Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky by Jacob D. Green
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Jacob D. Green >> Narrative of the Life of J.D. Green, a Runaway Slave, from Kentucky
"Ah, whither shall I go,
Burthened, or sick, or faint;
To whom shall I my troubles show,
And pour out my complaint."
Not daring to sing it for fear of disturbing the sale, they both knelt
down with the children, and Reuben offered up a long and fervent prayer.
In the interval of his prayer nineteen of the slaves were sold, and he had
not concluded when my number being twenty was called, and my master handed
me out under the hammer; when, after a few preliminary remarks on the part
of the auctioneer, my master mounted the auction block and recommended me
as a good field hand, a good cook, waiter, hostler, a coachman, gentle and
willing, and above all, free from the disease of running away. So after a
short and spirited bidding I went at 1,025 dollars. Here the sale
policeman, whose business it was to take charge of the negroes sold until
bills were settled and papers made out, led me from the block outside the
crowd, and placing me by a cart, put on a pair of iron handcuffs; but
being well acquainted with me as a troublesome tricky negro, he put the
handcuff on my right wrist--took the other cuff through the cart wheel and
round the spoke, and then locked it on my left hand, so that if I did
start to run, I should carry the cart and all with me. Number twenty-one
was now called, and out came poor Reuben, and was placed under the hammer;
his weight was said to be two hundred pounds, his age thirty two. Poor
Sally, his wife, unable any longer to control her feelings, made her way
out of the slave pen, with her babe in her arms, followed by her five
small children, and she threw one of her arms around Reuben's neck; and
now commenced a scene that beggars all description. Her countenance,
though mild and beautiful, was by the keenest pain and sorrow distorted
and disfigured: her voice soft and gentle, accompanied with heart rending
gestures, appealed to the slave buyer in tones so very mournful, that I
thought it might have even melted cruelty itself to some pity--coming as
it did from a woman:--Oh! master, master! buy me and my children with my
husband--do, pray; and this was the only crime the poor woman committed
for which she suffered death on the spot. Her master stepped up from
behind her, and with the butt end of his carriage whip loaded with lead,
struck her a blow on the side of the head or temples, and she fell her
full length to the ground. Poor Reuben stooped to raise her up, but was
prevented by the jail policeman, who seized him by the neck and led him
over close to where I stood: and whilst he was in the act of selecting a
pair of handcuffs for Reuben, voice after voice was heard in the
crowd--she is dead! she is dead! But what was the effect of these words
upon Reuben--one of the most easy, good-tempered, innocent, inoffensive,
and, in his way, religious slaves that I ever knew--satisfied apparently
that Sally's death was a fact--he tore himself loose from the policeman
and made his way through the crowd to where poor Sally lay, and exclaimed,
Oh! Sally! O Lord! By this time the policeman, who had followed him,
undertook to drag him back out of the crowd, but Reuben, with one blow of
his fist, stretched the policeman on the ground. Reuben's pain and sorrow,
mingled with his religious hope, seemed now to terminate in despair, and
transformed the inoffensive man into a raging demon. He rushed to a cart
which supported a great number of spectators, just opposite the auction
block, and tore out a heavy cart stave, made of red oak, and before the
panic-stricken crowd could arrest his arm, he struck his master to the
ground, and beat his brains literally out. The crowd then tried to close
upon him, but Reuben, mounted with both feet upon the dead body of his
master, and with his back against the cart wheel--with the cart stave kept
the whole crowd at bay for the space of two or three minutes, when a
gentleman behind the cart climbed upon the outside wheel and fired the
pistol at him, and shot poor Reuben through the head. He fell dead about
six yards from where the dead body of his beloved Sally lay, and where his
children were screaming terribly. An indescribable thrill of horror crept
through my whole soul, as I gazed from the cart wheel to which I was
ironed, upon the dead bodies first of Reuben and then his wife, who but a
few moments before I had seen kneeling in solemn prayer, before what they
considered the Throne of Grace--and their master, whom I heard that very
morning calling on God not only to damn his negroes, but to damn himself,
now, in less than thirty minutes, all three standing before the awful
Judgment Seat. After witnessing this dreadful scene I was led into
Hagerstown jail, where I remained until my new master was ready, when I
went with him to Memphis, Tennessee; but the remembrance of this awful
tragedy haunted my mind, and even my dreams, for many months.
Reuben was the son of old Uncle Reuben and Aunt Dinah, and had been
swopped away when about twelve years old to William Steele, for a pair of
horses and a splendid carriage. Like his father and mother he was very
religious, and I had often been to his prayer meetings, where poor Reuben
would exhort and preach. Mr. Cobb had made him a class-leader long before
he died; and, in fact, we all reverenced Reuben after the death of his
father as the most moderate and gifted man amongst us. I had always loved
Reuben, but never knew how much until that fatal day. After I went to
Memphis I composed some verses on the life and death of Reuben, which run
as follows:--
Poor Reuben he fell at his post,
He's gone;
Like Stephen, full of the Holy Ghost,
Poor Reuben's gone away.
He's gone where pleasure never dies,
He's gone,
In the golden chariot to the skies,
Poor Reuben's gone away.
For many years he faced the storm,
He's gone;
And the cruel lash he suffered long;
Poor Reuben's gone away.
But now he's left the land of death,
He's gone;
And entered heaven's happiness;
Poor Reuben's gone away.
His friends he bid a long adieu,
He's gone;
When heaven opened to his view,
Poor Reuben's gone away;
His pain and sorrow of heart are passed,
He's gone;
He arrived in heaven just safe at last;
Poor Reuben's gone away.
Poor Sally, his wife, lays by his side,
He's gone;
For whom poor Reuben so nobly died;
Poor Reuben's gone away;
A mournful look on her he cast,
He's gone,
Five minutes before he breathed his last,
Poor Reuben's gone away.
In Jordan the angel heard him cry,
He's gone;
Elijah's chariot was passing by,
Poor Reuben's gone away;
His body lays in the earth quite cold,
He's gone,
But now he walks in the streets of gold,
Poor Reuben's gone away.
After working in Tennessee three years and seven months, my master hired
me to Mr. Steele. This gentleman was going to New Orleans, and I was to
act as his servant, but I contrived to get away from him, and went to the
house of a free black, named Gibson, and after working four days on the
levy (or wharf) I succeeded in secreting myself in a ship, well supplied
by Mr. Gibson and friends with provisions, and in the middle hold under
the cotton I remained until the ship arrived at New York; my being there
was only known to two persons on board, the steward and the cook, both
colored persons. When the vessel was docked in the pier thirty-eight,
North river, I managed to make my way through the booby hatch on to the
deck, and was not seen by the watchman on board who supposed I was a
stranger, or what they call a "River Thief." I made a jump to escape over
the bow and fell into the river; but before he could raise an alarm, I had
reached the next dock, got out and made my way off as fast as possible. I
wandered about the streets until morning, not knowing where to go, during
which time my clothes had dried on my body. About ten o'clock in the
forenoon I met with a colored man named Grundy, who took me to his house,
and gave me something to eat, and enquired where I came from and where I
belonged; I hesitated about telling my true situation, but after
considerable conversation with him, I ventured to confide in him, and when
I had given him, all the particulars, he took me to the underground
Railway office and introduced me to the officials, who having heard my
story determined to send me to Canada, forty dollars being raised to find
me clothes, and pay my fare to Toronto, but I was only taken to Utica, in
the State of New York, where I agreed to stop with Mr. Cleveland and
coachman.
In November I was sent to Post-street on an errand, where I saw my master,
who laid hold of me, and called to his aid a dozen more, when I was taken
before a magistrate, and that night I was placed in prison, and next day
brought before a court, and ordered to be given up to my master. I was
taken back to prison that afternoon, and irons placed on my ancles, and
hand-cuffed; but, previous to leaving, Mr. Cleveland and family came to
take a kind leave of me, and gave me religious advice and encouragement,
telling me to put my trust in the Lord, and I was much affected at his
little girl, who, when I was placed in the waggon screamed and cried as if
she would fall into fits, telling her father to have me brought back, for
these men intended to murder me. The waggon drove to the railway depot,
and I was placed in the cars, and at three o'clock we started for Buffalo,
where I was placed on the steam boat "Milwaukie," for Chicago, Illinois,
on Lake Erie. The next night I arrived in Cleveland, and was taken from
the boat, and placed in prison, until my master was ready to proceed.
While in prison a complaint was made that a fugitive slave was placed in
irons, contrary to the law of the state of Ohio, and after investigation,
my irons were ordered to be taken off. On the Monday following I was taken
on board the steam boat "Sultana" bound for Sandusky, Ohio, and on my way
there, the Black people, in large numbers, made an attempt to rescue me,
and so desperate was the attack, that several officers were wounded, and
the attempt failed. I was placed in the cabin, and at dinner time the
steam boat started, and had about half a mile to go before she got into
the lake, and, on the way, the captain came down to me, and cautiously
asked me if I could swim--I answered I could, when he told me to stand
close by a window, which he pointed out, and when the paddle wheels ceased
I must jump out. I stood ready, and as soon as the wheels ceased I made a
spring and jumped into the water, and after going a short distance, I
looked up and saw the captain standing on the promenade deck, who, when he
saw I was clear of the wheels, waved a signal for the engineer to start
the vessel. I had much difficulty in preventing myself from being drawn
back by the suction of the wheels, and before I had gone far I saw my
master and heard him shout, "Here, here, stop captain; yonder goes my
nigger," which was echoed by shouts from the passengers; but the boat
continued her course, while I made my way as fast as possible to Cleveland
lighthouse, where I arrived in safety, and received by an innumerable
company of both blacks and whites. I was then sent to a place called
Oberlin, where I remained a week, and from there I went to Zanesville,
Ohio, where I stopped for four months, when I was taken up on suspicion of
breaking the windows of a store, and while in prison I was seen by a Mr.
Donelson, who declared to the keeper that I belonged to him. I knew him
well as the father-in-law of Mr. Steel, with whom I travelled to New
Orleans. He was also a methodist minister. He had me discharged by paying
the damage, and making affidavit that I was his slave, I was placed in
prison, and kept in two weeks, when I was brought before the court for
trial; and Mr. Donelson procured papers showing that he had purchased me
as a runaway. I therefore saw it was of no use prolonging the matter, and
I acknowledged myself. I was then taken and put into the stage and taken
to Cincinnati, Ohio, where I was placed upon the steam boat, _Pike_, No.
3, to be taken to Louisville, Kentucky, and there placed in prison a week,
and on Thursday brought out to auction and sold to Mr. Silas Wheelbanks
for 1,050 dollars, with whom I remained about twelve months, and acted as
coachman and waiting in the house. Upon a Saturday evening, my master came
and told me to make my carriage and horses so that he could see his face
in them, and be ready to take my young mistress, Mary, down to
Centreville, to see her grandmother. So I prepared my horses and carriage,
and on Monday was ready. The lady got in, and when about seven miles I
drove into a blind road, distant about two miles from any house, where I
made the horses stand still, and I ordered Miss Mary to get out: and when
she asked me why, I thundered out at the top of my voice, "Get out, and
ask no questions." She commenced crying, and asked if I was going to kill
her. I said "No, if she made no noise," I helped her out, and having no
rope, I took her shawl and fastened her to a tree by the roadside; and for
fear she should untie the knot and spread the alarm, I took off her veil,
and with it tied her hands behind her. I then mounted the box, and drove
off in the direction of Lexington, and at a place called Elton I stripped
the horses of their harness and let them go. I made my way to Louisville
and arrived about 7 o'clock in the evening. I walked about the dock until
_Pike_ No. 3, the same vessel before spoken of, was nearly ready for
starting and I got a gentleman's trunk on my shoulder and went on board,
and when I had been paid six cents for carrying the trunk I watched a
chance, and jumped down the cotton hold and stowed myself away among the
cotton bags and the next day was in Cincinnati, Ohio, where I arrived
about daylight in the morning. I waited until the passangers had left the
boat and saw neither officer nor engineer about when I ventured to go on
shore. On starting up the hill I met my master's nephew, who at once
seized hold of me, and a sharp struggle ensued. He called for help but I
threw him and caught a stone and struck him on the head, which caused him
to let go, when I ran away as fast my legs could carry me, pursued by a
numerous crowd, crying "stop thief." I mounted a fence in the street, and
ran though an alley into an Irishman's yard, and through his house,
knocking over the Irishman's wife and child, and the chair on which she
sat, the husband at the time sat eating at the table, jumped into a cellar
on the opposite side of the street without being seen by any one, I made
my way into the back cellar and went up the chimney, where I sat till
dark, and at night came down and slept in the cellar. In the morning the
servant girl came down into the cellar, and when I saw she was black I
thought it would be best to make myself known to her, which I did, and she
told me I had better remain where I was and keep quiet, and she would go
and tell Mr. Nickins, one of the agents of the underground Railway. She
brought me down a bowl of coffee and some bread and meat, which I relished
very much, and that night she opened the cellar door gently, and called to
me to come out, and introduced me to Mr. Nickins and two others, who took
me to a house in Sixth street, where I remained until the next night, when
they dressed me in female's clothes, and I was taken to the railway depot
in a carriage--was put in the car, and sent to Cleveland, Ohio where I was
placed on board a steam boat called the _Indiana_, and carried down Lake
Erie to the city of Buffalo, New York, and the next day placed on the car
for the Niagara Falls, and received by a gentleman named Jones, who took
me in his carriage to a place called Lewiston, where I was placed on board
a steamboat called _Chief Justice Robinson_. I was furnished with a ticket
and twelve dollars. Three hours after starting I was in Toronto, Upper
Canada, where I lived for three years and sang my song of
deliverance,--
* * * * *
WHAT THE "TIMES" SAID OF THE SECESSION IN 1861
(From the _Liverpool Daily Post_, Feb. 3, 1863.)
The following article appeared as a "Leader" in the _Times_ on the 7th of
January, 1861:--
"The State of South Carolina has seceded from the Union by a unanimous
vote of her legislature, and it now remains to be seen whether any of the
other Southern States will follow her example, and what course the Federal
authorities will pursue under the circumstances. While we wait for further
information on these points, it may be well to consider once again the
cause of quarrel which has thus begun to rend asunder the mightiest
confederation which the world has yet beheld. One of the prevalent
delusions of the age in which we live is to regard democracy as equivalent
to liberty, and the attribution of power to the poorest and worst educated
citizens of the State as a certain way to promote the purest liberality of
thought and the most beneficial course of action. Let those who hold this
opinion examine the quarrel at present raging in the United States, and
they will be aware that democracy, like other forms of government, may
co-exist with any course of action or any set of principles. Between North
and South there is at this moment raging a controversy which goes as deep
as any controversy can into the elementary principles of human nature and
the sympathies and antipathies which in so many men supply the place of
reason and reflection. The North is for freedom, the South is for slavery.
The North is for freedom of discussion, the South represses freedom of
discussion with the tar-brush and the pine fagot. Yet the North and South
are both democracies--nay, possess almost exactly similar institutions,
with this enormous divergence in theory and practice. It is not democracy
that has made the North the advocate of freedom, or the South the advocate
of slavery. Democracy is a quality which appears on both sides, and may
therefore be rejected, as having no influence over the result. From the
sketch of the history of slavery which was furnished us by our
correspondent in New York last week, we learn that at the time of the
American Revolution slavery existed in every State in the Union except
Massachusetts; but we also learn that the great men who directed that
revolution--Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Patrick Henry, and
Hamilton--were unanimous in execrating the practice of slavery, and looked
forward to the time when it would cease to contaminate the soil of free
America. The abolition of the slave trade, which subsequently followed,
was regarded by its warmest advocates as not only beneficial in itself,
but as a long step towards the extinction of slavery altogether, it was
not foreseen that certain free and democratic communities would arise
which would apply themselves to the honourable office of breeding slaves,
to be consumed on the free and democratic plantations of the South, and of
thus replacing the African slave trade by an internal traffic in human
flesh, carried on under circumstances of almost equal atrocity through the
heart of a free and democratic nation. Democracy has verily a strong
digestion, and one not to be interfered with by trifles.
"But the most melancholy part of the matter is, that during the seventy
years for which the American confederacy has existed, the whole tone of
sentiment with regard to slavery has, in the Southern States at least,
undergone a remarkable change. Slavery used to be treated as a thoroughly
exceptional institution--as an evil legacy of evil times--as a disgrace to
a constitution founded on the natural freedom and independence of mankind.
There was hardly a political leader of any note who had not some plan for
its abolition. Jefferson himself, the greatest chief of the democracy, had
in the early part of this century speculated deeply on the subject; but
the United States became possessed of Louisiana and Florida, they have
conquered Texas, they have made Arkansas and Missouri into States; and
these successive acquisitions have altered entirely the view with which
slavery is regarded. Perhaps as much as anything, from the long license
enjoyed by the editors of the South of writing what they pleased in favour
of slavery, with the absolute certainty that no one would be found bold
enough to write anything on the other side, and thus make himself a mark
for popular vengeance, the subject has come to be written on in a tone of
ferocious and cynical extravagance, which is to an European eye absolutely
appalling. The South has become enamoured of her shame. Free labour is
denounced as degrading and disgraceful; the honest triumphs of the poor
man who works his way to independence are treated with scorn and contempt.
It is asserted that what we are in the habit of regarding as the honorable
pursuits of industry incapacitate a nation for civilisation and
refinement, and that no institutions can be really free and democratic
which do not rest, like those of Athens and of Rome, on a broad substratum
of slavery. So far from treating slavery as an exceptional institution, it
is regarded by these Democratic philosophers as the natural state of a
great portion of the human race; and, so far from admitting that America
ought to look forward to its extinction, it is contended that the property
in human creatures ought to be as universal as the property in land or in
tame animals.
"Nor have these principles been merely inert or speculative. For the last
ten or twelve years slavery has altered her tactics, and from a defensive
she has become an aggressive power. Every compromise which the moderation
of former times had erected to stem the course of this monster evil has
been swept away, and that not by the encroachments of the North, but by
the aggressive ambition of the South. With a majority in Congress and in
the Supreme Court of the United States, the advocates of slavery have
entered on a career the object of which would seem to be to make their
favourite institution conterminous with the limits of the Republic. They
have swept away the Missouri compromise, which limited slavery to the
tract south of 36 degrees of north latitude. They have forced upon the
North, in the Fugitive Slave Bill, a measure which compels them to lend
their assistance to the South in the recovery of their bondmen. In the
case of Kansas they have sought by force of arms to assert the right of
bringing slaves into a free territory, and in the Dred Scott case they
obtained an extrajudicial opinion from the Supreme Court, which would have
placed all the territories at their disposal. All this while the North has
been resisting, feebly and ineffectually, this succession of Southern
aggressions. All that was desired was peace, and that peace could not be
obtained.
"While these things were done the South continued violently to upbraid the
Abolitionists of the North as the cause of all their troubles, and the
ladies of South Carolina showered presents and caresses on the brutal
assailant of Mr. Sumner. In 1856 the North endeavoured to elect a
President who though fully recognising the right of the South to its slave
property, was opposed to its extension in the territories. The North were
defeated, and submitted almost without a murmur to the result. On the
present occasion the South has submitted to the same ordeal, but not with
the same success. They have taken their chance of electing a President of
their own views, but they have failed. Mr. Lincoln, like Colonel Freemont,
fully recognises the right of the South to the institution of slavery,
but, like him, he is opposed to its extension. This cannot be endured.
With a majority in both houses of Congress and in the Supreme Court of the
United States, the South cannot submit to a President who is not their
devoted servant. Unless every power in the constitution is to be strained
in order to promote the progress of slavery, they will not remain in the
Union; they will not wait to see whether they are injured, but resent the
first check to their onward progress as an intolerable injury. This, then,
is the result of the history of slavery. It began as a tolerated, it has
ended as an aggressive institution, and if it now threatens to dissolve
the Union, it is not because it has anything to fear for that which it
possesses already, but because it has received a check to its hopes of
future acquisition."
* * * * *
SECESSION CONDEMNED IN A SOUTHERN CONVENTION.
SPEECH
Of the Hon. A.H. STEPHENS, made at the Georgia State Convention, held
January, 1861, for the purpose of determining whether the State of Georgia
was to secede. Notwithstanding this remarkable speech of an extraordinary
man, the Convention decided on secession. Mr. Stephens was afterwards
elected Vice President of the so-called Confederacy. This distinction
shows the estimate of his powers, and adds force to the deliverance, the
prophetic declarations of which are now being fulfilled to the letter.