imprisonment imprisoned himself for want of bail, and subjected in his defence to an expense exceeding the whole value of the property claimed, or finally of being mobbed or being put to death in a street fight by insane fanatics or brutal ruffians. In short, the condition of things is, that at this day very few of the owners of fugitive slaves have the hardihood to pass the frontier of a non-slaveholding state and exercise their undoubted, adjudicated constitutional right of seizing the fugitive. In such a conjuncture as this, the committee would be false to their dutythey would be false to their country, if they did not give utterance to their deliberate conviction, that the continuance of this state of things cannot be, and ought not to be much longer endured by the South be the consequences what they may. In such a diseased state of opinion as prevails in the nonslaveholding states on the subject of Southern slavery, it may well be imagined what the character of their local legislation must be. Yet it is deemed by the committee their duty to present before the country the actual state of that legislation, that the people of this commonwealth and of the entire South may see how rapid and complete has been its transition from a fraternal interest in our welfare to a rank and embittered hostility to our institutions. [Then follows a review of the Personal Liberty Acts passed from 1843 to 1848 by the states of Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Pennsylvania.] But this disgusting and revolting exhibition of faithless and unconstitutional legislation must now be brought to a close. It may be sufficient to remark that the same embittered feeling against the rights of the slaveholder, with more or less of intensity, now marks, almost without exception, the legislation of every non-slaveholding state of this Union. So far therefore as our rights depend upon the aid and coöperation of state officers and state legislation, we are wholly without remedy or relief. Kidnapers of slaves drove a lucrative trade in some parts of the South. The following account of the chase and capture of a slave stealer is from the Atlanta Daily Intelligencer of January 22, 1851: OVERHAULED: Those absconding negroes, accompanied by a white man (referred to in this paper of the 2a inst.) were overhauled by their owners, Messrs. Calhoun and Storey, after a hot and spirited chase through Alabama, Tenn., & Ky. The white fellow proved to be a young man named Howard from N. Carolina, who had been working in our town during some portion of the past year at the carpenter's trade. At Decatur, Alabama, he sold one of the boys, pocketed the money and provided himself with a pass to join him and the other boy at Tuscumbia. Learning, however, in the mean time that he was being hotly pursued,' Howard abandoned the boy and made tracks for his own safety in the direction of Illinois, through Tenn. & Ky. By the aid of the Telegraph, the progress of the villain was cut short off at Smithland, Ky., near the mouth of the Cumberland, within a few hundred yards of the State of Ill. He is now in jail, subject to the requisition of the Executive of this State all done too, without the owners of the negroes ever seeing the scoundrel, or being within hundreds of miles of him. We wish the young man a speedy retreat within our penitentiary, and plenty of good hard work, and hard usage for his pains of endeavoring to defraud honest men out of their property. The owners returned to this place, with their negroes on Tuesday last. One slave of exceptional intellectual powers, in whose veins ran white blood, escaped from his master at Baltimore, in September, 1838. This man was Frederick 1 How hot the pursuit of an absconding negro might be is illustrated by the following advertisement from a Louisiana newspaper, November 26, 1847 "The subscriber, living on Carroway Lake, on Hoe's Bayou, in Carrol Parish, sixteen miles on the road leading from Bayou Mason to Lake Providence, is ready with a pack of dogs to hunt runaway negroes at any time. These dogs are well trained and known throughout the Parish. Letters addressed to me at Providence will secure immediate attention. My terms are five dollars per day for hunting the trails, whether the negro is caught or not. When a twelve hours' trail is shown, and the negro not taken, no charge is made. For taking a negro $25.00, and no charge made for hunting. James H. Hall.” - Quoted by McMaster, History of the People of the United States, Vol. VII, p. 242, note. Douglass (1817-1895), abolitionist, orator, newspaper editor, Republican politician, European traveler, and lifelong champion of the rights of the colored man in all parts of the world. Douglass gives the following account of his escape from slavery: My means of escape were provided for me by the very men who were making laws to hold and bind me more securely in slavery. It was the custom in the State of Maryland to require of the free colored people to have what were called "free papers." This instrument they were required to renew very often, and by charging a fee for this writing, considerable sums from time to time were collected by the State. In these papers the name, age, color, height and form of the free man were described, together with any scars or other marks upon his person which could assist in his identification. This device of slaveholding ingenuity, like other devices of wickedness, in some measure defeated itself since more than one man could be found to answer the same general description. Hence many slaves could escape by personating the owner of one set of papers; and this was often done as follows: A slave nearly or sufficiently answering the description set forth in the papers, would borrow or hire them until he could by their means escape to a free state, and then, by mail or otherwise, return them to the owner. The operation was a hazardous one for the lender as well as the borrower. A failure on the part of the fugitive to send back the papers would imperil his benefactor, and the discovery of the papers in the possession of the wrong man would imperil both the fugitive and his friend. It was therefore an act of supreme trust on the part of a freeman of color thus to put in jeopardy his own liberty that another might be free. . . . I had one friend- a sailor who owned a sailor's protection . . . describing his person and certifying to the fact that he was a free American sailor. . . . The protection did not, when in my hands, describe its bearer very accurately. Indeed, it called for a man much darker than myself, and close examination of it would have caused my arrest at the start. In order to avoid this fatal scrutiny on the part of the railroad official, I had arranged with Isaac Rolls, a hackman, to bring my baggage to the train just on the moment of starting, and jumped upon the car myself when the train was already in motion. Had I gone into the station and offered to purchase a ticket, I should have been instantly and carefully examined, and undoubtedly arrested. . . . In my clothing I was rigged out in sailor style. I had on a red shirt and a tarpaulin hat and black cravat, tied in sailor fashion, carelessly and loosely about my neck. My knowledge of ships and sailors' talk came much to my assistance, for I knew a ship from stem to stern and from keelson to cross-trees, and could talk sailor like an "old salt." On sped the train, and I was well on the way to Havre de Grace before the conductor came into the negro car to collect tickets and examine the papers of his black passengers. My whole future depended upon the decision of this conductor. . . . "I suppose you have your free papers?" [he observed]. To which I answered: "No, sir; I never carry my free papers to sea with me." "But you have something to show that you are a free man, have you not?" Yes, sir," I answered; "I have a paper with the American eagle on it, that will carry me round the world." With this I drew from my deep sailor's pocket my seaman's protection, as before described. The merest glance at the paper satisfied him, and he took my fare and went on about his business.... Though much relieved, I realized that I was still in great danger: I was still in Maryland and subject to arrest at any moment. I saw on the train several persons who would have known me in any other clothes, and I feared they might recognize me, even in my sailor's "rig," and report me to the conductor. . . . ... Though I was not a murderer fleeing from justice, I felt, perhaps, quite as miserable as such a criminal. ... Minutes were hours, and hours were days during this part of my flight. After Maryland I was to pass through Delaware-another slave State, where slave catchers generally awaited their prey.... The border lines between slavery and freedom were the dangerous ones for the fugitives. The heart of no fox or deer, with hungry hounds on his trail in full chase, could have beaten more anxiously or noisily than mine did from the time I left Baltimore till I reached Philadelphia.... A German blacksmith, whom I knew very well, was on the train with me, and looked at me very intently [on the ferry over the Susquehanna River]. I really believe he knew me, but had no heart to betray me. At any rate, he saw me escaping and held his peace. The last point of imminent danger, and the one I dreaded most, was Wilmington. Here we left the train, and took the steamboat for Philadelphia. In making the change I again apprehended arrest, but no one disturbed me, and I was soon on the broad and beautiful Delaware, speeding away to the Quaker City. On reaching Philadelphia in the afternoon I inquired of a colored man how I could get on to New York. He directed me to the Willow St. depot, and thither I went, taking the train that night. I reached New York Tuesday morning, having completed the journey in less than twenty-four hours. Such is briefly the manner of my escape from slavery and the end of my experience as a slave. Other chapters will tell the story of my life as a freeman. 'BLEEDING KANSAS " On the afternoon of December 4, 1855, the newsboys 85. The on Broadway were hawking an "extra" of the New York Herald, on the "Great War in Kansas." CALL FROM THE GOVERNOR FOR UNITED By Telegraph Accounts from Kansas state that Governor Shannon has telegraphed to the President concerning the present condition of affairs in that Territory. He says that one thousand men have arrived in Lawrence, and rescued a prisoner from the sheriff of Douglas County, and burned some houses and other property. He asks the President to order out the troops at Fort Leavenworth to aid in the execution of the laws. Douglas Brewerton, an old companion of Kit Carson on his Rocky Mountain travels, bought a copy of the "extra," "Bogus Legislature" of Kansas, 1855 [389] |