The Western Luminary, a religious paper published at Lexington, Kentucky, in an editorial article, in the summer of 1833, says:
"A few weeks since we gave an account of a company of men, women and children, part of whom were manacled, pa.s.sing through our streets.
Last week, a number of slaves were driven through the main street of our city, among whom were a number manacled together, two abreast, all connected by, and supporting a _heavy iron chain_, which extended the whole length of the line."
TESTIMONY OF A VIRGINIAN.
The _name_ of this witness cannot be published, as it would put him in peril; but his _credibility_ is vouched for by the Rev. Ezra Fisher, pastor of the Baptist Church, Quincy, Illinois, and Dr. Richard Eels, of the same place. These gentlemen say of him, "We have great confidence in his integrity, discretion, and strict Christian principle." He says--
"About five years ago, I remember to have pa.s.sed, in _a single day_, four droves of slaves for the south west; the largest drove had 350 slaves in it, and the smallest upwards of 200. I counted 68 or 70 in a single _coffle_. The "_coffle chain_" is a chain fastened at one end to the centre of the bar of a pair of hand cuffs, which are fastened to the right wrist of one, and the left wrist of another slave, they standing abreast, and the chain between them. These are the head of the coffle. The other end is pa.s.sed through a ring in the bolt of the next handcuffs, and the slaves being manacled thus, two and two together, walk up, and the coffle chain is pa.s.sed, and they go up towards the head of the coffle. Of course they are closer or wider apart in the coffle, according to the number to be coffled, and to the length of the chain. _I have seen HUNDREDS of droves and chain-coffles of this description_, and every coffle was a scene of misery and wo, of tears and brokenness of heart."
Mr. SAMUEL HALL a teacher in Marietta College, Ohio, gives, in a late letter, the following statement of a fellow student, from Kentucky, of whom he says, "he is a professor of religion, and worthy of entire confidence."
"I have seen at least _fifteen_ droves of "human cattle," pa.s.sing by us on their way to the south; and I do not recollect an exception, where there were not more or less of them _chained_ together."
Mr. GEORGE P.C. HUSSEY, of Fayetteville, Franklin county, Pennsylvania, writes thus:
"I was born and raised in Hagerstown, Washington county, Maryland, where slavery is perhaps milder than in any other part of the slave states; and yet I have seen _hundreds_ of colored men and women chained together, two by two, and driven to the south. I have seen slaves tied up and lashed till the blood ran down to their heels."
Mr. GIDDINGS, member of Congress from Ohio, in his speech in the House of Representatives, Feb. 13, 1839, made the following statement:
"On the beautiful avenue in front of the Capitol, members of Congress, during this session, have been compelled to turn aside from their path, to permit a coffle of slaves, males and females, _chained to each other by their necks_, to pa.s.s on their way to this _national slave market_."
Testimony of JAMES K. PAULDING, Esq. the present Secretary of the United States" Navy.
In 1817, Mr. Paulding published a work, ent.i.tled "Letters from the South, written during an excursion in the summer of 1816." In the first volume of that work, page 128, Mr. P. gives the following description:
"The sun was shining out very hot--and in turning the angle of the road, we encountered the following group: first, a little cart drawn by one horse, in which five or six half naked black children were tumbled like pigs together. The cart had no covering, and they seemed to have been broiled to sleep. Behind the cart marched three black women, with head, neck and b.r.e.a.s.t.s uncovered, and without shoes or stockings: next came three men, bare-headed, and _chained together with an ox-chain_. Last of all, came a white man on horse back, carrying his pistols in his belt, and who, as we pa.s.sed him, had the impudence to look us in the face without blushing. At a house where we stopped a little further on, we learned that he had bought these miserable beings in Maryland, and was marching them in this manner to one of the more southern states. Shame on the State of Maryland! and I say, shame on the State of Virginia! and every state through which this wretched cavalcade was permitted to pa.s.s! I do say, that when they (the slaveholders) permit such flagrant and indecent outrages upon humanity as that I have described; when they sanction a villain in thus marching half naked women and men, loaded with chains, without being charged with any crime but that of being _black_ from one section of the United States to another, hundreds of miles in the face of day, they disgrace themselves, and the country to which they belong."[10]
[Footnote 10: The fact that Mr. Paulding, in the reprint of these "Letters," in 1835, struck out this pa.s.sage with all others disparaging to slavery and its supporters, does not impair the force of his testimony, however much it may sink the man. Nor will the next generation regard with any more reverence, his character as a prophet, because in the edition of 1835, two years after the American Antislavery Society was formed, and when its auxiliaries were numbered by hundreds, he inserted a _prediction_ that such movements would be made at the North, with most disastrous results. "Wot ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine!" Mr. Paulding has already been taught by Judge Jay, that he who aspires to the fame of an oracle, without its inspiration, must resort to other expedients to prevent detection, than the clumsy one of _antedating_ his responses.]
III. BRANDINGS, MAIMINGS, GUY-SHOT WOUNDS, &c.
The slaves are often branded with hot irons, pursued with fire arms and _shot_, hunted with dogs and torn by them, shockingly maimed with knives, dirks, &c.; have their ears cut off, their eyes knocked out, their bones dislocated and broken with bludgeons, their fingers and toes cut off, their faces and other parts of their persons disfigured with scars and gashes, _besides_ those made with the lash.
We shall adopt, under this head, the same course as that pursued under previous ones,--first give the testimony of the slaveholders themselves, to the mutilations, &c. by copying their own graphic descriptions of them, in advertis.e.m.e.nts published under their own names, and in newspapers published in the slave states, and, generally, in their own immediate vicinity. We shall, as heretofore, insert only so much of each advertis.e.m.e.nt as will be necessary to make the point intelligible.
Mr. Micajah Ricks, Nash County, North Carolina, in the Raleigh "Standard," July 18, 1838.
"Ranaway, a negro woman and two children; a few days before she went off, _I burnt her with a hot iron_, on the left side of her face,_ I tried to make the letter M._"
Mr. Asa B. Metcalf, Kingston, Adams Co. Mi. in the "Natchez Courier;"
June 15, 1832.
"Ranaway Mary, a black woman, has a _scar_ on her back and right arm near the shoulder, _caused by a rifle ball._"
Mr. William Overstreet, Benton, Yazoo Co. Mi. in the "Lexington (Kentucky) Observer," July 22, 1838.
"Ranaway a negro man named Henry, _his left eye out_, some scars from a _dirk_ on and under his left arm, and _much scarred_ with the whip."
Mr. R.P. Carney, Clark Co. Ala., in the Mobile Register, Dec. 22, 1832
One hundred dollars reward for a negro fellow Pompey, 40 years old, he is _branded_ on the _left jaw_.
Mr. J. Guyler, Savannah Georgia, in the "Republican," April 12, 1837.
"Ranaway Laman, an old negro man, grey, has _only one eye._"
J.A. Brown, jailor, Charleston, South Carolina, in the "Mercury," Jan.
12, 1837.
"Committed to jail a negro man, has _no toes_ on his left foot."
Mr. J. Scrivener, Herring Bay, Anne Arundel Co. Maryland, in the Annapolis Republican, April 18, 1837.
"Ranaway negro man Elijah, has a scar on his left cheek, apparently occasioned by _a shot_."
Madame Burvant corner of Chartres and Toulouse streets, New Orleans, in the "Bee," Dec. 21, 1838.
"Ranaway a negro woman named Rachel, has _lost all her toes_ except the large one."
Mr. O.W. Lains, In the "Helena, (Ark.) Journal," June 1, 1833.
"Ranaway Sam, he was _shot_ a short time since, through the hand, and has _several shots in his left arm and side_."
Mr. R.W. Sizer, in the "Grand Gulf, [Mi.] Advertiser," July 8, 1837.
"Ranaway my negro man Dennis, said negro has been _shot_ in the left arm between the shoulders and elbow, which has paralyzed the left hand."
Mr. Nicholas Edmunds, in the "Petersburgh [Va.] Intelligencer," May 22, 1838.
"Ranaway my negro man named Simon, _he has been shot badly_ in his back and right arm."