, the slightest manifestation of humanity toward a colored
\nperson was denounced as abolitionism, and that name subjected
\nits bearer to frightful liabilities. The watchwords of the bloodyminded in that region, and in those days, were, \u201cDamn the
\nabolitionists!\u201d and \u201cDamn the niggers!\u201d There was nothing
\ndone, and probably nothing would have been done if I had been
\nkilled. Such was, and such remains, the state of things in the
\nChristian city of Baltimore.
\nMaster Hugh, finding he could get no redress, refused to let
\nme go back again to Mr. Gardner. He kept me himself, and his
\nwife dressed my wound till I was again restored to health. He
\nthen took me into the ship-yard of which he was foreman, in the
\nemployment of Mr. Walter Price. There I was immediately set
\nto calking, and very soon learned the art of using my mallet and
\nirons. In the course of one year from the time I left Mr.
\nGardner\u2019s, I was able to command the highest wages given to
\nthe most experienced calkers. I was now of some importance to
\nmy master. I was bringing him from six to seven dollars per
\nweek. I sometimes brought him nine dollars per week: my
\nwages were a dollar and a half a day. After learning how to
\ncalk, I sought my own employment, made my own contracts,
\nand collected the money which I earned. My pathway became
\nmuch more smooth than before; my condition was now much
\nmore comfortable. When I could get no calking to do, I did
\nnothing. During these leisure times, those old notions about
\nfreedom would steal over me again. When in Mr. Gardner\u2019s
\nemployment, I was kept in such a perpetual whirl of excitement,
\nI could think of nothing, scarcely, but my life; and in thinking
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 85
\nof my life, I almost forgot my liberty. I have observed this in
\nmy experience of slavery,\u2014that whenever my condition was
\nimproved, instead of its increasing my contentment, it only
\nincreased my desire to be free, and set me to thinking of plans
\nto gain my freedom. I have found that, to make a contented
\nslave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary
\nto darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to
\nannihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no
\ninconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery
\nis right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be
\na man.
\nI was now getting, as I have said, one dollar and fifty cents
\nper day. I contracted for it; I earned it; it was paid to me; it was
\nrightfully my own; yet, upon each returning Saturday night, I
\nwas compelled to deliver every cent of that money to Master
\nHugh. And why? Not because he earned it,\u2014not because he had
\nany hand in earning it,\u2014not because I owed it to him,\u2014nor
\nbecause he possessed the slightest shadow of a right to it; but
\nsolely because he had the power to compel me to give it up. The
\nright of the grim-visaged pirate upon the high seas is exactly the
\nsame.
\n86 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nCHAPTER XI.
\nI NOW come to that part of my life during which I planned,
\nand finally succeeded in making, my escape from slavery. But
\nbefore narrating any of the peculiar circumstances, I deem it
\nproper to make known my intention not to state all the facts
\nconnected with the transaction. My reasons for pursuing this
\ncourse may be understood from the following: First, were I to
\ngive a minute statement of all the facts, it is not only possible,
\nbut quite probable, that others would thereby be involved in the
\nmost embarrassing difficulties. Secondly, such a statement
\nwould most undoubtedly induce greater vigilance on the part of
\nslaveholders than has existed heretofore among them; which
\nwould, of course, be the means of guarding a door whereby
\nsome dear brother bondman might escape his galling chains. I
\ndeeply regret the necessity that impels me to suppress any thing
\nof importance connected with my experience in slavery. It
\nwould afford me great pleasure indeed, as well as materially add
\nto the interest of my narrative, were I at liberty to gratify a
\ncuriosity, which I know exists in the minds of many, by an
\naccurate statement of all the facts pertaining to my most
\nfortunate escape. But I must deprive myself of this pleasure, and
\nthe curious of the gratification which such a statement would
\nafford. I would allow myself to suffer under the greatest
\nimputations which evil-minded men might suggest, rather than
\nexculpate myself, and thereby run the hazard of closing the
\nslightest avenue by which a brother slave might clear himself of
\nthe chains and fetters of slavery.
\nI have never approved of the very public manner in which
\nsome of our western friends have conducted what they call the
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 87
\nunderground railroad, but which I think, by their open
\ndeclarations, has been made most emphatically the upperground
\nrailroad. I honor those good men and women for their noble
\ndaring, and applaud them for willingly subjecting themselves to
\nbloody persecution, by openly avowing their participation in the
\nescape of slaves. I, however, can see very little good resulting
\nfrom such a course, either to themselves or the slaves escaping;
\nwhile, upon the other hand, I see and feel assured that those
\nopen declarations are a positive evil to the slaves remaining,
\nwho are seeking to escape. They do nothing towards
\nenlightening the slave, whilst they do much towards
\nenlightening the master. They stimulate him to greater
\nwatchfulness, and enhance his power to capture his slave. We
\nowe something to the slave south of the line as well as to those
\nnorth of it; and in aiding the latter on their way to freedom, we
\nshould be careful to do nothing which would be likely to hinder
\nthe former from escaping from slavery. I would keep the
\nmerciless slaveholder profoundly ignorant of the means of flight
\nadopted by the slave. I would leave him to imagine himself
\nsurrounded by myriads of invisible tormentors, ever ready to
\nsnatch from his infernal grasp his trembling prey. Let him be
\nleft to feel his way in the dark; let darkness commensurate with
\nhis crime hover over him; and let him feel that at every step he
\ntakes, in pursuit of the flying bondman, he is running the
\nfrightful risk of having his hot brains dashed out by an invisible
\nagency. Let us render the tyrant no aid; let us not hold the light
\nby which he can trace the footprints of our flying brother. But
\nenough of this. I will now proceed to the statement of those
\nfacts, connected with my escape, for which I am alone
\nresponsible, and for which no one can be made to suffer but
\nmyself.
\nIn the early part of the year 1838, I became quite restless. I
\ncould see no reason why I should, at the end of each week, pour
\n88 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nthe reward of my toil into the purse of my master. When I
\ncarried to him my weekly wages, he would, after counting the
\nmoney, look me in the face with a robber-like fierceness, and
\nask, \u201cIs this all?\u201d He was satisfied with nothing less than the
\nlast cent. He would, however, when I made him six dollars,
\nsometimes give me six cents, to encourage me. It had the
\nopposite effect. I regarded it as a sort of admission of my right
\nto the whole. The fact that he gave me any part of my wages
\nwas proof, to my mind, that he believed me entitled to the
\nwhole of them. I always felt worse for having received any
\nthing; for I feared that the giving me a few cents would ease his
\nconscience, and make him feel himself to be a pretty honorable
\nsort of robber. My discontent grew upon me. I was ever on the
\nlook-out for means of escape; and, finding no direct means, I
\ndetermined to try to hire my time, with a view of getting money
\nwith which to make my escape. In the spring of 1838, when
\nMaster Thomas came to Baltimore to purchase his spring goods,
\nI got an opportunity, and applied to him to allow me to hire my
\ntime. He unhesitatingly refused my request, and told me this
\nwas another stratagem by which to escape. He told me I could
\ngo nowhere but that he could get me; and that, in the event of
\nmy running away, he should spare no pains in his efforts to
\ncatch me. He exhorted me to content myself, and be obedient.
\nHe told me, if I would be happy, I must lay out no plans for the
\nfuture. He said, if I behaved myself properly, he would take
\ncare of me. Indeed, he advised me to complete thoughtlessness
\nof the future, and taught me to depend solely upon him for
\nhappiness. He seemed to see fully the pressing necessity of
\nsetting aside my intellectual nature, in order to contentment in
\nslavery. But in spite of him, and even in spite of myself, I
\ncontinued to think, and to think about the injustice of my
\nenslavement, and the means of escape.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 89
\nAbout two months after this, I applied to Master Hugh for
\nthe privilege of hiring my time. He was not acquainted with the
\nfact that I had applied to Master Thomas, and had been refused.
\nHe too, at first, seemed disposed to refuse; but, after some
\nreflection, he granted me the privilege, and proposed the
\nfollowing terms: I was to be allowed all my time, make all
\ncontracts with those for whom I worked, and find my own
\nemployment; and, in return for this liberty, I was to pay him
\nthree dollars at the end of each week; find myself in calking
\ntools, and in board and clothing. My board was two dollars and
\na half per week. This, with the wear and tear of clothing and
\ncalking tools, made my regular expenses about six dollars per
\nweek. This amount I was compelled to make up, or relinquish
\nthe privilege of hiring my time. Rain or shine, work or no work,
\nat the end of each week the money must be forthcoming, or I
\nmust give up my privilege. This arrangement, it will be
\nperceived, was decidedly in my master\u2019s favor. It relieved him
\nof all need of looking after me. His money was sure. He
\nreceived all the benefits of slaveholding without its evils; while
\nI endured all the evils of a slave, and suffered all the care and
\nanxiety of a freeman. I found it a hard bargain. But, hard as it
\nwas, I thought it better than the old mode of getting along. It
\nwas a step towards freedom to be allowed to bear the
\nresponsibilities of a freeman, and I was determined to hold on
\nupon it. I bent myself to the work of making money. I was ready
\nto work at night as well as day, and by the most untiring
\nperseverance and industry, I made enough to meet my expenses,
\nand lay up a little money every week. I went on thus from May
\ntill August. Master Hugh then refused to allow me to hire my
\ntime longer. The ground for his refusal was a failure on my part,
\none Saturday night, to pay him for my week\u2019s time. This failure
\nwas occasioned by my attending a camp meeting about ten
\nmiles from Baltimore. During the week, I had entered into an
\n90 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nengagement with a number of young friends to start from
\nBaltimore to the camp ground early Saturday evening; and
\nbeing detained by my employer, I was unable to get down to
\nMaster Hugh\u2019s without disappointing the company. I knew that
\nMaster Hugh was in no special need of the money that night. I
\ntherefore decided to go to camp meeting, and upon my return
\npay him the three dollars. I staid at the camp meeting one day
\nlonger than I intended when I left. But as soon as I returned, I
\ncalled upon him to pay him what he considered his due. I found
\nhim very angry; he could scarce restrain his wrath. He said he
\nhad a great mind to give me a severe whipping. He wished to
\nknow how I dared go out of the city without asking his
\npermission. I told him I hired my time and while I paid him the
\nprice which he asked for it, I did not know that I was bound to
\nask him when and where I should go. This reply troubled him;
\nand, after reflecting a few moments, he turned to me, and said I
\nshould hire my time no longer; that the next thing he should
\nknow of, I would be running away. Upon the same plea, he told
\nme to bring my tools and clothing home forthwith. I did so; but
\ninstead of seeking work, as I had been accustomed to do
\npreviously to hiring my time, I spent the whole week without
\nthe performance of a single stroke of work. I did this in
\nretaliation. Saturday night, he called upon me as usual for my
\nweek\u2019s wages. I told him I had no wages; I had done no work
\nthat week. Here we were upon the point of coming to blows. He
\nraved, and swore his determination to get hold of me. I did not
\nallow myself a single word; but was resolved, if he laid the
\nweight of his hand upon me, it should be blow for blow. He did
\nnot strike me, but told me that he would find me in constant
\nemployment in future. I thought the matter over during the next
\nday, Sunday, and finally resolved upon the third day of
\nSeptember, as the day upon which I would make a second
\nattempt to secure my freedom. I now had three weeks during
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 91
\nwhich to prepare for my journey. Early on Monday morning,
\nbefore Master Hugh had time to make any engagement for me, I
\nwent out and got employment of Mr. Butler, at his ship-yard
\nnear the drawbridge, upon what is called the City Block, thus
\nmaking it unnecessary for him to seek employment for me. At
\nthe end of the week, I brought him between eight and nine
\ndollars. He seemed very well pleased, and asked why I did not
\ndo the same the week before. He little knew what my plans
\nwere. My object in working steadily was to remove any
\nsuspicion he might entertain of my intent to run away; and in
\nthis I succeeded admirably. I suppose he thought I was never
\nbetter satisfied with my condition than at the very time during
\nwhich I was planning my escape. The second week passed, and
\nagain I carried him my full wages; and so well pleased was he,
\nthat he gave me twenty-five cents, (quite a large sum for a
\nslaveholder to give a slave,) and bade me to make a good use of
\nit. I told him I would.
\nThings went on without very smoothly indeed, but within
\nthere was trouble. It is impossible for me to describe my
\nfeelings as the time of my contemplated start drew near. I had a
\nnumber of warm-hearted friends in Baltimore,\u2014friends that I
\nloved almost as I did my life,\u2014and the thought of being
\nseparated from them forever was painful beyond expression. It
\nis my opinion that thousands would escape from slavery, who
\nnow remain, but for the strong cords of affection that bind them
\nto their friends. The thought of leaving my friends was
\ndecidedly the most painful thought with which I had to contend.
\nThe love of them was my tender point, and shook my decision
\nmore than all things else. Besides the pain of separation, the
\ndread and apprehension of a failure exceeded what I had
\nexperienced at my first attempt. The appalling defeat I then
\nsustained returned to torment me. I felt assured that, if I failed
\nin this attempt, my case would be a hopeless one\u2014it would seal
\n92 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nmy fate as a slave forever. I could not hope to get off with any
\nthing less than the severest punishment, and being placed
\nbeyond the means of escape. It required no very vivid
\nimagination to depict the most frightful scenes through which I
\nshould have to pass, in case I failed. The wretchedness of
\nslavery, and the blessedness of freedom, were perpetually
\nbefore me. It was life and death with me. But I remained firm,
\nand, according to my resolution, on the third day of September,
\n1838, I left my chains, and succeeded in reaching New York
\nwithout the slightest interruption of any kind. How I did so,\u2014
\nwhat means I adopted,\u2014what direction I travelled, and by what
\nmode of conveyance,\u2014I must leave unexplained, for the
\nreasons before mentioned.
\nI have been frequently asked how I felt when I found
\nmyself in a free State. I have never been able to answer the
\nquestion with any satisfaction to myself. It was a moment of the
\nhighest excitement I ever experienced. I suppose I felt as one
\nmay imagine the unarmed mariner to feel when he is rescued by
\na friendly man-of-war from the pursuit of a pirate. In writing to
\na dear friend, immediately after my arrival at New York, I said I
\nfelt like one who had escaped a den of hungry lions. This state
\nof mind, however, very soon subsided; and I was again seized
\nwith a feeling of great insecurity and loneliness. I was yet liable
\nto be taken back, and subjected to all the tortures of slavery.
\nThis in itself was enough to damp the ardor of my enthusiasm.
\nBut the loneliness overcame me. There I was in the midst of
\nthousands, and yet a perfect stranger; without home and without
\nfriends, in the midst of thousands of my own brethren\u2014children
\nof a common Father, and yet I dared not to unfold to any one of
\nthem my sad condition. I was afraid to speak to any one for fear
\nof speaking to the wrong one, and thereby falling into the hands
\nof money-loving kidnappers, whose business it was to lie in
\nwait for the panting fugitive, as the ferocious beasts of the forest
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 93
\nlie in wait for their prey. The motto which I adopted when I
\nstarted from slavery was this\u2014\u201cTrust no man!\u201d I saw in every
\nwhite man an enemy, and in almost every colored man cause for
\ndistrust. It was a most painful situation; and, to understand it,
\none must needs experience it, or imagine himself in similar
\ncircumstances. Let him be a fugitive slave in a strange land\u2014a
\nland given up to be the hunting-ground for slaveholders\u2014
\nwhose inhabitants are legalized kidnappers\u2014where he is every
\nmoment subjected to the terrible liability of being seized upon
\nby his fellow-men, as the hideous crocodile seizes upon his
\nprey!\u2014I say, let him place himself in my situation\u2014without
\nhome or friends\u2014without money or credit\u2014wanting shelter,
\nand no one to give it\u2014wanting bread, and no money to buy
\nit,\u2014and at the same time let him feel that he is pursued by
\nmerciless men-hunters, and in total darkness as to what to do,
\nwhere to go, or where to stay,\u2014perfectly helpless both as to the
\nmeans of defence and means of escape,\u2014in the midst of plenty,
\nyet suffering the terrible gnawings of hunger,\u2014in the midst of
\nhouses, yet having no home,\u2014among fellow-men, yet feeling as
\nif in the midst of wild beasts, whose greediness to swallow up
\nthe trembling and half-famished fugitive is only equalled by that
\nwith which the monsters of the deep swallow up the helpless
\nfish upon which they subsist,\u2014I say, let him be placed in this
\nmost trying situation,\u2014the situation in which I was placed,\u2014
\nthen, and not till then, will he fully appreciate the hardships of,
\nand know how to sympathize with, the toil-worn and whipscarred fugitive slave.
\nThank Heaven, I remained but a short time in this
\ndistressed situation. I was relieved from it by the humane hand
\nof Mr. DAVID RUGGLES, whose vigilance, kindness, and
\nperseverance, I shall never forget. I am glad of an opportunity to
\nexpress, as far as words can, the love and gratitude I bear him.
\nMr. Ruggles is now afflicted with blindness, and is himself in
\n94 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nneed of the same kind offices which he was once so forward in
\nthe performance of toward others. I had been in New York but a
\nfew days, when Mr. Ruggles sought me out, and very kindly
\ntook me to his boarding-house at the corner of Church and
\nLespenard Streets. Mr. Ruggles was then very deeply engaged
\nin the memorable Darg case, as well as attending to a number of
\nother fugitive slaves, devising ways and means for their
\nsuccessful escape; and, though watched and hemmed in on
\nalmost every side, he seemed to be more than a match for his
\nenemies.
\nVery soon after I went to Mr. Ruggles, he wished to know
\nof me where I wanted to go; as he deemed it unsafe for me to
\nremain in New York. I told him I was a calker, and should like
\nto go where I could get work. I thought of going to Write my essay for me – CA Essay writer Canada; but
\nhe decided against it, and in favor of my going to New Bedford,
\nthinking I should be able to get work there at my trade. At this
\ntime, Anna,
\n* my intended wife, came on; for I wrote to her
\nimmediately after my arrival at New York, (notwithstanding my
\nhomeless, houseless, and helpless condition,) informing her of
\nmy successful flight, and wishing her to come on forthwith. In a
\nfew days after her arrival, Mr. Ruggles called in the Rev. J. W.
\nC. Pennington, who, in the presence of Mr. Ruggles, Mrs.
\nMichaels, and two or three others, performed the marriage
\nceremony, and gave us a certificate, of which the following is
\nan exact copy:\u2014
\n\u201cTHIS may certify, that I joined together in holy matrimony
\nFrederick Johnson\u2020
\nand Anna Murray, as man and wife, in the
\npresence of Mr. David Ruggles and Mrs. Michaels.
\n\u201cJAMES W. C. PENNINGTON.
\n\u201cNew York, Sept. 15, 1838.\u201d
\n*
\nShe was free.
\n\u2020
\nI had changed my name from Frederick Bailey to that of Johnson.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 95
\nUpon receiving this certificate, and a five-dollar bill from
\nMr. Ruggles, I shouldered one part of our baggage, and Anna
\ntook up the other, and we set out forthwith to take passage on
\nboard of the steamboat John W. Richmond for Newport, on our
\nway to New Bedford. Mr. Ruggles gave me a letter to a Mr.
\nShaw in Newport, and told me, in case my money did not serve
\nme to New Bedford, to stop in Newport and obtain further
\nassistance; but upon our arrival at Newport, we were so anxious
\nto get to a place of safety, that, notwithstanding we lacked the
\nnecessary money to pay our fare, we decided to take seats in the
\nstage, and promise to pay when we got to New Bedford. We
\nwere encouraged to do this by two excellent gentlemen,
\nresidents of New Bedford, whose names I afterward ascertained
\nto be Joseph Ricketson and William C. Taber. They seemed at
\nonce to understand our circumstances, and gave us such
\nassurance of their friendliness as put us fully at ease in their
\npresence. It was good indeed to meet with such friends, at such
\na time. Upon reaching New Bedford, we were directed to the
\nhouse of Mr. Nathan Johnson, by whom we were kindly
\nreceived, and hospitably provided for. Both Mr. and Mrs.
\nJohnson took a deep and lively interest in our welfare. They
\nproved themselves quite worthy of the name of abolitionists.
\nWhen the stage-driver found us unable to pay our fare, he held
\non upon our baggage as security for the debt. I had but to
\nmention the fact to Mr. Johnson, and he forthwith advanced the
\nmoney.
\nWe now began to feel a degree of safety, and to prepare
\nourselves for the duties and responsibilities of a life of freedom.
\nOn the morning after our arrival at New Bedford, while at the
\nbreakfast-table, the question arose as to what name I should be
\ncalled by. The name given me by my mother was, \u201cFrederick
\nAugustus Washington Bailey.\u201d I, however, had dispensed with
\nthe two middle names long before I left Maryland so that I was
\n96 NARRATIVE OF THE
\ngenerally known by the name of \u201cFrederick Bailey.\u201d I started
\nfrom Baltimore bearing the name of \u201cStanley.\u201d When I got to
\nNew York, I again changed my name to \u201cFrederick Johnson,\u201d
\nand thought that would be the last change. But when I got to
\nNew Bedford, I found it necessary again to change my name.
\nThe reason of this necessity was, that there were so many
\nJohnsons in New Bedford, it was already quite difficult to
\ndistinguish between them. I gave Mr. Johnson the privilege of
\nchoosing me a name, but told him he must not take from me the
\nname of \u201cFrederick.\u201d I must hold on to that, to preserve a sense
\nof my identity. Mr. Johnson had just been reading the \u201cLady of
\nthe Lake,\u201d and at once suggested that my name be \u201cDouglass.\u201d
\nFrom that time until now I have been called \u201cFrederick
\nDouglass;\u201d and as I am more widely known by that name than
\nby either of the others, I shall continue to use it as my own.
\nI was quite disappointed at the general appearance of things
\nin New Bedford. The impression which I had received
\nrespecting the character and condition of the people of the
\nnorth, I found to be singularly erroneous. I had very strangely
\nsupposed, while in slavery, that few of the comforts, and
\nscarcely any of the luxuries, of life were enjoyed at the north,
\ncompared with what were enjoyed by the slaveholders of the
\nsouth. I probably came to this conclusion from the fact that
\nnorthern people owned no slaves. I supposed that they were
\nabout upon a level with the non-slaveholding population of the
\nsouth. I knew they were exceedingly poor, and I had been
\naccustomed to regard their poverty as the necessary
\nconsequence of their being non-slaveholders. I had somehow
\nimbibed the opinion that, in the absence of slaves, there could
\nbe no wealth, and very little refinement. And upon coming to
\nthe north, I expected to meet with a rough, hard-handed, and
\nuncultivated population, living in the most Spartan-like
\nsimplicity, knowing nothing of the ease, luxury, pomp, and
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 97
\ngrandeur of southern slaveholders. Such being my conjectures,
\nany one acquainted with the appearance of New Bedford may
\nvery readily infer how palpably I must have seen my mistake.
\nIn the afternoon of the day when I reached New Bedford, I
\nvisited the wharves, to take a view of the shipping. Here I found
\nmyself surrounded with the strongest proofs of wealth. Lying at
\nthe wharves, and riding in the stream, I saw many ships of the
\nfinest model, in the best order, and of the largest size. Upon the
\nright and left, I was walled in by granite warehouses of the
\nwidest dimensions, stowed to their utmost capacity with the
\nnecessaries and comforts of life. Added to this, almost every
\nbody seemed to be at work, but noiselessly so, compared with
\nwhat I had been accustomed to in Baltimore. There were no
\nloud songs heard from those engaged in loading and unloading
\nships. I heard no deep oaths or horrid curses on the laborer. I
\nsaw no whipping of men; but all seemed to go smoothly on.
\nEvery man appeared to understand his work, and went at it with
\na sober, yet cheerful earnestness, which betokened the deep
\ninterest which he felt in what he was doing, as well as a sense of
\nhis own dignity as a man. To me this looked exceedingly
\nstrange. From the wharves I strolled around and over the town,
\ngazing with wonder and admiration at the splendid churches,
\nbeautiful dwellings, and finely-cultivated gardens; evincing an
\namount of wealth, comfort, taste, and refinement, such as I had
\nnever seen in any part of slaveholding Maryland.
\nEvery thing looked clean, new, and beautiful. I saw few or
\nno dilapidated houses, with poverty-stricken inmates; no halfnaked children and barefooted women, such as I had been
\naccustomed to see in Hillsborough, Easton, St. Michael\u2019s, and
\nBaltimore. The people looked more able, stronger, healthier,
\nand happier, than those of Maryland. I was for once made glad
\nby a view of extreme wealth, without being saddened by seeing
\nextreme poverty. But the most astonishing as well as the most
\n98 NARRATIVE OF THE
\ninteresting thing to me was the condition of the colored people,
\na great many of whom, like myself, had escaped thither as a
\nrefuge from the hunters of men. I found many, who had not
\nbeen seven years out of their chains, living in finer houses, and
\nevidently enjoying more of the comforts of life, than the
\naverage of slaveholders in Maryland. I will venture to assert,
\nthat my friend Mr. Nathan Johnson (of whom I can say with a
\ngrateful heart, \u201cI was hungry, and he gave me meat; I was
\nthirsty, and he gave me drink; I was a stranger, and he took me
\nin\u201d) lived in a neater house; dined at a better table; took, paid
\nfor, and read, more newspapers; better understood the moral,
\nreligious, and political character of the nation,\u2014than nine tenths
\nof the slaveholders in Talbot county Maryland. Yet Mr. Johnson
\nwas a working man. His hands were hardened by toil, and not
\nhis alone, but those also of Mrs. Johnson. I found the colored
\npeople much more spirited than I had supposed they would be. I
\nfound among them a determination to protect each other from
\nthe blood-thirsty kidnapper, at all hazards. Soon after my
\narrival, I was told of a circumstance which illustrated their
\nspirit. A colored man and a fugitive slave were on unfriendly
\nterms. The former was heard to threaten the latter with
\ninforming his master of his whereabouts. Straightway a meeting
\nwas called among the colored people, under the stereotyped
\nnotice, \u201cBusiness of importance!\u201d The betrayer was invited to
\nattend. The people came at the appointed hour, and organized
\nthe meeting by appointing a very religious old gentleman as
\npresident, who, I believe, made a prayer, after which he
\naddressed the meeting as follows: \u201cFriends, we have got him
\nhere, and I would recommend that you young men just take him
\noutside the door, and kill him!\u201d With this, a number of them
\nbolted at him; but they were intercepted by some more timid
\nthan themselves, and the betrayer escaped their vengeance, and
\nhas not been seen in New Bedford since. I believe there have
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 99
\nbeen no more such threats, and should there be hereafter, I
\ndoubt not that death would be the consequence.
\nI found employment, the third day after my arrival, in
\nstowing a sloop with a load of oil. It was new, dirty, and hard
\nwork for me; but I went at it with a glad heart and a willing
\nhand. I was now my own master. It was a happy moment, the
\nrapture of which can be understood only by those who have
\nbeen slaves. It was the first work, the reward of which was to be
\nentirely my own. There was no Master Hugh standing ready, the
\nmoment I earned the money, to rob me of it. I worked that day
\nwith a pleasure I had never before experienced. I was at work
\nfor myself and newly-married wife. It was to me the startingpoint of a new existence. When I got through with that job, I
\nwent in pursuit of a job of calking; but such was the strength of
\nprejudice against color, among the white calkers, that they
\nrefused to work with me, and of course I could get no
\nemployment.
\n*
\nFinding my trade of no immediate benefit, I
\nthrew off my calking habiliments, and prepared myself to do
\nany kind of work I could get to do. Mr. Johnson kindly let me
\nhave his wood-horse and saw, and I very soon found myself a
\nplenty of work. There was no work too hard\u2014none too dirty. I
\nwas ready to saw wood, shovel coal, carry wood, sweep the
\nchimney, or roll oil casks,\u2014all of which I did for nearly three
\nyears in New Bedford, before I became known to the antislavery world.
\nIn about four months after I went to New Bedford, there
\ncame a young man to me, and inquired if I did not wish to take
\nthe \u201cLiberator.\u201d I told him I did; but, just having made my
\nescape from slavery, I remarked that I was unable to pay for it
\nthen. I, however, finally became a subscriber to it. The paper
\ncame, and I read it from week to week with such feelings as it
\n*
\nI am told that colored persons can now get employment at calking in
\nNew Bedford\u2014a result of anti-slavery effort.
\n100 NARRATIVE OF THE
\nwould be quite idle for me to attempt to describe. The paper
\nbecame my meat and my drink. My soul was set all on fire. Its
\nsympathy for my brethren in bonds\u2014its scathing denunciations
\nof slaveholders\u2014its faithful exposures of slavery\u2014and its
\npowerful attacks upon the upholders of the institution\u2014sent a
\nthrill of joy through my soul, such as I had never felt before!
\nI had not long been a reader of the \u201cLiberator,\u201d before I got
\na pretty correct idea of the principles, measures and spirit of the
\nanti-slavery reform. I took right hold of the cause. I could do
\nbut little; but what I could, I did with a joyful heart, and never
\nfelt happier than when in an anti-slavery meeting. I seldom had
\nmuch to say at the meetings, because what I wanted to say was
\nsaid so much better by others. But, while attending an antislavery convention at Nantucket, on the 11th of August, 1841, I
\nfelt strongly moved to speak, and was at the same time much
\nurged to do so by Mr. William C. Coffin, a gentleman who had
\nheard me speak in the colored people\u2019s meeting at New
\nBedford. It was a severe cross, and I took it up reluctantly. The
\ntruth was, I felt myself a slave, and the idea of speaking to white
\npeople weighed me down. I spoke but a few moments, when I
\nfelt a degree of freedom, and said what I desired with
\nconsiderable ease. From that time until now, I have been
\nengaged in pleading the cause of my brethren\u2014with what
\nsuccess, and with what devotion, I leave those acquainted with
\nmy labors to decide.
\nAPPENDIX.
\nI FIND, since reading over the foregoing Narrative, that I
\nhave, in several instances, spoken in such a tone and manner,
\nrespecting religion, as may possibly lead those unacquainted
\nwith my religious views to suppose me an opponent of all
\nreligion. To remove the liability of such misapprehension, I
\ndeem it proper to append the following brief explanation. What
\nI have said respecting and against religion, I mean strictly to
\napply to the slaveholding religion of this land, and with no
\npossible reference to Christianity proper; for, between the
\nChristianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I
\nrecognize the widest possible difference\u2014so wide, that to
\nreceive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject
\nthe other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. To be the friend of the
\none, is of necessity to be the enemy of the other. I love the pure,
\npeaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate
\nthe corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering,
\npartial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can
\nsee no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion
\nof this land Christianity. I look upon it as the climax of all
\nmisnomers, the boldest of all frauds, and the grossest of all
\nlibels. Never was there a clearer case of \u201cstealing the livery of
\nthe court of heaven to serve the devil in.\u201d I am filled with
\nunutterable loathing when I contemplate the religious pomp and
\nshow, together with the horrible inconsistencies, which every
\nwhere surround me. We have men-stealers for ministers,
\nwomen-whippers for missionaries, and cradle-plunderers for
\n102 APPENDIX TO THE
\nchurch members. The man who wields the blood-clotted
\ncowskin during the week fills the pulpit on Sunday, and claims
\nto be a minister of the meek and lowly Jesus. The man who robs
\nme of my earnings at the end of each week meets me as a classleader on Sunday morning, to show me the way of life, and the
\npath of salvation. He who sells my sister, for purposes of
\nprostitution, stands forth as the pious advocate of purity. He
\nwho proclaims it a religious duty to read the Bible denies me
\nthe right of learning to read the name of the God who made me.
\nHe who is the religious advocate of marriage robs whole
\nmillions of its sacred influence, and leaves them to the ravages
\nof wholesale pollution. The warm defender of the sacredness of
\nthe family relation is the same that scatters whole families,\u2014
\nsundering husbands and wives, parents and children, sisters and
\nbrothers,\u2014leaving the hut vacant, and the hearth desolate. We
\nsee the thief preaching against theft, and the adulterer against
\nadultery. We have men sold to build churches, women sold to
\nsupport the gospel, and babes sold to purchase Bibles for the
\npoor heathen! all for the glory of God and the good of souls!
\nThe slave auctioneer\u2019s bell and the church-going bell chime in
\nwith each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are
\ndrowned in the religious shouts of his pious master. Revivals of
\nreligion and revivals in the slave-trade go hand in hand together.
\nThe slave prison and the church stand near each other. The
\nclanking of fetters and the rattling of chains in the prison, and
\nthe pious psalm and solemn prayer in the church, may be heard
\nat the same time. The dealers in the bodies and souls of men
\nerect their stand in the presence of the pulpit, and they mutually
\nhelp each other. The dealer gives his blood-stained gold to
\nsupport the pulpit, and the pulpit, in return, covers his infernal
\nbusiness with the garb of Christianity. Here we have religion
\nand robbery the allies of each other\u2014devils dressed in angels\u2019
\nrobes, and hell presenting the semblance of paradise.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 103
\n\u201cJust God! and these are they,
\nWho minister at thine altar, God of right!
\nMen who their hands, with prayer and blessing, lay
\nOn Israel\u2019s ark of light.
\n\u201cWhat! preach, and kidnap men?
\nGive thanks, and rob thy own afflicted poor?
\nTalk of thy glorious liberty, and then
\nBolt hard the captive\u2019s door?
\n\u201cWhat! servants of thy own
\nMerciful Son, who came to seek and save
\nThe homeless and the outcast, fettering down
\nThe tasked and plundered slave!
\n\u201cPilate and Herod friends!
\nChief priests and rulers, as of old, combine!
\nJust God and holy! is that church which lends
\nStrength to the spoiler thine?\u201d
\nThe Christianity of America is a Christianity, of whose
\nvotaries it may be as truly said, as it was of the ancient scribes
\nand Pharisees, \u201cThey bind heavy burdens, and grievous to be
\nborne, and lay them on men\u2019s shoulders, but they themselves
\nwill not move them with one of their fingers. All their works
\nthey do for to be seen of men.\u2014They love the uppermost rooms
\nat feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, . . . . . . and to be
\ncalled of men, Rabbi, Rabbi.\u2014But woe unto you, scribes and
\nPharisees, hypocrites! for ye shut up the kingdom of heaven
\nagainst men; for ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye
\nthem that are entering to go in. Ye devour widows\u2019 houses, and
\nfor a pretence make long prayers; therefore ye shall receive the
\ngreater damnation. Ye compass sea and land to make one
\n104 APPENDIX TO THE
\nproselyte, and when he is made, ye make him twofold more the
\nchild of hell than yourselves.\u2014Woe unto you, scribes and
\nPharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint, and anise, and
\ncumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law,
\njudgment, mercy, and faith; these ought ye to have done, and
\nnot to leave the other undone. Ye blind guides! which strain at a
\ngnat, and swallow a camel. Woe unto you, scribes and
\nPharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup
\nand of the platter; but within, they are full of extortion and
\nexcess.\u2014Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for
\nye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear
\nbeautiful outward, but are within full of dead men\u2019s bones, and
\nof all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous
\nunto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.\u201d
\nDark and terrible as is this picture, I hold it to be strictly
\ntrue of the overwhelming mass of professed Christians in
\nAmerica. They strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel. Could any
\nthing be more true of our churches? They would be shocked at
\nthe proposition of fellowshipping a sheep-stealer; and at the
\nsame time they hug to their communion a man-stealer, and
\nbrand me with being an infidel, if I find fault with them for it.
\nThey attend with Pharisaical strictness to the outward forms of
\nreligion, and at the same time neglect the weightier matters of
\nthe law, judgment, mercy, and faith. They are always ready to
\nsacrifice, but seldom to show mercy. They are they who are
\nrepresented as professing to love God whom they have not seen,
\nwhilst they hate their brother whom they have seen. They love
\nthe heathen on the other side of the globe. They can pray for
\nhim, pay money to have the Bible put into his hand, and
\nmissionaries to instruct him; while they despise and totally
\nneglect the heathen at their own doors.
\nSuch is, very briefly, my view of the religion of this land;
\nand to avoid any misunderstanding, growing out of the use of
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 105
\ngeneral terms, I mean by the religion of this land, that which is
\nrevealed in the words, deeds, and actions, of those bodies, north
\nand south, calling themselves Christian churches, and yet in
\nunion with slaveholders. It is against religion, as presented by
\nthese bodies, that I have felt it my duty to testify.
\nI conclude these remarks by copying the following portrait
\nof the religion of the south, (which is, by communion and
\nfellowship, the religion of the north,) which I soberly affirm is
\n\u201ctrue to the life,\u201d and without caricature or the slightest
\nexaggeration. It is said to have been drawn, several years before
\nthe present anti-slavery agitation began, by a northern
\nMethodist preacher, who, while residing at the south, had an
\nopportunity to see slaveholding morals, manners, and piety,
\nwith his own eyes. \u201cShall I not visit for these things? saith the
\nLord. Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?\u201d
\n\u201cA PARODY
\n\u201cCome, saints and sinners, hear me tell
\nHow pious priests whip Jack and Nell,
\nAnd women buy and children sell,
\nAnd preach all sinners down to hell,
\nAnd sing of heavenly union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll bleat and baa, dona like goats,
\nGorge down black sheep, and strain at motes,
\nArray their backs in fine black coats,
\nThen seize their negroes by their throats,
\nAnd choke, for heavenly union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll church you if you sip a dram,
\nAnd damn you if you steal a lamb;
\nYet rob old Tony, Doll, and Sam,
\n106 APPENDIX TO THE
\nOf human rights, and bread and ham;
\nKidnapper\u2019s heavenly union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll loudly talk of Christ\u2019s reward,
\nAnd bind his image with a cord,
\nAnd scold, and swing the lash abhorred,
\nAnd sell their brother in the Lord
\nTo handcuffed heavenly union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll read and sing a sacred song,
\nAnd make a prayer both loud and long,
\nAnd teach the right and do the wrong,
\nHailing the brother, sister throng,
\nWith words of heavenly union.
\n\u201cWe wonder how such saints can sing,
\nOr praise the Lord upon the wing,
\nWho roar, and scold, and whip, and sting,
\nAnd to their slaves and mammon cling,
\nIn guilty conscience union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll raise tobacco, corn, and rye,
\nAnd drive, and thieve, and cheat, and lie,
\nAnd lay up treasures in the sky,
\nBy making switch and cowskin fly,
\nIn hope of heavenly union.
\n\u201cThey\u2019ll crack old Tony on the skull,
\nAnd preach and roar like Bashan bull,
\nOr braying ass, of mischief full,
\nThen seize old Jacob by the wool,
\nAnd pull for heavenly union.
\nLIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 107
\n\u201cA roaring, ranting, sleek man-thief,
\nWho lived on mutton, veal, and beef,
\nYet never would afford relief
\nTo needy, sable sons of grief,
\nWas big with heavenly union.
\n\u201c \u2018Love not the world,\u2019 the preacher said,
\nAnd winked his eye, and shook his head;
\nHe seized on Tom, and Dick, and Ned,
\nCut short their meat, and clothes, and bread,
\nYet still loved heavenly union.
\n\u201cAnother preacher whining spoke
\nOf One whose heart for sinners broke:
\nHe tied old Nanny to an oak,
\nAnd drew the blood at every stroke,
\nAnd prayed for heavenly union.
\n\u201cTwo others oped their iron jaws,
\nAnd waved their children-stealing paws;
\nThere sat their children in gewgaws;
\nBy stinting negroes\u2019 backs and maws,
\nThey kept up heavenly union.
\n\u201cAll good from Jack another takes,
\nAnd entertains their flirts and rakes,
\nWho dress as sleek as glossy snakes,
\nAnd cram their mouths with sweetened cakes;
\nAnd this goes down for union.\u201d
\nSincerely and earnestly hoping that this little book may do
\nsomething toward throwing light on the American slave system,
\nand hastening the glad day of deliverance to the millions of my
\n108 APPENDIX TO THE
\nbrethren in bonds\u2014faithfully relying upon the power of truth,
\nlove, and justice, for success in my humble efforts\u2014and
\nsolemnly pledging myself anew to the sacred cause,\u2014I
\nsubscribe myself,
\nFREDERICK DOUGLASS.
\nLYNN, Mass., April 28, 1845.
\nTHE END.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS, AN AMERICAN SLAVE BY FREDERICK DOUGLASS 7^WYS`f7Taa]e NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS, AN AMERICAN SLAVE. WRITTEN\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2486,1115,1724],"tags":[2453,2489,2487,2472,1427,1656,2491,2370,2386,2488,2490],"class_list":["post-7047","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-msn-papers","category-online-nursing-essays","category-top-nursing-papers","tag-bsn-papers","tag-dnp-assignment","tag-health-care-essays","tag-healthcare-dissertations","tag-healthcare-essays","tag-medical-papers","tag-nur","tag-nursing-assessment","tag-nursing-case-study","tag-nursing-homework","tag-online-nursing-papers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7047","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7047"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7047\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7047"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7047"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/homeworkacetutors.com\/nursing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7047"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}