"The above account is from my brother, I was at work on Hilton Head
about twenty miles north of my brother, during the same winter. The
same allowance of one peck of corn for a week, the same kind of houses
to live in, and the same method of grinding their corn, and always in
the night, and in the dark, was practiced there.
"A number of instances of severe whipping came under my notice. The
first was this:--two men were sent out to saw some blocks out of large
live oak timber on which to raise my building. Their saw was in poor
order, and they sawed them badly, for which their master stripped them
naked and flogged them.
"The next instance was a boy about sixteen years of age. He had crept
into the coach to sleep; after two or three nights he was caught by
the coach driver, a _northern man_, and stripped _entirely naked_, and
whipped without mercy, his master looking on.
"Another instance. The overseer, a young white man, had ordered
several negroes a boat's crew, to be on the spot at a given time. One
man did not appear until the boat had gone. The overseer was very
angry and told him to strip and be flogged; he being slow, was told if
he did not instantly strip off his jacket, he, the overseer, would
whip it off which he did in shreds, whipping him cruelly.
"The man ran into the barrens and it was about a month before they
caught him. He was newly starved, and at last stole a turkey; then
another, and was caught.
"Having occasion to pass a plantation very early one foggy morning, in
a boat we heard the sound of the whip, before we could see, but as we
drew up in front of the plantation, we could see the negroes at work
in the field. The overseer was going from one to the other causing
them to lay down their hoe, strip off their garment, hold up their
hands and receive their number of lashes. Thus he went on from one to
the other until we were out of sight. In the course of the winter a
family came where I was, on a visit from a neighboring island; of
course, in a boat with negroes to row them--one of these a barber,
told me that he ran away about two years before, and joined a company
of negroes who had fled to the swamps. He said they suffered a great
deal--were at last discovered by a party of hunters, who fired among
them, and caused them to scatter. Himself and one more fled to the
coast, took a boat and put off to sea, a storm came on and swamped or
upset them, and his partner was drowned, he was taken up by a passing
vessel and returned to his master.