Part II

_THE LIGHTNING_

And what man moves but on the crest of history!

The spark flashes from each to each.

The incandescence fuses--

Blooms out of the ghetto pit--

Roars to the sky--

Fans into a fiery liberty tree

Showering its seed to the last beaches of the embattled earth!

--HARRY GRANICK

CHAPTER SIX

_Is this a thing, or can it be a man?_

Freedom is a hard-bought thing! Frederick expected to remain in New

York. He was free, he had money in his pocket, he would find work.

He had no plans beyond reaching this big city, where there were

Abolitionists who printed papers calling for the freeing of the slaves,

and many free Negroes. Here he could work in safety.

“_Voila!_” murmured a little French seamstress, peeping through the

slits of her blinds as the jaunty figure came in view. She had seen

such stepping before, such lifting of the head, such a singing with

the shoulders. She remembered free men marching into the Place de la

Concorde. She smiled and hummed a few bars of the “_Marseillaise_.”

“_Allons, enfants.... Marchons...._” She threw the shutters open. What

a beautiful morning!

But Frederick didn’t find work that first day. By nightfall he was

feeling uneasy. Job-hunting had brought him up against an unexpected

wall. The colored people he saw seemed to be avoiding him. He walked

straight up to the next Negro he saw and spoke to him. From his

bespattered appearance, and his pail and brush, Frederick judged the

man to be a house painter.

“Good evening, mister! Could you tell me where I might find a place to

stay? I just got here and--”

The man’s eyes in his sunken, dark face were rolling in every direction

at once.

“Lemme be. I donno nothin’.” He was moving on, but Frederick blocked

his path.

“Look, mister, I only want--”

The man’s tones were belligerent, though his voice was low.

“Donno nothin’ ’bout you, sailor. An’ I ain’t tellin’ you nothin’!”

Frederick watched him disappear around a corner. As night came on he

followed a couple of sailors into a smoke-filled eating place. There he

ate well, served by a swarthy, good-natured fellow, whose father that

day had picked olives on a hillside overlooking Rome. Garlic, coarse

laughter, warmth and the tangy smell of seamen mingled in the dimly

lighted room. Some of the men lifted their foamy mugs in greeting as

Frederick sank into a corner. He waved back. But he hurried through his

meal, not daring to linger long for fear of betraying himself.

He walked aimlessly in the gathering gloom. He thought a lamplighter,

lifting his wick to the corner lamp, eyed him suspiciously. Frederick

turned down a dimmer thoroughfare. He was tired. The suitcase was heavy.

Across the street a bearded seaman took his stubby pipe from between

his teeth and looked after the solitary figure. _Young sailors do not

carry heavy suitcases, bumping against their legs!_ The man grunted,

crossed the street and came up behind the young man. He spoke softly.

“Hi, sailor!”

With a start Frederick turned. Now it was his turn to hesitate. In the

fading light he could not distinguish whether the face behind the thick

beard was white or colored. So he only answered, “Hi, yo’self!”

The stranger fell in beside him. “When’d you get in?”

“Yesterday. Up from the West Indies.” The answer came easily. _But_,

the seaman thought to himself, _it’s the wrong answer_. Out of the

corner of his eye he studied the young man and threw out another

question.

“What’s your ship?”

Frederick was well prepared for this question.

“The _Falcon_.”

They walked along in silence, the bearded seaman puffing his pipe.

Frederick waited.

“Might you be headin’ toward the--north star?”

Frederick’s heart leaped. The words could have only one meaning. Yet

was this man friend or foe? Dared he trust him?

“I hear tell the north star leads us straight,” he said.

The stranger took Frederick’s arm.

“It has led you well. Come!”

In the little house on Centre Street, Frederick met Tom Stuart’s

mother, a bright-eyed little woman who greeted him warmly. But hardly

could he blurt out an outline of his story before he had fallen

asleep--for the first time in nearly forty-eight hours.

Then Tom Stuart went quickly to the corner of Lispenard and Church

Streets and knocked on the door of David Ruggles, secretary of the New

York Vigilance Committee.

“You are right,” said the secretary, when he heard what the seaman had

to say. “He is not safe here.”

“New York’s full of Southerners. They’re beginning to come back from

the watering-places now,” Stuart added.

“Looking for work down on the waterfront, he’ll be caught.”

The scar on Ruggles’ black face twisted into a smile.

“God’s providence protected him today. Now we must do our part and get

him away.” He covered his sightless eyes with his hand and sat thinking.

David Ruggles had been born free. He was schooled, alert, and he had

courage. But once he had dared too much for his own good. In Ohio an

irate slave-chaser’s whip had cut across his face. Its thongs had torn

at his eyes, and he would never see again. But the slave whom he was

helping to escape had got away. And David Ruggles had said, “My eyes

for a man’s life? We were the winners!”

The seaman cleared his throat.

“There is a girl--a freewoman. She is to meet him here.”

The secretary frowned.

“Good heavens! Haven’t we enough to do without managing love trysts?”

Tom Stuart grinned in the darkness as he walked home. He knew the heart

of this black man. He would show no sign of annoyance the next morning

when he welcomed the young fugitive.

As for Frederick, he wanted to kiss the hands of this blind man when

they clasped his own so firmly. _An agent of the Underground Railroad!

Underground Railroad!_--a whisper up and down the Eastern Shore. Now

Frederick was to hear them spoken aloud.

The increasing numbers of slaves who were escaping, in spite of

the rigid cordons thrown round the slave states and the terrifying

penalties for failure in the attempt, gave rise to wild rumors. The

bayous of Louisiana, the backlands of Alabama and Mississippi, the

swamps of Florida and the mountains of the Atlantic states, seemed to

suck them in like a man-eating plant. People said there was a colony

of blacks deep in the Florida scrub, where they lived a life of ease

far inside the bayous that no white man could penetrate. Another group,

so they said, raised crops on the broad flat plains that ran toward the

border of Georgia; and two thousand more hid inside the dismal swamps

of Virginia, coming out to trade with Negroes and whites.

There was no denying the fact that Negroes showed up across the border

of Canada with surprising regularity--slaves from the rice fields of

Georgia and South Carolina, the tobacco lands of Virginia and Maryland,

and the cotton fields of Alabama.

“One thousand slaves a year disappear!” John Calhoun thundered in

Congress. “They go as if swallowed up by an underground passage.”

The idea caught on. Young America expanding--passages opening to new

territory. To a people still using the stagecoach, trains symbolized

daring and adventure. An underground railway to freedom! Men cocked

their hats rakishly, cut off their mustaches and tightened the holsters

at their belts; small shopkeepers put heavy padlocks on their doors

and slipped out to meetings; tall, lean men wearing linen and nankeen

pantaloons--sons of planters among them--emptied their mint juleps and

climbed into the saddle; the devout Quaker put a marker in his Bible

and dug a new deep cellar underneath his house, partitioned off rooms

with false walls and laid in fresh supplies of thick wide cloaks and

long black veils.

What more natural than that slaves down in their quarters sang, _Dat

train comin’, hit’s comin’ round da bend!_ and _Git on board, lil’

chillun, git on board!_

The “train” might be a skiff, securely fastened under overhanging

reeds. Or it might be a peddler’s cart, an open wagon filled with hay,

or the family carryall, driven by a quiet man in a wide-brimmed Quaker

hat, who spoke softly to the ladies sitting beside him, neatly dressed

in gray, with Quaker bonnets on their heads and veils over their faces.

The “train” might simply be a covered-up path through the woods. But

the slave voices rose, exulting:

“Da train am rollin’

Da train am rollin’ by--

Hallelujah!”

“Conductors” planned the connections. And David Ruggles in the house

on Church Street routed the train in and out of New York City. He

collected and paid out money, received reports and checked routes.

David Ruggles was a busy man.

He heard Frederick through quietly. Frederick was worried. If he could

not stay in New York, where would he go?

“It’s a big country,” Mr. Ruggles assured the young man. “A workman is

worthy of his hire. We shall look about.” Then he asked abruptly, “Have

you written the young lady?”

Frederick felt his face burn. Being among people with whom he could

share his precious secret was a new experience.

“Y-es, sir,” he stammered. “I--I posted a letter this morning--On my

way here.”

He looked toward Tom Stuart, whose eyes were laughing at him. The

seaman put in a word.

“Got up and wrote the letter before dawn!”

“Since she is a freewoman,” Mr. Ruggles smiled, “she can no doubt join

you immediately.”

“Yes--Yes, sir.”

“Very well. Then you must remain under cover until she comes.”

“He’s safe at my house,” Tom Stuart said quickly, and the secretary

nodded.

“That is good,” he said. “And now for the record.”

At this word a slender boy of nine or ten years, who had been sitting

quietly at the table, opened a large ledger and picked up a quill

pen. He said nothing but turned his intelligent, bright eyes toward

Frederick. Mr. Ruggles laid his hand on the boy’s arm.

“My son here is my eyes,” he said.

Frederick regarded the little fellow with amazement. He was going to

write with that pen!

“You are called Frederick?” the father asked.

Frederick gave a start. “I have sometimes heard of another

name--Bailey,” he said. “I--I really don’t know. They call me

Frederick.”

“For the present, we shan’t worry about the surname. It is safer now to

lose whatever identity you might have. Write Frederick Johnson, son!”

The boy wrote easily. “There are so many Johnsons. But now that you are

a free man, you must have a name--a family name.”

“Oh, yes, sir!”

The days passed swiftly. Anna arrived--warmly welcomed by Tom Stuart’s

mother and whisked quickly out of sight until the moment when she

stood beside him. Anna, her eyes pools of happiness, wearing a lovely

plum-colored silk dress! They were married by the Reverend J. W. C.

Pennington, whose father, after having been freed by George Washington,

had served him faithfully at Valley Forge. He refused the fee offered

by the eager young bridegroom.

“It is my wedding gift to you, young man. God speed you!”

They were put aboard the steamer _John W. Richmond_, belonging to the

line running between New York and Newport, Rhode Island.

“New Bedford is your place,” David Ruggles had said. “There are many

Friends in New Bedford, and the shipyards are constantly fitting out

ships for long whaling voyages. A good caulker will find work. Good

luck, my boy!”

Since colored passengers were not allowed in the cabins, the bride and

groom had to pass their first night on the deck. But what mattered

whether they were cold or hot, wet or dry; whether they stood leaning

over the rail, jammed against sticky kegs, or sat on the hard boards?

They were free--they were young--they were on their way, to make a

home, to build a life _together_.

Oh, how bright the stars shone that night! Anna saw Frederick’s lips

move as he gazed at them. She leaned closer and he tightened his arm

about her. “I must not forget!” he murmured.

The nights on the open deck--they had two of them--enfolded them and

shut out all the world. The ache of all their lonely years dissolved

before the new happiness in their hearts. Then, out of the gray mist

and the darker shadows, emerged the gaunt shores of their new world.

Anna gripped her husband’s arm and trembled. But he lifted her face to

his and kissed her.

As the boat approached New Bedford, the crowded harbor, with its

stained, weather-beaten ships and dirty warehouses, was a golden

gate--let down from the clouds just for them. Frederick wanted to shout.

“Look! Look!” He was pointing at an imposing house that stood on a

hill behind the town. “That’s the kind of house we’ll have. A fine,

big house! I’ll make it with my own hands. I’m free, Anna, I’m free to

build a house like that!”

Her eyes laughed with him.

So it was that they landed on the rocky shores of New England, where

free men had set their feet before them. Leif, son of Eric the Red,

touched this coast with his Norsemen. In 1497 and ’98 John Cabot,

Venetian navigator, explored here and gave England her claim to the

region. Cabot under the British flag, Verrazzano under the _fleur de

lis_, and Gomez under the flag of Spain, all of them had come even

before the Pilgrim Fathers.

It was from Rhode Island--from Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson, all

part of the rising winds of rebellion--that New Bedford got its start.

Time and again this salty breeze had blown through the Massachusetts

commonwealth. It rose and blew steadily during most of the eighteenth

century, bringing gains in political freedom and education and

religious tolerance. Impoverished farmers had followed Daniel Shays;

and an early governor, James Sullivan, had been stirred to say, “Where

the mass of people are ignorant, poor and miserable, there is no public

opinion excepting what is the offspring of fear.” The winds had died

down during the rise of Federalism, but now once more a little breeze

fanned the cheeks of the mill girls in Lowell and the mechanics in

Boston. It rustled the dead, dry leaves piled high in Cambridge and

Concord. It was scattering the seeds of Abolitionism.

Boston had William Lloyd Garrison, whom neither jails, fires, threats,

nor the elegant rhetoric of William Ellery Channing could stifle. He

waved his paper, the _Liberator_, high in the air, whipping the breeze

higher. He stood his ground and loosed a blast destined to shake the

rafters of the nation.

“Urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in

earnest. I will not equivocate. I will not excuse. I will not retreat a

single inch--and I will be heard!”

Certain slave states had set a price on William Lloyd Garrison’s head.

But in February, 1837, the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society had

convened in the hall of the House of Representatives in Boston, and

after every space was filled nearly five thousand people were turned

away. Nathan Johnson had been one of the delegates from New Bedford.

Nathan Johnson was proud of the commonwealth of Massachusetts. His

people had lived in the midst of a group of Dutch dairy farmers

comfortably spread out over the meadowlands near Sheffield. They had

owned a tiny piece of land. Nathan had gone to school, learned a trade

and, like many another Massachusetts farm boy, made a trip to sea.

For a time he had lingered in Scotland where a Negro was a curiosity.

There was something about the hills and valleys with their jutting

rocks that drew him. Then he realized he was homesick. He returned to

Massachusetts, married and plied his trade--he was a carpenter--near

the sight and sound and smell of the sea. He had seen the face of

slavery, but he believed the State of Massachusetts would educate the

nation away from such evil practices.

David Ruggles had written Nathan Johnson about Frederick. The answer

had come back: “Send him along!” And Johnson had hurried to the dock to

meet the “poor critters.”

But the young man who stepped from the boat and took his hand with such

a firm grip did not call forth pity. To the Yankee he had the look

neither of a fugitive nor a slave.

Ma Johnson blocked all questions while she bustled about setting a

good, hot meal before the newcomers.

“Dead beat, I know,” was her comment. “Now you just wash up and make

yourselves right at home.” She poured water and handed them thick white

towels, while little Lethia and Jane stared with wide eyes.

Everything floated in a dreamy mist. This house, this abundant table,

this room were unbelievable. Frederick’s fingers itched to take down

the books from their shelves, to pick up papers lying about. With an

effort he brought his eyes back to the animated face of his host.

“There ain’t a thing in the laws or constitution of Massachusetts to

stop a colored man being governor of the state, if the folks sees fit

to elect him!” Lethia nodded her small head gravely and smiled at

Frederick.

Ma Johnson sighed gently. Nathan was off on his favorite

topic--Massachusetts! But that was safe talk for these two nice young

people. They could just eat in peace. She set a plate of savory clam

chowder in front of Anna.

“No slaveholder’d dare try takin’ a slave out of New Bedford!” The

glasses quivered as Johnson thumped the table. Frederick smiled.

“I’m glad to hear that--after what they told me about New York.”

“Humph!” The Yankee snorted. “New York ain’t in Massachusetts, young

man. All sorts of people there. Can’t count on ’em!” Ma Johnson gently

intervened.

“Reckon we have some troublemakers, too, even in New Bedford.”

“Ay, and I reckon we know how to take care of ’em!”

It was Indian summer in New England. The evenings were still long, with

no suggestion of frost in the air. After supper they sat in the yard,

and between long puffs on his pipe the host talked and gradually drew

out the young man. Came the moment when he took his pipe from his mouth

and sat forward on his chair, lips pressed together in a grim line.

“I cannot understand how such things be!” he said, shaking his head.

The women had gone inside. Lights shone in the cottage across the

way, and on the other side of the white picket fence a girl laughed.

Frederick stood up. Even in the dusk, Johnson was conscious of the

broad shoulders and the long, lithe limbs. He was looking up at the

trees.

“Almost--Almost I am afraid,” Frederick said.

“Afraid? Now? Your time to be afraid is gone. Now you are safe!”

“That’s it! _I_ am safe. I’m afraid of so much happiness.”

“A mite o’ happiness won’t spoil you, my boy. There’s strength in you.

And now I reckon your wife is waiting.” Nathan Johnson stood up.

Inside the house Frederick turned and clasped the hand of his host.

“How can I thank you?” he asked.

The older man smiled. “Fine words ain’t needed, son. The two of you are

good for Ma and me. Now go ’long with you!”

And he sent him to Anna.

They were awakened by church bells. Then they heard the children

getting off to church. Anna started up guiltily. Perhaps they were

delaying Mrs. Johnson.

But over the house lay a sweet Sabbath calm; it ran all up and down

the street--and over all New Bedford. The day passed in unhurried

discussion of jobs and plans for the young folks. Now indeed Frederick

must have a name.

“Some take the name of their old master.”

“I won’t.” Frederick spoke emphatically.

“Ay,” agreed Nathan. “No sense in tying a stone round your children’s

necks. Give ’em a good name.” He grinned at Frederick and Anna. “When

I look at you I think of somebody I read about--fellow by the name of

Douglass.”

“You want to name him from a book, Pa?” His wife laughed.

“Why not? He’s already got a heap out of books. And this Scotchman,

Douglass, was a fine man. The book says he had a ‘stalwart hand’.”

Then Nathan launched into a vivid description of Scotland as he had

seen it. He came back to the name.

“Ay, Douglass is a bonny name.”

Anna spoke softly. “Frederick Douglass--It has a good, strong sound.”

“You like it, Anna?” Frederick’s eyes drew her to him.

And Anna smiled, nodding her head. So Douglass was the name he passed

on to their children.

The next day he went down to the wharves and caught his first view of

New England shipping.

“The sight of the broad brim and the plain, Quaker dress,” he

recalled later, “which met me at every turn, greatly increased my

sense of freedom and security. _I am among the Quakers_, thought I,

_and am safe_. Lying at the wharves and riding in the stream, were

full-rigged ships of finest model, ready to start on whaling voyages.

Upon the right and the left, I was walled in by large granite-fronted

warehouses, crowded with the good things of this world. On the wharves,

I saw industry without bustle, labor without noise, and heavy toil

without the whip. There was no loud singing, as in Southern ports

where ships are loading or unloading--no loud cursing or swearing--but

everything went on as smoothly as the works of a well-adjusted machine.

How different was all this from the noisily fierce and clumsily absurd

manner of labor-life in Baltimore and St. Michaels! One of the first

incidents which illustrated the superior mental character of Northern

labor over that of the South, was the manner of unloading a ship’s

cargo of oil. In a Southern port, twenty or thirty hands would have

been employed to do what five or six did here, with the aid of a single

ox hitched to the end of a fall. Main strength, unassisted by skill, is

slavery’s method of labor. An old ox worth eighty dollars was doing in

New Bedford what would have required fifteen thousand dollars’ worth

of human bone and muscle to have performed in a Southern port.... The

maid servant, instead of spending at least a tenth part of her time

in bringing and carrying water, as in Baltimore, had the pump at her

elbow. Wood-houses, indoor pumps, sinks, drains, self-shutting gates,

washing machines, pounding barrels, were all new things, and told me

that I was among a thoughtful and sensible people. The carpenters

struck where they aimed, and the caulkers wasted no blows in idle

flourishes of the mallet.”[1]

He remembered little about the hardships of that first winter in the

North, and only mentioned in passing that he was not permitted to use

his skill as a caulker. Even here white labor shut the black worker

out. The difference between the wage of a caulker and that of a common

day-laborer was 50 per cent. But Frederick would not be stopped. He was

free. So he sawed wood, dug cellars, shoveled coal, rolled oil casks

on the wharves, loaded and unloaded vessels. It was the cold that he

remembered.

Nothing had prepared them for the cold--the silent, thick, gray cold

that shut down like a vise over the land. The tiny house on a back

street, which had seemed the fulfillment of their dreams, now was a

porous shed. It had none of the Northern conveniences, and each trip

through the snowdrifts to the distant well with its frozen buckets was

a breath-taking effort.

Each morning Anna got her husband’s breakfast by candlelight, and

Frederick set out for work. Odd jobs were not as easy to find nor as

steady as he would have liked. Many cotton mills in New England were

still that winter, and many ships lay idle all along Cape Cod. Down in

Washington a new President was proving himself weak and ineffectual.

Banks were tottering and business houses were going down in ruins. This

was the year Susan B. Anthony’s father lost his factory, his store,

his home; and the eighteen-year-old Quaker girl, with Berkshire hills

mirrored in her eyes, went out to teach school.

During the hardest part of the winter, Frederick’s wages were less than

ten dollars for the month. He and Anna were pinched for food. But they

were never discouraged: they were living in a new world. When he could,

Frederick attended the meetings of colored people of New Bedford. These

meetings went far beyond the gatherings of the East Baltimore Mental

Improvement Society, and once more Frederick sat silent, listening and

learning. He was constantly amazed at the resolutions presented and

discussions which followed. All the speakers seemed to him possessed of

marvelously superior talents.

Two events during his first months in New Bedford had a decisive effect

upon his life.

“Among my first concerns on reaching New Bedford,” he said years

later, “was to become united with the church, for I had never given

up, in reality, my religious faith. I had become lukewarm and in a

backslidden state, but I was still convinced that it was my duty to

join the church.... I therefore resolved to join the Methodist church

in New Bedford and to enjoy the spiritual advantage of public worship.

The minister of the Elm Street Methodist Church was the Reverend Mr.

Bonney; and although I was not allowed a seat in the body of the house,

and was proscribed on account of my color, regarding this proscription

simply as an accommodation of the unconverted congregation who had not

yet been won to Christ and his brotherhood, I was willing thus to be

proscribed, lest sinners should be driven away from the saving power of

the Gospel. Once converted, I thought they would be sure to treat me as

a man and a brother. _Surely,_ thought I, _these Christian people have

none of this feeling against color_....

“An opportunity was soon afforded me for ascertaining the exact

position of Elm Street Church on the subject.... The occasion ...

was the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.... At the close of his (Mr.

Bonney’s) discourse, the congregation was dismissed and the church

members remained to partake of the sacrament. I remained to see, as

I thought, this holy sacrament celebrated in the spirit of its great

Founder.

“There were only about a half dozen colored members attached to the

Elm Street Church, at this time.... These descended from the gallery

and took a seat against the wall most distant from the altar. Brother

Bonney was very animated, and sung very sweetly, ‘Salvation, ’tis

a joyful sound,’ and soon began to administer the sacrament. I was

anxious to observe the bearing of the colored members, and the result

was most humiliating. During the whole ceremony, they looked like sheep

without a shepherd. The white members went forward to the altar by the

bench full; and when it was evident that all the whites had been served

with the bread and wine, Brother Bonney--pious Brother Bonney--after

a long pause, as if inquiring whether all the white members had been

served, and fully assuring himself on that important point, then raised

his voice to an unnatural pitch, and looking to the corner where his

black sheep seemed penned, beckoned with his hand, exclaiming, ‘Come

forward, colored friends!--come forward! You, too, have an interest in

the blood of Christ. God is no respecter of persons. Come forward, and

take this holy sacrament to your comfort.’ The colored members--poor,

slavish souls--went forward, as invited. I went _out_, and have never

been in that church since, although I honestly went there with the view

of joining that body.”[2]

The second event was happier. Not long after they moved into the

little house a young man knocked on their door. Frederick had just

come in from a particularly hard and unproductive day. Anna, turning

from the stove where she was about to serve the evening meal, listened

attentively. She wanted to say something. Then she heard Frederick’s

tired voice, “Subscribe? the _Liberator_?”

“Yes,” the young man spoke briskly, “You know, William Lloyd Garrison’s

Abolitionist paper. Surely _we_ ought to support him!”

Anna moved to the doorway, but Frederick was shaking his head.

“I wish I could, but--We--I can’t--now.”

Anna slipped her hand in his. It was warm and a little moist. The young

man understood. He cleared his throat.

“You’d _like_ to read it?” he asked.

“Oh, yes!” It was Anna who breathed the answer.

“Then--you can pay me later!”

“Oh, Freddie, that’s wonderful!” Anna said, but her eyes were beaming

at the young man, who grinned and disappeared around the corner.

“_She’s_ got brains!” he thought, with thorough appreciation.

Back at the stove, Anna was fairly singing.

“We hardly dared get the _Liberator_ through the mail in Baltimore. Now

to think we can sit in our own yard and read it!”

Every week Anna watched eagerly for the paper. When it came she waved

the sheet triumphantly over her head as she walked back from the

mailbox. Garrison was a hero. The authorities had run the New Englander

out of Baltimore. But it had been from the sparks he drew that the East

Baltimore Improvement Society had come into being. Anna sent their

copies to Baltimore after they had finished with them.

“E-man-ci-pa-tion,” Frederick stumbled over the long word. “What does

it mean, Anna?”

“Freedom, Frederick--or rather _setting_ the people free. Listen to

this!” The two dark heads bent near the oil lamp. “‘The Constitution

of the United States knows nothing of white or black men; makes no

distinction with regard to the color or condition of free inhabitants.’”

Frederick learned to love the paper and its editor. Now he and Nathan

Johnson could really talk together. Nathan found an apt pupil, and Ma

Johnson took Anna under her wing.

As the days grew cooler folks began talking about Thanksgiving.

“What is it?” Anna asked, wrinkling her brow.

Then Ma Johnson told her about the Pilgrims, of their first, hard

winter, of how now each year after harvest time the people of New

England set aside a special feasting day in their memory, a day when

they gave thanks for all the good things of the earth.

“What a beautiful idea!” Anna turned it over in her mind. “A day of

thanksgiving!”

“Those poor young ones never tasted turkey.” Ma conveyed this tragic

information to Nathan. They decided to take a turkey to them.

“And I’ll show her how to cook it.” Ma was very fond of Anna.

They carried the fresh-killed bird, resplendent in all its feathers, to

the little house. Frederick and Anna gazed upon it with awe.

“Hot water! Plenty of hot water!” Nathan rolled up his sleeves, and

while they followed his movements like two children he plucked the fowl

and handed it to Anna.

“We’ll have meat all winter!” Frederick laughed, his eyes on Anna’s

shining face.

The little house was fairly bursting with happiness that fall. They

were going to have a child--a child born on free soil.

“He’ll be a free man!” Frederick made the words a hymn of praise.

And Anna smiled.

In April William Lloyd Garrison came to New Bedford.

“You must go, Frederick,” Anna said, “since I can’t. Look at me!”

“Not without you.” The young husband shook his head, but Anna laughed

and rushed supper. Frederick was one of the first to arrive at the hall.

He saw only one face that night, he heard only one voice--a face which

he described as “heavenly,” a voice which he said “was never loud or

noisy, but calm and serene as a summer sky, and as pure.”

Garrison was a young man then, with a singularly pleasing face and an

earnest manner.

“The motto upon our banner has been, from the commencement of our

moral warfare, ‘Our country is the world--our countrymen are all

mankind.’ We trust it will be our only epitaph. Another motto we have

chosen is ‘Universal Emancipation.’ Up to this time we have limited

its application to those who are held in this country, by Southern

taskmasters, as marketable commodities, goods and chattels, and

implements of husbandry. Henceforth we shall use it in its widest

latitude: the emancipation of our whole race from the dominion of man,

from the thralldom of self, from the government of brute force, from

the bondage of sin--and bringing them under the dominion of God, the

control of an inward spirit, the government of the law of love, and

into the obedience and liberty of Christ, who is the same yesterday,

today, and forever.”

Frederick’s heart beat fast. He was breathing hard. The words came

faint; for inside he was shouting, “This man is Moses! Here is the

Moses who will lead my people out of bondage!” He wanted to throw

himself at this man’s feet. He wanted to help him.

Then they were singing--all the people in the hall were singing--and

Frederick slipped out. He ran all the way home. He could not walk.

Summer came. There was more work on the wharves, when his son was born.

Frederick laughed at obstacles. He’d show them! “Them” became the whole

world--the white caulkers who refused to work with him, anybody who

denied a place to his son because his skin was rosy brown! The young

father went into an oil refinery, and then into a brass foundry where

all through the next winter he worked two nights a week besides each

day. Hard work, night and day, over a furnace hot enough to keep the

metal running like water, might seem more favorable to action than

to thought, yet while he fanned the flames Frederick dreamed dreams,

saw pictures in the flames. He must get ready! He must learn more.

He nailed a newspaper to the post near his bellows and read while he

pushed the heavy beam up and down.

In the summer of 1841 the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society held its

grand convention in Nantucket. Frederick decided to take a day off from

work and attend a session.

The little freedom breeze was blowing up a gale. Theologians,

congressmen, governors and business men had hurled invectives, abuse

and legislation at the Anti-Slavery Society, at the _Liberator_ and at

the paper’s editor, William Lloyd Garrison. But in London, Garrison had

refused to sit on the floor of the World Convention of Anti-Slavery

Societies because women delegates had been barred; and now the very man

who had founded the movement in America was being execrated by many of

those who professed to follow him.

But Frederick knew only that William Lloyd Garrison would be at

Nantucket.

The boat rounded Brant Point Light and came suddenly on a gray town

that rose out of the sea. Nantucket’s cobbled lanes, bright with

summer frocks, fanned up from the little bay where old whalers rested

at anchor, slender masts of long sloops pointed to the sky, deep-sea

fishing boats sprawled on the dirty waters, and discolored warehouses

crowded down on the quays.

Frederick had no trouble finding his way to the big hall, for the

Abolitionist convention was the main event in the town. It spilled out

into the streets where groups of men stood in knots, talking excitedly.

Quakers, sitting inside their covered carriages, removed their hats and

talked quietly; and women, trying not to be conspicuous, stood under

shade trees, but they too talked.

The morning session had been stormy. A serious rift had developed

within the ranks of the antislavery movement. During his absence

Garrison had been attacked by a body of clergymen for what they termed

his “heresies”--the immediate charge being his “breaking of the

Sabbath.” Garrison, it seemed, saw no reason why anyone should “rest”

from abolishing slavery any day of the week. He maintained that all

days should be kept holy. He lacked forbearance and Christian patience,

they charged. He “aired America’s dirty linen” in Europe. He “insulted”

the English brethren when he took his stand for full recognition of

women in the World Anti-Slavery Convention, despite the fact that St.

Paul had adjured women to silence. Garrison had made a statement in the

_Liberator_: “I expressly declare that I stand upon the Bible, and the

Bible alone, in regard to my views of the Sabbath, the Church, and the

Ministry, and that I feel that if I can not stand triumphantly on that

foundation I can stand nowhere in the universe. My arguments are all

drawn from the Bible and from no other source.”[3]

For weeks the controversy had raged--sermons were preached, columns and

letters were written. Theodore Parker, young minister in Boston, was

denounced by his fellow-clergymen because he sided with Garrison. Now

they had all come to Nantucket--Garrisonites and anti-Garrisonites;

the issue of slavery was tabled while scholars drew nice lines in the

science of casuistry and ethics, and theologians chanted dogmas.

All morning Garrison sat silent. His right hand twitched nervously.

Pains shot up into his arm. His face was drawn and tired. His heart was

heavy. Here and there in the crowd a bewildered black face turned to

him. William Lloyd Garrison lowered his eyes and shut his teeth against

a groan that welled up from his heart.

And so he did not see one more dark figure push into the hall; but

William C. Coffin, a Quaker and ardent Abolitionist, did. He had met

Frederick at the house of his friend, Nathan Johnson. Coffin made his

way back through the crowd and laid his hand on Frederick’s arm.

“Thee are well come, my friend,” he said.

Frederick had been peering anxiously toward the platform. He was so

far back, the crowd was so thick and the people wedged in so tightly,

that he despaired of hearing or seeing anything; but he smiled a warm

greeting at the Quaker.

“Follow me, there are seats up front,” Friend Coffin was saying.

The older man led the way down a side aisle, and there close against

the wall was a little space. Frederick gratefully slipped in beside his

friend.

“This is fine,” he whispered, “I hated to miss anything.” He looked

around at the other occupants of the side seats. He spoke worriedly.

“But--But I don’t belong up here.”

The Quaker smiled. “This is thy place.” He leaned closer, and his eyes

were very earnest. “Douglass, I am asking thee to speak a few words to

the convention this afternoon.”

Frederick stared at him. He gasped.

“Me? Speak?”

The great hall was a vast arena packed with all the people in the

world! Surely the Quaker was joking. But no, the voice was very low,

but calm and sure.

“Tell them thy story, Douglass, as thee have told the men at the mill.

Just tell them the truth--no matter how the words come.” Frederick

shook his head helplessly. He couldn’t stand up there before all those

people. He tried to hear what the man on the platform was saying, but

the words were meaningless. The hall was stifling hot. Men were mopping

their brows with damp handkerchiefs. Frederick opened his shirt at the

neck and let his coat slip off his shoulders.

“Thee cannot escape thy duty, Douglass,” Mr. Coffin urged quietly.

“Look about you! Today, thy people need thee to speak for them.”

Frederick held his breath, and the Quaker added gravely, “And _he_

needs thee--that good man who has worked so hard needs thy help.”

Frederick followed the Quaker’s eyes. He was gazing at William Lloyd

Garrison, the man whom he honored and loved above all other men. How

sunken and tired he looked!

“He needs thee,” the Quaker said again.

Frederick’s lips formed the words, though no sound came at first.

“I’ll try,” he whispered.

* * * * *

How long it was after this that Frederick found himself on his feet,

being gently pushed toward the platform, he could not have said. Only

when he was standing up there before all those people did he realize

that he had not replaced his coat. It was a clean shirt, fresh from

Anna’s tub and iron, but--! He fumbled with the button at his neck. His

fingers were stiff and clumsy. He could not button it with the faces, a

sea of faces, looking up at him, waiting. Everything was so still. They

were waiting for him. He swallowed.

“Ladies and gentlemen--” a little girl, all big grave eyes, pushed her

damped curls back and smiled at him, encouraging. Suddenly a mighty

wave of realization lifted and supported him. These people were glad

that he was free. They wanted him to be free! He began again.

“Friends, only a few short months ago I was a slave. Now I am free!”

He saw them sway toward him. “I cannot tell you how I escaped because

if known those who helped me would suffer terribly, _terribly_.” He

said the word a second time and saw some realization of what he meant

reflected in their faces.

“I do not ask anything for myself. I have my hands to work--my

strength.... All of the seas could not hold my thanksgiving to Almighty

God--and to you.” He was silent a moment and they saw his eyes grow

darker; his face contracted as if in pain. When he began again, his

voice trembled, they had to lean forward to catch his words.

“But I am only one. Where are my brothers? Where are my sisters? Their

groans sound in my ears. Their voices cry out to me for help. My

mother--my own mother--where is she? I hope she is dead. I hope that

she has found the only peace that comes to a slave--that last, last

peace in a grave. But even as I stand before you it may be--It may be

that--” He stopped and covered his face with his hands. When he lifted

his head, his eyes shone with resolution. “Hear me,” he said, “hear me

while I tell you about slavery.”

And then, in a clear voice, he told them of Caroline, why she dragged

her leg, and how she had risked her life to save him; he told them

about Henry and John, Nada and Jeb. He told them of little children he

had seen clinging to their mother as she was being sold away, of men

and women whose “spirits” had to be broken, of degradation. He told

them the content of human slavery.

“I am free,” his voice went low; but they leaned forward, hanging on

every word. “But I am branded with the marks of the lash. See!” And

with one movement, he threw back his shirt. He turned, and there across

the broad, young back were deep knotty ridges, where the brown flesh

had been cut to the bone and healed in pink lumps. They gasped.

“I have not forgotten--I do not forget anything. Nor will I forget

while, any place upon this earth, there are slaves.”

He turned to leave the platform.

Then in the silence another voice, a golden voice, was heard. It was as

if a trumpet called.

“Is this a thing--a chattel--or a man?”

William Lloyd Garrison stood there--his eyes flaming--his face alight.

He waited for an answer, holding Frederick’s hand in his, facing the

audience. And from a thousand voices rose the shout.

“He is a man!”

“A man! A man!”

Garrison let the tumultuous shouts roll and reverberate. Men wept

unashamed. Far down the street people heard the applause and shouting

and came running. Through it all Garrison stood, holding the strong

brown hand in his. At last Garrison pressed the hand gently, and

Frederick stumbled to his seat. Then Garrison stepped to the edge of

the platform.

Those who had heard him oftenest and known him longest were astonished

by his speech that afternoon. He was the fabulous orator who could

convert a vast audience into a single individuality.

“And to this cause we solemnly dedicate our strength, our minds, our

spirits and our lives!”

As long as they lived men and women talked about that August afternoon

on Nantucket Island.

John A. Collins, general agent of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery

Society, was at Frederick’s elbow when the meeting let out.

“We want you as an agent,” he was saying. “Come, Mr. Garrison told me

to bring you to him.”

While the crowd surged about them, the great man once more held

Frederick’s hand, but now he gazed searchingly at the brown face.

“Will you join us, Frederick Douglass?” he asked.

“Oh, sir, I am a member of the Society in New Bedford,” Frederick

answered quickly and proudly. Garrison smiled.

“Of course. But I mean more than that--a lot more. I’m asking

you to leave whatever job you have and work with me. The pay

is--well--uncertain. They tell me you have a family. I too have a

family.”

“Yes, sir. I know,” Frederick said, his eyes like an adoring child’s.

“I am asking you to leave your own family and work for the larger

family of God.”

“Yes, sir, I understand. I want to help. But I am ignorant. I was

planning to go to school.”

“You will learn as you walk, Frederick Douglass. Your people need your

strength now. We all need you.”

So Frederick left his job at the foundry and, as an agent of the

Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, began active work to outlaw slavery

in the nation.

CHAPTER SEVEN

_Jobs in Washington and voting in Rhode Island_

Amelia Kemp stood at her attic window. The waters of Chesapeake Bay

tossed green and white and set the thick mass of trees on distant

Poplar Island in motion. A boat rounded Keat Point. For a few moments

Amelia could see the tips of the masts and a bit of white sail against

the sky. Then it all disappeared. But the sight of a boat sailing away

over the waters, of a ship going out to sea, was not at this moment

depressing. She too was going away.

Lucy was dead. That morning they had laid her worn body in a grave at

the edge of the pines. Covey, his Sunday suit sagging, stared stupidly

while they shoveled in the hard lumps of clay. The preacher had wrung

the widower’s hand, reminding him that “The Lord giveth and the Lord

taketh away”; and they had returned to the unpainted, sagging house.

Now there was nothing further to do. She could go.

Amelia had tried to persuade her sister to leave with her before it was

too late. She had dared to read her portions of Jack’s letters--“Come

along, there are jobs in Washington--even for women.” But Lucy would

have none of it. Her duty was clear. There were moments when she urged

Amelia to go, others when she clung to her weakly. So the months had

stretched into six years, and Amelia had stayed on.

Covey dropped into a chair on the front porch when they returned from

the grave. All the lines of his body ran downward. Covey had not

prospered. He knew nothing about a nationwide depression, Van Buren’s

bickering with the banks, wars in Texas, or gag rules in Congress; he

had no idea there was any connection between the 1840 presidential

election and the price of cotton. He did know he was losing ground.

No matter how hard he beat the slaves, crops failed or rotted in the

fields, stock died, debts piled up, markets slumped and tempers were

short all around the bay.

Now, his wife was dead--_hadn’t been really sick, either. Just, petered

out._ Here it was April, and the sun was scorching.

He had heard no sound, but Covey was suddenly aware of being watched.

He sat very still and stared hard into the bushes near the corner of

the porch. Two hard, bright eyes stared back. Covey spoke sharply.

“Who’s that? Who’s that sneakin’ in them bushes?”

The eyes vanished, but the bushes did not stir. With a snarl, Covey

leaned forward.

“Dammit! I’ll git my shotgun!”

The leaves parted and he saw the streaked, pallid, pinched face

in which the green eyes blazed--a face topped with dirty, tangled

tow-colored hair. It was an old face; but the slight body with

pipe-stem legs and arms was that of a child, a girl-child not more

than ten years old. She wore a coarse one-piece slip. One bare foot

was wrapped as if to protect some injury, the other was scratched

and bruised. The child did not come forward, but crouched beside the

porch giving back stare for hard stare. Then with a little cry she

disappeared around the house.

Covey spat over the porch rail and settled back. It was that brat of

Caroline’s of course, still running about like a wild animal. Time she

was helping around the house. He began to deliberate. Might be better

to get rid of her right off. She’d soon be market size, and yellow

gals brought good prices. He’d speak to Caroline about feeding her up.

Better bring her in the house. Mustn’t let Caroline suspect anything,

though.

He pulled himself up and turned to go inside. Maybe Caroline had

something for him to eat.

Amelia stopped him in the hallway. She was wearing a hat and carrying a

suitcase. Covey frowned.

“Oh, Mr. Covey! I was looking for you.” Her voice had a note of urgency.

Amelia had a way of emerging from the nondescript background with

startling vividness. Months passed when he hardly saw her. Then there

she was jumping out at him! What the devil did she want now? He waited

for her to explain.

“I’m going away.”

Just like that. No stumbling around the words. Covey let his flat eyes

travel over her. Not a bad-looking woman, Amelia. More spirit than her

sister. He spoke slowly.

“I ain’t putting you out.”

Amelia’s response sounded grateful enough. “Oh, I know, Mr. Covey. It’s

not that. But now that poor Lucy’s gone, I’ve no right to--to impose.”

Covey remembered that he _had_ been keeping a roof over her head all

these years. And what had he got out of it? Nothing. His eyes narrowed.

“Where you aiming to go?”

“I’m going to Washington. A cousin of Tom’s down there--his name’s Jack

Haley--says I can get a--a job.”

Her words had started in a rush, but they faltered a little by the time

she reached her incredible conclusion.

_A job in Washington!_ Was the female crazy? In a surge of masculine

protectiveness, Covey glowered at her.

“Who said you had to get out and get a job? Eh? Who said so?”

Amelia swallowed. She had not expected an argument. She did not intend

to argue. She had to be getting along. She would miss her boat. She

spoke firmly.

“Mr. Covey, it’s all settled. I’m going. Ben told me you were sending

him to town this afternoon. I want to ride with him.”

Covey spoke deliberately. “The nigger’s lyin’--as usual. He better not

go off the place this afternoon. An’ you best get those fool notions

out of your head. You can stay right here and look after the house. I

ain’t kickin’.” He strode into the kitchen. That took care of that.

It was close to ten miles to St. Michaels. She’d have time to think

it over. But who was this fellow in Washington--a cousin of her late

husband, so she said. Um-um! Yes, Amelia had more spirit than poor Lucy.

Amelia, left standing in the hall, sighed and set down her bag. _A

pretty kettle of fish!_ Did Covey think he could hold her? Was she one

of his slaves? Then in a flash of realization she saw the truth. She

was indeed a slave--had been for all these years. And she was running

away--just as much as those black slaves she read about.

Amelia picked up her suitcase, walked out onto the porch, down the

steps, along the path, out to the road. She looked down the long dusty

road to St. Michaels, and started walking.

It was nearly two miles to Lawson’s place, and when she reached the

welcome shade of his grove she sank down to rest. Not too bad: she was

making time. She rubbed her benumbed arm and wondered if there weren’t

something in the bag she could dump out. She was going to have blisters

on her feet. Soon, now, she’d reach the highway. If she did not get a

ride, she would miss the boat.

When she set out again, she stumbled and cut her foot against a hidden

stone. There was no time to do anything about it, however, so she

plodded along, fixing her mind firmly on the Washington boat.

Thus she did not hear the cart until it was close behind her. Then she

stopped, her legs trembling. The mule stopped without any sign from the

Negro driver.

It was not the same mule, driven by the old Negro who had passed Amelia

one morning more than six years before. There were so many mules being

driven by so many Negroes up and down the Eastern Shore. This Negro

was younger and he could see quite clearly. And what he saw puzzled and

disturbed him--a white woman, alone on a side road, carrying a suitcase

and giving every sign of being about to ask him for a lift!

_Not good._ He sat, a solid cloud of gloom, waiting for her to speak.

Amelia smiled. She had to clear her throat. The mule regarded her

stolidly.

“Boy,” she asked, and the tone of her voice confirmed his worse fears,

“are you going into St. Michaels?”

“No, _ma’m_. Jus’ up da road a piece, an’ right back. No, ma’m, Ah

ain’t goin’ neah St. Michael. No, _ma’m_.”

He was too vehement. Amelia saw the confusion in his face and, because

she was in the process of acquiring wisdom, she knew the cause. She

must think of a way to reassure him. She spoke slowly.

“You see, I’m trying to get to St. Michaels. I want to catch a boat.”

Amelia saw the man’s eyes flicker. Going somewhere always aroused

interest. He shook his head, but did not speak. Amelia looked away. The

road seemed to quiver in the sun.

“You see, I’m starting on a journey.” Now she looked full at him--she

looked at him as one looks at a friend and she said softly, “I’m

heading toward the north star.”

Perhaps the man’s hands tightened on the reins. At any rate the mule

jerked up his head. The black face froze. For one instant everything

stood still. Then the Negro looked up and down the road and to the

right and to the left. There were only dust and fields, and here and

there a tree.

He climbed down from the cart and picked up her bag. He spoke without

looking at her.

“Jus’ remembered, ma’m, Ah might could drive toward St. Michael. Jus’

_might_ could.”

“Oh, thank you! Thank you so much!” The warmth in her tone forced a

smile from him.

“Reckon Ah could fix up a seat for you in back.”

He did fix a seat, shoving aside sacks and cords of wood. It was not an

upholstered carriage, but it got her to St. Michaels. She alighted at

the market, to arouse less attention. But he insisted on carrying her

bag to the pier.

“Ma’m,” he said, turning his hat in his hands, “hit seem mighty funny,

but Ah--Ah wishes yo’ luck!”

And Amelia, eyes shining, answered, “Thank you--Thank you, my friend.

The same to you!”

The slave leaned lazily against a pile until the gangplank was pulled

up, his eyes under the flopping straw hat darting in every direction,

watching. Then, as the space of dirty water widened and the boat became

a living thing, he stood up, waved his hat in the air and, after wiping

the beads of sweat from his forehead, spoke fervently.

“Do Jesus!”

* * * * *

Washington, D. C. had become a tough problem to the Boston

Abolitionists. A group was meeting one evening in the _Liberator_

office to map out some course of action.

“Every road barred to us! Our papers not even delivered in the mail!”

Parker Pillsbury tossed his head angrily.

“Washington is a slave city. Thee must accept facts.” The Quaker,

William Coffin, spoke in conciliatory tones.

“But it’s our Capital, too--a city of several thousand inhabitants--and

the slaveholders build high walls around it.” The Reverend Wendell

Phillips was impatient.

“We should hold a meeting in Washington!” William Lloyd Garrison

sighed, thinking of all the uninformed people in that city.

His remark was followed by a heavy silence. An Abolitionist meeting in

Washington was out of the question. Several Southern states had already

put a price on Garrison’s head. Frederick, sitting in the shadows,

studied the glum faces and realized that, in one way or another, every

man in the room was marked. They were agents of the Anti-Slavery

Society and they, no more than he, could go South. Washington was

South. Then from near the door came a drawling voice.

“Gentlemen, trouble your heads no longer. I’m going home.” A slender

man was coming forward into the lamplight.

At the sound of the soft drawl, Frederick froze. He crouched low,

hiding his face. But no alarm was sounded. There was welcome in

Garrison’s low greeting: “Gamaliel Bailey!”

The first voice answered, “I heard only enough to agree fully. We

do need a spokesman in Washington. I would not flatter myself,

gentlemen--but I am ready.”

Garrison spoke with unaccustomed vehemence.

“No! We need you here.”

Frederick slowly lifted his head. The man was a stranger to him. His

speech proclaimed him a Southerner. Now Frederick saw an attractive,

dark-haired gentleman in black broadcloth and loosely fitted gray

trousers. He looked down at Garrison, his black eyes bright.

“This is the job that I alone can do,” he said.

Wendell Phillips’ golden voice was warm as he nodded his head.

“He’s right. Garrison. Gamaliel Bailey can go to Washington. He

belongs.”

“Captain John Smith, himself,” Pillsbury teased, but with affection.

“At your service, sir.” The Southerner swept him a low bow.

“This is no laughing matter, Mr. Bailey,” a stern voice interposed.

“They know you have worked with us. You are a known Abolitionist!”

Gamaliel Bailey flicked a bit of non-existent dust from his waistcoat,

and gave a soft laugh.

“Once a Virginia Bailey, always a Virginia Bailey! Have no fear, Mr.

Hunton,” he said. He caught sight of Frederick’s dark face lifting

itself among them. His eyes lit up. “This must be the new agent of whom

I’ve been hearing.”

“Yes,” several said at once. “It’s Frederick Douglass.”

Their handclasp was a promise. “I go to Washington now, so that you can

come later,” said the Virginian.

“And I’ll be along!” promised Frederick Douglass.

William Lloyd Garrison did not smile. His face was clouded with

apprehension. “You’ll need help,” he said.

“It is best that I find my help in Washington. I know one young man

whom I can count on. Jack Haley. He’ll bring me all the news. You know,

I think I’ll publish a paper!” He grinned. “Since they won’t let the

_Liberator_ in, we’ll see if I can’t get a paper out.”

So it happened that Jack Haley was not on the dock to meet Amelia’s

boat from St. Michaels. The weekly issue of the _National Era_ had

hit the streets the day before, and scattered like a bomb all up and

down Pennsylvania Avenue. In Congress, on the streets and in the clubs

they raged! Here was heresy of the most dangerous order, printed and

distributed within a stone’s throw of the Capitol. It was enough to

make God-fearing Americans shudder when the son of such an old and

respected family as the Virginia Baileys flaunted the mongrel elements

in their faces. They did shudder, some of them. And grinning reporters

ran from one caucus to the other.

Jack was much younger than his cousin Tom. He remembered Tom’s wife

with affection. Her letters had intrigued him, and he was glad she was

coming to Washington.

He found her down on the wharf, surrounded by bales of cotton, serenely

rocking in a highback New England rocker!

Amelia saw him staring at her and with a little cry of joy she sprang

up.

“Jack, I knew you’d get here! I wasn’t worrying a bit. And kind Captain

Drayton has made me quite comfortable.”

The weather-beaten Vermonter, leaning against the rail of his ship,

regarded the late arrival and scowled until his thick eyebrows

threatened to tangle with his heavy beard.

“Nice way to treat a female!” he boomed.

Jack held her hands in his. She was so thin, so little. The gray

strands smoothed carefully behind her ears accentuated the hollows in

her face; the cotton dress she wore was washed out, but the blue eyes

looking up at him were young and bright.

Amelia exclaimed over the little buggy Jack had waiting. He helped her

in, tucked the bag under their feet and flapped the reins.

Washington in the spring! Heavy wagon wheels bogged down in deep ruts,

and hogs wallowed in the mud; but a soft green haze lay over the

sprawling town and wrapped it in loveliness. They were rolling along a

wide street, and Amelia was trying to see everything at once. Then she

saw the Capitol lifting its glistening dome against the wide blue sky,

and she caught her breath.

They circled the Capitol grounds, turned down a shaded lane and

stopped before a two-story brick house which sat well back in a yard

with four great elms.

“Here we are!” Jack smiled down at her.

“How nice! Is this where you live?”

“No, ma’am. This is where, I hope, you’re going to live.”

“But who--?” began Amelia.

“Just you wait.” Jack jumped out and hitched the reins around a post.

The big trees up and down the street formed an avenue of coolness.

Amelia hesitated when he turned to assist her.

“Are they--Are they expecting me?”

Jack chuckled.

“Mrs. Royall, my dear, is expecting anything--at any time!”

“Jack! You don’t mean Mrs. Royall--the authoress!” Amelia hung

motionless over the wheel. Jack grasped her firmly by the elbow.

“Who else? There is only one Mrs. Royall. There’s Her Highness now,

back in the chicken yard. Come along. I’ll fetch the bag later.”

Amelia shook out her skirts and followed him along the path that led

around the house.

The little old lady bending over a chicken coop from which spilled

yellow puffs of baby chicks, might have been somebody’s indulgent

grandmother. The calico dress drawn in around a shapeless middle

was faded; so was the bonnet from which escaped several strands of

iron-gray hair.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Royall!” There was warm deference in Jack’s voice.

She stood up and her shoulders squared. There was a certain

sprightliness in the movement, and in the tanned, unwrinkled face

gleamed eyes of a remarkable brightness. When she spoke her voice had

an unexpected crispness.

“Indeed--it’s Jack Haley. And who is this female with you?”

“This is a kinswoman of mine, Mrs. Royall. I have the pleasure of

presenting to you, Mrs. Amelia Kemp.”

“How do ye do!” The little old lady spoke with prim formality, her eyes

flashing briefly over Amelia.

“I am honored, ma’am.” Amelia scarcely managed the words.

“She has come to Washington to work,” Jack went on. “So I have brought

her to you.”

The gray eyes snapped.

“And why should you bring your kinswoman to me?”

“Because, Mrs. Royall, it’s newspapers she wants to know about. And

you’re the best newsman in Washington, begging your pardon, ma’am.” He

bowed elaborately.

“You needn’t!” She turned to Amelia.

“I’ve read one of your books, ma’am. Jack sent it to me. I learned so

much about America.”

Undoubtedly the gray eyes softened, but the tone did not change.

“Why don’t you take her to your friend on the avenue--that infamous

Abolitionist?”

“Mrs. Royall!” Jack’s voice was charged with shock. “You couldn’t be

speaking about Editor Gamaliel Bailey?”

“He should be ashamed of himself. Selling out to those long-winded

black coats!”

“But, Mrs. Royall--”

“Don’t interrupt. If he’d come to me I’d tell him how to get rid

of slavery. It’s a curse on the land. But those psalm-singing

missionaries--Bah!”

“May I remind you, Mrs. Royall,” Jack spoke very softly, “that when you

came back from Boston you spoke very highly of the Reverend Theodore

Parker. And he’s a--”

“He’s _not_ a black coat.” The lady spoke with feeling. Her face

cleared and she added sweetly, “He must be a Unitarian.” Then she

laughed, all shadows and restraint gone. “Forgive an old windbag,

guilty of the very faults she criticizes in others.” She lifted her

eyes. “See how the sun shines on our Capitol. Have you ever seen

anything half so beautiful?”

Amelia shook her head.

“I’ve never traveled any place before, ma’am. Washington is more than I

can believe.”

“It’s too good for the people who live here. But come and rest

yourself. I am a bad hostess.” Her eyes twinkled as she turned to Jack.

“First, does she know I’m a criminal--a convicted criminal?” She made

it sound very mysterious, and Amelia stared.

Jack laughed. “You tell her, Mrs. Royall!”

“’Tis very sad.” There was mockery in her voice. “A ‘common

scold’--that was the finding of the jury. In England they would have

ducked me in a pond; but here there was only the Potomac, and the

honored judge deemed that might not be right--the waters would be

contaminated. So they let me go.” They were in the house now and she

was setting out china cups. “You know,” she frowned slightly, “the

thing I really objected to was the word ‘common.’ That I did not like.”

“I agree with you, madam. Mrs. Royall’s scoldings of senators,

congressmen and even presidents, of bankers and bishops, have always

been in a class by themselves. ‘Common’ was not the word.” And again he

bowed.

The old lady eyed him with approval.

“Where, might I ask, did you get your good manners? They are rare

enough in Washington these days.” Before he could reply she had turned

to Amelia--the gracious host to her guest. “Some day, my dear, I shall

tell you of the Marquis de la Fayette. Ah! there were manners!”

“_Liberté, fraternité, égalité!_” Jack murmured the words half under

his breath, but the old lady turned on him, her eyes flashing. Then,

like an imp, she grinned.

So Amelia came to live with Anne Royall, long-time relict of Captain

William Royall. He had fought beside Washington in the Revolutionary

War and had been the General’s lifelong friend. In her own way she

waged a war too. Each week she cranked a clumsy printing press in

her shed and turned out a pithy paper called the _Huntress_. It

advocated free schools for children everywhere, free trade, and liberal

appropriations for scientific investigation. Amelia helped her about

the house and with her chickens, accompanied her on interviews, saw

red-faced legislators dodge down side-streets to avoid her. Gradually

she learned something of how news is gathered and dispensed, but she

learned more about the ways of Washington, D. C.

* * * * *

Amelia had been in Washington three weeks when one evening Jack stopped

by.

“I’m going up North!” he announced.

“Where? What for?”

“The boss heard something about a rebellion in New England. He’s

tickled pink. Said maybe that would keep Yankee noses out of other

people’s worries. He’s sending me out to puff the scandal!”

“Do you know anything about it?” Mrs. Royall’s ears were alert.

“From what I can gather, seems a lot of poor folks in Rhode Island want

to vote. And the bigwigs don’t like it!”

All of New England had become involved. Two state administrations

were claiming the election in Rhode Island, and a clash was imminent.

Until 1841 Rhode Island had operated under its colonial charter, which

prohibited anyone from voting who did not own 134 acres of land.

Therefore, seats in the state legislature were controlled by the older

conservative villages, while the growing industrial towns, where the

larger portion of the population was disfranchised, were penalized.

That year Thomas Wilson Dorr, a Whig and graduate of Harvard, started a

reform movement; and a new constitution was drawn up. This constitution

was framed to enlarge the basis of representation and abolish the

odious property requirement. But it confined the right of suffrage to

white male citizens, pointedly shutting out the Negroes who had settled

in Rhode Island.

Quakers were non-resistance men; they held themselves aloof from

politics, but they were always on the alert to protect the black man’s

rights. All antislavery advocates wanted a new constitution, but they

did not want a defective instrument which would require reform from

the start. So they could not back Dorr. The Perry brothers, Providence

manufacturers, wrote to their friend, John Brown, a wool merchant in

Springfield, Massachusetts.

“The time has come when the people of Rhode Island must accept a more

comprehensive gospel of human rights than has gotten itself into this

Dorr constitution. We have talked to him, and while he agrees in

principle he fears to go further.”

John Brown sent the letter on to John Greenleaf Whittier, Secretary of

the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. Whittier talked it over with

the Reverend Theodore Parker, who was considering making a series of

speeches in Rhode Island, denouncing the color bar in what was being

called a “People’s Constitution.”

“Why should not Negroes vote with all the other workers?” asked

Whittier. “They would limit their gains in throwing out the old

charter.”

Theodore Parker sighed wearily.

“It’s the workers who are doing this. Their own struggle has blinded

them.”

“Thee are right.” Whittier slipped into the Quaker idiom in moments of

great seriousness. “They see the black man only as a threat.”

Then their eyes met, fusing in a single thought. They spoke almost in

one breath.

“Frederick Douglass!”

For a moment they smiled together, congratulating themselves. Then a

frown came on Whittier’s face. He shook his head.

“But Friend Garrison will not consent. Thee knows his attitude toward

any of us taking part in politics.”

Theodore Parker was silent a moment, drumming his long, white fingers

on the table. Then his black eyes flashed.

“Are we discussing politics? We are concerned here with the rights of

men.”

Whittier shook his head, but he grinned.

“Thee had best take care! Quoting Thomas Paine will not help.”

“Fiddlesticks! Tom Paine had more religion than all the clerics of

Massachusetts rolled into one.” The young divine got to his feet, his

thin face alight with enthusiasm. “Douglass goes to Rhode Island! I’ll

take care of Garrison.”

It was decided, and Douglass was one of the Abolitionists’ trio which

invaded every town and corner of the little state. They were Stephen S.

Foster of New Hampshire, Parker Pillsbury from Boston, and Frederick

Douglass from some unspecified section of the slave world--two white

and one black--young and strong and on fire with their purpose. The

splendid vehemence of Foster, the weird and terrible denunciations

of Pillsbury, and the mere presence of Douglass created a furor from

one end of the state to the other. They were followed by noisy mobs,

they were thrown out of taverns, they were pelted with eggs and rocks

and foul words. But they kept right on talking--in schoolhouses and

churches and halls, in market places, in warehouses, behind factories

and on docks. Sometimes they were accompanied by Abby Kelly, who was

later to become Stephen Foster’s wife. Her youth and simple Quaker

beauty, combined with her wonderful earnestness, her large knowledge

and great logical power, bore down opposition. She stilled the wildest

turmoil.

The people began to listen. They drew up a Freeman’s Constitution to

challenge Thomas Dorr’s and called a huge mass meeting in Providence.

On streamers and handbills distributed throughout the state, they

listed “Frederick Douglass, Fugitive from Slavery,” as the principal

speaker.

Jack Haley saw the streamers when he reached Providence late in the

evening. He heard talk of the meeting around the hostelry while he

gulped down his supper. When he reached the crowded hall things were

already under way. There was some confusion as he was pushing his way

in. Someone on the floor seemed to be demanding the right to speak.

“It’s Seth Luther!” whispered excited bystanders. “Thomas Dorr’s

right-hand man.”

“Go on, Seth, have your say!” called out a loud voice in the crowd.

The young man on the platform motioned for silence. He nodded to the

man standing in the aisle.

“Speak, my friend!” he said.

The man’s voice was harsh.

“You philanthropists are moaning over the fate of Southern slaves.

Go down there and help them! We here are concerned with equal rights

for men, with the emancipation of white men, before we run out after

helping blacks whether they are free or in slavery. You’re meddling

with what doesn’t concern you!”

There was some applause. There were boos and hisses, but the man sat

down amid a murmur of approval from those near him.

Then Jack saw that the chairman on the platform had stepped aside and

his place had been taken by an impressive figure. Even before he said

a word the vast audience settled into silence. For undoubtedly this

was the “fugitive slave” they had come to hear. Jack stared: this man

did not look as if he had ever been a slave. The massive shoulders,

straight and shapely body, great head with bushy mane sweeping back

from wide forehead, deep-set eyes and jutting jaw covered with full

beard--the poise and controlled strength in every line--called forth a

smothered exclamation from Jack.

“My God! What a human being!”

“Ssh-sh!” several people hissed. Frederick Douglass was speaking.

“The gentleman would have us argue more and denounce less. He speaks

of men and black and slaves as if our cause can differ from his own.

What is our concern except with equal rights for men? And must we argue

to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race? Is it not astonishing

that, while we are plowing, planting, and reaping, using all kinds

of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building

ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold;

that, while we are reading, writing and ciphering, acting as clerks

and secretaries, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in

the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hillside, living, moving,

acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives and

children, and, above all, confessing and worshiping the Christian’s

God, we are called upon to prove that we are men!

“I tell you the slaveholders in the darkest jungles of the Southland

concede this fact. They acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for

their government; they acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on

the part of the slave. There are seventy-two crimes in the state of

Virginia which, if committed by a black man (no matter how ignorant

he be) subject him to punishment by death; while only two of the

same crimes will subject a white man to the like punishment. What is

this but the acknowledgment that the slave is a moral, intellectual,

and responsible being? It is admitted in fact that Southern statute

books are covered with enactments forbidding, under severe fines and

penalties, the teaching of the slave to read or to write. When you can

point to any such laws in reference to the beasts of the field, than I

may consent to argue the manhood of the black man.”

Men stamped and shouted and threw their hats into the air. The hall

rang. Douglass took up in a quieter mood. He talked of the meaning

of constitutional government, he talked of what could be gained if

exploited people stood together and what they lost by battling among

themselves.

“The slaveholders, with a craftiness peculiar to themselves, encourage

enmity of the poor labouring white man against the blacks, and succeed

in making the white man almost as much a slave as the black slave

himself. The difference is this: the latter belongs to one slaveholder,

the former belongs to the slaveholders collectively. Both are

plundered, and by the same plunderers.”

Afterward Jack tried to go forward and ask some questions of the

amazing orator, but the press of the crowd stopped him. He gave up and

returned to the inn. And the next day they had gone back to Boston, he

was told. Thomas Dorr, through his timidity and caution, had lost the

people.

When the new Rhode Island constitution was finally adopted the word

_white_ had been struck out.

Jack Haley returned to Washington and handed in his account of the

“rebellion.” The editor blue-penciled most of it. He said they had

thrown away money on a wild-goose chase.

But Gamaliel Bailey studied the closely written pages Jack laid on his

desk. True, he could not now publish the material in his _National

Era_; but he drew a circle around the name “Frederick Douglass” and

slipped the sheets into his file for future reference.

Every drop of blood slowly drained from Amelia’s face while

Jack talked. Mrs. Royall dropped the stick of type she had been

clutching--Jack had interrupted them at work in the shed--and stared at

her helper.

“She’s sick!”

But Amelia shook her head. She leaned against the board, struggling to

speak while into her white face there came a glow which changed her

blue eyes into dancing stars.

“You said his name was Frederick, didn’t you? About how old would you

say he was?”

“What?” asked Mrs. Royall.

“_How old?_” asked Jack.

“Yes.” Amelia was a little impatient. “The one you’re talking

about--that slave who spoke. I’m sure I know who he is!”

“Oh, my goodness, Amelia! That’s impossible!” The idea made Jack frown.

Mrs. Royall snorted.

“Describe him to me, Jack,” Amelia insisted, “every detail.”

She kept nodding her head while Jack rather grudgingly complied with

her request. It seemed such a waste of time. He shook his head as he

finished.

“There couldn’t possibly have been such an extraordinary slave around

any place where you’ve been. All of us would have heard of him!”

Amelia smiled.

“I remember how he came walking up the road that day in a swirl of

dust. He was little more than a boy then. Now he’s a man. It is the

same.”

Then she told how that morning at dawn she had leaned from her attic

window and watched a young buck slave defy a slave-breaker, how he had

sent the overseer moaning to one side with his kick, how he had thrown

the master to the ground. This was the first time she had ever told the

story, but she told it very well.

“His name was Frederick--the same color, the same powerful shoulders

and the same big head.”

“But this man--he looked older--he’s educated! If you had heard him!”

Jack could not believe this thing.

Amelia only smiled.

“I found out afterward that even then he could read and write. Mr.

Covey had him help with the accounts.”

“It’s just too incredible. That man from the Eastern Shore!”

Mrs. Royall spoke precisely. “Young man, when you’re my age you’ll know

that it’s the incredible things which make life wonderful.”

And Amelia added, “There couldn’t be two Fredericks--turned from the

same mold!”

CHAPTER EIGHT

_On two sides of the Atlantic_

Many people would have shared Jack’s reluctance to believe Amelia’s

story. As time passed the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society found

itself caught in a dilemma. The committee knew all the facts of

Frederick’s case; but for his protection the members took every

precaution, withholding the name of the state and county from which

he had come, his master’s name and any other detail which might lead

to his capture. Even so they realized that they must be constantly on

guard. But the audiences began to murmur that this Frederick Douglass

could not be a “fugitive from slavery.”

During the first three or four months Frederick’s speeches had

been almost exclusively made up of narrations of his own personal

experiences as a slave.

“Give us the facts,” said Secretary Collins. “We’ll take care of the

philosophy.”

“Tell your story, Frederick,” Garrison would whisper as his protégé

stepped upon the platform. And Frederick, smiling his devotion to the

older man, always followed the injunction.

But Frederick was growing in stature. Scholars’ libraries were thrown

open to him. Theodore Parker had sixteen thousand volumes; his library

covered the entire third floor of his house.

“Come up any time, Frederick. Books, my boy, were written to be read.”

And Frederick reveled in Thomas Jefferson, Carlyle, Edmund Burke, Tom

Paine, John Quincy Adams, Jonathan Swift, William Godwin. He became

drunk on books; staggering home late at night, his eyes red, he would

fall heavily across his bed. He pored over the newspapers from all

parts of the country which Garrison gathered in the _Liberator_

office; he sat at the feet of the greatest orators of the day--Wendell

Phillips, Charles Redmond, Theodore Parker among them. He munched

sandwiches and listened, while John Whittier read his verses; and

always the young fugitive from slavery followed in the wake of William

Lloyd Garrison, devouring his words, tapping his sources of wisdom,

attuning his ears to every pitch of the loved voice.

Frederick’s speeches began to expand in content, logic and delivery.

“People won’t believe you ever were a slave, Frederick, if you keep on

this way,” cautioned Collins. But Garrison shook his head.

“Let him alone!” he said.

The year 1843 was one of remarkable antislavery activity. The New

England Anti-Slavery Society mapped out a series of one hundred

conventions. The territory covered in the schedule included all of New

England, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Indiana. Under Garrison’s

leadership it was a real campaign, taking more than six months to

complete. Frederick Douglass was chosen as one of the agents to tour

the country.

The first convention was held in Middlebury, Vermont, home of William

Slade, for years co-worked with John Quincy Adams in Congress. Yet in

this town the opposition to the antislavery convention was intensely

bitter and violent. Vermont boasted that within her borders no slave

had ever been delivered up to a master, but the towns did not wish to

be involved in “agitation.”

What was in this respect true of the Green Mountain State was most

discouragingly true of New York, the next state they visited. All

along the Erie canal, from Albany to Buffalo, they met with apathy,

indifference, and sometimes the mob spirit. Syracuse refused to furnish

church, market, house, or hall in which to hold the meetings. Mr.

Stephen Smith, who had received the little group of speakers in his

home, was sick with distress. Frederick, standing beside a wide window,

looked out upon a park covered with young trees. He turned to his

unhappy host.

“Don’t worry, my friend,” he said. “We’ll have our meeting.”

The next morning he took his stand under a tree in the southeast

corner of this park and began to speak to an audience of five persons.

Before the close of the afternoon he had before him not less than five

hundred. In the evening he was waited upon by the officers of the

Congregational church and tendered the use of an old wooden building

which they had deserted for a better. Here the convention continued for

three days.

In the growing city of Rochester their reception was more cordial.

Gerrit Smith, Myron Holly, William Goodell and Samuel Porter were

influential Abolitionists in the section. Frederick was to know the

eccentric, learned and wealthy Gerrit Smith much better. Now he argued

with him, upholding Garrison’s moral persuasion against Gerrit Smith’s

ballot-box, as the weapon for abolishing slavery. From Rochester,

Frederick and William Bradburn made their way to Buffalo, a rising city

of steamboats, business and bustle. The Friends there had been able to

secure for the convention only an old dilapidated and deserted room

on a side-street, formerly used as a post-office. They went at the

time appointed and found seated a few cabmen in their coarse, wrinkled

clothes, whips in hand, while their teams were standing on the street

waiting for a job.

Bradburn was disgusted. After an hour of what he considered futile talk

and haranguing, he left. That evening he took the steamer to Cleveland.

But Frederick stayed on. For nearly a week he spoke every day in the

old post-office to constantly increasing audiences. Then a Baptist

church was thrown open to him. The following Sunday he spoke in an open

park to an assembly of several thousand persons.

In Richmond, Indiana, their meeting was broken up, and their clothes

ruined with evil-smelling eggs. In Pendleton, Indiana, Frederick’s

speaking schedule suffered a delay.

It had been found impossible to obtain a building in Pendleton in which

to hold the convention. So a platform was erected in the woods at the

edge of town. Here a large audience assembled and Frederick and his

companion speaker, William A. White, were in high spirits. But hardly

had they climbed to the stand when they were attacked by a mob of about

sixty persons who, armed with clubs, picks and bricks, had come out to

“kill the nigger!”

It was a furious but uneven fight. The Friends tried to protect

Frederick, but they had no defense. White, standing his ground, pleaded

with the ruffians and got a ferocious blow on the head, which cut his

scalp and knocked him to the ground. Frederick had caught up a stick,

and he fought with all his strength; but the mob beat him down, leaving

him, they supposed, dead on the ground. Then they mounted their horses

and rode to Anderson where, it was said, most of them lived.

Frederick lay on the ground at the edge of the woods, bleeding and

unconscious. Neal Hardy, a Quaker, carried him to his cart and took him

home. There he was bandaged and nursed. His right hand had been broken

and never recovered its natural strength and dexterity. But within a

few days he was up and on his way. His arm was in a sling but, as he

remarked, the rest of him “little the worse for the tussle.”

“A complete history of these hundred conventions would fill a volume

far larger than the one in which this simple reference is to find

place,” Frederick Douglass wrote many years later. “It would be a

grateful duty to speak of the noble young men who forsook ease and

pleasure, as did White, Gay and Monroe, and endured all manner of

privations in the cause of the enslaved and down-trodden of my race....

Mr. Monroe was for many years consul to Brazil, and has since been a

faithful member of Congress from Oberlin District, Ohio, and has filled

other important positions in his state. Mr. Gay was managing editor of

the _National Anti-Slavery Standard_, and afterward of the _New York

Tribune_, and still later of the _New York Evening Post_.”[4]

* * * * *

The following winter, against the advice of his friends, Douglass

decided on an independent course of action.

“_Your word_ is being doubted,” he said to Garrison and Phillips. “That

I cannot endure. They are saying that I am an impostor. I shall write

out the facts connected with my experience in slavery, giving names,

places and dates.”

“It will be a powerful story!” said Garrison, his eyes watching the

glow of light from the fireplace.

Theodore Parker spoke impatiently. “So powerful that it will bring the

pack on his heels. And neither the people nor the laws of Massachusetts

will be able to protect him.”

“He’s mad!” Wendell Phillips’ golden voice was hard. “When he has

finished I shall advise him to throw the manuscript in the fire!”

But Garrison smiled.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “we’ll find a way. God will not lose such a man

as Frederick Douglass!”

They looked at him sitting there in the dusk, with the firelight

playing over his calm face. There were times when Garrison’s quiet

faith confounded the two divines.

A way did reveal itself. In May, 1845, the _Narrative of the Life of

Frederick Douglass_, prefaced by letters by Garrison and Phillips, made

its appearance. Priced at fifty cents, it ran through a large edition.

In August, Douglass, with a purse of two hundred and fifty dollars

raised by his friends in Boston, boarded the British ship _Cambria_

for England, in company with the Hutchinsons, a family of Abolitionist

singers, and James Buffum, vice-president of the Massachusetts

Anti-Slavery Society.

Anna stood on the dock and waved goodbye. She smiled, though the ship

was blurred and she could not distinguish his dear face at the rail.

A blast of the whistle made little Freddie clutch her skirts and bury

his face in alarm. He wanted to go home. Close by her side, straight

and unmoved, stood six-year-old Lewis, holding the hand of his weeping

sister, Rosetta.

“Look after Mother and the children, Son. I’m depending on you!” Lewis

was turning over his father’s parting words. Now he would be the man of

the house. Girls, of course, could cry. He watched his mother’s face.

A few final shouts, a last flutter of handkerchiefs, some stifled sobs,

and the relatives and friends of the voyagers began to disperse. Anna

felt a light touch on her arm.

“Come, Mrs. Douglass”--it was Mrs. Wendell Phillips--“we’re going to

drive you home.”

Friends surrounded her--comforting, solicitous.

“You can depend upon us, Mrs. Douglass. You know that.”

Anna smiled. She had wanted him to go, to get out of harm’s reach. She

could not continue to live in the terror that had gripped her ever

since Frederick had returned from the western trip. He had made light

of the “Indiana incident,” but his broken hand could not be hidden.

Each time he left her after that, she knew what _might_ happen. So she

had urged him to go; she had smiled and said, “Don’t worry about us,

Frederick. You must go!”

“My salary will be paid direct to you.”

“I’ll manage. Now that we’re in our home, it will be easy.” Nothing but

confidence and assurances for him.

The summer before they had bought a lot in Lynn, Massachusetts. They

had planned the house together; and in the fall--between trips and with

the help of several friends--Douglass had built a cottage.

Anna hated to leave New Bedford--“a city of friends,” she called it.

“But you see,” she explained to them ruefully, “the Douglass family

has simply rent the seams of this little house. We have to have more

room.”

They had chosen Lynn because it was more on the path for Frederick’s

work and because the town had a thriving Anti-Slavery Society. Came

the day when they moved into their cottage. Anna washed windows and

woodwork, and Lewis followed his father around, “chunking up all the

holes” so that when the cold weather came they would be snug and warm.

* * * * *

The highway was good and the May day pleasant as the Reverend Wendell

Phillips drove Douglass’ family back to their home.

“How long do you think he’ll have to stay away, Mr. Phillips?”

They were nearly there, before Anna dared ask the question she had been

avoiding.

Wendell Phillips flicked his whip. It was a moment before he answered.

“It’s impossible to say, Mrs. Douglass. We’re certain he’ll render

valuable service to the cause of freedom among peoples who do not know

the real horrors of American slavery. Meanwhile, we’ll do what we can

to see that his own return may be safe.”

“Pray God the time will not be long!” Mrs. Phillips laid her hand over

that of the woman by her side.

Then they were at the gate and goodbyes were said. The children climbed

down nimbly and rushed up the path. Anna moved more slowly.

She smiled at the sight of moist, chubby Charlie in the neighbor

woman’s arms. This was their youngest son--hers and Frederick’s. Poor

little fellow! Anna felt her heart contract. _He_ didn’t know his

father was going so far away.

“Hasn’t whimpered a mite,” the neighbor had kept him during the

family’s absence. “So I mixed up a pot of soup for you. It’s on the

stove all ready. I knew you’d all be starved.”

Anna’s voice choked when she tried to thank the good soul. The woman

patted her arm and hurried homeward across the vacant lot.

Small Charlie was quite happy, so Anna left him with the other children

and went to the room she shared with her husband. It was very small.

The wardrobe door, left swinging open, bumped against the washstand

crowding the bed. Anna took off her hat, placed it on the shelf and

closed the door. Moving mechanically, she emptied the half-filled

bowl of water on the stand and hung up an old alpaca coat. Frederick

had discarded it at the last moment. Then she stood motionless, just

thinking.

She had not told him she was going to have another baby: he might not

have gone. But she knew she needed more money than that tiny salary.

She could not leave the children. There must be something she could do.

She must manage. Suddenly her face lighted. Lynn, Massachusetts, had

one industry which in the early 1840’s spilled over into every section.

Lynn had developed like a guild town in England; and that evening

Anna made up her mind that she could do what was being done in many

households in the town--she would make shoes.

In time she learned to turn a sole with the best of them.

* * * * *

Meanwhile a ship was going out to sea. And all was not smooth sailing.

“We should have taken one of the French boats--even if they are

slower!” Mrs. Hutchinson regarded the apologetic purser scornfully.

“I’ll see the Captain at once.” And James Buffum stalked away in search

of him.

No cabin had been assigned to Frederick Douglass. Though the tickets

had been purchased together, the party was being separated--the

Hutchinsons and Mr. Buffum sent to cabins, Frederick Douglass to the

steerage.

Douglass took no part in the angry discussion that ensued. It was an

old story to him. Negroes who had the temerity to travel about the

United States were subject to insults and indignities. On the Sound

between New York and Stonington no colored man was allowed abaft the

wheel. In all seasons of the year, hot or cold, wet or dry, the deck

was his only place. Douglass had been in many fights--had been beaten

by conductors and brakemen. He smiled now remembering the time six men

ejected him from a car on the Eastern Line between Boston and Portland.

He had managed to tear away several seats and break a couple of windows.

But this morning, as the _Cambria_ nosed her way out of the bay and

started back to the Old Country which so many had left in their search

for freedom, Douglass shrugged his shoulders.

“Let it go!” he said. “We’ll all reach England together. If I cannot go

to the cabins, you can come to me in the steerage.”

“Oh, yes, Mr. Douglass,” Captain Judkins quickly intervened. “There is

only the formality of an invitation. You can visit your friends at any

time.”

“Thank you, sir!” Douglass bowed gravely.

But Mrs. Hutchinson would not be quieted. “It’s ridiculous!”

Her husband sighed and slipped his arm through Frederick’s.

“Let’s go now and see that our friend is properly settled,” he said.

So they all went first to the steerage. And here, to the edification of

the steerage passengers, they spent most of their time. But, as always

happens within a small world, word got around, and during the long

afternoons and evenings other first-class passengers began visiting the

steerage.

The Hutchinsons, celebrated vocalists, sang their sweetest songs, and

groups gathered on the rude forecastle-deck in spirited conversation

with Frederick Douglass.

“Always thought Abolitionists were crackpots!” The man from Indiana

frowned.

“Wouldn’t think any--er--a black could talk like that!” The speaker,

who came from Delaware, certainly had never heard such talk before.

“This man--he is not black.” The tinge of foreign accent in the words

caused the Americans to glance up sharply. Perhaps the immaculate

swarthy passenger was from Quebec. A Washingtonian eyed him coolly and

rose to his feet.

“He’s a nigger just the same!” he said, and walked away from the group.