Three Years in Europe: Places I Have Seen and People I Have MetBrown, William Wells
History
Three Years in Europe: Places I Have Seen and People I Have Met
Brown, William Wells
Great Britain -- Description and travel
George, however, did not forget his promise to use all means in his
power to get Mary out of slavery. He, therefore, laboured with all his
might, to obtain money with which to employ some one to go back to
Virginia for Mary. After nearly six months' labour at St. Catharines, he
employed an English missionary to go and see if the girl could be
purchased, and at what price. The missionary went accordingly, but
returned with the sad intelligence that on account of Mary's aiding
George to escape, the court had compelled Mr. Green to sell her out of
the State, and she had been sold to a Negro trader and taken to the New
Orleans market. As all hope of getting the girl was now gone, George
resolved to quit the American continent for ever. He immediately took
passage in a vessel laden with timber, bound for Liverpool, and in five
weeks from that time he was standing on the quay of the great English
seaport. With little or no education, he found many difficulties in the
way of getting a respectable living. However, he obtained a situation
as porter in a large house in Manchester, where he worked during the
day, and took private lessons at night. In this way he laboured for
three years, and was then raised to the situation of a clerk. George was
so white as easily to pass for a white man, and being somewhat ashamed
of his African descent, he never once mentioned the fact of his having
been a slave. He soon became a partner in the firm that employed him,
and was now on the road to wealth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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