Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe

by Harriet Beecher Stowe

  My employer then begged them not to disgrace their town in such a manner, but to appoint a jury of twelve sober men to decide what should be done. And twelve as sober men as could be found (I was not sober) said he must be hanged. They then tied a rope round his neck, and set him on an old horse. He made a speech to the mob, which I at the time thought, if it had come from some senator, would have been received with rounds of applause; and, withal, he was more calm than I am now in writing this. And after he had told all about the deed and its causes, he then kicked the horse out from under him, and was launched into eternity. My employer has often remarked that he never saw anything more noble in his whole life than the conduct of that boy.

  Now, Mr. Editor, I have given you facts, and can give you names and dates. You can do what you think is best for the cause of humanity. I hope I have seen the evil of my former practices, and will endeavour to reform.

  Very respectfully, JAMES L. HILL.

  Springfield, Illinois, Sept. 17th, 1852.

  “The opinion of a Southerner,” given below, appeared in the National Era, published at Washington. This is an anti-slavery journal, but by its generous tone and eminent ability it commands the respect and patronage of many readers in the slave States:

  The following communication comes enclosed in an envelope from Louisiana. — Ed. Era.

  THE OPINION OF A SOUTHERNER.

  To the Editor of the National Era.

  I have just been reading, in the New York Observer of the 12th of August, an article from the Southern Free Press, headed by an editorial one from the Observer, that has for its caption, “Progress in the Right Quarter.”

  The editor of the New York Observer says that the Southern Free Press has been an able and earnest defender of Southern institutions, but that he now advocates the passage of a law to prohibit the separation of families, and recommends instruction to a portion of slaves that are most honest and faithful. The Observer further adds: “It was such language as this that was becoming common before Northern fanaticism ruined the prospects of emancipation.” It is not so! Northern fanaticism, as he calls it, has done everything that has been done for bettering the condition of the slave. Every one who knows anything of slavery for the last thirty years will recollect that about that time since, the condition of the slave in Louisiana — for about Louisiana only do I speak, because about Louisiana only do I know — was as depressed and miserable as any of the accounts of the abolitionists that ever I have seen have made it. I say abolitionists; I mean friends and advocates of freedom in a fair and honourable way. If any doubt my assertion, let them seek for information; let them get the black laws of Louisiana, and read them; let them get facts from individuals of veracity, on whose statements they would rely.

  This wretched condition of slaves roused the friends of humanity, who, like men and Christian men, came fearlessly forward and told truths, indignantly expressing their abhorrence of their oppressors. Such measures of course brought forth strife, which caused the cries of humanity to sound louder and louder throughout the land. The friends of freedom gained the ascendancy in the hearts of the people, and the slaveholders were brought to a stand. Some, through fear of consequences, lessened their cruelties, while others were made to think that, perhaps, were not unwilling to do so when it was urged upon them. Cruelties were not only refrained from, but the slave’s comforts were increased. A retrograde treatment now was not practicable; fears of rebellion kept them to it. The slaves had found friends, and they were watchful. It was, however, soon discovered, that too many privileges, too much leniency, and giving knowledge, would destroy the power to keep down the slave, and tend to weaken, if not destroy the system. Accordingly, stringent laws had to be passed, and a penalty attached to them. No one must teach, or cause to be taught, a slave, without incurring the penalty. The law is now in force. These necessary laws, as they are called, are all put down to the account of the friends of freedom; to their interference. I do suppose that they do justly belong to their interference; for who that studies the history of the world’s transactions does not know that in all contests with power the weak, until successful, will be dealt with more rigorously? Lose not sight, however, of their former condition. Law after law has since been passed to draw the cord tighter around the poor slave, and all attributed to the abolitionists. Well, anyhow, progress is being made. Here comes out the Southern Press, and make some honourable concessions. He says: “The assaults upon slavery, made for the last twenty years by the North, have increased the evils of it. The treatment of slaves has undoubtedly become a delicate and difficult question. The South has a great and moral conflict to wage; and it is for her to put on the most invulnerable moral panoply.” He then thinks the availability of slave property would not be injured by passing a law to prohibit the separation of slave families; for he says, “Although cases sometimes occur which we observe are seized by these Northern fanatics as characteristic of the system,”&c. Nonsense! there are no “cases sometimes” occurring; no such thing! They are every day’s occurrences, though there are families that form the exception, and many, I would hope, that would not do it. While I am writing, I can call before me three men that were brought here by negro traders from Virginia, each having left six or seven children, with their wives, from whom they have never heard. One other died here a short time since, who left the same number in Carolina, from whom he had never heard.

  I spent the summer of 1845 in Nashville. During the month of September six hundred slaves passed through that place, in four different gangs, for New Orleans; final destination, probably, Texas. A goodly proportion were women; young women, of course; many mothers must have left not only their children, but their babies. One gang only had a few children. I made some excursions to the different watering-places around Nashville; and while at Robinson or Tyree Springs, twenty miles from Nashville, on the borders of Kentucky and Tennessee, my hostess said to me one day, “Yonder comes a gang of slaves chained.” I went to the road-side, and viewed them. For the better answering my purpose of observation, I stopped the white man in front, who was at his ease in a one-horse waggon, and asked him if those slaves were for sale. I counted them and observed their position. They were divided by three one-horse waggons, each containing a man-merchant, so arranged as to command the whole gang. Some were unchained; sixty were chained in two companies, thirty in each, the right hand of one to the left hand of the other opposite one, making fifteen each side of a large ox-chain, to which every hand was fastened, and necessarily compelled to hold up — men and women promiscuously, and about in equal proportions — all young people. No children here, except a few in a waggon behind, which were the only children in the four gangs. I said to a respectable mulatto woman in the house, “Is it true that the negro traders take mothers from their babies?” “Missis, it is true; for here, last week, such a girl (naming her), who lives about a mile off, was taken after dinner — knew nothing of it in the morning — sold, put into the gang, and her baby was given away to a neighbour. She was a stout young woman and brought a good price.”

  The annexation of Texas induced the spirited traffic that summer. Coming down home in a small boat, water low, a negro trader on board had forty-five men and women crammed into a little spot, some handcuffed. One respectable-looking man had left a wife and seven children in Nashville. Near Memphis the boat stopped at a plantation by previous arrangement, to take in thirty more. An hour’s delay was the stipulated time with the captain of the boat. Thirty young men and women came down the bank of the Mississippi, looking Wretcheduess personified, just from the field; in appearance dirty, disconsolate and oppressed some with an old shawl under their arm; a few had blankets; some had nothing at all — looked as though they cared for nothing. I calculated, while looking at them coming down the bank, that I could hold in a bundle all that the whole of them had. The short notice that was given them, when about to leave, was in consequence of the fears entertained that they would slip one side. They all looked distressed,
leaving all that was dear to them behind, to be put under the hammer, for the property of the highest bidder. No children here! The whole seventy-five were crammed into a little space on the boat, men and women all together.

  I am happy to see that morality is rearing its head with advocates for slavery, and that a “most invulnerable moral panoply” is thought to be necessary. I hope it may not prove to be like Mr. Clay’s compromises. The Southern Press says: As, for caricatures of slavery in ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ and the ‘White Slave,’ all founded in imaginary circumstances, &c., we consider them highly incendiary. He who undertakes to stir up strife between two individual neighbours, by detraction, is justly regarded, by all men and all moral codes, as a criminal.” Then he quotes the Ninth Commandment, and adds: “But to bear false witness against whole States, and millions of people,&c., would seem to be a crime as much deeper in turpitude as the mischief is greater and the provocation less.” In the first place, I will put the Southern Press upon proof that Mrs. has told one falsehood. If she has told truth, she has, indeed, a powerful engine of “assault on slavery,” such as these Northern fanatics have made for the “last twenty years.” The number against whom she offends, in the editor’s opinion, seems to increase the turpitude of her crime. This is good reasoning! I hope the editor will be brought to feel that wholesale wickedness is worse than single-handed, and is infinitely harder to reach, particularly if of long standing. It gathers boldness and strength when it is sanctioned by the authority of time, and aided by numbers that are interested in supporting it. Such is slavery; and Mrs. deserves the gratitude of “States and millions of people” for her talented work, in showing it up in its true light. She has advocated truth, justice, and humanity, and they will back her efforts. Her work will be read by “States and millions of people;” and when the Southern Press attempts to malign her, by bringing forward her own avowal, “that the subject of slavery had been so painful to her, that she had abstained from conversing on it for several years,” and that, in his opinion, “it accounts for the intensity of the venom of her book,” his really envenomed shafts will fall harmless at her feet; for readers will judge for themselves, and be very apt to conclude that more venom comes from the Southern Press than from her. She advocates what is right, and has a straight road, which “few get lost on;” he advocates what is wrong, and has, consequently, to tack, concede, deny, slander, and all sorts of things.

  With all due deference to whatever of just principles the Southern Press may have advanced in favour of the slave, I am a poor judge of human nature, if I mistake in saying that Mrs. Stowe has done much to draw from him those concessions; and the putting forth of this “most invulnerable moral panoply,” that has just come into his head as a bulwark of safety for slavery, owes its impetus to her and other like efforts. I hope the Southern Press will not imitate the spoiled child, who refused to eat his pie for spite.

  The “White Slave” I have not seen. I guess its character; for I made a passage to New York, some fourteen or fifteen years since, in a packet-ship, with a young woman whose face was enveloped in a profusion of light-brown curls, and who sat at the table with the passengers all the way as a white woman. When at the quarantine, Staten Island, the captain received a letter, sent by express mail, from a person in New Orleans, claiming her as his slave, and threatening the captain with the penalty of the existing law if she was not immediately returned. The streaming eyes of the poor unfortunate girl told the truth, when the captain reluctantly broke it to her. She unhesitatingly confessed that she had run away, and that a friend had paid her passage. Proper measures were taken, and she was conveyed to a packet-ship that was at Sandy Hook, bound for New Orleans.

  “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” I think, is a just delineation of slavery. The incidents are coloured, but the position that the slave is made to hold is just. I did not read every page of it, my object being to ascertain what position the slave occupied. I could state a case of whipping to death that would equal Uncle Tom’s; still, such cases are not very frequent.

  The stirring up of strife between neighbours, that the Southern Press complains of, deserves notice. Who are neighbours? The most explicit answer to this question will be found in the reply Christ made to the lawyer, when he asked it of him. Another question will arise, Whether, in Christ’s judgment, Mrs. Stowe would be considered a neighbour or an incendiary? As the Almighty Ruler of the universe and the Maker of man has said that He has made all the nations of the earth of one blood, and man in His own image, the black man, irrespective of his colour, would seem to be a neighbour who has fallen among his enemies, that have deprived him of the fruits of his labour, his liberty, his right to his wife and children, his right to obtain the knowledge to read, or to anything that earth holds dear, except such portions of food and raiment as will fit him for his despoiler’s purposes. Let not the apologists for slavery bring up the isolated cases of leniency, giving instruction, and affectionate attachment, that are found among some masters, as specimens of slavery! It is unfair! They form exceptions, and much do I respect them; but they are not the rules of slavery. The strife that is being stirred up is not to take away anything that belongs to another — neither their silver nor gold, their fine linen or purple, their houses or land, their horses or cattle, or anything that is their property; but to rescue a neighbour from their unmanly cupidity.

  A REPUBLICAN.

  No introduction is necessary to explain the following correspondence, and no commendation will be required to secure for it a respectful attention from thinking readers: —

  Washington City, D. C., Dec. 6, 1852.

  DEAR SIR, — I understand that you are a North Carolinian, and have always resided in the South; you must, consequently, be acquainted with the workings of the institution of slavery. You have doubtless also read that world-renowned book, “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” by Mrs. Stowe. The apologists for slavery deny that this book is a truthful picture of slavery. They say that its representations are exaggerated, its scenes and incidents unfounded, and, in a word, that the whole book is a caricature. They also deny that families are separated — that children are sold from parents, wives from their husbands,&c. Under these circumstances, I am induced to ask your opinion of Mrs. Stowe’s book, and whether or not, in your opinion, her statements are entitled to credit.

  I have the honour to be, yours truly, A. M. GANGEWER.

  D. R. Goodloe, Esq.

  Washington, Dec. 8, 1852.

  DEAR SIR, — Your letter of the 6th inst., asking my opinion of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” has been received; and there being no reason why I should withhold unless it be the fear of public opinion (your object being, as I understand, the publication of my reply), I proceed to give it in some detail.

  A book of fiction, to be worth reading, must necessarily be filled with rare and striking incidents, and the leading characters must be remarkable, some for great virtues — others, perhaps, for great vices or follies. A narrative of the ordinary events in the lives of common-place people would be insufferably dull and insipid, and a book made up of such materials would be, to the elegant and graphic pictures of life and manners which we have in the writings of Sir Walter Scott and Dickens, what a surveyor’s plot of a ten-acre field is to a painted landscape, in which the eye is charmed by a thousand varieties of hill and dale, of green shrubbery and transparent water, of light and shade, at a glance. In order to determine whether a novel is a fair picture of society, it is not necessary to ask if its chief personages are to be met with every day; but whether they are characteristic of the times and country — whether they embody the prevalent sentiments, virtues, vices, follies, and peculiarities — and whether the events, tragic or otherwise, are such as may and do occasionally occur.

  Judging “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” by these principles, I have no hesitation in saying that it is a faithful portraiture of Southern life and institutions. There is nothing in the book inconsistent with the laws and usages of the slave-holding States; the virtues, v
ices, and peculiar hues of character and manners are all Southern, and must be recognised at once by everyone who reads the book. I may never have seen such depravity in one man as that exhibited in the character of Legree, though I have ten thousand times witnessed the various shades of in different individuals. On the other hand, I have never seen so many perfections concentrated in one human being as Mrs. Stowe has conferred upon the daughter of a slave-holder. Evangeline is an image of beauty and goodness which can never be effaced from the mind, whatever may be its prejudices; yet her whole character is fragrant of the South: her generous sympathy, her beauty and delicacy, her sensibility, are all Southern. They are “to the manner born,” and embodying as they do the Southern ideal of beauty and loveliness, cannot be ostracised from Southern hearts, even by the power of the Vigilance Committees.