Among the many fugitives whose stories were full of interest, was that
of a woman named Rachel. She was tall, muscular, slight, with an
extremely sensitive nervous organization, a brain of large size, and an
expression of remarkable sagacity and quickness. She was living in West
Chester, Chester county, Pa., when attempts were made to retake her to
Slavery. With wonderful swiftness and adroitness she eluded pursuit, and
was soon hurried away. Speedily reaching our house, she hid herself away
during the day, and in the evening, as a place of greater safety, she
was transferred to the house of our uncle, Dr. Fussell, then residing on
an adjoining farm. As was his wont, this kind-hearted man soon entered
into a conversation with her, and in a few minutes discovered that she
had once been a pupil of his during his residence in Maryland many years
before.
At the moment of recognition she sprang up, overwhelming him with her
manifestations of delight, crying: "You Dr. Fussell? You Dr. Fussell?
Don't you remember me? I'm Rache--Cunningham's Rache, down at Bush River
Neck." Then receding to view him better, "Lord bless de child! how he is
grown!"
Her tongue once loosened, she poured forth her whole history, expressing
in every lineament her concentrated abhorrence of her libertine master,
"Mort Cunningham." Over that story, it is needful to pass lightly,
simply saying, she endured all outraged nature could endure and survive.
For the sake of humanity we may trust there were few such fiends even
among southern masters as this monster in human shape. Cunningham
finally sold her to go further South, with a master whose name cannot
now be recalled. This man was in ill health, and after a time he and his
wife started northward, bringing Rache with them. On the voyage the
master grew worse, and one night when he was about to die, a fearful
storm arose, which Rache devoutly believed was sent from Heaven. In
describing this scene, she impersonated her surroundings with wonderful
vividness and marvellous power. At one moment she was the howling wind;
at another the tumultuous sea--then the lurching ship--the bellowing cow
frightened by the storm--the devil, who came to carry away her master's
soul, and finally the weak, dying man, as he passed to eternity.
They proceeded on their voyage and landed at their place of destination.
Rache sees the cow snuffing the land breeze and darting off through the
crowd. The captain of the vessel points to the cow and motions her to
follow its example. She needs nothing more. Again she is acting--she is
now the cow; but human caution, shrewdness, purpose, are lent to animal
instinct. She looks around her with wary eye--scents the air--a flash,
and she is hidden from the crowd which you see around her--she is free!
Making her way northward, she finally arrived at the house of Emmer
Kimber, Kimberton, Chester county, Pa., and proving a remarkably capable
woman, she remained a considerable time in his family, as a cook. She
finally married, and settled in West Chester, where the pair prospered
and were soon surrounded by the comforts of a neat home. After several
years of peaceful life there, she was one day alarmed, not by the heirs
of her dead master, but by the loathed "Mort Cunningham," who, without
the shadow of legal right, had come to carry her back to Slavery. Fear
lent her wings. She darted into a hatter's shop and out through the back
buildings, springing over a dye kettle in her way, and cleared a board
fence at a bound. On her way to a place of safety she looked back to
see, with keen enjoyment, "Mort Cunningham" falling backward from the
fence she had leaped. Secure in a garret, she looked down into the
streets below, to see his vacant, dazed look as he sought, unable to
find her. Her rendering of the expression of his face at this time, was
irresistibly ludicrous, as was that of his whole bearing while searching
for her. "Mort Cunningham" did not get her, but whether or not she ever
returned to the enjoyment of her happy home, in West Chester, we never
knew, as this sudden flight was the last we ever heard of her. She was
one of the most wide-awake of human beings, and the world certainly lost
in the uneducated slave, an actor of great dramatic power.