The Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin
Page 5
which a slave feels when making up his mind upon this subject. If he makes an
effort and is not successful, he must be laughed at by his fellows, he will be beaten
unmercifully by the master, and then watched and used the harder for it all his life.
And then, if he gets away, who, what will he find? He is ignorant of the
world. All the white part of mankind that he has ever seen are enemies to him
and all his kindred. How can he venture where none but white faces shall greet
him? The master tells him that abolitionists decoy slaves off into the free States
to catch them and sell them to Louisiana or Mississippi; and, if he goes to
Canada, the British will put him in a mine under ground, with both eyes put out,
for life. How does he know what or whom to believe? A horror of great dark-
ness comes upon him, as he thinks over what may befall him. Long, very long
time did I think of escaping before I made the effort.
At length the report was started that I was to be sold for Louisiana. Then I
thought it was time to act. My mind was made up.
* * * * * * * * *
What my feelings were when I reached the free shore can be better imagined
than described. I trembled all over with deep emotion, and I could feel my hair
rise up on my head. I was on what was called a free soil, among a people who
had no slaves. I saw white men at work, and no slave smarting beneath the lash.
Everything was indeed new and wonderful. Not knowing where to find a friend,
and being ignorant of the country, unwilling to inquire lest I should betray my
ignorance, it was a whole week before I reached Cincinnati. At one place where
I put up, I had a great many more questions put to me than I wished to answer.
At another place I was very much annoyed by the officiousness of the landlord,
who made it a point to supply every guest with newspapers. I took the copy
handed me, and turned it over in a somewhat awkward manner, I suppose. He
came to me to point out a veto, or some other very important news. I thought it
best to decline his assistance, and gave up the paper, saying my eyes were not in a
fit condition to read much.
At another place, the neighbours, on learning that a Kentuckian was at the
tavern, came in great earnestness to find out what my business was. Kentuckians
sometimes came there to kidnap their citizens. They were in the habit of watch-
ing them close. I at length satisfied them by assuring them that I was not, nor
my father before me, any slaveholder at all; but, lest their suspicions should be
excited in another direction, I added my grandfather was a slaveholder.
* * * * * * * * *
At daylight we were in Canada. When I stepped ashore here, I said, Sure
enough I am free. Good Heavens! what a sensation, when it first visits the
bosoms of a full-grown man; one born to bondage; one who had been taught
from early infancy that this was his inevitable lot for life! Not till then did I
dare to cherish for a moment the feeling that one of the limbs of my body was my
own. The slaves often say, when cut in the hand or foot, “Plague on the old
foot,” or “the old hand! It is master's, let him take care of it; nigger don't care
if he never get well.” My hands, my feet were now my own.
It will be recollected that George, in conversing with Eliza,
gives an account of a scene in which he was violently beaten by
his master's young son. This incident was suggested by the
following letter from John M. Nelson to Mr. Theodore Weld,
given in Slavery as It is, p. 51.
Mr. Nelson removed from Virginia to Highland County,
Ohio, many years since, where he is extensively known and
respected. The letter is dated January 3rd, 1839.
I was born and raised in Augusta County, Virginia; my father was an elder
in the Presbyterian church, and was “owner” of about twenty slaves; he was
what was generally termed a “good master.” His slaves were generally tolerably
well fed and clothed, and not over-worked; they were sometimes permitted to
attend church, and called in to family worship; few of them, however, availed
themselves of these privileges. On some occasions I have seen him whip them
severely, particularly for the crime of trying to obtain their liberty, or for what
was called “running away.” For this they were scourged more severely than for
anything else. After they have been retaken, I have seen them stripped naked
and suspended by the hands, sometimes to a tree, sometimes to a post, until their
toes barely touched the ground, and whipped with a cowhide until the blood
dripped from their backs. A boy named Jack, particularly, I have seen served
in this way more than once. When I was quite a child, I recollect it grieved me
very much to see one tied up to be whipped, and I used to intercede with tears in
their behalf, and mingle my cries with theirs, and feel almost willing to take part
of the punishment; I have been severely rebuked by my father for this kind of
sympathy. Yet, such is the hardening nature of such scenes, that from this kind
of commiseration for the suffering slave I became so blunted that I could not
only witness their stripes with composure, but myself inflict them, and that
without remorse. One case I have often looked back to with sorrow and con-
trition, particularly since I have been convinced that “negroes are men.” When
I was perhaps fourteen or fifteen years of age, I undertook to correct a young
fellow named Ned, for some supposed offence, I think it was leaving a bridle out
of its proper place; he, being larger and stronger than myself, took hold of my
arms and held me, in order to prevent my striking him. This I considered the
height of insolence, and cried for help, when my father and mother both came
running to my rescue. My father stripped and tied him, and took him into the
orchard, where switches were plenty, and directed me to whip him; when one
switch wore out, he supplied me with others. After I had whipped him a while,
he fell on his knees to implore forgiveness, and I kicked him in the face; my
father said, “Don't kick him, but whip him;” this I did until his back was lite-
rally covered with welts. I know I have repented, and trust I have obtained
pardon for these things.
My father owned a woman we used to call Aunt Grace; she was purchased
in Old Virginia. She has told me that her old master, in his will, gave her her
freedom, but at his death his sons had sold her to my father. When he bought
her she manifested some unwillingness to go with him; when she was put in
irons and taken by force. This was before I was born; but I remember to have
seen the irons, and was told that was what they had been used for. Aunt Grace
is still living, and must be between seventy and eighty years of age; she has, for
the last forty years, been an exemplary Christian. When I was a youth, I took
some pains to learn her to read; this is now a great consolation to her. Since
age and infirmity have rendered her of little value to her “owners,” she is per-
mitted to read as much as she pleases; this she can do, with the aid of glasses, in
the old family Bible, which is almost the only book she has ever looked into.
This, with some little mending for the black children, is all she does; she is still
held as a slave. I well remember what a heart-rending scene there was in the
family when my father sold her husband; this was, I suppose, thirty-five years
ago. And yet my father was considered one of the best of masters. I know of
few who were better, but of many who were worse.
With regard to the intelligence of George, and his teaching
himself to read and write, there is a most interesting and affecting
parallel to it in the “Life of Frederick Douglass”--a book
which can be recommended to anyone who has a curiosity to
trace the workings of an intelligent and active mind through all
the squalid misery, degradation and oppression, of slavery. A
few incidents will be given.
Like Clark, Douglass was the son of a white man. He was a
plantation slave in a proud old family; his situation, probably,
may be considered as an average one; that is to say, he led a life
of dirt, degradation, discomfort of various kinds, made tolerable
as a matter of daily habit, and considered as enviable in com-
parison with the lot of those who suffer worse abuse. An inci-
dent which Douglass relates of his mother is touching; he states
that it is customary at an early age to separate mothers from
their children, for the purpose of blunting and deadening natural
affection. When he was three years old his mother was sent to
work on a plantation eight or ten miles distant, and after that he
never saw her except in the night. After her day's toil she
would occasionally walk over to her child, lie down with him in
her arms, hush him to sleep in her bosom, then rise up and walk
back again to be ready for her field-work by daylight. Now,
we ask the highest-born lady in England or America, who is a
mother, whether this does not show that this poor field-labourer
had in her bosom, beneath her dirt and rags, a true mother's heart?
The last and bitterest indignity which had been heaped on the
head of the unhappy slaves has been the denial to them of those
holy affections which God gives alike to all. We are told, in
fine phrase, by languid ladies of fashion, that “it is not to be
supposed that those creatures have the same feelings that we
have,” when, perhaps, the very speaker could not endure one
tithe of the fatigue and suffering which the slave-mother often
bears for her child. Every mother who has a mother's heart
within her ought to know that this is blasphemy against nature,
and, standing between the cradle of her living and the grave of
her dead child, should indignantly reject such a slander on all
motherhood.
Douglass thus relates the account of his learning to read,
after he had been removed to the situation of house-servant in
Baltimore.
It seems that his mistress, newly-married and unaccustomed
to the management of slaves, was very kind to him, and, amongst
other acts of kindness, commenced teaching him to read. His
master, discovering what was going on, he says,
At once forbade Mrs. Auld to instruct me further, telling her, among other
things, that it was unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read. To use
his own words, further, he said, “If you give a nigger an inch he will take an ell.
A nigger should know nothing but to obey his master--to do as he is told to do.
Learning would spoil the best nigger in the world. Now,” said he, “if you teach
that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping him. It
would for ever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable,
and of no value to his master. As to himself, it could do him no good, but a great
deal of harm. It would make him discontented and unhappy.” These words
sank deep into my heart, stirred up sentiments within that lay slumbering, and
called into existence an entirely new train of thought. It was a new and special
revelation, explaining dark and mysterious things, with which my youthful under-
standing had struggled, but struggled in vain. I now understood what had been
to me a most perplexing difficulty--to wit, the white man's power to enslave the
black man. It was a grand achievement, and I prized it highly. From that
moment I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom.
After this, his mistress was as watchful to prevent his learning
to read as she had before been to instruct him. His course
after this he thus describes:--
From this time I was most narrowly watched. If I was in a separate room any
considerable length of time, I was sure to be suspected of having a book, and was
at once called to give an account of myself; all this, however, was too late--the
first step had been taken. Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given me
the inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking the ell.
The plan which I adopted, and the one by which I was most successful, was
that of making friends of all the little white boys whom I met in the street. As
many of these as I could I converted into teachers. With their kindly aid,
obtained at different times and in different places, I finally succeeded in learning
to read. When I was sent of errands I always took my book with me, and by
going one part of my errand quickly, I found time to get a lesson before my return.
I used also to carry bread with me, enough of which was always in the house,
and to which I was always welcome, for I was much better off in this regard
than many of the poor white children in our neighbourhood. This bread I used
to bestow upon the poor hungry little urchins, who, in return, would give me that
more valuable bread of knowledge. I am strongly tempted to give the names of
two or three of those little boys, as a testimonial of the gratitude and affection I
bear them, but prudence forbids; not that it would injure me, but it might em-
barrass them, for it is almost an unpardonable offence to teach slaves to read in
this Christian country. It is enough to say of the dear little fellows, that they
lived in Philpot-street, very near Durgin and Bailey's ship-yard. I used to talk
this matter of slavery over with them. I would sometimes say to them, I wished
I could be free as they would be when they got to be men. “You will be free as
soon as you are twenty-one, but I am a slave for life! Have not I as good a right
to be free as you have?” These words used to trouble them; they would express
for me the liveliest sympathy, and console me with the hope that something would
occur by which I might be free.
I was now about twelve years old, and the thought of being a slave for life
began to bear heavily upon my heart. Just about this time I got hold of a
book entitled the “Columbian Orator.” Every opportunity I got I used to
read this book. Among much of other interesting matter, I found in it a
dialogue between a master and his slave. The slave was represented as having
run away from his master three times. The dialogue represented the conversa-
tion which took place between them when the slave was retaken the third time.
In this dialogue the whole argument in b
ehalf of slavery was brought forward
by the master, all of which was disposed of by the slave. The slave was made
to say some very smart as well as impressive things in reply to his master--
things which had the desired though unexpected effect; for the conversation
resulted in the voluntary emancipation of the slave on the part of the master.
In the same book I met with one of Sheridan's mighty speeches on and in
behalf of Catholic emancipation. These were choice documents to me. I read
them over and over again, with unabated interest. They gave tongue to interest-
ing thoughts of my own soul, which had frequently flashed through my mind,
and died away for want of utterance. The moral which I gained from the
dialogue was the power of truth over the conscience of even a slaveholder.
What I got from Sheridan was a bold denunciation of slavery, and a powerful
vindication of human rights. The reading of these documents enabled me
to utter my thoughts, and to meet the arguments brought forward to sustain
slavery; but while they relieved me of one difficulty, they brought on another
still more painful than the one of which I was relieved. The more I read, the
more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no
other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes and gone
to Africa and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to
slavery. I loathed them as being the meanest as well as the most wicked of men.
As I read and contemplated the subject, behold! that very discontentment which
Master Hugh had predicted would follow my learning to read had already come,
to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I writhed under it, I
would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing.
It had given me a view of my wretched condition without the remedy. It
opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In
moments of agony I envied my fellow slaves for their stupidity. I have often
wished myself a beast. I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my
own: anything, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting
thinking of my condition that tormented me: there was no getting rid of it.