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Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
NARRATIVE
OF THE
LIFE
OF
FREDERICK DOUGLASS,
AN
AMERICAN SLAVE.
--------------- WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. ---------------
BOSTON PUBLISHED AT THE ANTI-SLAVERY OFFICE, NO. 25 CORNHILL 1845
NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS, AN AMERICAN SLAVE
WRITTEN BY HIMSELF
ENTERED, ACCORDING TO ACT OF CONGRESS, IN THE YEAR 1845 BY FREDERICK
DOUGLASS, IN THE CLERK'S OFFICE OF THE DISTRICT COURT OF
MASSACHUSETTS.
PREFACE
In the month of August, 1841, I attended an anti- slavery convention
in Nantucket, at which it was my happiness to become acquainted with
FREDERICK DOUGLASS, the writer of the following Narrative. He was a
stranger to nearly every member of that body; but, having recently
made his escape from the south- ern prison-house of bondage, and
feeling his curiosity excited to ascertain the principles and measures
of the abolitionists,--of whom he had heard a somewhat vague
description while he was a slave,--he was in- duced to give his
attendance, on the occasion al- luded to, though at that time a
resident in New Bedford.
Fortunate, most fortunate occurrence!--fortunate for the millions of
his manacled brethren, yet pant- ing for deliverance from their awful
thraldom!--for- tunate for the cause of negro emancipation, and of
universal liberty!--fortunate for the land of his birth, which he has
already done so much to save and bless! --fortunate for a large circle
of friends and acquaint- ances, whose sympathy and affection he has
strongly secured by the many sufferings he has endured, by his
virtuous traits of character, by his ever-abiding remembrance of those
who are in bonds, as being bound with them!--fortunate for the
multitudes, in various parts of our republic, whose minds he has
enlightened on the subject of slavery, and who have been melted to
tears by his pathos, or roused to virtuous indignation by his stirring
eloquence against the enslavers of men!--fortunate for himself, as it
at once brought him into the field of public use- fulness, "gave the
world assurance of a MAN," quick- ened the slumbering energies of his
soul, and con- secrated him to the great work of breaking the rod of
the oppressor, and letting the oppressed go free!
I shall never forget his first speech at the conven- tion--the
extraordinary emotion it excited in my own mind--the powerful
impression it created upon a crowded auditory, completely taken by
surprise--the applause which followed from the beginning to the end of
his felicitous remarks. I think I never hated slavery so intensely as
at that moment; certainly, my perception of the enormous outrage which
is in- flicted by it, on the godlike nature of its victims, was
rendered far more clear than ever. There stood one, in physical
proportion and stature commanding and exact--in intellect richly
endowed--in natural elo- quence a prodigy--in soul manifestly "created
but a little lower than the angels"--yet a slave, ay, a fugi- tive
slave,--trembling for his safety, hardly daring to believe that on the
American soil, a single white person could be found who would befriend
him at all hazards, for the love of God and humanity! Ca- pable of
high attainments as an intellectual and moral being--needing nothing
but a comparatively small amount of cultivation to make him an orna-
ment to society and a blessing to his race--by the law of the land, by
the voice of the people, by the terms of the slave code, he was only a
piece of property, a beast of burden, a chattel personal,
nevertheless!
A beloved friend from New Bedford prevailed on Mr. DOUGLASS to address
the convention: He came forward to the platform with a hesitancy and
embar- rassment, necessarily the attendants of a sensitive mind in
such a novel position. After apologizing for his ignorance, and
reminding the audience that slav- ery was a poor school for the human
intellect and heart, he proceeded to narrate some of the facts in his
own history as a slave, and in the course of his speech gave utterance
to many noble thoughts and thrilling reflections. As soon as he had
taken his seat, filled with hope and admiration, I rose, and declared
that PATRICK HENRY, of revolutionary fame, never made a speech more
eloquent in the cause of liberty, than the one we had just listened to
from the lips of that hunted fugitive. So I believed at that
time--such is my belief now. I reminded the audience of the peril
which surrounded this self- emancipated young man at the North,--even
in Mas- sachusetts, on the soil of the Pilgrim Fathers, among the
descendants of revolutionary sires; and I ap- pealed to them, whether
they would ever allow him to be carried back into slavery,--law or no
law, con- stitution or no constitution. The response was unani- mous
and in thunder-tones--"NO!" "Will you succor and protect him as a
brother-man--a resident of the old Bay State?" "YES!" shouted the
whole mass, with an energy so startling, that the ruthless tyrants
south of Mason and Dixon's line might almost have heard the mighty
burst of feeling, and recognized it as the pledge of an invincible
determination, on the part of those who gave it, never to betray him
that wanders, but to hide the outcast, and firmly to abide the
consequences.
It was at once deeply impressed upon my mind, that, if Mr. DOUGLASS
could be persuaded to conse- crate his time and talents to the
promotion of the anti-slavery enterprise, a powerful impetus would be
given to it, and a stunning blow at the same time inflicted on
northern prejudice against a colored complexion. I therefore
endeavored to instil hope and courage into his mind, in order that he
might dare to engage in a vocation so anomalous and re- sponsible for
a person in his situation; and I was seconded in this effort by
warm-hearted friends, es- pecially by the late General Agent of the
Massa- chusetts Anti-Slavery Society, Mr. JOHN A. COLLINS, whose
judgment in this instance entirely coincided with my own. At first,
he could give no encourage- ment; with unfeigned diffidence, he
expressed his conviction that he was not adequate to the perform- ance
of so great a task; the path marked out was wholly an untrodden one;
he was sincerely appre- hensive that he should do more harm than good.
After much deliberation, however, he consented to make a trial; and
ever since that period, he has acted as a lecturing agent, under the
auspices either of the American or the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery
Society. In labors he has been most abundant; and his success in
combating prejudice, in gaining proselytes, in agi- tating the public
mind, has far surpassed the most sanguine expectations that were
raised at the com- mencement of his brilliant career. He has borne
him- self with gentleness and meekness, yet with true manliness of
character. As a public speaker, he excels in pathos, wit, comparison,
imitation, strength of reasoning, and fluency of language. There is
in him that union of head and heart, which is indispensable to an
enlightenment of the heads and a winning of the hearts of others. May
his strength continue to be equal to his day! May he continue to
"grow in grace, and in the knowledge of God," that he may be
increasingly serviceable in the cause of bleeding humanity, whether at
home or abroad!
It is certainly a very remarkable fact, that one of the most efficient
advocates of the slave population, now before the public, is a
fugitive slave, in the person of FREDERICK DOUGLASS; and that the free
colored population of the United States are as ably represented by one
of their own number, in the per- son of CHARLES LENOX REMOND, whose
eloquent appeals have extorted the highest applause of multi- tudes on
both sides of the Atlantic. Let the calum- niators of the colored
race despise themselves for their baseness and illiberality of spirit,
and hence- forth cease to talk of the natural inferiority of those who
require nothing but time and opportunity to attain to the highest
point of human excellence.
It may, perhaps, be fairly questioned, whether any other portion of
the population of the earth could have endured the privations,
sufferings and horrors of slavery, without having become more degraded
in the scale of humanity than the slaves of African descent. Nothing
has been left undone to cripple their intellects, darken their minds,
debase their moral nature, obliterate all traces of their relation-
ship to mankind; and yet how wonderfully they have sustained the
mighty load of a most frightful bond- age, under which they have been
groaning for cen- turies! To illustrate the effect of slavery on the
white man,--to show that he has no powers of endurance, in such a
condition, superior to those of his black brother,--DANIEL O'CONNELL,
the distinguished advocate of universal emancipation, and the mighti-
est champion of prostrate but not conquered Ireland, relates the
following anecdote in a speech delivered by him in the Conciliation
Hall, Dublin, before the Loyal National Repeal Association, March 31,
1845. "No matter," said Mr. O'CONNELL, "under what specious term it
may disguise itself, slavery is still hideous. ~It has a natural, an
inevitable tendency to brutalize every noble faculty of man.~ An
American sailor, who was cast away on the shore of Africa, where he
was kept in slavery for three years, was, at the expiration of that
period, found to be imbruted and stultified--he had lost all reasoning
power; and having forgotten his native language, could only ut- ter
some savage gibberish between Arabic and Eng- lish, which nobody could
understand, and which even he himself found difficulty in pronouncing.
So much for the humanizing influence of THE DOMESTIC INSTITUTION!"
Admitting this to have been an ex- traordinary case of mental
deterioration, it proves at least that the white slave can sink as low
in the scale of humanity as the black one.
Mr. DOUGLASS has very properly chosen to write his own Narrative, in
his own style, and according to the best of his ability, rather than
to employ some one else. It is, therefore, entirely his own produc-
tion; and, considering how long and dark was the ca- reer he had to
run as a slave,--how few have been his opportunities to improve his
mind since he broke his iron fetters,--it is, in my judgment, highly
creditable to his head and heart. He who can peruse it without a
tearful eye, a heaving breast, an afflicted spirit,-- without being
filled with an unutterable abhorrence of slavery and all its abettors,
and animated with a determination to seek the immediate overthrow of
that execrable system,--without trembling for the fate of this country
in the hands of a righteous God, who is ever on the side of the
oppressed, and whose arm is not shortened that it cannot save,--must
have a flinty heart, and be qualified to act the part of a trafficker
"in slaves and the souls of men." I am con- fident that it is
essentially true in all its statements; that nothing has been set down
in malice, nothing exaggerated, nothing drawn from the imagination;
that it comes short of the reality, rather than over- states a single
fact in regard to SLAVERY AS IT IS. The experience of FREDERICK
DOUGLASS, as a slave, was not a peculiar one; his lot was not
especially a hard one; his case may be regarded as a very fair
specimen of the treatment of slaves in Maryland, in which State it is
conceded that they are better fed and less cruelly treated than in
Georgia, Alabama, or Louisiana. Many have suffered incomparably more,
while very few on the plantations have suf- fered less, than himself.
Yet how deplorable was his situation! what terrible chastisements were
inflicted upon his person! what still more shocking outrages were
perpetrated upon his mind! with all his noble powers and sublime
aspirations, how like a brute was he treated, even by those professing
to have the same mind in them that was in Christ Jesus! to what
dreadful liabilities was he continually subjected! how destitute of
friendly counsel and aid, even in his greatest extremities! how heavy
was the midnight of woe which shrouded in blackness the last ray of
hope, and filled the future with terror and gloom! what longings after
freedom took possession of his breast, and how his misery augmented,
in proportion as he grew reflective and intelligent,--thus
demonstrating that a happy slave is an extinct man! how he thought,
reasoned, felt, under the lash of the driver, with the chains upon his
limbs! what perils he en- countered in his endeavors to escape from
his hor- rible doom! and how signal have been his deliverance and
preservation in the midst of a nation of pitiless enemies!
This Narrative contains many affecting incidents, many passages of
great eloquence and power; but I think the most thrilling one of them
all is the de- scription DOUGLASS gives of his feelings, as he stood
soliloquizing respecting his fate, and the chances of his one day
being a freeman, on the banks of the Chesapeake Bay--viewing the
receding vessels as they flew with their white wings before the
breeze, and apostrophizing them as animated by the living spirit of
freedom. Who can read that passage, and be in- sensible to its pathos
and sublimity? Compressed into it is a whole Alexandrian library of
thought, feeling, and sentiment--all that can, all that need be urged,
in the form of expostulation, entreaty, rebuke, against that crime of
crimes,--making man the prop- erty of his fellow-man! O, how accursed
is that system, which entombs the godlike mind of man, defaces the
divine image, reduces those who by crea- tion were crowned with glory
and honor to a level with four-footed beasts, and exalts the dealer in
hu- man flesh above all that is called God! Why should its existence
be prolonged one hour? Is it not evil, only evil, and that
continually? What does its pres- ence imply but the absence of all
fear of God, all regard for man, on the part of the people of the
United States? Heaven speed its eternal overthrow!
So profoundly ignorant of the nature of slavery are many persons, that
they are stubbornly incredu- lous whenever they read or listen to any
recital of the cruelties which are daily inflicted on its victims.
They do not deny that the slaves are held as prop- erty; but that
terrible fact seems to convey to their minds no idea of injustice,
exposure to outrage, or savage barbarity. Tell them of cruel
scourgings, of mutilations and brandings, of scenes of pollution and
blood, of the banishment of all light and knowl- edge, and they affect
to be greatly indignant at such enormous exaggerations, such wholesale
misstate- ments, such abominable libels on the character of the
southern planters! As if all these direful outrages were not the
natural results of slavery! As if it were less cruel to reduce a
human being to the condition of a thing, than to give him a severe
flagellation, or to deprive him of necessary food and clothing! As if
whips, chains, thumb-screws, paddles, blood- hounds, overseers,
drivers, patrols, were not all in- dispensable to keep the slaves
down, and to give protection to their ruthless oppressors! As if,
when the marriage institution is abolished, concubinage, adultery, and
incest, must not necessarily abound; when all the rights of humanity
are annihilated, any barrier remains to protect the victim from the
fury of the spoiler; when absolute power is assumed over life and
liberty, it will not be wielded with destruc- tive sway! Skeptics of
this character abound in so- ciety. In some few instances, their
incredulity arises from a want of reflection; but, generally, it
indicates a hatred of the light, a desire to shield slavery from the
assaults of its foes, a contempt of the colored race, whether bond or
free. Such will try to discredit the shocking tales of slaveholding
cruelty which are recorded in this truthful Narrative; but they will
labor in vain. Mr. DOUGLASS has frankly disclosed the place of his
birth, the names of those who claimed ownership in his body and soul,
and the names also of those who committed the crimes which he has
alleged against them. His statements, there- fore, may easily be
disproved, if they are untrue.
In the course of his Narrative, he relates two in- stances of
murderous cruelty,--in one of which a planter deliberately shot a
slave belonging to a neigh- boring plantation, who had unintentionally
gotten within his lordly domain in quest of fish; and in the other, an
overseer blew out the brains of a slave who had fled to a stream of
water to escape a bloody scourging. Mr. DOUGLASS states that in
neither of these instances was any thing done by way of legal arrest
or judicial investigation. The Baltimore Amer- ican, of March 17,
1845, relates a similar case of atrocity, perpetrated with similar
impunity--as fol- lows:--"~Shooting a slave.~--We learn, upon the au-
thority of a letter from Charles county, Maryland, received by a
gentleman of this city, that a young man, named Matthews, a nephew of
General Mat- thews, and whose father, it is believed, holds an of-
fice at Washington, killed one of the slaves upon his father's farm by
shooting him. The letter states that young Matthews had been left in
charge of the farm; that he gave an order to the servant, which was
dis- obeyed, when he proceeded to the house, ~obtained a gun, and,
returning, shot the servant.~ He immedi- ately, the letter continues,
fled to his father's resi- dence, where he still remains
unmolested."--Let it never be forgotten, that no slaveholder or
overseer can be convicted of any outrage perpetrated on the person of
a slave, however diabolical it may be, on the testimony of colored
witnesses, whether bond or free. By the slave code, they are adjudged
to be as incompetent to testify against a white man, as though they
were indeed a part of the brute creation. Hence, there is no legal
protection in fact, whatever there may be in form, for the slave
population; and any amount of cruelty may be inflicted on them with
impunity. Is it possible for the human mind to conceive of a more
horrible state of society?
The effect of a religious profession on the conduct of southern
masters is vividly described in the fol- lowing Narrative, and shown
to be any thing but salutary. In the nature of the case, it must be
in the highest degree pernicious. The testimony of Mr. DOUGLASS, on
this point, is sustained by a cloud of witnesses, whose veracity is
unimpeachable. "A slave- holder's profession of Christianity is a
palpable im- posture. He is a felon of the highest grade. He is a
man-stealer. It is of no importance what you put in the other scale."
Reader! are you with the man-stealers in sympathy and purpose, or on
the side of their down-trodden victims? If with the former, then are
you the foe of God and man. If with the latter, what are you pre-
pared to do and dare in their behalf? Be faithful, be vigilant, be
untiring in your efforts to break every yoke, and let the oppressed go
free. Come what may --cost what it may--inscribe on the banner which
you unfurl to the breeze, as your religious and po- litical motto--"NO
COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS!"
WM. LLOYD GARRISON BOSTON, ~May~ 1, 1845.