Rhetorical Analysis - Frederick Douglass Narrative

NARRATIVE 

OF THE LIFE OF 

FREDERICK DOUGLASS, AN AMERICAN SLAVE 

BY 

5

FREDERICK DOUGLASS

NARRATIVE 

OF THE 

LIFE 

OF 

10

FREDERICK DOUGLASS, AN 

AMERICAN SLAVE. 

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 

BOSTON 

PUBLISHED AT THE ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE, NO. 25 CORNHILL 

15

1845

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845, 

BY FREDERICK DOUGLASS, 

in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of Massachusetts. 

COPYRIGHT INFORMATION 

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Book: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass Author: Frederick Douglass, 1817?–95 

First published: 1845 

The original book is in the public domain in the United  States and in most, if not all, other countries as well. Readers  outside the United States should check their own countries’  copyright laws to be certain they can legally download this  ebook. The Online Books Page has an FAQ which gives a  summary of copyright durations for many other countries, as  well as links to more official sources. 

This PDF ebook was 

created by José Menéndez.

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PREFACE. 

IN the month of August, 1841, I attended an anti-slavery  convention in Nantucket, at which it was my happiness to  become acquainted with FREDERICK DOUGLASS, the writer of  the following Narrative. He was a stranger to nearly every  member of that body; but, having recently made his escape from  the southern prison-house of bondage, and feeling his curiosity  excited to ascertain the principles and measures of the  abolitionists,—of whom he had heard a somewhat vague  description while he was a slave,—he was induced to give his  attendance, on the occasion alluded to, though at that time a  resident in New Bedford.  

Fortunate, most fortunate occurrence!—fortunate for the  millions of his manacled brethren, yet panting for deliverance  from their awful thraldom!—fortunate for the cause of negro  emancipation, and of universal liberty!—fortunate for the land  of his birth, which he has already done so much to save and  bless!—fortunate for a large circle of friends and acquaintances,  whose sympathy and affection he has strongly secured by the  many sufferings he has endured, by his virtuous traits of  character, by his ever-abiding remembrance of those who are in  bonds, as being bound with them!—fortunate for the multitudes,  in various parts of our republic, whose minds he has enlightened  on the subject of slavery, and who have been melted to tears by  his pathos, or roused to virtuous indignation by his stirring  eloquence against the enslavers of men!—fortunate for himself,  as it at once brought him into the field of public usefulness, 

vi PREFACE 

“gave the world assurance of a MAN,” quickened the slumbering  energies of his soul, and consecrated him to the great work of  breaking the rod of the oppressor, and letting the oppressed go  free!  

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I shall never forget his first speech at the convention—the  extraordinary emotion it excited in my own mind—the powerful  impression it created upon a crowded auditory, completely  taken by surprise—the applause which followed from the  beginning to the end of his felicitous remarks. I think I never  hated slavery so intensely as at that moment; certainly, my  perception of the enormous outrage which is inflicted by it, on  the godlike nature of its victims, was rendered far more clear  than ever. There stood one, in physical proportion and stature  commanding and exact—in intellect richly endowed—in natural  eloquence a prodigy—in soul manifestly “created but a little  lower than the angels”—yet a slave, ay, a fugitive slave,— trembling for his safety, hardly daring to believe that on the  American soil, a single white person could be found who would  befriend him at all hazards, for the love of God and humanity!  Capable of high attainments as an intellectual and moral  being—needing nothing but a comparatively small amount of  cultivation to make him an ornament to society and a blessing to  his race—by the law of the land, by the voice of the people, by  the terms of the slave code, he was only a piece of property, a  beast of burden, a chattel personal, nevertheless!  

A beloved friend from New Bedford prevailed on Mr.  DOUGLASS to address the convention. He came forward to the  platform with a hesitancy and embarrassment, necessarily the  attendants of a sensitive mind in such a novel position. After  apologizing for his ignorance, and reminding the audience that  slavery was a poor school for the human intellect and heart, he  proceeded to narrate some of the facts in his own history as a  slave, and in the course of his speech gave utterance to many 

PREFACE vii 

noble thoughts and thrilling reflections. As soon as he had taken  his seat, filled with hope and admiration, I rose, and declared  that PATRICK HENRY, of revolutionary fame, never made a speech more eloquent in the cause of liberty, than the one we  had just listened to from the lips of that hunted fugitive. So I  believed at that time—such is my belief now. I reminded the  audience of the peril which surrounded this self-emancipated  young man at the North,—even in Massachusetts, on the soil of  the Pilgrim Fathers, among the descendants of revolutionary  sires; and I appealed to them, whether they would ever allow  him to be carried back into slavery,—law or no law,  constitution or no constitution. The response was unanimous  and in thunder-tones—“NO!” “Will you succor and protect him  as a brother-man—a resident of the old Bay State?” “YES!”  shouted the whole mass, with an energy so startling, that the  ruthless tyrants south of Mason and Dixon’s line might almost  have heard the mighty burst of feeling, and recognized it as the  pledge of an invincible determination, on the part of those who  gave it, never to betray him that wanders, but to hide the  outcast, and firmly to abide the consequences.  

It was at once deeply impressed upon my mind, that, if Mr.  DOUGLASS could be persuaded to consecrate his time and  talents to the promotion of the anti-slavery enterprise, a  powerful impetus would be given to it, and a stunning blow at  the same time inflicted on northern prejudice against a colored  complexion. I therefore endeavored to instil hope and courage  into his mind, in order that he might dare to engage in a  vocation so anomalous and responsible for a person in his  situation; and I was seconded in this effort by warm-hearted  friends, especially by the late General Agent of the  Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Mr. JOHN A. COLLINS,  whose judgment in this instance entirely coincided with my  own. At first, he could give no encouragement; with unfeigned 

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viii PREFACE 

diffidence, he expressed his conviction that he was not adequate  to the performance of so great a task; the path marked out was  wholly an untrodden one; he was sincerely apprehensive that he  should do more harm than good. After much deliberation,  however, he consented to make a trial; and ever since that  period, he has acted as a lecturing agent, under the auspices  either of the American or the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery  Society. In labors he has been most abundant; and his success in  combating prejudice, in gaining proselytes, in agitating the  public mind, has far surpassed the most sanguine expectations  that were raised at the commencement of his brilliant career. He  has borne himself with gentleness and meekness, yet with true  manliness of character. As a public speaker, he excels in pathos,  wit, comparison, imitation, strength of reasoning, and fluency of  language. There is in him that union of head and heart, which is  indispensable to an enlightenment of the heads and a winning of  the hearts of others. May his strength continue to be equal to his  day! May he continue to “grow in grace, and in the knowledge  of God,” that he may be increasingly serviceable in the cause of  bleeding humanity, whether at home or abroad!  

It is certainly a very remarkable fact, that one of the most  efficient advocates of the slave population, now before the  public, is a fugitive slave, in the person of FREDERICK DOUGLASS; and that the free colored population of the United  States are as ably represented by one of their own number, in  the person of CHARLES LENOX REMOND, whose eloquent  appeals have extorted the highest applause of multitudes on  both sides of the Atlantic. Let the calumniators of the colored  race despise themselves for their baseness and illiberality of  spirit, and henceforth cease to talk of the natural inferiority of  those who require nothing but time and opportunity to attain to  the highest point of human excellence. 

PREFACE ix 

It may, perhaps, be fairly questioned, whether any other  portion of the population of the earth could have endured the  privations, sufferings and horrors of slavery, without having  become more degraded in the scale of humanity than the slaves  of African descent. Nothing has been left undone to cripple their  intellects, darken their minds, debase their moral nature,  obliterate all traces of their relationship to mankind; and yet  how wonderfully they have sustained the mighty load of a most  frightful bondage, under which they have been groaning for  centuries! To illustrate the effect of slavery on the white man,— to show that he has no powers of endurance, in such a  condition, superior to those of his black brother,—DANIEL O’CONNELL, the distinguished advocate of universal  emancipation, and the mightiest champion of prostrate but not  conquered Ireland, relates the following anecdote in a speech  delivered by him in the Conciliation Hall, Dublin, before the  Loyal National Repeal Association, March 31, 1845. “No  matter,” said Mr. O’CONNELL, “under what specious term it  may disguise itself, slavery is still hideous. It has a natural, an inevitable tendency to brutalize every noble faculty of man. An  American sailor, who was cast away on the shore of Africa,  where he was kept in slavery for three years, was, at the  expiration of that period, found to be imbruted and stultified— he had lost all reasoning power; and having forgotten his native  language, could only utter some savage gibberish between  Arabic and English, which nobody could understand, and which  even he himself found difficulty in pronouncing. So much for  the humanizing influence of THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTION!”  Admitting this to have been an extraordinary case of mental  deterioration, it proves at least that the white slave can sink as  low in the scale of humanity as the black one.  

40

Mr. DOUGLASS has very properly chosen to write his own  Narrative, in his own style, and according to the best of his 

x PREFACE 

ability, rather than to employ some one else. It is, therefore,  entirely his own production; and, considering how long and  dark was the career he had to run as a slave,—how few have  been his opportunities to improve his mind since he broke his  iron fetters,—it is, in my judgment, highly creditable to his head  and heart. He who can peruse it without a tearful eye, a heaving  breast, an afflicted spirit,—without being filled with an  unutterable abhorrence of slavery and all its abettors, and  animated with a determination to seek the immediate overthrow  of that execrable system,—without trembling for the fate of this  country in the hands of a righteous God, who is ever on the side  of the oppressed, and whose arm is not shortened that it cannot  save,—must have a flinty heart, and be qualified to act the part  of a trafficker “in slaves and the souls of men.” I am confident  that it is essentially true in all its statements; that nothing has  been set down in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn  from the imagination; that it comes short of the reality, rather  than overstates a single fact in regard to SLAVERY AS IT IS. The  experience of FREDERICK DOUGLASS, as a slave, was not a  peculiar one; his lot was not especially a hard one; his case may  be regarded as a very fair specimen of the treatment of slaves in  Maryland, in which State it is conceded that they are better fed  and less cruelly treated than in Georgia, Alabama, or Louisiana.  Many have suffered incomparably more, while very few on the  plantations have suffered less, than himself. Yet how deplorable  was his situation! what terrible chastisements were inflicted  upon his person! what still more shocking outrages were  perpetrated upon his mind! with all his noble powers and  sublime aspirations, how like a brute was he treated, even by  those professing to have the same mind in them that was in  Christ Jesus! to what dreadful liabilities was he continually  subjected! how destitute of friendly counsel and aid, even in his  greatest extremities! how heavy was the midnight of woe which 

PREFACE xi 

shrouded in blackness the last ray of hope, and filled the future  with terror and gloom! what longings after freedom took  possession of his breast, and how his misery augmented, in  proportion as he grew reflective and intelligent,—thus  demonstrating that a happy slave is an extinct man! how he  thought, reasoned, felt, under the lash of the driver, with the  chains upon his limbs! what perils he encountered in his  endeavors to escape from his horrible doom! and how signal  have been his deliverance and preservation in the midst of a  nation of pitiless enemies!  

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This Narrative contains many affecting incidents, many  passages of great eloquence and power; but I think the most  thrilling one of them all is the description DOUGLASS gives of  his feelings, as he stood soliloquizing respecting his fate, and  the chances of his one day being a freeman, on the banks of the  Chesapeake Bay—viewing the receding vessels as they flew  with their white wings before the breeze, and apostrophizing  them as animated by the living spirit of freedom. Who can read  that passage, and be insensible to its pathos and sublimity?  Compressed into it is a whole Alexandrian library of thought,  feeling, and sentiment—all that can, all that need be urged, in  the form of expostulation, entreaty, rebuke, against that crime of  crimes,—making man the property of his fellow-man! O, how  accursed is that system, which entombs the godlike mind of  man, defaces the divine image, reduces those who by creation  were crowned with glory and honor to a level with four-footed  beasts, and exalts the dealer in human flesh above all that is  called God! Why should its existence be prolonged one hour? Is  it not evil, only evil, and that continually? What does its  presence imply but the absence of all fear of God, all regard for  man, on the part of the people of the United States? Heaven  speed its eternal overthrow! 

xii PREFACE 

So profoundly ignorant of the nature of slavery are many  persons, that they are stubbornly incredulous whenever they  read or listen to any recital of the cruelties which are daily  inflicted on its victims. They do not deny that the slaves are  held as property; but that terrible fact seems to convey to their  minds no idea of injustice, exposure to outrage, or savage  barbarity. Tell them of cruel scourgings, of mutilations and  brandings, of scenes of pollution and blood, of the banishment  of all light and knowledge, and they affect to be greatly  indignant at such enormous exaggerations, such wholesale  misstatements, such abominable libels on the character of the  southern planters! As if all these direful outrages were not the  natural results of slavery! As if it were less cruel to reduce a human being to the condition of a thing, than to give him a  severe flagellation, or to deprive him of necessary food and  clothing! As if whips, chains, thumb-screws, paddles,  bloodhounds, overseers, drivers, patrols, were not all  indispensable to keep the slaves down, and to give protection to  their ruthless oppressors! As if, when the marriage institution is  abolished, concubinage, adultery, and incest, must not  necessarily abound; when all the rights of humanity are  annihilated, any barrier remains to protect the victim from the  fury of the spoiler; when absolute power is assumed over life  and liberty, it will not be wielded with destructive sway!  Skeptics of this character abound in society. In some few  instances, their incredulity arises from a want of reflection; but,  generally, it indicates a hatred of the light, a desire to shield  slavery from the assaults of its foes, a contempt of the colored  race, whether bond or free. Such will try to discredit the  shocking tales of slaveholding cruelty which are recorded in this  truthful Narrative; but they will labor in vain. Mr. DOUGLASS has frankly disclosed the place of his birth, the names of those  who claimed ownership in his body and soul, and the names 

PREFACE xiii 

also of those who committed the crimes which he has alleged  against them. His statements, therefore, may easily be  disproved, if they are untrue.  

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In the course of his Narrative, he relates two instances of  murderous cruelty,—in one of which a planter deliberately shot  a slave belonging to a neighboring plantation, who had  unintentionally gotten within his lordly domain in quest of fish;  and in the other, an overseer blew out the brains of a slave who  had fled to a stream of water to escape a bloody scourging. Mr.  DOUGLASS states that in neither of these instances was any thing  done by way of legal arrest or judicial investigation. The  Baltimore American, of March 17, 1845, relates a similar case  of atrocity, perpetrated with similar impunity—as follows:— “Shooting a slave.—We learn, upon the authority of a letter  from Charles county, Maryland, received by a gentleman of this  city, that a young man, named Matthews, a nephew of General  Matthews, and whose father, it is believed, holds an office at  Washington, killed one of the slaves upon his father’s farm by  shooting him. The letter states that young Matthews had been  left in charge of the farm; that he gave an order to the servant,  which was disobeyed, when he proceeded to the house,  obtained a gun, and, returning, shot the servant. He  immediately, the letter continues, fled to his father’s residence,  where he still remains unmolested.”—Let it never be forgotten,  that no slaveholder or overseer can be convicted of any outrage perpetrated on the person of a slave, however diabolical it may  be, on the testimony of colored witnesses, whether bond or free.  By the slave code, they are adjudged to be as incompetent to  testify against a white man, as though they were indeed a part of the brute creation. Hence, there is no legal protection in fact,  whatever there may be in form, for the slave population; and  any amount of cruelty may be inflicted on them with impunity. 

xiv PREFACE 

Is it possible for the human mind to conceive of a more horrible  state of society?  

The effect of a religious profession on the conduct of  southern masters is vividly described in the following Narrative,  and shown to be any thing but salutary. In the nature of the case,  it must be in the highest degree pernicious. The testimony of  Mr. DOUGLASS, on this point, is sustained by a cloud of  witnesses, whose veracity is unimpeachable. “A slaveholder’s  profession of Christianity is a palpable imposture. He is a felon  of the highest grade. He is a man-stealer. It is of no importance  what you put in the other scale.”  

Reader! are you with the man-stealers in sympathy and  purpose, or on the side of their down-trodden victims? If with  the former, then are you the foe of God and man. If with the  latter, what are you prepared to do and dare in their behalf? Be  faithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every  yoke, and let the oppressed go free. Come what may—cost what  it may—inscribe on the banner which you unfurl to the breeze,  as your religious and political motto—“NO COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS!”  

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WM. LLOYD GARRISON. 

BOSTON, May 1, 1845.

LETTER 

FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. 

BOSTON, April 22, 1845. 

60

My Dear Friend:  

You remember the old fable of “The Man and  the Lion,” where the lion complained that he should not be so  misrepresented “when the lions wrote history.”  

I am glad the time has come when the “lions write history.”  We have been left long enough to gather the character of  slavery from the involuntary evidence of the masters. One  might, indeed, rest sufficiently satisfied with what, it is evident,  must be, in general, the results of such a relation, without  seeking farther to find whether they have followed in every  instance. Indeed, those who stare at the half-peck of corn a  week, and love to count the lashes on the slave’s back, are  seldom the “stuff” out of which reformers and abolitionists are  to be made. I remember that, in 1838, many were waiting for  the results of the West India experiment, before they could  come into our ranks. Those “results” have come long ago; but,  alas! few of that number have come with them, as converts. A  man must be disposed to judge of emancipation by other tests  than whether it has increased the produce of sugar,—and to hate  slavery for other reasons than because it starves men and whips  women,—before he is ready to lay the first stone of his anti slavery life. 

xvi LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. 

I was glad to learn, in your story, how early the most  neglected of God’s children waken to a sense of their rights, and  of the injustice done them. Experience is a keen teacher; and  long before you had mastered your A B C, or knew where the  “white sails” of the Chesapeake were bound, you began, I see,  to gauge the wretchedness of the slave, not by his hunger and  want, not by his lashes and toil, but by the cruel and blighting  death which gathers over his soul.  

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In connection with this, there is one circumstance which  makes your recollections peculiarly valuable, and renders your  early insight the more remarkable. You come from that part of  the country where we are told slavery appears with its fairest  features. Let us hear, then, what it is at its best estate—gaze on  its bright side, if it has one; and then imagination may task her  powers to add dark lines to the picture, as she travels southward  to that (for the colored man) Valley of the Shadow of Death,  where the Mississippi sweeps along.  

Again, we have known you long, and can put the most  entire confidence in your truth, candor, and sincerity. Every one  who has heard you speak has felt, and, I am confident, every  one who reads your book will feel, persuaded that you give  them a fair specimen of the whole truth. No one-sided  portrait,—no wholesale complaints,—but strict justice done,  whenever individual kindliness has neutralized, for a moment,  the deadly system with which it was strangely allied. You have  been with us, too, some years, and can fairly compare the  twilight of rights, which your race enjoy at the North, with that  “noon of night” under which they labor south of Mason and  Dixon’s line. Tell us whether, after all, the half-free colored  man of Massachusetts is worse off than the pampered slave of  the rice swamps!  

In reading your life, no one can say that we have unfairly  picked out some rare specimens of cruelty. We know that the 

LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. xvii 

bitter drops, which even you have drained from the cup, are no  incidental aggravations, no individual ills, but such as must  mingle always and necessarily in the lot of every slave. They  are the essential ingredients, not the occasional results, of the  system.  

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After all, I shall read your book with trembling for you.  Some years ago, when you were beginning to tell me your real  name and birthplace, you may remember I stopped you, and  preferred to remain ignorant of all. With the exception of a  vague description, so I continued, till the other day, when you  read me your memoirs. I hardly knew, at the time, whether to  thank you or not for the sight of them, when I reflected that it was still dangerous, in Massachusetts, for honest men to tell  their names! They say the fathers, in 1776, signed the  Declaration of Independence with the halter about their necks.  You, too, publish your declaration of freedom with danger  compassing you around. In all the broad lands which the  Constitution of the United States overshadows, there is no  single spot,—however narrow or desolate,—where a fugitive  slave can plant himself and say, “I am safe.” The whole armory  of Northern Law has no shield for you. I am free to say that, in  your place, I should throw the MS. into the fire.  

You, perhaps, may tell your story in safety, endeared as  you are to so many warm hearts by rare gifts, and a still rarer  devotion of them to the service of others. But it will be owing  only to your labors, and the fearless efforts of those who,  trampling the laws and Constitution of the country under their  feet, are determined that they will “hide the outcast,” and that  their hearths shall be, spite of the law, an asylum for the  oppressed, if, some time or other, the humblest may stand in our  streets, and bear witness in safety against the cruelties of which  he has been the victim. 

xviii LETTER FROM WENDELL PHILLIPS, ESQ. 

Yet it is sad to think, that these very throbbing hearts which  welcome your story, and form your best safeguard in telling it,  are all beating contrary to the “statute in such case made and  provided.” Go on, my dear friend, till you, and those who, like  you, have been saved, so as by fire, from the dark prison-house,  shall stereotype these free, illegal pulses into statutes; and New  England, cutting loose from a blood-stained Union, shall glory  in being the house of refuge for the oppressed;—till we no  longer merely “hide the outcast,” or make a merit of standing  idly by while he is hunted in our midst; but, consecrating anew  the soil of the Pilgrims as an asylum for the oppressed, proclaim  our welcome to the slave so loudly, that the tones shall reach  every hut in the Carolinas, and make the broken-hearted  bondman leap up at the thought of old Massachusetts.  

God speed the day! 

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Till then, and ever, 

Yours truly, 

WENDELL PHILLIPS. 

FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

NARRATIVE 

80

OF THE 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 

CHAPTER I. 

I WAS born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and about  twelve miles from Easton, in Talbot county, Maryland. I have  no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any  authentic record containing it. By far the larger part of the  slaves know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs, and  it is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep  their slaves thus ignorant. I do not remember to have ever met a  slave who could tell of his birthday. They seldom come nearer  to it than planting-time, harvest-time, cherry-time, spring-time,  or fall-time. A want of information concerning my own was a  source of unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white  children could tell their ages. I could not tell why I ought to be  deprived of the same privilege. I was not allowed to make any  inquiries of my master concerning it. He deemed all such  inquiries on the part of a slave improper and impertinent, and  evidence of a restless spirit. The nearest estimate I can give  makes me now between twenty-seven and twenty-eight years of  age. I come to this, from hearing my master say, some time  during 1835, I was about seventeen years old.  

My mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was the  daughter of Isaac and Betsey Bailey, both colored, and quite 

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2 NARRATIVE OF THE 

dark. My mother was of a darker complexion than either my  grandmother or grandfather.  

My father was a white man. He was admitted to be such by  all I ever heard speak of my parentage. The opinion was also  whispered that my master was my father; but of the correctness  of this opinion, I know nothing; the means of knowing was  withheld from me. My mother and I were separated when I was  but an infant—before I knew her as my mother. It is a common  custom, in the part of Maryland from which I ran away, to part  children from their mothers at a very early age. Frequently,  before the child has reached its twelfth month, its mother is  taken from it, and hired out on some farm a considerable  distance off, and the child is placed under the care of an old  woman, too old for field labor. For what this separation is done,  I do not know, unless it be to hinder the development of the  child’s affection toward its mother, and to blunt and destroy the  natural affection of the mother for the child. This is the  inevitable result.  

I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than  four or five times in my life; and each of these times was very  short in duration, and at night. She was hired by a Mr. Stewart,  who lived about twelve miles from my home. She made her  journeys to see me in the night, travelling the whole distance on  foot, after the performance of her day’s work. She was a field  hand, and a whipping is the penalty of not being in the field at  sunrise, unless a slave has special permission from his or her  master to the contrary—a permission which they seldom get,  and one that gives to him that gives it the proud name of being a  kind master. I do not recollect of ever seeing my mother by the  light of day. She was with me in the night. She would lie down  with me, and get me to sleep, but long before I waked she was  gone. Very little communication ever took place between us.  Death soon ended what little we could have while she lived, and 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 3 

90

with it her hardships and suffering. She died when I was about  seven years old, on one of my master’s farms, near Lee’s Mill. I  was not allowed to be present during her illness, at her death, or  burial. She was gone long before I knew any thing about it.  Never having enjoyed, to any considerable extent, her soothing  presence, her tender and watchful care, I received the tidings of  her death with much the same emotions I should have probably  felt at the death of a stranger.  

Called thus suddenly away, she left me without the slightest  intimation of who my father was. The whisper that my master  was my father, may or may not be true; and, true or false, it is of  but little consequence to my purpose whilst the fact remains, in  all its glaring odiousness, that slaveholders have ordained, and  by law established, that the children of slave women shall in all  cases follow the condition of their mothers; and this is done too  obviously to administer to their own lusts, and make a  gratification of their wicked desires profitable as well as  pleasurable; for by this cunning arrangement, the slaveholder, in  cases not a few, sustains to his slaves the double relation of  master and father.  

I know of such cases; and it is worthy of remark that such  slaves invariably suffer greater hardships, and have more to  contend with, than others. They are, in the first place, a constant  offence to their mistress. She is ever disposed to find fault with  them; they can seldom do any thing to please her; she is never  better pleased than when she sees them under the lash,  especially when she suspects her husband of showing to his  mulatto children favors which he withholds from his black  slaves. The master is frequently compelled to sell this class of  his slaves, out of deference to the feelings of his white wife;  and, cruel as the deed may strike any one to be, for a man to sell  his own children to human flesh-mongers, it is often the dictate  of humanity for him to do so; for, unless he does this, he must 

4 NARRATIVE OF THE 

not only whip them himself, but must stand by and see one  white son tie up his brother, of but few shades darker  complexion than himself, and ply the gory lash to his naked  back; and if he lisp one word of disapproval, it is set down to  his parental partiality, and only makes a bad matter worse, both  for himself and the slave whom he would protect and defend.  

95

Every year brings with it multitudes of this class of slaves.  It was doubtless in consequence of a knowledge of this fact, that  one great statesman of the south predicted the downfall of  slavery by the inevitable laws of population. Whether this  prophecy is ever fulfilled or not, it is nevertheless plain that a  very different-looking class of people are springing up at the  south, and are now held in slavery, from those originally  brought to this country from Africa; and if their increase do no  other good, it will do away the force of the argument, that God  cursed Ham, and therefore American slavery is right. If the  lineal descendants of Ham are alone to be scripturally enslaved,  it is certain that slavery at the south must soon become  unscriptural; for thousands are ushered into the world, annually,  who, like myself, owe their existence to white fathers, and those  fathers most frequently their own masters.  

I have had two masters. My first master’s name was  Anthony. I do not remember his first name. He was generally  called Captain Anthony—a title which, I presume, he acquired  by sailing a craft on the Chesapeake Bay. He was not  considered a rich slaveholder. He owned two or three farms,  and about thirty slaves. His farms and slaves were under the  care of an overseer. The overseer’s name was Plummer. Mr.  Plummer was a miserable drunkard, a profane swearer, and a  savage monster. He always went armed with a cowskin and a  heavy cudgel. I have known him to cut and slash the women’s  heads so horribly, that even master would be enraged at his  cruelty, and would threaten to whip him if he did not mind 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 5 

himself. Master, however, was not a humane slaveholder. It  required extraordinary barbarity on the part of an overseer to  affect him. He was a cruel man, hardened by a long life of  slaveholding. He would at times seem to take great pleasure in  whipping a slave. I have often been awakened at the dawn of  day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt of mine,  whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back  till she was literally covered with blood. No words, no tears, no prayers, from his gory victim, seemed to move his iron heart  from its bloody purpose. The louder she screamed, the harder he  whipped; and where the blood ran fastest, there he whipped  longest. He would whip her to make her scream, and whip her  to make her hush; and not until overcome by fatigue, would he  cease to swing the blood-clotted cowskin. I remember the first  time I ever witnessed this horrible exhibition. I was quite a  child, but I well remember it. I never shall forget it whilst I  remember any thing. It was the first of a long series of such  outrages, of which I was doomed to be a witness and a  participant. It struck me with awful force. It was the blood stained gate, the entrance to the hell of slavery, through which I  was about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I wish I  could commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld it.  

This occurrence took place very soon after I went to live  with my old master, and under the following circumstances.  Aunt Hester went out one night,—where or for what I do not  know,—and happened to be absent when my master desired her  presence. He had ordered her not to go out evenings, and  warned her that she must never let him catch her in company  with a young man, who was paying attention to her belonging to  Colonel Lloyd. The young man’s name was Ned Roberts,  generally called Lloyd’s Ned. Why master was so careful of  her, may be safely left to conjecture. She was a woman of noble  form, and of graceful proportions, having very few equals, and 

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fewer superiors, in personal appearance, among the colored or  white women of our neighborhood.  

Aunt Hester had not only disobeyed his orders in going out,  but had been found in company with Lloyd’s Ned; which  circumstance, I found, from what he said while whipping her,  was the chief offence. Had he been a man of pure morals  himself, he might have been thought interested in protecting the  innocence of my aunt; but those who knew him will not suspect  him of any such virtue. Before he commenced whipping Aunt  Hester, he took her into the kitchen, and stripped her from neck  to waist, leaving her neck, shoulders, and back, entirely naked.  He then told her to cross her hands, calling her at the same time  a d——d b——h. After crossing her hands, he tied them with a  strong rope, and led her to a stool under a large hook in the  joist, put in for the purpose. He made her get upon the stool, and  tied her hands to the hook. She now stood fair for his infernal  purpose. Her arms were stretched up at their full length, so that  she stood upon the ends of her toes. He then said to her, “Now,  you d——d b——h, I’ll learn you how to disobey my orders!”  and after rolling up his sleeves, he commenced to lay on the  heavy cowskin, and soon the warm, red blood (amid heart rending shrieks from her, and horrid oaths from him) came  dripping to the floor. I was so terrified and horror-stricken at the  sight, that I hid myself in a closet, and dared not venture out till  long after the bloody transaction was over. I expected it would  be my turn next. It was all new to me. I had never seen any  thing like it before. I had always lived with my grandmother on  the outskirts of the plantation, where she was put to raise the  children of the younger women. I had therefore been, until now,  out of the way of the bloody scenes that often occurred on the  plantation.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 7 

CHAPTER II. 

105

MY master’s family consisted of two sons, Andrew and  Richard; one daughter, Lucretia, and her husband, Captain  Thomas Auld. They lived in one house, upon the home  plantation of Colonel Edward Lloyd. My master was Colonel  Lloyd’s clerk and superintendent. He was what might be called  the overseer of the overseers. I spent two years of childhood on  this plantation in my old master’s family. It was here that I  witnessed the bloody transaction recorded in the first chapter;  and as I received my first impressions of slavery on this  plantation, I will give some description of it, and of slavery as it  there existed. The plantation is about twelve miles north of  Easton, in Talbot county, and is situated on the border of Miles  River. The principal products raised upon it were tobacco, corn,  and wheat. These were raised in great abundance; so that, with  the products of this and the other farms belonging to him, he  was able to keep in almost constant employment a large sloop,  in carrying them to market at Baltimore. This sloop was named  Sally Lloyd, in honor of one of the colonel’s daughters. My  master’s son-in-law, Captain Auld, was master of the vessel;  she was otherwise manned by the colonel’s own slaves. Their  names were Peter, Isaac, Rich, and Jake. These were esteemed  very highly by the other slaves, and looked upon as the  privileged ones of the plantation; for it was no small affair, in  the eyes of the slaves, to be allowed to see Baltimore.  

Colonel Lloyd kept from three to four hundred slaves on  his home plantation, and owned a large number more on the  neighboring farms belonging to him. The names of the farms  nearest to the home plantation were Wye Town and New 

8 NARRATIVE OF THE 

Design. “Wye Town” was under the overseership of a man  named Noah Willis. New Design was under the overseership of  a Mr. Townsend. The overseers of these, and all the rest of the  farms, numbering over twenty, received advice and direction  from the managers of the home plantation. This was the great  business place. It was the seat of government for the whole  twenty farms. All disputes among the overseers were settled  here. If a slave was convicted of any high misdemeanor,  became unmanageable, or evinced a determination to run away,  he was brought immediately here, severely whipped, put on  board the sloop, carried to Baltimore, and sold to Austin  Woolfolk, or some other slave-trader, as a warning to the slaves  remaining.  

Here, too, the slaves of all the other farms received their  monthly allowance of food, and their yearly clothing. The men  and women slaves received, as their monthly allowance of food,  eight pounds of pork, or its equivalent in fish, and one bushel of  corn meal. Their yearly clothing consisted of two coarse linen  shirts, one pair of linen trousers, like the shirts, one jacket, one  pair of trousers for winter, made of coarse negro cloth, one pair  of stockings, and one pair of shoes; the whole of which could  not have cost more than seven dollars. The allowance of the  slave children was given to their mothers, or the old women  having the care of them. The children unable to work in the  field had neither shoes, stockings, jackets, nor trousers, given to  them; their clothing consisted of two coarse linen shirts per  year. When these failed them, they went naked until the next  allowance-day. Children from seven to ten years old, of both  sexes, almost naked, might be seen at all seasons of the year.  

110

There were no beds given the slaves, unless one coarse  blanket be considered such, and none but the men and women  had these. This, however, is not considered a very great  privation. They find less difficulty from the want of beds, than 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 9 

from the want of time to sleep; for when their day’s work in the  field is done, the most of them having their washing, mending,  and cooking to do, and having few or none of the ordinary  facilities for doing either of these, very many of their sleeping  hours are consumed in preparing for the field the coming day;  and when this is done, old and young, male and female, married  and single, drop down side by side, on one common bed,—the  cold, damp floor,—each covering himself or herself with their  miserable blankets; and here they sleep till they are summoned  to the field by the driver’s horn. At the sound of this, all must  rise, and be off to the field. There must be no halting; every one  must be at his or her post; and woe betides them who hear not  this morning summons to the field; for if they are not awakened  by the sense of hearing, they are by the sense of feeling: no age  nor sex finds any favor. Mr. Severe, the overseer, used to stand  by the door of the quarter, armed with a large hickory stick and  heavy cowskin, ready to whip any one who was so unfortunate  as not to hear, or, from any other cause, was prevented from  being ready to start for the field at the sound of the horn.  

Mr. Severe was rightly named: he was a cruel man. I have  seen him whip a woman, causing the blood to run half an hour  at the time; and this, too, in the midst of her crying children,  pleading for their mother’s release. He seemed to take pleasure  in manifesting his fiendish barbarity. Added to his cruelty, he  was a profane swearer. It was enough to chill the blood and  stiffen the hair of an ordinary man to hear him talk. Scarce a sentence escaped him but that was commenced or concluded by  some horrid oath. The field was the place to witness his cruelty  and profanity. His presence made it both the field of blood and  of blasphemy. From the rising till the going down of the sun, he  was cursing, raving, cutting, and slashing among the slaves of  the field, in the most frightful manner. His career was short. He  died very soon after I went to Colonel Lloyd’s; and he died as 

10 NARRATIVE OF THE 

115

he lived, uttering, with his dying groans, bitter curses and horrid  oaths. His death was regarded by the slaves as the result of a merciful providence.  

Mr. Severe’s place was filled by a Mr. Hopkins. He was a  very different man. He was less cruel, less profane, and made  less noise, than Mr. Severe. His course was characterized by no  extraordinary demonstrations of cruelty. He whipped, but  seemed to take no pleasure in it. He was called by the slaves a  good overseer.  

The home plantation of Colonel Lloyd wore the appearance  of a country village. All the mechanical operations for all the  farms were performed here. The shoemaking and mending, the  blacksmithing, cartwrighting, coopering, weaving, and grain 

grinding, were all performed by the slaves on the home  plantation. The whole place wore a business-like aspect very  unlike the neighboring farms. The number of houses, too,  conspired to give it advantage over the neighboring farms. It  was called by the slaves the Great House Farm. Few privileges  were esteemed higher, by the slaves of the out-farms, than that  of being selected to do errands at the Great House Farm. It was  associated in their minds with greatness. A representative could  not be prouder of his election to a seat in the American  Congress, than a slave on one of the out-farms would be of his  election to do errands at the Great House Farm. They regarded  it as evidence of great confidence reposed in them by their  overseers; and it was on this account, as well as a constant  desire to be out of the field from under the driver’s lash, that  they esteemed it a high privilege, one worth careful living for.  He was called the smartest and most trusty fellow, who had this  honor conferred upon him the most frequently. The competitors  for this office sought as diligently to please their overseers, as  the office-seekers in the political parties seek to please and  deceive the people. The same traits of character might be seen 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 11 

120

in Colonel Lloyd’s slaves, as are seen in the slaves of the  political parties.  

The slaves selected to go to the Great House Farm, for the  monthly allowance for themselves and their fellow-slaves, were  peculiarly enthusiastic. While on their way, they would make  the dense old woods, for miles around, reverberate with their  wild songs, revealing at once the highest joy and the deepest  sadness. They would compose and sing as they went along,  consulting neither time nor tune. The thought that came up,  came out—if not in the word, in the sound;—and as frequently  in the one as in the other. They would sometimes sing the most  pathetic sentiment in the most rapturous tone, and the most  rapturous sentiment in the most pathetic tone. Into all of their  songs they would manage to weave something of the Great  House Farm. Especially would they do this, when leaving  home. They would then sing most exultingly the following  words:—  

“I am going away to the Great House Farm! 

O, yea! O, yea! O!”  

This they would sing, as a chorus, to words which to many  would seem unmeaning jargon, but which, nevertheless, were  full of meaning to themselves. I have sometimes thought that  the mere hearing of those songs would do more to impress some  minds with the horrible character of slavery, than the reading of  whole volumes of philosophy on the subject could do.  

125

I did not, when a slave, understand the deep meaning of  those rude and apparently incoherent songs. I was myself within  the circle; so that I neither saw nor heard as those without might  see and hear. They told a tale of woe which was then altogether  beyond my feeble comprehension; they were tones loud, long,  and deep; they breathed the prayer and complaint of souls 

12 NARRATIVE OF THE 

boiling over with the bitterest anguish. Every tone was a  testimony against slavery, and a prayer to God for deliverance  from chains. The hearing of those wild notes always depressed  my spirit, and filled me with ineffable sadness. I have  frequently found myself in tears while hearing them. The mere  recurrence to those songs, even now, afflicts me; and while I am  writing these lines, an expression of feeling has already found  its way down my cheek. To those songs I trace my first  glimmering conception of the dehumanizing character of  slavery. I can never get rid of that conception. Those songs still  follow me, to deepen my hatred of slavery, and quicken my  sympathies for my brethren in bonds. If any one wishes to be  impressed with the soul-killing effects of slavery, let him go to  Colonel Lloyd’s plantation, and, on allowance-day, place  himself in the deep pine woods, and there let him, in silence,  analyze the sounds that shall pass through the chambers of his  soul,—and if he is not thus impressed, it will only be because  “there is no flesh in his obdurate heart.”  

I have often been utterly astonished, since I came to the  north, to find persons who could speak of the singing, among  slaves, as evidence of their contentment and happiness. It is  impossible to conceive of a greater mistake. Slaves sing most  when they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave represent  the sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an  aching heart is relieved by its tears. At least, such is my  experience. I have often sung to drown my sorrow, but seldom  to express my happiness. Crying for joy, and singing for joy,  were alike uncommon to me while in the jaws of slavery. The  singing of a man cast away upon a desolate island might be as  appropriately considered as evidence of contentment and  happiness, as the singing of a slave; the songs of the one and of  the other are prompted by the same emotion.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 13 

130

CHAPTER III. 

COLONEL LLOYD kept a large and finely cultivated garden,  which afforded almost constant employment for four men,  besides the chief gardener, (Mr. M’Durmond.) This garden was  probably the greatest attraction of the place. During the summer  months, people came from far and near—from Baltimore,  Easton, and Annapolis—to see it. It abounded in fruits of almost  every description, from the hardy apple of the north to the  delicate orange of the south. This garden was not the least  source of trouble on the plantation. Its excellent fruit was quite  a temptation to the hungry swarms of boys, as well as the older  slaves, belonging to the colonel, few of whom had the virtue or  the vice to resist it. Scarcely a day passed, during the summer,  but that some slave had to take the lash for stealing fruit. The  colonel had to resort to all kinds of stratagems to keep his slaves  out of the garden. The last and most successful one was that of  tarring his fence all around; after which, if a slave was caught  with any tar upon his person, it was deemed sufficient proof that  he had either been into the garden, or had tried to get in. In  either case, he was severely whipped by the chief gardener. This  plan worked well; the slaves became as fearful of tar as of the  lash. They seemed to realize the impossibility of touching tar without being defiled.  

The colonel also kept a splendid riding equipage. His stable  and carriage-house presented the appearance of some of our  large city livery establishments. His horses were of the finest  form and noblest blood. His carriage-house contained three  splendid coaches, three or four gigs, besides dearborns and  barouches of the most fashionable style. 

14 NARRATIVE OF THE 

This establishment was under the care of two slaves—old  Barney and young Barney—father and son. To attend to this  establishment was their sole work. But it was by no means an  easy employment; for in nothing was Colonel Lloyd more  particular than in the management of his horses. The slightest  inattention to these was unpardonable, and was visited upon those, under whose care they were placed, with the severest  punishment; no excuse could shield them, if the colonel only  suspected any want of attention to his horses—a supposition  which he frequently indulged, and one which, of course, made  the office of old and young Barney a very trying one. They  never knew when they were safe from punishment. They were  frequently whipped when least deserving, and escaped  whipping when most deserving it. Every thing depended upon the looks of the horses, and the state of Colonel Lloyd’s own  mind when his horses were brought to him for use. If a horse  did not move fast enough, or hold his head high enough, it was  owing to some fault of his keepers. It was painful to stand near  the stable-door, and hear the various complaints against the  keepers when a horse was taken out for use. “This horse has not  had proper attention. He has not been sufficiently rubbed and  curried, or he has not been properly fed; his food was too wet or  too dry; he got it too soon or too late; he was too hot or too  cold; he had too much hay, and not enough of grain; or he had  too much grain, and not enough of hay; instead of old Barney’s  attending to the horse, he had very improperly left it to his son.”    To all these complaints, no matter how unjust, the slave must  answer never a word. Colonel Lloyd could not brook any  contradiction from a slave. When he spoke, a slave must stand,  listen, and tremble; and such was literally the case. I have seen  Colonel Lloyd make old Barney, a man between fifty and sixty  years of age, uncover his bald head, kneel down upon the cold,  damp ground, and receive upon his naked and toil-worn 

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LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 15 

shoulders more than thirty lashes at the time. Colonel Lloyd had  three sons—Edward, Murray, and Daniel,—and three sons-in law, Mr. Winder, Mr. Nicholson, and Mr. Lowndes. All of these  lived at the Great House Farm, and enjoyed the luxury of  whipping the servants when they pleased, from old Barney  down to William Wilkes, the coach-driver. I have seen Winder  make one of the house-servants stand off from him a suitable  distance to be touched with the end of his whip, and at every  stroke raise great ridges upon his back.  

To describe the wealth of Colonel Lloyd would be almost  equal to describing the riches of Job. He kept from ten to fifteen  house-servants. He was said to own a thousand slaves, and I  think this estimate quite within the truth. Colonel Lloyd owned  so many that he did not know them when he saw them; nor did  all the slaves of the out-farms know him. It is reported of him,  that, while riding along the road one day, he met a colored man,  and addressed him in the usual manner of speaking to colored  people on the public highways of the south: “Well, boy, whom  do you belong to?” “To Colonel Lloyd,” replied the slave.  “Well, does the colonel treat you well?” “No, sir,” was the  ready reply. “What, does he work you too hard?” “Yes, sir.”  “Well, don’t he give you enough to eat?” “Yes, sir, he gives me  enough, such as it is.”  

The colonel, after ascertaining where the slave belonged,  rode on; the man also went on about his business, not dreaming  that he had been conversing with his master. He thought, said,  and heard nothing more of the matter, until two or three weeks  afterwards. The poor man was then informed by his overseer  that, for having found fault with his master, he was now to be  sold to a Georgia trader. He was immediately chained and  handcuffed; and thus, without a moment’s warning, he was  snatched away, and forever sundered, from his family and  friends, by a hand more unrelenting than death. This is the 

16 NARRATIVE OF THE 

140

penalty of telling the truth, of telling the simple truth, in answer  to a series of plain questions.  

It is partly in consequence of such facts, that slaves, when  inquired of as to their condition and the character of their  masters, almost universally say they are contented, and that  their masters are kind. The slaveholders have been known to  send in spies among their slaves, to ascertain their views and  feelings in regard to their condition. The frequency of this has  had the effect to establish among the slaves the maxim, that a  still tongue makes a wise head. They suppress the truth rather  than take the consequences of telling it, and in so doing prove  themselves a part of the human family. If they have any thing to  say of their masters, it is generally in their masters’ favor,  especially when speaking to an untried man. I have been  frequently asked, when a slave, if I had a kind master, and do not remember ever to have given a negative answer; nor did I,  in pursuing this course, consider myself as uttering what was  absolutely false; for I always measured the kindness of my  master by the standard of kindness set up among slaveholders  around us. Moreover, slaves are like other people, and imbibe  prejudices quite common to others. They think their own better  than that of others. Many, under the influence of this prejudice,  think their own masters are better than the masters of other  slaves; and this, too, in some cases, when the very reverse is  true. Indeed, it is not uncommon for slaves even to fall out and  quarrel among themselves about the relative goodness of their  masters, each contending for the superior goodness of his own  over that of the others. At the very same time, they mutually  execrate their masters when viewed separately. It was so on our  plantation. When Colonel Lloyd’s slaves met the slaves of  Jacob Jepson, they seldom parted without a quarrel about their  masters; Colonel Lloyd’s slaves contending that he was the  richest, and Mr. Jepson’s slaves that he was the smartest, and 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 17 

most of a man. Colonel Lloyd’s slaves would boast his ability to  buy and sell Jacob Jepson. Mr. Jepson’s slaves would boast his  ability to whip Colonel Lloyd. These quarrels would almost  always end in a fight between the parties, and those that  whipped were supposed to have gained the point at issue. They  seemed to think that the greatness of their masters was  transferable to themselves. It was considered as being bad  enough to be a slave; but to be a poor man’s slave was deemed  a disgrace indeed!

18 NARRATIVE OF THE 

145

CHAPTER IV. 

MR. HOPKINS remained but a short time in the office of  overseer. Why his career was so short, I do not know, but  suppose he lacked the necessary severity to suit Colonel Lloyd.  Mr. Hopkins was succeeded by Mr. Austin Gore, a man  possessing, in an eminent degree, all those traits of character  indispensable to what is called a first-rate overseer. Mr. Gore  had served Colonel Lloyd, in the capacity of overseer, upon one  of the out-farms, and had shown himself worthy of the high  station of overseer upon the home or Great House Farm.  

Mr. Gore was proud, ambitious, and persevering. He was  artful, cruel, and obdurate. He was just the man for such a place,  and it was just the place for such a man. It afforded scope for  the full exercise of all his powers, and he seemed to be perfectly  at home in it. He was one of those who could torture the  slightest look, word, or gesture, on the part of the slave, into  impudence, and would treat it accordingly. There must be no  answering back to him; no explanation was allowed a slave,  showing himself to have been wrongfully accused. Mr. Gore  acted fully up to the maxim laid down by slaveholders,—“It is  better that a dozen slaves should suffer under the lash, than that  the overseer should be convicted, in the presence of the slaves,  of having been at fault.” No matter how innocent a slave might  be—it availed him nothing, when accused by Mr. Gore of any  misdemeanor. To be accused was to be convicted, and to be  convicted was to be punished; the one always following the  other with immutable certainty. To escape punishment was to  escape accusation; and few slaves had the fortune to do either,  under the overseership of Mr. Gore. He was just proud enough 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 19 

to demand the most debasing homage of the slave, and quite  servile enough to crouch, himself, at the feet of the master. He  was ambitious enough to be contented with nothing short of the  highest rank of overseers, and persevering enough to reach the  height of his ambition. He was cruel enough to inflict the  severest punishment, artful enough to descend to the lowest  trickery, and obdurate enough to be insensible to the voice of a  reproving conscience. He was, of all the overseers, the most  dreaded by the slaves. His presence was painful; his eye flashed  confusion; and seldom was his sharp, shrill voice heard, without  producing horror and trembling in their ranks.  

150

Mr. Gore was a grave man, and, though a young man, he  indulged in no jokes, said no funny words, seldom smiled. His  words were in perfect keeping with his looks, and his looks  were in perfect keeping with his words. Overseers will  sometimes indulge in a witty word, even with the slaves; not so  with Mr. Gore. He spoke but to command, and commanded but  to be obeyed; he dealt sparingly with his words, and bountifully  with his whip, never using the former where the latter would  answer as well. When he whipped, he seemed to do so from a  sense of duty, and feared no consequences. He did nothing  reluctantly, no matter how disagreeable; always at his post,  never inconsistent. He never promised but to fulfil. He was, in a  word, a man of the most inflexible firmness and stone-like  coolness.  

His savage barbarity was equalled only by the consummate  coolness with which he committed the grossest and most savage  deeds upon the slaves under his charge. Mr. Gore once  undertook to whip one of Colonel Lloyd’s slaves, by the name  of Demby. He had given Demby but few stripes, when, to get  rid of the scourging, he ran and plunged himself into a creek,  and stood there at the depth of his shoulders, refusing to come  out. Mr. Gore told him that he would give him three calls, and 

20 NARRATIVE OF THE 

that, if he did not come out at the third call, he would shoot him.  The first call was given. Demby made no response, but stood  his ground. The second and third calls were given with the same  result. Mr. Gore then, without consultation or deliberation with  any one, not even giving Demby an additional call, raised his  musket to his face, taking deadly aim at his standing victim, and  in an instant poor Demby was no more. His mangled body sank  out of sight, and blood and brains marked the water where he  had stood.  

A thrill of horror flashed through every soul upon the  plantation, excepting Mr. Gore. He alone seemed cool and  collected. He was asked by Colonel Lloyd and my old master,  why he resorted to this extraordinary expedient. His reply was,  (as well as I can remember,) that Demby had become  unmanageable. He was setting a dangerous example to the other  slaves,—one which, if suffered to pass without some such  demonstration on his part, would finally lead to the total  subversion of all rule and order upon the plantation. He argued  that if one slave refused to be corrected, and escaped with his  life, the other slaves would soon copy the example; the result of  which would be, the freedom of the slaves, and the enslavement  of the whites. Mr. Gore’s defence was satisfactory. He was  continued in his station as overseer upon the home plantation.  His fame as an overseer went abroad. His horrid crime was not  even submitted to judicial investigation. It was committed in the presence of slaves, and they of course could neither institute a suit, nor testify against him; and thus the guilty perpetrator of  one of the bloodiest and most foul murders goes unwhipped of  justice, and uncensured by the community in which he lives.  Mr. Gore lived in St. Michael’s, Talbot county, Maryland, when  I left there; and if he is still alive, he very probably lives there  now; and if so, he is now, as he was then, as highly esteemed 

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LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 21 

and as much respected as though his guilty soul had not been  stained with his brother’s blood.  

I speak advisedly when I say this,—that killing a slave, or  any colored person, in Talbot county, Maryland, is not treated  as a crime, either by the courts or the community. Mr. Thomas  Lanman, of St. Michael’s, killed two slaves, one of whom he  killed with a hatchet, by knocking his brains out. He used to  boast of the commission of the awful and bloody deed. I have  heard him do so laughingly, saying, among other things, that he  was the only benefactor of his country in the company, and that  when others would do as much as he had done, we should be  relieved of “the d——d niggers.”  

The wife of Mr. Giles Hicks, living but a short distance  from where I used to live, murdered my wife’s cousin, a young  girl between fifteen and sixteen years of age, mangling her  person in the most horrible manner, breaking her nose and  breastbone with a stick, so that the poor girl expired in a few  hours afterward. She was immediately buried, but had not been  in her untimely grave but a few hours before she was taken up and examined by the coroner, who decided that she had come to  her death by severe beating. The offence for which this girl was  thus murdered was this:—She had been set that night to mind  Mrs. Hicks’s baby, and during the night she fell asleep, and the  baby cried. She, having lost her rest for several nights previous,  did not hear the crying. They were both in the room with Mrs.  Hicks. Mrs. Hicks, finding the girl slow to move, jumped from  her bed, seized an oak stick of wood by the fireplace, and with it  broke the girl’s nose and breastbone, and thus ended her life. I  will not say that this most horrid murder produced no sensation  in the community. It did produce sensation, but not enough to  bring the murderess to punishment. There was a warrant issued  for her arrest, but it was never served. Thus she escaped not 

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only punishment, but even the pain of being arraigned before a  court for her horrid crime.  

Whilst I am detailing bloody deeds which took place during  my stay on Colonel Lloyd’s plantation, I will briefly narrate  another, which occurred about the same time as the murder of  Demby by Mr. Gore.  

Colonel Lloyd’s slaves were in the habit of spending a part  of their nights and Sundays in fishing for oysters, and in this  way made up the deficiency of their scanty allowance. An old  man belonging to Colonel Lloyd, while thus engaged, happened  to get beyond the limits of Colonel Lloyd’s, and on the premises  of Mr. Beal Bondly. At this trespass, Mr. Bondly took offence,  and with his musket came down to the shore, and blew its  deadly contents into the poor old man.  

Mr. Bondly came over to see Colonel Lloyd the next day,  whether to pay him for his property, or to justify himself in  what he had done, I know not. At any rate, this whole fiendish  transaction was soon hushed up. There was very little said about  it at all, and nothing done. It was a common saying, even among  little white boys, that it was worth a half-cent to kill a “nigger,”  and a half-cent to bury one.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 23 

165

CHAPTER V. 

AS to my own treatment while I lived on Colonel Lloyd’s  plantation, it was very similar to that of the other slave children.  I was not old enough to work in the field, and there being little  else than field work to do, I had a great deal of leisure time. The  most I had to do was to drive up the cows at evening, keep the  fowls out of the garden, keep the front yard clean, and run of  errands for my old master’s daughter, Mrs. Lucretia Auld. The  most of my leisure time I spent in helping Master Daniel Lloyd  in finding his birds, after he had shot them. My connection with  Master Daniel was of some advantage to me. He became quite  attached to me, and was a sort of protector of me. He would not  allow the older boys to impose upon me, and would divide his  cakes with me.  

I was seldom whipped by my old master, and suffered little  from any thing else than hunger and cold. I suffered much from  hunger, but much more from cold. In hottest summer and  coldest winter, I was kept almost naked—no shoes, no 

stockings, no jacket, no trousers, nothing on but a coarse tow  linen shirt, reaching only to my knees. I had no bed. I must have  perished with cold, but that, the coldest nights, I used to steal a  bag which was used for carrying corn to the mill. I would crawl  into this bag, and there sleep on the cold, damp, clay floor, with  my head in and feet out. My feet have been so cracked with the  frost, that the pen with which I am writing might be laid in the  gashes.  

We were not regularly allowanced. Our food was coarse  corn meal boiled. This was called mush. It was put into a large  wooden tray or trough, and set down upon the ground. The 

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children were then called, like so many pigs, and like so many  pigs they would come and devour the mush; some with oyster shells, others with pieces of shingle, some with naked hands,  and none with spoons. He that ate fastest got most; he that was  strongest secured the best place; and few left the trough  satisfied.  

I was probably between seven and eight years old when I  left Colonel Lloyd’s plantation. I left it with joy. I shall never  forget the ecstasy with which I received the intelligence that my  old master (Anthony) had determined to let me go to Baltimore,  to live with Mr. Hugh Auld, brother to my old master’s son-in 

law, Captain Thomas Auld. I received this information about  three days before my departure. They were three of the happiest  days I ever enjoyed. I spent the most part of all these three days  in the creek, washing off the plantation scurf, and preparing  myself for my departure.  

The pride of appearance which this would indicate was not  my own. I spent the time in washing, not so much because I  wished to, but because Mrs. Lucretia had told me I must get all  the dead skin off my feet and knees before I could go to  Baltimore; for the people in Baltimore were very cleanly, and  would laugh at me if I looked dirty. Besides, she was going to  give me a pair of trousers, which I should not put on unless I  got all the dirt off me. The thought of owning a pair of trousers  was great indeed! It was almost a sufficient motive, not only to  make me take off what would be called by pig-drovers the  mange, but the skin itself. I went at it in good earnest, working  for the first time with the hope of reward.  

175

The ties that ordinarily bind children to their homes were  all suspended in my case. I found no severe trial in my  departure. My home was charmless; it was not home to me; on  parting from it, I could not feel that I was leaving any thing  which I could have enjoyed by staying. My mother was dead, 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 25 

my grandmother lived far off, so that I seldom saw her. I had  two sisters and one brother, that lived in the same house with  me; but the early separation of us from our mother had well  nigh blotted the fact of our relationship from our memories. I  looked for home elsewhere, and was confident of finding none  which I should relish less than the one which I was leaving. If,  however, I found in my new home hardship, hunger, whipping,  and nakedness, I had the consolation that I should not have  escaped any one of them by staying. Having already had more  than a taste of them in the house of my old master, and having  endured them there, I very naturally inferred my ability to  endure them elsewhere, and especially at Baltimore; for I had  something of the feeling about Baltimore that is expressed in  the proverb, that “being hanged in England is preferable to  dying a natural death in Ireland.” I had the strongest desire to  see Baltimore. Cousin Tom, though not fluent in speech, had  inspired me with that desire by his eloquent description of the  place. I could never point out any thing at the Great House, no  matter how beautiful or powerful, but that he had seen  something at Baltimore far exceeding, both in beauty and  strength, the object which I pointed out to him. Even the Great House itself, with all its pictures, was far inferior to many  buildings in Baltimore. So strong was my desire, that I thought  a gratification of it would fully compensate for whatever loss of  comforts I should sustain by the exchange. I left without a  regret, and with the highest hopes of future happiness.  

We sailed out of Miles River for Baltimore on a Saturday  morning. I remember only the day of the week, for at that time I  had no knowledge of the days of the month, nor the months of  the year. On setting sail, I walked aft, and gave to Colonel  Lloyd’s plantation what I hoped would be the last look. I then  placed myself in the bows of the sloop, and there spent the 

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remainder of the day in looking ahead, interesting myself in  what was in the distance rather than in things near by or behind.  In the afternoon of that day, we reached Annapolis, the  capital of the State. We stopped but a few moments, so that I  had no time to go on shore. It was the first large town that I had  ever seen, and though it would look small compared with some  of our New England factory villages, I thought it a wonderful  place for its size—more imposing even than the Great House  Farm!  

We arrived at Baltimore early on Sunday morning, landing  at Smith’s Wharf, not far from Bowley’s Wharf. We had on  board the sloop a large flock of sheep; and after aiding in  driving them to the slaughterhouse of Mr. Curtis on Louden  Slater’s Hill, I was conducted by Rich, one of the hands  belonging on board of the sloop, to my new home in Alliciana  Street, near Mr. Gardner’s ship-yard, on Fells Point.  

Mr. and Mrs. Auld were both at home, and met me at the  door with their little son Thomas, to take care of whom I had  been given. And here I saw what I had never seen before; it was  a white face beaming with the most kindly emotions; it was the  face of my new mistress, Sophia Auld. I wish I could describe  the rapture that flashed through my soul as I beheld it. It was a  new and strange sight to me, brightening up my pathway with  the light of happiness. Little Thomas was told, there was his  Freddy,—and I was told to take care of little Thomas; and thus I  entered upon the duties of my new home with the most cheering  prospect ahead.  

I look upon my departure from Colonel Lloyd’s plantation  as one of the most interesting events of my life. It is possible,  and even quite probable, that but for the mere circumstance of  being removed from that plantation to Baltimore, I should have  to-day, instead of being here seated by my own table, in the  enjoyment of freedom and the happiness of home, writing this 

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185

Narrative, been confined in the galling chains of slavery. Going  to live at Baltimore laid the foundation, and opened the  gateway, to all my subsequent prosperity. I have ever regarded  it as the first plain manifestation of that kind providence which  has ever since attended me, and marked my life with so many  favors. I regarded the selection of myself as being somewhat  remarkable. There were a number of slave children that might  have been sent from the plantation to Baltimore. There were  those younger, those older, and those of the same age. I was  chosen from among them all, and was the first, last, and only  choice.  

I may be deemed superstitious, and even egotistical, in  regarding this event as a special interposition of divine  Providence in my favor. But I should be false to the earliest  sentiments of my soul, if I suppressed the opinion. I prefer to be  true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of  others, rather than to be false, and incur my own abhorrence.  From my earliest recollection, I date the entertainment of a deep  conviction that slavery would not always be able to hold me  within its foul embrace; and in the darkest hours of my career in  slavery, this living word of faith and spirit of hope departed not  from me, but remained like ministering angels to cheer me  through the gloom. This good spirit was from God, and to him I  offer thanksgiving and praise.

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CHAPTER VI. 

MY new mistress proved to be all she appeared when I first  met her at the door,—a woman of the kindest heart and finest  feelings. She had never had a slave under her control previously  to myself, and prior to her marriage she had been dependent  upon her own industry for a living. She was by trade a weaver;  and by constant application to her business, she had been in a  good degree preserved from the blighting and dehumanizing  effects of slavery. I was utterly astonished at her goodness. I  scarcely knew how to behave towards her. She was entirely  unlike any other white woman I had ever seen. I could not  approach her as I was accustomed to approach other white  ladies. My early instruction was all out of place. The crouching  servility, usually so acceptable a quality in a slave, did not  answer when manifested toward her. Her favor was not gained  by it; she seemed to be disturbed by it. She did not deem it  impudent or unmannerly for a slave to look her in the face. The  meanest slave was put fully at ease in her presence, and none  left without feeling better for having seen her. Her face was  made of heavenly smiles, and her voice of tranquil music.  

190

But, alas! this kind heart had but a short time to remain  such. The fatal poison of irresponsible power was already in her  hands, and soon commenced its infernal work. That cheerful  eye, under the influence of slavery, soon became red with rage;  that voice, made all of sweet accord, changed to one of harsh  and horrid discord; and that angelic face gave place to that of a  demon.  

Very soon after I went to live with Mr. and Mrs. Auld, she  very kindly commenced to teach me the A, B, C. After I had 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 29 

learned this, she assisted me in learning to spell words of three  or four letters. Just at this point of my progress, Mr. Auld found  out what was going on, and at once forbade Mrs. Auld to  instruct me further, telling her, among other things, that it was  unlawful, as well as unsafe, to teach a slave to read. To use his  own words, further, he said, “If you give a nigger an inch, he  will take an ell. A nigger should know nothing but to obey his  master—to do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best  nigger in the world. Now,” said he, “if you teach that nigger  (speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping  him. It would forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once  become unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As to  himself, it could do him no good, but a great deal of harm. It  would make him discontented and unhappy.” These words sank  deep into my heart, stirred up sentiments within that lay  slumbering, and called into existence an entirely new train of  thought. It was a new and special revelation, explaining dark  and mysterious things, with which my youthful understanding  had struggled, but struggled in vain. I now understood what had  been to me a most perplexing difficulty—to wit, the white  man’s power to enslave the black man. It was a grand  achievement, and I prized it highly. From that moment, I  understood the pathway from slavery to freedom. It was just  what I wanted, and I got it at a time when I the least expected it.  Whilst I was saddened by the thought of losing the aid of my  kind mistress, I was gladdened by the invaluable instruction  which, by the merest accident, I had gained from my master.  Though conscious of the difficulty of learning without a  teacher, I set out with high hope, and a fixed purpose, at  whatever cost of trouble, to learn how to read. The very decided  manner with which he spoke, and strove to impress his wife  with the evil consequences of giving me instruction, served to  convince me that he was deeply sensible of the truths he was 

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uttering. It gave me the best assurance that I might rely with the  utmost confidence on the results which, he said, would flow  from teaching me to read. What he most dreaded, that I most  desired. What he most loved, that I most hated. That which to  him was a great evil, to be carefully shunned, was to me a great  good, to be diligently sought; and the argument which he so  warmly urged, against my learning to read, only served to  inspire me with a desire and determination to learn. In learning  to read, I owe almost as much to the bitter opposition of my  master, as to the kindly aid of my mistress. I acknowledge the  benefit of both.  

I had resided but a short time in Baltimore before I  observed a marked difference, in the treatment of slaves, from  that which I had witnessed in the country. A city slave is almost  a freeman, compared with a slave on the plantation. He is much  better fed and clothed, and enjoys privileges altogether  unknown to the slave on the plantation. There is a vestige of  decency, a sense of shame, that does much to curb and check  those outbreaks of atrocious cruelty so commonly enacted upon  the plantation. He is a desperate slaveholder, who will shock the  humanity of his non-slaveholding neighbors with the cries of  his lacerated slave. Few are willing to incur the odium attaching  to the reputation of being a cruel master; and above all things,  they would not be known as not giving a slave enough to eat.  Every city slaveholder is anxious to have it known of him, that  he feeds his slaves well; and it is due to them to say, that most  of them do give their slaves enough to eat. There are, however,  some painful exceptions to this rule. Directly opposite to us, on  Philpot Street, lived Mr. Thomas Hamilton. He owned two  slaves. Their names were Henrietta and Mary. Henrietta was  about twenty-two years of age, Mary was about fourteen; and of  all the mangled and emaciated creatures I ever looked upon,  these two were the most so. His heart must be harder than stone, 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 31 

that could look upon these unmoved. The head, neck, and  shoulders of Mary were literally cut to pieces. I have frequently  felt her head, and found it nearly covered with festering sores,  caused by the lash of her cruel mistress. I do not know that her  master ever whipped her, but I have been an eye-witness to the  cruelty of Mrs. Hamilton. I used to be in Mr. Hamilton’s house  nearly every day. Mrs. Hamilton used to sit in a large chair in  the middle of the room, with a heavy cowskin always by her  side, and scarce an hour passed during the day but was marked  by the blood of one of these slaves. The girls seldom passed her  without her saying, “Move faster, you black gip!” at the same  time giving them a blow with the cowskin over the head or  shoulders, often drawing the blood. She would then say, “Take  that, you black gip!”—continuing, “If you don’t move faster,  I’ll move you!” Added to the cruel lashings to which these  slaves were subjected, they were kept nearly half-starved. They  seldom knew what it was to eat a full meal. I have seen Mary  contending with the pigs for the offal thrown into the street. So  much was Mary kicked and cut to pieces, that she was oftener  called “pecked” than by her name.

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200

CHAPTER VII. 

I LIVED in Master Hugh’s family about seven years. During  this time, I succeeded in learning to read and write. In  accomplishing this, I was compelled to resort to various  stratagems. I had no regular teacher. My mistress, who had  kindly commenced to instruct me, had, in compliance with the  advice and direction of her husband, not only ceased to instruct,  but had set her face against my being instructed by any one else.  It is due, however, to my mistress to say of her, that she did not  adopt this course of treatment immediately. She at first lacked  the depravity indispensable to shutting me up in mental  darkness. It was at least necessary for her to have some training  in the exercise of irresponsible power, to make her equal to the  task of treating me as though I were a brute.  

My mistress was, as I have said, a kind and tender-hearted  woman; and in the simplicity of her soul she commenced, when  I first went to live with her, to treat me as she supposed one  human being ought to treat another. In entering upon the duties  of a slaveholder, she did not seem to perceive that I sustained to  her the relation of a mere chattel, and that for her to treat me as  a human being was not only wrong, but dangerously so. Slavery  proved as injurious to her as it did to me. When I went there,  she was a pious, warm, and tender-hearted woman. There was  no sorrow or suffering for which she had not a tear. She had  bread for the hungry, clothes for the naked, and comfort for  every mourner that came within her reach. Slavery soon proved  its ability to divest her of these heavenly qualities. Under its  influence, the tender heart became stone, and the lamblike  disposition gave way to one of tiger-like fierceness. The first 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 33 

step in her downward course was in her ceasing to instruct me.  She now commenced to practise her husband’s precepts. She  finally became even more violent in her opposition than her  husband himself. She was not satisfied with simply doing as  well as he had commanded; she seemed anxious to do better.  Nothing seemed to make her more angry than to see me with a  newspaper. She seemed to think that here lay the danger. I have  had her rush at me with a face made all up of fury, and snatch  from me a newspaper, in a manner that fully revealed her  apprehension. She was an apt woman; and a little experience  soon demonstrated, to her satisfaction, that education and  slavery were incompatible with each other.  

205

From this time I was most narrowly watched. If I was in a  separate room any considerable length of time, I was sure to be  suspected of having a book, and was at once called to give an  account of myself. All this, however, was too late. The first step  had been taken. Mistress, in teaching me the alphabet, had given  me the inch, and no precaution could prevent me from taking  the ell.  

The plan which I adopted, and the one by which I was most  successful, was that of making friends of all the little white boys  whom I met in the street. As many of these as I could, I  converted into teachers. With their kindly aid, obtained at  different times and in different places, I finally succeeded in  learning to read. When I was sent of errands, I always took my  book with me, and by going one part of my errand quickly, I  found time to get a lesson before my return. I used also to carry  bread with me, enough of which was always in the house, and  to which I was always welcome; for I was much better off in  this regard than many of the poor white children in our  neighborhood. This bread I used to bestow upon the hungry  little urchins, who, in return, would give me that more valuable  bread of knowledge. I am strongly tempted to give the names of 

34 NARRATIVE OF THE 

two or three of those little boys, as a testimonial of the gratitude  and affection I bear them; but prudence forbids;—not that it would injure me, but it might embarrass them; for it is almost  an unpardonable offence to teach slaves to read in this Christian  country. It is enough to say of the dear little fellows, that they  lived on Philpot Street, very near Durgin and Bailey’s ship 

yard. I used to talk this matter of slavery over with them. I  would sometimes say to them, I wished I could be as free as  they would be when they got to be men. “You will be free as  soon as you are twenty-one, but I am a slave for life! Have not I  as good a right to be free as you have?” These words used to  trouble them; they would express for me the liveliest sympathy,  and console me with the hope that something would occur by  which I might be free.  

210

I was now about twelve years old, and the thought of being  a slave for life began to bear heavily upon my heart. Just about  this time, I got hold of a book entitled “The Columbian Orator.”  Every opportunity I got, I used to read this book. Among much  of other interesting matter, I found in it a dialogue between a  master and his slave. The slave was represented as having run  away from his master three times. The dialogue represented the  conversation which took place between them, when the slave  was retaken the third time. In this dialogue, the whole argument  in behalf of slavery was brought forward by the master, all of  which was disposed of by the slave. The slave was made to say  some very smart as well as impressive things in reply to his  master—things which had the desired though unexpected effect;  for the conversation resulted in the voluntary emancipation of  the slave on the part of the master.  

In the same book, I met with one of Sheridan’s mighty  speeches on and in behalf of Catholic emancipation. These were  choice documents to me. I read them over and over again with  unabated interest. They gave tongue to interesting thoughts of 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 35 

my own soul, which had frequently flashed through my mind,  and died away for want of utterance. The moral which I gained  from the dialogue was the power of truth over the conscience of  even a slaveholder. What I got from Sheridan was a bold  denunciation of slavery, and a powerful vindication of human  rights. The reading of these documents enabled me to utter my thoughts, and to meet the arguments brought forward to sustain  slavery; but while they relieved me of one difficulty, they  brought on another even more painful than the one of which I  was relieved. The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and  detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a  band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone  to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land  reduced us to slavery. I loathed them as being the meanest as  well as the most wicked of men. As I read and contemplated the  subject, behold! that very discontentment which Master Hugh  had predicted would follow my learning to read had already  come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I  writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had  been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of  my wretched condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes  to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In  moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their  stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast. I preferred the  condition of the meanest reptile to my own. Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting  thinking of my condition that tormented me. There was no  getting rid of it. It was pressed upon me by every object within  sight or hearing, animate or inanimate. The silver trump of  freedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness. Freedom  now appeared, to disappear no more forever. It was heard in  every sound, and seen in every thing. It was ever present to  torment me with a sense of my wretched condition. I saw 

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nothing without seeing it, I heard nothing without hearing it,  and felt nothing without feeling it. It looked from every star, it  smiled in every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in  every storm.  

I often found myself regretting my own existence, and  wishing myself dead; and but for the hope of being free, I have  no doubt but that I should have killed myself, or done  something for which I should have been killed. While in this  state of mind, I was eager to hear any one speak of slavery. I  was a ready listener. Every little while, I could hear something  about the abolitionists. It was some time before I found what the  word meant. It was always used in such connections as to make  it an interesting word to me. If a slave ran away and succeeded  in getting clear, or if a slave killed his master, set fire to a barn,  or did any thing very wrong in the mind of a slaveholder, it was  spoken of as the fruit of abolition. Hearing the word in this  connection very often, I set about learning what it meant. The  dictionary afforded me little or no help. I found it was “the act  of abolishing;” but then I did not know what was to be  abolished. Here I was perplexed. I did not dare to ask any one  about its meaning, for I was satisfied that it was something they  wanted me to know very little about. After a patient waiting, I  got one of our city papers, containing an account of the number  of petitions from the north, praying for the abolition of slavery  in the District of Columbia, and of the slave trade between the  States. From this time I understood the words abolition and  abolitionist, and always drew near when that word was spoken,  expecting to hear something of importance to myself and  fellow-slaves. The light broke in upon me by degrees. I went  one day down on the wharf of Mr. Waters; and seeing two  Irishmen unloading a scow of stone, I went, unasked, and  helped them. When we had finished, one of them came to me  and asked me if I were a slave. I told him I was. He asked, “Are 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 37 

ye a slave for life?” I told him that I was. The good Irishman  seemed to be deeply affected by the statement. He said to the  other that it was a pity so fine a little fellow as myself should be  a slave for life. He said it was a shame to hold me. They both  advised me to run away to the north; that I should find friends  there, and that I should be free. I pretended not to be interested  in what they said, and treated them as if I did not understand  them; for I feared they might be treacherous. White men have  been known to encourage slaves to escape, and then, to get the  reward, catch them and return them to their masters. I was  afraid that these seemingly good men might use me so; but I  nevertheless remembered their advice, and from that time I  resolved to run away. I looked forward to a time at which it  would be safe for me to escape. I was too young to think of  doing so immediately; besides, I wished to learn how to write,  as I might have occasion to write my own pass. I consoled  myself with the hope that I should one day find a good chance.  Meanwhile, I would learn to write.  

The idea as to how I might learn to write was suggested to  me by being in Durgin and Bailey’s ship-yard, and frequently  seeing the ship carpenters, after hewing, and getting a piece of  timber ready for use, write on the timber the name of that part  of the ship for which it was intended. When a piece of timber  was intended for the larboard side, it would be marked thus— “L.” When a piece was for the starboard side, it would be  marked thus—“S.” A piece for the larboard side forward, would  be marked thus—“L. F.” When a piece was for starboard side  forward, it would be marked thus—“S. F.” For larboard aft, it  would be marked thus—“L. A.” For starboard aft, it would be  marked thus—“S. A.” I soon learned the names of these letters,  and for what they were intended when placed upon a piece of  timber in the ship-yard. I immediately commenced copying  them, and in a short time was able to make the four letters 

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named. After that, when I met with any boy who I knew could  write, I would tell him I could write as well as he. The next  word would be, “I don’t believe you. Let me see you try it.” I  would then make the letters which I had been so fortunate as to  learn, and ask him to beat that. In this way I got a good many  lessons in writing, which it is quite possible I should never have  gotten in any other way. During this time, my copy-book was  the board fence, brick wall, and pavement; my pen and ink was  a lump of chalk. With these, I learned mainly how to write. I  then commenced and continued copying the Italics in Webster’s  Spelling Book, until I could make them all without looking on  the book. By this time, my little Master Thomas had gone to  school, and learned how to write, and had written over a number  of copy-books. These had been brought home, and shown to  some of our near neighbors, and then laid aside. My mistress  used to go to class meeting at the Wilk Street meetinghouse  every Monday afternoon, and leave me to take care of the  house. When left thus, I used to spend the time in writing in the  spaces left in Master Thomas’s copy-book, copying what he had  written. I continued to do this until I could write a hand very  similar to that of Master Thomas. Thus, after a long, tedious  effort for years, I finally succeeded in learning how to write.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 39 

CHAPTER VIII. 

IN a very short time after I went to live at Baltimore, my  old master’s youngest son Richard died; and in about three  years and six months after his death, my old master, Captain  Anthony, died, leaving only his son, Andrew, and daughter,  Lucretia, to share his estate. He died while on a visit to see his  daughter at Hillsborough. Cut off thus unexpectedly, he left no  will as to the disposal of his property. It was therefore necessary  to have a valuation of the property, that it might be equally  divided between Mrs. Lucretia and Master Andrew. I was  immediately sent for, to be valued with the other property. Here  again my feelings rose up in detestation of slavery. I had now a  new conception of my degraded condition. Prior to this, I had  become, if not insensible to my lot, at least partly so. I left  Baltimore with a young heart overborne with sadness, and a  soul full of apprehension. I took passage with Captain Rowe, in  the schooner Wild Cat, and, after a sail of about twenty-four  hours, I found myself near the place of my birth. I had now been  absent from it almost, if not quite, five years. I, however,  remembered the place very well. I was only about five years old  when I left it, to go and live with my old master on Colonel  Lloyd’s plantation; so that I was now between ten and eleven  years old.  

225

We were all ranked together at the valuation. Men and  women, old and young, married and single, were ranked with  horses, sheep, and swine. There were horses and men, cattle and  women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale  of being, and were all subjected to the same narrow  examination. Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth, maids and 

40 NARRATIVE OF THE 

matrons, had to undergo the same indelicate inspection. At this  moment, I saw more clearly than ever the brutalizing effects of  slavery upon both slave and slaveholder.  

After the valuation, then came the division. I have no  language to express the high excitement and deep anxiety which  were felt among us poor slaves during this time. Our fate for life  was now to be decided. We had no more voice in that decision  than the brutes among whom we were ranked. A single word  from the white men was enough—against all our wishes,  prayers, and entreaties—to sunder forever the dearest friends,  dearest kindred, and strongest ties known to human beings. In  addition to the pain of separation, there was the horrid dread of  falling into the hands of Master Andrew. He was known to us  all as being a most cruel wretch,—a common drunkard, who  had, by his reckless mismanagement and profligate dissipation,  already wasted a large portion of his father’s property. We all  felt that we might as well be sold at once to the Georgia traders,  as to pass into his hands; for we knew that that would be our  inevitable condition,—a condition held by us all in the utmost  horror and dread.  

I suffered more anxiety than most of my fellow-slaves. I  had known what it was to be kindly treated; they had known  nothing of the kind. They had seen little or nothing of the world.  They were in very deed men and women of sorrow, and  acquainted with grief. Their backs had been made familiar with  the bloody lash, so that they had become callous; mine was yet  tender; for while at Baltimore I got few whippings, and few  slaves could boast of a kinder master and mistress than myself;  and the thought of passing out of their hands into those of  Master Andrew—a man who, but a few days before, to give me  a sample of his bloody disposition, took my little brother by the  throat, threw him on the ground, and with the heel of his boot  stamped upon his head till the blood gushed from his nose and 

230

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 41 

ears—was well calculated to make me anxious as to my fate.  After he had committed this savage outrage upon my brother, he  turned to me, and said that was the way he meant to serve me  one of these days,—meaning, I suppose, when I came into his  possession.  

Thanks to a kind Providence, I fell to the portion of Mrs.  Lucretia, and was sent immediately back to Baltimore, to live  again in the family of Master Hugh. Their joy at my return  equalled their sorrow at my departure. It was a glad day to me. I  had escaped a worse than lion’s jaws. I was absent from  Baltimore, for the purpose of valuation and division, just about  one month, and it seemed to have been six.  

Very soon after my return to Baltimore, my mistress,  Lucretia, died, leaving her husband and one child, Amanda; and  in a very short time after her death, Master Andrew died. Now  all the property of my old master, slaves included, was in the  hands of strangers,—strangers who had had nothing to do with  accumulating it. Not a slave was left free. All remained slaves,  from the youngest to the oldest. If any one thing in my  experience, more than another, served to deepen my conviction  of the infernal character of slavery, and to fill me with  unutterable loathing of slaveholders, it was their base  ingratitude to my poor old grandmother. She had served my old  master faithfully from youth to old age. She had been the source  of all his wealth; she had peopled his plantation with slaves; she  had become a great grandmother in his service. She had rocked  him in infancy, attended him in childhood, served him through  life, and at his death wiped from his icy brow the cold death sweat, and closed his eyes forever. She was nevertheless left a  slave—a slave for life—a slave in the hands of strangers; and in  their hands she saw her children, her grandchildren, and her  great-grandchildren, divided, like so many sheep, without being  gratified with the small privilege of a single word, as to their or 

42 NARRATIVE OF THE 

235

her own destiny. And, to cap the climax of their base ingratitude  and fiendish barbarity, my grandmother, who was now very old,  having outlived my old master and all his children, having seen  the beginning and end of all of them, and her present owners  finding she was of but little value, her frame already racked  with the pains of old age, and complete helplessness fast  stealing over her once active limbs, they took her to the woods,  built her a little hut, put up a little mud-chimney, and then made  her welcome to the privilege of supporting herself there in  perfect loneliness; thus virtually turning her out to die! If my  poor old grandmother now lives, she lives to suffer in utter  loneliness; she lives to remember and mourn over the loss of  children, the loss of grandchildren, and the loss of great grandchildren. They are, in the language of the slave’s poet,  Whittier,—  

“Gone, gone, sold and gone 

To the rice swamp dank and lone, 

Where the slave-whip ceaseless swings, 

Where the noisome insect stings, 

240

Where the fever-demon strews 

Poison with the falling dews, 

Where the sickly sunbeams glare 

Through the hot and misty air:— 

 Gone, gone, sold and gone 

245

 To the rice swamp dank and lone, 

 From Virginia hills and waters— 

 Woe is me, my stolen daughters!” 

The hearth is desolate. The children, the unconscious  children, who once sang and danced in her presence, are gone.  She gropes her way, in the darkness of age, for a drink of water.  Instead of the voices of her children, she hears by day the 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 43 

250

moans of the dove, and by night the screams of the hideous owl.  All is gloom. The grave is at the door. And now, when weighed  down by the pains and aches of old age, when the head inclines  to the feet, when the beginning and ending of human existence  meet, and helpless infancy and painful old age combine  together—at this time, this most needful time, the time for the  exercise of that tenderness and affection which children only  can exercise towards a declining parent—my poor old  grandmother, the devoted mother of twelve children, is left all  alone, in yonder little hut, before a few dim embers. She  stands—she sits—she staggers—she falls—she groans—she  dies—and there are none of her children or grandchildren  present, to wipe from her wrinkled brow the cold sweat of  death, or to place beneath the sod her fallen remains. Will not a  righteous God visit for these things?  

In about two years after the death of Mrs. Lucretia, Master  Thomas married his second wife. Her name was Rowena  Hamilton. She was the eldest daughter of Mr. William  Hamilton. Master now lived in St. Michael’s. Not long after his  marriage, a misunderstanding took place between himself and  Master Hugh; and as a means of punishing his brother, he took  me from him to live with himself at St. Michael’s. Here I  underwent another most painful separation. It, however, was not  so severe as the one I dreaded at the division of property; for,  during this interval, a great change had taken place in Master  Hugh and his once kind and affectionate wife. The influence of  brandy upon him, and of slavery upon her, had effected a  disastrous change in the characters of both; so that, as far as  they were concerned, I thought I had little to lose by the change.  But it was not to them that I was attached. It was to those little  Baltimore boys that I felt the strongest attachment. I had  received many good lessons from them, and was still receiving  them, and the thought of leaving them was painful indeed. I was 

44 NARRATIVE OF THE 

leaving, too, without the hope of ever being allowed to return.  Master Thomas had said he would never let me return again.  The barrier betwixt himself and brother he considered  impassable.  

I then had to regret that I did not at least make the attempt  to carry out my resolution to run away; for the chances of  success are tenfold greater from the city than from the country.  

255

I sailed from Baltimore for St. Michael’s in the sloop  Amanda, Captain Edward Dodson. On my passage, I paid  particular attention to the direction which the steamboats took to  go to Philadelphia. I found, instead of going down, on reaching  North Point they went up the bay, in a north-easterly direction. I  deemed this knowledge of the utmost importance. My  determination to run away was again revived. I resolved to wait  only so long as the offering of a favorable opportunity. When  that came, I was determined to be off.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 45 

CHAPTER IX. 

I HAVE now reached a period of my life when I can give  dates. I left Baltimore, and went to live with Master Thomas  Auld, at St. Michael’s, in March, 1832. It was now more than  seven years since I lived with him in the family of my old  master, on Colonel Lloyd’s plantation. We of course were now  almost entire strangers to each other. He was to me a new  master, and I to him a new slave. I was ignorant of his temper  and disposition; he was equally so of mine. A very short time,  however, brought us into full acquaintance with each other. I  was made acquainted with his wife not less than with himself.  They were well matched, being equally mean and cruel. I was  now, for the first time during a space of more than seven years,  made to feel the painful gnawings of hunger—a something  which I had not experienced before since I left Colonel Lloyd’s  plantation. It went hard enough with me then, when I could look  back to no period at which I had enjoyed a sufficiency. It was  tenfold harder after living in Master Hugh’s family, where I had  always had enough to eat, and of that which was good. I have  said Master Thomas was a mean man. He was so. Not to give a  slave enough to eat, is regarded as the most aggravated  development of meanness even among slaveholders. The rule is, no matter how coarse the food, only let there be enough of it.  This is the theory; and in the part of Maryland from which I  came, it is the general practice,—though there are many  exceptions. Master Thomas gave us enough of neither coarse  nor fine food. There were four slaves of us in the kitchen—my  sister Eliza, my aunt Priscilla, Henny, and myself; and we were  allowed less than a half of a bushel of corn-meal per week, and 

46 NARRATIVE OF THE 

260

very little else, either in the shape of meat or vegetables. It was  not enough for us to subsist upon. We were therefore reduced to  the wretched necessity of living at the expense of our neighbors.  This we did by begging and stealing, whichever came handy in  the time of need, the one being considered as legitimate as the  other. A great many times have we poor creatures been nearly  perishing with hunger, when food in abundance lay mouldering  in the safe and smoke-house, and our pious mistress was aware  of the fact; and yet that mistress and her husband would kneel  every morning, and pray that God would bless them in basket  and store!  

Bad as all slaveholders are, we seldom meet one destitute  of every element of character commanding respect. My master  was one of this rare sort. I do not know of one single noble act  ever performed by him. The leading trait in his character was  meanness; and if there were any other element in his nature, it  was made subject to this. He was mean; and, like most other  mean men, he lacked the ability to conceal his meanness.  Captain Auld was not born a slaveholder. He had been a poor  man, master only of a Bay craft. He came into possession of all  his slaves by marriage; and of all men, adopted slaveholders are  the worst. He was cruel, but cowardly. He commanded without  firmness. In the enforcement of his rules, he was at times rigid,  and at times lax. At times, he spoke to his slaves with the  firmness of Napoleon and the fury of a demon; at other times,  he might well be mistaken for an inquirer who had lost his way.  He did nothing of himself. He might have passed for a lion, but  for his ears. In all things noble which he attempted, his own  meanness shone most conspicuous. His airs, words, and actions,  were the airs, words, and actions of born slaveholders, and,  being assumed, were awkward enough. He was not even a good  imitator. He possessed all the disposition to deceive, but wanted  the power. Having no resources within himself, he was 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 47 

compelled to be the copyist of many, and being such, he was  forever the victim of inconsistency; and of consequence he was  an object of contempt, and was held as such even by his slaves.  The luxury of having slaves of his own to wait upon him was  something new and unprepared for. He was a slaveholder  without the ability to hold slaves. He found himself incapable of  managing his slaves either by force, fear, or fraud. We seldom  called him “master;” we generally called him “Captain Auld,”  and were hardly disposed to title him at all. I doubt not that our  conduct had much to do with making him appear awkward, and  of consequence fretful. Our want of reverence for him must  have perplexed him greatly. He wished to have us call him  master, but lacked the firmness necessary to command us to do  so. His wife used to insist upon our calling him so, but to no  purpose. In August, 1832, my master attended a Methodist  camp-meeting held in the Bay-side, Talbot county, and there  experienced religion. I indulged a faint hope that his conversion  would lead him to emancipate his slaves, and that, if he did not  do this, it would, at any rate, make him more kind and humane.  I was disappointed in both these respects. It neither made him to  be humane to his slaves, nor to emancipate them. If it had any  effect on his character, it made him more cruel and hateful in all  his ways; for I believe him to have been a much worse man  after his conversion than before. Prior to his conversion, he  relied upon his own depravity to shield and sustain him in his  savage barbarity; but after his conversion, he found religious  sanction and support for his slaveholding cruelty. He made the  greatest pretensions to piety. His house was the house of prayer.  He prayed morning, noon, and night. He very soon  distinguished himself among his brethren, and was soon made a class-leader and exhorter. His activity in revivals was great, and  he proved himself an instrument in the hands of the church in  converting many souls. His house was the preachers’ home. 

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265

They used to take great pleasure in coming there to put up; for  while he starved us, he stuffed them. We have had three or four  preachers there at a time. The names of those who used to come  most frequently while I lived there, were Mr. Storks, Mr.  Ewery, Mr. Humphry, and Mr. Hickey. I have also seen Mr.  George Cookman at our house. We slaves loved Mr. Cookman.  We believed him to be a good man. We thought him  instrumental in getting Mr. Samuel Harrison, a very rich  slaveholder, to emancipate his slaves; and by some means got  the impression that he was laboring to effect the emancipation  of all the slaves. When he was at our house, we were sure to be  called in to prayers. When the others were there, we were  sometimes called in and sometimes not. Mr. Cookman took  more notice of us than either of the other ministers. He could  not come among us without betraying his sympathy for us, and,  stupid as we were, we had the sagacity to see it.  

While I lived with my master in St. Michael’s, there was a  white young man, a Mr. Wilson, who proposed to keep a  Sabbath school for the instruction of such slaves as might be  disposed to learn to read the New Testament. We met but three  times, when Mr. West and Mr. Fairbanks, both class-leaders,  with many others, came upon us with sticks and other missiles,  drove us off, and forbade us to meet again. Thus ended our little  Sabbath school in the pious town of St. Michael’s.  

I have said my master found religious sanction for his  cruelty. As an example, I will state one of many facts going to  prove the charge. I have seen him tie up a lame young woman,  and whip her with a heavy cowskin upon her naked shoulders,  causing the warm red blood to drip; and, in justification of the  bloody deed, he would quote this passage of Scripture—“He  that knoweth his master’s will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten  with many stripes.” 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 49 

Master would keep this lacerated young woman tied up in  this horrid situation four or five hours at a time. I have known  him to tie her up early in the morning, and whip her before  breakfast; leave her, go to his store, return at dinner, and whip  her again, cutting her in the places already made raw with his  cruel lash. The secret of master’s cruelty toward “Henny” is  found in the fact of her being almost helpless. When quite a  child, she fell into the fire, and burned herself horribly. Her  hands were so burnt that she never got the use of them. She  could do very little but bear heavy burdens. She was to master a  bill of expense; and as he was a mean man, she was a constant  offence to him. He seemed desirous of getting the poor girl out  of existence. He gave her away once to his sister; but, being a  poor gift, she was not disposed to keep her. Finally, my  benevolent master, to use his own words, “set her adrift to take  care of herself.” Here was a recently-converted man, holding on  upon the mother, and at the same time turning out her helpless  child, to starve and die! Master Thomas was one of the many  pious slaveholders who hold slaves for the very charitable  purpose of taking care of them.  

270

My master and myself had quite a number of differences.  He found me unsuitable to his purpose. My city life, he said,  had had a very pernicious effect upon me. It had almost ruined  me for every good purpose, and fitted me for every thing which  was bad. One of my greatest faults was that of letting his horse  run away, and go down to his father-in-law’s farm, which was  about five miles from St. Michael’s. I would then have to go  after it. My reason for this kind of carelessness, or carefulness,  was, that I could always get something to eat when I went there.  Master William Hamilton, my master’s father-in-law, always  gave his slaves enough to eat. I never left there hungry, no  matter how great the need of my speedy return. Master Thomas  at length said he would stand it no longer. I had lived with him 

50 NARRATIVE OF THE 

nine months, during which time he had given me a number of  severe whippings, all to no good purpose. He resolved to put me  out, as he said, to be broken; and, for this purpose, he let me for  one year to a man named Edward Covey. Mr. Covey was a poor  man, a farm-renter. He rented the place upon which he lived, as  also the hands with which he tilled it. Mr. Covey had acquired a  very high reputation for breaking young slaves, and this  reputation was of immense value to him. It enabled him to get  his farm tilled with much less expense to himself than he could  have had it done without such a reputation. Some slaveholders  thought it not much loss to allow Mr. Covey to have their slaves  one year, for the sake of the training to which they were  subjected, without any other compensation. He could hire  young help with great ease, in consequence of this reputation.  Added to the natural good qualities of Mr. Covey, he was a  professor of religion—a pious soul—a member and a class leader in the Methodist church. All of this added weight to his  reputation as a “nigger-breaker.” I was aware of all the facts,  having been made acquainted with them by a young man who  had lived there. I nevertheless made the change gladly; for I was  sure of getting enough to eat, which is not the smallest  consideration to a hungry man.

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 51 

CHAPTER X. 

275

I LEFT Master Thomas’s house, and went to live with Mr.  Covey, on the 1st of January, 1833. I was now, for the first time  in my life, a field hand. In my new employment, I found myself  even more awkward than a country boy appeared to be in a  large city. I had been at my new home but one week before Mr.  Covey gave me a very severe whipping, cutting my back,  causing the blood to run, and raising ridges on my flesh as large  as my little finger. The details of this affair are as follows: Mr.  Covey sent me, very early in the morning of one of our coldest  days in the month of January, to the woods, to get a load of  wood. He gave me a team of unbroken oxen. He told me which  was the in-hand ox, and which the off-hand one. He then tied  the end of a large rope around the horns of the in-hand ox, and  gave me the other end of it, and told me, if the oxen started to  run, that I must hold on upon the rope. I had never driven oxen  before, and of course I was very awkward. I, however,  succeeded in getting to the edge of the woods with little  difficulty; but I had got a very few rods into the woods, when  the oxen took fright, and started full tilt, carrying the cart  against trees, and over stumps, in the most frightful manner. I  expected every moment that my brains would be dashed out  against the trees. After running thus for a considerable distance,  they finally upset the cart, dashing it with great force against a  tree, and threw themselves into a dense thicket. How I escaped  death, I do not know. There I was, entirely alone, in a thick  wood, in a place new to me. My cart was upset and shattered,  my oxen were entangled among the young trees, and there was  none to help me. After a long spell of effort, I succeeded in 

52 NARRATIVE OF THE 

getting my cart righted, my oxen disentangled, and again yoked  to the cart. I now proceeded with my team to the place where I  had, the day before, been chopping wood, and loaded my cart  pretty heavily, thinking in this way to tame my oxen. I then  proceeded on my way home. I had now consumed one half of  the day. I got out of the woods safely, and now felt out of  danger. I stopped my oxen to open the woods gate; and just as I  did so, before I could get hold of my ox-rope, the oxen again  started, rushed through the gate, catching it between the wheel  and the body of the cart, tearing it to pieces, and coming within  a few inches of crushing me against the gate-post. Thus twice,  in one short day, On my  return, I told Mr. Covey what had happened, and how it  happened. He ordered me to return to the woods again  immediately. I did so, and he followed on after me. Just as I got  into the woods, he came up and told me to stop my cart, and  that he would teach me how to trifle away my time, and break  gates. He then went to a large gum-tree, and with his axe cut  three large switches, and, after trimming them up neatly with  his pocket-knife, he ordered me to take off my clothes. I made  him no answer, but stood with my clothes on. He repeated his  order. I still made him no answer, nor did I move to strip  myself. Upon this he rushed at me with the fierceness of a tiger,  tore off my clothes, and lashed me till he had worn out his  switches, cutting me so savagely as to leave the marks visible  for a long time after. This whipping was the first of a number  just like it, and for similar offences.  

I lived with Mr. Covey one year. During the first six  months, of that year, scarce a week passed without his whipping  me. I was seldom free from a sore back. My awkwardness was  almost always his excuse for whipping me. We were worked  fully up to the point of endurance. Long before day we were up,  our horses fed, and by the first approach of day we were off to 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 53 

280

the field with our hoes and ploughing teams. Mr. Covey gave us  enough to eat, but scarce time to eat it. We were often less than  five minutes taking our meals. We were often in the field from  the first approach of day till its last lingering ray had left us; and  at saving-fodder time, midnight often caught us in the field  binding blades.  

Covey would be out with us. The way he used to stand it,  was this. He would spend the most of his afternoons in bed. He  would then come out fresh in the evening, ready to urge us on  with his words, example, and frequently with the whip. Mr.  Covey was one of the few slaveholders who could and did work  with his hands. He was a hard-working man. He knew by  himself just what a man or a boy could do. There was no  deceiving him. His work went on in his absence almost as well as in his presence; and he had the faculty of making us feel that  he was ever present with us. This he did by surprising us. He  seldom approached the spot where we were at work openly, if  he could do it secretly. He always aimed at taking us by  surprise. Such was his cunning, that we used to call him, among  ourselves, “the snake.” When we were at work in the cornfield,  he would sometimes crawl on his hands and knees to avoid  detection, and all at once he would rise nearly in our midst, and  scream out, “Ha, ha! Come, come! Dash on, dash on!” This  being his mode of attack, it was never safe to stop a single  minute. His comings were like a thief in the night. He appeared  to us as being ever at hand. He was under every tree, behind  every stump, in every bush, and at every window, on the  plantation. He would sometimes mount his horse, as if bound to  St. Michael’s, a distance of seven miles, and in half an hour  afterwards you would see him coiled up in the corner of the  wood-fence, watching every motion of the slaves. He would, for  this purpose, leave his horse tied up in the woods. Again, he  would sometimes walk up to us, and give us orders as though he 

54 NARRATIVE OF THE 

was upon the point of starting on a long journey, turn his back  upon us, and make as though he was going to the house to get  ready; and, before he would get half way thither, he would turn  short and crawl into a fence-corner, or behind some tree, and  there watch us till the going down of the sun.  

Mr. Covey’s forte consisted in his power to deceive. His  life was devoted to planning and perpetrating the grossest  deceptions. Every thing he possessed in the shape of learning or  religion, he made conform to his disposition to deceive. He  seemed to think himself equal to deceiving the Almighty. He  would make a short prayer in the morning, and a long prayer at  night; and, strange as it may seem, few men would at times  appear more devotional than he. The exercises of his family  devotions were always commenced with singing; and, as he was  a very poor singer himself, the duty of raising the hymn  generally came upon me. He would read his hymn, and nod at  me to commence. I would at times do so; at others, I would not.  My non-compliance would almost always produce much  confusion. To show himself independent of me, he would start  and stagger through with his hymn in the most discordant  manner. In this state of mind, he prayed with more than  ordinary spirit. Poor man! such was his disposition, and success  at deceiving, I do verily believe that he sometimes deceived  himself into the solemn belief, that he was a sincere worshipper  of the most high God; and this, too, at a time when he may be  said to have been guilty of compelling his woman slave to  commit the sin of adultery. The facts in the case are these: Mr.  Covey was a poor man; he was just commencing in life; he was  only able to buy one slave; and, shocking as is the fact, he  bought her, as he said, for a breeder. This woman was named  Caroline. Mr. Covey bought her from Mr. Thomas Lowe, about  six miles from St. Michael’s. She was a large, able-bodied  woman, about twenty years old. She had already given birth to 

285

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 55 

one child, which proved her to be just what he wanted. After  buying her, he hired a married man of Mr. Samuel Harrison, to  live with him one year; and him he used to fasten up with her  every night! The result was, that, at the end of the year, the  miserable woman gave birth to twins. At this result Mr. Covey  seemed to be highly pleased, both with the man and the  wretched woman. Such was his joy, and that of his wife, that  nothing they could do for Caroline during her confinement was  too good, or too hard, to be done. The children were regarded as  being quite an addition to his wealth.  

If at any one time of my life more than another, I was made  to drink the bitterest dregs of slavery, that time was during the  first six months of my stay with Mr. Covey. We were worked in  all weathers. It was never too hot or too cold; it could never  rain, blow, hail, or snow, too hard for us to work in the field.  Work, work, work, was scarcely more the order of the day than  of the night. The longest days were too short for him, and the  shortest nights too long for him. I was somewhat unmanageable  when I first went there, but a few months of this discipline  tamed me. Mr. Covey succeeded in breaking me. I was broken  in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my  intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the  cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of  slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a  brute!  

Sunday was my only leisure time. I spent this in a sort of  beast-like stupor, between sleep and wake, under some large  tree. At times I would rise up, a flash of energetic freedom  would dart through my soul, accompanied with a faint beam of  hope, that flickered for a moment, and then vanished. I sank  down again, mourning over my wretched condition. I was  sometimes prompted to take my life, and that of Covey, but was 

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prevented by a combination of hope and fear. My sufferings on  this plantation seem now like a dream rather than a stern reality.  Our house stood within a few rods of the Chesapeake Bay,  whose broad bosom was ever white with sails from every  quarter of the habitable globe. Those beautiful vessels, robed in  purest white, so delightful to the eye of freemen, were to me so  many shrouded ghosts, to terrify and torment me with thoughts  of my wretched condition. I have often, in the deep stillness of a  summer’s Sabbath, stood all alone upon the lofty banks of that  noble bay, and traced, with saddened heart and tearful eye, the  countless number of sails moving off to the mighty ocean. The  sight of these always affected me powerfully. My thoughts  would compel utterance; and there, with no audience but the  Almighty, I would pour out my soul’s complaint, in my rude  

way, with an apostrophe to the moving multitude of ships:—  “You are loosed from your moorings, and are free; I am  fast in my chains, and am a slave! You move merrily before the  gentle gale, and I sadly before the bloody whip! You are  freedom’s swift-winged angels, that fly round the world; I am  confined in bands of iron! O that I were free! O, that I were on  one of your gallant decks, and under your protecting wing!  Alas! betwixt me and you, the turbid waters roll. Go on, go on.  O that I could also go! Could I but swim! If I could fly! O, why  was I born a man, of whom to make a brute! The glad ship is  gone; she hides in the dim distance. I am left in the hottest hell  of unending slavery. O God, save me! God, deliver me! Let me  be free! Is there any God? Why am I a slave? I will run away. I  will not stand it. Get caught, or get clear, I’ll try it. I had as well  die with ague as the fever. I have only one life to lose. I had as  well be killed running as die standing. Only think of it; one  hundred miles straight north, and I am free! Try it? Yes! God  helping me, I will. It cannot be that I shall live and die a slave. I  will take to the water. This very bay shall yet bear me into 

LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS 57 

freedom. The steamboats steered in a north-east course from  North Point. I will do the same; and when I get to the head of  the bay, I will turn my canoe adrift, and walk straight through  Delaware into Pennsylvania. When I get there, I shall not be  required to have a pass; I can travel without being disturbed. Let  but the first opportunity offer, and, come what will, I am off.  Meanwhile, I will try to bear up under the yoke. I am not the  only slave in the world. Why should I fret? I can bear as much  as any of them. Besides, I am but a boy, and all boys are bound  to some one. It may be that my misery in slavery will only  increase my happiness when I get free. There is a better day  coming.”  

Thus I used to think, and thus I used to speak to myself;  goaded almost to madness at one moment, and at the next  reconciling myself to my wretched lot.  

295

I have already intimated that my condition was much  worse, during the first six months of my stay at Mr. Covey’s,  than in the last six. The circumstances leading to the change in  Mr. Covey’s course toward me form an epoch in my humble  history. You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall  see how a slave was made a man. On one of the hottest days of  the month of August, 1833, Bill Smith, William Hughes, a slave  named Eli, and myself, were engaged in fanning wheat. Hughes  was clearing the fanned wheat from before the fan. Eli was  turning, Smith was feeding, and I was carrying wheat to the fan.  The work was simple, requiring strength rather than intellect;  yet, to one entirely unused to such work, it came very hard.  About three o’clock of that day, I broke down; my strength  failed me; I was seized with a violent aching of the head,  attended with extreme dizziness; I trembled in every limb.  Finding what was coming, I nerved myself up, feeling it would  never do to stop work. I stood as long as I could stagger to the  hopper with grain. When I could stand no longer, I fell, and felt 

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as if held down by an immense weight. The fan of course  stopped; every one had his own work to do; and no one could  do the work of the other, and have his own go on at the same  time.  

Mr. Covey was at the house, about one hundred yards from  the treading-yard where we were fanning. On hearing the fan  stop, he left immediately, and came to the spot where we were.  He hastily inquired what the matter was. Bill answered that I  was sick, and there was no one to bring wheat to the fan. I had  by this time crawled away under the side of the post and rail 

fence by which the yard was enclosed, hoping to find relief by  getting out of the sun. He then asked where I was. He was told  by one of the hands. He came to the spot, and, after looking at  me awhile, asked me what was the matter. I told him as well as  I could, for I scarce had strength to speak. He then gave me a savage kick in the side, and told me to get up. I tried to do so,  but fell back in the attempt. He gave me another kick, and again  told me to rise. I again tried, and succeeded in gaining my feet;  but, stooping to get the tub with which I was feeding the fan, I  again staggered and fell. While down in this situation, Mr.  Covey took up the hickory slat with which Hughes had been  striking off the half-bushel measure, and with it gave me a heavy blow upon the head, making a large wound, and the  blood ran freely; and with this again told me to get up. I made  no effort to comply, having now made up my mind to let him do  his worst. In a short time after receiving this blow, my head  grew better. Mr. Covey had now left me to my fate. At this  moment I resolved, for the first time, to go to my master, enter a  complaint, and ask his protection. In order to do this, I must that  afternoon walk seven miles; and this, under the circumstances,  was truly a severe undertaking. I was exceedingly feeble; made  so as much by the kicks and blows which I received, as by the  severe fit of sickness to which I had been subjected. I, however, 

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watched my chance, while Covey was looking in an opposite  direction, and started for St. Michael’s. I succeeded in getting a  considerable distance on my way to the woods, when Covey  discovered me, and called after me to come back, threatening  what he would do if I did not come. I disregarded both his calls  and his threats, and made my way to the woods as fast as my  feeble state would allow; and thinking I might be overhauled by  him if I kept the road, I walked through the woods, keeping far  enough from the road to avoid detection, and near enough to  prevent losing my way. I had not gone far before my little  strength again failed me. I could go no farther. I fell down, and  lay for a considerable time. The blood was yet oozing from the  wound on my head. For a time I thought I should bleed to death;  and think now that I should have done so, but that the blood so  matted my hair as to stop the wound. After lying there about  three quarters of an hour, I nerved myself up again, and started  on my way, through bogs and briers, barefooted and  bareheaded, tearing my feet sometimes at nearly every step; and  after a journey of about seven miles, occupying some five hours  to perform it, I arrived at master’s store. I then presented an  appearance enough to affect any but a heart of iron. From the  crown of my head to my feet, I was covered with blood. My  hair was all clotted with dust and blood; my shirt was stiff with  blood. I suppose I looked like a man who had escaped a den of  wild beasts, and barely escaped them. In this state I appeared  before my master, humbly entreating him to interpose his  authority for my protection. I told him all the circumstances as  well as I could, and it seemed, as I spoke, at times to affect him.  He would then walk the floor, and seek to justify Covey by  saying he expected I deserved it. He asked me what I wanted. I  told him, to let me get a new home; that as sure as I lived with  Mr. Covey again, I should live with but to die with him; that  Covey would surely kill me; he was in a fair way for it. Master 

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Thomas ridiculed the idea that there was any danger of Mr.  Covey’s killing me, and said that he knew Mr. Covey; that he  was a good man, and that he could not think of taking me from  him; that, should he do so, he would lose the whole year’s  wages; that I belonged to Mr. Covey for one year, and that I  must go back to him, come what might; and that I must not  trouble him with any more stories, or that he would himself get  hold of me. After threatening me thus, he gave me a very large  dose of salts, telling me that I might remain in St. Michael’s that  night, (it being quite late,) but that I must be off back to Mr.  Covey’s early in the morning; and that if I did not, he would get  hold of me, which meant that he would whip me. I remained all  night, and, according to his orders, I started off to Covey’s in  the morning, (Saturday morning,) wearied in body and broken  in spirit. I got no supper that night, or breakfast that morning. I  reached Covey’s about nine o’clock; and just as I was getting  over the fence that divided Mrs. Kemp’s fields from ours, out  ran Covey with his cowskin, to give me another whipping.  Before he could reach me, I succeeded in getting to the  cornfield; and as the corn was very high, it afforded me the  means of hiding. He seemed very angry, and searched for me a  long time. My behavior was altogether unaccountable. He  finally gave up the chase, thinking, I suppose, that I must come  home for something to eat; he would give himself no further  trouble in looking for me. I spent that day mostly in the woods,  having the alternative before me,—to go home and be whipped  to death, or stay in the woods and be starved to death. That  night, I fell in with Sandy Jenkins, a slave with whom I was  somewhat acquainted. Sandy had a free wife who lived about  four miles from Mr. Covey’s; and it being Saturday, he was on  his way to see her. I told him my circumstances, and he very  kindly invited me to go home with him. I went home with him,  and talked this whole matter over, and got his advice as to what 

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course it was best for me to pursue. I found Sandy an old  adviser. He told me, with great solemnity, I must go back to  Covey; but that before I went, I must go with him into another  part of the woods, where there was a certain root, which, if I  would take some of it with me, carrying it always on my right  side, would render it impossible for Mr. Covey, or any other  white man, to whip me. He said he had carried it for years; and  since he had done so, he had never received a blow, and never  expected to while he carried it. I at first rejected the idea, that  the simple carrying of a root in my pocket would have any such  effect as he had said, and was not disposed to take it; but Sandy  impressed the necessity with much earnestness, telling me it  could do no harm, if it did no good. To please him, I at length  took the root, and, according to his direction, carried it upon my  right side. This was Sunday morning. I immediately started for  home; and upon entering the yard gate, out came Mr. Covey on  his way to meeting. He spoke to me very kindly, bade me drive  the pigs from a lot near by, and passed on towards the church.  Now, this singular conduct of Mr. Covey really made me begin to think that there was something in the root which Sandy had  given me; and had it been on any other day than Sunday, I could  have attributed the conduct to no other cause than the influence  of that root; and as it was, I was half inclined to think the root to  be something more than I at first had taken it to be. All went  well till Monday morning. On this morning, the virtue of the  root was fully tested. Long before daylight, I was called to go  and rub, curry, and feed, the horses. I obeyed, and was glad to  obey. But whilst thus engaged, whilst in the act of throwing  down some blades from the loft, Mr. Covey entered the stable  with a long rope; and just as I was half out of the loft, he caught  hold of my legs, and was about tying me. As soon as I found  what he was up to, I gave a sudden spring, and as I did so, he  holding to my legs, I was brought sprawling on the stable floor. 

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Mr. Covey seemed now to think he had me, and could do what  he pleased; but at this moment—from whence came the spirit I  don’t know—I resolved to fight; and, suiting my action to the  resolution, I seized Covey hard by the throat; and as I did so, I  rose. He held on to me, and I to him. My resistance was so  entirely unexpected that Covey seemed taken all aback. He  trembled like a leaf. This gave me assurance, and I held him  uneasy, causing the blood to run where I touched him with the  ends of my fingers. Mr. Covey soon called out to Hughes for  help. Hughes came, and, while Covey held me, attempted to tie  my right hand. While he was in the act of doing so, I watched  my chance, and gave him a heavy kick close under the ribs.  This kick fairly sickened Hughes, so that he left me in the hands  of Mr. Covey. This kick had the effect of not only weakening  Hughes, but Covey also. When he saw Hughes bending over  with pain, his courage quailed. He asked me if I meant to persist  in my resistance. I told him I did, come what might; that he had  used me like a brute for six months, and that I was determined  to be used so no longer. With that, he strove to drag me to a  stick that was lying just out of the stable door. He meant to  knock me down. But just as he was leaning over to get the stick,  I seized him with both hands by his collar, and brought him by a  sudden snatch to the ground. By this time, Bill came. Covey  called upon him for assistance. Bill wanted to know what he  could do. Covey said, “Take hold of him, take hold of him!”  Bill said his master hired him out to work, and not to help to  whip me; so he left Covey and myself to fight our own battle  out. We were at it for nearly two hours. Covey at length let me  go, puffing and blowing at a great rate, saying that if I had not  resisted, he would not have whipped me half so much. The truth  was, that he had not whipped me at all. I considered him as  getting entirely the worst end of the bargain; for he had drawn  no blood from me, but I had from him. The whole six months