Personal Memoir of Daniel Drayton Part 4

Are you going to presume that the chickens run into his bag of their own accord, and without his agency? A man is found riding your horse. Are you to presume that the horse came to him of its own accord? and yet horses love liberty,--they love to kick up their heels and run. Yet this would be just as sensible as to suppose that these slaves came on board Drayton's vessel without his direct agency. He came here from Philadelphia for them; they are found on board his vessel; Drayton says he would steal a negro if he could; is not that enough? Then he was here some months before with an oyster-boat, pretending to sell oysters. He pretended that he came for his health. Likely story, indeed! I should like to see the doctor who would recommend a patient to come here in the fall of the year, when the fever and ague is so thick in the marshes that you can cut it with a knife. Cruising about, eating and selling oysters, at that time of the year, for his health! Nonsense! He was here, at that very time, hatching and contriving that these very negroes should go on board the Pearl. But the prisoner's counsel say he might have been employed by others simply to carry them away! Who could have employed him but abolitionists; and did he not say he had no sympathy with abolitionists. So much for that hypothesis. Then, he in fact pleads guilty,--he says he expects to die in the penitentiary. Don't you think he ought to? If there is any chasm here, the prisoner must shed light upon it. If he had employers, who were they?

The prisoner's counsel have said that he is not bound to tell; and that the witnesses, if summoned here, would not be compelled to criminate themselves. But shall this prisoner be allowed to take advantage of his own wrong?

"As to the metaphysics of the prisoner's counsel about possession, that is easily disposed of. Were not these slaves found in Drayton's possession, and didn't he admit that he took them?

"As to the cautions given you about prejudice and pa.s.sion, I do not think they are necessary. I have seen no sort of excitement here since the first detection of this affair that would prevent the prisoner having a fair trial. Is there any crowd or excitement here? The community will be satisfied with the verdict. There is no question the party is guilty. I never had anything to do with a case sustained by stronger evidence. I don't ask you to give an illegal or perjured verdict. Take the law and the evidence, and decide upon it.

"N.B.--The argument being now concluded, and the jury about to go out, some question arose whether the jury should have the written instructions of the court with them; and some inquiry being made as to the practice, one of the jurors observed that in a case in which he had formerly acted as juror the jury had the instructions with them, and he proceeded to tell a funny story about a bottle of rum, told by one of the jurors on that occasion, which story caused him to remember the fact. It may be observed, by the way, that the proceedings of the United States Criminal Court for the District of Columbia are not distinguished for any remarkable decorum or dignity. The jury, in this case, were in constant intercourse, during any little intervals in the trial, with the spectators outside the bar."

The case was given to the jury about three o'clock, P.M., and the court, after waiting half an hour, adjourned.

When the court met, at ten o'clock the next morning, the jury were still out, having remained together all night without being able to agree.

Meanwhile the District Attorney proceeded to try me on another indictment, for stealing three slaves the property of one William H.

Upperman. As this trial was proceeding, about half-past two the jury in the first case came in, and rendered a verdict of GUILTY. They presented rather a haggard appearance, having been locked up for twenty-four hours, and some of them being perhaps a little troubled in their consciences. The jury, it was understood, had been divided, from the beginning, four for acquittal and eight for conviction. These four were all Irishmen, and perhaps they did not consider it consistent with their personal safety and business interests to persist in disappointing the slave-holding public of that verdict which the District Attorney had so imperiously demanded. The agreement, it was understood, had taken place only a few moments before they came in, and had been reached entirely on the strength of Williams' testimony to my having said, that had I got off I should have made an independent fortune. Now, it was a curious coincidence, that at the very moment that this agreement was thus taking place, Williams, again on the stand as a witness on the second trial, wished to take back what he had then sworn to on the first trial, stating that he could not tell whether he had heard me say this, or whether he had heard of my having said it from somebody else.

After the rendition of the verdict of the other jury, the second case was again resumed. The evidence varied in only a few particulars from that which had been given in the first case. There was, in addition, the testimony of Upperman, the pretended owner of the woman and her daughters, one of fifteen, the other nine years old, whom I was charged in this indictment with stealing. This man swore with no less alacrity, and with no less falsehood, than Houver had done before him. He stated that about half-past ten, of that same night that the Pearl left Washington, while he was fastening up his house, he saw a man standing on the side-walk opposite his door, and observed him for some time. Not long after, having gone to bed, he heard a noise of somebody coming down stairs; and, calling out, he was answered by his slave-woman, who was just then going off, though he had no suspicion of it at the time. That man standing on the side-walk he pretended to recognize as me. He was perfectly certain of it, beyond all doubt and question. The object of this testimony was, to lead to a conclusion of enticement or persuasion on my part, and so to bring the case within one of the judge's instructions already stated. On a subsequent trial, Upperman was still more certain, if possible, that I was the man. But he was entirely mistaken in saying so. His house was on Pennsylvania Avenue, more than a mile from where the Pearl lay, and I was not within a mile of it that night. I dare say Upperman was sincere enough. He was one of your positive sort of men; but his case, like that of Houver, shows that men in a pa.s.sion will sometimes fall into blunders. I have reason to believe that after the trials were over Upperman became satisfied of his error.

The first trial had consumed a week; the second one lasted four days.

The judge laid down the same law as before, and similar exceptions were taken by my counsel. The jury again remained out all night, being long divided,--nine for conviction to three for acquittal; but on the morning of August 9th they came in with a verdict of GUILTY.

Satisfied for the present with these two verdicts against me, the District Attorney now proposed to pa.s.s over the rest of my cases, and to proceed to try Sayres. My counsel objected that, having been forced to proceed against my remonstrances, I was here ready for trial, and they insisted that all my cases should be now disposed of. They did not prevail, however; and the District Attorney proceeded to try Sayres on an indictment for stealing the same two slaves of Houver.

In addition to the former witnesses against me, English was now put upon the stand, the District Attorney having first entered _nolle prosequi_ upon the hundred and fifteen indictments against him. But he could state nothing except the circ.u.mstances of his connection with the affair, and the coming on board of the pa.s.sengers on Sat.u.r.day night, as I have already related them. On the other hand, the "phantom brig" story, of which the District Attorney had made so great a handle in the two cases against me, was now ruled out, on the ground that the brig could not be brought into the case till some connection had first been shown between her and the Pearl. The trial lasted three days. The District Attorney pressed for a conviction with no less violence than he had done in my case, a.s.suring the jury that if they did not convict there was an end of the security of slave property. But Sayres had several advantages over me. My two juries had been citizens of Washington, several of them belonging to a cla.s.s of loafers who frequent the courts for the sake of the fees to be got as jurymen. Some complaints having been made of this, the officers had been sent to Georgetown and the country districts, and the present jury was drawn from those quarters. Then, again, I was regarded as the main culprit,--the only one in the secret of the transaction; and, as I was already convicted, the feeling against Sayres was much lessened. In fact, the jury in his case, after an absence of half an hour, returned a verdict of NOT GUILTY.

The District Attorney, greatly surprised and vexed, proceeded to try Sayres on another indictment. This trial lasted three days and a half; but, in spite of the efforts of the District Attorney, who was more positive, longer and louder, than ever, the jury, in ten minutes, returned a verdict of NOT GUILTY.

The trials had now continued through nearly four weeks of very hot weather, and both sides were pretty well worn out. Vexed at the two last verdicts, the District Attorney threatened to give up Sayres on a requisition from Virginia, which was said to have been lodged for us, some of the alleged slaves belonging there, and we having been there shortly before.

Finally, it was agreed that verdicts should be taken against Sayres in the seventy-four transportation cases, he to have the advantage of carrying the points of law before the Circuit Court, and the remaining larceny indictments against him to be discontinued.

Thus ended the first legal campaign. English was discharged altogether, without trial. Sayres had got rid of the charge of larceny. I had been found guilty on two indictments for stealing, upon which Judge Crawford sentenced me to twenty years imprisonment in the penitentiary; while Sayres, on seventy-four indictments for a.s.sisting the escape of slaves, was sentenced to a fine on each indictment of one hundred and fifty dollars and costs, amounting altogether to seven thousand four hundred dollars. But from these judgments an appeal had been taken to the Circuit Court, and meanwhile Sayres and I remained in prison as before.

The hearing before the Circuit Court came on the 26th of November. That court consisted of Chief-Justice Cranch, an able and upright judge, but very old and infirm; and Judges Morrell and Dunlap, the latter of whom claimed to be the owner of two of the negroes found on board the Pearl.

My cases were argued for me by Messrs. Hildreth, Carlisle and Mann. The District Attorney, who was much better fitted to bawl to a jury than to argue before a court, had retained, at the expense of the United States, the a.s.sistance of Mr. Bradley, one of the ablest lawyers of the District. The argument consumed not less than three days. Many points were discussed; but that on which the cases turned was the definition of larceny. It resulted in the allowance of several of my bills of exceptions, the overturn of the law of Judge Crawford on the subject of larceny, and the establishment by the Circuit Court of the doctrine on that subject contended for by my counsel; but from this opinion Judge Dunlap dissented. The case of Sayres, for want of time, was postponed till the next term.

A new trial having been ordered in my two cases, everybody supposed that the charge of larceny would now be abandoned, as the Circuit Court had taken away the only basis on which it could possibly rest. But the zeal of the District Attorney was not yet satisfied; and, no longer trusting to his own una.s.sisted efforts, he obtained (at the expense of the United States) the a.s.sistance of Richard c.o.x, Esq., an old and very unscrupulous pract.i.tioner, with whose aid he tried the cases over again in the Criminal Court. The two trials lasted about fourteen days. I was again defended by Messrs. Mann and Carlisle, and now with better success, as the juries, under the instructions which Judge Crawford found himself obliged to give, and notwithstanding the desperate efforts against me, acquitted me in both cases, almost without leaving their seats.

Finally, the District Attorney agreed to abandon the remaining larceny cases, if we would consent to verdicts in the transportation cases on the same terms with those in the case of Sayres. This was done; when Judge Crawford had the satisfaction of sentencing me to fines and costs amounting together to ten thousand and sixty dollars, and to remain in prison until that amount was paid.

There was still a further hearing before the Circuit Court on the bills of exceptions to these transportation indictments. My counsel thought they had some good legal objections; but the hearing unfortunately came on when Judge Cranch was absent from the bench, and the other two judges overruled them. By a strange construction of the laws, no criminal case, except by accident, can be carried before the Supreme Court of the United States; otherwise, the cases against us would have been taken there, including the question of the legality of slavery in the District of Columbia.

Thus, after a severe and expensive struggle, I was saved from the penitentiary; but Sayres and myself remained in the Washington jail, loaded with enormous fines, which, from our total inability to pay them, would keep us there for life, unless the President could be induced to pardon us; and it was even questioned, as I shall show presently, whether he had any such power.

The jail of the District of Columbia is under the charge of the Marshal of the District. That office, when I was first committed to prison, was filled by a Mr. Hunter; but he was sick at the time, and died soon after, when Robert Wallace was appointed. This Wallace was a Virginian, from the neighbor hood of Alexandria, son of a Doctor Wallace from whom he had inherited a large property, including many slaves. He had removed to Tennessee, and had set up cotton-planting there; but, failing in that business, had returned back with the small remnants of his property, and Polk provided for him by making him marshal. It was not long before I found that he had a great spite against me. It was in vain that I solicited from him the use of the pa.s.sage. The light which came into my cell was very faint, and I could only read by sitting on the floor with my back against the grating of the cell door. But, so far from aiding me to read,--and it was the only method I had of pa.s.sing my time,--Wallace made repeated and vexatious attempts to keep me from receiving newspapers. I should very soon have died on the prison allowance. The marshal is allowed by the United States thirty-three cents per day for feeding the prisoners. For this money they receive two meals; breakfast, consisting of one herring, corn-bread and a dish of mola.s.ses and water, very slightly flavored with coffee; and for dinner, corn-bread again, with half a pound of the meanest sort of salted beef, and a soup made of corn-meal stirred into the pot-liquor. This is the bill of fare day after day, all the year round; and, as at the utmost such food cannot cost more than eight or nine cents a day for each prisoner, and as the average number is fifty, the marshal must make a handsome profit. The diet has been fixed, I suppose, after the model of the slave allowances.

But Congress, after providing the means of feeding the prisoners in a decent manner, ought not to allow them to be starved for the benefit of the marshal. Such was the diet to which I was confined in the first days of my imprisonment. But I soon contrived to make a friend of Jake, the old black cook of the prison, who, I could see as he came in to pour out my coffee, evinced a certain sympathy and respect for me. Through his agency I was able to purchase some more eatable food; and indeed the surgeon of the jail allowed me flour, under the name of medicine, it being impossible, as he said, for me to live on the prison diet.

Wallace, soon after he came into office, finding a small sum in my possession, of about forty dollars, took it from me. He expressed a fear that I might corrupt old Jake, or somebody else,--especially as he found that I gave Jake my old newspapers,--and so escape from the prison. But he left the money in the hands of the jailer, and allowed me to draw it out, a dollar at a time. He presently turned out old Jake, and put in a slave-woman of his own as cook; but she was better disposed towards me than her master, and I found no difficulty in purchasing with my own money, and getting her to prepare such food as I wanted. I was able, too, after some six or eight weeks' sleeping on the stone floor of my cell, to obtain some improvement in that particular; and not for myself only, but for all the other prisoners also. The jailer was requested by several persons who came to see us to procure mattresses for us at their expense; and, finally, Wallace, as if out of pure shame, procured a quant.i.ty of husk mattresses for the use of the prisoners generally.

Still, we had no cots, and were obliged to spread our mattresses on the floor.

The allowance of clothing made to the prisoners who were confined without any means of supporting themselves corresponded pretty well with the jail allowance of provisions. They received shirts, one at a time, made of the very meanest kind of cotton cloth, and of the very smallest dimensions; trousers of about equal quality, and shoes. It was said that the United States paid also for jackets and caps. How that was I do not know; but the prisoners never received any.

The custody of the jail was intrusted to a head jailer, a.s.sisted by four guards, or turnkeys, one of whom acted also as book-keeper. Of the personal treatment toward me of those in office, at the time I was first committed, I have no complaint to make. The rigor of my confinement was indeed great; but I am happy to say that it was not aggravated by any disposition on the part of these men to triumph over me, or to trample upon me. As they grew more acquainted with me, they showed their sense that I was not an ordinary criminal, and treated me with many marks of consideration, and even of regard, and in one of them I found a true friend.

Shortly after Wallace came into office, he made several changes. He was full of caprices, and easily took offence from very small causes; and of this the keepers, as well as the prisoners, had abundant experience. The head jailer did his best to please, behaving in the most humble and submissive manner; but all to no purpose. He was discharged, as were also the others, one after another,--Wallace undertaking to act as head jailer himself. Of Wallace's vexatious conduct towards me; of his refusal to allow me to receive newspapers,--prohibiting the under jailer to lend me even the Baltimore _Sun_; of his accusation against me of bribing old Jake, whom he forbade the turnkeys to allow to come near me; of his keeping me shut up in my cell; and generally of a bitter spirit of angry malice against me,--I had abundant reason to complain during the weary fifteen months or more that I remained under his power. But his subordinates, though obliged to obey his orders and to comply with his humors, were far from being influenced by his feelings. Even his favorite among the turnkeys, a person who pretty faithfully copied his conduct towards the other prisoners, always behaved very kindly towards me, and even used to make a confidant of me, by coming to my cell to talk over his troubles.

But the person whose kind offices and friendly sympathy did far more than those of any other to relieve the tediousness of my confinement, and to keep my heart from sinking, was Mr. Wood. There is no chaplain at the Washington jail, nor has Congress, so far as I am aware, made any provision of any kind for the spiritual wants or the moral and religious instruction of the inmates of it. This great deficiency Mr. Wood, a man of a great heart, though of very limited pecuniary means, being then a clerk in the Telegraph office, had taken it upon himself to supply, so far as he could; and for that purpose he was in the habit of visiting the prison on Sundays, conversing with the prisoners, and furnishing tracts and books to such as were able and disposed to read. He came to my cell, or to the grating of the pa.s.sage in which I was confined, on the very first Sunday of my imprisonment, and he readily promised, at my request, to furnish me with a Bible; though in that act of kindness he was antic.i.p.ated by the colored woman of whom I have already made mention, who appeared at my cell, with a Bible for me, just after Mr.

Wood had left it.

The kindness of Mr. Wood's heart, and the sincerity of his sympathy, was so apparent as to secure him the affectionate respect of all the prisoners. To me he proved a very considerate and useful friend. Not only was I greatly indebted to his a.s.sistance in making known my necessities and those of my family to those disposed to relieve them, but his cheerful and Christian conversation served to brighten many a dark hour, and to dispel many gloomy feelings. Were all professing Christians like my friend Mr. Wood, we should not hear so many denunciations as we now do of the church, and complaints of her short-comings.

There was another person, also, whose kind attentions to me I ought not to overlook. This was Mrs. Susannah Ford, a very respectable colored woman, who sold refreshments in the lobby of the court-house, and who, in the progress of the trial, had evinced a good deal of interest in the case. As she often had boarders in the jail, who, like me, could not live on the jail fare, and whom she supplied, she was frequently there, and she seldom came without bringing with her some substantial token of her regard.

Sayres and myself had looked forward to the change of administration, which resulted from the election of General Taylor, with considerable hopes of advantage from it--but, for a considerable time, this advantage was limited to a change in the marshal in whose custody we were. The turning out of Wallace gave great satisfaction to everybody in the jail, or connected with it, except the turnkeys, who held office by his appointment, and who expected that his dismissal would be followed by their own. The very day before the appointment of his successor came out, I had been remonstrating with him against the cruelty of refusing me the use of the pa.s.sage; and I had even ventured to hint that I hoped he would do nothing which he would be ashamed to see spoken of in the public prints; to which he replied, "G--d d--n the public prints!--in that cell you will stay!" But in this he proved not much of a prophet.

The next day, as soon as the news of his dismissal reached the jail, the turnkeys at once unlocked my cell-door and admitted me into the pa.s.sage, observing that the new marshal, when he came to take possession, should at least find me there.

This new marshal was Mr. Robert Wallach, a native of the District, very similar in name to his predecessor, but very different in nature; and from the time that he entered into office the extreme rigor hitherto exercised to me was a good deal abated. One thing, however, I had to regret in the change, which was the turning out of all the old guards, with whom I was already well acquainted, and the appointment of a new set. One of these thus turned out--the person to whom I have already referred to as the chief favorite of the late marshal--made a desperate effort to retain his office. But, although he solicited and obtained certificates to the effect that he was, and always had been, a good Whig, he had to walk out with the others.

The new jailer appointed by Wallach, and three of the new guards, or turnkeys, were very gentlemanly persons, and neither I nor the other prisoners had any reason to complain of the change. Of the fourth turnkey I cannot say as much. He was violent, overbearing and tyrannical, and he was frequently guilty of conduct towards the prisoners which made him very unfit to serve under such a marshal, and ought to have caused his speedy removal. But, unfortunately, the marshal was under some political obligations to him, which made the turning him out not so easy a matter. This person seemed to have inherited all the feelings of hatred and dislike which the late marshal had entertained towards me, and he did his best to annoy me in a variety of ways, though, of course, his power was limited by his subordinate position.

But, although I gained considerably by the new-order of things, I soon found that it had also some annoying consequences. Under the old marshal, either to make the imprisonment more disagreeable to me, or from fear lest I should corrupt the other prisoners, I had been kept in a sort of solitary confinement, no other prisoners being placed in the same pa.s.sage. This system was now altered; and, although my privacy was always so far respected that I was allowed a cell by myself, I often found myself with fellow-prisoners in the same pa.s.sage from whose society it was impossible for me to derive either edification or pleasure. I suffered a good deal from this cause; but at length succeeded in obtaining a remedy, or, at least, a partial one. I was allowed, during the day-time, the range of the debtors' apartments, a suite of s.p.a.cious, airy and comfortable rooms, in which there were seldom more than one or two tenants. I pleaded hard to be removed to these apartments altogether,--to be allowed to sleep there, as well as to pa.s.s the days there. As it was merely for the non-payment of a sum of money that I was held, I thought I had a right to be treated as a debtor. But those apartments were so insecure, that the keepers did not care to trust me there during the night.

By this change of quarters my condition was a good deal improved. I not only had ample conveniences for reading, but I improved the opportunity to learn to write, having only been able to sign my name when T was committed to the prison.

But a jail, after all, is a jail; and I longed and sighed to obtain my liberty, and to enjoy again the society of my wife and children. Had it been wished to impress my mind in the strongest manner with the horrors of slavery, no better method could have been devised than this imprisonment in the Washington jail. I felt personally what it was to be restrained of my liberty; and, as many of the prisoners were runaway slaves, or slaves committed at the request of their masters, I saw a good deal of what slaves are exposed to. Of this I shall here give but a single instance. Wallace, the marshal, as I have already mentioned, had two female slaves, the last remnants of the large slave-property which he had inherited from his father. One of these was a young and very comely mulatto girl, whom Wallace had made his housekeeper, and whom he sought to make also his concubine. But, as the girl already had a child by a young white man, to whom she was attached, she steadily repelled all his advances. Not succeeding by persuasion, this scion of the aristocracy of the Old Dominion--this Virginian gentleman, and marshal of the United States for the District of Columbia--shut the girl up in the jail of the District, in hopes of thus breaking her to his will; and, as she proved obstinate, he finally sold her. He then turned his eyes on the other woman,--his property,--Jemima, our cook, already the mother of three children. But she set him at open defiance. As she wished to be sold, he had lost the greatest means of controlling her; and as she openly threatened, before all the keepers, to tear every rag of clothing off his body if he dared lay his hand upon her, he did not venture, to brave her fury.

In most of the states, if not in all of them, certainly in all the free states, there is no such thing as keeping a man in prison for life merely for the non-payment of a fine which he has no means to pay. The same spirit of humanity which has abolished the imprisonment of poor debtors at the caprice of their creditors has provided means for discharging, after a short imprisonment, persons held in prison for fines which they have no means of paying. Indeed, what can be more unequal or unjust than to hold a poor man a prisoner for life for an offence which a rich man is allowed to expiate by a small part of his superfluous wealth? But this is one, among many other barbarisms, which the existence of slavery in the District of Columbia, by preventing any systematic revision of the laws, has entailed upon the capital of our model democracy. There was, as I have stated, no means by which Sayres and myself could be discharged from prison except by paying our fines (which was totally out of the question), or by obtaining a presidential pardon, which, for a long time, seemed equally hopeless. There was, indeed, a peculiarity about our case, such as might afford a plausible excuse for not extending to us any relief. Under the law of 1796, the sums imposed upon us as fines were to go one half to the owners of the slaves, and the other half to the District; and it was alleged, that although the President might remit the latter half, he could not the other.

That same Mr. Radcliff whom I have already had occasion to mention volunteered his services--for a consideration--to get over this difficulty. In consequence of a handsome fee which he received, he undertook to obtain the consent of the owners of the slaves to our discharge. But, having pocketed the money, he made, so far as I could find, very little progress in the business, not having secured above five or six signers. In answer to my repeated applications, he at length proposed that my wife and youngest daughter should come on to "Washington to do the business which he had undertaken, and for which he had secured a handsome payment in advance. They came on accordingly, and, by personal application, succeeded in obtaining, in all, the signatures of twenty-one out of forty-one, the whole number. The reception which they met with from different parties was very different, showing that there is among slave-holders as much variety of character as among other people. Some signed with alacrity, saying that, as no slaves had been lost, I had been kept in jail too long already. Others required much urging. Others positively refused. Some even added insults. Young Francis Dodge, of Georgetown, would not sign, though my life had depended upon it. One wanted me hung, and another tarred and feathered. One pious church-member, lying on his death-bed, as he supposed, was persuaded to sign; but he afterwards drew back, and nothing could prevail on him to put his name to the paper. Die or live, he wholly refused. But the most curious case occurred at Alexandria, to which place my wife went to obtain the signature of a pious old lady, who had been the claimant of a youngster found among the pa.s.sengers of the Pearl, and who had been sold, in consequence, for the southern market. The old lady, it appeared, was still the owner of the boy's mother, who acted as one of her domestics, and, if she was willing, the old lady professed her readiness to sign. The black woman was accordingly called in, and the nature of my wife's application stated to her. But, with much positiveness and indignation, she refused to give her consent, declaring that my wife could as well do without her husband as she could do without her boy. So imbruted and stupefied by slavery was this old woman, that she seemed to think the selling her boy away from her a perfectly humane, Christian and proper act, while all her indignation was turned against me, who had merely afforded the boy an opportunity of securing his freedom! I dare say they had persuaded the old woman that I had enticed the boy to run away; whereas, as I have already stated, I had never seen him, nor any other of the pa.s.sengers, till I found them on board.

As only twenty-one signers could be obtained, the matter stood very much as it did before the attempt was made. So long as President Fillmore remained a candidate for reelection there was little ground to expect from him a favorable consideration of my case. I therefore felt sincerely thankful to the Whig convention when they pa.s.sed by Mr.

Fillmore, and gave the nomination to General Scott. Mr. Fillmore being thus placed in a position which enabled him to listen to the dictates of reason, justice and humanity, my hopes, and those of my friends, were greatly raised. Mr. Sumner, the Free Democratic senator from Ma.s.sachusetts, had visited me in prison shortly after his arrival at Washington, and had evinced from the beginning a sincere and active sympathy for me. Some complaints were made against him in some anti-slavery papers, because he did not present to the senate some pet.i.tions in my behalf, which had been forwarded to his care. But Mr.

Sumner was of opinion, and I entirely agreed with him, that if the object was to obtain my discharge from prison, that object was to be accomplished, not by agitating the matter in the senate, but by private appeals to the equity and the conscience of the President; nor did he think, nor I either, that my interests ought to be sacrificed for the opportunity to make an anti-slavery speech. There is reason in everything; and I thought, and he thought too, that I had been made enough of a martyr of already.

The case having been brought to the notice of the President, he, being no longer a candidate for reelection, could not fail to recognize the claim of Sayres and myself to a discharge. We had already been kept in jail upwards of four years, for an offence which the laws had intended to punish by a trifling pecuniary fine Nor was this all. The earlier part of our confinement had been exceedingly rigorous, and it had only been by the untiring efforts of our friends, and at a great expense to them, that we had been saved from falling victims to the conspiracy, between the District Attorney and Judge Crawford, to send us to the penitentiary. Although my able and indefatigable counsel, Mr. Mann, whose arduous labors and efforts in my behalf I shall never forget, and still less his friendly counsels and kind personal attentions, had received nothing, except, I believe, the partial reimburs.e.m.e.nt of his travelling expenses, and although there was much other service gratuitously rendered in our cases, yet it had been necessary to pay pretty roundly for the services of Mr. Carlisle; and, altogether, the expenditures which had been incurred to shield us from the effects of the conspiracy above mentioned far exceeded any amount of fine which might have been reasonably imposed under the indictments upon which we had been found guilty. Was not the enormous sum which Judge Crawford sentenced us to pay a gross violation of the provision in the const.i.tution of the United States against excessive fines? Any fine utterly beyond a man's ability to pay, and which operates to keep him a prisoner for life, must be excessive, or else that word has no meaning.

But, though our case was a strong one, there still remained a serious obstacle in the way, in the idea that, because half the fines was to go to the owners of the slaves, the President could not remit that half.

Here was a point upon which Mr. Sumner was able to a.s.sist us much more effectually than by making speeches in the senate. It was a point, too, involved in a good deal of difficulty; for there were some English cases which denied the power of pardon under such circ.u.mstances. Mr. Sumner found, however, by a laborious examination of the American cases, that a different view had been taken in this country; and he drew up and submitted to the President an elaborate legal opinion, in which the right of the executive to pardon us was very clearly made out.

This opinion the President referred to the Attorney General. A considerable time elapsed before he found leisure to examine it; but at last it obtained his sanction, also. Information at length reached us--the matter having been pending for two months or more--that the President had signed our pardon. It had yet, however, to pa.s.s through the office of the Secretary for the Interior, and meanwhile we were not by any means free from anxiety. The reader will perhaps recollect that among the other things which the District Attorney had held over our heads had been the threat to surrender us up to the authorities of Virginia, on a requisition which it was alleged they had made for us.

The story of this requisition had been repeated from time to time, and a circ.u.mstance now occurred which, in seeming to threaten us with something of the sort, served to revive all our apprehensions. Mr.

Stuart, the Secretary of the Interior, through whose office the pardon was to pa.s.s, sent word to the marshal that such a pardon had been signed, and, at the same time, requested him, if it came that day into his hands, not to act upon it till the next. As this Stuart was a Virginian, out apprehensions were naturally excited of some movement from that quarter. The pardon arrived about five o'clock that afternoon; and immediately upon receiving it the marshal told us that he had no longer any hold upon us,--that we were free men, and at liberty to go where we chose. As we were preparing to leave the jail, I observed that a gentleman, a friend of the marshal, whom I had often seen there, and who had always treated me with great courtesy, hardly returned my good-day, and looked at me as black as a thunder-cloud. Afterwards, upon inquiring of the jailer what the reason could be, I learned that this gentleman, who was a good deal of a politician, was greatly alarmed and disturbed lest the act of the President in having pardoned us should result in the defeat of the Whig party--and, though willing enough that we should be released, he did not like to have it done at the expense of his party, and his own hopes of obtaining some good office. The Whigs were defeated, sure enough; but whether because we were pardoned--though the idea is sufficiently nattering to my vanity--is more than I shall venture to decide. The black prisoners in the jail, having nothing to hope or fear from the rise or fall of parties, yielded freely to their friendly feelings, and greeted our departure with three cheers. We left the jail as privately as possible, and proceeded in a carriage to the house of a gentleman of the District, where we were entertained at supper. Our imprisonment had lasted four years and four months, lacking seven days. We did not feel safe, however, with that Virginia requisition hanging over our heads, so long as we remained in the District, or anywhere on slave-holding ground; and, by the liberality of our friends, a hack was procured for us, to carry us, that same night, to Baltimore, there, the next morning, to take the cars for Philadelphia. The night proved one of the darkest and stormiest which it had ever been my fate to encounter,--and I have seen some bad weather in my time. The rain fell in torrents, and the road was only now and then visible by the flashes of the lightning. But our trusty driver persevered, and, in spite of all obstacles, brought us to Baltimore by the early dawn. Sayres proceeded by the direct route to Philadelphia.

Having still some apprehensions of pursuit and a requisition, I took the route by Harrisburg. Great was the satisfaction which I felt as the cars crossed the line from Maryland into Pennsylvania. It was like escaping out of Algiers into a free and Christian country.

I shall leave it to the reader to imagine the meeting between myself and my family. They had received notice of my coming, and were all waiting to receive me. If a man wishes to realize the agony which our American slave-trade inflicts in the separation of families, let him personally feel that separation, as I did; let him pa.s.s four years in the Washington jail.

When committed to the prison, I was by no means well. I had been a good deal out of health, as appeared from the evidence on the trial, for two or three years before. Close confinement, or, indeed, confinement of any sort, does not agree with persons of my temperament; and I came out of the prison a good deal older, and much more of an invalid, than when I entered it.

The reader, perhaps, will inquire what good was gained by all these sufferings of myself and my family--what satisfaction I can have, as it did not succeed, in looking back to an enterprise attended with so much risk, and which involved me in so long and tedious an imprisonment?