“The author of this book is my highly-esteemed friend. If its
readers knew her as I know her, they could not fail to be deeply
interested in her story. She was a beloved inmate of our family
nearly the whole of the year 1849. She was introduced to us by her
affectionate and conscientious brother, who had previously related
to us some of the almost incredible events in his sister’s life. I
immediately became much interested in Linda; for her appearance was
prepossessing, and her deportment indicated remarkable delicacy of
feeling and purity of thought.
“As we became acquainted, she related to me, from time to time
some of the incidents in her bitter experiences as a slave-woman.
Though impelled by a natural craving for human sympathy, she
passed through a baptism of suffering, even in recounting her
trials to me, in private confidential conversations. The burden of
these memories lay heavily upon her spirit—naturally virtuous and
refined. I repeatedly urged her to consent to the publication of
her narrative; for I felt that it would arouse people to a more
earnest work for the disinthralment of millions still remaining in
that soul-crushing condition, which was so unendurable to her. But
her sensitive spirit shrank from publicity. She said, “You know
a woman can whisper her cruel wrongs in the ear of a dear friend
much easier than she can record them for the world to read.” Even
in talking with me, she wept so much, and seemed to suffer such
mental agony, that I felt her story was too sacred to be drawn from
her by inquisitive questions, and I left her free to tell as much,
or as little, as she chose. Still, I urged upon her the duty of
publishing her experience, for the sake of the good it might do;
and, at last, she undertook the task.
“Having been a slave so large a portion of her life, she is
unlearned; she is obliged to earn her living by her own labor, and
she has worked untiringly to procure education for her children;
several times she has been obliged to leave her employments, in
order to fly from the man-hunters and woman-hunters of our land;
but she pressed through all these obstacles and overcame them.
After the labors of the day were over, she traced secretly and
wearily, by the midnight lamp, a truthful record of her eventful
life.
“This Empire State is a shabby place of refuge for the oppressed;
but here, through anxiety, turmoil, and despair, the freedom of
Linda and her children was finally secured, by the exertions of a
generous friend. She was grateful for the boon; but the idea of
having been _bought_ was always galling to a spirit that could
never acknowledge itself to be a chattel. She wrote to us thus,
soon after the event: ‘I thank you for your kind expressions in
regard to my freedom; but the freedom I had before the money was
paid was dearer to me. God gave me _that_ freedom; but man put
God’s image in the scales with the paltry sum of three hundred
dollars. I served for my liberty as faithfully as Jacob served for
Rachel. At the end, he had large possessions; but I was robbed of
my victory; I was obliged to resign my crown, to rid myself of a
tyrant.’
“Her story, as written by herself, cannot fail to interest the
reader. It is a sad illustration of the condition of this country,
which boasts of its civilization, while it sanctions laws and
customs which make the experiences of the present more strange than
any fictions of the past.
Amy Post.
“Rochester, N.Y., Oct. 30th, 1859.”
The following testimonial is from a man who is now a highly respectable
colored citizen of Boston.