THE
LIFE OF JOSIAH HENSON,
FORMERLY A SLAVE,
NOW AN INHABITANT OF CANADA,
AS
NARRATED BY HIMSELF.
BOSTON:
ARTHUR D. PHELPS.
1849.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by
ARTHUR D. PHELPS,
in the office of the Clerk of the District Court
of the District of Massachusetts
CAMBRIDGE:
PRINTED BY BOLLES AND HOUGHTON.
ADVERTISEMENT.
The following memoir was written from the dictation of JOSIAH HENSON.
A portion of the story was told, which, when written, was read to him,
that any errors of statement might be corrected. The substance of it,
therefore, the facts, the reflections, and very often the words, are
his; and little more than the structure of the sentences belongs to
another.
The narrative, in this form, necessarily loses the attraction derived
from the earnest manner, the natural eloquence of a man who tells a
story in which he is deeply interested; but it is hoped that enough
remains to repay perusal, and that the character of the man, and the
striking nature of the events of his life will be thought to justify
the endeavor to make them more extensively known. The story has this
advantage, that it is not fiction, but fact; and it will be found
fruitful in instruction by those who attentively consider its lessons.
LIFE OF JOSIAH HENSON.
I was born, June 15, 1789, in Charles County, Maryland, on a farm
belonging to Mr. Francis N., about a mile from Port Tobacco. My mother
was the property of Dr. Josiah McP., but was hired by Mr. N., to whom
my father belonged. The only incident I can remember, which occurred
while my mother continued on N.’s farm, was the appearance of my father
one day, with his head bloody and his back lacerated. He was in a
state of great excitement, and though it was all a mystery to me at
the age of three or four years, it was explained at a later period,
and I understood that he had been suffering the cruel penalty of the
Maryland law for beating a white man. His right ear had been cut off
close to his head, and he had received a hundred lashes on his back.
He had beaten the overseer for a brutal assault on my mother, and this
was his punishment. Furious at such treatment, my father became a
different man, and was so morose, disobedient, and intractable, that
Mr. N. determined to sell him. He accordingly parted with him, not long
after, to his son, who lived in Alabama; and neither my mother nor I,
ever heard of him again. He was naturally, as I understood afterwards
from my mother and other persons, a man of amiable temper, and of
considerable energy of character; but it is not strange that he should
be essentially changed by such cruelty and injustice under the sanction
of law.
After the sale of my father by N., and his leaving Maryland for
Alabama, Dr. McP. would no longer hire out my mother to N. She
returned, therefore, to the estate of the doctor, who was very much
kinder to his slaves than the generality of planters, never suffering
them to be struck by any one. He was, indeed, a man of good natural
impulses, kind-hearted, liberal, and jovial. The latter quality was so
much developed as to be his great failing; and though his convivial
excesses were not thought of as a fault by the community in which
he lived, and did not even prevent his having a high reputation for
goodness of heart, and an almost saint-like benevolence, yet they were,
nevertheless, his ruin. My mother, and her young family of three girls
and three boys, of which I was the youngest, resided on this estate for
two or three years, during which my only recollections are of being
rather a pet of the doctor’s, who thought I was a bright child, and of
being much impressed with what I afterwards recognized as the deep
piety and devotional feeling and habits of my mother. I do not know
how, or where she acquired her knowledge of God, or her acquaintance
with the Lord’s prayer, which she so frequently repeated and taught me
to repeat. I remember seeing her often on her knees, endeavoring to
arrange her thoughts in prayers appropriate to her situation, but which
amounted to little more than constant ejaculation, and the repetition
of short phrases, which were within my infant comprehension, and have
remained in my memory to this hour.
After this brief period of comparative comfort, however, the death of
Dr. McP. brought about a revolution in our condition, which, common
as such things are in slave countries, can never be imagined by those
not subject to them, nor recollected by those who have been, without
emotions of grief and indignation deep and ineffaceable. The doctor was
riding from one of his scenes of riotous excess, when, falling from his
horse, in crossing a little run, not a foot deep, he was unable to save
himself from drowning.
In consequence of his decease, it became necessary to sell the estate
and the slaves, in order to divide the property among the heirs; and
we were all put up at auction and sold to the highest bidder, and
scattered over various parts of the country. My brothers and sisters
were bid off one by one, while my mother, holding my hand, looked on
in an agony of grief, the cause of which I but ill understood at
first, but which dawned on my mind, with dreadful clearness, as the
sale proceeded. My mother was then separated from me, and put up in her
turn. She was bought by a man named Isaac R., residing in Montgomery
county, and then I was offered to the assembled purchasers. My mother,
half distracted with the parting forever from all her children, pushed
through the crowd, while the bidding for me was going on, to the spot
where R. was standing. She fell at his feet, and clung to his knees,
entreating him in tones that a mother only could command, to buy her
_baby_ as well as herself, and spare to her one of her little ones at
least. Will it, can it be believed that this man, thus appealed to,
was capable not merely of turning a deaf ear to her supplication, but
of disengaging himself from her with such violent blows and kicks,
as to reduce her to the necessity of creeping out of his reach, and
mingling the groan of bodily suffering with the sob of a breaking
heart? Yet this was one of my earliest observations of men; an
experience which has been common to me with thousands of my race, the
bitterness of which its frequency cannot diminish to any individual
who suffers it, while it is dark enough to overshadow the whole
after-life with something blacker than a funeral pall.--I was bought by
a stranger.--Almost immediately, however, whether my childish strength,
at five or six years of age, was overmastered by such scenes and
experiences, or from some accidental cause, I fell sick, and seemed to
my new master so little likely to recover, that he proposed to R., the
purchaser of my mother, to take me too at such a trifling rate that it
could not be refused. I was thus providentially restored to my mother;
and under her care, destitute as she was of the proper means of nursing
me, I recovered my health, and grew up to be an uncommonly vigorous and
healthy boy and man.
The character of R., the master whom I faithfully served for many
years, is by no means an uncommon one in any part of the world; but it
is to be regretted that a domestic institution should anywhere put it
in the power of such a one to tyrannize over his fellow beings, and
inflict so much needless misery as is sure to be produced by such a man
in such a position. Coarse and vulgar in his habits, unprincipled and
cruel in his general deportment, and especially addicted to the vice of
licentiousness, his slaves had little opportunity for relaxation from
wearying labor, were supplied with the scantiest means of sustaining
their toil by necessary food, and had no security for personal rights.
The natural tendency of slavery is, to convert the master into a
tyrant, and the slave into the cringing, treacherous, false, and
thieving victim of tyranny. R. and his slaves were no exception to the
general rule, but might be cited as apt illustrations of the nature of
the case.
My earliest employments were, to carry buckets of water to the men
at work, to hold a horse-plough, used for weeding between the rows
of corn, and as I grew older and taller, to take care of master’s
saddle-horse. Then a hoe was put into my hands, and I was soon required
to do the day’s work of a man; and it was not long before I could do
it, at least as well as my associates in misery.
The every-day life of a slave on one of our southern plantations,
however frequently it may have been described, is generally little
known at the North; and must be mentioned as a necessary illustration
of the character and habits of the slave and the slave-holder, created
and perpetuated by their relative position. The principal food of
those upon my master’s plantation consisted of corn meal, and salt
herrings; to which was added in summer a little buttermilk, and the
few vegetables which each might raise for himself and his family, on
the little piece of ground which was assigned to him for the purpose,
called a truck patch. The meals were two, daily. The first, or
breakfast, was taken at 12 o’clock, after laboring from daylight; and
the other when the work of the remainder of the day was over. The only
dress was of tow cloth, which for the young, and often even for those
who had passed the period of childhood, consisted of a single garment,
something like a shirt, but longer, reaching to the ancles; and for
the older, a pair of pantaloons, or a gown, according to the sex; while
some kind of round jacket, or overcoat, might be added in winter, a
wool hat once in two or three years, for the males, and a pair of
coarse shoes once a year. Our lodging was in log huts, of a single
small room, with no other floor than the trodden earth, in which ten or
a dozen persons--men, women, and children--might sleep, but which could
not protect them from dampness and cold, nor permit the existence of
the common decencies of life. There were neither beds, nor furniture of
any description--a blanket being the only addition to the dress of the
day for protection from the chillness of the air or the earth. In these
hovels were we penned at night, and fed by day; here were the children
born, and the sick--neglected. Such were the provisions for the daily
toil of the slave.
Notwithstanding this system of management, however, I grew to be a
robust and vigorous lad, and at fifteen years of age, there were few
who could compete with me in work, or in sport--for not even the
condition of a slave can altogether repress the animal spirits of
the young negro. I was competent to all the work that was done upon
the farm, and could run faster and farther, wrestle longer, and jump
higher, than anybody about me. My master and my fellow slaves used
to look upon me, and speak of me, as a wonderfully smart fellow, and
prophecy the great things I should do when I became a man. A casual
word of this sort, sometimes overheard, would fill me with a pride
and ambition which some would think impossible in a negro slave,
degraded, starved, and abused as I was, and had been, from my earliest
recollection. But the love of superiority is not confined to kings and
emperors; and it is a positive fact, that pride and ambition were as
active in my soul as probably they ever were in that of the greatest
soldier or statesman. The objects I pursued, I must admit, were not
just the same as theirs. Mine were to be first in the field, whether
we were hoeing, mowing, or reaping; to surpass those of my own age, or
indeed any age, in athletic exercises; and to obtain, if possible, the
favorable regard of the petty despot who ruled over us. This last was
an exercise of the understanding, rather than of the affections; and I
was guided in it more by what I supposed would be effectual, than by a
nice judgment of the propriety of the means I used.
I obtained great influence with my companions, as well by the
superiority I showed in labor and in sport, as by the assistance I
yielded them, and the favors I conferred upon them, from impulses which
I cannot consider as wrong, though it was necessary for me to conceal
sometimes the act as well as its motive. I have toiled, and induced
others to toil, many an extra hour, in order to show my master what an
excellent day’s work had been accomplished, and to win a kind word, or
a benevolent deed from his callous heart. In general, indifference, or
a cool calculation of my value to him, were my reward, chilling those
hopes of an improvement in my condition, which was the ultimate object
of my efforts. I was much more easily moved to compassion and sympathy
than he was; and one of the means I took to gain the good-will of my
fellow sufferers, was by taking from him some things that he did not
give, in part payment of my extra labor. The condition of the male
slave is bad enough, Heaven knows; but that of the female, compelled
to perform unfit labor, sick, suffering, and bearing the burdens of
her own sex unpitied and unaided, as well as the toils which belong
to the other, has often oppressed me with a load of sympathy. And
sometimes, when I have seen them starved, and miserable, and unable to
help themselves, I have helped them to some of the comforts which they
were denied by him who owned them, and which my companions had not the
wit or the daring to procure. Meat was not a part of our regular food;
but my master had plenty of sheep and pigs, and sometimes I have picked
out the best one I could find in the flock, or the drove, carried it a
mile or two into the woods, slaughtered it, cut it up, and distributed
it among the poor creatures, to whom it was at once food, luxury,
and medicine. Was this wrong? I can only say that, at this distance
of time, my conscience does not reproach me for it, and that then I
esteemed it among the best of my deeds.
By means of the influence thus acquired, the increased amount of
work done upon the farm, and by the detection of the knavery of the
overseer, who plundered his employer for more selfish ends, and through
my watchfulness was caught in the act and dismissed, I was promoted
to be superintendent of the farm work, and managed to raise more than
double the crops, with more cheerful and willing labor, than was ever
seen on the estate before.
Previous to my attaining this important station, however, an incident
occurred of so powerful an influence on my intellectual development,
my prospect of improvement in character, as well as condition, my
chance of religious culture, and in short, on my whole nature, body and
soul, that it deserves especial notice and commemoration. There was a
person living at Georgetown, a few miles only from R.’s plantation,
whose business was that of a baker, and whose character was that of an
upright, benevolent, Christian man. He was noted especially for his
detestation of slavery, and his resolute avoidance of the employment
of slave labor in his business. He would not even hire a slave, the
price of whose toil must be paid to his master, but contented himself
with the work of his own hands, and with such free labor as he could
procure. His reputation was high, not only for this almost singular
abstinence from what no one about him thought wrong, but for his
general probity and excellence. This man occasionally served as a
minister of the Gospel, and preached in a neighborhood where preachers
were somewhat rare at that period. One Sunday when he was to officiate
in this way, at a place three or four miles distant, my mother
persuaded me to ask master’s leave to go and hear him; and although
such permission was not given freely or often, yet his favor to me
was shown for this once by allowing me to go, without much scolding,
but not without a pretty distinct intimation of what would befall me,
if I did not return immediately after the close of the service. I
hurried off, pleased with the opportunity, but without any definite
expectations of benefit or amusement; for up to this period of my life,
and I was then eighteen years old, I had never heard a sermon, nor
any discourse or conversation whatever, upon religious topics, except
what had been impressed upon me by my mother, of the responsibility of
all to a Supreme Being. When I arrived at the place of meeting, the
services were so far advanced that the speaker was just beginning his
discourse, from the text, Hebrews ii. 9; “That he, by the grace of
God, should taste of death for every man.” This was the first text of
the Bible to which I had ever listened, knowing it to be such. I have
never forgotten it, and scarce a day has passed since, in which I have
not recalled it, and the sermon that was preached from it. The divine
character of Jesus Christ, his life and teachings, his sacrifice of
himself for others, his death and resurrection were all alluded to, and
some of the points were dwelt upon with great power,--great, at least,
to me, who heard of these things for the first time in my life. I was
wonderfully impressed, too, with the use which the preacher made of the
last words of the text, “_for every man_.” He said the death of Christ
was not designed for the benefit of a select few only, but for the
salvation of the world, for the bond as well as the free; and he dwelt
on the glad tidings of the Gospel to the poor, the persecuted, and the
distressed, its deliverance to the captive, and the liberty wherewith
Christ has made us free, till my heart burned within me, and I was in
a state of the greatest excitement at the thought that such a being as
Jesus Christ had been described should have died for me--for _me_ among
the rest, a poor, despised, abused slave, who was thought by his fellow
creatures fit for nothing but unrequited toil and ignorance, for mental
and bodily degradation. I immediately determined to find out something
more about “Christ and him crucified;” and revolving the things which I
had heard in my mind as I went home, I became so excited that I turned
aside from the road into the woods, and prayed to God for light and for
aid with an earnestness, which, however unenlightened, was at least
sincere and heartfelt; and which the subsequent course of my life has
led me to imagine might not have been unacceptable to Him who heareth
prayer. At all events, I date my conversion, and my awakening to a new
life--a consciousness of superior powers and destiny to any thing I had
before conceived of--from this day, so memorable to me. I used every
means and opportunity of inquiry into religious matters; and so deep
was my conviction of their superior importance to every thing else, so
clear my perception of my own faults, and so undoubting my observation
of the darkness and sin that surrounded me, that I could not help
talking much on these subjects with those about me; and it was not long
before I began to pray with them, and exhort them, and to impart to
the poor slaves those little glimmerings of light from another world,
which had reached my own eye. In a few years I became quite an esteemed
preacher among them, and I will not believe it is vanity which leads me
to think I was useful to some.
I must return, however, for the present, to the course of my life
in secular affairs, the facts of which it is my principal object to
relate. The difference between the manner in which it was designed that
all men should regard one another, as children of the same Father, and
the manner in which men actually do treat each other, as if they were
placed here for mutual annoyance and destruction, is well exemplified
by an incident that happened to me within a year or two from this
period, that is, when I was nineteen or twenty years old. My master’s
habits were such as were common enough among the dissipated planters of
the neighborhood; and one of their frequent practices was, to assemble
on Saturday or Sunday, which were their holidays, and gamble, run
horses, or fight game-cocks, discuss politics, and drink whiskey, and
brandy and water, all day long. Perfectly aware that they would not be
able to find their own way home at night, each one ordered a slave, his
particular attendant, to come after him and help him home. I was chosen
for this confidential duty by my master; and many is the time I have
held him on his horse, when he could not hold himself in the saddle,
and walked by his side in darkness and mud from the tavern to his
house. Of course, quarrels and brawls of the most violent description
were frequent consequences of these meetings, and whenever they became
especially dangerous, and glasses were thrown, dirks drawn, and pistols
fired, it was the duty of the slaves to rush in, and each one was to
drag his master from the fight, and carry him home. To tell the truth,
this was a part of my business for which I felt no reluctance. I was
young, remarkably athletic and self-relying, and in such affrays I
carried it with a high hand, and would elbow my way among the whites,
whom it would have been almost death for me to strike, seize my master,
and drag him out, mount him on his horse, or crowd him into his buggy,
with the ease with which I would handle a bag of corn, and at the same
time with the pride of conscious superiority, and the kindness inspired
by performing an act of benevolence. I knew I was doing for him what
he could not do for himself, and showing my superiority to others, and
acquiring their respect in some degree, at the same time.
On one of these occasions, my master got into a quarrel with his
brother’s overseer, who was one of the party, and in rescuing the
former, I suppose I was a little more rough with the latter than
usual. I remember his falling upon the floor, and very likely it was
from the effects of a push from me, or a movement of my elbow. He
attributed his fall to me, rather than to the whiskey he had drunk,
and treasured up his vengeance for the first favorable opportunity.
About a week afterwards, I was sent by my master to a place a few miles
distant, on horseback, with some letters. I took a short cut through
a lane, separated by gates from the high road, and bounded by a fence
on each side. This lane passed through some of the farm owned by my
master’s brother, and his overseer was in the adjoining field, with
three negroes, when I went by. On my return, a half an hour afterwards,
the overseer was sitting on the fence; but I could see nothing of the
black fellows. I rode on, utterly unsuspicious of any trouble, but as
I approached, he jumped off the fence, and at the same moment two
of the negroes sprung up from under the bushes, where they had been
concealed, and stood with him, immediately in front of me; while the
third sprang over the fence just behind me. I was thus enclosed between
what I could no longer doubt were hostile forces. The overseer seized
my horse’s bridle, and ordered me to alight, in the usual elegant
phraseology used by such men to slaves. I asked what I was to alight
for. “To take the cursedest flogging you ever had in your life, you
d---d black scoundrel.” “But what am I to be flogged for, Mr. L.,” I
asked. “Not a word,” said he, “but ’light at once, and take off your
jacket.” I saw there was nothing else to be done, and slipped off the
horse on the opposite side from him. “Now take off your shirt,” cried
he; and as I demurred at this, he lifted a stick he had in his hand to
strike me, but so suddenly and violently, that he frightened the horse,
which broke away from him, and ran home. I was thus left without means
of escape, to sustain the attacks of four men, as well as I might. In
avoiding Mr. L.’s blow, I had accidentally got into a corner of the
fence, where I could not be approached except in front. The overseer
called upon the negroes to seize me; but they, knowing something of
my physical power, were rather slow to obey. At length they did their
best, and as they brought themselves within my reach, I knocked them
down successively; and one of them trying to trip up my feet when
he was down, I gave him a kick with my heavy shoe, which knocked out
several of his front teeth, and sent him groaning away. Meanwhile,
the cowardly overseer was availing himself of every opportunity to
hit me over the head with his stick, which was not heavy enough to
knock me down, though it drew blood freely. At length, tired of the
length of the affray, he seized a stake, six or seven feet long, from
the fence, and struck at me with his whole strength. In attempting to
ward off the blow, my right arm was broken, and I was brought to the
ground; where repeated blows broke both my shoulder blades, and made
the blood gush from my mouth copiously. The two blacks begged him not
to murder me, and he just left me as I was, telling me to learn what
it was to strike a white man. The alarm had been raised at the house,
by seeing the horse come back without his rider, and it was not long
before assistance arrived to convey me home. It may be supposed it
was not done without some suffering on my part; as, besides my broken
arm and the wounds on my head, I could feel and hear the pieces of
my shoulder-blades grate against each other with every breath. No
physician or surgeon was called to dress my wounds, and I never knew
one to be called to a slave upon R.’s estate, on any occasion whatever,
and have no knowledge of such a thing being done on any estate in the
neighborhood. I was attended, if it may be called attendance, by my
master’s sister, who had some reputation in such affairs; and she
splintered my arm, and bound up my back as well as she knew how, and
nature did the rest. It was five months before I could work at all, and
the first time I tried to plough, a hard knock of the colter against
a stone, shattered my shoulder-blades again, and gave me even greater
agony than at first. I have been unable to raise my hands to my head
from that day to this. My master prosecuted Mr. L. for abusing and
maiming his slave; and when the case was tried before the magistrate,
he made a statement of the facts as I have here related them. When Mr.
L. was called upon to say why he should not be fined for the offence,
he simply stated, without being put on oath, that he had acted in
self-defence; that I had assaulted him; and that nothing had saved him
from being killed on the spot by so stout a fellow, but the fortunate
circumstance that his three negroes were within call. The result was,
that my master paid all the costs of court. He had the satisfaction of
calling Mr. L. a liar and scoundrel, and, afterwards, of beating him in
a very thorough manner, for which he had also to pay a fine and costs.
My situation, as overseer, I retained, together with the especial favor
of my master, who was not displeased either with saving the expense of
a large salary for a white superintendent, or with the superior crops
I was able to raise for him. I will not deny that I used his property
more freely than he would have done himself, in supplying his people
with better food; but if I cheated him in this way, in small matters,
it was unequivocally for his own benefit in more important ones; and
I accounted, with the strictest honesty, for every dollar I received
in the sale of the property entrusted to me. Gradually the disposal of
every thing raised on the farm, the wheat, oats, hay, fruit, butter,
and whatever else there might be, was confided to me, as it was quite
evident that I could, and did sell for better prices than any one else
he could employ, and he was quite incompetent to attend to the business
himself. For many years I was his factotum, and supplied him with all
his means for all his purposes, whether they were good or bad. I had
no reason to think highly of his moral character, but it was my duty
to be faithful to him, in the position in which he placed me; and I
can boldly declare, before God and man, that I was so. I forgave him
the causeless blows and injuries he had inflicted on me in childhood
and youth, and was proud of the favor he now showed me, and of the
character and reputation I had earned by strenuous and persevering
efforts.
When I was about twenty-two years of age, I married a very efficient,
and, for a slave, a very well-taught girl, belonging to a neighboring
family, reputed to be pious and kind, whom I first met at the chapel
I attended; and during nearly forty years that have since elapsed, I
have had no reason to regret the connection, but many, to rejoice in
it, and be grateful for it. She has borne me twelve children, eight of
whom survive, and promise to be the comfort of my declining years.
Things remained in this condition for a considerable period; my
occupations being to superintend the farming operations, and to sell
the produce in the neighboring markets of Washington and Georgetown.
Many respectable people, yet living there, may possibly have some
recollection of “’Siah,” or “Si,” (as they used to call me,) as their
market-man; but if they have forgotten me, I remember them with an
honest satisfaction.
After passing his youth in the manner I have mentioned in a general
way, and which I do not wish more particularly to describe, my master,
at the age of forty-five, or upwards, married a young woman of
eighteen, who had some little property, and more thrift. Her economy
was remarkable, and was certainly no addition to the comfort of the
establishment. She had a younger brother, Francis, to whom R. was
appointed guardian, and who used to complain--not without reason, I am
confident--of the meanness of the provision made for the household; and
he would often come to me, with tears in his eyes, to tell me he could
not get enough to eat. I made him my friend for life, by sympathizing
in his emotions, and satisfying his appetite, sharing with him the food
I took care to provide for my own family.
After a time, however, continual dissipation was more than a match for
domestic saving. My master fell into difficulty, and from difficulty
into a lawsuit with a brother-in-law, who charged him with dishonest
mismanagement of property confided to him in trust. The lawsuit was
protracted enough to cause his ruin, of itself. He used every resource
to stave off the inevitable result, but at length saw no means of
relief but removal to another State. He often came to my cabin to
pass the evening in lamentations over his misfortune, in cursing his
brother-in-law, and in asking my advice and assistance. The first
time he ever intimated to me his ultimate project, he said he was
ruined, that every thing was gone, that there was but one resource,
and that depended upon me. “How can that be, master?” said I, in
astonishment. Before he would explain himself, however, he begged me
to promise to do what he should propose, well knowing, from his past
experience of my character, that I should hold myself bound by such
promise to do all that it implied, if it were within the limits of
possibility. Solicited in this way, with urgency and tears, by the man
whom I had so zealously served for twenty years, and who now seemed
absolutely dependent upon his slave,--impelled, too, by the fear which
he skilfully awakened, that the sheriff would seize every one who
belonged to him, and that all would be separated, or perhaps sold to go
to Georgia, or Louisiana--an object of perpetual dread to the slave
of the more northern States--I consented, and promised faithfully to
do all I could to save him from the fate impending over him. He then
told me I must take his slaves to his brother, in Kentucky. In vain
I represented to him that I had never travelled a day’s journey from
his plantation, and knew nothing of the way, or the means of getting
to Kentucky. He insisted that such a smart fellow as I could travel
anywhere, he promised to give me all necessary instructions, and urged
that this was the only course by which he could be saved. The result
was, that I agreed to undertake the enterprise--certainly no light one
for me, as it could scarcely be considered for even an experienced
manager. There were eighteen negroes, besides my wife, two children,
and myself, to transport nearly a thousand miles, through a country I
knew nothing about, and in winter time, for we started in the month
of February, 1825. My master proposed to follow me in a few months,
and establish himself in Kentucky. He furnished me with a small sum of
money, and some provisions; and I bought a one-horse wagon, to carry
them, and to give the women and children a lift now and then, and the
rest of us were to trudge on foot. Fortunately for the success of the
undertaking, these people had been long under my direction, and were
devotedly attached to me for the many alleviations I had afforded to
their miserable condition, the comforts I had procured them, and the
consideration which I had always manifested for them.
Under these circumstances no difficulty arose from want of submission
to my authority, and none of any sort, except that which I necessarily
encountered from my ignorance of the country, and my inexperience in
such business. On arriving at Wheeling, I sold the horse and wagon, and
purchased a boat of sufficient size, and floated down the river without
further trouble or fatigue, stopping every night to encamp.
I said I had no further trouble, but there was one source of anxiety
which I was compelled to encounter, and a temptation I had to resist,
the strength of which others can appreciate as well as myself. In
passing along the State of Ohio, we were frequently told that we were
free, if we chose to be so. At Cincinnati, especially, the colored
people gathered round us, and urged us with much importunity to remain
with them; told us it was folly to go on; and in short used all the
arguments now so familiar to induce slaves to quit their masters.
My companions probably had little perception of the nature of the
boon that was offered to them, and were willing to do just as I told
them, without a wish to judge for themselves. Not so with me. From my
earliest recollection, freedom had been the object of my ambition, a
constant motive to exertion, an ever-present stimulus to gain and to
save. No other means of obtaining it, however, had occurred to me, but
purchasing myself of my master. The idea of running away was not one
that I had ever indulged. I had a sentiment of honor on the subject, or
what I thought such, which I would not have violated even for freedom;
and every cent which I had ever felt entitled to call my own, had been
treasured up for this great purpose, till I had accumulated between
thirty and forty dollars. Now was offered to me an opportunity I had
not anticipated. I might liberate my family, my companions, and myself,
without the smallest risk, and without injustice to any individual,
except one whom we had none of us any reason to love, who had been
guilty of cruelty and oppression to us all for many years, and who had
never shown the smallest symptom of sympathy with us, or with any one
in our condition. But I need not make the exception. There would have
been no injustice to R. himself--it would have been a retribution which
might be called righteous--if I had availed myself of the opportunity
thus thrust suddenly upon me.
But it was a punishment which it was not for me to inflict. I had
promised that man to take his property to Kentucky, and deposit it
with his brother; and this, and this only, I resolved to do. I left
Cincinnati before night, though I had intended to remain there,
and encamped with my entire party a few miles below the city. What
advantages I may have lost, by thus throwing away an opportunity of
obtaining freedom, I know not; but the perception of my own strength
of character, the feeling of integrity, the sentiment of high honor, I
have experienced.--these advantages I do know, and prize; and would not
lose them, nor the recollection of having attained them, for all that
I can imagine to have resulted from an earlier release from bondage.
I have often had painful doubts as to the propriety of my carrying so
many other individuals into slavery again, and my consoling reflection
has been, that I acted as I thought at the time was best.
I arrived at Daviess county, Kentucky, about the middle of April,
1825, and delivered myself and my companions to Mr. Amos R., the
brother of my owner, who had a large plantation, with from eighty to
one hundred negroes. His house was situated about five miles south
of the Ohio River, and fifteen miles above the Yellow Banks, on Big
Blackford’s Creek. There I remained three years, expecting my master
to follow; and employed meantime on the farm, of which I had the
general management, in consequence of the recommendation for ability
and honesty which I brought with me from Maryland. The situation was
in many respects more comfortable than that I had left. The farm was
larger, and more fertile, and there was a greater abundance of food,
which is, of course, one of the principal sources of the comfort of
a slave, debarred, as he is, from so many enjoyments which other
men can obtain. Sufficiency of food is a pretty important item in
any man’s account of life; but is tenfold more so in that of the
slave, whose appetite is always stimulated by as much labor as he can
perform, and whose mind is little occupied by thought on subjects of
deeper interest. My post of superintendent gave me some advantages,
too, of which I did not fail to avail myself, particularly with
regard to those religious privileges, which, since I first heard of
Christ and Christianity, had greatly occupied my mind. In Kentucky,
the opportunities of attending on the preaching of whites, as well
as of blacks, were more numerous; and partly by attending them, and
the camp-meetings which occurred from time to time, and partly from
studying carefully my own heart, and observing the developments of
character around me, in all the stations of life which I could watch, I
became better acquainted with those religious feelings which are deeply
implanted in the breast of every human being, and learnt by practice
how best to arouse them, and keep them excited, how to stir up the
callous and indifferent, and in general to produce some good religious
impressions on the ignorant and thoughtless community by which I was
surrounded.
No great amount of theological knowledge is requisite for the purpose.
If it had been, it is manifest enough that preaching never could have
been my vocation; but I am persuaded that, speaking from the fulness of
a heart deeply impressed with its own sinfulness and imperfection, and
with the mercy of God, in Christ Jesus, my humble ministrations have
not been entirely useless to those who have had less opportunity than
myself to reflect upon these all-important subjects. It is certain that
I could not refrain from the endeavor to do what I saw others doing in
this field; and I labored at once to improve myself and those about
me in the cultivation of the harvests which ripen only in eternity. I
cannot but derive some satisfaction, too, from the proofs I have had
that my services have been acceptable to those to whom they have been
rendered. In the course of the three years from 1825 to 1828, I availed
myself of all the opportunities of improvement which occurred, and
was admitted as a preacher by a Conference of the Methodist Episcopal
Church.
In the spring of the year 1828, news arrived from my master that he
was unable to induce his wife to accompany him to Kentucky, and he
must therefore remain where he was. He sent out an agent to sell
all his slaves but me and my family, and to carry back the proceeds
to him. And now another of those heart-rending scenes was to be
witnessed, which had impressed itself so deeply on my childish soul.
Husbands and wives, parents and children were to be separated forever.
Affections, which are as strong in the African as in the European
were to be cruelly disregarded; and the iron selfishness generated by
the hateful “institution” was to be exhibited in its most odious and
naked deformity. I was exempted from a personal share in the dreadful
calamity, but I could not see without the deepest grief the agony which
I recollected in my own mother, and which was again brought before my
eyes in the persons with whom I had been long associated; nor could I
refrain from the bitterest feeling of hatred of the system and those
who sustain it. What else, indeed, can be the feeling of the slave,
liable at every moment of his life to these frightful and unnecessary
calamities, which may be caused by the caprice of the abandoned, or
the supposed necessities of the better part of the slaveholders, and
inflicted upon him without sympathy or redress, under the sanction of
the laws which uphold the institution? I lamented my agency in bringing
the poor creatures hither, if such was to be the end of the expedition;
but I could not reproach myself with having made their condition
really worse, nor with any thing but complying with the commands of a
heartless master.
In the course of the summer of 1828, a Methodist preacher, a white man
of some reputation, visited our neighborhood, and I became acquainted
with him. He was soon interested in me, and visited me frequently, and
one day talked to me in a confidential manner about my position. He
said I ought to be free; that I had too much capacity to be confined to
the limited and comparatively useless sphere of a slave; “and though,”
said he, “I must not be known to have spoken to you on this subject,
yet if you will obtain Mr. Amos’s consent to go to see your old master
in Maryland, I will try and put you in a way by which I think you may
succeed in buying yourself.” He said this to me more than once; and as
it was in harmony with all my aspirations and wishes, was flattering
to my self-esteem, and could be attended with no harm that I could
foresee, I soon resolved to make the attempt to get the necessary
leave. Somewhat to my surprise, Master Amos made no objection; but
gave me a pass to go to Maryland and back, with some remarks which
showed his sense of the value of my services to him, and his opinion
that I had earned such a privilege if I desired it. Furnished with
this, and with a letter of recommendation from my Methodist friend
to a brother preacher in Cincinnati, I started about the middle of
September, 1828, for the east. By the aid of the good man to whom I
had a letter, I had an opportunity of preaching in two or three of
the pulpits of Cincinnati, when I took the opportunity of stating my
purpose, and was liberally aided in it by contributions made on the
spot. My friend also procured some subscriptions in the city, so that
in three or four days I left it with not less than one hundred and
sixty dollars in my pocket. The annual Methodist Conference was about
to be held at Chillicothe, to which my kind friend accompanied me, and
by his influence and exertions I succeeded well there also. By his
advice I then purchased a suit of respectable clothes, and an excellent
horse, and travelled leisurely from town to town, preaching as I went,
and, wherever circumstances were favorable, soliciting aid in my
great object. I succeeded so well, that when I arrived at Montgomery
county, I was master of two hundred and seventy-five dollars, besides
my horse and my clothes. My master was surprised to see me dressed
and mounted in so respectable a style, and I must say my horse was a
good one, and my clothes better than Mr. R.’s; and he was a little
puzzled to understand why I was so long in reaching home, for it was
now Christmas, and he had been informed that I had left Kentucky in
September. I gave him such an account of my preaching and getting the
assistance of friends, as, while it was consistent with the truth, and
explained my appearance, did not betray to him my principal purpose.
Amid expressions of an apparently cordial welcome, I could discern
plainly enough the look of displeasure that a slave should have got
possession of such luxuries; and he bantered me not a little, in his
coarse way, upon my preaching, and my being so speedily converted
into a “black gentleman.” He asked for my pass, and saw that it was
expressed so as to authorize my return to Kentucky. He then handed it
to his wife, and desired her to put it into the desk. The manœuvre was
cool, but I resolved to manœuvre too.
At night I was sent to such quarters as I had been accustomed to
long enough,--the cabin used for a kitchen, with its earth floor,
its filth, and its numerous occupants;--but it was so different from
my accommodations in the free States for the last three months, and
so incompatible with my nice wardrobe, that I looked round me with a
sensation of disgust that was new to me; and instead of going to sleep,
I sat down and deliberated upon the best plan to adopt for my next
proceedings. I found my mother had died during my absence, and every
tie which had ever connected me with this place was broken. Strangers
were around me here, the slaves being those Mrs. R. had brought to
her husband, and I had not a friend to consult but Master Frank, the
brother of R.’s wife, before mentioned, who was now of age, and had
established himself in business in Washington. To him I resolved to
go, and as soon as I thought it time to start, I saddled my horse and
rode up to the house. It was early in the morning, and my master had
already gone to the tavern on his usual business, but Mrs. R. came out
to look at my horse and equipments. “Where are you going, ’Siah?” was
the natural question. I replied, “I am going to Washington, Mistress,
to see Mr. Frank, and I must take my pass with me if you please.” “O,
everybody knows you here; you won’t need your pass.” “But I can’t go to
Washington without it. I may be met by some surly stranger, who will
stop me and plague me, if he can’t do any thing worse.” “Well, I’ll get
it for you,” she answered; and glad was I to see her return with it in
her hand, and to have her give it to me, while she little imagined its
importance to my plan.
My reception by Master Frank was all I expected, as kind and hearty as
possible. He was delighted at my appearance, and I immediately told
him all my plans and hopes. He entered cordially into them, with that
sympathy which penetrates the heart of a slave, as little accustomed
as I had been, to the exhibition of any such feeling on the part of a
white man. I found he had a thorough detestation of Mr. R., whom he
charged with having defrauded him of a large proportion of his property
which he had held as guardian, though, as he was still on terms with
him, he readily agreed to negotiate for my freedom, and bring him to
the most favorable bargain. Accordingly, in a few days he rode over to
the house, and had a long conversation with R. on the subject of my
emancipation. He disclosed to him the facts that I had got some money,
and _my pass_, and urged that I was a smart fellow, who was bent upon
getting his freedom, and had served the family faithfully for many
years; that I had really paid for myself a hundred times over, in the
increased amount of produce I had raised by my skill and influence; and
that if he did not take care, and accept a fair offer when I made it
to him, he would find some day that I had the means to do without his
help, and that he would see neither me nor my money; that with my horse
and my pass I was pretty independent of him already, and he had better
make up his mind to what was really inevitable, and do it with a good
grace. By such arguments as these, Mr. Frank not only induced him to
think of the thing, but before long brought him to an actual bargain,
by which he agreed to give me my manumission papers for four hundred
and fifty dollars, of which three hundred and fifty dollars were to be
in cash, and the remainder in my note. My money and my horse enabled me
to pay the cash at once, and thus my great hopes seemed in a fair way
of being realized.