NARRATIVE 
 
 Of AN 
 
 ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 
 
r 
 
 <*--_ 
 
NARRATIVE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 ADVENTURES AND ESCAPE 
 
 OF 
 
 MOSES ROPER, 
 
 FROM 
 
 AMERICAN SLAVERY. 
 
 ' By our sufferings, since ye brought us 
 
 To the man-degrading mart ; 
 All sustained by patience, taught us 
 Only by a broken heart." 
 
 THIRTY-THIRD THOUSAND. 
 
 BERWICK-UPON-TWEED : 
 
 PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR, AND PRINTED 
 
 AT THE WARDER OFFICE. 
 
 1846. 
 
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 
 
 THE determination of laying this little Nar- 
 rative before the public, did not arise from 
 any desire to make myself conspicuous, but 
 with the view of exposing the cruel system of 
 slavery, as will here be laid before my readers ; 
 from the urgent calls of nearly all the friends 
 to whom I had related any part of my story, 
 and also from the recommendation of anti- 
 slavery meetings, which I have attended, 
 through the suggestion of many warm friends 
 of the cause of the oppressed. 
 
 The general narrative, I am aware, may 
 seem to many of my readers, and especially 
 to those who have not been before put in pos- 
 session of the actual features of this accursed 
 system, somewhat at variance with the dic- 
 tates of humanity. But the facts related here 
 do not come before the reader unsubstantiated 
 by collateral evidence, nor highly coloured to 
 the disadvantage of our cruel task-masters. 
 
 My readers may be put in possession of 
 facts respecting this system which equal in 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 cruelty my own Narrative, on an authority 
 which may be investigated with the greatest 
 satisfaction. Besides which, this little book 
 will not be confined to a small circle of my 
 own friends in London, or even in England. 
 The slave-holder, the colonizationist, and even 
 Mr. Gooch himself, will be able to obtain this 
 document, and be at liberty to draw from it 
 whatever they are honestly able, in order to 
 set me down as the tool of a party. Yea, 
 even Friend Brechenridge, a gentleman known 
 at Glasgow, will be able to possess this, and to 
 draw from it all the forcible arguments on his 
 own side, which in his wisdom, honesty, and 
 candour he may be able to adduce. 
 
 The earnest wish to lay this Narrative be- 
 fore my friends as an impartial statement of 
 facts, has led me to develope some part of my 
 conduct, which I now deeply deplore. The 
 ignorance in which the poor slaves are kept 
 by their masters, precludes almost the possi- 
 bility of their being alive to any moral duties. 
 
 With these remarks, I leave the statement 
 before the public. May this little volume be 
 the instrument of opening the eyes of the 
 ignorant of the system of convincing the 
 wicked, cruel, and hardened slave-holder and 
 of befriending generally the cause of oppressed 
 humanity. 
 
 MOSES ROPER. 
 LONPOIT, 1839. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Birth-place of the Author. The first time he was sold from 
 his Mother. He passes through several hands, . 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 The Author is sold to Mr. J. Gooch. The cruel treatment 
 he both received and witnessed on that Estate. Kepeated 
 attempts at running away. Escapes to his Mother after 
 being absent from her about ten years. Meets with his 
 sister, whom he had never seen before, on the road, who 
 conducted him to his Mother, .... 5 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 An Account of the Author's meeting with his Mother, who 
 did not know him ; but was with her a very short time 
 before he was taken by armed men, and imprisoned for 
 thirty-one days, and then taken back to his Master, 21 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Author is flogged and punished in various ways, but 
 still perseveres in his attempts to escape, till he was sold 
 to Mr. Wilson, . .29 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 The Author was not long with Mr. Wilson, who was a Negro 
 Trader, before he was exchanged to Mr. Rowland, who 
 
Vlll CONTENTS. 
 
 was also a Trader, for another slave, and after being with 
 him for about a year, was sold to Mr. D. Goodly, who soon 
 exchanged him again to Mr. Louis, ... 40 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 Travels with Mr. Louis to Pendleton Indian Springs, from 
 thence to Columbus, where he was sold at auction to Mr. 
 Beveridge. His Travels and History with Mr. B. Is 
 eold again to Mr. Register, . . . . 43 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Author's last attempt and final Eseape from Marianna 
 to Savannah. From thence to New York. Quarantined 
 at Staten Island, . . . ... 48 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 His arrival in New York. On to Poughkeepsie. Albany. 
 Rogester. Vermont. Boston, and returned from thence 
 to New York, and embarked for England, . . 62 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 The Author arrives at. Liverpool, November 29, 1835. 
 Makes his way for London, . . . . 68 
 
 APPENDIX, ..... 73 
 
NARBATIVE, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Birth-place of the Author. The first time he was sold from his 
 Mother, and passed through several other hands. 
 
 I WAS born in North Carolina, in Caswell County, 
 I am not able to tell in what month or year. What 
 I shall now relate, is what was told me by my mo- 
 ther and grandmother. A few months before I 
 was born, my father married my mother's young 
 mistress. As soon as my father's wife heard of my 
 birth, she sent one of my mother's sisters to see 
 whether I was white or black, and when my aunt 
 had seen me, she returned back as soon as she 
 could, and told her mistress that I was white, and 
 resembled Mr. Roper very much. Mr. Roper's wife 
 not being pleased with this report, she got a large 
 club-stick and knife, and hastened to the place in 
 which my mother was confined. She went into 
 my mother's room with a full intention to niurder 
 me with her knife and club, but as she was going 
 to stick the knife into me, my grandmother hap- 
 
2 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 pening to come in, caught the knife and saved my 
 life. But as well as I can recollect, from what my 
 mother told me, my father sold her and myself, 
 soon after her confinement. I cannot recollect 
 anything that is worth notice till I was six or se- 
 ven years of age. My mother being half white, 
 and iny father a white man, I was at that time 
 very white. Soon after I was six or seven years 
 of age, my mother's old master died, that is, my 
 father's wife's father. All his slaves had to be 
 divided among the children.* I have mentioned 
 before of my father disposing of me, I am not sure 
 whether he exchanged me and my mother for an- 
 other slave or not, but think it very likely he did 
 exchange me with one of his wife's brothers or 
 sisters, because I remember when my mother's old 
 master died, I was living with my father's wife's 
 brother-in-law, whose name was Mr. Durham. My 
 mother was drawn with the other slaves. 
 
 The way they divide their slaves is this : they 
 write the names of different slaves on a small piece 
 of paper, and put it into a box, and let them all 
 draw. I think that Mr. Durham drew my mother, 
 and Mr. Fowler drew me, so we were separated a 
 considerable distance, I cannot say how far. My 
 resembling my father so much, and being whiter 
 than the other slaves, caused me to be soon sold 
 to what they call a negro trader, who took me to 
 the Southern States of America, several hundred 
 
 * Slaves are usually a part of the marriagi portion, but lent ra- 
 ther than given, to be returned to the estate at the decease of the fa- 
 thcr. in order Mint th'\v may be ! vided equally among hiacliildrcii. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 3 
 
 miles from my mother. As well as I can recollect, 
 I was then about six years old. The trader, Mr. 
 Mitchell, after travelling several hundred miles, 
 and selling a good many of his slaves, found he 
 could not sell me very well (as I was so much 
 whiter than other slaves were), for he had been 
 trying several months left me with a Mr. Sneed, 
 who kept a large boarding-house, who took me to 
 wait at table, and sell me if he could. I think I 
 stayed with Mr. Sneed about a year, but he could 
 not sell me. When Mr. Mitchell had sold his 
 slaves, lie went to the north, and brought up an- 
 other drove, and returned to the south with them, 
 and sent his son-in-law into Washington, in Geor- 
 gia, after me, so lie came and took me from Mr. 
 Sneed, and met his father-in-law with me, in a town 
 called Lancaster, with his drove of slaves. We 
 stayed in Lancaster a week, because it was court 
 week, and there were a great many people there, 
 and it was a good opportunity for selling the slaves ; 
 cind there he was enabled to sell me to a gentle- 
 man, Dr. Jones, who was both a doctor and a cot- 
 ton planter. He took me into his shop to beat 
 up and mix medicines, which was not a very hard 
 employment, but I did not keep it long, as the 
 Doctor soon sent me to his cotton plantation, that 
 I might be burnt darker by the sun. He sent me 
 to. be with a tailor to .learn the trade, but the jour- 
 ney men being white men, Mr. Bryant, the tailor, 
 .did not let mo work in the shop ; I cannot say 
 whether it was the prejudice of his men in not 
 .wanting me to sit in the shop with them, or wh.e- 
 
4 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 ther Mr. Bryant wanted to keep me about the 
 house to do the domestic work, instead of teach- 
 ing me the trade. After several months, my mas- 
 ter came to know how I got on with the trade: 
 I am not able to tell Mr. Bryant's answer, but it 
 was either that I could not learn, or that his 
 journeymen were unwilling that I should sit in 
 the shop with them. I was only once in the shop 
 all the time I was there, and then only for an 
 hour or two, before his wife called me out to do 
 some other work. So my master took me home, 
 and as he was going to send a load of cotton to 
 ( 1 nmbden. about forty miles distance, he sent me 
 with the bales of cotton to be sold with it, where 
 I was sold to a gentleman, named Allen, but Mr. 
 Allen soon exchanged me for a female slave to 
 please his wife. .The traders who bought me, were 
 named Cooper and Lindsey, who took me for sale, 
 but could not sell me, people objecting to my be- 
 ing rather white. They then took me to the city 
 of Fayetteville, North Carolina, where he swopt 
 me for a boy, that was blacker than me, to Mr. 
 Smith, who lived several miles off 
 
 I was with Mr. Smith nearly a year. I arrived 
 at the first knowledge of my age when I lived 
 with him. I was then between twelve and thir- 
 teen years old, it was when President Jackson was 
 elected the first time, and he has been President 
 eight years, so I must be nearly twenty-one years 
 of age. At this time I was quite a small boy, and 
 was sold to Mr. Hodge, a negro trader. Here I 
 began to enter into hardships. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 The Author's being sold to Mr. J. Gooch. The cruel treatment 
 he both received and witnessed while on his estate. Repeated 
 attempts at running away. Escapes to his Mother 'after being 
 absent from her about ten years. Meets with his sister, whom 
 he had never seen before, on the road, who conducted him to 
 his mother. 
 
 AFTER travelling several hundred miles, Mr. 
 Hodge sold me to Mr. Gooch, the cotton planter, 
 Cashaw County, South Carolina; he purchased 
 me at a town called Liberty Hill, about three 
 miles from his home. As soon as he got home, he 
 immediately put me on his cotton plantation to 
 work, and put me under overseers, gave me an 
 allowance of meat and bread with the other slaves, 
 which was not half enough for me to live upon, 
 and very laborious work ; here my heart was al- 
 most broke with grief at leaving my fellow-slaves. 
 Mr. Gooch did not mind my grief, for he flogged 
 me nearly every day, and very severely. Mr. 
 Gooch bought me for his son-in-law, Mr. Ham- 
 mans, about five miles distance from his residence. 
 This man had but two slaves besides myself ; he 
 treated me very kindly for a week or two, but in 
 summer, when cotton was ready to hoe, he gave 
 me task work, connected with this department, 
 
6 NARRATIVE OF AN" 
 
 which I could not get done, not having worked on 
 cotton farms before. When I failed in my task 
 he commenced flogging me, and set me to work 
 without any shirt, in the cotton field, in a very 
 hot sun, in the month of July. In August, Mr. 
 Condell, his overseer, gave me a task at pulling 
 fodder ; having finished my task before night, I 
 left the field. The rain came on, which soaked the 
 fodder ; on discovering this, he threatened to flog 
 me for not getting in the fodder before the rain 
 came. I attempted to run away, knowing that I 
 should get a flogging. I was then between thir- 
 teen and fourteen years of age ; I ran away to the 
 woods half naked ; I was caught by a slave-holder, 
 who put me in Lancaster Gaol. When they put 
 slaves in gaol, they advertise for their masters to 
 own them ; but if the master does not claim his 
 slave in six months, from the time of imprison- 
 ment, the slave is sold for gaol fees. When the 
 slave runs away, the master always adopts a more 
 rigorous system of flogging ; this was the case in 
 the present instance. After this, having deter- 
 mined from my youth to gain my freedom, I made 
 several attempts, was caught, and got a severe 
 flogging of one hundred lashes each time. Mr. 
 Hammans was a very severe and cruel master, and 
 his wife still worse ; she used to tie me up and 
 flog me while naked. 
 
 After Mr. Hammans saw that I was determined 
 to die in the woods, and not live with him, he 
 tried to obtain a piece of land from his father- 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. t 
 
 in-law. Mr. Gooch ; not having the means of pur- 
 chasing it, he exchanged me for the land. 
 
 As soon as Mr. Gooch had possession of me 
 again, knowing that I was averse to going back to 
 him, he chained me by the neck to his chaise. 
 In this manner he took me to his home at Mac 
 Daniel's Ferry, in the County of Chester, a dis- 
 tance of fifteen miles. After which, he put me 
 into a swamp, to cut trees, the heaviest work, 
 which men of twenty-five or thirty years of age 
 have to do, I being but sixteen. Here I was on 
 very short allowance of food, and having heavy 
 work, was too weak to fulfil my tasks. For this 
 I got many severe floggings ; and, after I had got 
 my irons off, I made another attempt at running 
 away. He took my irons oif, in the full anticipation 
 that I could never get across the Catarba River, 
 even when at liberty. On this, I procured a small 
 Indian canoe, which was tied to a tree, and ulti- 
 mately got across the river in it. I then wan- 
 dered through the wilderness for several days 
 without any food, and but a drop of water to allay 
 my thirst, till I became so starved, that I was ob- 
 liged to go to a house to beg for something to eat, 
 when I was captured, and again imprisoned. 
 
 Mr. Gooch having heard of me through an ad- 
 vertisement, sent his son after me ; he tied me up, 
 and took me back to his father. Mr. Gooch then 
 obtained the assistance of another slave-holder, 
 and tied me up in his blacksmith's shop, and gave 
 me fifty lashes with a cow-hide. He then put a 
 
8 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 log chain, weighing twenty-five pounds, round my 
 neck, and sent me into a field, into which he fol- 
 lowed me with a cow-hide, intending to set his 
 slaves to flog me again. Knowing this, and dread- 
 ing to suffer again in this way, I gave him the 
 slip, and got out of his sight, he having stopped 
 to speak with the other slave-holder. 
 
 I got to a canal on the Catarba River, on the 
 banks of which, and near to a loch, I procured a 
 stone and a piece of iron, with which I forced the 
 ring off my chain, and got it off, and then crossed 
 the river, and walked about twenty miles, when I 
 fell in with a slave-holder, named Ballad, who had 
 married the sister of Mr. Hammans. I knew that 
 he was not so cruel as Mr. Gooch, and therefore 
 begged of him to buy me. Mr, Ballad, who was 
 one of the best planters in the neighbourhood, 
 said that he was not able to buy me, and stated, 
 that he was obliged to take me back to my mas- 
 ter, on account of the heavy fine attaching to a 
 man harbouring a slave. Mr. Ballad proceeded to 
 take me back ; as we came in sight of Mr. Gooch's 
 all the treatment that I had met with there came 
 forcibly upon my mind, the powerful influence of 
 which is beyond description. On my knees, with 
 tears in my eyes, with terror in my countenance, 
 and fervency in all my features, I implored Mr. 
 Ballad to buy me, but he again refused, and I was 
 taken back to my dreaded and cruel master. Hav- 
 ing reached Mr. Gooch's he proceeded to punish 
 me. This he did, by first tying my wrists together 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 9 
 
 and placing them over the knees, he then put a 
 stick through, under my knees and over my arms, 
 and having thus secured my arms, he proceeded 
 to flog me, and gave me five hundred lashes on 
 my bare back. This may appear incredible, but 
 the marks which they left at present remain on 
 my body, a standing testimony to the truth of this 
 statement of his severity. He then chained me 
 down in a log-pen with a forty pounds chain, and 
 made me lie on the damp earth all night. In the 
 morning, after his breakfast, he came to me, and 
 without giving me any breakfast, tied me to a 
 large heavy harrow, which is usually drawn by 
 a horse, and made me drag it to the cotton field 
 for the horse to use in the field. Thus, the reader 
 will see, that it was of no possible use to my mas- 
 ter, to make me drag it to the cotton field and not 
 through it ; his cruelty went so far, as actually to 
 make me the slave of his horse, and thus to de- 
 grade me. He then flogged me again, and set me 
 to work in the corn field the whole of that day, 
 and at night chained me down in the log-pen as 
 before. The next morning he took me to the cot- 
 ton field, and gave me a third flogging, and sent 
 me to hoe cotton. At this time I was dreadfully 
 sore and weak with the repeated floggings and 
 cruel treatment I had endured. He put me under 
 a black man, with orders that if I did not keep my 
 row up in hoeing with this man, he was to flog me. 
 The reader must recollect here, that not being used 
 to this kind of work, having been a domestic slave, 
 
10 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 it was impossible for me to keep up with him, 
 and therefore I was repeatedly flogged during the 
 day. 
 
 Mr. Gooch had a female servant about eighteen 
 years old, who had also been a domestic slave, 
 and, through not being able to fulfil her task, had 
 run away : which slave he was at this time punish- 
 ing for that offence. On the third day, he chained 
 me to this female slave, with a large chain of 
 forty pounds* weight round my neck. It was 
 most harrowing to my feelings thus to be chained 
 to a young female slave, for whom I would rather 
 have suffered one hundred lashes than she should 
 have been thus treated ; he kept me chained to 
 her during the week, and repeatedly flogged us 
 both, while thus chained together, and forced us 
 to keep up with the other slaves, although retarded 
 by the heavy weight of the log-chain. 
 
 Here again, words cannot describe the misery 
 which possessed both body and mind whilst under 
 this treatment, and which was most dreadfully in- 
 creased by the sympathy which I felt for my poor, 
 degraded fellow-sufferer. On the Friday morning, 
 I entreated my master to set me free from my 
 chains, and promised him to do the task which 
 was given me, and more if possible, if he would 
 desist from flogging me. This he refused to do 
 until Saturday night, when he did set me free. 
 
 * This was a chain that they used to draw logs with from the 
 woods, when they clear their land. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. I 1 
 
 This must rather be ascribed to his own interest 
 Hi preserving me from death, as it was very evi- 
 dent I could no longer have survived under such 
 treatment. 
 
 After this, though still determined in my own 
 mind to escape, I stayed with him some months, 
 during which he frequently flogged me, but not so 
 severely as before related. During this time I 
 had opportunity for recovering my health, and 
 using means to heal my wounds. My master's 
 cruelty was not confined to me, it was his general 
 conduct to all his slaves. I might relate many 
 instances to substantiate this, but will confine my- 
 self to one or two. Mr. Gooch, it is proper to ob- 
 serve, was a member of a Baptist church, called 
 Black Jack Meeting House, in Cashaw County, 
 which church I attended for several years, but 
 was never inside. This is accounted for by the 
 fact, that the coloured population are not per- 
 mitted to mix with the white population. In the 
 Roman Catholic church no distinction is made. 
 Mr. Gooch had a slave named Phil, who was a 
 member of a Methodist church ; this man was be- 
 tween seventy and eighty years of age ; he was so 
 feeble that he could not accomplish his tasks, for 
 which his master used to chain him round the 
 neck, and run him down a steep hill ; this treat- 
 ment he never relinquished to the time of his 
 death. Another case was that of a slave, named 
 Peter, who, for not doing his task, he flogged 
 nearly to death, and afterwards pulled out his 
 
12 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 pistol to shoot him, but his (Mr. Gooch's) daugh- 
 ter snatched the pistol from his hand. Another 
 mode of punishment which this man adopted, was 
 that of using iron horns, with bells, attached to 
 the back of the slave's neck. The following is the 
 instrument of torture : 
 
 A WOMAN WITH IRON HORNS AND BELLS ON, TO KEEP 
 HER FROM RUNNING AWAY. 
 
 This instrument he used to prevent the negroes 
 running away, being a very ponderous machine, 
 several feet in height, and the cross pieces being 
 two feet four, and six feet in length. This custom 
 is generally adopted among the slave-holders in 
 South Carolina, and other slave States. One 
 morning, ' about an hour before daybreak, I was 
 going on an errand for my master ; having pro- 
 ceeded about a quarter of a mile, I came up to a 
 
ESCAPE FKOM SLAVERY. 13 
 
 man named King (Mr. Sumlin's overseer), who had 
 caught a young girl that had run away with the 
 above machine on her. She had proceeded four 
 miles from her station, with the intention of get- 
 ting into the hands of a more humane master. 
 She came up with this overseer nearly dead, and 
 could get no farther ; he immediately secured her, 
 and took her back to her master, a Mr. Johnson. 
 
 Having been in the habit of going over many 
 slave States with my master, I had good oppor- 
 tunities of witnessing the harsh treatment which 
 was adopted by masters towards their slaves. As 
 I have never heard or read anything connected 
 with slavery, so cruel as what I have myself wit- 
 nessed, it will be as well to mention a case or two. 
 
 A large farmer, Colonel M'Quiller, in Cashaw 
 county, South Carolina, was in the habit of driv- 
 ing nails into a hogshead, so as to leave the point 
 of the nail just protruding in the inside of the 
 cask ; into this, he vised to put his slaves for 
 punishment, and roll them down a very long and 
 steep hill. I have heard from several slaves (though 
 I had no means of ascertaining the truth of the 
 statement), that in this way he had killed six or 
 seven of his slaves. This plan was first adopted 
 by a Mr. Perry, who lived on the Catarba River, 
 and has since been adopted by several planters. 
 Another was that of a young lad, who had been 
 hired by Mr. Bell, a member of a holding church, 
 to hoe three-quarters of an acre of cotton per day. 
 Having been brought up as a domestic slave, he 
 
14 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 was not able to accomplish the task assigned to 
 him. On the Saturday night, he left three or four 
 TOWS to do on the Sunday ; on the same night it 
 rained very hard, by which the master could tell 
 that he had done some of the rows on the Sunday ; 
 on Monday, his master took and tied him up to 
 a tree in the field, and kept him there the whole 
 of that day, and flogged him at intervals. At 
 night, when he was taken down, he was so weak 
 that he could not get home, having a mile to go. 
 Two white men who were employed by Mr. Bell 
 put him on a horse, took him home, and threw him 
 down on the kitchen floor, while they proceeded 
 to their supper. In a little time, they heard some 
 deep groans proceeding from the kitchen ; they 
 went to see him die ; he had groaned his last. Thus 
 Mr. Bell flogged the poor boy even to death, for 
 what? for breaking the Sabbath, when he (his 
 master) had set liim a task, on Saturday, which it 
 was not possible for him to do, and which, if he 
 did not do, no mercy would be extended towards 
 him ! The general custom in this respect is, that 
 if a man kills his own slave, no notice is taken of 
 it by the civil functionaries ; but if a man kills a 
 slave belonging to another master, he is compelled 
 to pay the worth of the slave. In this case a jury 
 met, returned a verdict of " wilful murder" against 
 this man, and ordered him to pay the value. Mr. 
 Bell was unable to do this, but a Mr. Cunningham 
 paid the debt, and took this Mr. Bell, with this-, 
 .commendation for cruelty, to be his overseen:. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 15 
 
 It will be observed that the most of the cases 
 here cited are those in respect to males. Many 
 instances, however, in respect to females, might be 
 mentioned, but are too disgusting to appear in this 
 narrative. The cases here brought forward are not 
 xare, but the continued feature of slavery. But I 
 must now follow up the narrative as regards my- 
 self in peculiar. I stayed with this master for 
 several months, during which time we went on very 
 well in general. In August, 1831 (this was my 
 first acquaintance with any date ; I happened to 
 hear a man mention this date, and, as it excited 
 my curiosity, I asked what it meant ; they told me 
 it was the number of the year from the birth of 
 Christ) on this date, August, 1831, some cows 
 broke into a crib where the corn is kept, and ate 
 a great deal. For this his slaves were tied up 
 and received several floggings ; but myself and an- 
 other man, hearing the groans of those who were 
 being flogged, stayed back in the field, and would 
 not come up. Upon this I thought to escape 
 punishment. On the Monday morning, however, 
 I heard my master flogging the other man who 
 was in the field ; he could not see me, it being a 
 field of Indian corn, which grows to a great height. 
 Being afraid that he would catch me, and dread- 
 ing it flogging more than many other, I determined 
 to run for it ; and, after travelling forty miles, I 
 arrived at the estate of Mr. Crawford, in North 
 Carolina, Mecklinburgh county. Having formerly 
 Jieard people talk about the Free States, I deter- 
 
] 6 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 mined upon going thither, and, if possible, in my 
 way to find out my poor mother, who was in sla- 
 very several hundred miles from Chester ; but the 
 hope of doing the latter was very faint, and, even 
 if I did, it was not likely that she would know me, 
 having been separated from her when between five 
 and six years old. 
 
 The first night I slept in a barn, upon Mr. Craw- 
 ford's estate, and, having overslept myself, was 
 awoke by Mr. Crawford's overseer, upon which I 
 was dreadfully frightened ; he asked me what I 
 was doing there ? I made no reply to him then ; 
 and he making sure that he had secured a run- 
 away slave, did not press me for an answer. On 
 my way to his house, however, I made up the fol- 
 lowing story, which I told him in the presence of 
 his wife : I said that I had been bound to a very 
 cruel master when I was a little boy, and that 
 having been treated very badly, I wanted to get 
 home to see my mother. This statement may ap- 
 pear to some to be untrue, but, as I understood the 
 word bound, I considered it to apply to my case, 
 having been sold to him, and thereby bound to 
 serve him ; though still, I did rather hope that he 
 would understand it, that I was bound when a boy 
 till twenty-one years of age. Though I was white 
 at that time, he would not believe my story, on 
 account of my hair being curly and woolly, which 
 led him to conclude I was possessed of enslaved 
 blood. The overseer's wife, however, who seemed 
 much interested in me, said she did not think I 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 1 7 
 
 was of the African origin, and that she had seen 
 white men still darker than me ; her persuasion 
 prevailed ; and after the overseer had given me 
 as much butter-milk as I could drink, and some- 
 thing to eat, which was very acceptable, having 
 had nothing for two days, I set off for Charlotte, 
 in North Carolina, the largest town in the county. 
 I went on very quickly the whole of that day, 
 fearful of being pursued. The trees were very 
 thick on each side of the road, and only a few 
 houses, at the distance of two or three miles apart ; 
 as I proceeded, I turned round in all directions to 
 see if I was pursued, and if I caught a glimpse of 
 any one coming along the road, I immediately 
 rushed into the thickest part of the wood, to elude 
 the grasp of what, I was afraid, might be my mas- 
 ter. I went on in this way the whole day ; at 
 night, I came up with two waggons, they had been 
 to market ; the regular road waggons do not ge- 
 nerally put up at inns, but encamp in the roads 
 and fields. When I came to them, I told them 
 the same story I had told Mr. Crawford's overseer, 
 with the assurance that the statement would meet 
 the same success. After they had heard me, they 
 gave me something to eat, and also a lodging in 
 the camp with them. 
 
 I then went on with them about five miles, and 
 they agreed to take me with them as far as they 
 went, if I would assist them. This I promised to 
 do. In the morning, however, I was much fright- 
 ened by one of the men putting several questions 
 
 B 
 
18 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 to me we were then about three miles from Char- 
 lotte. When within a mile of the town, we stopped 
 at a brook to water the horses ; while stopping there 
 I saw the men whispering, and fancying I over- 
 heard them say they would put me in Charlotte 
 gaol when they got there, I made my escape into 
 the woods, pretending to be looking after some- 
 thing till I got out of their sight. I then ran on 
 as fast as I could, but did not go through the town 
 of Charlotte as had been my intention ; being a 
 large town, I was fearful it might prove fatal 'to 
 my escape. Here I was at a loss how to get on, 
 as houses were not very distant from each other 
 for nearly two hundred miles. 
 
 While thinking what I should do, I observed 
 some waggons before me, which I determined to 
 keep behind, and never go nearer to them than a 
 quarter of a mile in this way I travelled till I 
 got to Salisbury. If I happened to meet any per- 
 son 011 the road, I was afraid they would take me 
 up, I asked them how far the waggons had gone 
 on before me, to make them suppose I belonged 
 to the waggons. At night, I slept on the ground 
 in the woods, some little distance from the wag- 
 irons, but not near enough to be seen by the men 
 belonging to them. All this time, I had but little 
 food, principally fruit, which I found on the road. 
 On Thursday night, I got into Salisbury, having 
 left Chester on the Monday morning preceding. 
 After this, being afraid my master was in pursuit 
 of me, I left the usual line of road, and took an- 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 19 
 
 other direction, through Huntsville and Salem, 
 principally through fields and woods ; on my way 
 to Caswell Court-House, a distance of nearly two 
 hundred miles from Salisbury,* I was stopped by 
 a white man, to whom I told my old story, and 
 again succeeded in my escape. I also came up 
 with a small cart, driven by a poor man, who had 
 been moving into the western territories, and was 
 going back to Virginia, to move some more of his 
 luggage. On this I told him I was going the same 
 way to Hilton, thirteen miles from Caswell Court- 
 House ; he took me up in his cart, and went to the 
 Red House, two miles from Milton, the place where 
 Mr. Mitchell took me from, when six years old, to 
 go to the Southern States. This was a very pro- 
 vidential circumstance, for it happened, that at 
 the time I had to pass through Caswell Court- 
 house, a fair or election was going on, which caus- 
 ed the place to be much crowded with people, and 
 rendered it more dangerous for me to pass through. 
 At the Ked House I left the cart, and wandered 
 about a long time, not knowing which way to go 
 and find my mother. After some time, I took the 
 road leading over Ikeo Creek. I shortly came up 
 with a little girl, about six years old, and asked 
 her where she was going ; she said to her mother's, 
 pointing to a house on a hill, half a mile off. She 
 had been at the overseer's house, and was return- 
 
 * The distance from Salisbury to Caswell Court house is not so 
 fir. but I had to go a round-about way. 
 
'20 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 ing to her mother. I then felt some emotions 
 arising in my breast, which I cannot describe, but 
 will be explained in the sequel. I told her I was 
 thirsty, and would go with her to get something 
 to drink. On our way, I asked her several ques- 
 tions, such as her name, that of her mother ; she 
 said hers was Maria, and that of her mother's 
 Nancy. I inquired, if her mother had any more 
 children ? she said five besides herself, and that 
 they had been sold, that one had been sold when 
 a little boy. I then asked the name of this child ? 
 she said it was Moses. These answers, as we ap- 
 proached the house, led me nearer and nearer to 
 the finding out the object of my pursuit, and of 
 recognising in the little girl the person of my own 
 sister, 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 21 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 An account of the Author's meeting with his mother, who did 
 not know him, but was with her a very short time before he 
 was taken by armed men, and imprisoned for thirty- one days, 
 and then taken back to his master. 
 
 AT last I got to my mother's house ! My mo- 
 ther was at home. I asked her if she knew me ? 
 She said, no. Her master was having a house 
 built close by, and as the men were digging a well, 
 she supposed that I was one of the diggers. I 
 told her I knew her very well, and thought that if 
 she looked at me a little, she would know me, but 
 this had no effect. I then asked her if she had 
 any sons ? She said, yes ; but none so large as me. 
 I then waited a few minutes, and narrated some 
 circumstances to her, attending my being sold into 
 slavery, and how she grieved at my loss. Here 
 the mother's feelings on that dire occasion, and 
 which a mother only can know, rushed to her 
 mind : she saw her own son before her, for whom 
 she had so often wept ; and, in an instant, we 
 were clasped in each other's arms, amidst the 
 ardent interchange of caresses and tears of joy. 
 Ten years had elapsed since I had seen my dear 
 mother. My own feelings, and the circumstances 
 
22 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 attending my coming home, have been often 
 brought to mind since, on a perusal of the 42d, 
 43d, 44th, and 45th chapters of Genesis. What 
 could picture my feelings so well, as I once more 
 beheld the mother who had brought me into the 
 world, and had nourished me, not with the antici- 
 pation of my being torn from her maternal care, 
 when only six years old, to become the prey of a 
 mercenary and blood-stained slaveholder : I say, 
 what picture so vivid in description of this part 
 of my tale, as the 7th and 8th verses of the 42d 
 chapter of Genesis, "And Joseph saw his brethren, 
 and he knew them, but made himself strange unto 
 them. And Joseph knew his brethren, but they 
 knew not him.'" After the first emotion of the 
 mother, on recognizing her first-born, had some- 
 what subsided, could the reader not fancy the lit- 
 tle one, my sister, as she told her simple tale of 
 meeting with me to her mother, how she would 
 say, while the parent listened with intense inte- 
 rest : " The man asked me straitly of our state 
 and our kindred, saying, is your father yet alive, 
 and have ye another brother." Or, when at last, 
 I could no longer refrain from making myself 
 known, I say, I was ready to burst into a frenzy 
 of joy. How applicable the 1st, 2d, and 3d verses 
 of the 45th chapter " Then Joseph could not re- 
 frain himself before all them that stood by him, 
 and he wept aloud, and said unto his brethren, I 
 am Joseph, doth my father still live/' Then when 
 the mother knew her son, when the brothers and 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 23 
 
 sisters owned their brother ; " he kissed all his 
 brethren and wept over them, and after that his 
 brethren talked with him," 15th verse. At night 
 my mother's husband, a blacksmith, belonging to 
 Mr. Jefferson at the Red House, came home ; he 
 was surprised to see me with the family, not know- 
 ing who I was. He had been married to my mo- 
 ther when I was a babe, and had always been 
 very fond of me. After the same tale had been 
 told him, and the same emotions filled his soul, 
 he again kissed the object of his early affection. 
 The next morning I wanted to go on my jour- 
 ney, in order to make sure of my escape to the 
 Free States ; but, as might be expected, my mo- 
 ther, father, brothers, and sisters, could ill part 
 with their long lost one, and persuaded me to go 
 into the woods in the day time, and at night come 
 home and sleep there. This I did for about a 
 week. On the next Sunday night, I laid me down 
 to sleep between my two brothers, on a pallet, 
 which my mother had prepared for me. About 
 twelve o'clock I was suddenly awoke, and found 
 my bed surrounded by twelve slave-holders, with 
 pistols in hand, who took me away (not allowing 
 me to bid farewell to those I loved so dearly) to 
 the Red House, where they confined me in a room 
 the rest of the night, and in the morning lodged 
 me in the gaol of Caswell Court-House. 
 
 What was the scene at home, what sorrow pos- 
 sessed their hearts, I am unable to describe, as I 
 never after saw any of them more. I heard, how- 
 
24 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 ever, that my mother was, soon after I left, con- 
 lined, and was very long before she recovered the 
 effects of this disaster.* I was told afterwards, 
 that some of those men who took me were pro- 
 fessing Christians, but, to me, they did not seem 
 to live up to what they professed ; they did not 
 seem, by their practice, at least, to recognise that 
 God as their God, who hath said, "Thou shalt 
 not deliver unto his master, the servant which is 
 escaped from his master unto thee ; he shall dwell 
 with thee, even among you, in that place which 
 he shall choose, in one of thy gates, where it lik- 
 eth him best ; thou shalt not oppress him/' 
 Deut. xxiii. 15, 16. 
 
 I was confined here in a dungeon under ground, 
 the grating of which looked to the door of the 
 gaoler's house. His wife had a great antipathy 
 to me. She was Mr. Roper's wife's cousin. My 
 grandmother used to come to me nearly every day, 
 and bring me something to eat, besides the regular 
 gaol allowance, by which my sufferings were some- 
 what decreased. Whenever the gaoler went out, 
 which he often did, his wife used to come to my 
 dungeon, and shut the wooden door over the grat- 
 ing, by which I was nearly suffocated, the place 
 being very damp and noisome. My master did 
 not hear of my being in gaol for thirty-one days 
 after I had been placed there. He immediately 
 
 * My mother had seven children living when I last saw her, 
 and the above one was born soon after I left, making the eighth, 
 and they are now all in slavery except myself. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 25 
 
 sent his son and son-in-law, Mr. Anderson, after 
 me. They came in a horse and chaise, took me 
 from the gaol to a blacksmith's shop, and got an 
 iron collar fitted round my neck, with a heavy 
 chain attached, then tied my hands, and fastened 
 the other end of the chain on a horse, and put me 
 on its back. Just before we started, my grand- 
 mother came to bid me farewell ; I gave her my 
 hand as well as I could, and she having given me 
 two or three presents, we parted. I had felt 
 enough, far too much, for the weak state I was 
 in ; but how shall I describe my feelings, upon 
 parting with the last relative that I ever saw ? 
 The reader must judge by what would be his own 
 feelings under similar circumstances. We then 
 went on for fifty miles ; 1 was very weak, and 
 could hardly sit on the horse. Having been in 
 prison so long, I had lost the southern tan ; and 
 as the people could not see my hair, having my 
 hat on, they thought I was a white man a crimi- 
 nal and asked me what crime I had committed. 
 We arrived late at night, at the house of Mr. 
 Britton. I shall never forget the journey that 
 night. The thunder was one continued roar, and 
 the lightning blazing all around. I expected 
 every minute that my iron collar would attiact it, 
 and I should be knocked off the horse, and dragged 
 along the ground. This gentleman, a year or two 
 before, had liberated his slaves, and sent them into 
 Ohio, having joined the Society of Friends, which 
 society does not allow the holding of slaves. I 
 
26 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 was, therefore, treated' very well there, and they 
 gave me a very hearty supper, which did me much 
 good in my weak state. 
 
 They secured me in the night by locking me to 
 the post of the bed on which they slept. The 
 next morning, we went on to Salisbury. At that 
 place we stopped to water the horses ; they chained 
 me to a tree in the yard, by the side of their chaise. 
 On my horse they put the saddle-bags which con- 
 tained the provisions. As I was in the yard, a 
 black man came and asked me what I had been 
 doing ; I told him that I had run away from my 
 master, after which he told me several tales about 
 the slaves, and among them he mentioned the case 
 of a Quaker, who was then in prison, waiting to 
 be hung, for giving a free passage to a slave. I 
 had been considering all the way how I could 
 escape from my horse, and once had an idea of 
 cutting his head off, but thought it too cruel ; and 
 at last thought of trying to get a rasp, and cut 
 the chain by which I was fastened to the horse. 
 As they often let me get on a quarter of a mile 
 before them, I thought I should have a good op- 
 portunity of doing this without being seen. The 
 black man procured me a rasp, and I put it into 
 the saddle-bags which contained the provisions. 
 We then went on our journey, and one of the sons 
 asked me if I wanted anything to eat ; I answered 
 no, though very hungry at the time, as I was 
 afraid of their going to the bags and discovering 
 the rasp. However, they had not had their own 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. '27 
 
 meal at the inn, as I had supposed, and went to 
 the bags to supply themselves, where they found 
 the rasp. Upon this, they fastened my horse be- 
 side the horse in their chaise, and kept a stricter 
 watch over me. Nothing remarkable occurred till 
 we got within eight miles of Mr. Gooch's, where 
 we stopped a short time ; and, taking advantage 
 of their absence, I broke a switch from some 
 boughs above my head, lashed my horse, and set 
 off at full speed. I had got about a quarter of a 
 mile before they could get their horse loose from 
 the chaise ; one then rode the horse, and the other 
 ran as fast as he could after me. When I caught 
 sight of them, I turned off the main road into the 
 woods, hoping to escape their sight ; their horse, 
 
 MR. ANDERSON ATTEMPTING TO SHOOT THE AUTHOR, 
 AFTER TELLING HIM TO STOP THREE TIMES, ACCORD- 
 ING TO THE LAW. 
 
28 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 however, being much swifter than mine, they soon 
 got within a short distance of me. I then came 
 to a rail fence, which I found it very difficult to 
 get over, but breaking several rails away I effected 
 rny object. They then called upon me to stop 
 more than three times ; and I not doing so, they 
 fired after me, but the pistol only snapped. 
 
 This is according to law ; after three calls they 
 may shoot a runaway slave. Soon after the one 
 on the horse came up with me, and catching hold 
 of the bridle of my horse, pushed the pistol to my 
 side ; the other soon came up, and breaking off 
 several stout branches from the trees, they gave 
 me about one hundred blows. This they did very 
 near to a planter's house. The gentleman was 
 not at home, but his wife came out and begged 
 them not to kill me so near the house ; they took no 
 notice of this, but kept on beating me. They then 
 fastened me to the axle tree of their chaise. One 
 of them got into the chaise, the other took my 
 horse, and they ran me all the eight miles as fast 
 as they could ; the one on my horse going behind 
 to guard me. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 29 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 The Author is Flogged and Punished in various ways, but still 
 perseveres in his attempts to Escape, till he is sold to Mr. 
 Wilson. 
 
 IN this way we came to my old master, Mr. 
 Gooch. The first person I saw was himself; he 
 unchained me from the chaise, and at first seemed 
 to treat me very gently, asking me where I had 
 been, &c. The first thing the sons did was to 
 show the rasp which I had got to cut my chain. 
 My master gave me a hearty dinner, the best he 
 ever did give me ; but it was to keep me from 
 dying before he had given me all the flogging he 
 intended. After dinner he took me to a log-house, 
 stripped me quite naked, fastened a rail up very 
 high, tied my hands to the rail, fastened my feet 
 together, put a rail between my feet, and stood on 
 one end of it to hold me down ; the two sons then 
 gave me fifty lashes each, the son-in-law another 
 fifty, and Mr. Gooch himself fifty more. 
 
 While doing this his wife came out, and begged 
 him not to kill me, the first act of sympathy I 
 ever noticed in her. When I called for water, 
 they brought a pail-full and threw it over my back 
 ploughed up by the lashes. After this they took 
 
so 
 
 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 WE. GOOCH STRIPPING THE AUTHOR TO FLOG KIM, HIS 
 TWO SONS AND SON-IN-LAW PRESENT. THEY AT THIS 
 TIME GIVE HIM FIFTY LASHES EACH. 
 
 me to the blacksmith's shop, got two large bars of 
 iron, which they bent round my feet, each bar 
 weighing twenty pounds, and put a heavy log chain 
 on my neck. This was on Saturday. On the 
 Monday, he chained me to the same female slave 
 as before. As he had to go out that day, he did 
 not give me the punishment which he intended to 
 give me every day, but at night when we came 
 home, he made us walk round his estate, and by 
 all the houses of the slaves, for them to taunt us ; 
 when we came home, he told us, we must be up 
 very early in the morning, and go to the field, be- 
 fore the other slaves. We were up at daybreak, 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 31 
 
 but we could not get on fast, on account of the 
 heavy irons on my feet. It may be necessary to 
 state here, that these irons were first made red 
 hot and bent in a circle, so as just to allow of my 
 feet going through ; it having been cooled, and my 
 leg with the iron on lifted up to an anvil, it was 
 made secure round my ancles. When I walked 
 with these irons on, I used to hold them up with 
 my hands by means of a cord. We walked 
 about a mile in two hours, but knowing the punish- 
 ment he was going to inflict on us, we made up 
 our minds to escape into the woods, and secrete 
 ourselves. This we did, and he not being able to 
 find us, which they could not do ; and about twelve 
 o'clock, when we thought they would give up look- 
 ing for us at that time, we went on, and came to 
 the banks of the Catarba. Here I got a stone, and 
 opened the ring of the chain on her neck, and got 
 it off'; and as the chain round my neck was only 
 passed through a ring, as soon as I got her's offj I 
 slipped the chain through my ring, and got it off' 
 my own neck.* We then went on by the banks 
 of the river for some distance, and found a little 
 canoe about two feet wide. I managed to get in, 
 although the irons on my feet made it very dan- 
 gerous, for if I had upset the canoe, I could not 
 swim. The female got in after me, and gave me 
 the paddles, by which we got some distance down 
 
 * It may be well to state here, that the ring which fastened 
 the log chain together around the female's neck was an open iron 
 rin.'>\ similar to those used at the end of a watch chain. 
 
32 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 the river. The current being very strong, it drove 
 us against a small island ; we paddled round the 
 island to the other side, and then made towards 
 the opposite bank. Here again we were stopped 
 by the current, and made up to a large rock in the 
 river, between the island and the opposite shore. 
 As the weather was very rough we landed on the 
 rock, and secured the canoe, as it was not possible 
 to get back to the island. It was a very dark 
 night and rained tremendously ; and, as the water 
 was rising rapidly towards the top of the rock, we 
 gave all up for lost, and sometimes hoped, and some- 
 times feared to hope, that we should never see the 
 morning. But Providence was moving in our fa- 
 vour ; the rain ceased, the water reached the edge 
 of the rock, then receded, and we were out of dan- 
 ger from this cause. We remained all night upon 
 the rock, and in the morning reached the opposite 
 shore, and then made our way through the woods 
 till we came to a field of Indian corn, where we 
 plucked some of the green ears and ate them, hav- 
 ing had nothing for two days and nights. We 
 
 came to the estate of , where we met 
 
 with a coloured man who knew me, and having 
 run away himself from a bad master, he gave us 
 some food, and told us we might sleep in the barn 
 that night. Being very fatigued, we overslept our- 
 selves ; the proprietor came to the barn, but as I 
 was in one corner under some Indian corn tops, 
 and she in another, he did not perceive us, and 
 we did not leave the J>arn before night (Wednes- 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 33 
 
 day). We then went out, got something to eat, 
 and strayed about the estate till Sunday. On that 
 day, I met with some men, one of whom had irons 
 on the same as me ; he told me that his master 
 was going out to see his friends, and that he would 
 try and get my feet loose ; for this purpose 1 part- 
 ed with this female, fearing, that if she were 
 caught with me, she would be forced to tell who 
 took my irons off. The man tried some time with- 
 out effect, he then gave me a file and I tried my- 
 self, but was disappointed on account of their 
 thickness. 
 
 On the Monday I went on towards Lancaster, 
 and got within three miles of it that night ; and 
 went towards the plantation of Mr. Crockett, as I 
 kndw some of his slaves, and hoped to get some 
 food given me. When I got there, however, the 
 dogs smelt me out and barked ; upon which, Mr. 
 Crockett came out, followed me with his rifle, and 
 came up with me. He put me on a horse's back, 
 which put me to extreme pain, from the great 
 weight hanging from my feet. We reached Lan- 
 caster gaol that night, and he lodged me there. I 
 was placed in the next dungeon to a man who 
 was going to be hanged. I shall never forget his 
 cries and groans, as he prayed all night for the 
 mercy of God. Mr. Gooch did not hear of me for 
 several weeks ; when he did, he sent his son-in- 
 law, Mr. Anderson, after me. Mr. Gooch himself 
 came within a mile of Lancaster, and waited until 
 Mr. Anderson brought me. At this time I had 
 
 c 
 
34 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 but one of the irons on my feet, having got so thin 
 round my ancles that I had slipped one off while 
 in gaol. His son-in-law tied my hands, and made 
 me walk along till we came to Mr. Gooch. As 
 soon as we arrived at M 'Daniel's Ford, two miles 
 above the Ferry, on the Catarba river, they made 
 me wade across, themselves going on horseback. 
 The water was very deep, and having irons on one 
 foot and round my neck, I could not keep a foot- 
 ing. They dragged me along by my chain on the 
 top of the water. It was as much as they could 
 do to hold me by the chain, the current being very 
 strong. They then took me home, flogged me, put 
 extra irons on my neck and feet, and put me un- 
 der the driver, with more work than ever I had 
 before. He did not flog me so severely as before, 
 but continued it every day. Among the instru- 
 ments of torture employed, I here describe one : 
 This is a machine used for packing and pressing 
 cotton. By it he hung me up by the hands at let- 
 ter a, a horse, and, at times, a man moving round 
 the screw e, and carrying it up and down, and 
 pressing the block c into a box d, into which the 
 cotton is put. At this time he hung me up for a 
 quarter of an hour. I was carried up ten feet 
 from the ground, when Mr. Gooch asked me if I 
 was tired ? He then let me rest for five minutes, 
 then carried me round again, after which, he let 
 me down, and put me into the box d, and shut me 
 down in it for about ten minutes. After this tor- 
 ture, I stayed with him several months, and did 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 
 
 THE AUTHOR HANGING BY HIS HANDS TIED TO A 
 COTTON SCREW.* 
 
 my work very well. It was about the beginning 
 of 1832, when he took off my irons, and being in 
 dread of him, he having threatened me with more 
 punishment, I attempted again to escape from him. 
 At this time I got into North Carolina : but a re- 
 
 * This screw is sometimes moved round by hand when there 
 is a person hanging on it. The screw is made with wood, a 
 large tree cut down and carved the shape of a screw. 
 
JO NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 ward having been offered for me, a Mr. Robinson 
 caught me, and chained me to a chair, upon which 
 he sat up with me all night, and next day pro- 
 ceeded home with me. This was Saturday. 
 Mr. Gooch had gone to church, several miles 
 from his house. When he came back, the first 
 thing he did was to pour some tar upon my head, 
 then rubbed it all over my face, took a torch with 
 pitch on, and set it on fire ; he put it out be- 
 fore it did me very great injury, but the pain 
 which I endured was most excruciating, nearly 
 all my hair having been burnt off. On Monday, 
 he put irons on me again, weighing nearly fifty 
 pounds. He threatened me again on the Sunday 
 with another flogging ; and on the Monday morn- 
 ing, before day-break, I got away again, with my 
 irons on, and was about three hours going a dis- 
 tance of two miles.* I had gone a good distance, 
 when I met with a coloured man, who got some 
 wedges, and took my irons off. However, I was 
 caught again, and put into prison in Charlotte, 
 where Mr. Gooch came, and took me back to Ches- 
 ter. He asked me how I got my irons off. They 
 having been got off by a slave, I would not answer 
 his question, for fear of getting the man punished. 
 Upon this he put the fingers of my Lands into a 
 vice, and squeezed all my nails off. He then had 
 
 * It must be recollected, that when a person is two miles 
 from a house, in that part of the country, he can hide himself in 
 the woods for weeks, and I knew a. slave who was hid for six 
 months without discovery, the trees being so thick. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 37 
 
 my feet piit on an anvil, and ordered a man to 
 beat my toes, till he smashed some of my nails off. 
 The marks of this treatment still remain upon 
 me, some of my nails never having grown perfect 
 since. He inflicted this punishment in order to 
 get out of me how I got my irons off, but never 
 succeeded. After this, he hardly knew what to 
 do with me ; the whole stock of his cruelties 
 seemed to be exhausted. He chained me down 
 in the log-house. Soon after this, he sent a female 
 slave to see if I was safe. Mr. Gooch had not 
 secured me as he thought ; but had only run my 
 chain through the ring, without locking it. This 
 I observed ; and while the slave was coming, I was 
 employed in loosening the chain with the hand 
 that was not wounded. As soon as I observed 
 her coming I drew the chain up tight, and she ob- 
 serving that I seemed fast, went away and told 
 her master, who Avas in the field ordering the 
 slaves. When she was gone, I drew the chain 
 through the ring, escaped under the flooring of 
 the log-house, and went on under it, till I came 
 out at the other side, and ran on ; but, being sore 
 and weak, I had not got a mile before I was caught, 
 and again carried back. He tied me up to a tree 
 in the woods at night, and made his slaves flog 
 me. I cannot say how many lashes I received ; 
 but it was the worst flogging I ever had, and the 
 last which Mr. Gooch ever gave me. 
 
 There are several circumstances which occurred 
 on this estate while I was there, relative to other 
 
38 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 slaves, which it may be interesting to mention, 
 Hardly a day ever passed without some one being 
 flogged. To one of his female slaves he had given 
 a dose of castor oil and salts together, as much as 
 she could take ;* he then got a box, about six feet 
 by two and a half, and one and a half feet deep ; 
 he put this slave under the box, and made the 
 men fetch as many logs as they could get, and put 
 them on the top of it ; under this she was made 
 to stay all night. I believe, that if he had given 
 this slave one, he had given her three thousand 
 lashes. Mr. Gooch was a member of a Baptist 
 Church. His slaves thinking him a very bad sam- 
 ple of what a professing Christian ought to be, 
 would not join the connexion he belonged to, think- 
 ing they must be a very bad set of people ; there 
 were many of them members of the Methodist 
 Church.-)- On Sunday, the slaves can only go to 
 church at the will of their master, when he gives 
 them a pass for the time they are to be out. If 
 they are found by the patrol after the time to 
 which their pass extends, they are severely flogged. 
 On Sunday nights a slave, named Allen, used to 
 come to Mr. Gooch's estate for the purpose of ex- 
 horting and praying with his brother slaves, by 
 
 * The female whom Mr. Gooch chained to me. 
 
 1* In fact, in some of the States nearly all of the slaves are 
 Methodists ; and when in the field at work they may be often 
 heard singing these words, " I am happy, I am happy, Lord pity 
 poor me. Me never know what happiness was, until I joined 
 de Methodists. I am happy, Lord pity poor me." 
 
ESCAPE FKOM SLAVERY. 39 
 
 whose instrumentality many of them had been 
 converted. . One evening, Mr. Gooch caught them 
 all in a room, turned Allen out, and threatened 
 his slaves with one hundred lashes each if they 
 ever brought him there again. At one time Mr. 
 Gooch was ill and confined to his room ; if any of 
 the slaves had done anything which he thought de- 
 served a flogging, he would have them brought 
 into his bed-room and flogged before his eyes. 
 
 With respect to food, he used to allow us one 
 peck of Indian meal per week, which after being 
 sifted and the bran taken from it, would not be 
 much more than half a peck. Meat we did not 
 get for sometimes several weeks together ; how- 
 ever, he was proverbial for giving his slaves more 
 food than any other slave-holder. I stayed with 
 Mr. Gooch a year and a half ; during that time 
 the scenes of cruelty I witnessed and experienced 
 are not at all fitted for these pages. There is much 
 to excite disgust in what has been narrated, but 
 hundreds of other cases might be mentioned. 
 
40 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 I was not long with Mr. Wilson, who was a Negro trader, before 
 he exchanged me to Mr. Rowland, who was also a trader, for 
 another slave, and after being with him about a year, was sold 
 to Mr. Goodly, who exchanged me again to Mr. Louis. 
 
 AFTER this, Mr. Gooch seeing that I was deter- 
 mined to get away from him, chained me, and 
 sent me with another female slave, whom he had 
 treated very cruelly, to Mr. Britton, son of the be- 
 fore mentioned slave-dealer. We were to have 
 gone to Georgia to be sold, but a bargain was 
 struck before we arrived there. Mr. Britton had 
 put chains on me to please Mr. Gooch, but having 
 gone some little distance we came up with a white 
 man, who begged Mr. Britton to unchain me ; he 
 then took off my handcuffs. We then went on to 
 Union Court House, where we met a drove of 
 slaves belonging to Mr. Wilson, who ultimately 
 bought me and sent me to his drove ; the girl was 
 sold to a planter in the neighbourhood as bad as 
 Mr. Gooch.* In court week the negro traders 
 and slaves encamp a little way out of the town. 
 
 " As I am often asked, " What became of the female I was 
 chained to ]" the above is the girl, whom I have seen once since 
 she was last sold, and from what I saw of her then, I do not 
 think she can be alive now. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 41 
 
 The traders here will often sleep with the best- 
 looking female slaves among them, and they will 
 often have many children in the year, which are 
 said to be slave-holder's children, by which means, 
 through his villany, he will make an immense 
 profit of this intercourse, by selling the babe with 
 its mother. They often keep an immense stock of 
 slaves on hand ; many of them will be with the 
 trader a year or more before they are sold. Mr. 
 Marcus Rowland, the drover who bought me, then 
 returned with his slaves to his brother's house 
 (Mr. John Rowland), where he kept his drove on 
 his way to Virginia. He kept me as a kind of ser- 
 vant. I had to grease the faces of the blacks every 
 morning with sweet oil, to make* them shine, be- 
 fore they are put up to sell. After he had been 
 round several weeks, and sold many slaves, he left 
 me and some more at his brother's house, while 
 he went on to Washington, about 600 miles, to 
 buy some more slaves, the drove having got very 
 small. We were treated very well while there, 
 having plenty to eat and little work to do, in order 
 to make us fat. I was brought up more as a do- 
 mestic slave, as they generally prefer slaves of my 
 colour for that purpose. When Mr. Rowland came 
 back, having been absent about five months, he 
 found all the slaves well except one female, who 
 had been grieving very much at being parted from 
 her parents, and at last died of grief. He dressed 
 us very nicely and went on again. I travelled 
 with him for a year, and had to look over the 
 
42 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 slaves and see that they were dressed well, had 
 plenty of food, and to oil their faces. During this 
 time we stopped once at White House Church, a 
 Baptist Association ; a protracted camp meeting 
 was holding there, on the plan of the revival 
 meetings in this country. We got there at the 
 time of the meeting, and sold two female slaves 
 on the Sunday morning, at the time the meeting 
 broke up, to a gentleman who had been attending 
 the meeting the whole of the week. While I was 
 with Mr. Rowland, we were at many such meet- 
 ings ; and the members of the churches are by 
 this means so well influenced towards their fel- 
 low-creatures at these meetings for the worship of 
 God, that it becomes a fruitful season for the 
 drover, who carries on an immense traffic with 
 the attendants at these places. This is common 
 to Baptists and Methodists. At the end of the 
 year, he exchanged me to a farmer, Mr. David 
 Goodly, for a female slave in Greenville, about 
 fourteen miles from Greenville Court House. This 
 gentleman was going to Missouri to settle, and on 
 his way had to pass through Ohio, a free State. 
 But having learnt after he bought me, that I had 
 before tried to get away to the free States, he was 
 afraid to take me with him, and I was exchanged 
 to a Mr. Louis. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 43 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 Travel with Mr. Louis to Pendleton Indian Springs, from thence 
 to Columbus, where I was sold at auction to Mr. Beveridge. 
 Travels and history with Mr. Beveridge. 
 
 MR. MARVEL Louis was in the habit of travel- 
 ling a great deal, and took me as a domestic slave 
 to wait on him. Mr. Louis boarded at the house 
 of a Mr. Clevelin, a rich planter, at Greenville, 
 South Carolina. Mr. L. was paying his addresses 
 to the daughter of this gentleman, but was sur- 
 prised and routed in his approaches by a Colonel 
 Dorkins, of Union Court House, who ultimately 
 carried her off in triumph. After this, Mr. Louis 
 took to drinking, to drown his recollection of dis- 
 appointed love. 
 
 One day he went to Pendleton races, and I wait- 
 ed on the road for him : returning intoxicated he 
 was thrown from his horse into a brook, and was 
 picked up by a gentleman, and taken to an inn, 
 and I went there to take care of him. Next day 
 he went on to Punkintown with Mr. Warren R. 
 Davis, a member of Congress ; I went with him. 
 This was at the time of the agitation of the Union 
 and Nullifying party, which was expected to end 
 in a general war. The Nullifying party had a 
 
44 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 grand dinner on the occasion, after which, they 
 gave their slaves all their refuse, for the purpose 
 of bribing them to fight on the side of their party. 
 The scene on this occasion was humorous, all the 
 slaves scrambling after bare bones and crumbs, as 
 if they had had nothing for weeks. When Mr. 
 Louis had got over this fit of drunkenness, we re- 
 turned to Greenville, where I had little to do ex- 
 cept in warehouse. There was preaching in the 
 Court-house on the Sunday ; but scarcely had the 
 sweet savour of the worship of God passed away, 
 when, on Monday, a public auction was held for 
 the sale of slaves, cattle, sugar, iron, &c. by Z. 
 Davis, the high constable and others. 
 
 On these days I was generally very busy in 
 handing out the different articles for inspection, 
 and was employed in this way for several months. 
 After which, Mr. Louis left his place for Pendle- 
 ton ; but his health getting worse, and fast ap- 
 proaching consumption, he determined to travel. 
 I went with him over Georgia to the Indian 
 Springs, and from there to Columbus ; here he 
 left me with Lawyer Kemp, a member of the 
 State Assembly, to take care of his horse and car- 
 riage till he came back from Cuba, where he went 
 for the benefit of his health. I travelled round 
 with Mr. Kemp, waiting until my master came 
 back. I soon after heard, that Mr. Louis had died 
 in Appalachicola, and had been buried at Tenessee 
 Bluff. I was very much attached to the neigh- 
 bourhood of Pendleton and Greenville, and feared, 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 45 
 
 from Mr. Louis's death, I should not get back 
 there. 
 
 As soon as this information arrived, Mr. Kemp 
 put me, the carriage and horses, a gold watch, 
 and cigars, up to auction, on which I was much 
 frightened, knowing there would be some very 
 cruel masters at- the sale ; and fearing I should 
 again be disappointed in my attempt to escape 
 from bondage. A Mr. Beveridge, a Scotchman, 
 from Appalachicola, bought me, the horses, and 
 cigars.* He was not a cruel master ; he had been 
 in America eighteen years, and I believe I was the 
 iirst slave he ever bought. Mr. Kemp had no 
 right to sell me, which he did before he had writ- 
 ten to Mr. Louis's brother. 
 
 Shortly after this, Mr. Kemp having had some 
 altercation with General Woodfork, it ended in a 
 duel, in which Mr. W. was killed. A few weeks 
 after, as Mr. Kemp was passing down a street, he 
 was suddenly shot dead by Mr. Milton, a rival 
 lawyer. When I heard this, I considered it a visi- 
 tation of God on Mr. Kemp for having sold me un- 
 justly, as I did not belong to him. This was soon 
 discovered by me, Mr. Louis's brother having called 
 at Mackintosh Hotel, Columbus, to claim me, but 
 
 * How Mr. Beveridge ever became a slaveholder, I cannot 
 account for, for I believe him to be the only kind slaveholder in 
 ;-ica ; and not only that, I have been in England many 
 vizirs, and have never met with a kinder man than Mr. Beve- 
 ridge, aud have often prayed that God would deliver him from 
 that one sin, a sin which he was kept from eighteen years. 
 
46 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 which he could not effect. After this, I travelled 
 with Mr. Beveridge through Georgia, to the warm 
 springs, and then back to Columbus, going on to 
 Marianna, his summer house, in Florida. 
 
 Here I met with better treatment than I had 
 ever experienced before ; we travelled on the whole 
 summer ; at the fall, Mr. Beveridge went to Ap- 
 palachicola on business. Mr. Beveridge was con- 
 tractor for the mail from Columbus to Appalachi- 
 
 "X and owner of three steam-boats, the Versailles, 
 Andrew Jackson, and Van Buren. He made me 
 steward on board of the Versailles the whole win- 
 ter. The river then got so low that the boats 
 could not run. At this time Mr. Beveridge went 
 to Mount Vernon. On our way we had to pass 
 through the Indian nation. We arrived at Co- 
 lumbus, where I was taken dangerously ill of a 
 fever. After I got well, Mr. Beveridge returned 
 to Marianna, through the Indian nation. Having 
 gone about twelve miles, he was taken very ill. 
 
 I took him out of the carriage to a brook, and 
 washed his hands and face until he got better, 
 when I got him into the carriage again, and drove 
 off till we came to General Irving's, where he 
 stopped several days on account of his health. 
 While there, I observed on the floor of the kitchen 
 several children, one about three months old, with- 
 out any body to take care of her ; I asked where 
 her mother was, and was told that Mrs. Irving 
 had given her a very hard task to do at washing, 
 in a brook about a quarter of a mile distant We 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 47 
 
 heard after, that not being able to get it done, she 
 got some cords, tied them round her neck, climbed 
 up a tree, swung off, and hung herself. Being 
 missed, persons were sent after her, who observed 
 several buzzards flying about a particular spot, to 
 which they directed their steps, and found the poor 
 woman nearly eaten up. 
 
 After this we travelled several months without 
 any thing remarkable taking place. 
 
48 NARRA.TIVE OF AN 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 The Author's last Attempt and final Escape from Marianna to 
 Savannah ; from thence to I^ew York ; Quarantined at Staten 
 Island. 
 
 IN the year 1834, Mr. Beveridge, who was now 
 residing in Appalachicola, a town in West Florida, 
 became a bankrupt, when all his property was sold, 
 and I fell into the hands of a very cruel master, 
 Mr. Register, a planter in the same State; of whom, 
 knowing his savage character, I always had a dread. 
 Previously to his purchasing me, he had frequently 
 taunted me, by saying, " You have been a gentle- 
 man long enough, and, whatever may be the con- 
 sequences, I intend to buy you." To which I 
 remarked, that I would on no account live with 
 him if I could help it. Nevertheless, intent upon 
 his purpose, in the month of July, 1884, he bought 
 me ; after which I was so exasperated, that I cared 
 not whether I lived or died ; in fact, whilst I was 
 on my passage from Appalachicola, I procured a 
 quart bottle of whisky, for the purpose of so in- 
 toxicating myself, that I might be able either 
 to plunge myself into the river, or so enrage my 
 master that he should despatch me forthwith. I 
 was, however, by a kind Providence, prevented 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAYEEY. 49 
 
 from committing this horrid deed by an old slave 
 on board, who, knowing my intention, secretly 
 took the bottle from me ; after which, my hands 
 were tied, and I was led into the town of Ochesa, 
 to a warehouse, where my master was asked by 
 the proprietor of the place the reason of his 'con- 
 fining my hands ; in answer to which Mr. Register 
 said that he had purchased me. The proprietor, 
 however, persuaded him to untie me ; after which 
 my master, being excessively drunk, asked for a 
 cow-hide, intending to flog me, from which the 
 proprietor dissuaded him, saying that he had 
 known me for some time, and he was sure that I 
 did not require to be flogged. From this place we 
 proceeded about mid -day on our way. He placed 
 me on the bare back of a half-starved old horse, 
 which he had purchased, and upon which sharp 
 surface he kindly intended I should ride about eighty 
 miles, the distance we were then from his home. 
 In this unpleasant situation I could not help re- 
 flecting upon the prospects before me, not forget- 
 ting that I had heard my new master had been in 
 the habit of stealing cattle and other property, and 
 among other things a slave woman ; and that I had 
 said, as it afterwards turned out, in the hearing of 
 some one who communicated the saying to my 
 master, that I had been accustomed to live with a 
 gentleman and not with a rogue ; and, finding that 
 he hud been informed of this, I had the additional 
 dread of a few hundred lashes for it on my arrival 
 at my destination. 
 
 D 
 
50 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 About two hours after we started it began to 
 rain very heavily, and continued to do so until we 
 arrived at Marianna, about twelve at night, where 
 we were to rest till morning. My master here 
 questioned me as to whether I intended to run 
 away or not ; and I not then knowing the sin of 
 lying, at once told him that I would not. He then 
 gave me his clothes to dry. I took them to the 
 kitchen for that purpose, and he retired to bed, 
 taking a bag of clothes belonging to me with him, 
 as a kind of security, I presume, for my safety. 
 In an hour or two afterwards I took his clothes to 
 him dried, and found him fast asleep. I placed 
 them by his side, and said that I would then take 
 my own to dry too, taking care to speak loud 
 enough to ascertain whether he was asleep or not, 
 knowing that he had a dirk and pistol by his side, 
 Avhich he would not have hesitated using against 
 me, if I had attempted secretly to have procured 
 them. I was glad to find that the effects of his 
 drinking the day before had caused his sleeping 
 very soundly, and I immediately resolved on mak- 
 ing my escape ; and without loss of time started 
 with my few clothes into the woods, which were 
 in the immediate neighbourhood ; and after run- 
 ning many miles, I came up to the river Chapoli, 
 which is very deep, and so beset with alligators 
 that I dared not attempt to swim across. 
 
 I paced up and down this river, with the hope 
 of finding a conveyance across, for a whole day, 
 the succeeding night, and till noon on the follow- 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 51 
 
 ing day, which was Saturday. About twelve 
 o'clock on that day I discovered an Indian canoe, 
 which had not from all appearance been used for 
 some time ; this, of course, I used to convey myself 
 across, and after being obliged to go a little way 
 down the river, by means of a piece of wood I 
 providentially found in the boat, I landed on the 
 opposite side. Here I found myself surrounded by 
 planters looking for me, in consequence of which, 
 I hid myself in the bushes until night, when I 
 again travelled several miles to the farm of a Mr. 
 Robinson, a large sugar and cotton planter, where 
 I rested till morning in a field. Afterwards I set 
 out, working my way through the woods, about 
 twenty miles towards the east ; this I knew by my 
 knowledge of the position of the sun at its rising. 
 Having reached the Chattahoochee river, which 
 divides Florida from Georgia, I was again puzzled 
 to know how to cross ; it was about three o'clock 
 in the day, when a number of persons were fishing; 
 having walked for some hours along the banks, I 
 at last, after dark, procured a ferry-boat, which not 
 being able, from the swiftness of the river, to steer 
 direct across, I was carried many miles down the 
 river, landing on the Georgian side, from whence 
 I proceeded on through the woods two or three 
 miles, and came to a little farm-house about twelve 
 o'clock at night; at a short distance from the house 
 I found an old slave hut, into which I went, and 
 informed the old man, who appeared seventy or 
 eighty years old, that I had had a very bad mas- 
 
52 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 ter, from whom 1 run away ; and asked him if lie 
 could give me something to eat, having had no 
 suitable food for three or four days ; he told me he 
 had nothing but a piece of dry Indian bread, which 
 he cheerfully gave me ; having eaten it, I went on 
 a short distance from the hut, and laid down in 
 the wood to rest for an hour or two. All the 
 following day (Monday) I continued travelling 
 through the woods, and was greatly distressed for 
 want of water to quench my thirst, it being a very 
 dry country, till I came to Spring Creek, which is 
 a wide deep stream, and with some of which I 
 gladly quenched my thirst, I then proceeded to 
 cross the same by a bridge close by, and continued 
 my way until dusk. I came to a gentleman's house 
 in the woods, where I inquired how far it was to 
 the next house, taking care to watch an opportu- 
 nity to ask some individual whom I could master, 
 and get away from, if any interruption to my pro- 
 gress was attempted. I went on for some time, it 
 being a very fine moonlight night, and was pre- 
 sently alarmed by the howling of a wolf near me ; 
 which, I concluded, was calling others to join him 
 in attacking me, having understood that they al- 
 ways assemble in numbers for such a purpose ; the 
 howling increased, and I was still pursued, and iLe 
 .numbers were evidently increasing fast ; but I was 
 happily rescued from my dreadful fright, by com- 
 ing to some cattle, which attracted, as I supposed, 
 the wolves, and saved my life ; for I could not et 
 up the trees for safety, they being very tall pines, 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 53 
 
 the lowest branches of which Avere, at least, forty 
 or fifty feet from the ground, and the trunks very 
 large and smooth. 
 
 About two o'clock I came to the house of a Mr. 
 Cherry, on the borders of the Flint River ; I went 
 up to the house, and called them up to beg some- 
 thing to eat ; but having nothing cooked, they 
 kindly allowed me to lie down in the porch, where 
 they made me a bed. In conversation with this 
 Mr. Cherry, I discovered that I had known him 
 before, having been in a steam-boat, the Versailles, 
 some months previous, which sunk very near the 
 house, but which I did not at first discern to be 
 the same. I then thought it would not be prudent 
 for me to stop there, and therefore told them I 
 was in a hurry to get on, and must start very early 
 again, he having no idea who I was ; and I gave 
 his son six cents to take me across the river, which 
 he did when the sun was about half an hour high, 
 and unfortunately landed me where there was a 
 man building a boat, who knew me very well, and 
 my former master too, he calling me by name, 
 asked me where I was going. 
 
 I was very much frightened at being discovered, 
 but summoned up courage, and said that my mas- 
 ter had gone to Tallyhassa by the coach, and that 
 there was not room for me, and I had to walk 
 round to meet him. I then asked the man to put 
 me in the best road to get there, which, however, 
 I knew as well as he did, having travelled there 
 before ; he directed me the best way ; but I, of 
 
54 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 course, took the contrary direction, wanting to get on 
 to Savannah. By this hasty and wicked deception, 
 I saved myself from going to Bainbridge prison, 
 which was close by, and to which I should certainly 
 have been taken had it been known that I was 
 making my escape. 
 
 Leaving Bainbridge, I proceeded about forty 
 miles, travelling all day under a scorching sun 
 through the woods, in which I saw many deer and 
 serpents, until I reached Thomas Town in the 
 evening. I there inquired the way to Augusta of 
 a man whom I met, and also asked where I could 
 obtain lodgings, and was told there was a poor 
 minister about a mile from the place who would 
 give me lodgings. I accordingly went, and found 
 them in a little log-house, where, having awakened 
 the family, I found them all lying on the bare 
 boards, where I joined them for the remainder of 
 the night. 
 
 In the morning the old gentleman prayed for 
 me, that I might be preserved on my journey ; he 
 had previously asked me where I was going> and 
 knowing, that if I told him the right place, any 
 that inquired of him for me would be able to find 
 me, asked the way to Augusta, instead of Savannah, 
 my real destination. I also told him, that I was 
 partly Indian and partly white, but I am also 
 partly African, but this I omitted to tell him, 
 knowing if I did I should be apprehended. After 
 I had left this hut, I again inquired for Augusta, for 
 the purpose of misleading my pursuers, but I after- 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 55 
 
 wards took my course through the woods, and came 
 into a road, called the Coffee Road, which General 
 Jackson cut down for his troops at the time of the 
 war between the Americans and Spaniards in 
 Florida ; in which road there are but few houses, 
 and which I preferred for the purpose of avoiding 
 detection. 
 
 After several days I left this road and took a 
 more direct way to Savannah, where I had to wade 
 through two rivers before I came to the Alatamah, 
 which I crossed in a ferry-boat, about a mile below 
 the place where the rivers Oconee and Ocmulgee 
 run together into one river, called the Alata- 
 mah. I here met with some cattle drovers, who 
 were collecting cattle to drive to Savannah. On 
 walking on before them, I began to consider in 
 what way I could obtain a passport for Savannah, 
 and determined on the following plan : 
 
 I called at a cottage, and after I had talked 
 some time with the wife, who began to feel greatly 
 for me, in consequence of my telling her a little of 
 my history (her husband being out hunting), I 
 pretended to show her my passport, feeling for it 
 everywhere about my coat and hat, and not finding 
 it, I went back a little way, pretending to look for 
 it, but came back, saying I was very sorry, but I 
 did not know where it was. At last, the man 
 came home, carrying a deer upon his shoulders, 
 which he brought into the yard, and began to dress 
 it The wife then went out to tell him my situa- 
 tion, and after long persuasion, he said he could 
 
56 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 not write, but that if I could tell his son what 
 was in my passport, he would write me one. 
 Knowing that I should not be able to pass through 
 Savannah without one, and having heard several 
 free coloured men read theirs, I thought I could 
 tell the boy what to write. The lad sat down and 
 wrote what I told him, nearly filling a large sheet 
 of paper for the passport, and another with recom- 
 mendations. These being completed, I was invited 
 to partake of the fresh venison, which the woman 
 of the house had prepared for dinner ; and having 
 done so, and feeling grateful for their kindness, I 
 proceeded on my way. Going along, I took my 
 papers out of my pocket, and looking at them, 
 although I could not read a word, I perceived that 
 the boy's writing was very unlike other writing 
 that I had seen, and was greatly blotted besides ; 
 consequently, I was afraid that these documents 
 would not answer 'my purpose, and began to con- 
 sider what other plan I could pursue to obtain 
 another pass. 
 
 I had now to wade through another river to 
 which I came, and which I had great difficulty in 
 crossing, in consequence of the water overflowing 
 the banks of several rivers to the extent of up- 
 wards of twenty miles. In the midst of the water, 
 I passed one night upon a small island, and the 
 next day I went through the remainder of the 
 water. On many occasions I was obliged to walk 
 upon my toes, and consequently found the advan- 
 tage of being six feet two inches high (I have 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. .)7 
 
 grown three inches since), and at other times was 
 obliged to swim. In the middle of this extremity, 
 I felt it would be imprudent for me to return ; for 
 if my master was in pursuit of me, my safest place 
 from him was in the water, if I could keep my 
 head above the surface. I was, however, dread- 
 fully frightened at the crocodiles, and most ear- 
 nestly prayed that I might be kept from a watery 
 grave, and resolved that if again I landed I would 
 spend my life in the service of God. 
 
 Having, through mercy, again started on my 
 journey, I met with the drovers ; and having, 
 whilst in the waters, taken the pass out of my 
 hat, and so dipped it in the water as to spoil it, I 
 showed it to the men, and asked them where I 
 could get another. They told me that in the 
 neighbourhood there lived a rich cotton merchant, 
 who would write me one. They took me to him, 
 and gave their word that they saw the passport 
 before it was wet (for I had previously showed it 
 to them), upon which the cotton-planter wrote a 
 free pass and a recommendation, to which the cow- 
 drovers affixed their marks. 
 - The recommendation was as follows : 
 
 "John Roper, a very interesting young lad, 
 whom I have seen and travelled with for eighty 
 or ninety miles on his road from Florida, is a free 
 man, descended from Indian and white. I trust 
 he will be allowed to pass on without interruption, 
 being convinced, from what I have seen, that he 
 
58 NARRATIVE OF Alt 
 
 is free, and, though dark, is not an African. I had 
 seen his papers before they were wetted." 
 
 These cow-drovers, who procured me the pass- 
 port and recommendation from the cotton-planter, 
 could not read ; and they were intoxicated when 
 they went with me to him. I am part African, as 
 well as Indian and white, my father being a white 
 man, Henry Roper, Esq., Caswell County, North 
 Carolina, U.S., a very wealthy slave-holder, who 
 sold me when quite a child, for the strong resem- 
 blance I bore him. My mother is part Indian, 
 part African ; but I dared not disclose that, or I 
 should have been taken up. I then had eleven 
 miles to go to Savannah, one of the greatest slave- 
 holding cities in America, and where they are al- 
 ways looking out for runaway slaves. When at 
 this city, I had travelled about five hundred miles.* 
 It required great courage to pass through this 
 place. I went through the main street with ap- 
 parent confidence, though much alarmed ; did not 
 stop at any house in the city, but went down im- 
 mediately to the docks, and inquired for a berth, 
 as a steward to a vessel to New York. I had been 
 in this capacity before on the Appalachicola River. 
 The person whom I asked to procure me a berth 
 was steward of one of the New York packets ; he 
 knew Captain Deckay, of the schooner Fox, and 
 got me a situation on board that vessel in five 
 
 The distance between these two places is much less than 
 five hundred miles ; but I was obliged to travel round about, in 
 order to avoid being caught. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 59 
 
 minutes after I had been at the docks. The 
 schooner Fox was a very old vessel, twenty-seven 
 years old, laden with lumber and cattle for New 
 York ; she was rotten, and could not be insured. 
 The sailors were afraid of her ; but I ventured on 
 board, and five minutes after, we dropped from the 
 docks into the river. My spirits then began to 
 revive, and I thought I should get to a free coun- 
 try directly. We cast anchor in the stream, to 
 keep the sailors on, as they were so dissatisfied 
 with the vessel, and lay there four days ; during 
 which time I had to go into the city several times, 
 which exposed me to great danger, as my master 
 was after me, and I dreaded meeting him in the 
 city. 
 
 Fearing the Fox would not sail before I should 
 be seized, I deserted her, and went on board a brig 
 sailing to Providence, that was towed out by a 
 steam-boat,* and got thirty miles from Savannah. 
 During this time I endeavoured to persuade the 
 steward to take me as an assistant, and hoped to 
 have accomplished my purpose ; but the captain 
 had examined me attentively, and thought I was 
 a slave. He therefore ordered me, when the steam- 
 boat was sent back, to go on board her to Savan- 
 nah, as the fine for taking a slave from that city 
 to any of the Free States is five hundred dollars. 
 I reluctantly went back to Savannah, among slave- 
 
 An iron boat, the first that was ever built in America, be- 
 longing to Mr. Lemayor, and this was also the first time Bhe 
 sailed. 
 
60 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 holders and slaves. My mind was in a sad state ; 
 and I was under strong temptation to throw my- 
 self into the river. I had deserted the schooner 
 Fox, and knew that the captain might put me 
 into prison till the vessel was ready to sail ; if 
 this happened, and my master had come to jail in 
 search of me, I must have gone back to slavery. 
 But when I reached the docks at Savannah, the 
 first person I met was the captain of the Fox, 
 looking for another steward in my place. He was 
 a very kind man, belonging to the Free States, 
 and inquired if I would go back to his vessel. 
 This usage was very different to what I expected, 
 and I gladly accepted his offer. This captain did 
 not know that I was a slave. In about two days 
 we sailed from Savannah to New York. 
 
 I am (August, 1834,) unable to express the joy 
 I now felt. I never was at sea before, and, after 
 I had been out about an hour, was taken with sea- 
 sickness, which continued five days. I was scarcely 
 able to stand up, and one of the sailors was obliged 
 to take my place. The captain was very kind to 
 me all this time ; but even after I recovered, I 
 was not sufficiently well to do my duty properly, 
 and could not give satisfaction to the sailors, who 
 swore at me, and asked me why I shipped as I 
 was not used to the sea ? We had a very quick 
 passage ; and in six days after leaving Savannah, 
 we were in the harbour at Staten Island, where 
 the vessel was quarantined for two days, six miles 
 from New York. The captain went to the city, 
 
ESCAPE FHOM SLAVERY. 61 
 
 but left me aboard with the sailors, who had most 
 of them been brought up in the slave-holding 
 States, and were very cruel men. One of the 
 sailors was particularly angry with me because 
 he had to perform the duties of my place ; and 
 while the captain was in the city, the sailors called 
 me to the fore-hatch, where they said they would 
 treat me. I went, and while I was talking, they 
 threw a rope round my neck and nearly choked 
 me. The blood streamed from my nose profusely. 
 They also took up ropes with large knots, and 
 knocked me over the head. They said I was a 
 negro : they despised me ; and I expected they 
 would have thrown me into the water. When we 
 arrived at the city, these men, who had so ill- 
 treated me, ran away that they might escape the 
 punishment which would otherwise have been 
 inflicted on them. 
 
62 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 Arrived in New York, went on to Poughkeepsie, Albany, Ver- 
 mont, Boston, and return to New York Embarked for Eng- 
 land. 
 
 WHEN I arrived in the city of New York, I 
 thought I was free ; but learned I was not, and 
 could be taken there. I went out into the coun- 
 try several miles, and tried to get employment ; 
 but failed, as I had no recommendation. I then 
 returned to New York ; but finding the same dif- 
 ficulty there to get work as in the country, I went 
 back to the vessel, which was to sail eighty miles 
 up the Hudson river, to Poughkeepsie. When I 
 arrived, I obtained employment at an inn, and 
 after I had been there about two days, was seized 
 with the cholera, which was at that place. The 
 complaint was, without doubt, brought on by hav- 
 ing subsisted on fruit only for several days, while 
 I was in the slave States. The landlord of the 
 inn came to me when I was in bed, suffering vio- 
 lently from cholera, and told me he knew I had 
 that complaint, and as it had never been in his 
 house, I could not stop there any longer. No one 
 would enter my room, except a young lady, who 
 appeared very pious and amiable, and had visited 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 63 
 
 persons with the cholera. She immediately pro- 
 cured me some medicine at her own expense, and 
 administered it herself; and whilst I was groan- 
 ing with agony, the landlord came up and ordered 
 me out of the house directly. Most of the persons 
 in Poughkeepsie had retired for the night, and I 
 lay under a shed on some cotton bales. The 
 medicine relieved me, having been given so prompt- 
 ly ; and next morning I went from the shed, and 
 laid on the banks of the river below the city. To- 
 wards evening, I felt much better, and went on 
 in a steam-boat to the city of Albany, about eighty 
 miles. When I reached there, I went into the 
 country, and tried for three or four days to procure 
 employment, but failed. 
 
 At that time I had scarcely any money, and 
 lived upon fruit ; so I returned to Albany, where 
 I could get no work, as I could not show the re- 
 commendations I possessed, which were only from 
 slave States ; and I did not wish any one to know 
 I came from them. After a time, I went up the 
 western canal as steward in one of the boats. 
 When I had gone about 350 miles up the canal, I 
 found I was going too much towards the slave 
 States, in consequence of which, I returned to 
 Albany, and went up the northern canal, into one 
 of the New England States Vermont. The dis- 
 tance I had travelled, including the 350 miles I 
 had to return from the west, and the 1 00 to Ver- 
 mont, was 2300 miles. When I reached Vermont, 
 I found the people very hospitable and kind ; they 
 
64 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 seemed opposed to slavery, so I told them I was a 
 runaway slave. I hired myself to a firm in Sud- 
 bury.* After I had been in Sudbury some time, 
 the neighbouring farmers told me, that I had hired 
 myself for much less money than I ought. I men- 
 tioned it to my employers, who were very angry 
 about it ; I was advised to leave by some of the 
 people round, who thought the gentleman I was 
 with would write to my former master, informing 
 him where I was, and obtain the reward fixed up- 
 on me. Fearing I should be taken I immediately 
 left, and went into the town of Ludlow, where I 
 
 met with a kind friend, Mr. ,-f- who sent me 
 
 to school for several weeks. At this time I was 
 advertised in the papers, and was obliged to leave. 
 I went a little way out of Ludlow,| to a retired 
 
 * During my stay in this town, I thought of the vow I made 
 in the water (page 57), and I became more thoughtful about the 
 salvation of my soul. I attended the Methodist Chapel, where a 
 Mr. Benton preached, and there I began to feel that I was a 
 great sinner. During the latter part of my stay here, I became 
 more anxious about salvation, and I entertained the absurd no- 
 tion that religion would come to me in some extraordinary way. 
 With this impression, I used to go into the woods two hours be- 
 fore daylight to pray, and expected something would take place, 
 and I should become religious. 
 
 t It would not be proper to mention any names, as a person 
 in any of the States in America, found harbouring a slave, would 
 have to pay a heavy fine. 
 
 $ Whilst in this neighbourhood, I attended the Baptist Meet- 
 ing, and trust the preaching of the Gospel was much blessed to 
 my soul. As this was the first time I was ever favoured with 
 any education, I was very intent upon learning to read the 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 65 
 
 place, and lived two weeks with a Mr. , deacon 
 
 of a Baptist church at Ludlow ; at this place I 
 could have obtained education, had it been safe to 
 have remained. From there I went to New Hamp- 
 shire, where I was not safe, so went to Boston, 
 Massachusetts, with the hope of returning to Lud- 
 low. a place to which I was much attached. At 
 Boston, I met with a friend, who kept a shop, and 
 took me to assist him for several weeks. Here I 
 did not consider myself safe, as persons from all 
 parts of the country were continually coining to 
 the shop, and I feared some might come who knew 
 me. I now had my head shaved, and bought a 
 wig, and engaged myself to a Mr. Perkins, of 
 Brookline, three miles from Boston, where I re- 
 mained about a month. Some of the family dis- 
 covered that I wore a wig, and said that I was a 
 runaway slave ; but the neighbours all around 
 thought I was a white, to prove which I have a 
 document in my possession to call me to military 
 duty. The law is that no slave or coloured per- 
 son performs this, but every other person in Ame- 
 rica, of the age of twenty-one, is called upon to 
 
 Bible, and in a few weeks I was able, from iny own reading, to 
 repeat by heart the whole of the last chapter of Matthew. I also 
 attended the prayer and inquiry meetings, where the attendants 
 used to relate their experience, and I was requested to do the 
 same. I found these meetings a great blessing, and they were 
 the means, under God, of communicating to iny mind a more 
 clear and distinct knowledge of the way of salvation by Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 E 
 
66 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 perform military duty once or twice in the year, 
 or pay a fine. 
 
 COPY OF THE DOCUMENT. 
 
 " Mr. Moses Roper, 
 
 " You being duly enrolled as a soldier in 
 the company, under the command of Captain Ben- 
 jamin Bradley, are hereby notified and ordered to 
 appear at the Town House, in Brookline, on Fri- 
 day, 28th instant, at three o'clock, P.M., for the 
 purpose of filling the vacancy in the said company, 
 occasioned by the promotion of Lieut. Nathaniel 
 M. Weeks, and of filling any other vacancy which 
 may then and there occur in the said company, 
 and then wait further orders. 
 
 " By order of the Captain, 
 
 " F. P. WENTWORTH, Clerk. 
 "BrooMine, August Utk, 1835.* 
 
 I then returned to the city of Boston, to the 
 shop where I was before. Several weeks after I 
 had returned to my situation, two coloured men 
 informed me that a gentleman had been inquiring 
 for a person, whom, from the description, I knew 
 to be myself, and offered them a considerable sum 
 if they would disclose my place of abode ; but they, 
 being much opposed to slavery, came and told me ; 
 upon which information, I secreted myself till I 
 
 * Being very tall, I was taken to be twenty-one; but my cor- 
 rect age, as far as I can tell, is stated iu page 4. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 67 
 
 could get off. I went into the Green mountains 
 for several weeks, from thence to the city of New 
 York, and remained in secret several days, till I 
 heard of a ship, the Napoleon, sailing to England, 
 and on the llth of November, 1835, I sailed, taking 
 my letters of recommendation to the Drs. Morri- 
 son and Raffles, and the Rev. Alexander Fletcher. 
 The time I first started from slavery was in July, 
 1834, so that I was nearly sixteen months in mak- 
 ing my escape. 
 
68 BAKRATIVE OF AN 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 The Author arrives at Liverpool, November 29, ] 835. Man- 
 chester. London. 
 
 ON the 29th of November, 1835, 1 reached Liver- 
 pool ; and my feelings -when I first touched the 
 shores of Britain were indescribable, and can only 
 be properly understood by those who have escaped 
 from the cruel bondage of slavery. 
 
 " Tis liberty alone, that gives the flower 
 Of fleeting life its lustre and perfume ; 
 And we are weeds without it." 
 
 " Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs 
 Receive our air, that moment they are free ; \9 
 They touch our country, and their shackles fall." COWPEK. 
 
 When I reached Liverpool, I proceeded to Dr. 
 Raffles, and handed my letters of recommendation 
 to him. He received me very kindly, and intro- 
 duced me to a member of his church, with whom 
 I stayed the night. Here I met with the greatest 
 attention and kindness. The next day I went to 
 Manchester, where I met with many kind friends ; 
 among others, Mr. Adshead, of that town, to whom 
 I desire, through this medium, to return my most 
 sincere thanks for the many great services which 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 69 
 
 he rendered me, adding both to my spiritual and 
 temporal comfort. I would not, however, forget 
 to remember here Mr. Leese, Mr. Giles, Mr. Crewd- 
 son, and Mr. Clare, the latter of whom gave me a 
 letter to Mr. Scoble, the secretary of the Anti-sla- 
 very Society. I remained here several days, and 
 then proceeded to London, December 12th, 1835, 
 and immediately called on Mr. Scoble, to whom I 
 delivered my letter. This gentleman procured me 
 a lodging. I then lost no time in delivering my 
 letters to Dr. Morrison and the Rev. Alexander 
 Fletcher, who received me with the greatest kind- 
 ness ; and shortly after this, Dr. Morrison sent my 
 letter from New York, with another from himself, 
 to the Patriot newspaper, in which he kindly im- 
 plored the sympathy of the public in my behalf. 
 The appeal Avas read by Mr. Christopherson, a mem- 
 ber of Dr. Morrison's church, of which gentleman, 
 I express but little of my feelings and gratitude, 
 when I say, that throughout he has been towards 
 me a parent, for whose tenderness and sympathy 
 I desire ever to feel that attachment which I do 
 not know how to express. 
 
 I stayed at his house several weeks, being treat- 
 ed as one of the family. The appeal in the Pa- 
 triot referred to getting a suitable academy for me, 
 which the Rev. Dr. Cox recommended, at Hackney, 
 where I remained half a year, going through the 
 rudiments of an English education. At this time, 
 I attended the ministry of Dr. Cox, which I enjoy- 
 ed very much, and to which I ascribe the attain- 
 
70 NARRATIVE OF AN 
 
 merit of clearer views of divine grace than I had 
 before. I had attended here several months, when 
 I expressed my wish to Dr. Cox to become a mem- 
 ber of his church. I was proposed ; and after 
 stating my experience, was admitted, March 31, 
 1836. 
 
 Here it it necessary that I should draw this nar- 
 rative to a close, not that my materials are exhaust- 
 ed, but that I am unwilling to extend it to a size 
 which might preclude many well-wishers from the 
 possession of it. 
 
 But I must remark, that my feelings of hap- 
 piness at having escaped from cruel bondage are 
 not unmixed with sorrow of a very touching kind. 
 " The Land of the Free" still contains the mother,* 
 the brothers, and the sister of Moses Roper, not 
 enjoying liberty, not the possessors of like feelings 
 with me, not having even a distant glimpse of ad- 
 vancing towards freedom, but still slaves ! This 
 is a weight which hangs heavy on me. As circum- 
 stances at present stand, there is not much pro- 
 
 About five months ago the Author wrote to Dr. Gallon, his 
 mother's master, to know what sum would be sufficient to pur- 
 chase her freedom, and he has received the following painful 
 answer : 
 
 " Milton, North Carolina, Aug. 28<A, 1839. 
 
 " Your mother and her family were transferred from this place, 
 two or three years ago, to Grunsburgh, in the State of Alabama, 
 and I regret to inform you that your mother is since dead." 
 
 H& The Author has since ascertained that the above is untrue, 
 and sent merely to annoy him. 
 
 April, 1843. 
 
ESCAPE FROM SLAVERY. 71 
 
 spect of ever again seeing those dear ones, from 
 whom, on the Sunday night, I was torn away by 
 armed slave-holders, and carried into cruel bon- 
 dage.* And nothing would contribute so much to 
 my entire happiness, if the kindness of gracious 
 Providence should ever place me in such favour- 
 able circumstances as to be able to purchase their 
 freedom. But I desire to express my entire resig- 
 nation to the will of God. Should that Divine 
 Being who made of one flesh all the kindreds of 
 the earth, see fit that I should again clasp them to 
 my breast, and see in them the reality of free men 
 and free women, how shall I, a poor mortal, be en- 
 abled to sing a strain of praise sufficiently appro- 
 priate to such a boon from heaven. 
 
 But if the All- wise Disposer of all things should 
 see fit to keep them still in suffering and bondage, 
 it is a mercy to know that he orders all things well, 
 that he is still the judge of all the earth, and that 
 under such dispensations of his providence, he is 
 working out that which shall be most for the ad- 
 vantage of his creatures. 
 
 Whatever I may have experienced in America 
 at the hands of the cruel task-masters, yet I am 
 unwilling to speak in any but respectful terms of 
 the land of my birth. It is far from my wish to 
 attempt to degrade America in the eyes of Britons. 
 I love her institutions in the Free States, her zeal 
 for Christ ; I bear no enmity to the slave-holders, 
 
 * See page 23. 
 
72 NARRATIVE, ETC. 
 
 but regret their delusions ; many, I am aware, are 
 deeply sensible of the fault, but some, I regret to 
 say, are not, and I could wish to open their eyes 
 to their sin ; may the period come when God shall 
 wipe off this deep stain from her constitution, and 
 may America soon be indeed the land of the free. 
 In conclusion, I thank my dear friends in Eng- 
 land for their affectionate attentions, and may God 
 help me to show by my future walk and life, that 
 I am not wanting in my acknowledgments of their 
 kindness. But above all, to the God of all grace, 
 I give thanks before his people, that all the way in 
 which he has led me has been the right way, and 
 as in his mercy and wisdom he has led me to this 
 country, where I am allowed to go free, may all my 
 actions tend to lead me on, through the mercy of 
 God in Christ, in the right way to a city of habi- 
 tation. 
 
73 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 MARCH, 1846. 
 
 SOON after my arrival in England, I went to a 
 boarding-school at Hackney, near London, and 
 afterwards to another boarding-school at Walling- 
 ford, and after learning to read and write, and some 
 other branches, I entered as student at University 
 College, London, which place I very much regret, 
 however, I was obliged to leave, in consequence of 
 bad health ; and during the time I was at school 
 I lectured in different towns and sold my Narrative 
 or book to pay for my education. On the 29th of 
 December, 1839, 1 was married to a lady of Bristol, 
 and, after travelling tens of thousands of miles, and 
 lecturing in nearly every town, and hundreds of 
 villages in England, at the commencement of 1844, 
 I left England with my family for British North 
 America, and have taken up my future residence 
 in Canada West, it being as near as I can get to 
 my relations (who are still in bondage) without 
 being again taken. Having some matters of a pri- 
 vate nature to settle in this country, I left Canada 
 in December last for England, and arrived at 
 
74 APPENDIX. 
 
 Liverpool on the 25th of January 1846, in the 
 ship Orphan. I intend now, before I return to 
 Canada, to visit Scotland and Ireland, and deliver 
 lectures, as I have not been in many towns in those 
 countries. I shall then bid farewell once more to 
 dear and happy Old England, not expecting again 
 ever to return, but hoping to meet many thousands 
 of her inhabitants (whom I have seen and ad- 
 dressed) in Heaven. My dear and kind friends, 
 throughout Great Britain and Ireland, farewell ! 
 
 LETTERS BY A GENTLEMAN IN MANCHESTER, WHO 
 SAYS MR. ROPER DID WRONG IN RUNNING AWAY 
 FROM HIS MASTER. 
 
 Monday Morning, Sept. 18, 1837. 
 
 I have read the accompanying Narrative with much interest, 
 and I may say it has increased my deep abhorrence of the hor- 
 rid evils of slavery ; but, I must confess, it is impossible for 
 me to approve the conduct, past or present, of the poor fugi- 
 tive. In perusing his account of himself, I have been much 
 struck with the fact, that all the cruel usage he complains of 
 he brought wilfully upon himself by repeatedly running 
 away ; indeed, his entire history is a series of fugitive con- 
 duct, which cannot be approved upon Christian principles, as 
 is evident from the whole tenor of Scripture (see 1st Epistle 
 to the Corinthians, c. vii. v. 20-24, and 1st Epistle to Peter, 
 c. ii. v. 18-21) ; and from St. Paul to Philemon, I should 
 learn that professing himself now a Christian, it is either his 
 incumbent duty to return to his master, acknowledge his past 
 unprofitable conduct, and for what he has wronged him make 
 restitution, or if not, I think the money raised by the sale of 
 his book should, first of all, be applied to the purchase of his 
 
APPENDIX. 75 
 
 freedom and paying compensation ; which done, he may, with 
 a quiet conscience, go forward with the expense of his educa- 
 tion, and expect God's blessing to crown the excellent work 
 to which he purposes dedicating himself. If this course is 
 pursued, or any other that I can comfortably sanction, I shall 
 be glad to aid him as far as I can by promoting the circula- 
 tion of his Narrative. 
 
 EDWAKD LINGAKD. 
 
 Saturday Night, September 23, 1837. 
 As my poor hasty note which I wrote in the hurry of busi- 
 ness the other day, relative to the object of your kind com- 
 passion Moses Roper has excited some interest in your 
 mind, I am told that you wish to submit it to the considera- 
 tion of some few friends. Perhaps, if I had thought it would 
 have attracted so much of your attention, I might have 
 studied and weighed my sentiments more closely ; but as I 
 only briefly expressed the honest sentiments of my mind, I 
 can have no objection at all to your making what use you 
 think proper of my note, especially as the more I reflect upon 
 all the circumstances of poor Roper's Narrative, the more I 
 am convinced that my view of the subject is correct and 
 Scriptural. I hope, my dear Sir, that I am not misunder- 
 stood : I do as heartily deprecate the system and evils of 
 slavery as the most zealous member of the Anti-Slavery So- 
 ciety ; but there is a legitimate as well as illegitimate method 
 to pursue for its abolition, and if it had been compatible 
 with the gentle submissive spirit of Christianity violently to 
 break its bonds asunder, we should not find Christ and his 
 Apostles so earnestly exhorting their converts to endure the 
 yoke patiently ', while yet to desire freedom, if they could ob- 
 tain it legally and justly ; and horrid as is the present system 
 of slavery, it is mild and tolerable now compared to the 
 severity and wretchedness of it under Roman laws and cus- 
 toms in the primitive ages of the Gospel ; therefore, I cannot 
 approve of Moses Roper violently breaking loose from servi- 
 tude, for if it is justifiable in him, it would be equally so in 
 
76 APPENDIX. 
 
 the whole Negro race, and instead of being anxious to pur- 
 chase the freedom of his mother, he ought to recommend her 
 to make her escape, and follow him to Britain's fair isle of 
 peace and liberty. 
 
 EDWARD LINGARD. 
 
 A REPLY TO THE PRECEDING LETTERS. 
 The above writer grants the evils of slavery, but does not 
 appear to understand that liberty is the unalienable right of 
 every man, and that all laws which tend to deprive him of 
 that liberty, being inconsistent with moral obligations, so far 
 from being binding, are to be resisted. 2d, Without Moses 
 Roper was a party to the law which made him a slave, that 
 law must in his case be considered wholly nugatory. 3d, If 
 slavery be iniquitous, Moses Roper acted right by breaking 
 from his bonds, and so far from being blameable is to all in- 
 tents praiseworthy. There is a mistake in the proposition 
 that he brought his ill treatment wilfully upon himself by 
 his fugitive method of freeing himself from slavery, because 
 if he had escaped, as was his obvious intention, he would 
 have been out of the reach of ill-treatment. The writer is 
 evidently unhappy in the Christian part of the argument, 
 and especially in his quotations from Scripture, which go to 
 prove the opposite view of the question ; instance the case of 
 Onesimus, whom the Apostle requests Philemon to receive 
 not as a servant, but as a beloved brother. With respect to a 
 restitution being made, the right in the master to Moses 
 Roper is not warranted by Christianity ; if not, it is contrary 
 thereto ; and by making restitution, he would acknowledge 
 and support that which is contrary to the system of revealed 
 truth. 
 
APPENDIX. 77 
 
 ANSWER TO MR. LINGARD'S LETTER. 
 
 Manchester, 10th Mo. 18th, 1837. 
 
 I have read thy two notes on the subject of Moses Roper's 
 case, in which I wished to have called thy charitable feelings 
 and to have had thy sympathy on his behalf ; but as thou 
 hast taken a view agreeably to the contract of man to man, 
 and not as the law of God, which must be superior to every 
 other law, and must also be fully acknowledged by every pro- 
 fessing Christian ; the consequence is, we must admit the law 
 of God is superior and anterior to the law of man. As to 
 thy allusions to the Scriptures (1 Cor. 7 c. 20 to 24 v. and 1 
 Peter, 2 c. 18 to 21 v.). I can only consider them in a spiritual 
 light, and as to Onesimus, that of an individual who had 
 bound himself as a servant by his own consent, as we would 
 consider an apprentice ; but be it remembered, the master 
 has no right ever to inflict corporeal punishment ; the law is 
 open to both parties, and if either do wrong they are only 
 answerable to the infliction of the violation of the laws, 
 which no man can dispute. but not so, says the slave, nor 
 can he conscientiously acquiesce therein, because he is torn 
 from his happy home his dearest relations and friends, that 
 land so beautifully described by Montgomery : 
 
 " There is a land of every land the pride, 
 Beloved by Heaven, o'er all the world beside ; 
 Where brighter scenes dispense serener light, 
 And milder moons imparadise the night." 
 
 And is not that land equally as much the birthright of the 
 slave, as the roaming mariner, or the inhabitants of the happy 
 shores and internal residents of Great Britain ? Yes, I con- 
 sider the slave as free to enjoy his native climes as ourselves. 
 God never made him a slave to man, mark that ! Although 
 I deprecate slavery in its highest terms, I still more deprecate 
 the merciless disposition of man over man. Every one has a 
 right to entertain his own opinion, but I cannot see how a 
 minister of the Gospel can preach otherwise than " pe--> and 
 goodwill toward men," and "to do as they would be dor. to." 
 
78 APPENDIX. 
 
 Where a contract has been made between a man and his 
 master, that ought to be binding, but when thy beloved wife 
 and daughters are taken from thee to a land of slavery, op- 
 pression, and cruelty, does it not harrow up thy better feelings 
 to consider its horrible inconsistency ? And dost thou in 
 this case suppose for a moment, that thy family is more 
 sacred than the poor African's, or any other being similarly 
 situated ? No, God forbid, it cannot be, and my full belief 
 is, the vengeance of the Lord will be upon all those who 
 advocate the cause to the contrary. Thou hast an idea that 
 the miserable afflicted slave has had by his apprenticeship an 
 amelioration of his sufferings, but ample testimonies can be 
 brought forward to prove the contrary. The slave-master 
 knows he has only a short period to possess the powers of his 
 inhuman cruelties, and it is his pride and his boast that they 
 shall not be worth much when he has done with the objects 
 of his constant reproaches and punishments. I have not 
 replied to thy two notes hastily, but have patiently waited 
 the time, when I could enter feelingly upon the subject, after 
 giving them due consideration, and in the honest conviction 
 of my mind. I believe I have sincerely stated the matter of 
 fact in as few words as I could, as respected the condition of 
 man to man, and man to his Great Creator. I am certain no 
 example can be drawn forth from our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
 Christ (who is above all the apostles, or saints, or prophets, 
 that have ever written), that he ever encouraged the inhuman 
 traffic of slavery or holding men in bondage, whether in the 
 cares of this world or the spirit. His language was, " Come 
 unto me all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will 
 give you rest." There is one subject, although too delicate 
 to be named, must not escape thine and my notice remem- 
 ber Moses Roper* s father was a free white man. Now, I ask, 
 then, what right, by the laws of religion, had he to become 
 so intimate with his slave, and produce an offspring there- 
 from, and at the age of six years, to banish that object be- 
 cause it was his very portrait ; which said act was done to 
 the satisfying the caprice of a newly married wife. Can this 
 
APPENDIX. 79 
 
 act justify the law of slavery ? No ! it cannot. Therefore, 
 taking slavery on thy plea, and by the arguments I have ad- 
 vanced, I do consider Moses Roper, and every other slave, is 
 fully justified, and conscientiously bound to effect his liberty 
 in the best way he can, so as not to do it with violence. 
 
 With the best feelings towards the alleviation of the suf- 
 ferings and miseries of those that are in bondage, 
 
 Allow me to subscribe myself, &c., 
 
 JOSEPH EVELEIGH. 
 
 Mr. B. is a member of the Society of Friends. 
 
 LINES 
 
 WRITTEN BY A LADY IN TAUNTON, ON HEARING OP 
 THE ARRIVAL OF MOSES ROPER IN ENGLAND. 
 
 ALL hail to thee, land of the brave, 
 
 Thou beautiful isle of the sea ! 
 take to thy bosom the heart -stricken slave ; 
 
 And bid him henceforward be free. 
 
 A poor friendless exile, from home 
 
 I have fled, and am seeking for rest ; 
 From the high boasted country of freedom I come, 
 
 One of thousands by freemen oppressed ! 
 
 Oh, America, boast not again 
 
 That thou art the " Land of the free," 
 Whilst thou forgest for Africa's children the chain, 
 
 Can liberty flourish in thee 1 
 
 You ask me what soul- wasting sin 
 
 Has doomed me an outcast to rove 1 
 My crime ? 'twas the African tint of skin, 
 
 Which Americans dare not to love. 
 
 Not to love though the blood in our veins, 
 From the very same source may have flowed ; 
 
 'Twas a father who fettered my limbs with these chains, 
 Sold, nor one parting blessing bestowed. 
 
80 APPENDIX. 
 
 Vain, vain was a mother's despair, 
 Unheeded the tears which she shed ; 
 
 His slave, he but answered with curses her prayer, 
 And filled her torn bosom with dread. 
 
 I left her, all childless, to weep ; 
 
 Ah, how oft 'tis the negress's doom ! 
 O'er the forms of lost dear ones sad vigils to keep, 
 
 Till her sorrows find rest in the tomb. 
 
 But 'tis past, and I will not relate 
 All the toils and the sufferings I bore, 
 
 For my proud spirit rose, I have conquered my fate, 
 And I come to this negro-loved shore. 
 
 All hail to thee, land of the brave ! 
 
 As I step on thy shore from the sea, 
 The fetters are snapt from the limbs of the slave 
 And I feel that this moment I'm free. 
 
 S.D. 
 January 1st, 1836. 
 
 LINES 
 
 WRITTEN ON OCCASION OF THE ESCAPE TO ENGLAND 
 
 OF MR. MOSES ROPER, 
 Late an American Slave, now a Freeman of Great Britain. 
 
 Who is my brother ? Ask the waves that -come 
 From Afric's shores to greet our island home. 
 Who is my brother ? Ask the winds that stray 
 From Indian realms, to chase our clouds away. 
 Who is my brother ? Ask the suns that shine 
 On southern seas, then turn to smile on thine. 
 Who is my brother ? Ask the stars that roll 
 Their nightly journey round from pole to pole. 
 These with one voice shall answer that they find 
 But one vast family in all mankind ; 
 
APPENDIX, 81 
 
 Nor colour, clime, nor caste can e'er efface 
 The kindred likeness of the wide-spread race, 
 Or break the chain that at the first began 
 To bind in one the family of man. 
 
 Come then, awake thy sympathies to feel 
 
 A brother's interest in thy brother's weal. 
 
 God's wisdom and his goodness both decreed 
 
 That from one stock all nations should proceed ; 
 
 That wheresoe'er he cast his creature's lot, 
 
 Kindness and love might consecrate the spot. 
 
 Behold thy brother ! On his form, confessed, 
 
 Thy nature's dignity is seen imprest, 
 
 In every look in every gesture man ! 
 
 Wipe off the stamp of manhood, ye who can ! 
 
 Beats not his breast with warm affection's glow ? 
 
 Breathes not his mind with thought's impassion' d flow ? 
 
 Is there a joy a grief man ever knew, 
 
 But in his bosom has a birth-place too 1 
 
 What though a tyrant's hand might strive to bind, 
 
 With iron grasp, the energies of mind, 
 
 As well might chains and stripes control the wave, 
 
 The soul! the soul ! can never be a slave ! 
 
 Brother, by that Creative Power whose word 
 One common nature on our race conferred ; 
 Brother, still closer by the love that sent 
 The Son of God to bear sin's punishment ; 
 Brother, Jsy grace divine which poured its light 
 On the dark horrors of our heathen night, 
 We give th'e hand of fellowship to thee, 
 We bid thee welcome, and we hail thee Free ! 
 
 Thou art a slave no longer ! On thy brow 
 The air of Freedom breathes in triumph now ! 
 Thine heart rejoices o'er thy broken chain, 
 Whose links are sever'd ne'er to meet again. 
 But sweeter still, that liberty to know 
 Which Christ, the Saviour, only can bestow, 
 
 F 
 
82 APPENDIX. 
 
 And feel, whate'er thy future lot may lj>2, 
 The truth ! The truth has made thy spirit free I 
 Through all thy touching story, glad we trace 
 The ways of Providence, the power of grace - T 
 And see thy countless trials join to prove 
 The God of glory is the God of love. 
 
 Go, then, still guided by his mighty hand, 
 
 Where'er His will, his wisdom may command. 
 
 His love direct thy steps, as when of old 
 
 He led the shepherd of His chosen fold. 
 
 Thy tale, like his whose name is borne by thee., 
 
 Mark'd out for death in helpless infancy, 
 
 Like him, the child of servitude and shame, 
 
 Born of a race that bear the captive name ; 
 
 ]>aily indebted to a tyrant's nod, 
 
 For the free mercies of a bounteous God ; 
 
 Holding the very life He gave, at will 
 
 Of those who, though they cannot save, can kill, 
 
 Like him, cast from the land that gave thee birth, 
 
 And driven a wanderer on the face of earth. 
 
 (Like him, in all thy wanderings may'st thou find 
 
 The stranger's kindness soothe and cheer thy mind,) 
 
 Like him, when come to years, by grace divine, 
 
 Led to embrace a Saviour's cross as thine. 
 
 Still be thy tale like his ; to thee be given 
 
 To bear on earth the messages of heaven ; 
 
 To tell the Pharaohs who enslave thy race 
 
 That God will scatter plagues on every place 
 
 Where proud oppression dares His wrath defy, 
 
 And brave his arm, and scorn His searching eye. 
 
 Sound out his thunders till the dead in sin 
 
 Shall hear the voice of conscience speak within. 
 
 Believe, and tremble at the dread decree, 
 
 Break every chain bid every slave be free. 
 
 Then, when thy brethren forth from bondage come, 
 
 Bd thine to lea'i them to their better home 
 
APPENDIX. 83 
 
 The Land of Promise, where their souls shall rest, 
 
 With peace and liberty for ever blest, 
 
 And through the wilderness that lies between 
 
 Their wearied spirits and the joys unseen, 
 
 Be God to thee and them a shade by day, 
 
 A light by night to mark their future way, 
 
 Till all the freemen of the Lord shall meet 
 
 To cast their crowns at Jesu's sacred feet, 
 
 And own the link that shall for ever bind, 
 
 Even as one soul, all nations of mankind. 
 
 M. B. TUCKEY. 
 Ferney. Cork, October 31, 1838. 
 
 WRITTEN BY A YOUNG PERSON AFTER HEARING 
 MR. ROPER LECTURE IN SHEFFIELD. 
 
 TO MR. MOSES ROPER. 
 
 Welcome, my brother, to the land 
 Where Freedom's banner's waving ; 
 
 Philanthropists, with heart and hand, 
 Rejoice to take the slave in. 
 
 "Slave !" no ! "slave" I dare not call thee, 
 
 When thou wast created free ; 
 Lest God's thunderbolts appal me, 
 
 For my base impiety. 
 
 But I'll call thee friend and brother ; 
 
 Oh, those sweet endearing names ; 
 Though not the offspring of one mother, 
 
 Both to Heaven have equal claims. 
 
 God, our parent, condescendeth 
 
 To be the father, friend of all, 
 Whose desires heav'nward asccudeth, 
 
 And for saving mercy call. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 Of persons he Is no respecter, 
 Black and white his love may share ; 
 
 He himself is the inspector 
 Of the fruit which all men bear. 
 
 Though oppression's sun is shining r 
 Ere long it shall cease to shine ; 
 
 Lo ! already 'tis declining, 
 May the pleasure yet be thine, 
 
 To hear these words (in thunder spoken)., 
 
 " Slavery hath ceased to be ; 
 And the galling chain is broken. 
 
 Every son of man is free !" 
 
 May the God of Heaven redress thee. 
 For thy sufferings here below 
 
 Cause Britannia's sons to bless thee, 
 Sweeten here thy cup of woe. 
 
 May the olive tree of peace soon, 
 Fruitful, wave o'er all the Earth ; 
 
 And that horrid traffic cease soon, 
 Which derived from Hell its birth. 
 
 May'st thou never know the want of 
 Friends to cheer thee, and to bless ; 
 
 May they be just like a plant of 
 Everlasting fruitfulness. 
 
 WRITTEN BY A GENTLEMAN AFTEE THE ADDRESS ON 
 AMERICAN SLAVERY, DELIVERED IN EXETER, 
 
 BY MOSES ROPER, 
 21st January, 1839. 
 
 Son of God ! lend an ear, 
 These our supplications hear j 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 By the counsels of thy will, 
 By thy purpose to fulfil, 
 The Eternal God's decree- 
 Man, immortal, shall be free ; 
 let our prayers ascend to Heaven, 
 And freedom to all Slaves be given ! 
 
 By thy purposes to save, 
 From the terrors of the grave ; 
 By thy Sceptre, Prince of Peace, 
 Grant the suffering slaves release ! 
 By thy mighty Ann of power, 
 Save them in the trying hour ; 
 hear us when we call on Thee 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By the pledge to Adam given, 
 
 Ere from Eden he was driven ; 
 
 By that dawn of hope to man, 
 
 In redemption's wond'rous plan ; 
 
 By the covenant of grace, 
 
 To restore our fallen race ; 
 
 hear us when we call on Thee 
 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By thy truth from age to age 
 
 Written in the sacred page, 
 
 And revealed to holy Seers 
 
 'Midst their sorrows, hopes and fears ; 
 
 By thy word to prophets sent, 
 
 By thy holy testament ; 
 
 O hear us when we call on Thee 
 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By thy mystery of grace, 
 Standing in the sinner's place ; 
 By thine own incarnate love, 
 Send deliverance from above ; 
 
86 APPENDIX 
 
 By thy sorrows, pains, and grief, 
 Grant the suffering Slaves relief : 
 hear us when we call on Thee 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By that dark and awful hour, 
 Of thy foes' permitted power ; 
 By thine interceding prayer, 
 Lord, our supplications hear ; 
 By thy bloody sweat and tears, 
 Lord, remove the bondman's fears ; 
 hear us when we call on Thee 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By thy love which took our guilt, 
 
 By thy blood for sinners spilt ; 
 
 By thy sufferings on the tree, 
 
 By thy dying agony ; 
 
 By thy last expiring breath, 
 
 By thy word pronounced in death, 
 
 O hear us when we call on Thee 
 
 Throughout the world let man be free ! 
 
 By thy rising from the tomb, 
 Lord, avert the tyrant's doom ; 
 By thy victory o'er the grave, 
 Free the Master, free the Slave ; 
 All Creation groans for thee, 
 From the curse all creatures free ; 
 come, Thou Mighty Saviour, come, 
 And take thy ransom'd people home. 
 
 N.H. 
 Clifton Place, Exeter. 
 
APPENDIX. 87 
 
 PRESENTED TO MOSES ROPER.* 
 
 TO ANDREW STEVENSON, 
 Minister Plenipotentiary from the United States. 
 Go back, thou bold ambassador, 
 
 To thine own land of slaves ; 
 Touch not our talismanic shore, 
 
 Plough not our free blue waves. 
 
 The land of Sidney, Hampden, Pyin,' 
 
 Frowns on the recreants bold, 
 Who value men by strength of limb, 
 
 And sell those limbs for gold. 
 
 The bread which England's fields produce 
 
 Is only sweet to the free ; 
 It is ordained for freemen's use, 
 
 And must he bitter to thee. 
 
 How must the skylark, whistling clear, 
 
 Annoy thee with its strain ; 
 Thou, who at home art wont to hear 
 
 The negro's clanking chain. 
 
 England rejects thee from her shore, 
 
 She withers thee with scorn ; 
 Her peasantry, 'tis true, are poor, 
 
 But they are freemen born. 
 
 Go make thy human stock thy care, 
 
 See how the young ones grow ; 
 Inspect their limbs their worth compare, 
 
 And watch how markets go. 
 
 Insult not with thy presence men, 
 Who scorn to deal in slaves ; 
 
 * It was publicly announced by a member of the House of Com- 
 mons, that the American Minister was a slave-holder; I I'eteted the 
 fact at a puMic meeting at Colchester, arid the next day a gentleman 
 gitvo me the above lines composed by himself. 
 
88 APPENDIX. 
 
 Go to thy human cattle-pen, 
 
 And drive thy trade with knaves. 
 
 Go back to those who sent thee here, 
 
 Go hide with them thy shame ; 
 Men who nor heaven nor angels fear, 
 
 Nor heed their own fair fame. 
 
 Is not the writing on the -wall* 
 
 By your own finger drawn ? 
 Bo you not blush to read that " all," 
 
 All men are equal born ? 
 
 Where is your " sacred honour" then ? 
 
 Is thus its value shown 1 
 If but the flourish of the pen, 
 
 It cheats yourselves alone. 
 
 Your " spangled banner" high may flash 
 
 Her famous " stripes and stars ;" 
 The first denote the driver's lash, 
 
 The second mean the scars. 
 
 Go wash thy hands e'en though in ink, 
 
 Thy hands it will not stain, 
 Go break the bondsman's every link, 
 
 Or come not here again. 
 
 J. H. 
 
 * The Declaration of Independence. This celebrated document, 
 perhaps the noblest State paper that waa ever issued, and the one 
 most grossly falsified, is frequently in America framed and glazed, 
 and hung up as a parlour ornament. 
 
 THE END. 
 
rf 
 
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