The Abolitionists: Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights, 1830-1864Hume, John F. (John Ferguson)
Philosophy
The Abolitionists: Together With Personal Memories Of The Struggle For Human Rights, 1830-1864
Hume, John F. (John Ferguson)
Abolitionists -- United States; Antislavery movements -- United States
Mrs. Mott gave much of her time and all the means she could control to
the cause of the slave. She was an exceedingly spirited and eloquent
speaker. On one lecturing tour she traveled twenty-four hundred miles,
the most of the way in old-fashioned stage-coaches. By a number of
taverns she was denied entertainment.
Like other pioneers in the same movement, Mrs. Mott was the victim of
numerous mobbings. One incident shows her courage and resourcefulness.
An Anti-Slavery meeting she was attending was broken up by rowdies,
and some of the ladies present were greatly frightened. Seeing this
Mrs. Mott asked the gentleman who was escorting her, to leave her and
assist some of the others who were more timid. "But who will take care
of you?" he asked. "This man," she answered, lightly laying her hand
on the arm of one of the roughest of the mob. The man, completely
surprised, responded by respectfully conducting her through the tumult
to a place of safety.
But before Mrs. Stowe and Mrs. Mott had taken up the work for the
bondman, two other remarkable women had become interested in his
cause. Their history has some features that the most accomplished
novel-writer could not improve upon. They were sisters, known as the
Grimké sisters, Sarah and Angelina, the latter becoming the wife of
Theodore W. Weld, a noted Abolition lecturer. They were daughters of a
Judge of the Supreme Court of South Carolina, their early home being
in Charleston.
The family was of the highest pretension, being related to the Rhetts,
the Barnwells, the Pickenses, and other famous representatives of the
Palmetto aristocracy. It was wealthy, and of course had many slaves.
The girls had their colored attendants, whose only service was to wait
upon them and do their bidding. That circumstance finally led to
trouble.
At that time there was a statute in South Carolina against teaching
slaves to read and write. The penalties were fine and imprisonment.
The Grimké girls, however, had little respect for or fear of that
law. The story of their offending is told by Sarah.
Her attendant, when she was little more than a child, was a colored
girl of about the same age. She says,
"I took an almost malicious satisfaction in teaching my little
waiting maid at night, when she was supposed to be occupied in
combing and brushing my long hair. The light was put out, the
key-hole screened, and flat on our stomachs before the fire, with
the spelling-book under our eyes, we defied the law of South
Carolina."
South Carolina was long noted for its rebels, but it never had a more
interesting one than the author of the above narrative; nor a braver
one.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account