Chapter 7

[13] Would it be superstitious to presume, that the sovereign Father of all nations, permitted the _perpetration_ of this apparently execrable transaction, as a _fiery_, though salutary signal of his displeasure at the conduct of his Columbian children, in erecting and idolizing this splendid fabric as the temple of freedom, and at the same time oppressing with the yoke of captivity and toilsome bondage, twelve or fifteen hundred thousand of their African _brethren_ (by logical induction,) making merchandize of their _blood_, and dragging their bodies with _iron chains_, even under its towering walls? Yet is it a fact, that _slaves_ are employed in rebuilding this sanctuary of _liberty_.

[14] It is a notorious and afflicting truth, that in the United States, the head of a _poor black man_ has been cut off _with impunity_, by a white man (or master;) that black men have been _wantonly shot_ by white men; and that a free black man (whom I have seen myself) was _hoppled_, and being unsuccessfully offered for sale as a slave, was bound to a post in the winter, and left without food until his feet _were frozen_, where he would probably have perished, had he not extricated himself by his own struggles.

[15] This statement was furnished by a respectable citizen, who was one of the first that found the dead body, near his own house.

N.B. Nothing can more strongly indicate the true state of the case than this _disguising of names_. The _Author_ dared put _his_ name; but he was in _Pennsylvania_: he would, probably have exposed his _Maryland_-informant to _death_ by naming him. W. C.

[16] It is a frequent custom in the district of Columbia, Maryland, and Delaware, for masters to endeavour to reform their bad slaves, by terrifying them with threats of selling them for the Georgia market, or "_to Carolina_" them; which is often carried into effect. There are, notwithstanding, several individuals, so conscientiously opposed to selling men against their will, that the most unpardonable conduct will not induce men to do it; and they prefer rejecting them, and letting them keep all the wages they can get for their own use.

[17] One of the members of the house of representatives (Mr. ADGATE,) related to me, while at Washington, the following fact:--"That during the last session of congress, (1815-16,) as several members were standing in the street, near the new capitol, a drove of manacled coloured people were passing by; and when just opposite, one of them elevating his manacles as high as he could reach, commenced singing the favorite national song, "_Hail Columbia! happy land_," &c.

N.B. This is an excessively stupid song, written more than 20 years ago by one HOPKINSON, a lawyer of Philadelphia, who seems to have been born to be an ornament of Grub-Street. But, however silly the thoughts or inflated the expressions, down it goes if national vanity or party strife lay hold of it. "_Hail Columbia_" is much about upon a level with "_God save the king_;" they have both had about the same cause to keep them in vogue; but, I must confess, that the Americans, with _manacles on their hands and chains round their necks_, singing songs in praise of the _freedom_ of that Country, is going a little further than our fools when they bleat and bellow and bawl out that parcel of stuff, that low bombast, which the news-papers, in their cant, call "Our great National _Anthem_;" an "_Anthem_" that talks, amongst other things, of "confounding _politicks_ and all their _knavish tricks_!" Come, come: we must not pretend to _laugh_ at the Washington Negro!--W. C.

[18] Judge Morrel, in his charge to the grand jury of Washington, at the session of the circuit court of the United States, in January 1816, for the district of Columbia, urged this subject to its attention very emphatically, as an object of remonstrance and juridical investigation. He said the frequency with which the streets of the city had been crowded with manacled captives, sometimes even on the sabbath, could not fail to shock the feelings of all humane persons; that it was repugnant to the spirit of our political institutions, and the rights of man, and he believed was calculated to impair the public morals, by familiarizing scenes of cruelty to the minds of youth.

[19] Extract from the preamble to the first act passed by the legislature of Pennsylvania, for the gradual abolition of slavery in that state:

"Sect. 2. And whereas the condition of those persons who have heretofore been denominated negro and mulatto slaves, has been attended with circumstances which not only deprived them of the common blessings that they were by nature entitled to, but has cast them into the deepest afflictions by an unnatural separation of husband and wife from each other and from their children--an injury the greatness of which can only be conceived by supposing that we were in the same unhappy case," &c.

Darwin, who may well be styled an _arch connoisseur_, both in physiology and morality, in his classification of human diseases, includes one which he denominates _Nostalgia_, and thus defines it:

"_Nostalgia._ An unconquerable desire of returning to one's native country, frequent in long voyages, in which the patients become so insane as to throw themselves into the sea, mistaking it for green fields and meadows. The Swiss are said to be particularly liable to this disease, and when taken into foreign service frequently desert from this cause, and especially after hearing or singing a particular tune, which was used in their village dances, in their native country; on which account their playing or singing this tune was punished with death. Zwingerus.

Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms, And dear that hill, which lifts him to the storms. Goldsmith." Zoonomia, Cl. III. 1. 1. 6.

The late _indefatigable Rush_, in his Inquiry into the Causes of the Derangement of the Human Mind, states, that the slaves imported into the _West Indies from Africa_, frequently become distracted when they are about to commence the toils of perpetual slavery on the plantations.

N. B. This "_indefatigable_ RUSH" was, indeed, _indefatigable_ in _puffing himself off_ for a friend of _humanity_, in which he was pretty successful too. He made his court to the Quakers, and even exceeded some of them in cunning. It was as puny a creature, in point of talent, as ever contrived to get a reputation for wisdom. Principles he had none: he wrote about every thing, and about nothing well; but, as a _pretender_ to humanity he was consummate. Only mind how he _here_ calls for indignation against the "_West India_" planters. Not a word about those of his own "_free country_!" What a hypocrite! He was a Doctor of Physic; and he knew well that he would have lost his best patients, those that paid best for the _blood-letting_, (for which he was so famous) if he had made free with the Slave-holders of his own "free-country."--W. C.

[20] To those speculators in human flesh, who purchase free people as well as slaves, without discrimination, I must now apply the title of _Man-Dealers_, instead of Slave Traders.

[21] While interrogating him about the manner of his being seized and bound, he gave his chains a shake, by moving his feet on the floor, and with vexation muttered, "When the devil gets 'em he'll _chain them_." "No, no," said I, "you shouldn't make such speeches as that, perhaps they were brought up to such things, and don't know any better." "_Well but_," said he, "_they know what's right_." I have since been assured, that several instances of _black_ man-stealing had occurred, in which fathers, sons, brothers, and even wives and daughters, were promiscuously engaged.

[22] I was informed, on my arrival in the neighbourhood where this affair was transacted, that this _person_, on hearing that the mulatto man had been intercepted at Washington, said he had a _bad pain_ on his mind, and believed he should _clear out_; which he had done accordingly.

[23] Thos. Clarkson states, in his History of the Abolition of the Slave Trade, that "the arrival of slave ships on the coasts of Africa was the uniform signal for the immediate commencement of wars for the attainment of prisoners, for sale and exportation to America and the West Indies." In Maryland and Delaware, the same drama is now performed in miniature. The arrival of the Man-Traffickers, _laden_ with cash, at their respective _stations_, near the coasts of a great American water, called justly, by Mr. Randolph, "a Mediterranean sea," or at their several _inland posts_, near the dividing line of Maryland and Delaware, (at some of which they have grated prisons for the purpose) is the well known signal for the professed _kidnappers_, like beasts of prey, to commence their nightly invasions upon the _fleecy flocks_; extending their ravages, (generally attended with bloodshed, and sometimes murder,) and spreading terror and consternation amongst both freemen and slaves throughout the _sandy regions_, from the western to the eastern shores. These "two-legged featherless animals," or _human bloodhounds_, when overtaken (rarely) by the messengers of law, are generally found armed with instruments of death, sometimes with pistols with _latent_ spring daggers attached to them! Mr. Cooper, one of the representatives to congress from Delaware, assured me that he had often been afraid to send one of his servants out of his house in the evening, from the danger of their being seized by kidnappers.

While at Wilmington (Del.) I accidentally heard a black woman telling the gate-keeper of the bridge, that she had set out to go to Georgetown, (Del.) but was returning without having reached it, for fear of being caught on the road by the kidnappers.

[24] I was informed in Delaware, that her seller absconded in about ten days after the outrage was committed.

[25] The mulatto youth had been purchased in the city of Washington, and kept in it in irons several weeks, by a person who confessed his regret that he had not removed him before the suit for the recovery of his freedom had commenced; and that, if he had known it sooner, he would have taken him on to ----, (the place of his residence,) even if he had been satisfied of his being free. One Slave-Trader, to whom he had been offered, was however so conscientious, that he refused to purchase him, or the lad who was with him, (before mentioned) being confident that they were illegally enslaved.

[26] I have been assured by a gentleman of the highest respectability, that a former representative to Congress, from one of the southern states, acknowledged to him, that he held a mulatto man as a slave, having purchased him in company with slaves, who affirmed that he was free born, and had been kidnapped from one of the New England states; who was well educated, and who, he had no doubt, was born as free a man as himself, or my informant. Upon being asked, how he could _bear_ then to retain him, he replied, that the customs of his part of the country were such, that these things are not minded much.

[27] I was informed that the mulatto man was probably destined for the New-Orleans market, not very far distant from the _Gulf of Mexico_, which probably embraces more personal slavery, including its neighbouring regions, than any region of equal extent on the globe.

[28] On the ensuing day, having persevered in endeavours to secure the captives, the son of this landlord (to whom I presume _manacles_, _hand-cuffs_, _iron man-fetters_, _hopples_ _&c._ are as familiar as steel-traps and snares to the hunter of the _animals which yield fur_,) expressed his sympathy for the loss of the purchaser of the mulatto man, (who still remained in his chains,) should he be set at liberty. I asked him whether he considered it worse for the trader to lose a few hundred dollars in money, than for the mulatto man to be transported to a strange country, and be deprived of his liberty for life. To which he replied, after a short pause, _that he did not know as there was much difference_! I assured him, that if he _did not_, I was _sorry_ for him. This illustrates the invincible force of morbid education and of habit.

[29] By information, derived from distinct and corresponding sources, a few days after this caravan left Washington, there is no doubt of the fact, that it contained, in addition to the slaves, a young black woman, who had been emancipated in Delaware, and was sold by the same person as an agent, that assisted in seizing and sold the black woman and child; and also a legally free mulatto man, in irons, who had been sold in the night by his employer, near Philadelphia, and who was most unmercifully beaten with a club, on the night previous to their arrival in the city, for telling a person that he was free.

[30] Additional aid was also rendered by the Abolition Society at Wilmington.

[31] It would be equally as absurd to do this, as it would to import 2,000,000 prisoners of war from Turkey or China, and make citizens of them.

[32] "It is not for us to inquire why, in the creation of mankind, the inhabitants of the several parts of the earth were distinguished by a difference in feature or complexion. It is sufficient to know, that all are the work of an Almighty Hand." [From the first section of the Preamble to the Pennsylvania act for the Abolition of Slavery, before referred to.]

[33] M'Gurran Coulon, in his "Observations on the Insurrection of the Negroes in the Island of St. Domingo," read before the National Assembly of France, attributes the _troubles_ of that island, "above all, to the injustice of which the whites have been guilty, in refusing to let the mulattos partake of the blessings of liberty." This was evidently one of the chief _proximate_ causes;--but the primitive radical origin of those implacable conflicts between different shades of colour, may be traced to the miserable fatal policy which permitted the production of those shades. "The white father falls a victim to the unnatural rage of his mulatto son." "In a country where it is by no means unusual for the known children of the Planter to undergo all the hardships, and the ignominy of slavery, in common with the most degraded class of mortals, is it there we are to seek for instances of filial affection?" [Inquiry into the Causes of the Insurrection of the Negroes in St. Domingo.]

[34] Recent message of the President of the United States to Congress, alluding to the red natives of America.

[35] See Parag. 40. I consider it a fortunate circumstance, and one which will protect me effectually from the imputation of plagiarism, in respect to the similarity of what I had previously written on the subject of colonization by "_beneficent societies_" and the national ransom of slaves (see Parag. 80 & 81) to any thing advanced at this meeting; that I had communicated the contents of the original manuscript of the preceding work to page 98, except some notes and slight alterations, to Roberts Vaux, Esq. one of the members of the common council of the city of Philadelphia, on or previous to the 8th of Dec. 1816--And the fact is made public, in this manner, with his consent and approbation.

[36] Several free persons of colour, of both sexes and all a little shaded with a yellowish tint, being employed as servants in the house in which I lodge, I inquired of two of the females, a few days ago, whether they would like to go to Africa, as it was the country of their forefathers. One of them expressed great repugnance at going there, and the other said her fathers did not come from Africa, "and (said she) if they (the Americans) did not want us, they had no need to have brought us away: after they've brought us here, and made us work hard, and _disfigured the colour_, I don't think it would be fair to send us back again."

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Transcriber's note:

There is some inconsistency in the placing of italic and small capital markup. They are as in the original.