Historical Romance of the American Negro

"I beg leave now to draw these few lines to a close. Mother and Tom write in lots of love to you, and I am sure I shall be delighted to receive even half a dozen lines from you at any time that you can make it convenient, or feel disposed to write your dear daughter. And I am yours in all affection,

"BEULAH JACKSON."

Having written the above letter, I posted it at once, and no doubt but it was received in a couple of days and read with great interest by my own dear father, and also by Mrs. Jackson, though with very different feelings from his. I was perfectly well aware that there was an abundance of pent-up wrath in her imperious temper, and that it would explode one of these fine days!

As my mother, Harriet Jackson, was a woman of great handsomeness, beauty and a thousand graces, and still comparatively young, being only thirty-seven, her hand was sought by a settled and most honorable man named Mr. John B. Sutherland, a resident of Buffalo, and a member of the A. M. E. Church. They had a nice wedding at the church on Vine street, in the presence of an applauding and highly-respectable company. It was a perfect union of hearts, like Jacob and Rachel's over again. As we had plenty of room, and were unwilling to have mother set up a different establishment, Mr. and Mrs. Sutherland took up their residence with us, and all things went on most harmoniously together. The Almighty seemed to pour His richest blessings upon us all, and we tried to honor and glorify His holy name in all that we did. Our experience in slavery had been light, and we were now only too thankful to be free.

One day in the month of November, Tom received the following letter from Mrs. Jackson at Riverside Hall, though it was intended for all three of us:

"RIVERSIDE HALL, Near Louisville, November, 1855.

"Mr. Thomas Lincoln,

"Dear Tom: – We duly received all your letters, and also the Buffalo newspaper with an account of the marriage of Harriet to Mr. John B. Sutherland. That would all be right enough if you were white people, or even free people of color, but the whole three of you are neither one nor the other. You are our goods and chattels, and our runaway slaves, and we have decided to bring you back, or else you must pay us the reduced sum of one thousand dollars apiece; that is, two thousand dollars, when we will give you your free papers, and a full discharge. As your master and mistress, we are herein doing you a great favor, for we could easily get two thousand dollars apiece for each of you, Tom and Beulah, in the public market. I suppose you are aware that the Fugitive Slave Bill is the law of the land, and in case you do not give us satisfaction immediately, we will proceed to put the law in force, and either bring you back to Riverside Hall, or sell you down the river. Now, Tom, a word to the wise is sufficient. We shall look for a letter from you soon.

"I am yours respectfully,

"SARAH JACKSON."

When the above letter arrived at our house, the whole four of us were seated at the tea table in the evening, and laughing first over one thing and then another, as people will do at eventide when the work of the day is done. We read the letter aloud in the midst of great sport and laughter, which went on, grew and increased the more we examined it. It was the work of Mrs. Jackson and hers alone. None of us believed that father knew anything about it at all, and I am sure he did not. Mrs. Sarah Jackson evidently was unable to keep down her temper and spite after all our grand escapades, marriages and other things.

"Why," said Mr. Sutherland, "I suppose she will be coming on us with bloodhounds themselves! She would look grand in hunting costume on the streets of Buffalo with bloodhounds!"

"What makes me laugh," remarked Tom, "would be to see the boys and young lads pelting those dogs with stones, and belaboring their sides with big sticks!"

This was followed by another shout of loud laughter, when mother exclaimed,

"She would indeed be a sight well worthy of a first-class painter in the midst of an infuriated crowd who were bent upon our protection and rescue."

As it was now my turn to put in a word, I remarked,

"She had better send nobody after us. It is now five years since the passage of the Fugitive Slave Bill, which no man can enforce, because the Christian spirit of the North will not have it, and the North is right to resist it."

The question next arose as to who should answer the letter. Tom and Mrs. Sutherland absolutely refused to answer it in any shape or form, so I took pity on the great lady of Riverside Hall, and said that I would answer her one of these fine days, which would be both sport and pleasure for me, and then perhaps she would let us all have a rest. So in a few days after the receipt of her wonderful letter, I took up my pen and wrote as follows:

"BUFFALO, N. Y., November, 1855.

"Mrs. Sarah Jackson,

"Madam: – As both Tom and Mrs. Sutherland have absolutely refused to take the slightest notice of your letter, it has fallen to me to answer it. It would not suit the convenience of any of us to come to Riverside Hall at this time, or, indeed, to go anywhere else. Even if we had all the opportunities in the world, we would not come to Riverside unless we came as specially invited guests; a visit, in short, that would be a mutual gratification to us all. But at this time, Tom has got a most excellent situation on Delaware avenue, the grand residence avenue of Buffalo; besides, he has married a wife, and therefore he cannot come. (Such is the language of Holy Writ).

"As for myself, the grand committee on abolition have engaged me to give a number of lectures, and to sing at their meetings in the interest of the freedom of all those who are held in the South in enforced and involuntary bondage. The committee on freedom think that the presence of a young woman like me would help on the good cause, draw the crowds, and drive another nail into the coffin of slavery in Kentucky, and wherever the hated institution exists.

"It will not be a very hard thing for me to make out a clear case against slavery, and in favor of freedom. Now, just look at myself, and all those graces and qualifications that I possess and inherit from both father and mother, and how our gracious Lord has cut me out to be something, and to do something in the world! Suppose that I had chosen to remain at Riverside Hall! What was to hinder you spiriting me away to the cotton fields of the Sunny South to wear my life away as if I were a mere animal, instead of being a human being like yourself, and one for whom Christ died? I therefore rejoice at dear mother's freedom; for slavery is nothing but a revolting crime – a system of robbery and murder! Now, here I am, and in a short time intend to appear on the public stage in the capacity of a lecturer, a singer and a player on the piano. Just fancy the idea of a handsome young woman of seventeen, like myself, being sold away to Louisiana or Georgia to wear my life away among the rice fields, the cotton and the cane, when nature has qualified me with gifts and graces, the admiration of my gallant and clever Tom, and the 'pick' of the general public to serve against slavery in the Northern States! I only hope that I shall be able to do my full share to help on the great conflagration that is now raging all over the free states, and which I hope will never cease burning until it has burnt the whole 'institution' down to the ground. Here in the North I shall be seen and heard by legions of people. But who would ever see or hear me in the cotton fields, or the sugar plantations, and in the rice swamps of Louisiana or Georgia?

"I have failed to answer your letter in the way intended. What impression you intended to make on my mind is more than I know. Your statements were nothing but the old parrot cries of the South, that have been heard for many years. Of course, you cannot compel us to come back so long as we ourselves object. If you write us any more, and expect your letters to be read, you will have to make them of a readable character. We will tolerate no less respect than if you were writing to the Bishop or his wife. I know you don't wish your letters to be returned to you unread. 'A word to the wise is sufficient.'

"I am yours very respectfully,

"BEULAH JACKSON."

The country continued to ring with abolitionism. Orators and agitators continued to traverse it in all directions. Men and women mounted the rostrum, and held forth hour after hour before greatly-interested gatherings of both sexes and all ages. Fugitive slaves who had made their escape over the lines were introduced upon the platform, and gave their wonderful experiences of slavery in the South, and how they managed to get away. It was thrilling to hear some of them tell of all the dangers they encountered upon the road; how they were pursued for hundreds of miles by men, horses and even bloodhounds; how they were assisted by free people of color, and even by those in bondage and white people; and thus helped along week after week, and month after month, till they felt that they were at last both safe and free. When we consider how the slave States passed one law after another, and all pulled, and hauled, and banded together to protect and perpetuate their hold upon their human property, it was most wonderful how very many slaves effected their escape. The nearer the awful storm came to breaking over our heads, the more numerous grew the successful escapes that were made. The frantic South still kept tying the strings tighter and tighter; but instead of producing the effect she desired, the more daring grew the soul of the intrepid slave, who seemed encouraged by the very God of battles himself to strike for liberty and flee to the North.

Thus the grand storm went on, increased and grew. Fred. Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, and many other famous writers continued to issue their papers week by week, or month by month. The agitation was kept at fever heat by all sorts and conditions of men and women. Still the Abolitionists did not have the entire field to themselves, for there were thousands and thousands of people in the Northern states who believed in slavery for the colored man as much as the Southern slave-holder himself, away down in Louisiana and Georgia. But Henry Ward Beecher, Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, and others without number continued to lay on with hard licks and steady blows; the public conscience of the free States became more and more educated, and the people in general came to take a sympathetic interest in the oppressed African they had never done before. The presence of the poor, oppressed fugitive slaves in their meetings, and seen streaming along the North towards the Great Lakes and Canada, with the marks of the "peculiar institution" stamped for life upon their backs, were proof positive that none could deny. The furious quarrel was carried into the halls of Congress at Washington, and the South was unable to keep it out, though they made the most determined efforts to do so. The Quakers and all the friends of the slaves were forever at it, ding-dong, hammer and tongs, and thus the family quarrel went on. John Brown and free-soil men were in Kansas, and so were the "Border Ruffians" who came pouring in from Missouri and the South, being determined to carry Kansas and all other new States and territories into slavery like the rest of the slave States in their rear. And still the great American family quarrel went on, increased and grew, and the Christian voice of the North declared, "Thus far shalt thou come and no further; and here shall thy proud waves be stayed." The far-away Christian nations of the world watched the gathering of the coming tempest from over the seas, and it was apparent to their unobscured vision that a fearful judgment was coming upon America, and that it would not be long in coming, either.

The escape of mother and Tom and myself from slavery caused no small sensation in and around Buffalo. An endless tide of visitors came on to see us, and they had a thousand questions to ask us about our early life and experiences in Kentucky and Louisiana. As Lemuel Jackson had caused us to be duly educated, so that we could even play the piano well, we were rather more fortunate in the line of education than most of our fugitive brothers and sisters. In those days, great anti-slavery demonstrations were all the go. The announcement that some great national abolitionist was to be on hand at the Hall, to address the general public on the wrongs and crimes of slavery, would pack the whole place, and sometimes the crowds that came could not find even standing room. Then music was added at times, songs were sung, even brass and stringed bands were brought into play, and everything was done to draw the prohibition hosts of the great North, then to keep them there, and finally to make them come again.

The Abolitionists took advantage of our presence in Buffalo to help one grand meeting in the city for the purpose of making a demonstration in force, to prove that colored people were just the very same as white people when they were educated and polished, as we three had been. Because the lie had been repeated ten thousand times in the South, and reechoed by their abetting friends in the North, that we were unfitted for civilization, and that the African was formed by God himself for slavery, and for slavery alone, and was never intended by nature to be the equal and companion of white men and women! It was considered that our presence in a highly intelligent audience would knock that argument completely on the head, and kill the abominable falsehood once for all. Therefore they made a demonstration in force, and we ourselves were on hand.

When the night and hour arrived, Tom, mother and myself proceeded to the hall, which was already half full, though we were there early. We saw that great things were expected of us all, and we braced ourselves up for the occasion, determined that nobody should go away disappointed. The music discoursed sweet tunes as the people were gathering, and in due course of time the Rev. Doctor Henderson called the meeting to order, and took the chair for the evening. He called on our pastor to offer up prayer to the Giver of every good and perfect gift. The glee club then sang "The Negro's Complaint," which was written by Mr. William Cowper, of England. Then the chairman exclaimed,

"Now, ladies and gentlemen, the slave-holders tell us that the children of African descent in these United States are unfitted for civilization, and that they are nothing but goods and chattels. I will now call upon one specimen of these goods and chattels to give us a rattling tune on the grand piano, and to sing us 'The Mocking Bird,' and put some life in it." (Great display of approbation, mingled with shouts of loud laughter).

Then said the reverend speaker, turning to myself,

"Mrs. Lincoln, will you be so kind as to favor us with some of your warm Southern music?"

Now, of course, the indulgent reader will readily understand that upon this august occasion I was arrayed like a bride adorned for her husband. So I arose, bowed to the audience, and put on one of my sweetest smiles, and proceeded to play and sing with unusual vigor. When I came to the chorus the whole audience joined in, and I thought they would have brought down the roof of the hall on our heads. Nor was that the best part of it, because they not only sang at the end of each verse, but when I got through the entire audience arose upon their feet and shouted their applause, calling for an encore, and would not be refused.

I gave them a Southern song with music, for which they gave me another sounding cheer, when Dr. Henderson introduced my honored mother, Mrs. Sutherland, in the following happy terms:

"Dear Friends: We are assembled here to-night, in our accustomed place of meeting, to give the grand chariot of progress another push towards the bottom of the hill. (Loud applause). The lesson we wish to teach upon this special and most exceptional occasion is to show what the colored race are capable of doing and becoming if they had simply an open field and fair play. It is our desire to see them get an open field and fair play! (More applause). But I will not detain this large and splendid audience any longer, but at once introduce to you Mrs. John B. Sutherland, formerly of Kentucky, but now of Buffalo, who will entertain us for a time and address the house."

Loud applause followed the Doctor's remarks, when my honored mother came to the front of the platform, and spoke as follows:

"My good friends, I consider myself most especially honored this night to be permitted to come before you, to assist in driving another nail into the coffin of the 'peculiar institution' from whose clutches I have just been rescued by the kindness and daring of my own daughter. (Loud cheers). The South has told you ten thousand times that we of the colored race are only fit for hewers of wood and drawers of water, like the Gibeonites. These drawers of water of our poor, oppressed race, that they themselves may live in mansions more palatial than the lords, and barons, and dukes of Continental Europe and the British Isles. Who ever heard of such unmanliness and cowardice? Men who ape the aristocracy of Europe, and even surpass them in brilliant, grand displays, wringing their wealth from the oppressed African!

"I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that Almighty God is getting tired of such refined badness, and that the day is coming, and will soon be here when such a storm of wrath will be upon the South as will wipe out the blood-red crime of slavery from Mason and Dixon's line to the Rio Grande. The sooner that day of judgment comes the better!

"Just look abroad over all these far-spreading Northern and Western States, and hear how they are ringing with the loud notes of freedom, and the sounds of coming conflict! I am free to say that upon this night, and at this very hour there are hundreds of meetings going on all along the Northern States for the purpose of enlightening the nation as to the real character, intentions and purposes of the South. The South is not ignorant of these things. They have got Argus eyes for all we do, both in Congress and out of it, and they will push things as fast and as far as they dare. They will give us no rest till we are either all slaves, or all free! (Loud applause). I look around me at the political skies, and I see them growing blacker and blacker as the great national storm is gathering. John Brown and the free-soil men are in Kansas; loud and angry words are being bandied forth between the occupants of the two ends of the house – between the powerful North and the passionate South. From words they will most assuredly come to blows over that very 'peculiar institution,' and American slavery and all the evils that follow in its train, will pass away. But of one thing rest assured. The South will never consent to emancipate her slaves. They have been throwing it up in the face of the North these past fifty years that they can't get their own way; they will go out of the Union, and set up a slave empire of their own. Then they will attempt a dissolution of these glorious States. Then they will dare and defy you to force them back into the Union by the sword. The day is coming, and what will you do about it?" (Great cheering).

CHAPTER IV

Continuation and End of the Great Abolition Meeting at Buffalo.

"The determination of the slave-holding oligarchy is to keep our persecuted race under a bushel – both soul and body – and to sit down on the top of that bushel for all coming time. They are stone blind to the fact that they are sitting on the top of a bushel of dynamite, which will blow them sky-high one of these days, with terrible effect. They have entirely forgotten that this world belongs to God; and they and the devil between them have made up their minds to do as they please. Between bloodhounds and cowhides they think they will do very well. My own firm belief is that a war is coming upon us that will carry mourning into every house in this great republic, both North and South. There are thousands and ten thousands of the very same opinion as myself. The South will never surrender their 'peculiar institution.' If it were dogs, cows or horses that they were called upon to give up, they would cheerfully give them up for a fair price. But the very 'Old Lad' himself is in the business when it comes to claim property in men and women, especially when those men and women happen to be better than themselves, which is usually the case. (Loud laughter and cheering all over the hall). When a dog, a horse or a cow runs away, they will let it go, but if it be a man or a woman, they will pursue the fugitive over mountains, lakes and rivers, and even die in the attempt to bring them back to slavery. If this rising storm shall end in a war, the old lie that the black man will not fight will certainly be exploded, for every slave will go to the field, if necessary, and their strong arms will knock down the 'peculiar institution.' (Great applause).

"On my way down the Mississippi to New Orleans, they brought an old colored man on board, having sold him to a family resident in the Queen City of the South. I conversed much with that grand old hero, and it was wonderful to see what an intuitive knowledge he had of human nature, and what a vast amount of natural goodness there was still left in him, after so much hard experience, labor and toil among the cane brakes and cotton fields. Such a man as Judah – for that was his name – ought to have been a bishop in the Church of God, instead of being reckoned among the bales and bundles, and goods and chattels, of the Southern States. If that good man (who left such a deep impression on the hearts and minds of all Christian people who conversed with him) – if he had been free according to the will of God, and been educated like white men, instead of being robbed and plundered of his rights, he would have made a splendid bishop, for I am perfectly positive that he had every qualification for that office in the highest degree. That saintly man – that Judah – should this very day be the right reverend and honored bishop among his brethren in a nation where all are free, instead of being no more than a favored spaniel or ornament to grace the pride of some family in New Orleans. If that grand old man had only had the same opportunities that the white bishops have had, he would at this hour be gracing the churches and halls of this nation, the very same as white men do. The day of judgment is at hand that will reverse all that!

"On the same voyage down the Mississippi to New Orleans, they brought on board a fair and beautiful creature of seventeen, who, like Judah, was also intended to grace a baronial hall in the Queen City of the South. A more attractive woman I have never seen anywhere. It was pitiable to think of her future. She was graceful in all her movements; most handsome; had a musical voice, and was withal a splendid singer. Where she was born I cannot tell, but they gave $2,500 for her! The more I looked at poor Julia, the more mournful I became. What a glorious ornament for society she would have been had she been free! Almost any honorable man would have been proud to make her his wife. She could have led the choir in the house of God, and could have sung with the minstrels before Queen Victoria and all the crowned heads of Europe. She might have been a bright and shining light in some way or other, under the guiding hand of divine providence; her life and times might have been written by some famous author, and read by millions of people in this and other nations of the earth.

"In this way we can go on to the end of the chapter. Our traducers and slanderers say that we are unfit for this, that and the other thing, which is a deliberate and willful falsehood. We are well qualified for everything that any other race upon earth is qualified to perform, and that is the very reason why our maligners say we are not; and they are even unwilling to give us the chance to try. It is true that a few of us are educated, but very few. We three, that is, myself and daughter and her husband, were taught a little because we were favorably situated under Mr. Jackson, but the slave-holders, as a general thing, make a specialty of keeping us in the most complete ignorance, and it is a crime for a slave to be taught to read, write and cast accounts, and it is also a crime for any man to be found teaching him.

"But there is a better day coming, and will soon be here; only we will have to pass through a time of the most tremendous affliction before the better times arrive. When, by the predetermined will of God, all men and women are free from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from the Lakes to the Gulf, then, indeed, shall we arise and shine forth, for our light will be come, and the glory of the Lord will be risen upon us. Then shall new schools and colleges be established all over the land, into which our sons and daughters will crowd, and they will also go to those which have been long established. Then shall our professional men and women go forth in their thousands and ten thousands, and spread to lands and islands beyond the seas. Then shall our senators and representatives enter the halls of Congress at Washington, and every state legislature. Our surgeons and physicians shall then ride forth precisely the same as their white brothers duly armed with the very same diplomas, authorizing them to heal the sick, and alleviate the ailments of those that are afflicted, instead of wearing their lives away in the cane brakes, the cotton fields and the rice swamp of the South as slaves. They may labor all over the far-extended lands as freemen toiling for themselves and their families at useful trades, and laying up money against a rainy day. Then shall children go forth in their hundreds and thousands to be trained like others for the duties of life, and to become the ornaments of society. Then shall our afflicted sons and daughters sit no longer in the galleries of the churches of the land as so many 'goods and chattels" thrust away up into the corner, but walk forth in freedom to the house of the Lord on the Sabbath day – go forth in their thousands and tens of thousands to our most Holy Communion in all that liberty of soul and body wherein the Lord has made us all free. The time would fail for me to tell, and for you to listen to all the good things that will come with freedom, after every man, woman and child, now in slavery, are at liberty."