ON receiving intelligence of the arrest of Isabella, Mr. Gordon
authorized the sheriff to sell her to the highest bidder. She was,
therefore, sold; the purchaser being the noted negro-trader, Hope H.
Slater, who at once placed her in prison. Here the fugitive saw none but
slaves like herself, brought in and taken out to be placed in ships, and
sent away to some part of the country to which she herself would soon be
compelled to go. She had seen or heard nothing of her daughter while in
Richmond, and all hopes of seeing her had now fled.
At the dusk of the evening previous to the day when she was to be sent
off, as the old prison was being closed for the night, Isabella suddenly
darted past the keeper, and ran for her life. It was not a great distance
from the prison to the long bridge which passes from the lower part of
the city across the Potomac to the extensive forests and woodlands of
the celebrated Arlington Heights, then occupied by that distinguished
relative and descendant of the immortal Washington, Mr. Geo. W. Custis.
Thither the poor fugitive directed her flight. So unexpected was her
escape that she had gained several rods the start before the keeper had
secured the other prisoners, and rallied his assistants to aid in the
pursuit. It was at an hour, and in a part of the city where horses could
not easily be obtained for the chase; no bloodhounds were at hand to run
down the flying woman, and for once it seemed as if there was to be
a fair trial of speed and endurance between the slave and the
slave-catchers.
The keeper and his force raised the hue-and-cry on her path as they
followed close behind; but so rapid was the flight along the wide avenue
that the astonished citizens, as they poured forth from their dwellings
to learn the cause of alarm, were only able to comprehend the nature of
the case in time to fall in with the motley throng in pursuit, or raise
an anxious prayer to heaven as they refused to join in the chase (as
many a one did that night) that the panting fugitive might escape, and
the merciless soul-dealer for once be disappointed of his prey. And now,
with the speed of an arrow, having passed the avenue, with the distance
between her and her pursuers constantly increasing, this poor, hunted
female gained the “Long Bridge,” as it is called, where interruption
seemed improbably. Already her heart began to beat high with the hope
of success. She had only to pass three-quarters of a mile across the
bridge, when she could bury herself in a vast forest, just as the time
when the curtain of night would close around her, and protect her from
the pursuit of her enemies.
But God, by his providence, had otherwise determined. He had ordained
that an appalling tragedy should be enacted that night within plain
sight of the President's house, and the Capitol of the Union, which
would be an evidence wherever it should be known of the unconquerable
love of liberty which the human heart may inherit, as well as a fresh
admonition to the slave-dealer of the cruelty and enormity of his
crimes.
Just as the pursuers passed the high draw, soon after entering upon the
bridge, they beheld three men slowly approaching from the Virginia side.
They immediately called to them to arrest the fugitive, proclaiming her
a runaway slave. True to their Virginia instincts, as she came near,
they formed a line across the narrow bridge to intercept her. Seeing the
escape was impossible in that quarter, she stopped suddenly, and turned
upon her pursuers.
On came the profane and ribald crew faster than ever, already exulting
in her capture, and threatening punishment for her flight. For a moment
she looked wildly and anxiously around to see if there was no hope of
escape. On either hand, far down below, rolled the deep, foaming waters
of the Potomac, and before and behind were the rapidly approaching steps
and noisy voices of her pursuers. Seeing how vain would be any further
effort to escape, her resolution was instantly taken. She clasped her
hands convulsively together, raised her tearful and imploring eyes
toward heaven, and begged for the mercy and compassion there which was
unjustly denied her on earth; then, exclaiming, “Henry, Clotelle, I die
for thee!” with a single bound, vaulted over the railing of the bridge,
and sank forever beneath the angry and foaming waters of the river!
Such was the life, and such the death, of a woman whose virtues and
goodness of heart would have done honor to one in a higher station of
life, and who, had she been born in any other land but that of slavery,
would have been respected and beloved. What would have been her
feelings if she could have known that the child for whose rescue she had
sacrificed herself would one day be free, honored, and loved in another
land?