The “break-down whippings,” as they are termed on the plantations, are
usually done by placing the slave with his face to a post in which is
framed a cross bar. An iron collar or ring is put round his neck and
fastened to the post. The arms are extended each way and fastened to
the cross-bar by rings around the wrist. They are then stripped bare,
and thus are whipped from twenty-five to fifty lashes and upwards,
and sometimes as long as a man can continue to use the whip without
being exhausted, and they often die there under the lash. If a slave
is brought down from Kentucky or Virginia, and sold to a planter at
the South, and it is understood that he has any pride, or occasionally
assumes a degree of independence unbecoming a slave, or shows any
reluctance against being driven beyond what is consistent and human,
he is, as the drivers say, “getting too damned smart” and must have a
small touch of the “Mississippi break-down;” and without any further
ceremony he is put on to the post and whipped until the driver thinks
he “will not be quite so _smart_.” And in many cases it is necessary
to repeat this “break down” operation a number of times before the
“smartness” will all pass out of them.
The change from Kentucky and Virginia slavery, to a large cotton or
sugar plantation in the more Southern States, is as great almost as
liberty and slavery, and there are many slaves taken from these States
and sold far South, that can never be subdued only by death; and this
they are sure to meet unless they give up their “smartness.” And in
them is only seen exhibited the motto of every American citizen,
“LIBERTY or DEATH.” They will never yield, for they have the feelings
of an American, and the pride and spirit of their own _fathers_ who
are among the most distinguished men of their native State. And this
is _American_ slavery--one of our “cherished institutions!” and the
forbidding of its further extension is now threatening the existence of
this happy Union, and to deluge this land in blood!!