CORDELIA LONEY, SLAVE OF MRS. JOSEPH CAHELL (WIDOW OF THE LATE HON.
JOSEPH CAHELL, OF VA.), OF FREDERICKSBURG, VA.--CORDELIA'S ESCAPE FROM
HER MISTRESS IN PHILADELPHIA.
Rarely did the peculiar institution present the relations of mistress
and maid-servant in a light so apparently favorable as in the case of
Mrs. Joseph Cahell (widow of the late Hon. Jos Cahell, of Va.), and her
slave, Cordelia. The Vigilance Committee's first knowledge of either of
these memorable personages was brought about in the following manner.
About the 30th of March, in the year 1859, a member of the Vigilance
Committee was notified by a colored servant, living at a fashionable
boarding-house on Chestnut street that a lady with a slave woman from
Fredericksburg, Va., was boarding at said house, and, that said slave
woman desired to receive counsel and aid from the Committee, as she was
anxious to secure her freedom, before her mistress returned to the
South. On further consultation about the matter, a suitable hour was
named for the meeting of the Committee and the Slave at the above named
boarding-house. Finding that the woman was thoroughly reliable, the
Committee told her "that two modes of deliverance were open before her.
One was to take her trunk and all her clothing and quietly retire." The
other was to "sue out a writ of habeas corpus; and bring the mistress
before the Court, where she would be required, under the laws of
Pennsylvania, to show cause why she restrained this woman of her
freedom." Cordelia concluded to adopt the former expedient, provided the
Committee would protect her. Without hesitation the Committee answered
her, that to the extent of their ability, she should have their aid with
pleasure, without delay. Consequently a member of the Committee was
directed to be on hand at a given hour that evening, as Cordelia would
certainly be ready to leave her mistress to take care of herself. Thus,
at the appointed hour, Cordelia, very deliberately, accompanied the
Committee away from her "kind hearted old mistress."
In the quiet and security of the Vigilance Committee Room, Cordelia
related substantially the following brief story touching her
relationship as a slave to Mrs. Joseph Cahell. In this case, as with
thousands and tens of thousands of others, as the old adage fitly
expresses it, "All is not gold that glitters." Under this apparently
pious and noble-minded lady, it will be seen, that Cordelia had known
naught but misery and sorrow.
Mrs. Cahell, having engaged board for a month at a fashionable private
boarding-house on Chestnut street, took an early opportunity to caution
Cordelia against going into the streets, and against having anything to
say or do with "free niggers in particular"; withal, she appeared
unusually kind, so much so, that before retiring to bed in the evening,
she would call Cordelia to her chamber, and by her side would take her
Prayer-book and Bible, and go through the forms of devotional service.
She stood very high both as a church communicant and a lady in society.
For a fortnight it seemed as though her prayers were to be answered, for
Cordelia apparently bore herself as submissively as ever, and Madame
received calls and accepted invitations from some of the _elite_ of the
city, without suspecting any intention on the part of Cordelia to
escape. But Cordelia could not forget how her children had all been sold
by her mistress!
Cordelia was about fifty-seven years of age, with about an equal
proportion of colored and white blood in her veins; very neat,
respectful and prepossessing in manner.
From her birth to the hour of her escape she had worn the yoke under
Mrs. C., as her most efficient and reliable maid-servant. She had been
at her mistress' beck and call as seamstress, dressing-maid, nurse in
the sickroom, etc., etc., under circumstances that might appear to the
casual observer uncommonly favorable for a slave. Indeed, on his first
interview with her, the Committee man was so forcibly impressed with the
belief, that her condition in Virginia had been favorable, that he
hesitated to ask her if she did not desire her liberty. A few moments'
conversation with her, however, convinced him of her good sense and
decision of purpose with regard to this matter. For, in answer to the
first question he put to her, she answered, that, "As many creature
comforts and religious privileges as she had been the recipient of under
her 'kind mistress,' still she 'wanted to be free,' and 'was bound to
leave,' that she had been 'treated very cruelly,' that her children had
'all been sold away' from her; that she had been threatened with sale
herself 'on the first insult,'" etc.
She was willing to take the entire responsibility of taking care of
herself. On the suggestion of a friend, before leaving her mistress, she
was disposed to sue for her freedom, but, upon a reconsideration of the
matter, she chose rather to accept the hospitality of the Underground
Rail Road, and leave in a quiet way and go to Canada, where she would be
free indeed. Accordingly she left her mistress and was soon a free
woman.
The following sad experience she related calmly, in the presence of
several friends, an evening or two after she left her mistress:
Two sons and two daughters had been sold from her by her mistress,
within the last three years, since the death of her master. Three of her
children had been sold to the Richmond market and the other in Nelson
county.
Paulina was the first sold, two years ago last May. Nat was the next; he
was sold to Abram Warrick, of Richmond. Paulina was sold before it was
named to her mother that it had entered her mistress's mind to dispose
of her. Nancy, from infancy, had been in poor health. Nevertheless, she
had been obliged to take her place in the field with the rest of the
slaves, of more rugged constitution, until she had passed her twentieth
year, and had become a mother. Under these circumstances, the overseer
and his wife complained to the mistress that her health was really too
bad for a field hand and begged that she might be taken where her duties
would be less oppressive. Accordingly, she was withdrawn from the field,
and was set to spinning and weaving. When too sick to work her mistress
invariably took the ground, that "nothing was the matter,"
notwithstanding the fact, that her family physician, Dr. Ellsom, had
pronounced her "quite weakly and sick."
In an angry mood one day, Mrs. Cahell declared she would cure her; and
again sent her to the field, "with orders to the overseer, to whip her
every day, and make her work or kill her." Again the overseer said it
was "no use to try, for her health would not stand it," and she was
forthwith returned. The mistress then concluded to sell her.
One Sabbath evening a nephew of hers, who resided in New Orleans,
happened to be on a visit to his aunt, when it occurred to her, that she
had "better get Nancy off if possible." Accordingly, Nancy was called in
for examination. Being dressed in her "Sunday best" and "before a poor
candle-light," she appeared to good advantage; and the nephew concluded
to start with her on the following Tuesday morning. However, the next
morning, he happened to see her by the light of the sun, and in her
working garments, which satisfied him that he had been grossly deceived;
that she would barely live to reach New Orleans; he positively refused
to carry out the previous evening's contract, thus leaving her in the
hands of her mistress, with the advice, that she should "doctor her up."
The mistress, not disposed to be defeated, obviated the difficulty by
selecting a little boy, made a lot of the two, and thus made it an
inducement to a purchaser to buy the sick woman; the boy and the woman
brought $700.
In the sale of her children, Cordelia was as little regarded as if she
had been a cow.
"I felt wretched," she said, with emphasis, "when I heard that Nancy had
been sold," which was not until after she had been removed. "But," she
continued, "I was not at liberty to make my grief known to a single
white soul. I wept and couldn't help it." But remembering that she was
liable, "on the first insult," to be sold herself, she sought no
sympathy from her mistress, whom she describes as "a woman who shows as
little kindness towards her servants as any woman in the States of
America. She neither likes to feed nor clothe well."
With regard to flogging, however, in days past, she had been up to the
mark. "A many a slap and blow" had Cordelia received since she arrived
at womanhood, directly from the madam's own hand.
One day smarting under cruel treatment, she appealed to her mistress in
the following strain: "I stood by your mother in all her sickness and
nursed her till she died!" "I waited on your niece, night and day for
months, till she died." "I waited upon your husband all my life--in his
sickness especially, and shrouded him in death, etc., yet I am treated
cruelly." It was of no avail.
Her mistress, at one time, was the owner of about five hundred slaves,
but within the last few years she had greatly lessened the number by
sales.
She stood very high as a lady, and was a member of the Episcopal Church.
To punish Cordelia, on several occasions, she had been sent to one of
the plantations to work as a field hand. Fortunately, however, she found
the overseers more compassionate than her mistress, though she received
no particular favors from any of them.
Asking her to name the overseers, etc., she did so. The first was
"Marks, a thin-visaged, poor-looking man, great for swearing." The
second was "Gilbert Brower, a very rash, portly man." The third was
"Buck Young, a stout man, and very sharp." The fourth was "Lynn Powell,
a tall man with red whiskers, very contrary and spiteful." There was
also a fifth one, but his name was lost.
Thus Cordelia's experience, though chiefly confined to the "great
house," extended occasionally over the corn and tobacco fields, among
the overseers and field hands generally. But under no circumstances
could she find it in her heart to be thankful for the privileges of
Slavery.
After leaving her mistress she learned, with no little degree of
pleasure, that a perplexed state of things existed at the
boarding-house; that her mistress was seriously puzzled to imagine how
she would get her shoes and stockings on and off; how she would get her
head combed, get dressed, be attended to in sickness, etc., as she
(Cordelia), had been compelled to discharge these offices all her life.
Most of the boarders, being slave-holders, naturally sympathized in her
affliction; and some of them went so far as to offer a reward to some of
the colored servants to gain a knowledge of her whereabouts. Some
charged the servants with having a hand in her leaving, but all agreed
that "she had left a very kind and indulgent mistress," and had acted
very foolishly in running out of Slavery into Freedom.
A certain Doctor of Divinity, the pastor of an Episcopal church in this
city and a friend of the mistress, hearing of her distress, by request
or voluntarily, undertook to find out Cordelia's place of seclusion.
Hailing on the street a certain colored man with a familiar face, who he
thought knew nearly all the colored people about town, he related to him
the predicament of his lady friend from the South, remarked how kindly
she had always treated her servants, signified that Cordelia would rue
the change, and be left to suffer among the "miserable blacks down
town," that she would not be able to take care of herself; quoted
Scripture justifying Slavery, and finally suggested that he (the colored
man) would be doing a duty and a kindness to the fugitive by using his
influence to "find her and prevail upon her to return."
It so happened that the colored man thus addressed, was Thomas Dorsey,
the well-known fashionable caterer of Philadelphia, who had had the
experience of quite a number of years as a slave at the South,--had
himself once been pursued as a fugitive, and having, by his industry in
the condition of Freedom, acquired a handsome estate, he felt entirely
qualified to reply to the reverend gentleman, which he did, though in
not very respectful phrases, telling him that Cordelia had as good a
right to her liberty as he had, or her mistress either; that God had
never intended one man to be the slave of another; that it was all false
about the slaves being better off than the free colored people; that he
would find as many "poor, miserably degraded," of his own color
"down-town," as among the "degraded blacks"; and concluded by telling
him that he would "rather give her a hundred dollars to help her off,
than to do aught to make known her whereabouts, if he knew ever so much
about her."
What further steps were taken by the discomfited divine, the mistress,
or her boarding-house sympathizers, the Committee was not informed.
But with regard to Cordelia: she took her departure for Canada, in the
midst of the Daniel Webster (fugitive) trial, with the hope of being
permitted to enjoy the remainder of her life in Freedom and peace. Being
a member of the Baptist Church, and professing to be a Christian, she
was persuaded that, by industry and assistance of the Lord, a way would
be opened to the seeker of Freedom even in a strange land and among
strangers.
This story appeared in part in the _N.Y. Evening Post_, having been
furnished by the writer, without his name to it. It is certainly none
the less interesting now, as it may be read in the light of Universal
Emancipation.
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