History of the Negro Race in America Volume I Part 27

They were not allowed in numbers greater than three, and then, if not in the service of some white person, were liable to be arrested, and sent to the House of Correction.

"The slave was the property of his master as much as his ox or his horse; _he had no civil rights_ but that of protection from cruelty; he could acquire no property nor dispose of any[343] without the consent of his master.... We think he had not the capacity to communicate a civil relation to his children, which he did not enjoy himself, except as the property of his master."[344]

With but small means the free Negroes of the colony were unable to secure many comforts in their homes. They were hated and dreaded more than their brethren in bondage. They could judge, by contrast, of the abasing influences of slavery. They were only nominally free; because they were taxed[345] without representation,--had no voice in the colonial government.

But, notwithstanding the obscure and neglected condition of the free Negroes, some of them by their industry, frugality, and apt.i.tude won a place in the confidence and esteem of the more humane of the white population. Owning their own time, many of the free Negroes applied themselves to the acquisition of knowledge. Phillis Wheatley, though nominally a slave for some years, stood at the head of the intellectual Negroes of this period. She was brought from Africa to the Boston slave-market, where, in 1761, she was purchased by a benevolent white lady by the name of Mrs. John Wheatley. She was naked, save a piece of dirty carpet about her loins, was delicate of const.i.tution, and much fatigued from a rough sea-voyage. Touched by her modest demeanor and intelligent countenance, Mrs. Wheatley chose her from a large company of slaves. It was her intention to teach her the duties of an ordinary domestic; but clean clothing and wholesome diet effected such a radical change in the child for the better, that Mrs. Wheatley changed her plans, and began to give her private instruction. Eager for learning, apt in acquiring, though only eight years old, she greatly surprised and pleased her mistress. Placed under the instruction of Mrs. Wheatley's daughter, Phillis learned the English language sufficiently well as to be able to read the most difficult portions of the Bible with ease and accuracy. This she accomplished in less than a year and a half. She readily mastered the art of writing; and within four years from the time she landed in the slave-market in Boston, she was able to carry on an extensive correspondence on a variety of topics.

Her ripening intellectual faculties attracted the attention of the refined and educated people of Boston, many of whom sought her society at the home of the Wheatleys. It should be remembered, that this period did not witness general culture among the ma.s.ses of white people, and certainly no facilities for the education of Negroes. And yet some cultivated white persons gave Phillis encouragement, loaned her books, and called her out on matters of a literary character.

Having acquired the principles of an English education, she turned her attention to the study of the Latin language,[346] and was able to do well in it. Encouraged by her success, she translated one of Ovid's tales. The translation was considered so admirable that it was published in Boston by some of her friends. On reaching England it was republished, and called forth the praise of many of the reviews.

Her manners were modest and refined. Her nature was sensitive and affectionate. She early gave signs of a deep spiritual experience,[347] which gave tone and character to all her efforts in composition and poetry. There was a charming vein of grat.i.tude in all her private conversations and public utterances, which her owners did not fail to recognize and appreciate. Her only distinct recollection of her native home was, that every morning early _her mother poured out water before the rising sun_. Her growing intelligence and keen appreciation of the blessings of civilization overreached mere animal grief at the separation from her mother. And as she knew more of the word of G.o.d, she became more deeply interested in the condition of her race.

At the age of twenty her master emanc.i.p.ated her. Naturally delicate, the severe climate of New England, and her constant application to study, began to show on her health. Her friend and mother, for such she proved herself to be, Mrs. Wheatley, solicitous about her health, called in eminent medical counsel, who prescribed a sea-voyage. A son of Mrs. Wheatley was about to visit England on mercantile business, and therefore took Phillis with him. For the previous six years she had cultivated her taste for poetry; and, at this time, her reputation was quite well established. She had corresponded with persons in England in social circles, and was not a stranger to the English. She was heartily welcomed by the leaders of the society of the British metropolis, and treated with great consideration. Under all the trying circ.u.mstances of high social life, among the n.o.bility and rarest literary genius of London, this redeemed child of the desert, coupled to a beautiful modesty the extraordinary powers of an incomparable conversationalist. She carried London by storm. Thoughtful people praised her; t.i.tled people dined her; and the press extolled the name of Phillis Wheatley, the African poetess.

Prevailed upon by admiring friends, in 1773[348] she gave her poems to the world. They were published in London in a small octavo volume of about one hundred and twenty pages, comprising thirty-nine pieces. It was dedicated to the Countess of Huntingdon, with a picture of the poetess, and a letter of recommendation signed by the governor and lieutenant-governor, with many other "respectable citizens of Boston."

TO THE PUBLIC.

As it has been repeatedly suggested to the publisher, by persons who have seen the ma.n.u.script, that numbers would be ready to suspect they were not really the writings of PHILLIS, he has procured the following attestation, from the most respectable characters in _Boston_, that none might have the least ground for disputing their _Original_.

We, whose Names are under-written, do a.s.sure the World, that the Poems specified in the following page were (as we verily believe) written by PHILLIS, a young Negro Girl, who was, but a few Years since, brought, an uncultivated Barbarian, from _Africa_, and has ever since been, and now is, under the disadvantage of serving as a Slave in a family in this town. She has been examined by some of the best judges, and is thought qualified to write them.

_His Excellency_, THOMAS HUTCHINSON, _Governor_.

_The Hon_. ANDREW OLIVER, _Lieutenant Governor_.

_Hon_. Thomas Hubbard, | _Rev_. Charles Chauncy, _Hon_. John Erving, | _Rev_. Mather Byles, _Hon_. James Pitts, | _Rev_. Ed Pemberton, _Hon_. Harrison Gray, | _Rev_. Andrew Elliot, _Hon_. James Bowdoin, | _Rev_. Samuel Cooper, John Hanc.o.c.k, _Esq_. | _Rev_. Samuel Mather, Joseph Green, _Esq_. | _Rev_. John Moorhead, Richard Cary, _Esq_. | _Mr_. John Wheatley, her master.

The volume has pa.s.sed through several English and American editions, and is to be found in all first-cla.s.s libraries in the country. Mrs.

Wheatley sickened, and grieved daily after Phillis. A picture of her little ward, sent from England, adorned her bedroom; and she pointed it out to visiting friends with all the sincere pride of a mother. On one occasion she exclaimed to a friend, "See! Look at my Phillis! Does she not seem as though she would speak to me?" Getting no better, she sent a loving request to Phillis to come to her at as early a moment as possible. With a deep sense of grat.i.tude to Mrs. Wheatley for countless blessings bestowed upon her, Phillis hastened to return to Boston. She found her friend and benefactor just living, and shortly had the mournful satisfaction of closing her sightless eyes. The husband and daughter followed the wife and mother quickly to the grave. Young Mr. Wheatley married, and settled in England. Phillis was alone in the world.

"She soon after received an offer of marriage from a respectable colored man, of Boston. The name of this individual was _John_ Peters.[349] He kept a grocery in Court Street, and was a man of handsome person. He wore a wig, carried a cane, and quite acted out '_the gentleman_.'

In an evil hour, he was accepted; and, though he was a man of talents and information,--writing with fluency and propriety, and, at one period, reading law,--he proved utterly unworthy of the distinguished woman who honored him by her alliance."

Her married life was brief. She was the mother of one child, that died early. Ignorant of the duties of domestic life, courted and flattered by the cultivated, Peters's jealousy was at length turned into harsh treatment. Tenderly raised, and of a delicate const.i.tution, Phillis soon went into decline, and died Dec. 5, 1784, in the thirty-first[350] year of her life, greatly beloved and sincerely mourned by all whose good fortune it had been to know of her high mental endowments and blameless Christian life.

Her influence upon the rapidly growing anti-slavery sentiment of Ma.s.sachusetts was considerable. The friends of humanity took pleasure in pointing to her marvellous achievements, as an evidence of what the Negro could do under favorable circ.u.mstances. From a state of nudity in a slave-market, a stranger to the English language, this young African girl had won her way over the rough path of learning; had conquered the spirit of caste in the best society of conservative old Boston; had brought two continents to her feet in admiration and amazement at the rare poetical accomplishments of a child of Africa![351]

She addressed a poem to Gen. Washington that pleased the old warrior very much. We have never seen it, though we have searched diligently.

Mr. Sparks says of it,--

"I have not been able to find, among Washington's papers the letter and poem addressed to him. They have doubtless been lost. From the circ.u.mstance of her invoking the muse in his praise, and from the tenor of some of her printed pieces, particularly one addressed to King George seven years before, in which she compliments him on the repeal of the Stamp Act, it may be inferred, that she was a Whig in politics after the American way of thinking; and it might be curious to see in what manner she would eulogize liberty and the rights of man, while herself, nominally at least, in bondage."[352]

Gen. Washington, in a letter to Joseph Reed, bearing date of the 10th of February, 1776, from Cambridge, refers to the letter and poem as follows:--

"I recollect nothing else worth giving you the trouble of, unless you can be amused by reading a letter and poem addressed to me by Miss Phillis Wheatley. In searching over a parcel of papers the other day, in order to destroy such as were useless, I brought it to light again. At first, with a view of doing justice to her poetical genius, I had a great mind to publish the poem; but not knowing whether it might not be considered rather as a mark of my own vanity, than as a compliment to her, I laid it aside,[353] till I came across it again in the manner just mentioned."[354]

This gives the world an "inside" view of the brave old general's opinion of the poem and poetess, but the "outside" view, as expressed to Phil's, is worthy of reproduction at this point.

CAMBRIDGE, 28 February, 1776.

MISS PHILLIS,--Your favor of the 26th of October did not reach my hands, till the middle of December. Time enough, you will say, to have given an answer ere this. Granted. But a variety of important occurrences, continually interposing to distract the mind and withdraw the attention, I hope will apologize for the delay, and plead my excuse for the seeming but not real neglect. I thank you most sincerely for your polite notice of me, in the elegant lines you enclosed; and however undeserving I may be of such encomium and panegyric, the style and manner exhibit a striking proof of your poetical talents; in honor of which, and as a tribute justly due to you, I would have published the poem, had I not been apprehensive, that, while I only meant to give the world this new instance of your genius, I might have incurred the imputation of vanity. This, and nothing else, determined me not to give it place in the public prints.

If you should ever come to Cambridge, or near head-quarters, I shall be happy to see a person so favored by the Muses, and to whom nature has been so liberal and beneficent in her dispensations.

I am, with great respect, your obedient, humble servant,

GEORGE WASHINGTON.[355]

This letter is a handsome compliment to the poetess, and does honor to both the head and heart of the general. His modesty, so characteristic, has deprived history of its dues. But it is consoling to know that the sentiments of the poem found a response in the patriotic heart of the _first soldier of the Revolution, and the Father of his Country_!

While Phillis Wheatley stands out as one of the most distinguished characters of this period, and who, as a Colored person, had no equal, yet she was not the only individual of her race of intellect and character. A Negro boy from Africa was purchased by a Mr. Sloc.u.m, who resided near New Bedford, Ma.s.s. After he acquired the language, he turned his thoughts to freedom, and in a few years, by working beyond the hours he devoted to his master, was enabled to buy himself from his master. He married an Indian woman named Ruth Moses, and settled at Cutterhunker, in the Elizabeth Islands, near New Bedford. In a few years, through industry and frugality, John Cuffe--the name he took as a freeman--was enabled to purchase a good farm of one hundred (100) acres. Every year recorded new achievements, until John Cuffe had a wide reputation for wealth, honesty, and intelligence. He applied himself to books, and secured, as the ripe fruit of his studious habits, a fair business education. Both himself and wife were Christian believers; and to lives of industry and increasing secular knowledge, they added that higher knowledge which makes alive to "everlasting life." Ten children were born unto them,--four boys and six girls. One of the boys, Paul Cuffe, became one of the most distinguished men of color Ma.s.sachusetts has produced. The reader will be introduced to him in the proper place in the history. John Cuffe died in 1745, leaving behind, in addition to considerable property, a good name, which is of great price.[356]

Richard Dalton, Esq., of Boston, owned a Negro boy whom he taught to read any Greek writer without hesitancy. Mr. Dalton was afflicted with weak eyes; and his fondness for the cla.s.sics would not allow him to forego the pleasure of them, and hence his Negro boy Caesar was instructed in the Greek.[357] "The Boston Chronicle" of Sept. 21, 1769, contains the following advertis.e.m.e.nt: "To be sold, a Likely Little negroe boy, who _can speak the French language_, and very fit for a Valet."

With increasing evidence of the Negro's capacity for mental improvement, and fitness for the duties and blessings of a freeman, and the growing insolence and rigorous policy of the mother country, came a wonderful change in the colony. The Negroes were emboldened to ask for and claim rights as British subjects, and the more humane element among the whites saw in a relaxation of the severe treatment of the blacks security and immunity in war. But anti-slavery sentiment in Ma.s.sachusetts was not born of a genuine desire to put down a wicked and cruel traffic in human beings. Two things operated in favor of humane treatment of the slaves,--an impending war, and the decision of Lord Mansfield in the Sommersett case. The English government was yearly increasing the burdens of the colonists. The country was young, its resources little known. The people were largely engaged in agricultural pursuits. There were no tariff laws encouraging or protecting the labor or skill of the people. Civil war seemed inevitable. Thoughtful men began to consider the question as to which party the Negroes of the colony would contribute their strength. It was no idle question to determine whether the Negroes were Tories or Whigs. As early as 1750 the questions as to the legality of holding Negroes in slavery in British colonies began to be discussed in England and New England. "What, precisely, the English law might be on the subject of slavery, still remained a subject of doubt."[358] Lord Holt held that slavery was a condition unknown to English law,--that the being in England was evidence of freedom. This embarra.s.sed New-England planters in taking their slaves to England. The planters banded for their common cause, and secured the written opinion of Yorke and Talbot, attorney and solicitor general of England. They held that slaves _could_ be held in England as well as in America; that baptism did not confer freedom: and the opinion stood as sound law for nearly a half-century.[359] The men in England who lived on the money wrung from the slave-trade, the members of the Royal African Company, came to the rescue of the inst.i.tution of slavery. In order to maintain it by law in the American colonies, it had to be recognized in England. The people of Ma.s.sachusetts took a lively interest in the question. In 1761, at a meeting "in the old court-house," James Otis,[360] in a speech against the "writs of a.s.sistance," struck a popular chord on the questions of "The Rights of the Colonies,"

afterwards published (1764) by order of the Legislature. He took the broad ground, "that the colonists, black and white, born here, are free-born British subjects and ent.i.tled to all the essential rights of such."[361] In 1766 Nathaniel Appleton and James Swan distinguished themselves in their defence of the doctrines of "liberty for all." It became the general topic of discussion in private and public, and country lyceums and college societies took it up as a subject of forensic disputation.[362] In the month of May, 1766, the representatives of the people were instructed to advocate the total abolition of slavery. And on the 16th of March, 1767, a resolution was offered to see whether the instructions should be adhered to, and was unanimously carried in the affirmative. But it should be remembered that British troops were in the colony, in the streets of Boston. The mutterings of the distant thunder of revolution could be heard. Public sentiment was greatly tempered toward the Negroes. On the 31st of May, 1609, the House of Representatives of Ma.s.sachusetts resolved against the presence of troops, and besought the governor to remove them. His Excellency disclaimed any power under the circ.u.mstances to interfere.

The House denounced a standing army in time of peace, without the consent of the General Court, as "without precedent, and unconst.i.tutional."[363] In 1769 one of the courts of Ma.s.sachusetts gave a decision friendly to a slave, who was the plaintiff. This stimulated the Negroes to an exertion for freedom. The entire colony was in a feverish state of excitement. An anonymous Tory writer reproached Bostonians for desiring freedom when they themselves enslaved others.

"'What!' cries our good people here, 'Negro slaves in Boston! It cannot be.' It is nevertheless true. For though the Bostonians have grounded their rebellion on the 'immutable laws of nature,' yet, notwithstanding their resolves about freedom in their Town-meetings, they actually have in town 2,000 Negro slaves."[364]

These trying and exasperating circ.u.mstances were but the friendly precursors of a spirit of universal liberty.

In England the decision of Lord Mansfield in the Sommersett[365] case had encouraged the conscientious few who championed the cause of the slave. Charles Stewart, Esq., of Boston, Ma.s.s., had taken to London with him his Negro slave, James Sommersett. The Negro was seized with a sickness in the British metropolis, and was thereupon abandoned by his master. He afterwards regained his health, and secured employment.

His master, learning of his whereabouts, had him arrested, and placed in confinement on board the vessel "Ann and Mary," Capt. John Knowls, commander, then lying in the Thames, but soon to sail for Jamaica, where Sommersett was to be sold.

"On the 3rd of Dec., 1771, affidavits were made by Thomas Walklin, Elizabeth Cade, and John Marlow, that James Sommersett, a Negro, was confined in irons on board a ship called the _Ann_ and _Mary_, John Knowls commander, lying in the Thames, and bound for Jamaica. Lord Mansfield, upon the prayer of the above subscribers, allowed a writ of _habeas corpus_, requiring the return of the body of Sommersett before his lordship with an explanation of the cause of his detention. On the 9th of Dec., Capt. Knowls produced the body of Sommersett in Court. Lord Mansfield, after a preliminary examination, referred the matter to the Court of King's Bench, and, therefore, took sureties, and bound Sommersett over 'till 'the 2nd day of the next Hillary term.' At the time appointed the defendant with counsel, the reputed master of the Negro man Sommersett, and Capt. John Knowls, appeared before the court. Capt. Knowls recited the reasons that led him to detain Sommersett: whereupon the counsel for the latter asked for time in which to prepare an argument against the return. Lord Mansfield gave them until the 7th of February. At the time appointed Mr. Sergeant Davy and Mr. Sergeant Glynn argued against the return, and had further argument 'postponed' till Easter term,' when Mr.

Mansfield, Mr. Alleyne, and Mr. Hargrave argued on the same side. 'The only question before us is whether the cause on the return is sufficient. If it is, the Negro must be remanded; if it is not, he must be discharged. The return states that the slave departed and refused to serve, whereupon he was kept to be sold abroad. So high an act of dominion must be recognized by the law of the country where it is used. The power of a master over his slave has been exceedingly different in different countries. The state of slavery is of such a nature that it is incapable of being introduced on any reasons, moral or political, but only by positive law, which preserves its force long after the reasons, occasions, and time itself from whence it was created is erased from memory. It is so odious that nothing can be suffered to support it but positive law. Whatever inconveniences, therefore, may follow from the decision, I cannot say this case is allowed or approved by the law of England, and therefore the black must be discharged.'"

The influence of this decision was wide-spread, and hurtful to slavery in the British colonies in North America. It poured new life into the expiring hopes of the Negroes, and furnished a rule of law for the advocates of "freedom for all." It raised a question of law in all the colonies as to whether the colonial governments could pa.s.s an Act legalizing that which was "contrary to English law."[366]

Notwithstanding the general and generous impulse for liberty, the indissoluble ties of avarice, and the greed for the unearned gains of the slave-trade, made public men conservate to conserve the interests of those directly interested in the inhuman traffic.

"In an age when the interests of trade guided legislation, this branch of commerce possessed paramount attractions. Not a statesman exposed its enormities; and, if Richard Baxter echoed the opinions of Puritan Ma.s.sachusetts, if Southern drew tears by the tragic tale of Oronooko, if Steele awakened a throb of indignation by the story of Inkle and Yarico, if Savage and Shenstone pointed their feeble couplets with the wrongs of 'Afric's sable children,' if the Irish metaphysician Hutcheson, struggling for a higher system of morals,--justly stigmatized the traffic; yet no public opinion lifted its voice against it. English ships, fitted out in English cities, under the special favor of the royal family, of the ministry, and of parliament, stole from Africa, in the years from 1700 to 1750, probably a million and a half of souls, of whom one-eighth were buried in the Atlantic, victims of the pa.s.sage; and yet in England no general indignation rebuked the enormity; for the public opinion of the age was obedient to materialism."[367]

Humane masters who desired to emanc.i.p.ate their slaves were embarra.s.sed by a statute unfriendly to manumission. The Act of 1703[368] deterred many persons from emanc.i.p.ating their slaves on account of its unjust and hard requirements. And under it quite a deal of litigation arose.

It required every master who desired to liberate his slave, before doing so, to furnish a bond to the treasurer of the town or place in which he resided, in a sum not less than fifty pounds.[369] This was to indemnify the town or place in case the Negro slave thus emanc.i.p.ated should, through lameness or sickness, become a charge. In case a master failed to furnish such security, his emanc.i.p.ated slaves were still contemplated by the law as in bondage, "notwithstanding any manumission or instrument of freedom to them made or given." Judge Sewall, in a letter to John Adams, cites a case in point.

"A man, by will, gives his Negro his liberty, and leaves him a legacy. The executor consents that the Negro shall be free, but refuseth to give bond to the selectmen to indemnify the town against any charge for his support in case he should become poor (without which, by the province law, he is not manumitted), or to pay him the legacy.

_Query_. Can he recover the legacy, and how?

I have just observed that in your last you desire me to say something towards discouraging you from removing to Providence; and you say, any thing will do. At present, I only say, you will do well enough where you are. I will explain myself, and add something further, in some future letter. I have not time to enlarge now, for which I believe you will not be inconsolably grieved. So, to put you out of pain, your hearty friend,

JONATHAN SEWALL."[370]