xt7cjs9h4f0d https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7cjs9h4f0d/data/mets.xml Clarke, Lewis Garrard, 1812-1897. 1846  books b923269769c542009 English B. Marsh : Boston, Mass. Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. Slavery --Kentucky. Narratives of the sufferings of Lewis and Milton Clarke, sons of a soldier of the revolution, during a captivity of more than twenty years among the slaveholders of Kentucky, one of the so called Christian states of North America. Dictated by themselves. text Narratives of the sufferings of Lewis and Milton Clarke, sons of a soldier of the revolution, during a captivity of more than twenty years among the slaveholders of Kentucky, one of the so called Christian states of North America. Dictated by themselves. 1846 2009 true xt7cjs9h4f0d section xt7cjs9h4f0d 
  
  
  
  
  
  
NARRATIVES
OF T H E SUFFERINGS OF

L E W I S A ND MILTON C L A R K E ,
SONS O F A SOLDIER OP T H E REVOLUTION,
DURING A

CAPTIVITY OF MORE T H A N T W E N T Y YEARS
AMONG T H E

S LAVEHOLDERS OF KENTUCKY,
ONE OF T H E

SO CALLED CHRISTIAN STATES OF NORTH AMERICA.

D ICTATED BY THEMSELVES.

BOSTON:
PUBLISHED BY 1846. All O rders to be s ent to the Publisher.
PRICE, 25 CENTS.

BELA

MARSH,

N O . 23

CORNI1ILL.

  
  
PREFACE.

I FIRST became acquainted w ith L E W I S C LARKE i n

D ecember, 1 842. I w ell remember the deep i mpression made upon my mind on hearing his Narrative f rom his own l ips. It gave me a new and more v ivid i mpression o f the wrongs of Slavery than I had ever before felt. Evidently a person of good native talents and o f deep s ensibilities, such a mind had been under the dark cloud of slavery for more than twenty-five y ears. Letters, reading, all the modes o f thought a wakened by them, had been utterly hid from his e yes ; and yet his mind had evidently been active, and trains o f thought were flowing through it which lie was u tterly ^ nable to express. I well remember, tou, the wave on wave of deep f eeling excited hi an audience o f more than a thousand persons, at H allowell, M e., as t hey listened to his story, and looked upon his energetic and m anly countenance, and w ^ d e r e d if the dark c loud of slavery could c over u p     nide from the world, and degrade to the condition of brutes     such i mmortal m inds. H is story, there and wherever since told, has aroused the most utter abhorrence of the Slave System. F o r the last two years, I have had the most ample opportunity of becoming acquainted w ith M r . C larke. H e has made this place his home, when not engaged i n g iving to public audiences the story of his sufferings and the sufferings of his fellow-slaves. Soon after he c ame to Ohio, by the faithful instruction o f pious friends, he was led, as he believes, to see himself a sinner

  
4

P REFACE.

before G od, and to seek p ardon and forgiveness through the precious blood of the Lamb. H e has ever m anifested an ardent thirst for religious, as w ell as for other kinds o f knowledge. In the opinion of all those best acquainted w ith h im, he has maintained the character o f a sincere C hristian. T hat he is what he professes to be,     a slave escaped from the grasp of avarice and p ower,    there is not the least shadow of doubt. H i s N arrative bears the most conclusive i nternal e vidence o f its t ruth. Persons of discriminating minds have heard it repeatedly, under a great variety of circumstances, and the story, in all substantial respects, has been always the same. H e has been repeatedly recognized i n the Free States, by persons who knew him in K entucky, w hen a slave. D uring the summer of 1 844, Cassius M . C lay visited Boston, and, on seeing M ilton C larke, r ecognized him as one of the C larke f amily, w ell k nown to him in Kentucky. Indeed, nothing can be more surely established than the fact that L e w i s and M ilton C larke are no impostors. F o r three years they have been engaged in t elling their story in seven o r eight different states, and no one has appeared to make an attempt to contradict them. The capture of M ilton i n Ohio, by the kidnappers, as a slave, m akes assurance doubly strong. Wherever they have told their s tory, large audjences have collected, and every w here they have been listened to with great interest and satisfaction. C yrus is f ully e qual to either of the brothers i n sprightliness o f mind     is w ithal a great wit, and would m ake an admirable lecturer, but for an unfortunate i mpediment in his speech. They all feel deeply the wrongs they have suffered, and are by no means forgetful o f their brethren in bonds. W h e n L e w i s first c ame to this place, he was frequently noticed in silent and deep meditation. On being asked what he was t hinking of, he would reply, " 0 , of the poor slaves !

  
P REFACE.

H ere I a m free, and they suffering so much.' '' B itter tears are often seen coursing down his manly cheeks, as he recurs to the scenes o f his early suffering. Many persons, who have heard him lecture, have expressed a strong desire that his story might be recorded in a connected f orm. H e has, therefore, concluded to have it p rinted. H e was anxious to spread the story of his sufferings as extensively as possible before the community, that he might awaken more hearts to feel for his down-trodden brethren. Nothing seems to grieve h im to the heart, l ike finding a minister of the gospel, or a professed C hristian, indifferent to the condition of the slave. A s to doing much for the instruction of the m inds of the slaves, or for the salvation of their souls, t ill they are E MANCIPATED, restored to the rights of m en, in his opinion it is utterly impossible.
1

W hen the master, or his representative, the man w ho justifies slaveholding, comes w ith the whip in one hand a nd the Bible in the other, the slave says, at least i n his heart, L a y down one or the other. E ither m ake the tree good and the fruit g ood, or else both corrupt together. Slaves do not believe that T HE RELIGION w hich is from God, bears ivhips and chains. T hey ask, e mphatically, concerning their F ATHER i n heaven,
" H a s H E bid y o u buy and sell us ; S p e a k i n g f rom his throne, the sky ?

F or the facts contained in the following Narrative, M r. C larke is of course alone responsible. Yet, having had the most ample opportunities for testing his accuracy, I do not hesitate to say, that 1 have not a shadow o f doubt but in all material points every word is true. M uch o f it is in his own language, and all of it according to his own dictation.
J . C. L O V E J O V . CAMBRIDGEPORT, April, 1* 1845.

  
  
N ARRATIVE OF LEWIS C L A R K E .

I WAS b orn i n M a r c h , as near as I can ascertain, i n the year 1815, i n Madison county, Kentucky, about seven miles from R i c h m o n d , upon the plantation o f my grandfather, Samuel Campbell. H e was c onsidered a very respectable man, among his fellowrobbers, the slaveholders. It did not render him less h onorable in their eyes, that he t ook to his bed M ary, h is s lave, perhaps half white, by whom he had one d aughter, L E T I T I A C A M P B E L L . T h i s was before h is m arriage. M y father was from " beyond the flood "     from S cotland, and by trade a weaver. H e had been married i n his own country, and lost his wife, who left to h im, as I have been told, two sons. H e c ame to this c ountry in time to be i n the earliest scenes o f the A merican r evolution. H e was at the battle of B u n ker H i l l , and continued in the army to the c lose o f the war. About the year 1800, or b efore, he c ame to K e n t u c k y , and married M iss L etitia C ampbell, t hen h eld as a slave by her dear a nd affectionate f ather. M y father died, as near as I can recollect, w hen I was about ten or twelve years of age. He

  
B

N A R R A T I V E OF

l iatl r eceived a wound in the war, which made him l ame as long as he lived. I have often heard him t ell o f Scotland, sing the merry songs o f his native l and, and long to see its h ills o nce m ore. M r . C ampbell promised my father that his daughter L etitia s hould be made free in his w ill. I t was w ith t his p romise that he married her. A n d I have no doubt that M r . Campbell was as g ood as his word, and that, by his will, m y mother and her nine c hildren were made free. But ten persons in one family, e ach worth three hundred dollars, are not easily set free among those accustomed to live by continued r obbery. W e did not, therefore, by an instrument from the hand of the dead, escape the avaricious grab o f the slaveholder. It is the common belief that the w ill was destroyed by the heirs of M r . Campbell. T h e night in which I was born, I have been told, was dark and terrible     black as the night for which J ob prayed, when he besought the clouds to pitch t heir tent rotind about the place of his b i r t h ; a nd ray l ife o f slavery was but too exactly prefigured by the stormy elements that hovered over the first hour o f my being. It was w ith great difficulty that any one could be urged out for a necessary attendant for my mother. A t length, one of the sons o f M r . C ampbell, W i l l i a m , by the promise from his mother o f the child that should be born, was induced to m ake an effort to obtain the necessary assistance. By g oing five or six miles, he obtained a female professor of the couch. W i l l i a m C ampbell, by virtue of this t itle, always c laimed me as his property. A n d well would it have

  
L EWIS

CLARKE.

9

been for me i f this claim had been regarded. A t the age of six or seven years, I f ell i nto the hands of his s ister, M r s . Betsey Banton, whose c haracter w ill be best k nown when I have told the horrid wrongs w hich she heaped upon me for ten years. I f there are any she s pirits that c ome up from h ell, a nd take possession of one part of mankind, I am sure she is one of that sort. I was consigned to her under the f ollowing c ircumstances: W h e n she was married, t here was given her, as part of her dower, as is c ommon among the Algerines of Kentucky, a girl, by the name of R u t h , about fourteen or fifteen years o ld. I n a short time, R u t h was dejected and injured, by beating and abuse of different kinds, so that she was sold, for a half-fool, to the more tender mercies o f the sugar-planter in Louisiana. T h e amiable Mrs. B etsey obtained then, on loan from her parents, another slave, named P hillis. I n six months she had suffered so severely, under the hand of this monsterwoman, that she made an attempt, to k i l l herself, and was taken home by the parents of M r s . Banton. T h i s p roduced a regular slaveholding family brawl ; a r egular w ar, of four y ears, between the mild anil p eaceable M r s . B . and her own parents. These wars are very common among the Algerines in Kentucky ; i ndeed, slaveholders have not arrived at that d egree o f civilization that enables them to live in tolerable p eace, t hough united by the nearest family ties. In t hem is f ulfilled what I have heard read in the B ible     " T h e father is against the son, and the daughter-inlaw against the mother-in-law, and their foes are of t heir o wn household." Some of the slaveholders

  
II)

N ARRATIVE OF

may have a wide h ouse; but one of the cat-handed, s nake-eyed, brawling women, which slavery produces, c an fill i t from cellar to garret. I have heard every p lace I could get into any way r ing w ith t heir s creech-owl voices. O f all the animals on the face o f this earth, I am most afraid of a real mad, passionate, raving, slaveholding woman. S omebody t old m e, o nce, that Edmund Burke declared that the n atives of India fled to the jungles, among tigers and l ions, to escape the more barbarous cruelty of W a r ren H astings. I am sure I would sooner l ie down to sleep by the side of tigers than near a raging-mad slave woman. But I must go back to sweet M rs. B anton. I have been describing her i n the abstract. I w ill g ive a full-grown portrait of her right away. F or four years after the trouble about P hillis she never c ame n ear her father's house. A t the end of t his p eriod, another of the amiable sisters was to be m arried, and sister Betsey could not repress the tide o f curiosity urging her to be present at the n uptial c eremonies. Beside, she had another motive. E ither s hrewdly suspecting that she might deserve less than any member of the family, or that some u ngrounded p artiality w ould be manifested toward her sister, she d etermined, at all hazards, to be present, and see that the scales which weighed out the children of the p lantation s hould be held w ith even hand. T h e wedding-day was appointed ; the sons and daughters of t his j oyful occasion were gathered together, and then c ame also the fair-faced, but black-hearted, M r s . B . S atan, a mong the sons o f God, was never less welcome t han this fury among her kindred. They all

  
L EWIS C LARKE.

k new what she came for,     to make mischief, if p ossible. " W e l l , n ow, if there aint Bets ! " exclaimed the old lady. T h e father was moody a nd silent, k nowing that she inherited largely of the disposition o f her mother; but he had experienced too many of h er retorts of courtesy to say as much, for dear experience had taught him the discretion of silence. T h e brothers smiled at the prospect of fun and frolic; the sisters trembled for fear, and word flew round a mong the slaves, " T h e old she-bear has c ome h ome! l ook out! look out! " T h e wedding went forward. Polly, a very g ood sort of a g irl to be raised in that region, was married, a nd r eceived, as the first instalment of her dower, a girl and a boy. N o w was the time for M r s . Banton, sweet, g ood M r s . Banton. " P o l l has a g irl a nd a boy, a nd I only had that fool of a g irl. I r eckon, i f I g o home w ithout a boy too, this house wont be left s tanding." T h i s was said, too, while the rugar of the weddingcake was yet melting upon her tongue. H o w the b itter words would flow when the guests had retired, a ll began to imagine. T o arrest this whirlwind of r ising p assion, her mother promised any boy upon the p lantation, to be taken h ome o n her return. N o w , my e vil star was right in the top of the sky. Every boy was ordered i n , to pass before t his female sorceress, that she might select a victim for her unprovoked m alice, and on whom to pour the vials of her wrath for years. I was that unlucky fellow. M r . Campbell, m y grandfather, o bjected, b ecause i t would divide a f amily, and offered her Moses, whose father and

  
12

N ARRATIVE OF

m other had been sold south. M r s . Campbell put i n for W illiam's c laim, dated ante natum     before I was b orn ; but objections and claims of every k ind w ere swept away by the w ild p assion and shrill-toned voice o f M r s . B . M e she would have, and none else. M r . C ampbell went out to hunt, and drive away bad thoughts ; the old lady b ecame q uiet, for she was sure none of her blood run in my veins, and, i f there was any of her husband's there, it was no fault of h ers. S lave women are always revengeful toward the children of slaves that have any of the blood of t heir h usbands in them. I was too young, only seven years of age, to understand what was going on. B u t my poor and affectionate mother understood and appreciated it all. W h e n she left the kitchen of the m ansion-house, where she was employed as c ook, a nd c ame home to her own l ittle c ottage, the tear of anguish was i n her eye, and the image of sorrow upon every feature of her face. She knew the female N ero, whose rod was now to be over me. T h a t night sleep departed from her eyes. W i t h t he youngest c hild c lasped firmly to her bosom, she spent the night i n w alking the floor, coming ever and anon to l ift up the clothes and look at me and my p oor b rother, w ho lay sleeping together. Sleeping, I s aid. B rother s lept, but not I. I saw my mother when she first c ame to me, and I could not sleep. T h e vision of that n ight     its deep, ineffaceable impression     is now before my mind w ith a ll the distinctness of yesterday. I n the morning, I was put into the carriage w ith M r s . B . and her children, and my weary pilgrimage of s uffering was f airly b egun. It was her business on

  
LEWIS

CLARKE.

the road, for about twenty-five or t hirty m iles, to i n itiate h er children into the art of tormenting their new victim. I was seated upon the bottom of the c arriage, and these l ittle i mps were employed i n p inching-me, p ulling m y ears and h a i r ; a nd they were stirred up by their mother, l ike a l itter o f young w olves, to torment me in every way possible. In the m ean time, I was compelled by the old she-wolf to c all t hem " Master," " Mistress," and bow to t h^pi, and obey t hem at the first c all. D u r i n g that day, I had, indeed, no very agreeable f oreboding of the torments to c ome ; b ut, sad as were my anticipations, the reality was infinitely beyond t hem. I nfinitely more bitter than death were the c ruelties I experienced at the hand of this merciless w oman. Save from one or two slaves on the plantation, d uring my ten years of captivity here, I scarcely h eard a k ind w ord, or saw a smile toward me from any l iving b eing. A n d now that I am where p eople l ook k i n d , a nd act k indly t oward me, it seems l ike a d ream. I hardly seem to be i n the same world that I was then. W h e n I first got into the free states, and saw every body l ook l ike they loved one another, s ure enough, I thought, this must be the "Heaven" o f L O V E I h ad heard something about. But I must g o back to what I suffered from that wicked woman. I t is hard work to keep the mind upon i t ; I hate to t hink i t over     but I must t ell i t     the world must k now what is d one i n Kentucky. I cannot, however, t ell a ll the ways by which she tormented me. I can o nly give a few instances of my suffering, as specimens of the whole. A b ook o f a thousand pages

  
1i

N ARRATIVE OF

w ould not be large enough to t ell o f all the tears I s hed, and the sufferings endured, in T HAT T E N Y EARS
O F P URGATORY.

A v ery t rivial offence was sufficient to c all f orth a g reat burst of indignation from this woman of u n governed passions. In my simplicity, I put my lips to the same vessel, and drank out of it, from which her children were accustomed to d rink. S he exessed her utter abhorrence of such an act, by r owing m y head violently back, and dashing into m y f ace two dippers of water. T h e shower of water was followed by a heavier shower of kicks; y es, d elicate reader, this lady d id not hesitate to kick, as w ell as cuff i n a very plentiful manner; but the w ords, bitter and cutting, that followed, were l ike a s torm of h ail upon my young heart. " She would t each me better manners than that; she would let me know I was to be brought up to her h a n d ; she w ould have one slave that knew his place ; i f I wanted w ater, go to the spring, and not drink there i n the h ouse." T h i s was new times for m e ; for some days I was completely benumbed w ith m y sorrow. I c ould neither eat nor sleep. I f there is any human b eing on earth, who has been so blessed as never to have tasted the cup of sorrow, and therefore is unable to c onceive o f suffering; i f there be one so lost to all feeling as even to say, that the slaves do not suffer when families are separated, let such a one g o to the ragged quilt which was my couch and p i l low, and stand there night after night, for long, weary h ours, and see the bitter tears streaming down the face o f that more than orphan boy, while, w ith half-

f

  
L EWIS

CLARKE.

15

suppressed sighs and sobs, he calls again and again u pon his absent mother.
" S ay, mother, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed ? H o v e r e d t hy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son ? W r e t c h even then! l ife's journey just b e g u n . "

L et h im stand by that couch of bitter sorrow through the terribly lonely night, and then wring out the wet e nd of those rags, and see how many tears yet remain, after the burning temples had absorbed all they could. H e w ill not doubt, he cannot doubt, but the slave has f eeling. B ut I find myself running away again from M r s . B anton     and I don't much wonder neither. T here were several children i n the family, and my first m ain b usiness was to wait upon them. Another y oung slave and myself have often been compelled to s it up by turns all night, to rock the cradle of a l ittle, p eevish scion of slavery. I f the cradle was stopped, t he moment they awoke a dolorous cry was sent forth t o mother or father, that L e w i s had g one to sleep. T h e reply to this c all w ould be a direction from the m other for these petty tyrants to get up and take the w hip, and give the good-for-nothing scoundrel a s nart w hipping. T h i s was the midnight pastime of a child t en or twelve years old. W h a t might you e xpect o f the future man ? T here were four house-slaves in this family, i n cluding m yself; and though we had not, in all respects, so hard work as the field hands, yet in many things o ur condition was much worse. W e were constantly exposed to the whims and passions of every member o f the family; from the least to the greatest, their

  
16

N ARRATIVE OF

anger was wreaked upon us. N o r was our life an easy one, in the hours of our t oil or in the amount o f labor performed. W e were always required to sit up u ntil a ll the family had retired ; then we must be up at early dawn in summer, and before day i n w inter. I f we failed, through weariness or for any other r eason, to appear at the first morning summons, we were sure to have our hearing quickened by a severe c hastisement. Such horror has seized me, lest I m ight not hear the first s hrill c all, that I have often i n dreams fancied I heard that unwelcome voice, and have leaped from my couch, and walked through the house and out of it before I a woke. I have g one a nd c alled the other slaves, i n my sleep, and asked them i f they did not hear master c all. N ever, while I l ive, w ill the remembrance of those long, bitter nights of fear pass from my mind. B ut I w ant to give you a few specimens of the abuse which I received. D u r i n g the ten years that I l ived w ith M r s . Banton, I do not think there were as many days, when she was at home, that I, or some other slave, did not receive some k ind o f beating or abuse at her hands. It seemed as though she could n ot live nor sleep unless some poor b ack was smarting, some head beating w ith p ain, or some eye filled .with tears, around her. Her tender mercies were i ndeed cruel. She brought up her children to imitate h er example. T w o of them manifested some d islike to the cruelties taught them by their mother, but they never stood high in favor w ith her ; indeed, any thing l ike h umanity or kindness to a slave, was looked u pon by her as a great offence.

  
L EWIS C L A R K E .

17

H er i nstruments of torture were ordinarily the r aw h ide, or a bunch of hickory-sprouts seasoned i n the fire and tied together. B u t if these were not at hand, nothing c ame a miss. She could r elish a b eating w ith a c hair, the broom, tongs, shovel, shears, k nife-handle, the heavy heel of her slipper, or a bunch o f keys; her zeal was so active in these barbarous i nflictions, that her invention was wonderfully quick, a nd some way of i nflicting the requisite torture was soon f ound out. O ne instrument of torture is worthy of particular d escription. This was an oak club, a foot and a half in length and an inch and a half square. W i t h t his delicate weapon she would beat us upon the hands and upon the feet u ntil t hey were blistered. T h i s i nstrument was carefully preserved for a period o f four years. Every day, for that time, I was compelled to see that hated tool of cruelty l ying i n the c hair by my side. T h e least d egree o f delinquency e ither i n not doing all the appointed work, or in look or behavior, was visited w ith a b eating from this oak c lub. T h a t club w ill always be a prominent o bject i n the picture of horrors of my life of more than t wenty years of bitter b ondage. W hen about nine years old, I was sent in the e vening to catch and k i l l a t urkey. T h e y were s ecurely sleeping i n a tree     their accustomed resting-place for the night. I approached as cautiously as possible, and selected the victim I was directed to c atch; but, just as I grasped him in my hand, my foot s lipped, and he made his escape from the tree, and fled beyond my reach. I returned w ith a heavv heart
2*

  
18

N ARRATIVE OF

t o my mistress w ith the story of my misfortune. S he was enraged beyond measure. She determined, at o nce, that I should have a whipping of the worst k i n d , and she was bent upon adding all the aggravations possible. Master had g one to bed drunk, a nd was now as fast asleep as drunkards ever are. A t any rate, he was filling the house w ith the noise of h is s noring and w ith the perfume of his breath. I was ordered to go and c all h im     wake him up     and ask him to be kind e nough to give me fifty g ood smart lashes. T o be whipped i s bad enough     to ask for it is worse     to ask a drunken man to whip y ou is too bad. I w ould sooner have g one to a nest o f rattlesnakes, than to the bed of this drunkard. B ut g o I must. Softly I crept along, and gently s haking h is arm, said, w ith a t rembling voice, " M a s ter, master, mistress wants you to wake up." T h i s d id not go to the extent of her command, and in a great fury she called out, " What, you wont ask him to whip you, w ill y ou ? " I then added, " Mistress wants you to give me fifty lashes." A bear at the s mell o f a lamb was never roused quicker. " Y e s , y es, that I w i l l ; I ' l l give you such a whipping as you w ill never want again." A n d , sure enough, so he did. H e s prang from the bed, seized me by the h air, l ashed me w ith a h andful of switches, threw me my whole l ength u pon the floor; beat, k i c k e d , and cuffed me worse than he would a dog, and then threw me, w ith a ll h is strength, out of the d oor, m ore dead than alive. T here I lay for a long time, scarcely able and not daring to move, t ill I c ould hear no sound of the furies w ithin, and then crept to my couch, longing for death

  
L EWIS C L A R K E .

IS

t o put an end to my misery. I had no friend in the w orld to whom I could utter one word of complaint, o r to whom I could look for protection. M r . B anton owned a blacksmith's shop, in which he spent some o f his time, though he was not a very e fficient hand at the forge. One day, mistress told me to go over to the shop and let master give me a flogging. I k new the mode o f punishing there too w ell. I w ould rather die than go. T h e p oor f ellow w ho worked in the shop, a very s kilful w orkman, one day c ame to the determination that he would workno more, unless he could be paid for his labor. T h e e nraged master put a handful of nail-rods into the f ire, a nd when they were rcd-kot, t ook t hem out, and cool.d one after another of them in the blood and flesh of the p oor s lave's back. I knew this was the shop mode o f punishment. I would not g o ; and M r . B anton c ame h ome, and his amiable lady told him the story of my refusal. H e broke forth in a great r age, and gave m e a most unmerciful beating; adding that, i f I had c ome, he would have burned the hot nail-rods into my back. M r s . B anton, as is common among slaveholding w omen, seemed to hate and abuse me all the more, because I h ad some o f the blood of her father in my v eins. T here are no slaves that are so badly abused, as those that are related to some o f the women, or the c hildren o f their own husband; it seems as though they never could hate these quite bad enough. M y sisters were as white and good-looking as any of the y oung ladies in Kentucky. It happened o nce o f a time, that a y oung man called at the house of M r . Camp-

  
20

NARK ATI VI'. OF

b ell, to see a sister of M r s . Banton. Seeing one of my sisters in the house, and pretty well dressed, w ith a s trong family look, he thought it was M iss C ampbell ; a nd, w ith that supposition, addressed some c onversation to her which he had intended for the private ear of M iss C . T h e mistake was noised abroad, and o ccasioned some amusement to young people. M r s . B anton h eard of it, and it made her caldron of wrath s izzling h ot; every thing that diverted and amused other people seemed to enrage her. There are hotsprings in K e n t u c k y ; she was just l ike one of them, o nly brimful of boiling poison. S he must wreak her vengeance, for this innocent m istake o f the young man, upon me. " She would l ix m e, so that nobody s hould ever think I was white." A ccordingly, in a burning hot day, she made me take off every rag of clothes, go out into the garden, a nd p ick herbs for hours, in order to burn me black. W hen I w ent out, she threw cold water on me, so that the sun might take effect u pon me; when I c ame i n, she gave me a severe beating on my blistered back. A fter I had lived w ith M r s . B. three or four years, I was put to spinning hemp, flax, and tow, on an oldfashioned foot-wheel. There were four or five slaves at this business, a g ood p art of the time. W e were k ept at our work from daylight to dark in summer, f rom long before day to nine or ten o 'clock i n the e vening in winter. M r s . Banton, for the most part, was near, or kept continually passing in and out, to see that each of us performed as much work as she t hought we ought to do. Being young, and sick at heart all the time, it was very hard work to go

  
L EWIS

CLARKE.

21

t hrough the day and evening and not suffer e xceedingly for want of more sleep. V e r y often, too, I was compelled to work beyond the ordinary hour, to f inish the appointed task of the day. Sometimes I f ound it impossible not to drop asleep at the wheel. O n these occasions, M r s . B . had her peculiar contrivances for keeping us awake. She would s ometimes sit, by the hour, w ith a d ipper of vinegar and s alt, a nd throw it i n my eyes to keep them open. M y h air was pulled t ill t here was no longer any pain f rom that source. And I can now suffer myself to be gifted by the hair of the head, without experiencing the least pain. S he very often kept me from getting water to satisfy my t hirst, a nd i n one instance kept me for two e ntire days without a particle of food. T h i s she did, i n o rder that I m ight make up for lost time. B u i , o f course, I lost rather than gained upon my task. E very m eal taken from me made me less able to w ork. It finally e nded i n a terrible beating. B ut a ll my severe labor, and bitter and cruel punishments, for these ten years of captivity w ith t his worse t han A r a b family, all these were as nothing to the. sufferings I experienced by being separated from my m other, brothers, and sisters; the same things, w ith t hem near to sympathize w ith m e, to hear my story o f sorrow, would have been comparatively tolerable. T h e y were distant only about t hirty m iles; and y et, in ten long, lonely years of childhood, I was onlypermitted to see them three times. M y m other occasionally found an opportunity to

  
22

N ARRATIVE O F

send me some t oken of remembrance and affection, a s ugar-plum or an apple ; but I scarcely ever ate t hem ; they were l aid u p, and handled and wept over t ill they wasted away i n my hand. M y thoughts continually by day, and my dreams by night, were of mother and home ; a nd the horror e xperienced in the morning, when I awoke and behold i t was a dream, is beyond the power of language to describe. B ut I am about to leave this den of robbers, where I h ad been so long imprisoned. I cannot, however, c all the reader from his new and pleasant acquaintance w ith t his amiable p air, w ithout giving a few more incidents of their history. W h e n this is d one, a nd I have taken great pains, as I s hall d o, to put a copy o f this portrait in the hands of this M r s . B . , I s hall b id her farewell. I f she sees s omething awfully hideous in her picture, as here presented, she w ill be c onstrained to acknowledge it is true to nature. I h ave given it from no malice, no feeling of resentment towards her, but that the world may know what is d one by slavery, and that slaveholders may know that t heir crimes w ill c ome to l ight. I hope and pray th