DEATH IS FREEDOM.
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 improbable. 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 at 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 that 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?