A Slave Girl's Story: Being an Autobiography of Kate Drumgoold.Drumgoold, Kate
Religion
A Slave Girl's Story: Being an Autobiography of Kate Drumgoold.
Drumgoold, Kate
Drumgoold, Kate; Enslaved persons -- United States -- Biography
On one bright Sunday I asked my older sister to go with me for a nice
walk and she did so, for she was the one that was so kind to the rest of
us--and we saw some sweet flowers on the wayside and we began to have
delight in picking them, when all at once I was led to leave her alone
with the flowers and to go where I could look up at that nice, clear
spot, and as I wanted to get as near to it as I could, I got on the
fence, and as I looked that way I saw a form coming to me that looked
like my dear mother's, and calling to my sister Frances to come at once
and see if that did not look like my dear mother and she came to us, so
glad to see us, and to ask after her baby that she was sold from that
was only six weeks old when she was taken from it; and I would that the
whole world could have seen the joy of a mother and her two girls on
that heaven-made day--a mother returning back to her own once more, a
mother that we did not know that we should ever see her face on this
earth more. And mother, not feeling good over the past events, had made
up her mind that she would take her children to a part of this land
where she thought that they would never be in bondage any more on this
earth.
So she sought out the head man that was placed there by the North to
look after the welfare of lately emancipated negroes of the South, to
see that they should have their rights as a freed people.
This gentleman's name was Major Bailley, who was a gentleman of the
highest type, and it was this loving man that sent my dear mother and
her ten little girls on to this lovely city, and the same time he
informed the people of Brooklyn that we were on the way and what time we
should reach there; and it seemed as though the whole city were out to
meet us. And as God would have it, six of us had homes on that same day,
and the people had their carriages there to take us to our new homes.
This God-sent blessing was of a great help to mother, as she could get
the money to pay her rent, which was ten dollars per month, and God
bless those of my sisters who could help mother to care for her little
ones, for they had not been called home then, and God be praised for all
that we have ever did for her love and comfort while she kept house.
The subject was only a few years old, when she saw her heart so fixed
that she could not leave me at my mother's any longer, so she took me to
be her own dear, loving child, to eat, drink, sleep and to go wherever
she went, if it was for months, or even years; I had to be there as her
own and not as a servant, for she did not like that, but I was there as
her loving child for her to care for me, and everything that I wanted I
had; truly do I feel grateful to my Heavenly Father for all of those
blessings that came to me in the time that I needed so much of love and
care.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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