<\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n\nThe original names of these adventurers were Joseph Grant and John Speaks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Between two and three years before escaping, they were sold from Maryland to John B. Campbell a negro trader, living in Baltimore, and thence to Campbell’s brother, another trader in New Orleans, and subsequently to Daniel McBeans and Mr. Henry, of Harrison county, Mississippi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Though both had to pass through nearly the same trial, and belonged to the same masters, this recital must be confined chiefly to the incidents in the career of Joseph.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He was about twenty-seven years of age, well made, quite black, intelligent and self-possessed in his manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He was owned in Maryland by Mrs. Mary Gibson, who resided at St. Michael’s on the Eastern Shore. She was a nice woman<\/em> he said, but her property was under mortgage and had to be sold, and he was in danger of sharing the same fate.<\/p>\n\n\n\nJoseph was a married man, and spoke tenderly of his wife.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She “promised” him when he was sold that she would “never marry,” and earnestly entreated him, if he “ever met with the luck, to come and see her.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She was unaware perhaps at that time of the great distance that was to divide them; his feelings on being thus sundered need not be stated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, he had scarcely been in Mississippi three weeks, ere his desire to return to his wife, and the place of his nativity constrained him to attempt to return; accordingly he set off, crossing a lake eighty miles wide in a small boat, he reached Kent Island.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There he was captured by the watchman on the Island, who with pistols, dirk and cutlass<\/em> in hand, threatened if he resisted that death would be his instant doom. Of course he was returned to his master.<\/p>\n\n\n\nHe remained there a few months, but could content himself no longer to endure the ills of his condition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, he again started for home, walked to Mobile, and thence he succeeded in stowing himself away in a steamboat and was thus conveyed to Montgomery, a distance of five hundred and fifty miles through solid slave territory.<\/p>\n\n\n
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Again, he was captured and returned to his owners; one of whom always went for immediate punishment, the other being mild thought persuasion the better plan in such cases.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On the whole, Joseph thus far had been pretty fortunate, considering the magnitude of his offence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A third time he summoned courage and steered his course homewards towards Maryland, but as in the preceding attempts, he was again unsuccessful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In this instance Mr. Henry, the harsh owner, was exasperated, and the mild one’s patience so exhausted that they concluded that nothing short of stern measures would cause Joe to reform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Said Mr. Henry; <\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I had rather lose my right arm than for him to get off without being punished, after having put us to so much trouble<\/em>.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\nJoseph will now speak for himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“He (master) sent the overseer to tie me. I told him I would not be tied. I ran and stayed away four days, which made Mr. Henry very anxious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mr. Beans told the servants if they saw me, to tell me to come back and I should not be hurt. Thinking that Mr. Beans had always stood to his word, I was over persuaded and came back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He sent for me in his parlor, talked the matter over, sent me to the steamboat (perhaps the one he tried to escape on.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After getting cleverly on board the captain told me, I am sorry to tell you, you have to be tied. I was tied and Mr. Henry was sent for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He came; ‘Well, I have got you at last, beg my pardon and promise you will never run away again and I will not be so hard on you.’<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I could not do it. He then gave me three hundred lashes well laid on. I was stripped entirely naked, and my flesh was as raw as a piece of beef.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He made John (the companion who escaped with him) hold one of my feet which I broke loose while being whipped, and when done made him bathe me in salt and water.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Then I resolved to ‘go or die’ in the attempt. Before starting, one week, I could not work.<\/p>\n\n\n
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On getting better we went to Ship Island; the sailors, who were Englishmen, were very sorry to hear of the treatment we had received, and counselled us how we might get free.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The counsel was heeded, and in due time they found themselves in Liverpool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There their stay was brief. Utterly destitute of money, education, and in a strange land, they very naturally turned their eyes again in the direction of their native land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Accordingly their host, the keeper of a sailor’s boarding-house, shipped them to Philadelphia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But to go back, Joseph saw many things in New Orleans and Mississippi of a nature too horrible to relate, among which were the following:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I have seen Mr. Beans whip one of his slaves to death, at the tree to which he was tied.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\nMr. Henry would make them lie down across a log, stripped naked, and with every stroke would lay the flesh open. Being used to it, some would lie on the log without being tied.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\nIn New Orleans, I have seen women stretched out just as naked as my hand, on boxes, and given one hundred and fifty lashes, four men holding them. I have helped hold them myself: when released they could hardly sit or walk. This whipping was at the “Fancy House.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\nThe “chain-gangs” he also saw in constant operation. Four and five slaves chained together and at work on the streets, cleaning, &c., was a common sight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He could hardly tell Sunday from Monday in New Orleans, the slaves were kept so constantly going.<\/p>\n\n\n\n