I was soon after taken from Mr. Colburn's, and hired to Elijah P.
Lovejoy, who was at that time publisher and editor of the "St. Louis
Times." My work, while with him, was mainly in the printing office,
waiting on the hands, working the press, &c. Mr. Lovejoy was a very
good man, and decidedly the best master that I had ever had. I am
chiefly indebted to him, and to my employment in the printing office,
for what little learning I obtained while in slavery.
Though slavery is thought, by some, to be mild in Missouri, when
compared with the cotton, sugar and rice growing states, yet no part
of our slave-holding country is more noted for the barbarity of its
inhabitants than St. Louis. It was here that Col. Harney, a United
States officer, whipped a slave woman to death. It was here that
Francis McIntosh, a free colored man from Pittsburg, was taken from the
steamboat Flora and burned at the stake. During a residence of eight
years in this city, numerous cases of extreme cruelty came under my
own observation;--to record them all would occupy more space than could
possibly be allowed in this little volume. I shall, therefore, give but
a few more in addition to what I have already related.
Capt. J. B. Brant, who resided near my master, had a slave named John.
He was his body servant, carriage driver, &c. On one occasion, while
driving his master through the city--the streets being very muddy, and
the horses going at a rapid rate--some mud spattered upon a gentleman
by the name of Robert More. More was determined to be revenged. Some
three or four months after this occurrence, he purchased John, for the
express purpose, as he said, "to tame the d----d nigger." After the
purchase he took him to a blacksmith's shop, and had a ball and chain
fastened to his leg, and then put him to driving a yoke of oxen, and
kept him at hard labor, until the iron around his leg was so worn into
the flesh, that it was thought mortification would ensue. In addition
to this, John told me that his master whipped him regularly three times
a week for the first two months:--and all this to "_tame him_." A more
noble-looking man than he was not to be found in all St. Louis, before
he fell into the hands of More; and a more degraded and spirit-crushed
looking being was never seen on a southern plantation, after he had
been subjected to this "_taming_" process for three months. The last
time that I saw him, he had nearly lost the entire use of his limbs.
While living with Mr. Lovejoy, I was often sent on errands to the
office of the "Missouri Republican," published by Mr. Edward Charless.
Once, while returning to the office with type, I was attacked by
several large boys, sons of slave-holders, who pelted me with
snow-balls. Having the heavy form of type in my hands, I could not make
my escape by running; so I laid down the type and gave them battle.
They gathered around me, pelting me with stones and sticks, until they
overpowered me, and would have captured me, if I had not resorted to
my heels. Upon my retreat they took possession of the type; and what
to do to regain it I could not devise. Knowing Mr. Lovejoy to be a
very humane man, I went to the office and laid the case before him. He
told me to remain in the office. He took one of the apprentices with
him and went after the type, and soon returned with it; but on his
return informed me that Samuel McKinney had told him he would whip me,
because I had hurt his boy. Soon after, McKinney was seen making his
way to the office by one of the printers, who informed me of the fact,
and I made my escape through the back door.
McKinney not being able to find me on his arrival, left the office
in a great rage, swearing that he would whip me to death. A few days
after, as I was walking along Main street, he seized me by the collar,
and struck me over the head five or six times with a large cane, which
caused the blood to gush from my nose and ears in such a manner that my
clothes were completely saturated with blood. After beating me to his
satisfaction he let me go, and I returned to the office so weak from
the loss of blood that Mr. Lovejoy sent me home to my master. It was
five weeks before I was able to walk again. During this time it was
necessary to have some one to supply my place at the office, and I lost
the situation.
After my recovery, I was hired to Capt. Otis Reynolds, as a waiter on
board the steamboat Enterprise, owned by Messrs. John and Edward Walsh,
commission merchants at St. Louis. This boat was then running on the
upper Mississippi. My employment on board was to wait on gentlemen,
and the captain being a good man, the situation was a pleasant one
to me;--but in passing from place to place, and seeing new faces
every day, and knowing that they could go where they pleased, I soon
became unhappy, and several times thought of leaving the boat at some
landing-place, and trying to make my escape to Canada, which I had
heard much about as a place where the slave might live, be free, and be
protected.
But whenever such thoughts would come into my mind, my resolution would
soon be shaken by the remembrance that my dear mother was a slave
in St. Louis, and I could not bear the idea of leaving her in that
condition. She had often taken me upon her knee, and told me how she
had carried me upon her back to the field when I was an infant--how
often she had been whipped for leaving her work to nurse me--and how
happy I would appear when she would take me into her arms. When these
thoughts came over me, I would resolve never to leave the land of
slavery without my mother. I thought that to leave her in slavery,
after she had undergone and suffered, so much for me, would be proving
recreant to the duty which I owed to her. Besides this, I had three
brothers and a sister there--two of my brothers having died.
My mother, my brothers Joseph and Millford, and my sister Elizabeth,
belonged to Mr. Isaac Mansfield, formerly from one of the free states,
(Massachusetts, I believe.) He was a tinner by trade, and carried on
a large manufacturing establishment. Of all my relatives, mother was
first, and sister next. One evening, while visiting them, I made some
allusion to a proposed journey to Canada, and sister took her seat by
my side, and taking my hand in hers, said, with tears in her eyes--
"Brother, you are not going to leave mother and your dear sister here
without a friend, are you?"
I looked into her face, as the tears coursed swiftly down her cheeks,
and bursting into tears myself, said--
"No, I will never desert you and mother!"
She clasped my hand in hers, and said--
"Brother, you have often declared that you would not end your days in
slavery. I see no possible way in which you can escape with us; and
now, brother, you are on a steamboat where there is some chance for you
to escape to a land of liberty. I beseech you not to let us hinder you.
If we cannot get our liberty, we do not wish to be the means of keeping
you from a land of freedom."
I could restrain my feelings no longer, and an outburst of my own
feelings caused her to cease speaking upon that subject. In opposition
to their wishes, I pledged myself not to leave them in the hand of the
oppressor. I took leave of them, and returned to the boat, and laid
down in my bunk; but "sleep departed from mine eyes, and slumber from
mine eyelids."
A few weeks after, on our downward passage, the boat took on board, at
Hannibal, a drove of slaves, bound for the New Orleans market. They
numbered from fifty to sixty, consisting of men and women from eighteen
to forty years of age. A drove of slaves on a southern steamboat, bound
for the cotton or sugar regions, is an occurrence so common, that no
one, not even the passengers, appear to notice it, though they clank
their chains at every step. There was, however, one in this gang that
attracted the attention of the passengers and crew. It was a beautiful
girl, apparently about twenty years of age, perfectly white, with
straight light hair and blue eyes. But it was not the whiteness of her
skin that created such a sensation among those who gazed upon her--it
was her almost unparalleled beauty. She had been on the boat but a
short time, before the attention of all the passengers, including the
ladies, had been called to her, and the common topic of conversation
was about the beautiful slave-girl. She was not in chains. The man
who claimed this article of human merchandise was a Mr. Walker--a
well known slave-trader, residing in St. Louis. There was a general
anxiety among the passengers and crew to learn the history of the girl.
Her master kept close by her side, and it would have been considered
impudent for any of the passengers to have spoken to her, and the crew
were not allowed to have any conversation with them. When we reached
St. Louis, the slaves were removed to a boat bound for New Orleans, and
the history of the beautiful slave-girl remained a mystery.
I remained on the boat during the season, and it was not an unfrequent
occurrence to have on board gangs of slaves on their way to the cotton,
sugar and rice plantations of the south.
Toward the latter part of the summer Captain Reynolds left the boat,
and I was sent home. I was then placed on the farm, under Mr. Haskell,
the overseer. As I had been some time out of the field, and not
accustomed to work in the burning sun, it was very hard; but I was
compelled to keep up with the best of the hands.
I found a great difference between the work in a steamboat cabin and
that in a corn-field.
My master, who was then living in the city, soon after removed to the
farm, when I was taken out of the field to work in the house as a
waiter. Though his wife was very peevish, and hard to please, I much
preferred to be under her control than the overseer's. They brought
with them Mr. Sloane, a Presbyterian minister; Miss Martha Tulley, a
niece of theirs from Kentucky; and their nephew William. The latter had
been in the family a number of years, but the others were all newcomers.
Mr. Sloane was a young minister, who had been at the South but a short
time, and it seemed as if his whole aim was to please the slaveholders,
especially my master and mistress. He was intending to make a visit
during the winter, and he not only tried to please them, but I think
he succeeded admirably. When they wanted singing, he sung; when they
wanted praying, he prayed; when they wanted a story told, he told a
story. Instead of his teaching my master theology, my master taught
theology to him. While I was with Captain Reynolds my master "got
religion," and new laws were made on the plantation. Formerly we had
the privilege of hunting, fishing, making splint brooms, baskets, &c.,
on Sunday; but this was all stopped. Every Sunday we were all compelled
to attend meeting. Master was so religious that he induced some others
to join him in hiring a preacher to preach to the slaves.