The Life and Sufferings of Leonard Black, a Fugitive from Slavery — Reading Companion

It is my object to give to the reader a plain, simple narrative of the more interesting portion of my life, while in slavery.

I was born in Annarundel County, State of Maryland, about sixty miles below Baltimore, and lived a slave more than twenty years. My old master was a physician, but I think it prudent to withhold his name. No one, who has always enjoyed the right of liberty, can realize the horrors of slavery. To be at the will of another, to be _owned_ like a cow or horse, and liable at any moment to be sold to the highest bidder, to be transported to a distant part of the country, leaving the dearest relatives behind; to be, in fine, ground down mentally and physically by the untold curses of slavery, may be a very pretty thing to the masters of the “peculiar institution,” but it is death to the slaves.

After more than twenty years of bondage, God delivered me from it, with a strong hand and an outstretched arm, as he did Israel of old.

As near as I can remember, my mother and sister were sold and taken to New Orleans, leaving four brothers and myself behind. We were all placed out. At six years of age I was placed with a Mr. Bradford, separated from my father, mother and family. But the eye of God was upon me, and blessed me. My master was a carpenter, and much from home--Mrs. Bradford beat me so much that her husband sent me to his father’s. Mrs. Bradford ordered me one day to take a bushel of corn up stairs; but I was unable to do it, upon which she knocked me down with the johnny-cake board, cutting my head so badly that it bled more than a quart. It was then that I thought of my mother. My little friends--who have your liberty, and the protecting hand of parents--these are some of the fruits of slavery; let your hearts warm with gratitude to the great Giver of all good, for the blessings you enjoy. Mrs. Bradford had a son about ten years old; she used to make him beat me and spit in my face. Here I was, a poor slave boy, without father or mother to take my part.

At the end of two years, Mrs. Bradford beat me so much, that her husband, fearing she would kill me, placed me at his father’s, where I remained until the death of the old gentleman. But old Mr. Bradford was worse than Mrs. Bradford! He had been a professor of religion, a class leader in the Methodist Church, but at this time he was a backslider; yea, a wanderer from God, and as cold as though he had never been warmed by the vivifying power of the religion of Jesus Christ.

I lived in this family seven and a half years, and when I left I was thirteen years old. During this time I had no hat, no pantaloons, but one pair of shoes, and wore a lindsey slip only. I was not allowed to sit down while I ate my meals. For my breakfast I had a pint of pot liquor, half a herring, and a little piece of bread. Whether this would stay the cravings of a young appetite or not, there was no more to be had. For my dinner I had a pint of pot liquor, and the skin off of the pork. I must say as the colored people say at the south, when singing to cheer their hearts while under the burning sun, and the crack of the whip, remembering what is placed before them every day for food--“My old master is a hard-hearted man; he eats the meat, and gives poor nigger bones.” At night I had a bit of bread for my supper, and a piece of carpet for my bed, spread down on the hearth, winter and summer. In the winter, when the fire got low, I used to burn my feet by getting them into the embers.

My work, in the winter time, was to fetch wood from the swamp up to the house. Being without shoes or hat, and thinly clad, I used to go into the house to warm myself. When in the house for this purpose, at one time, old Mr. Bradford followed me in, and said: “If you want to be warmed, I’ll warm you.” He took the tongs, heated them in the fire, and branded my legs; and the scars are there to this day. I could not sit down in consequence of the wound. He whipped me also, and used to put my head under the fence.