"Two negroes, runaways from Virginia, were overtaken a few days since
near Johnstown, Cambria co. Pa. when the persons in pursuit called out
for them to stop or they would shoot them.--One of the negroes turned
around and said, he would die before he would be taken, and at the
moment received a rifle ball through his knee: the other started to
run, but was brought to the ground by a ball being shot in his back.
After receiving the above wounds they made battle with their pursuers,
but were captured and brought into Johnstown. It is said that the
young men who shot them had orders to take them dead or alive."
Mr. M.M. SHAFTER, of Townsend, Vermont, recently a graduate of the
Wesleyan University at Middletown, Connecticut, makes the following
statement:
"Some of the events of the Southampton, Va. insurrection were narrated
to me by Mr. Benjamin W. Britt, from Riddicksville, N.C. Mr. Britt
claimed the honor of having shot a black on that occasion, for the
crime of disobeying Mr. Britt's imperative 'Stop.' And Mr. Ashurst, of
Edenton, Georgia, told me that a neighbor of his 'fired at a likely
negro boy of his mother,' because the said boy encroached upon his
premises."
Mr. DAVID HAWLEY, a class leader in the Methodist Episcopal Church at
St. Albans, Licking county, Ohio, who moved from Kentucky to Ohio in
1831, certifies as follows:--
"About the year 1825, a slave had escaped for Canada, but was arrested
in Hardin county. On his return, I saw him in Hart county--his wrists
tied together before, his arms tied close to his body, the rope then
passing behind his body, thence to the neck of a horse on which rode
the master, with a club about three feet long, and of the size of a
hoe handle; which, by the appearance of the slave, had been used on
his head, so as to wear off the hair and skin in several places, and
the blood was running freely from his mouth and nose; his heels very
much bruised by the horse's feet, as his master had rode on him
because he _would_ not go fast enough. Such was the slave's appearance
when passing through where I resided. Such cases were not unfrequent."
The following is furnished by Mr. F.A. HART, of Middletown,
Connecticut, a manufacturer, and an influential member of the
Methodist Episcopal Church. It occurred in 1824, about twenty-five
miles this side of Baltimore, Maryland.--
"I had spent the night with a Methodist brother; and while at
breakfast, a person came in and called for help. We went out and found
a crowd collected around a carriage. Upon approaching we discovered
that a slave-trader was endeavoring to force a woman into his
carriage. He had already put in three children, the youngest
apparently about eight years of age. The woman was strong, and
whenever he brought her to the side of the carriage, she resisted so
effectually with her feet that he could not get her in. The woman
becoming exhausted, at length, by her frantic efforts, he thrust her
in with great violence, _stamped her down upon the bottom with his
feet_! shouted to the driver to go on; and away they rolled, the
miserable captives moaning and shrieking, until their voices were lost
in the distance."
Mr. SAMUEL HALL, a teacher in Marietta College, Ohio, writes as
follows:--
"Mr. ISAAC C. FULLER is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church in
Marietta. He was a fellow student of mine while in college, and now
resides in this place. He says:--In 1832, as I was descending the Ohio
with a flat boat, near the 'French Islands,' so called, below
Cincinnati, I saw two negroes on horseback. The horses apparently took
fright at something and ran. Both jumped over a rail fence; and one of
the horses, in so doing, broke one of his fore-legs, falling at the
same time and throwing the negro who was upon his back. A white man
came out of a house not over two hundred yards distant, and came to
the spot. Seizing a stake from the fence, he knocked the negro down
five or six times in succession.
"In the same year I worked for a Mr. Nowland, eleven miles above Baton
Rouge, La. at a place called 'Thomas' Bend.' He had an overseer who
was accustomed to flog more or less of the slaves every morning. I
heard the blows and screams as regularly as we used to hear the
college bell that summoned us to any duty when we went to school. This
overseer was a nephew of Nowland, and there were about fifty slaves on
his plantation. Nowland himself related the following to me. One of
his slaves ran away, and came to the Homo Chitto river, where he found
no means of crossing. Here he fell in with a white man who knew his
master, being on a journey from that vicinity. He induced the slave to
return to Baton Rouge, under the promise of giving him a pass, by
which he might escape, but, in reality, to betray him to his master.
This he did, instead of fulfilling his promise. Nowland said that he
took the slave and inflicted five hundred lashes upon him, cutting his
back all to pieces, and then thew on hot embers. The slave was on the
plantation at the time, and told me the same story. He also rolled up
his sleeves, and showed me the scars on his arms, which, in
consequence, appeared in places to be callous to the bone. I was with
Nowland between five and six months."
Rev. JOHN RANKIN, formerly of Tennessee, now pastor of the
Presbyterian Church of Ripley, Ohio, has furnished the following
statement:--
"The Rev. LUDWELL G. GAINES, now pastor of the Presbyterian Church of
Goshen, Clermont county, Ohio, stated to me, that while a resident of
a slave state, he was summoned to assist in taking a man who had made
his black woman work naked several days, and afterwards murdered her.
The murderer armed himself, and threatened to shoot the officer who
went to take him; and although there was ample assistance at hand, the
officer declined further interference."