Seeking Eden

by Ann Turnbull

  “Thou would be an excellent teacher,” Betty said. “Don’t thou think so, Jos?”

  “Yes, indeed.”

  It would get her away from the house, I thought, and from her father’s domination. And she’d be good at it. I could see that.

  “Thou put me to shame,” I joked. “I’d better find another employer – someone who needs a clerk. A labourer can’t go courting a schoolmistress.”

  “Thou could,” said Kate. “But yes, thou should be a clerk. Or a merchant’s apprentice…” She turned to Betty. “It seems I should be studying Hollandisch?”

  “I reckon they have their own schools, up there in Germantown,” said Betty. “Still, it could do no harm. Perhaps we could learn it together? Dad likes these Germans well. They read, and study, and discuss ideas; and he says they are true Christians and that their lives speak the truth.”

  What clever women I am surrounded by, I thought. Kate a schoolteacher, Betty a printer, my mother in charge of the print shop. And I felt again that I had lost my way, that I needed to find my place, my purpose in life.

  As if she guessed these thoughts, Kate said, “I think Dad would like to have thee back, Jos, only he’s too proud to say so.”

  “I’m not sure I’d want to go back,” I said. I had my pride, too. “Hasn’t he found a new man?”

  “A clerk, yes. But he’s slapdash, and Dad hates that. He won’t last.”

  When the wharf was finished, in late summer, we began to feel that a real modern city was emerging. The wharf was Samuel Carpenter’s, but other merchants and ships paid to use it, and it was a great convenience to all. Soon plans for more wharves were being put forward, along with a design for a meeting house where the growing number of Friends would have more space than in one another’s homes. William Penn himself was gone to England on business, but had plans afoot for an estate of his own some distance upriver from Philadelphia.

  In September I found work as a grocer’s assistant, keeping accounts, serving in the shop and making deliveries. It was responsible work, though it held none of the challenge of the merchant’s life.

  Meanwhile, George Bainbrigg’s insistence that I keep away from Kate remained. It infuriated Kate, who argued with him and took every chance she could to slip out and meet me. There was some delight and excitement to be had in these secret meetings, and in the notes and messages that passed between us, usually via Betty; and they carried us through the late summer and autumn. But before long we began to tire of the enforced secrecy – and we knew that come winter our meetings would not be so easy to contrive. Early in November we decided to make a stand. I’d go to the house, and together we would confront her father.

  We made our plans, but before we could act on them, an English ship, the Isabella of Bristol, sailed into Philadelphia’s harbour; and during the events that followed, all thought of such a meeting was put to one side.

  Twenty-nine

  We were aware of the Isabella’s approach some time before she docked at the new wharf. Any ship attracted attention, and I joined my employer and several customers at the door of the grocer’s shop on Front Street and watched as this one drew nearer. She was a large, two-masted vessel with square sails.

  The grocer and his customers discussed her appearance.

  “Not one of our merchants’ ships. Not seen her before.”

  “English, I’d say.”

  “Looks like she’s been through some rough weather. See the state of those sails?”

  As the ship drew nearer I saw on her side the name Isabella, and her home port, Bristol. She was, indeed, battered and in need of repair, and I wondered what route she had followed. It seemed unlikely that she had come straight from England.

  We returned to our work, and by the time we left, the Isabella was tied up at Samuel Carpenter’s wharf and sailors were beginning to come ashore, bandy and still rolling with the ship’s motion.

  It was then that I knew – even before we heard the news. An odour had reached us – faint, and overlaid with cleansing herbs; but no amount of scrubbing could ever remove that smell. I had encountered it once before and would never forget it. By morning the news was all over town: the Bristol ship Isabella had sailed direct from the west coast of Africa and was carrying a cargo of a hundred and fifty slaves. They were to be sold by auction on the waterfront in four days’ time.

  I went home at noon for dinner and found an auctioneer at the print shop with a draft of a notice he wanted printed:

  “James Furlong, master of the ISABELLA of Bristol, offers for sale PRIME NEGROES – men, women and children – newly arrived from the coast of Guinea. To be sold by Public Vendue on Thursday the ninth day of November 1684 at 10 of the forenoon, at Front Street, Philadelphia.”

  My father read the notice, frowned, and gave a slow shake of the head. He handed it back. “I am sorry. We cannot undertake this work.”

  “You are too busy?” The auctioneer seemed surprised.

  I waited, tension growing in me. I knew my father must feel torn. The print shop was newly set up; he was beginning to attract customers but was in no way settled in business. To turn down work was risky. But his face was set firm; and I knew my mother would support him.

  “I cannot print a notice for the sale of slaves,” he said. “It is against my conscience.”

  A cheer rose inside me.

  The auctioneer said, “You won’t change your mind? We must draw it up by hand otherwise. It will make no difference.”

  I knew this was true, but still I was glad my father said no.

  Within hours notices had appeared outside the Blue Anchor, the post office and the Society of Traders’ hall. A standard form had been used – including a woodcut of a black man, naked except for a loincloth – and the details filled in by hand. As the auctioneer had said, it made no difference.

  The news struck Philadelphia and its surrounding farms like a hurricane. There were almost no black slaves in the colony, but the desire for them was huge. Over the next few days, as the word spread, settlers began pouring into town by boat, in carts and on foot. The Blue Anchor’s rooms were full and people were sleeping in their carts. New customers thronged the grocer’s shop, and I heard their talk – heard how badly they needed strong men to clear and plant their holdings; of the high cost of Negroes (“but they are better than bondsmen because once you’ve bought them you have them for life”); of their cooking and household skills, and their cleanliness, thought to be superior to that of many indentured servants. Foremost was the issue of cost: unlike bonded labourers, who must eventually be provided for, slaves were your property, and if they bred you owned their children. I felt an inward shiver as I listened to their talk, which seemed to me without compassion. I awaited the event with both fascination and dread, remembering the unease I had felt at the auction of the Chepstow’s cargo. And that was household goods. These were men and women.

  My parents appeared subdued by the arrival of the slave ship. I saw that it burdened their spirits, as it did mine. After supper, on the night before the public vendue, my mother lit candles and we sat and listened while my father read to us from the Bible, as was his custom of an evening. When he closed the book we remained silent for some time. I felt that we were preparing ourselves for the events to come.

  My father spoke once. “There is something unholy in this rush to auction,” he said. “I thought Friends would not wish to own slaves.” And I knew he was as shocked and disappointed as I was.

  Many more buyers gathered in town the next morning. “Almost the entire colony must be here,” my employer said. He looked forward to extra sales. From his shop on the front we were able to watch the preparations being made. A large area of Front Street was cordoned off, and a wooden stand set within it. This stand would accommodate, I guessed, seven or eight slaves at a time, so the vendue would be a prolonged affair if the Negroes were to be displayed in such small lots. Larger groups had been brought up in batches onto the ship’s deck earlier in the d
ay for some of the merchants to go on board, look them over and have first choice – and a fair number were sold in this way. I did not see George Bainbrigg among these merchants.

  I thought of Antony. Was he here, with his master, in the crowds? It was a day when almost everyone had come to the waterfront. Even if Antony was not here, he would know what was happening. How must he feel, I wondered, seeing others about to be sold as he had been?

  The auction began with a boy ringing a bell. In the shop we all rushed to the door, and saw the auctioneer mount a block and shout, in his strong, carrying voice, that the proceedings were open. The first captives were brought off the ship, and my heart almost stopped as I saw their terror: the uncontrollable shaking, the rolling eyes, the way they wept and tried to cling to one another. Some were so afraid that their knees gave way and they fell down in a swoon and had to be splashed with water by the sailors and hauled to their feet. I remembered my conversations with Antony in Barbados, how he’d said that when he arrived there, and was put up for auction, he’d thought the beak-nosed people surrounding him were demons who would kill and eat him. These men must be feeling that same dread. As soon as they were in place on the stand, shackled, almost naked, exposed to all, and in the grip of fear, prospective buyers rushed forward and fell upon them, pushing, prodding, turning them around. The settlers’ hands were in the men’s mouths; they forced their jaws open, made them bare their teeth, stick out their tongues. They examined eyes, skin, hair, private parts.

  Some of the Negroes were clearly worth having, for the settlers pushed and argued with one another over who was first. I saw a fight on the brink of breaking out before the auctioneer’s man calmed it.

  The first batch was sold, and next from the ship came a group of women, forced up onto the stand. They wore strips of cloth like little skirts around their hips, but their breasts were bare, and I found I was staring at their nakedness despite myself. Some of these women had young children with them – one a toddler no higher than its mother’s knee. And there was a girl, perhaps thirteen, still slim-hipped and with breasts just beginning to show. She stood with head down and tears falling. Nearly all the women cried, and some were so afraid they could not stand and had to be dragged upright. But a few, I noticed, remained still and quiet. These were mothers, and I believe they controlled their fear in order not to frighten the young ones.

  I returned briefly to my work, but female shrieks drew us all to the door again. Two of the women were being separated from their children. Their despair was harrowing. I could not bear it, and turned away.

  “They settle down,” the grocer said. “Screech and wail, but get over it fast enough. Like cows, when the calf’s taken.”

  They are not like cows, I thought. They are like my mother. Like Judith. Like Miata.

  Another group was brought up, and I felt the ripple of excitement that ran through the crowd. Each time a new group was brought forward onto the stand a roar erupted and people pushed forward. As the auctioneer began the bidding I saw the eager, greedy faces, the hands shooting up, and I imagined again, as I had at the time of the Chepstow sale, the auctioneer as an agent of the Devil, whipping up souls to evil. Perhaps Antony was right, and demons did indeed stalk the world.

  The auction continued until well into the afternoon. We heard that all the captives had been sold – and for cash.

  “Which means there will be scarcely any ready money left in the colony and everyone will be asking for credit,” the grocer said gloomily.

  I thought of the captives who, over the next day or so, would be taken out to farms and smallholdings in the countryside, far from others of their kind, lonely and afraid, unable to speak the language or understand the customs of their owners. No wonder slaves often kill themselves, I thought; or run away and endure cruel punishments, only to run away again. I had tried to help Antony by letting him escape. But it was not in my power truly to set him free. It seemed we were all caught in this evil trade and could not escape from it.

  When I returned home I found the ordinariness of our family life a refuge from the scenes of avarice and despair I had been witnessing all day. The hens ran clucking to Sarah as she tossed them handfuls of grain; my mother set the table; Betty scrubbed ink from her hands in the yard. We sat down to eat, and waited in silence on the light.

  We ate mostly in silence, too, in the manner of Friends, but afterwards we moved to the parlour, where Betty and my mother took up their sewing and Sarah struggled with her letters on a slate.

  “This has been a dark day,” my father said. I saw that he was shaken. An auction like this was something we had never thought to see in Philadelphia.

  “We must hope that since most of the buyers are Friends they will treat their slaves well and endeavour to bring them to the Truth,” my mother said.

  “Is that all?” I burst out – angering my father, who said, “Do not shout at thy mother.”

  I apologized, but with an ill grace, for I was full of pent-up rage at what I had witnessed on the waterfront.

  “We cannot alter the fact that they are slaves,” my mother said. “All we can do now is to urge Friends to care for them, body and soul, and eventually to set them free.”

  “Mam, if thou had seen the greed, the cruelty in the faces of those buyers, thou would not believe them capable of caring.”

  “All are capable,” my mother said. “And the buyers are all Christians.”

  “Would thou have bought a slave, Mam, if we needed one?” I demanded.

  “Thou know I would not.”

  My father intervened: “Thy mother understands that we now live among people who keep slaves and must appeal to the consciences of those people to behave rightly towards them. George Fox said as much; and William Penn has said they should be freed after fourteen years.”

  “It is not enough!” I said.

  “It is not. But once a sale is made it is all we can do. And people do change, Jos, over time.”

  “But what use is that to those who are suffering now?”

  Nothing they said could satisfy me.

  I was still brooding on the scenes I had witnessed when, two days later, we heard news that shocked us all.

  Tokpa

  Once again I glimpse Miata on a market day. Several moons have passed since we last met, and I see that she is now big with child. She doesn’t see me. There are several stalls between us – one heaped with gourds, another with corn; and although I fix my eyes on her and try to will her to look at me, she doesn’t turn. Her mistress leads her away, and they disappear into the crowd. I feel more bitter than ever at the loss of Miata. It cuts my heart to see my own woman heavy with my child and have no power to reach or touch her.

  We go back to the farm and I work with Isaac Shore and Enoch, his son, clearing the fields ready for next spring’s planting. Both men use any chance to cuff or punch me. The scars on my back are healed but I have many hidden cuts and bruises. Isaac Shore has made a switch of some flexible twig with sharp thorns, and he uses it all day long on me, pricking and stinging my face, neck, ears and arms. It maddens me and my hatred of him grows. Father and son grunt and snarl at each other, and Isaac hits out at Enoch as often as he does at me. That night, as always, he shackles me in the shed and locks the door. The nights are long now and the bad spirits crowd around me.

  If I had power I would avenge myself on this man.

  Next day Enoch goes to town, and when he comes back I hear the three of them talking about a ship from Africa full of slaves in Philadelphia’s harbour.

  At once I am full of hope, and fear. Who are the captives on this ship? Could my people be among them – my family who were left behind? All my love and longing for my people returns and torments me. I want them to be at home, in our village, and yet I want them here with me. I both want and dread to see the captives come off this ship.

  There will be an auction, Enoch says; and the woman, Isaac Shore’s wife, begins to chatter like a monkey with excitement, and say
s she will have a wench – a little wench to help her in the house.

  So we go to town: the four of us, me with an iron collar around my neck to mark me out as Shore’s if I should run.

  I smell the slaves and the slave ship as soon as we approach the harbour. Everything has been cleaned, and the Shores don’t seem to notice the lingering odour – but they are white people, used to living in filth; they don’t mind the stink of it.

  The smell reaches me and fills me with remembered terror. My knees feel weak and my mouth is dry. As we approach the harbour the noise surrounds us: the auctioneer shouting, the yells of the crowd, raised hands, eager pointing fingers. We enter the harbour front and the scene bursts upon me. I see a row of black men on a long stand, naked except for loincloths, staring-eyed and shaking with fear. My heart pounds. I know they expect to be killed and eaten by demons. I see the auctioneer in his cocked hat and his blue coat trimmed with grimy lace. A man leaps up from the crowd and grabs one of the captives, forces open his mouth, prods and pushes him. Words begin to fly back and forth between the crowd and the man in the blue coat. Hands shoot up, faces redden, calls come faster. The auctioneer bangs a stick on the block and the captive is unfastened and led away. I see these captives and hear their voices and I know they are not of my people. They speak a different language, but their terror takes root in me and I am back in the harbour in Barbados with the whiskery man and the cart full of people stinking of fear.

  “They are bringing the women up now,” says Enoch. And he runs his tongue over his lips. His mother looks up with an eager face.

  The women are weeping, trying to cover themselves with their hands. A young girl appears. None of these people is Kpelle; I know now that I will not find my family here. But this girl is about the age my sister Musu would be now; and I wonder, as I have so often, where Musu is, whether she is still alive, whether someone is hurting her. The girl stands with tears running down her face. I feel such pity for her that my own eyes flood.