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Title: The Life of Josiah Henson, Formerly a Slave, Now an Inhabitant of Canada

Author: Josiah Henson

Editor: Samuel Atkins Eliot

Release date: November 26, 2016 [eBook #53609]
                Most recently updated: October 23, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Cindy Horton and the Online Distributed
        Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was
        produced from images generously made available by The
        Internet Archive)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LIFE OF JOSIAH HENSON, FORMERLY A SLAVE, NOW AN INHABITANT OF CANADA ***

  THE

  LIFE OF JOSIAH HENSON,

  FORMERLY A SLAVE,

  NOW AN INHABITANT OF CANADA,

  AS

  NARRATED BY HIMSELF.


  BOSTON:

  ARTHUR D. PHELPS.

  1849.




  Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1849, by

  ARTHUR D. PHELPS,

  in the office of the Clerk of the District Court
  of the District of Massachusetts


  CAMBRIDGE:

  PRINTED BY BOLLES AND HOUGHTON.




ADVERTISEMENT.


The following memoir was written from the dictation of JOSIAH HENSON.
A portion of the story was told, which, when written, was read to him,
that any errors of statement might be corrected. The substance of it,
therefore, the facts, the reflections, and very often the words, are
his; and little more than the structure of the sentences belongs to
another.

The narrative, in this form, necessarily loses the attraction derived
from the earnest manner, the natural eloquence of a man who tells a
story in which he is deeply interested; but it is hoped that enough
remains to repay perusal, and that the character of the man, and the
striking nature of the events of his life will be thought to justify
the endeavor to make them more extensively known. The story has this
advantage, that it is not fiction, but fact; and it will be found
fruitful in instruction by those who attentively consider its lessons.




LIFE OF JOSIAH HENSON.


I was born, June 15, 1789, in Charles County, Maryland, on a farm
belonging to Mr. Francis N., about a mile from Port Tobacco. My mother
was the property of Dr. Josiah McP., but was hired by Mr. N., to whom
my father belonged. The only incident I can remember, which occurred
while my mother continued on N.’s farm, was the appearance of my father
one day, with his head bloody and his back lacerated. He was in a
state of great excitement, and though it was all a mystery to me at
the age of three or four years, it was explained at a later period,
and I understood that he had been suffering the cruel penalty of the
Maryland law for beating a white man. His right ear had been cut off
close to his head, and he had received a hundred lashes on his back.
He had beaten the overseer for a brutal assault on my mother, and this
was his punishment. Furious at such treatment, my father became a
different man, and was so morose, disobedient, and intractable, that
Mr. N. determined to sell him. He accordingly parted with him, not long
after, to his son, who lived in Alabama; and neither my mother nor I,
ever heard of him again. He was naturally, as I understood afterwards
from my mother and other persons, a man of amiable temper, and of
considerable energy of character; but it is not strange that he should
be essentially changed by such cruelty and injustice under the sanction
of law.

After the sale of my father by N., and his leaving Maryland for
Alabama, Dr. McP. would no longer hire out my mother to N. She
returned, therefore, to the estate of the doctor, who was very much
kinder to his slaves than the generality of planters, never suffering
them to be struck by any one. He was, indeed, a man of good natural
impulses, kind-hearted, liberal, and jovial. The latter quality was so
much developed as to be his great failing; and though his convivial
excesses were not thought of as a fault by the community in which
he lived, and did not even prevent his having a high reputation for
goodness of heart, and an almost saint-like benevolence, yet they were,
nevertheless, his ruin. My mother, and her young family of three girls
and three boys, of which I was the youngest, resided on this estate for
two or three years, during which my only recollections are of being
rather a pet of the doctor’s, who thought I was a bright child, and of
being much impressed with what I afterwards recognized as the deep
piety and devotional feeling and habits of my mother. I do not know
how, or where she acquired her knowledge of God, or her acquaintance
with the Lord’s prayer, which she so frequently repeated and taught me
to repeat. I remember seeing her often on her knees, endeavoring to
arrange her thoughts in prayers appropriate to her situation, but which
amounted to little more than constant ejaculation, and the repetition
of short phrases, which were within my infant comprehension, and have
remained in my memory to this hour.

After this brief period of comparative comfort, however, the death of
Dr. McP. brought about a revolution in our condition, which, common
as such things are in slave countries, can never be imagined by those
not subject to them, nor recollected by those who have been, without
emotions of grief and indignation deep and ineffaceable. The doctor was
riding from one of his scenes of riotous excess, when, falling from his
horse, in crossing a little run, not a foot deep, he was unable to save
himself from drowning.

In consequence of his decease, it became necessary to sell the estate
and the slaves, in order to divide the property among the heirs; and
we were all put up at auction and sold to the highest bidder, and
scattered over various parts of the country. My brothers and sisters
were bid off one by one, while my mother, holding my hand, looked on
in an agony of grief, the cause of which I but ill understood at
first, but which dawned on my mind, with dreadful clearness, as the
sale proceeded. My mother was then separated from me, and put up in her
turn. She was bought by a man named Isaac R., residing in Montgomery
county, and then I was offered to the assembled purchasers. My mother,
half distracted with the parting forever from all her children, pushed
through the crowd, while the bidding for me was going on, to the spot
where R. was standing. She fell at his feet, and clung to his knees,
entreating him in tones that a mother only could command, to buy her
_baby_ as well as herself, and spare to her one of her little ones at
least. Will it, can it be believed that this man, thus appealed to,
was capable not merely of turning a deaf ear to her supplication, but
of disengaging himself from her with such violent blows and kicks,
as to reduce her to the necessity of creeping out of his reach, and
mingling the groan of bodily suffering with the sob of a breaking
heart? Yet this was one of my earliest observations of men; an
experience which has been common to me with thousands of my race, the
bitterness of which its frequency cannot diminish to any individual
who suffers it, while it is dark enough to overshadow the whole
after-life with something blacker than a funeral pall.--I was bought by
a stranger.--Almost immediately, however, whether my childish strength,
at five or six years of age, was overmastered by such scenes and
experiences, or from some accidental cause, I fell sick, and seemed to
my new master so little likely to recover, that he proposed to R., the
purchaser of my mother, to take me too at such a trifling rate that it
could not be refused. I was thus providentially restored to my mother;
and under her care, destitute as she was of the proper means of nursing
me, I recovered my health, and grew up to be an uncommonly vigorous and
healthy boy and man.

The character of R., the master whom I faithfully served for many
years, is by no means an uncommon one in any part of the world; but it
is to be regretted that a domestic institution should anywhere put it
in the power of such a one to tyrannize over his fellow beings, and
inflict so much needless misery as is sure to be produced by such a man
in such a position. Coarse and vulgar in his habits, unprincipled and
cruel in his general deportment, and especially addicted to the vice of
licentiousness, his slaves had little opportunity for relaxation from
wearying labor, were supplied with the scantiest means of sustaining
their toil by necessary food, and had no security for personal rights.
The natural tendency of slavery is, to convert the master into a
tyrant, and the slave into the cringing, treacherous, false, and
thieving victim of tyranny. R. and his slaves were no exception to the
general rule, but might be cited as apt illustrations of the nature of
the case.

My earliest employments were, to carry buckets of water to the men
at work, to hold a horse-plough, used for weeding between the rows
of corn, and as I grew older and taller, to take care of master’s
saddle-horse. Then a hoe was put into my hands, and I was soon required
to do the day’s work of a man; and it was not long before I could do
it, at least as well as my associates in misery.

The every-day life of a slave on one of our southern plantations,
however frequently it may have been described, is generally little
known at the North; and must be mentioned as a necessary illustration
of the character and habits of the slave and the slave-holder, created
and perpetuated by their relative position. The principal food of
those upon my master’s plantation consisted of corn meal, and salt
herrings; to which was added in summer a little buttermilk, and the
few vegetables which each might raise for himself and his family, on
the little piece of ground which was assigned to him for the purpose,
called a truck patch. The meals were two, daily. The first, or
breakfast, was taken at 12 o’clock, after laboring from daylight; and
the other when the work of the remainder of the day was over. The only
dress was of tow cloth, which for the young, and often even for those
who had passed the period of childhood, consisted of a single garment,
something like a shirt, but longer, reaching to the ancles; and for
the older, a pair of pantaloons, or a gown, according to the sex; while
some kind of round jacket, or overcoat, might be added in winter, a
wool hat once in two or three years, for the males, and a pair of
coarse shoes once a year. Our lodging was in log huts, of a single
small room, with no other floor than the trodden earth, in which ten or
a dozen persons--men, women, and children--might sleep, but which could
not protect them from dampness and cold, nor permit the existence of
the common decencies of life. There were neither beds, nor furniture of
any description--a blanket being the only addition to the dress of the
day for protection from the chillness of the air or the earth. In these
hovels were we penned at night, and fed by day; here were the children
born, and the sick--neglected. Such were the provisions for the daily
toil of the slave.

Notwithstanding this system of management, however, I grew to be a
robust and vigorous lad, and at fifteen years of age, there were few
who could compete with me in work, or in sport--for not even the
condition of a slave can altogether repress the animal spirits of
the young negro. I was competent to all the work that was done upon
the farm, and could run faster and farther, wrestle longer, and jump
higher, than anybody about me. My master and my fellow slaves used
to look upon me, and speak of me, as a wonderfully smart fellow, and
prophecy the great things I should do when I became a man. A casual
word of this sort, sometimes overheard, would fill me with a pride
and ambition which some would think impossible in a negro slave,
degraded, starved, and abused as I was, and had been, from my earliest
recollection. But the love of superiority is not confined to kings and
emperors; and it is a positive fact, that pride and ambition were as
active in my soul as probably they ever were in that of the greatest
soldier or statesman. The objects I pursued, I must admit, were not
just the same as theirs. Mine were to be first in the field, whether
we were hoeing, mowing, or reaping; to surpass those of my own age, or
indeed any age, in athletic exercises; and to obtain, if possible, the
favorable regard of the petty despot who ruled over us. This last was
an exercise of the understanding, rather than of the affections; and I
was guided in it more by what I supposed would be effectual, than by a
nice judgment of the propriety of the means I used.

I obtained great influence with my companions, as well by the
superiority I showed in labor and in sport, as by the assistance I
yielded them, and the favors I conferred upon them, from impulses which
I cannot consider as wrong, though it was necessary for me to conceal
sometimes the act as well as its motive. I have toiled, and induced
others to toil, many an extra hour, in order to show my master what an
excellent day’s work had been accomplished, and to win a kind word, or
a benevolent deed from his callous heart. In general, indifference, or
a cool calculation of my value to him, were my reward, chilling those
hopes of an improvement in my condition, which was the ultimate object
of my efforts. I was much more easily moved to compassion and sympathy
than he was; and one of the means I took to gain the good-will of my
fellow sufferers, was by taking from him some things that he did not
give, in part payment of my extra labor. The condition of the male
slave is bad enough, Heaven knows; but that of the female, compelled
to perform unfit labor, sick, suffering, and bearing the burdens of
her own sex unpitied and unaided, as well as the toils which belong
to the other, has often oppressed me with a load of sympathy. And
sometimes, when I have seen them starved, and miserable, and unable to
help themselves, I have helped them to some of the comforts which they
were denied by him who owned them, and which my companions had not the
wit or the daring to procure. Meat was not a part of our regular food;
but my master had plenty of sheep and pigs, and sometimes I have picked
out the best one I could find in the flock, or the drove, carried it a
mile or two into the woods, slaughtered it, cut it up, and distributed
it among the poor creatures, to whom it was at once food, luxury,
and medicine. Was this wrong? I can only say that, at this distance
of time, my conscience does not reproach me for it, and that then I
esteemed it among the best of my deeds.

By means of the influence thus acquired, the increased amount of
work done upon the farm, and by the detection of the knavery of the
overseer, who plundered his employer for more selfish ends, and through
my watchfulness was caught in the act and dismissed, I was promoted
to be superintendent of the farm work, and managed to raise more than
double the crops, with more cheerful and willing labor, than was ever
seen on the estate before.

Previous to my attaining this important station, however, an incident
occurred of so powerful an influence on my intellectual development,
my prospect of improvement in character, as well as condition, my
chance of religious culture, and in short, on my whole nature, body and
soul, that it deserves especial notice and commemoration. There was a
person living at Georgetown, a few miles only from R.’s plantation,
whose business was that of a baker, and whose character was that of an
upright, benevolent, Christian man. He was noted especially for his
detestation of slavery, and his resolute avoidance of the employment
of slave labor in his business. He would not even hire a slave, the
price of whose toil must be paid to his master, but contented himself
with the work of his own hands, and with such free labor as he could
procure. His reputation was high, not only for this almost singular
abstinence from what no one about him thought wrong, but for his
general probity and excellence. This man occasionally served as a
minister of the Gospel, and preached in a neighborhood where preachers
were somewhat rare at that period. One Sunday when he was to officiate
in this way, at a place three or four miles distant, my mother
persuaded me to ask master’s leave to go and hear him; and although
such permission was not given freely or often, yet his favor to me
was shown for this once by allowing me to go, without much scolding,
but not without a pretty distinct intimation of what would befall me,
if I did not return immediately after the close of the service. I
hurried off, pleased with the opportunity, but without any definite
expectations of benefit or amusement; for up to this period of my life,
and I was then eighteen years old, I had never heard a sermon, nor
any discourse or conversation whatever, upon religious topics, except
what had been impressed upon me by my mother, of the responsibility of
all to a Supreme Being. When I arrived at the place of meeting, the
services were so far advanced that the speaker was just beginning his
discourse, from the text, Hebrews ii. 9; “That he, by the grace of
God, should taste of death for every man.” This was the first text of
the Bible to which I had ever listened, knowing it to be such. I have
never forgotten it, and scarce a day has passed since, in which I have
not recalled it, and the sermon that was preached from it. The divine
character of Jesus Christ, his life and teachings, his sacrifice of
himself for others, his death and resurrection were all alluded to, and
some of the points were dwelt upon with great power,--great, at least,
to me, who heard of these things for the first time in my life. I was
wonderfully impressed, too, with the use which the preacher made of the
last words of the text, “_for every man_.” He said the death of Christ
was not designed for the benefit of a select few only, but for the
salvation of the world, for the bond as well as the free; and he dwelt
on the glad tidings of the Gospel to the poor, the persecuted, and the
distressed, its deliverance to the captive, and the liberty wherewith
Christ has made us free, till my heart burned within me, and I was in
a state of the greatest excitement at the thought that such a being as
Jesus Christ had been described should have died for me--for _me_ among
the rest, a poor, despised, abused slave, who was thought by his fellow
creatures fit for nothing but unrequited toil and ignorance, for mental
and bodily degradation. I immediately determined to find out something
more about “Christ and him crucified;” and revolving the things which I
had heard in my mind as I went home, I became so excited that I turned
aside from the road into the woods, and prayed to God for light and for
aid with an earnestness, which, however unenlightened, was at least
sincere and heartfelt; and which the subsequent course of my life has
led me to imagine might not have been unacceptable to Him who heareth
prayer. At all events, I date my conversion, and my awakening to a new
life--a consciousness of superior powers and destiny to any thing I had
before conceived of--from this day, so memorable to me. I used every
means and opportunity of inquiry into religious matters; and so deep
was my conviction of their superior importance to every thing else, so
clear my perception of my own faults, and so undoubting my observation
of the darkness and sin that surrounded me, that I could not help
talking much on these subjects with those about me; and it was not long
before I began to pray with them, and exhort them, and to impart to
the poor slaves those little glimmerings of light from another world,
which had reached my own eye. In a few years I became quite an esteemed
preacher among them, and I will not believe it is vanity which leads me
to think I was useful to some.

I must return, however, for the present, to the course of my life
in secular affairs, the facts of which it is my principal object to
relate. The difference between the manner in which it was designed that
all men should regard one another, as children of the same Father, and
the manner in which men actually do treat each other, as if they were
placed here for mutual annoyance and destruction, is well exemplified
by an incident that happened to me within a year or two from this
period, that is, when I was nineteen or twenty years old. My master’s
habits were such as were common enough among the dissipated planters of
the neighborhood; and one of their frequent practices was, to assemble
on Saturday or Sunday, which were their holidays, and gamble, run
horses, or fight game-cocks, discuss politics, and drink whiskey, and
brandy and water, all day long. Perfectly aware that they would not be
able to find their own way home at night, each one ordered a slave, his
particular attendant, to come after him and help him home. I was chosen
for this confidential duty by my master; and many is the time I have
held him on his horse, when he could not hold himself in the saddle,
and walked by his side in darkness and mud from the tavern to his
house. Of course, quarrels and brawls of the most violent description
were frequent consequences of these meetings, and whenever they became
especially dangerous, and glasses were thrown, dirks drawn, and pistols
fired, it was the duty of the slaves to rush in, and each one was to
drag his master from the fight, and carry him home. To tell the truth,
this was a part of my business for which I felt no reluctance. I was
young, remarkably athletic and self-relying, and in such affrays I
carried it with a high hand, and would elbow my way among the whites,
whom it would have been almost death for me to strike, seize my master,
and drag him out, mount him on his horse, or crowd him into his buggy,
with the ease with which I would handle a bag of corn, and at the same
time with the pride of conscious superiority, and the kindness inspired
by performing an act of benevolence. I knew I was doing for him what
he could not do for himself, and showing my superiority to others, and
acquiring their respect in some degree, at the same time.

On one of these occasions, my master got into a quarrel with his
brother’s overseer, who was one of the party, and in rescuing the
former, I suppose I was a little more rough with the latter than
usual. I remember his falling upon the floor, and very likely it was
from the effects of a push from me, or a movement of my elbow. He
attributed his fall to me, rather than to the whiskey he had drunk,
and treasured up his vengeance for the first favorable opportunity.
About a week afterwards, I was sent by my master to a place a few miles
distant, on horseback, with some letters. I took a short cut through
a lane, separated by gates from the high road, and bounded by a fence
on each side. This lane passed through some of the farm owned by my
master’s brother, and his overseer was in the adjoining field, with
three negroes, when I went by. On my return, a half an hour afterwards,
the overseer was sitting on the fence; but I could see nothing of the
black fellows. I rode on, utterly unsuspicious of any trouble, but as
I approached, he jumped off the fence, and at the same moment two
of the negroes sprung up from under the bushes, where they had been
concealed, and stood with him, immediately in front of me; while the
third sprang over the fence just behind me. I was thus enclosed between
what I could no longer doubt were hostile forces. The overseer seized
my horse’s bridle, and ordered me to alight, in the usual elegant
phraseology used by such men to slaves. I asked what I was to alight
for. “To take the cursedest flogging you ever had in your life, you
d---d black scoundrel.” “But what am I to be flogged for, Mr. L.,” I
asked. “Not a word,” said he, “but ’light at once, and take off your
jacket.” I saw there was nothing else to be done, and slipped off the
horse on the opposite side from him. “Now take off your shirt,” cried
he; and as I demurred at this, he lifted a stick he had in his hand to
strike me, but so suddenly and violently, that he frightened the horse,
which broke away from him, and ran home. I was thus left without means
of escape, to sustain the attacks of four men, as well as I might. In
avoiding Mr. L.’s blow, I had accidentally got into a corner of the
fence, where I could not be approached except in front. The overseer
called upon the negroes to seize me; but they, knowing something of
my physical power, were rather slow to obey. At length they did their
best, and as they brought themselves within my reach, I knocked them
down successively; and one of them trying to trip up my feet when
he was down, I gave him a kick with my heavy shoe, which knocked out
several of his front teeth, and sent him groaning away. Meanwhile,
the cowardly overseer was availing himself of every opportunity to
hit me over the head with his stick, which was not heavy enough to
knock me down, though it drew blood freely. At length, tired of the
length of the affray, he seized a stake, six or seven feet long, from
the fence, and struck at me with his whole strength. In attempting to
ward off the blow, my right arm was broken, and I was brought to the
ground; where repeated blows broke both my shoulder blades, and made
the blood gush from my mouth copiously. The two blacks begged him not
to murder me, and he just left me as I was, telling me to learn what
it was to strike a white man. The alarm had been raised at the house,
by seeing the horse come back without his rider, and it was not long
before assistance arrived to convey me home. It may be supposed it
was not done without some suffering on my part; as, besides my broken
arm and the wounds on my head, I could feel and hear the pieces of
my shoulder-blades grate against each other with every breath. No
physician or surgeon was called to dress my wounds, and I never knew
one to be called to a slave upon R.’s estate, on any occasion whatever,
and have no knowledge of such a thing being done on any estate in the
neighborhood. I was attended, if it may be called attendance, by my
master’s sister, who had some reputation in such affairs; and she
splintered my arm, and bound up my back as well as she knew how, and
nature did the rest. It was five months before I could work at all, and
the first time I tried to plough, a hard knock of the colter against
a stone, shattered my shoulder-blades again, and gave me even greater
agony than at first. I have been unable to raise my hands to my head
from that day to this. My master prosecuted Mr. L. for abusing and
maiming his slave; and when the case was tried before the magistrate,
he made a statement of the facts as I have here related them. When Mr.
L. was called upon to say why he should not be fined for the offence,
he simply stated, without being put on oath, that he had acted in
self-defence; that I had assaulted him; and that nothing had saved him
from being killed on the spot by so stout a fellow, but the fortunate
circumstance that his three negroes were within call. The result was,
that my master paid all the costs of court. He had the satisfaction of
calling Mr. L. a liar and scoundrel, and, afterwards, of beating him in
a very thorough manner, for which he had also to pay a fine and costs.

My situation, as overseer, I retained, together with the especial favor
of my master, who was not displeased either with saving the expense of
a large salary for a white superintendent, or with the superior crops
I was able to raise for him. I will not deny that I used his property
more freely than he would have done himself, in supplying his people
with better food; but if I cheated him in this way, in small matters,
it was unequivocally for his own benefit in more important ones; and
I accounted, with the strictest honesty, for every dollar I received
in the sale of the property entrusted to me. Gradually the disposal of
every thing raised on the farm, the wheat, oats, hay, fruit, butter,
and whatever else there might be, was confided to me, as it was quite
evident that I could, and did sell for better prices than any one else
he could employ, and he was quite incompetent to attend to the business
himself. For many years I was his factotum, and supplied him with all
his means for all his purposes, whether they were good or bad. I had
no reason to think highly of his moral character, but it was my duty
to be faithful to him, in the position in which he placed me; and I
can boldly declare, before God and man, that I was so. I forgave him
the causeless blows and injuries he had inflicted on me in childhood
and youth, and was proud of the favor he now showed me, and of the
character and reputation I had earned by strenuous and persevering
efforts.

When I was about twenty-two years of age, I married a very efficient,
and, for a slave, a very well-taught girl, belonging to a neighboring
family, reputed to be pious and kind, whom I first met at the chapel
I attended; and during nearly forty years that have since elapsed, I
have had no reason to regret the connection, but many, to rejoice in
it, and be grateful for it. She has borne me twelve children, eight of
whom survive, and promise to be the comfort of my declining years.

Things remained in this condition for a considerable period; my
occupations being to superintend the farming operations, and to sell
the produce in the neighboring markets of Washington and Georgetown.
Many respectable people, yet living there, may possibly have some
recollection of “’Siah,” or “Si,” (as they used to call me,) as their
market-man; but if they have forgotten me, I remember them with an
honest satisfaction.

After passing his youth in the manner I have mentioned in a general
way, and which I do not wish more particularly to describe, my master,
at the age of forty-five, or upwards, married a young woman of
eighteen, who had some little property, and more thrift. Her economy
was remarkable, and was certainly no addition to the comfort of the
establishment. She had a younger brother, Francis, to whom R. was
appointed guardian, and who used to complain--not without reason, I am
confident--of the meanness of the provision made for the household; and
he would often come to me, with tears in his eyes, to tell me he could
not get enough to eat. I made him my friend for life, by sympathizing
in his emotions, and satisfying his appetite, sharing with him the food
I took care to provide for my own family.

After a time, however, continual dissipation was more than a match for
domestic saving. My master fell into difficulty, and from difficulty
into a lawsuit with a brother-in-law, who charged him with dishonest
mismanagement of property confided to him in trust. The lawsuit was
protracted enough to cause his ruin, of itself. He used every resource
to stave off the inevitable result, but at length saw no means of
relief but removal to another State. He often came to my cabin to
pass the evening in lamentations over his misfortune, in cursing his
brother-in-law, and in asking my advice and assistance. The first
time he ever intimated to me his ultimate project, he said he was
ruined, that every thing was gone, that there was but one resource,
and that depended upon me. “How can that be, master?” said I, in
astonishment. Before he would explain himself, however, he begged me
to promise to do what he should propose, well knowing, from his past
experience of my character, that I should hold myself bound by such
promise to do all that it implied, if it were within the limits of
possibility. Solicited in this way, with urgency and tears, by the man
whom I had so zealously served for twenty years, and who now seemed
absolutely dependent upon his slave,--impelled, too, by the fear which
he skilfully awakened, that the sheriff would seize every one who
belonged to him, and that all would be separated, or perhaps sold to go
to Georgia, or Louisiana--an object of perpetual dread to the slave
of the more northern States--I consented, and promised faithfully to
do all I could to save him from the fate impending over him. He then
told me I must take his slaves to his brother, in Kentucky. In vain
I represented to him that I had never travelled a day’s journey from
his plantation, and knew nothing of the way, or the means of getting
to Kentucky. He insisted that such a smart fellow as I could travel
anywhere, he promised to give me all necessary instructions, and urged
that this was the only course by which he could be saved. The result
was, that I agreed to undertake the enterprise--certainly no light one
for me, as it could scarcely be considered for even an experienced
manager. There were eighteen negroes, besides my wife, two children,
and myself, to transport nearly a thousand miles, through a country I
knew nothing about, and in winter time, for we started in the month
of February, 1825. My master proposed to follow me in a few months,
and establish himself in Kentucky. He furnished me with a small sum of
money, and some provisions; and I bought a one-horse wagon, to carry
them, and to give the women and children a lift now and then, and the
rest of us were to trudge on foot. Fortunately for the success of the
undertaking, these people had been long under my direction, and were
devotedly attached to me for the many alleviations I had afforded to
their miserable condition, the comforts I had procured them, and the
consideration which I had always manifested for them.

Under these circumstances no difficulty arose from want of submission
to my authority, and none of any sort, except that which I necessarily
encountered from my ignorance of the country, and my inexperience in
such business. On arriving at Wheeling, I sold the horse and wagon, and
purchased a boat of sufficient size, and floated down the river without
further trouble or fatigue, stopping every night to encamp.

I said I had no further trouble, but there was one source of anxiety
which I was compelled to encounter, and a temptation I had to resist,
the strength of which others can appreciate as well as myself. In
passing along the State of Ohio, we were frequently told that we were
free, if we chose to be so. At Cincinnati, especially, the colored
people gathered round us, and urged us with much importunity to remain
with them; told us it was folly to go on; and in short used all the
arguments now so familiar to induce slaves to quit their masters.
My companions probably had little perception of the nature of the
boon that was offered to them, and were willing to do just as I told
them, without a wish to judge for themselves. Not so with me. From my
earliest recollection, freedom had been the object of my ambition, a
constant motive to exertion, an ever-present stimulus to gain and to
save. No other means of obtaining it, however, had occurred to me, but
purchasing myself of my master. The idea of running away was not one
that I had ever indulged. I had a sentiment of honor on the subject, or
what I thought such, which I would not have violated even for freedom;
and every cent which I had ever felt entitled to call my own, had been
treasured up for this great purpose, till I had accumulated between
thirty and forty dollars. Now was offered to me an opportunity I had
not anticipated. I might liberate my family, my companions, and myself,
without the smallest risk, and without injustice to any individual,
except one whom we had none of us any reason to love, who had been
guilty of cruelty and oppression to us all for many years, and who had
never shown the smallest symptom of sympathy with us, or with any one
in our condition. But I need not make the exception. There would have
been no injustice to R. himself--it would have been a retribution which
might be called righteous--if I had availed myself of the opportunity
thus thrust suddenly upon me.

But it was a punishment which it was not for me to inflict. I had
promised that man to take his property to Kentucky, and deposit it
with his brother; and this, and this only, I resolved to do. I left
Cincinnati before night, though I had intended to remain there,
and encamped with my entire party a few miles below the city. What
advantages I may have lost, by thus throwing away an opportunity of
obtaining freedom, I know not; but the perception of my own strength
of character, the feeling of integrity, the sentiment of high honor, I
have experienced.--these advantages I do know, and prize; and would not
lose them, nor the recollection of having attained them, for all that
I can imagine to have resulted from an earlier release from bondage.
I have often had painful doubts as to the propriety of my carrying so
many other individuals into slavery again, and my consoling reflection
has been, that I acted as I thought at the time was best.

I arrived at Daviess county, Kentucky, about the middle of April,
1825, and delivered myself and my companions to Mr. Amos R., the
brother of my owner, who had a large plantation, with from eighty to
one hundred negroes. His house was situated about five miles south
of the Ohio River, and fifteen miles above the Yellow Banks, on Big
Blackford’s Creek. There I remained three years, expecting my master
to follow; and employed meantime on the farm, of which I had the
general management, in consequence of the recommendation for ability
and honesty which I brought with me from Maryland. The situation was
in many respects more comfortable than that I had left. The farm was
larger, and more fertile, and there was a greater abundance of food,
which is, of course, one of the principal sources of the comfort of
a slave, debarred, as he is, from so many enjoyments which other
men can obtain. Sufficiency of food is a pretty important item in
any man’s account of life; but is tenfold more so in that of the
slave, whose appetite is always stimulated by as much labor as he can
perform, and whose mind is little occupied by thought on subjects of
deeper interest. My post of superintendent gave me some advantages,
too, of which I did not fail to avail myself, particularly with
regard to those religious privileges, which, since I first heard of
Christ and Christianity, had greatly occupied my mind. In Kentucky,
the opportunities of attending on the preaching of whites, as well
as of blacks, were more numerous; and partly by attending them, and
the camp-meetings which occurred from time to time, and partly from
studying carefully my own heart, and observing the developments of
character around me, in all the stations of life which I could watch, I
became better acquainted with those religious feelings which are deeply
implanted in the breast of every human being, and learnt by practice
how best to arouse them, and keep them excited, how to stir up the
callous and indifferent, and in general to produce some good religious
impressions on the ignorant and thoughtless community by which I was
surrounded.

No great amount of theological knowledge is requisite for the purpose.
If it had been, it is manifest enough that preaching never could have
been my vocation; but I am persuaded that, speaking from the fulness of
a heart deeply impressed with its own sinfulness and imperfection, and
with the mercy of God, in Christ Jesus, my humble ministrations have
not been entirely useless to those who have had less opportunity than
myself to reflect upon these all-important subjects. It is certain that
I could not refrain from the endeavor to do what I saw others doing in
this field; and I labored at once to improve myself and those about
me in the cultivation of the harvests which ripen only in eternity. I
cannot but derive some satisfaction, too, from the proofs I have had
that my services have been acceptable to those to whom they have been
rendered. In the course of the three years from 1825 to 1828, I availed
myself of all the opportunities of improvement which occurred, and
was admitted as a preacher by a Conference of the Methodist Episcopal
Church.

In the spring of the year 1828, news arrived from my master that he
was unable to induce his wife to accompany him to Kentucky, and he
must therefore remain where he was. He sent out an agent to sell
all his slaves but me and my family, and to carry back the proceeds
to him. And now another of those heart-rending scenes was to be
witnessed, which had impressed itself so deeply on my childish soul.
Husbands and wives, parents and children were to be separated forever.
Affections, which are as strong in the African as in the European
were to be cruelly disregarded; and the iron selfishness generated by
the hateful “institution” was to be exhibited in its most odious and
naked deformity. I was exempted from a personal share in the dreadful
calamity, but I could not see without the deepest grief the agony which
I recollected in my own mother, and which was again brought before my
eyes in the persons with whom I had been long associated; nor could I
refrain from the bitterest feeling of hatred of the system and those
who sustain it. What else, indeed, can be the feeling of the slave,
liable at every moment of his life to these frightful and unnecessary
calamities, which may be caused by the caprice of the abandoned, or
the supposed necessities of the better part of the slaveholders, and
inflicted upon him without sympathy or redress, under the sanction of
the laws which uphold the institution? I lamented my agency in bringing
the poor creatures hither, if such was to be the end of the expedition;
but I could not reproach myself with having made their condition
really worse, nor with any thing but complying with the commands of a
heartless master.

In the course of the summer of 1828, a Methodist preacher, a white man
of some reputation, visited our neighborhood, and I became acquainted
with him. He was soon interested in me, and visited me frequently, and
one day talked to me in a confidential manner about my position. He
said I ought to be free; that I had too much capacity to be confined to
the limited and comparatively useless sphere of a slave; “and though,”
said he, “I must not be known to have spoken to you on this subject,
yet if you will obtain Mr. Amos’s consent to go to see your old master
in Maryland, I will try and put you in a way by which I think you may
succeed in buying yourself.” He said this to me more than once; and as
it was in harmony with all my aspirations and wishes, was flattering
to my self-esteem, and could be attended with no harm that I could
foresee, I soon resolved to make the attempt to get the necessary
leave. Somewhat to my surprise, Master Amos made no objection; but
gave me a pass to go to Maryland and back, with some remarks which
showed his sense of the value of my services to him, and his opinion
that I had earned such a privilege if I desired it. Furnished with
this, and with a letter of recommendation from my Methodist friend
to a brother preacher in Cincinnati, I started about the middle of
September, 1828, for the east. By the aid of the good man to whom I
had a letter, I had an opportunity of preaching in two or three of
the pulpits of Cincinnati, when I took the opportunity of stating my
purpose, and was liberally aided in it by contributions made on the
spot. My friend also procured some subscriptions in the city, so that
in three or four days I left it with not less than one hundred and
sixty dollars in my pocket. The annual Methodist Conference was about
to be held at Chillicothe, to which my kind friend accompanied me, and
by his influence and exertions I succeeded well there also. By his
advice I then purchased a suit of respectable clothes, and an excellent
horse, and travelled leisurely from town to town, preaching as I went,
and, wherever circumstances were favorable, soliciting aid in my
great object. I succeeded so well, that when I arrived at Montgomery
county, I was master of two hundred and seventy-five dollars, besides
my horse and my clothes. My master was surprised to see me dressed
and mounted in so respectable a style, and I must say my horse was a
good one, and my clothes better than Mr. R.’s; and he was a little
puzzled to understand why I was so long in reaching home, for it was
now Christmas, and he had been informed that I had left Kentucky in
September. I gave him such an account of my preaching and getting the
assistance of friends, as, while it was consistent with the truth, and
explained my appearance, did not betray to him my principal purpose.
Amid expressions of an apparently cordial welcome, I could discern
plainly enough the look of displeasure that a slave should have got
possession of such luxuries; and he bantered me not a little, in his
coarse way, upon my preaching, and my being so speedily converted
into a “black gentleman.” He asked for my pass, and saw that it was
expressed so as to authorize my return to Kentucky. He then handed it
to his wife, and desired her to put it into the desk. The manœuvre was
cool, but I resolved to manœuvre too.

At night I was sent to such quarters as I had been accustomed to
long enough,--the cabin used for a kitchen, with its earth floor,
its filth, and its numerous occupants;--but it was so different from
my accommodations in the free States for the last three months, and
so incompatible with my nice wardrobe, that I looked round me with a
sensation of disgust that was new to me; and instead of going to sleep,
I sat down and deliberated upon the best plan to adopt for my next
proceedings. I found my mother had died during my absence, and every
tie which had ever connected me with this place was broken. Strangers
were around me here, the slaves being those Mrs. R. had brought to
her husband, and I had not a friend to consult but Master Frank, the
brother of R.’s wife, before mentioned, who was now of age, and had
established himself in business in Washington. To him I resolved to
go, and as soon as I thought it time to start, I saddled my horse and
rode up to the house. It was early in the morning, and my master had
already gone to the tavern on his usual business, but Mrs. R. came out
to look at my horse and equipments. “Where are you going, ’Siah?” was
the natural question. I replied, “I am going to Washington, Mistress,
to see Mr. Frank, and I must take my pass with me if you please.” “O,
everybody knows you here; you won’t need your pass.” “But I can’t go to
Washington without it. I may be met by some surly stranger, who will
stop me and plague me, if he can’t do any thing worse.” “Well, I’ll get
it for you,” she answered; and glad was I to see her return with it in
her hand, and to have her give it to me, while she little imagined its
importance to my plan.

My reception by Master Frank was all I expected, as kind and hearty as
possible. He was delighted at my appearance, and I immediately told
him all my plans and hopes. He entered cordially into them, with that
sympathy which penetrates the heart of a slave, as little accustomed
as I had been, to the exhibition of any such feeling on the part of a
white man. I found he had a thorough detestation of Mr. R., whom he
charged with having defrauded him of a large proportion of his property
which he had held as guardian, though, as he was still on terms with
him, he readily agreed to negotiate for my freedom, and bring him to
the most favorable bargain. Accordingly, in a few days he rode over to
the house, and had a long conversation with R. on the subject of my
emancipation. He disclosed to him the facts that I had got some money,
and _my pass_, and urged that I was a smart fellow, who was bent upon
getting his freedom, and had served the family faithfully for many
years; that I had really paid for myself a hundred times over, in the
increased amount of produce I had raised by my skill and influence; and
that if he did not take care, and accept a fair offer when I made it
to him, he would find some day that I had the means to do without his
help, and that he would see neither me nor my money; that with my horse
and my pass I was pretty independent of him already, and he had better
make up his mind to what was really inevitable, and do it with a good
grace. By such arguments as these, Mr. Frank not only induced him to
think of the thing, but before long brought him to an actual bargain,
by which he agreed to give me my manumission papers for four hundred
and fifty dollars, of which three hundred and fifty dollars were to be
in cash, and the remainder in my note. My money and my horse enabled me
to pay the cash at once, and thus my great hopes seemed in a fair way
of being realized.

Some time was spent in the negotiations for this affair, and it was
not till the 9th of March, 1829, that I received my manumission papers
in due form of law. I was prepared to start immediately on my return
to Kentucky, and on the 10th, as I was getting ready in the morning
for my journey, my master accosted me in a very pleasant and friendly
manner, and entered into conversation with me about my plans. He asked
me what I was going to do with my freedom certificate; whether I was
going to show it if I were questioned on the road. I told him yes,
that I supposed it was given to me for that very purpose. “Ah,” said
he, “you do not understand the dangers to which you are exposed. You
may meet with some ruffian slave-purchaser who will rob you of that
piece of paper, and destroy it. You will then be thrown into prison,
and sold for your jail fees, before any of your friends can know it.
Why should you show it at all? You can go to Kentucky in perfect safety
with your pass. Let me enclose that valuable document for you under
cover to my brother, and nobody will dare to break a seal, for that
is a State prison matter; and when you arrive in Kentucky you will
have it all safe and sound.” This seemed most friendly advice, and I
felt very grateful for his kindness. I accordingly saw him enclose
my precious piece of paper in two or three envelopes, seal it with
three seals, and direct it to his brother in Daviess County, Kentucky,
in my care. Leaving immediately for Wheeling, to which place I was
obliged to travel on foot, I there took boat, and in due time reached
my destination. I was arrested repeatedly on the way, but by insisting
always upon being carried before a magistrate, I succeeded in escaping
all serious impediments by means of my pass, which was quite regular,
and could not be set aside by any responsible authority.

It so happened that the boat which took me down from Louisville, landed
me about dark, and my walk of five miles brought me to the plantation
at bed-time. I went directly to my own cabin, where I found my wife and
little ones well; and of course, we had a good deal to communicate to
each other. Letters had reached the “great house,” as the master’s was
always called, long before I had arrived, telling them what I had been
doing, and the children of the family had been eager to communicate
the great news to my wife,--how I had been preaching, and raising
money, and making a bargain for my freedom. It was not long before
Charlotte began to tell me with much excitement what she had heard, and
to question me about how I had raised the money I had paid, and how I
expected to get the remainder of the _thousand dollars_ I was to give
for my freedom. I could scarcely believe my ears; but before telling
her how the case exactly was, I questioned her again and again as to
what she had heard. She persisted in repeating the same story as she
had heard it from my master’s letters, and I began to perceive the
trick that had been played upon me, and to see the management by which
Isaac R. had contrived that the only evidence of my freedom should be
kept from every eye but that of his brother Amos, who was instructed
to retain it till I had made up six hundred and fifty dollars, the
balance I was reported to have agreed to pay. Indignation is a faint
word to express my deep sense of such villainy. I was without the means
of setting myself right. The only witness to the truth was my friend
Frank, who was a thousand miles off; and I could neither write to him,
nor get any one else to do it. Every man about me who could write was a
slaveholder; and what chance had I to be believed, or to get evidence
to the truth. In this dilemma I resolved not to deliver the paper to
Amos, and told my wife I had not seen it since I was in Louisville. It
might be in my bag, and perhaps it was lost; but at all events I did
not wish to see it again at present; and if she should find it, and put
it in some place which I did not know, it would be the best disposition
of it. In a few minutes she went out, and I remained in ignorance where
it was, till circumstances, presently to be mentioned, rendered it
necessary for me to have it again.

The next morning I went up to the house, and showed myself to Mr. Amos,
who welcomed me with apparent cordiality, and who, I have no doubt,
was really glad to see me, as my time and labor were important to him.
We had a long conversation, and after rallying me, as his brother had
done, about my being turned fine gentleman, he entered upon the subject
of my freedom, and told me what Isaac had written to him about the
price I was to pay, how much I had already made up, &c. I found my wife
was right. He then asked me if I had not a paper for him. I told him
I certainly had received something for him, of which I had taken the
greatest care; but that the last time I had seen it was at Louisville,
and that now it was not in my bag, and I did not know what had become
of it. I could not conceive how it could be lost, and yet I could not
find it. He expressed great concern, and sent me back to the landing to
see if it had been dropped on the way. When the search proved in vain,
he told me that, after all, it was of no consequence, for whenever I
made up the money, his brother would renew the paper. “But,” said he,
“you have given too much for yourself. Isaac has been too hard upon
you, and I don’t see how you are going to get so much in Kentucky.”

All this was very smooth and pleasant to a man who was in a frenzy
of grief at the base and apparently irremediable trick that had been
played upon him. I consoled myself as well as I could, and set about
my work again, with as quiet a mind as I could command, resolved to
trust in God, and never despair. Things went on as usual for about a
year, when, one day, Mr. Amos told me that his brother kept writing
to him about his want of money; and intimated that perhaps I might be
ready to pay another instalment of my price. I told him I had nothing,
as he knew very well, and that he never had said what he would allow
me, or whether he would allow me anything for my labor in his service.
That put an end to the conversation at the time, for he did not like
the idea of paying for the labor I had bestowed on his farm, the care
of his stock and of his people. It was not long, however, before the
subject was brought up again, and he said Isaac was perpetually telling
him he must have money, and added that I must get ready to go to New
Orleans with his son Amos, a young man about twenty-one years of age,
who was going down the river with a flat boat, and was nearly ready
to start; in fact he was to leave the next day, and I must go and take
care of him, and help him dispose of the cargo. The intimation was
enough. Though it was not distinctly stated, yet I well knew what was
intended, and my heart sunk within me at the near prospect of this
fatal blight to all my long-cherished hopes. There was no alternative
but death itself; and I thought that there was hope as long as there
was life, and I would not despair even yet. The expectation of my fate,
however, produced the degree of misery nearest to that of despair;
and it is in vain for me to attempt to describe the wretchedness I
experienced as I made ready to go on board the flat boat. I had little
preparation to make, to be sure; and there was but one thing that
seemed to me important. I asked my wife to sew up my manumission paper
securely in a piece of cloth, and to sew that again round my person. I
thought that having possession of it might be the means of saving me
yet, and I would not neglect any thing that offered the smallest chance
of escape from the frightful servitude that threatened me.

My wife and children accompanied me to the landing, where I bade
them an adieu, which might be for life, and then stepped into the
boat, which I found manned by three white men, who had been hired for
the trip. Mr. Amos and myself were the only other persons on board.
The load consisted of beef-cattle, pigs, poultry, corn, whiskey,
and other articles from the farm, and from some of the neighboring
estates, which were to be sold as we dropped down the river, wherever
they could be disposed of to the greatest advantage. It was a common
trading voyage to New Orleans, in which I was embarked, the interest
of which consisted not in the incidents that occurred, not in storms,
or shipwreck, or external disaster of any sort; but in the storm of
passions contending within me, and the imminent risk of the shipwreck
of my soul, which was impending over me nearly the whole period of the
voyage. One circumstance, only, I will mention, illustrating, as other
events of my life have often done, the counsel of the Saviour, “He that
will be chief among you, let him be your servant.”

We were, of course, all bound to take our trick at the helm in turn,
sometimes under direction of the captain, and sometimes on our own
responsibility, as he could not be always awake. In the daytime there
was less difficulty than at night, when it required some one who knew
the river, to avoid sand-bars and snags, and the captain was the only
person on board who had this knowledge. But whether by day or by night,
as I was the only negro on the boat, I was made to stand at least three
tricks to any other person’s one; so that from being much with the
captain, and frequently thrown upon my own exertions, I learnt the art
of steering and managing the boat far better than the rest. I watched
the manœuvres necessary to shoot by a sawyer, to land on a bank, or
avoid a snag, or a steamboat, in the rapid current of the Mississippi,
till I could do it as well as the captain. After a while the captain
had a disease of the eyes, by which they became very much inflamed and
swollen. He was soon rendered totally blind, and unable to perform
his share of duty. This disorder is not an infrequent consequence of
exposure to the intense light of the sun, doubled as it is by the
reflection from the river. I was the person who could best take his
place, and I was, in fact, master of the boat from that time till our
arrival at New Orleans.

After the captain became blind, we were obliged to lie by at night,
as none of the rest of us had been down the river before; and it was
necessary to keep watch all night, to prevent depredations by the
negroes on shore, who used frequently to attack such boats as ours, for
the sake of the provisions on board. As I paced backwards and forwards
on the deck, during my watch, it may well be believed I revolved many
a painful and passionate thought. After all that I had done for Isaac
and Amos R., after all the regard they professed for me, and the value
they could not but put upon me, such a return as this for my services,
such an evidence of their utter inattention to my claims upon them,
and the intense selfishness with which they were ready to sacrifice
me, at any moment, to their supposed interest, turned my blood to
gall and wormwood, and changed me from a lively, and I will say, a
pleasant-tempered fellow, into a savage, morose, dangerous slave. I was
going not at all as a lamb to the slaughter, but I felt myself becoming
more ferocious every day; and as we approached the place where this
iniquity was to be consummated, I became more and more agitated with
an almost uncontrollable fury. I had met, on the passage, with some
of my Maryland acquaintance who had been sold off to this region; and
their haggard and wasted appearance told a piteous story of excessive
labor and insufficient food. I said to myself, “If this is to be my
lot, I cannot survive it long. I am not so young as these men, and if
it has brought them to such a condition, it will soon kill me. I am to
be taken by my masters and owners, who ought to be my grateful friends,
to a place and a condition where my life is to be shortened, as well as
made more wretched. Why should I not prevent this wrong, if I can, by
shortening their lives, or those of their agents in accomplishing such
detestable injustice? I can do the last easily enough. They have no
suspicion of me, and they are at this moment under my control, and in
my power. There are many ways in which I can despatch them and escape,
and I feel that I should be justified in availing myself of the first
good opportunity.” These were not thoughts which just flitted across
my mind’s eye, and then disappeared. They fashioned themselves into
shapes which grew larger, and seemed firmer, every time they presented
themselves; and at length my mind was made up to convert the phantom
shadow into a positive reality. I resolved to kill my four companions,
take what money there was in the boat, then to scuttle the craft, and
escape to the north. It was a poor plan, may-be, and would very likely
have failed; but it was as well contrived, under the circumstances, as
the plans of murderers usually are; and blinded by passion, and stung
to madness as I was, I could not see any difficulty about it. One dark,
rainy night, within a few days of New Orleans, my hour seemed to have
come. I was alone on the deck; Mr. Amos and the hands were all asleep
below, and I crept down noiselessly, got hold of an axe, entered the
cabin, and looking by the aid of the dim light there for my victims, my
eye fell upon Master Amos, who was nearest to me; my hand slid along
the axe-handle, I raised it to strike the fatal blow,--when suddenly
the thought came to me, “What! commit _murder_! and you a Christian?”
I had not called it murder before. It was self-defence,--it was
preventing others from murdering me,--it was justifiable, it was even
praiseworthy. But now, all at once, the truth burst upon me that it
was a crime. I was going to kill a young man, who had done nothing to
injure me, but obey commands which he could not resist; I was about to
lose the fruit of all my efforts at self-improvement, the character
I had acquired, and the peace of mind which had never deserted me.
Ah this came upon me instantly, and with a distinctness which made
me almost think I heard it whispered in my ear; and I believe I even
turned my head to listen. I shrunk back, laid down the axe, crept up on
deck again, and thanked God, as I have done every day since, that I had
not committed murder.

My feelings were still agitated, but they were changed. I was filled
with shame and remorse for the design I had entertained, and with the
fear that my companions would detect it in my face, or that a careless
word would betray my guilty thoughts. I remained on deck all night,
instead of rousing one of the men to relieve me, and nothing brought
composure to my mind, but the solemn resolution I then made to resign
myself to the will of God, and take with thankfulness, if I could, but
with submission, at all events, whatever he might decide should be my
lot. I reflected that if my life were reduced to a brief term, I should
have less to suffer, and that it was better to die with a Christian’s
hope, and a quiet conscience, than to live with the incessant
recollection of a crime that would destroy the value of life, and under
the weight of a secret that would crush out the satisfaction that might
be expected from freedom and every other blessing.

It was long before I recovered my self-control and serenity; but I
believe no one but those to whom I have told the story myself, ever
suspected me of having entertained such thoughts for a moment.

In a few days after this tremendous crisis we arrived in New Orleans,
and the little that remained of our cargo was soon sold, the men were
discharged, and nothing was left but to dispose of me, and break up
the boat, and then Mr. Amos would take passage on a steamboat, and go
home. There was no longer any disguise about the purpose of selling
me. Mr. Amos acknowledged that such were his instructions, and he set
about fulfilling them. Several planters came to the boat to look at me;
and I was sent of some hasty errand, that they might see how I could
run. My points were canvassed as those of a horse would have been;
and doubtless some account of my human faculties was thrown into the
discussion of the bargain, that my value as a domestic animal might be
enhanced. Amos had talked, with apparent kindness, about getting me a
good master, who would employ me as a coachman, or as a house-servant;
but as time passed on I could discern no particular effort of the kind.
At length every thing was wound up but this single affair. The boat
was to be sold, and I was to be sold, the next day, and Amos was to
set off on his return, at six o’clock in the afternoon. I could not
sleep that night, which seemed long enough to me, though it was one of
the shortest in the year. The slow way in which we had come down had
brought us to the long days and the heat of June; and everybody knows
what the climate of New Orleans is at that time of the year.

A little before daylight master Amos awoke indisposed. His stomach was
disordered, but he lay down again, thinking it would pass off. In a
little while he was up again, and felt more sick than before, and it
was soon evident that the river fever was upon him. He became rapidly
worse, and by eight o’clock in the morning he was utterly prostrate;
his head was on my lap, and he was begging me to help him, to do
something for him, to save him. The tables were turned. He was now
rather more dependent upon me than I had been upon him the day before.
He entreated me to despatch matters, to sell the flat boat, in which
we two had been living by ourselves for some days, and to get him and
his trunk, containing the proceeds of the trip, on board the steamer
as quick as possible, and especially not to desert him so long as he
lived, nor to suffer his body, if he died, to be thrown into the river.
I attended to all his requests, and by twelve o’clock that day, he was
in one of the cabins of the steamer appropriated to sick passengers.

All was done which could be done for the comfort and relief of any
one in such a desperate condition. But he was reduced to extremity.
He ceased to grow worse after a day or two, and he must speedily have
died, if he had not; but his strength was so entirely gone, that he
could neither speak, nor move a limb; and could only indicate his wish
for a teaspoonful of gruel, or something to moisten his throat, by
a feeble motion of his lips. I nursed him carefully and constantly.
Nothing else could have saved his life. It hung by a thread for a long
time. We were as much as twelve days in reaching home, for the water
was low at that season, particularly in the Ohio river; and when we
arrived at our landing he was still unable to speak, and could only be
moved on a sheet, or a litter. Something of this sort was soon fixed
up at the landing, on which he could be carried to the house, which
was five miles off; and I got a party of the slaves belonging to the
estate to form relays for the purpose. As we approached the house, the
surprise at seeing me back again, and the perplexity to imagine what I
was bringing along, with such a party, were extreme; but the discovery
was soon made which explained the strange appearance; and the grief
of father and mother, and brothers and sisters, made itself seen and
heard. Loud and long were the lamentations over poor Amos; and when
the family came a little to themselves, great were the commendations
bestowed upon me, for my care of him and of the property.

We arrived home about the tenth of July, but it was not till the middle
of August that Amos was well enough to move out of his chamber, though
he had been convalescent all the while. As soon as he could speak, he
told all I had done for him, and said, “If I had sold him, I should
have died;” but it never seemed to occur to him or the rest of the
family that they were under any, the slightest, obligation to me on
that account. I had done well as a slave, and to have it acknowledged,
and to be praised for it, was compensation enough for me. My merits,
whatever they were, instead of exciting sympathy, or any feeling of
attachment to me, seemed only to enhance my money value to them. This
was not the view which I took of the case myself; and as soon as Amos
began to recover, I began to meditate upon a plan of escape from the
danger, in which I constantly stood, of a repetition of the attempt to
sell me in the highest market. Providence seemed to have interfered
once to defeat the scheme, but I could not expect such extraordinary
circumstances to be repeated, and I was bound to do every thing in
my power to secure myself and my family from the wicked conspiracy
of Isaac and Amos R. against my life, as well as against my natural
rights in my own person, and those which I had acquired, under even
the barbarous laws of slavery, by the money I had paid for myself. If
Isaac would only have been honest enough to adhere to his own bargain,
I would have adhered to mine, and paid him all I had promised. But
his attempt to kidnap me again, after having pocketed three-fourths
of my market value, absolved me from all obligation, in my opinion,
to pay him any more, or to continue in a position which exposed me
to his machinations. I determined to make my escape to Canada, about
which I had heard something, as beyond the limits of the United States;
for, notwithstanding there were free States in the Union, I felt that
I should be safer under an entirely foreign jurisdiction. The slave
States had their emissaries in the others, and I feared that I might
fall into their hands, and need a stronger protection than might be
afforded me by public opinion in the northern States at that time.

It was not without long thought on the subject that I devised a plan
of escape; but when I had fully made up my mind, I communicated my
intention to my wife, who was too much terrified by the dangers of the
attempt to do any thing, at first, but endeavor to dissuade me from it,
and try to make me contented with my condition as it was. In vain I
explained to her the liability we were in of being separated from our
children as well as from each other; and presented every argument which
had weighed with my own mind, and had at last decided me. She had not
gone through my trials, and female timidity overcame her sense of the
evils she had experienced. I argued the matter with her, at various
times, till I was satisfied that argument alone would not prevail;
and then I said to her, very deliberately, that though it was a cruel
thing for me to part with her, yet I would do it, and take all the
children with me but the youngest, rather than run the risk of forcible
separation from them all, and of a much worse captivity besides, which
we were constantly exposed to here. She wept and entreated, but found I
was resolute, and after a whole night spent in talking over the matter,
I left her to go to my work for the day. I had not gone far when I
heard her voice calling me;--I waited till she came up to me, and then,
finding me as determined as ever, she said, at last, she would go with
me. It was an immense relief to my nerves, and my tears flowed as fast
as hers had done before. I rode off with a heart a good deal lighter.

She was living, at the time, near the landing I have mentioned; for the
plantation extended the whole five miles from the house to the river,
and there were several different farms, all of which I was overseeing,
and, therefore, riding about from one to another every day. The oldest
boy was at the house with Master Amos, the rest were all with her.
Her consent was given on Thursday morning, and on the night of the
following Saturday, I had decided to set out, as it would then be
several days before I should be missed, and I should get a good start.
Some time previously I had got my wife to make me a large knapsack,
big enough to hold the two smallest children; and I had arranged it
that she should lead the second boy, while the oldest was stout enough
to go by himself, and to help me carry the necessary food. I used to
pack the little ones on my back, of an evening, after I had got through
my day’s work, and trot round the cabin with them, and go some little
distance from it, in order to accustom both them and myself to the task
before us.

At length the eventful night came. I went up to the house to ask leave
to take Tom home with me that he might have his clothes mended. No
objection was made, and I bade Master Amos “goodnight” for the last
time. It was about the middle of September, and by nine o’clock in
the evening all was ready. It was a dark, moonless night, and we got
into the little skiff in which I had induced a fellow-slave to take
us across the river. It was an agitating and solemn moment. The good
fellow who was rowing us over, said this affair might end in his death;
“but,” said he, “you will not be brought back alive, will you?” “Not if
I can help it,” I answered. “And if you are overpowered and return,”
he asked, “will you conceal my part of the business?” “That I will, so
help me God,” I replied. “Then I am easy,” he answered, “and wish you
success.” We landed on the Indiana shore, and I began to feel that I
was my own master. But in what circumstances of fear and misery still!
We were to travel by night, and rest by day, in the woods and bushes.
We were thrown absolutely upon our own poor and small resources, and
were to rely on our own strength alone. The population was not so
numerous as now, nor so well disposed to the slave. We dared look to no
one for help. But my courage was equal to the occasion, and we trudged
on cautiously and steadily, and as fast as the darkness, and the
feebleness of my wife and boys would allow.

It was nearly a fortnight before we reached Cincinnati; and a day or
two previous to getting there, our provisions were used up, and I had
the misery to hear the cry of hunger and exhaustion from those I loved
so dearly. It was necessary to run the risk of exposure by day-light
upon the road; so I sprung upon it boldly from our hiding place one
morning, and turned towards the south, to prevent the suspicion of my
going the other way. I approached the first house I saw, and asked if
they would sell me a little bread and meat. No, they had nothing for
black fellows. At the next I succeeded better, but had to make as good
a bargain as I could, and that was not very successful, with a man who
wanted to see how little he could give me for my quarter of a dollar.
As soon as I had succeeded in making a purchase, I followed the road,
still towards the south, till I got out of sight of the house, and then
darted into the woods again, and returned northward, just out of sight
of the road. The food which I bought, such as it was, put new life
and strength into my wife and children when I got back to them again,
and we at length arrived safe at Cincinnati. There we were kindly
received and entertained for several days, my wife and little ones were
refreshed, and then we were carried on our way thirty miles in a wagon.

We followed the same course as before, of travelling by night, and
resting by day, till we arrived at the Scioto, where we had been told
we should strike the military road of General Hull, in the last war
with Great Britain, and might then safely travel by day. We found the
road, accordingly, by the large sycamore and elm which marked its
beginning, and entered upon it with fresh spirits early in the day.
Nobody had told us that it was cut through the wilderness, and I had
neglected to provide any food, thinking we should soon come to some
habitation, where we could be supplied. But we travelled on all day
without seeing one, and laid down at night, hungry and weary enough.
I thought I heard the howling of wolves, and the terror inspired by
this, and the exertions I used to keep them off, by making as much
noise as I could, took away all power of sleeping, till daylight, and
rendered a little delay inevitable. In the morning we were as hungry as
ever, but had nothing to relieve our appetites but a little piece of
dried beef. I divided some of this all round, and then started for a
second day’s trip in the wilderness. It was a hard trial, and this day
is a memorable one in my life. The road was rough, of course, being
neglected, and the logs lying across it constantly; the underbrush was
somewhat cleared away, and that was about all to mark the track. As we
went wearily on, I was a little ahead of my wife and the boys, when I
heard them call to me, and, turning round, saw that my wife had fallen
over a log, and was prostrate on the ground. “Mother’s dying,” cried
Tom; and when I reached her, it seemed really so. She had fainted. I
did not know but it might be fatal, and was half distracted with the
fear and the uncertainty. In a few minutes, however, she recovered
sufficiently to take a few mouthfuls of the beef, and this, with a
little rest, revived her so much that she bravely set out once more.

We had not gone far, and I suppose it was about three o’clock in the
afternoon, when we discerned some persons approaching us at no great
distance. We were instantly on the alert, as we could hardly expect
them to be friends. The advance of a few paces showed me they were
Indians, with packs on their shoulders; and they were so near that
if they were hostile, it would be useless to try to escape. So I
walked along boldly, till we came close upon them. They were bent down
with their burdens, and had not raised their eyes till now; and when
they did so, and saw me coming towards them, they looked at me in a
frightened sort of way for a moment, and then, setting up a peculiar
howl, turned round, and ran as fast as they could. There were three or
four of them, and what they were afraid of I could not imagine, unless
they supposed I was the devil, whom they had perhaps heard of as black.
But even then one would have thought my wife and children might have
reassured them. However, there was no doubt they were well frightened,
and we heard their wild and prolonged howl, as they ran, for a mile or
more. My wife was alarmed too, and thought they were merely running
back to collect more of a party, and then to come and murder us, and
she wanted to turn back. I told her they were numerous enough to do
that, if they wanted to, without help; and that as for turning back,
I had had quite too much of the road behind us, and that it would be
a ridiculous thing that both parties should run away. If they were
disposed to run, I would follow. We did follow on, and soon the noise
was stopped; and, as we advanced, we could discover Indians peeping at
us from behind the trees, and dodging out of our sight, if they thought
we were looking at them. Presently we came upon their wigwams, and saw
a fine looking, stately Indian, with his arms folded, waiting for us
to approach. He was apparently the chief, and, saluting us civilly,
he soon discovered that we were human beings, and spoke to his young
men, who were scattered about, and made them come in, and give up their
foolish fears. And now curiosity seemed to prevail. Each one wanted to
touch the children, who were shy as partridges, with their long life in
the woods; and as they shrunk away, and uttered a little cry of alarm,
the Indian would jump back too, as if he thought they would bite him.
However, a little while sufficed to make them understand what we were,
and whither we were going, and what we needed; and as little, to set
them about supplying our wants, feeding us bountifully, and giving us
a comfortable wigwam for our night’s rest. The next day we resumed our
march, and found, from the Indians, that we were only about twenty-five
miles from the lake. They sent some of their young men to point out
the place where we were to turn off, and parted from us with as much
kindness as possible.

In passing over the part of Ohio near the lake, where such an extensive
plain is found, we came to a spot overflowed by a stream, across which
the road passed. I forded it first, with the help of a sounding-pole,
and then taking the children on my back, first, the two little ones,
and then the others, one at a time, and, lastly, my wife, I succeeded
in getting them all safely across, where the ford was one hundred to
one hundred and fifty yards wide, and the deepest part perhaps four
feet deep. At this time the skin was worn from my back to an extent
almost equal to the size of my knapsack.

One night more was passed in the woods, and in the course of the next
forenoon we came out upon the wide plain, without trees, which lies
south and west of Sandusky city. We saw the houses of the village, and
kept away from them for the present, till I should have an opportunity
to reconnoitre a little. When about a mile from the lake, I hid my
companions in the bushes, and pushed forward. Before I had gone far,
I observed on the left, on the opposite side from the town, something
which looked like a house, between which and a vessel, a number of
men were passing and repassing with activity. I promptly decided to
approach them; and, as I drew near, I was hailed by one of the number,
who asked me if I wanted to work. I told him yes; and it was scarcely
a minute before I had hold of a bag of corn, which, like the rest, I
emptied into the hold of the vessel lying at anchor a few rods off.
I got into the line of laborers hurrying along the plank next to the
only colored man I saw engaged, and soon entered into conversation with
him; in the course of which I inquired of him where they were going,
the best route to Canada, who was the captain, and other particulars
interesting to me, and communicated to him where I came from, and
whither I wished to go. He told the captain, who called me one side,
and by his frank look and manner soon induced me to acknowledge my
condition and purpose. I found I had not mistaken him. He sympathized
with me, at once, most heartily; and offered to take me and my family
to Buffalo, whither they were bound, and where they might arrive the
next evening, if the favorable wind continued, of which they were
hurrying to take advantage. Never did men work with a better will, and
soon two or three hundred bushels were thrown on board, the hatches
were fastened down, the anchor raised, and the sails hoisted. The
captain had agreed to send a boat for me, after sundown, rather than
take me on board at the landing; as there were Kentucky spies, he
said, on the watch for slaves, at Sandusky, who might get a glimpse
of me, if I brought my party out of the bush by daylight. I watched
the vessel, as she left her moorings, with intense interest, and began
to fear that she would go without me, after all; she stretched off
to so great a distance, as it seemed to me, before she rounded to.
At length, however, I saw her come up to the wind, and lower a boat
for the shore; and, in a few minutes, my black friend and two sailors
jumped out upon the beach. They went with me, immediately, to bring my
wife and children. But what was my alarm when I came back to the place
where I had left them, to find they had gone! For a moment, my fears
were overpowering; but I soon discerned them, in the fading twilight,
at no great distance. My wife had been alarmed by my long absence, and
thought I must have been discovered by some of our watchful enemies,
and had given up all for lost. Her fears were not removed by seeing
me returning with three other men; and she tried to hide herself. It
was not without difficulty that I satisfied her all was right, for her
agitation was so great that she could not, at once, understand what I
said. However, this was soon over, and the kindness of my companions
facilitated the matter very much. Before long, we were all on the way
to the boat, and it did not require much time or labor to embark our
luggage. A short row brought us to the vessel, and, to my astonishment,
we were welcomed on board, with three hearty cheers; for the crew
were as much pleased as the captain, with the help they were giving
us to escape. A fine run brought us to Buffalo the next evening, but
it was too late to cross the river that night. The next morning we
dropped down, to Black Rock, and the friendly captain, whose name I
have gratefully remembered as Captain Burnham, put us on board the
ferry-boat to Waterloo, paid the passage money, and gave me a dollar
at parting. He was a Scotchman, and had done enough to win my enduring
gratitude, to prove himself a kind and generous man, and to give me a
pleasant association with his dialect, and his country.

When I got on the Canada side, on the morning of the 28th of October,
1830, my first impulse was to throw myself on the ground, and giving
way to the riotous exultation of my feelings, to execute sundry
antics which excited the astonishment of those who were looking on.
A gentleman of the neighborhood, Colonel Warren, who happened to be
present, thought I was in a fit, and as he inquired what was the matter
with the poor fellow, I jumped up and told him _I was free_. “O,” said
he, with a hearty laugh, “is that it? I never knew freedom make a man
roll in the sand before.” It is not much to be wondered at, that my
certainty of being free was not quite a sober one at the first moment;
and I hugged and kissed my wife and children all round, with a vivacity
which made them laugh as well as myself. There was not much time to
be lost, though, in frolic, even at this extraordinary moment. I was
a stranger, in a strange land, and had to look about me at once, for
refuge and resource. I found a lodging for the night; and the next
morning set about exploring the interior for the means of support. I
knew nothing about the country, or the people; but kept my eyes and
ears open, and made such inquiries as opportunity afforded. I heard,
in the course of the day, of a Mr. Hibbard, who lived some six or
seven miles off, and who was a rich man, as riches were counted there,
with a large farm, and several small tenements on it, which he was
in the habit of letting to his laborers. To him I went, immediately,
though the character given him by his neighbors was not, by any means,
unexceptionably good. But I thought he was not probably any worse than
those I had been accustomed to serve, and that I could get along with
him, if honest and faithful work would satisfy him. In the afternoon I
found him, and soon struck a bargain with him for employment. I asked
him if there was any house where he would let me live. He said yes,
and led the way to an old two story sort of shanty, into the lower
story of which the pigs had broken, and had apparently made it their
resting-place for some time. Still, it was a house, and I forthwith
expelled the pigs, and set about cleaning it for the occupancy of a
better sort of tenants. With the aid of hoe and shovel, hot-water and
a mop, I got the floor into a tolerable condition by midnight, and
only then did I rest from my labor. The next day I brought the rest of
the Hensons to _my house_, and though there was nothing there but bare
walls and floors, we were all in a state of great delight, and my old
woman laughed and acknowledged that it was worth while, and that it was
better than a log-cabin with an earth-floor. I begged some straw of Mr.
Hibbard, and confining it by logs in the corners of the room, I made
beds of it three feet thick, upon which we reposed luxuriously after
our long fatigues.

Another trial awaited me which I had not anticipated. In consequence of
the great exposures we had gone through, my wife and all the children
fell sick; and it was not without extreme peril that they escaped with
their lives.

My employer soon found that my labor was of more value to him than
that of those he was accustomed to hire; and as I consequently gained
his favor, and his wife took quite a fancy to mine, we soon procured
some of the comforts of life, while the necessaries of food and fuel
were abundant. I remained with Mr. Hibbard three years, sometimes
working on shares, and sometimes for wages; and I managed in that time
to procure some pigs, a cow, and a horse. Thus my condition gradually
improved, and I felt that my toils and sacrifices for freedom had
not been in vain. Nor were my labors for the improvement of myself
and others, in more important things than food and clothing, without
effect. It so happened that one of my Maryland friends arrived in this
neighborhood, and hearing of my being here, inquired if I ever preached
now, and spread the reputation I had acquired elsewhere, for my gifts
in the pulpit. I had said nothing myself, and had not intended to say
any thing, of my having ever officiated in that way. I went to meeting
with others, when I had an opportunity, and enjoyed the quiet of the
Sabbath when there was no assembly. I would not refuse to labor in this
field, however, when desired to do so; and I hope it is no violation
of modesty to state the fact that I was frequently called upon, not
by blacks alone, but by all classes in my vicinity, the comparatively
educated, as well as the lamentably ignorant, to speak to them on their
duty, responsibility, and immortality, on their obligations to their
Maker, their Saviour, and themselves.

It may, nay, I am aware it must, seem strange to many that a man so
ignorant as myself, unable to read, and having heard so little as
I had of religion, natural or revealed, should be able to preach
acceptably to persons who had enjoyed greater advantages than myself.
I can explain it, only by reference to our Saviour’s comparison of the
kingdom of heaven to a plant which may spring from a seed no bigger
than a mustard-seed, and may yet reach such a size, that the birds of
the air may take shelter therein. Religion is not so much knowledge,
as wisdom;--and observation upon what passes without, and reflection
upon what passes within a man’s heart, will give him a larger growth
in grace than is imagined by the devoted adherents of creeds, or the
confident followers of Christ, who call him Lord, Lord, but do not the
things which he says.

Mr. Hibbard was good enough to give my eldest boy, Tom, two quarters’
schooling, to which the schoolmaster added more of his own kindness,
so that my boy learned to read fluently and well. It was a great
advantage, not only to him, but to me; for I used to get him to read
much to me in the Bible, especially on Sunday mornings when I was
going to preach; and I could easily commit to memory a few verses, or
a chapter, from hearing him read it over. One beautiful summer-Sabbath
I rose early, and called him to come and read to me. “Where shall I
read, father?” “Anywhere, my son,” I answered, for I knew not how to
direct him. He opened upon Psalm ciii. “Bless the Lord, O my soul,
and all that is within me bless his holy name;” and as he read this
beautiful outpouring of gratitude which I now first heard, my heart
melted within me. I recalled, with all the rapidity of which thought is
capable, the whole current of my life; and as I remembered the dangers
and afflictions from which the Lord had delivered me, and compared my
present condition with what it had been, not only my heart but my eyes
overflowed, and I could neither check nor conceal the emotion which
overpowered me. The words “Bless the Lord, O my soul,” with which the
Psalm begins and ends, were all I needed, or could use, to express the
fulness of my thankful heart. When he had finished, Tom turned to me
and asked, “Father, who was David?” He had observed my excitement, and
added, “He writes pretty, don’t he?” and then repeated his question.
It was a question I was utterly unable to answer. I had never heard of
David, but could not bear to acknowledge my ignorance to my own child.
So I answered evasively, “He was a man of God, my son.” “I suppose so,”
said he; “but I want to know something more about him. Where did he
live? What did he do?” As he went on questioning me, I saw it was in
vain to attempt to escape, and so I told him frankly I did not know.
“Why, father,” said he, “can’t you read?” This was a worse question
than the other, and if I had any pride in me at the moment, it took
it all out of me pretty quick. It was a direct question, and must
have a direct answer; so I told him at once I could not. “Why not,”
said he. “Because I never had an opportunity to learn, nor anybody to
teach me.” “Well, you can learn now, father.” “No, my son, I am too
old, and have not time enough. I must work all day, or you would not
have enough to eat.” “Then you might do it at night.” “But still there
is nobody to teach me. I can’t afford to pay anybody for it, and of
course no one can do it for nothing.” “Why, father, _I’ll teach you_.
I can do it, I know. And then you’ll know so much more, that you can
talk better, and preach better.” The little fellow was so earnest,
there was no resisting him; but it is hard to describe the conflicting
feelings within me at such a proposition from such a quarter. I was
delighted with the conviction that my children would have advantages
I had never enjoyed; but it was no slight mortification to think of
being instructed by a child of twelve years old. Yet ambition, and a
true desire to learn, for the good it would do my own mind, conquered
the shame, and I agreed to try. But I did not reach this state of mind
instantly. I was greatly moved by the conversation I had had with
Tom--so much so that I could not undertake to preach that day. The
congregation were disappointed, and I passed the Sunday in solitary
reflection in the woods. I was too much engrossed with the multitude
of my thoughts within me to return home to dinner, and spent the
whole day in secret meditation and prayer, trying to compose myself,
and ascertain my true position. It was not difficult to see that my
predicament was one of profound ignorance, and that I ought to use
every opportunity of enlightening it. I began to take lessons of Tom,
therefore, immediately, and followed it up, every evening, by the light
of a pine knot, or some hickory bark, which was the only light I could
afford. Weeks passed, and my progress was so slow, that poor Tom was
almost discouraged, and used to drop asleep, sometimes, and whine a
little over my dulness, and talk to me very much as a schoolmaster
talks to a stupid boy, till I began to be afraid that my age, my want
of practice in looking at such little scratches, the daily fatigue,
and the dim light, would be effectual preventives of my ever acquiring
the art of reading. But Tom’s perseverance and mine conquered at last,
and in the course of the winter I did really learn to read a little.
It was, and has been ever since, a great comfort to me to have made
this acquisition; though it has made me comprehend better the terrible
abyss of ignorance in which I had been plunged all my previous life. It
made me also feel more deeply and bitterly the oppression under which
I had toiled and groaned; but the crushing and cruel nature of which
I had not appreciated, till I found out, in some slight degree, from
what I had been debarred. At the same time it made me more anxious than
before to do something for the rescue and the elevation of those who
were suffering the same evils I had endured, and who did not know how
degraded and ignorant they really were.

After about three years had passed, I improved my condition again by
taking service with a gentleman by the name of Riseley, whose residence
was only a few miles distant, and who was a man of more elevation of
mind than Mr. Hibbard, and of superior abilities. At his place I began
to reflect, more and more, upon the circumstances of the blacks, who
were already somewhat numerous in this region. I was not the only one
who had escaped from the States, and had settled on the first spot in
Canada which they had reached. Several hundreds of colored persons were
in the neighborhood; and in the first joy of their deliverance, were
going on in a way which, I could see, led to little or no progress in
improvement. They were content to have the proceeds of their labor at
their own command, and had not the ambition for, or the perception of
what was within their easy reach, if they did but know it. They were
generally working for hire upon the lands of others, and had not yet
dreamed of becoming independent proprietors themselves. It soon became
my great object to awaken them to a sense of the advantages which
offered themselves to their grasp; and Mr. Riseley, seeing clearly
the justness of my views, and willing to coöperate with me in the
attempt to make them generally known among the blacks, permitted me
to call meetings, at his house, of those who were known to be among
the most intelligent and successful of our class. At these meetings we
considered and discussed the subject, till we were all of one mind; and
it was agreed, among the ten or twelve of us who assembled at them,
that we would invest our earnings in land, and undertake the task,
which, though no light one certainly, would yet soon reward us for our
effort, of settling upon wild lands which we could call our own; and
where every tree which we felled, and every bushel of corn we raised,
would be for ourselves; in other words, where we could secure all the
profits of our own labor.

The advantages of this course need not be dwelt upon in a country which
is every day exemplifying it, and has done so for two hundred years
and more; and has, by this very means, acquired an indestructible
character for energy, enterprise, and self-reliance. It was precisely
the Yankee spirit which I wished to instil into my fellow-slaves, if
possible; and I was not deterred from the task by the perception of
the immense contrast in all the habits and character generated by long
ages of freedom and servitude, activity and sloth, independence and
subjection. My associates agreed with me, and we resolved to select
some spot among the many offered to our choice, where we would colonize
and raise our own crops, eat our own bread, and be, in short, our
own masters. I was deputed to explore the country, and find a place
to which I would be willing to migrate myself; and they all said
they would go with me whenever such a one should be found. I set out
accordingly in the autumn of 1834, and travelled on foot all over
the extensive region between lakes Ontario, Erie, and Huron. When I
came to the territory east of Lake St. Clair and Detroit River, I was
strongly impressed with its fertility, its convenience, and, indeed,
its superiority, for our purposes, to any other spot I had seen. I
determined this should be the place; and so reported, on my return,
to my future companions. They were wisely cautious, however, and
sent me off again in the summer, that I might see it at the opposite
seasons of the year, and be better able to judge of its advantages. I
found no reason to change my opinion, but upon going further towards
the head of Lake Erie, I discovered an extensive tract of government
land, which, for some years, had been granted to a Mr. McCormick upon
certain conditions, and which he had rented out to settlers upon such
terms as he could obtain. This land being already cleared, offered
some advantages for the immediate raising of crops, which were not to
be overlooked by persons whose resources were so limited as ours; and
we determined to go there first, for a time, and with the proceeds of
what we could earn there, to make our purchases in Dawn afterwards.
This plan was followed, and some dozen or more of us settled upon these
lands the following spring, and accumulated something by the crops of
wheat and tobacco we were able to raise.

I discovered, before long, that McCormick had not complied with the
conditions of his grant, and was not, therefore, entitled to the
rent he exacted from settlers. I was advised by Sir John Cockburn,
to whom I applied on the subject, to appeal to the legislature for
relief. We did so; and though McCormick was able, by the aid of his
friends, to defeat us for one year, yet we succeeded the next, upon a
second appeal, and were freed from all rent, thereafter, so long as we
remained. Still, this was not our own land. The government, though it
demanded no rent, might set up the land for sale at any time, and then
we should, probably, be driven off by wealthier purchasers, with the
entire loss of all our improvements, and with no retreat provided. It
was manifest that it was altogether better for us to purchase before
competition was invited; and we kept this fully in mind during the time
we staid here. We remained in this position six or seven years; and all
this while the colored population was increasing rapidly around us,
and spreading very fast into the interior settlements and the large
towns. The immigration from the United States was incessant, and some,
I am not unwilling to admit, were brought hither with my knowledge
and connivance. I was glad to help such of my old friends as had the
spirit to make the attempt to free themselves; and I made more than one
trip, about this time, to Maryland and Kentucky, with the expectation,
in which I was not disappointed, that some might be enabled to follow
in my footsteps. I knew the route pretty well, and had much greater
facilities for travelling than when I came out of that Egypt for the
first time.

I did not find that our prosperity increased with our numbers. The
mere delight the slave took in his freedom, rendered him, at first,
contented with a lot far inferior to that which he might have attained.
Then his ignorance led him to make unprofitable bargains, and he would
often hire wild land on short terms, and bind himself to clear a
certain number of acres; and by the time they were cleared and fitted
for cultivation his lease was out, and his landlord would come in,
and raise a splendid crop on the new land; and the tenant would, very
likely, start again on just such another bargain, and be no better
off at the end of ten years than he was at the beginning. Another way
in which they lost the profits of their labor, was by raising nothing
but tobacco, the high price of which was very tempting, and the
cultivation of which was a monopoly in their hands, as no white man
understood it, or could compete with them at all. The consequence was,
however, that they had nothing but tobacco to sell; there was rather
too much of it in the market, and the price of wheat rose, while their
commodity was depressed; and they lost all they should have saved, in
the profit they gave the trader for his corn and stores. I saw the
effect of these things so clearly that I could not help trying to make
my friends and neighbors see it too; and I set seriously about the
business of lecturing upon the subject of crops, wages, and profits,
as if I had been brought up to it. I insisted on the necessity of
their raising their own crops, saving their own wages, and securing
the profits of their own labor, with such plain arguments as occurred
to me, and were as clear to their comprehension as to mine. I did this
very openly; and, frequently, my audience consisted in part of the
very traders whose inordinate profits upon individuals I was trying to
diminish, but whose balance of profit would not be ultimately lessened,
because they would have so many more persons to trade with who would
be able to pay them a reasonable advance in cash, or its equivalent,
on all their purchases. The purse is a tender part of the system;
but I handled it so gently, that the sensible portion of my natural
opponents were not, I believe, offended; while those whom I wished to
benefit, saw, for the most part, the propriety of my advice, and took
it. At least, there are now great numbers of settlers, in this region
of Canada, who own their farms, and are training up their children in
true independence, and giving them a good elementary education, who had
not taken a single step towards such a result before I began to talk to
them.

I said none of the respectable traders were offended with me; but one
man had the folly to arrest me for a small debt, under the pretence
that I was about to leave the country, when I was only going to Detroit
for a few days, in the spring, leaving my crops on the ground, and all
my family at home but one little girl, who was to go to school for
a few weeks. It was so absurd, however, that I was soon released by
some of my friends, of whom I had many among the whites as well as the
blacks.

While I remained at Colchester, I became acquainted with a
Congregational missionary from Massachusetts, by the name of Hiram
Wilson, who took an interest in our people, and was disposed to do
what he could to promote the cause of improvement which I had so much
at heart. He coöperated with me in many efforts, and I have been
associated with him from 1836 to the present time. He has been a
faithful friend, and still continues his important labors of love in
our behalf. Among other things which he did for us then, he wrote to a
Quaker friend of his, an Englishman, by the name of James C. Fuller,
residing at Skeneateles, New York, and endeavored to interest him in
the welfare of our struggling population.

He succeeded so far, that Mr. Fuller, who was going on a visit to
England, promised to do what he could among his friends there, to
induce them to aid us. He came back with fifteen hundred dollars which
had been subscribed for our benefit. It was a great question how this
sum, which sounded vast to many of my brethren, should be appropriated.
I had my own opinion pretty decidedly made up as to what it was best
for us all to do with it. But, in order to come to a satisfactory
conclusion, the first thing to be done was to call a convention of
delegates from every settlement of blacks that was within reach; that
all might see that whatever was decided on, was sanctioned by the
disinterested votes of those who were thought by their companions
best able to judge what was expedient. Mr. Wilson and myself called
such a convention, therefore, to meet in London, Upper Canada, and it
was held in June, 1838. I urged the appropriation of the money to the
establishment of a manual-labor school, where our children could be
taught those elements of knowledge which are usually the occupations
of a grammar-school; and where the boys could be taught, in addition,
the practice of some mechanic art, and the girls could be instructed
in those domestic arts which are the proper occupation and ornament
of their sex. Such an establishment would train up those who would
afterwards instruct others; and we should thus gradually become
independent of the white man for our intellectual progress, as we
might be also for our physical prosperity. It was the more necessary,
as in many districts, owing to the insurmountable prejudices of the
inhabitants, the children of the blacks were not allowed to share the
advantages of the common school. There was some opposition to this plan
in the convention; but in the course of the discussion, which continued
for three days, it appeared so obviously for the advantage of all to
husband this donation, so as to preserve it for a purpose of permanent
utility, that the proposal was, at last, unanimously adopted; and a
committee of three was appointed to select and purchase a site for the
establishment. Mr. Wilson and myself were the active members of this
committee, and after traversing the country for several months, we
could find no place more suitable than that upon which I had had my eye
for three or four years, for a permanent settlement, in the town of
Dawn. We therefore bought two hundred acres of fine, rich land, on the
river Sydenham, covered with a heavy growth of black walnut and white
wood, at four dollars the acre. I had made a bargain for two hundred
acres adjoining this lot, on my own account; and circumstances favored
me so that the man of whom I purchased was glad to let me have them
at a large discount from the price I had agreed to pay, if I would
give him cash for the balance I owed him. I transferred a portion of
the advantage of this bargain to the institution, by selling to it one
hundred acres more, at the low price at which I obtained them; and
thus the school has three hundred acres of as fine land, and as well
situated land, as Canada can show, at a very moderate cost. In 1842,
I removed with my family to Dawn, and as a considerable number of my
friends are there about me, and the school is permanently fixed there,
the future importance of this settlement seems to be decided. There are
many other settlements which are considerable; and, indeed, the colored
population is scattered over a territory, which does not fall far
short of three hundred miles in extent in each direction, and probably
numbers not less than twenty thousand persons in all. We look to the
school, and the possession of landed property by individuals, as two
great means of the elevation of our oppressed and degraded race to a
participation in the blessings, as they have hitherto been permitted to
share only the miseries and vices, of civilization.

My efforts to aid them, in every way in my power, and to procure the
aid of others for them, have been constant. I have made many journeys
into New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Maine, in all of
which States I have found or made some friends to the cause, and, I
hope, some personal friends. I have received many liberal gifts, and
experienced much kindness of treatment; but I must be allowed to allude
particularly to the donations received from Boston, by which we have
been enabled to erect a saw-mill, and thus to begin in good earnest,
the clearing of our lands, and to secure a profitable return for the
support of our school, as among those which have been most welcome and
valuable to us.

I could give here a great many particulars, which would amuse and
interest the reader, if they did not instruct him. But it is better not
to indulge the inclination; and I will conclude my narrative by simply
recording my gratitude, heartfelt and inexpressible, to God, and to
many of my fellow-men, for the vast improvement in my condition, both
physical and mental; for the great degree of comfort with which I am
surrounded; for the good I have been enabled to effect; for the light
which has risen upon me, for the religious privileges I enjoy, and the
religious hopes I am permitted to cherish; for the prospects opening to
my children, so different from what they might have been; and, finally,
for the cheering expectation of benefiting not only the present, but
many future generations of my race.




       *       *       *       *       *

Transcriber’s Note

Original spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been retained.





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