A little previous to Isabel's leaving her old master, he had sold
her child, a boy of five years, to a Dr. Gedney, who took him
with him as far as New York city, on his way to England; but
finding the boy too small for his service, he sent him back to his
brother, Solomon Gedney. This man disposed of him to his
sister's husband, a wealthy planter, by the name of Fowler, who
took him to his own home in Alabama.
This illegal and fraudulent transaction had been perpetrated
some months before Isabella knew of it, as she was now living
at Mr. Van Wagener's. The law expressly prohibited the sale of
any slave out of the State,-and all minors were to be free at
twenty-one years of age; and Mr. Dumont had sold Peter with
the express understanding, that he was soon to return to the State
of New York, and be emancipated at the specified time.
When Isabel heard that her son had been sold South, she
immediately started on foot and alone, to find the man who had
thus dared, in the face of all law, human and divine, to sell her
child out of the State; and if possible, to bring him to account
for the deed.
Arriving at New Paltz, she went directly to her former mistress,
Dumont, complaining bitterly of the removal of her son.
Her mistress heard her through, and then replied-'Ugh! a fine
fuss to make about a little nigger! Why, haven't you as many of
'em left as you can see to, and take care of? A pity 'tis, the niggers
are not all in Guinea!! Making such a halloo-balloo about the
neighborhood; and all for a paltry nigger!!!' Isabella heard her
through, and after a moment's hesitation, answered, in tones of
deep determination-'I'll have my child again.' 'Have your child
again!' repeated her mistress-her tones big with contempt, and
scorning the absurd idea of her getting him. 'How can you get
him? And what have you to support him with, if you could?
Have you any money?' 'No,' answered Bell, 'I have no
money, but God has enough, or what's better! And I'll have my
child again.' These words were pronounced in the most slow,
solemn, and determined measure and manner. And in speaking
of it, she says, 'Oh my God! I know'd I'd have him agin. I was
sure God would help me to get him. Why, I felt so tall within-I
felt as if the power of a nation was with me!'
The impressions made by Isabella on her auditors, when
moved by lofty or deep feeling, can never be transmitted to
paper, (to use the words of another,) till by some Daguerrian act,
we are enabled to transfer the look, the gesture, the tones of
voice, in connection with the quaint, yet fit expressions used,
and the spirit-stirring animation that, at such a time, pervades all
she says.
After leaving her mistress, she called on Mrs. Gedney, mother
of him who had sold her boy; who, after listening to her lamentations,
her grief being mingled with indignation at the sale of
her son, and her declaration that she would have him again-said,
'Dear me! What a disturbance to make about your child!
What, is your child, better than my child? My child is gone out
there, and yours is gone to live with her, to have enough of
every thing, and be treated like a gentleman!' And here she
laughed at Isabel's absurd fears, as she would represent them to
be. 'Yes,' said Isabel, 'your child has gone there, but she is
married, and my boy has gone as a slave, and he is too little to go
so far from his mother. Oh, I must have my child.' And here the
continued laugh of Mrs. G. seemed to Isabel, in this time of
anguish and distress, almost demoniacal. And well it was for Mrs.
Gedney, that, at that time, she could not even dream of the
awful fate awaiting her own beloved daughter, at the hands of
him whom she had chosen as worthy the wealth of her love
and confidence, and in whose society her young heart had
calculated on a happiness, purer and more elevated than was ever
conferred by a kingly crown. But, alas! she was doomed to
disappointment, as we shall relate by and by. At this point,
Isabella earnestly begged of God that he would show to those
about her that He was her helper; and she adds, in narrating,
'And He did; or, if He did not show them, he did me.'