Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman: Embracing a Correspondence of Several Years, While President of Wilberforce Colony, London, Canada WestSteward, Austin
History
Twenty-Two Years a Slave, and Forty Years a Freeman: Embracing a Correspondence of Several Years, While President of Wilberforce Colony, London, Canada West
"Swear against you, Mr. Steward!" said she. "I know nothing to swear that
would injure you; I have always known you as an honest, upright man, and
you need not fear my turning against an innocent person, for the benefit
of one I know to be guilty. Nor would I have left my place, had I known
what I now do." So all help and fear was ended in that quarter.
When at length the appointed morning arrived, I arose early, but with a
saddened heart. I looked upon my wife and helpless family, reflecting that
possibly this might be the last time we should all assemble around the
breakfast table in our hitherto quiet home, and I could scarcely refrain
from weeping. I, however, took my leave, and a lad with me, to bring back
a message of the result, if the court found sufficient cause to detain me
for trial. But when I found that I must be tried, I felt too unhappy to
make others so, and kept out of the lad's way. He returned without a
message; and I took my seat in the prisoner's box. I had just taken a
letter out of the post office, from Rochester, containing recommendations
and attestations from the first men in the city, of my good character,
which relieved my feelings somewhat: nevertheless, my heart was heavy, and
especially when, soon after I took my seat, a trap-door was opened and a
murderer was brought up and seated by my side!
Chief Justice Robinson, made his appearance in great pomp--dressed in the
English court style-then the crier, in a shrill voice, announced the
opening of the court, and finished by exclaiming, "God save the King!"
His lordship then called the attention of the jury to the law of the land;
particularly to that portion relating to their present duty; and the grand
jury presented me to the court, for feloniously taking a certain
promissory note from the house of Israel Lewis. The King's Attorney had
but one witness, and that was Lewis. He was called to the stand, permitted
to relate his story, and retire without any cross-examination on the part
of my Attorney; but that gentleman called up three respectable white men,
all of whom swore that they would not believe Israel Lewis under oath!
Then submitted the case to the jury without remark or comment, and the
jury, without leaving their seats, brought in a verdict of "NOT GUILTY."
Thus ended my first and last trial for theft! Oh, how my very soul
revolted at the thought of being thus accused; but now that I stood
justified before God and my fellow-men, I felt relieved and grateful; nor
could I feel anything but pity for Lewis, who, like Hainan, had been so
industriously engaged in erecting "a gallows fifty cubits high" for me,
but found himself dangling upon it He raved like a madman, clutched the
arm of the Judge and demanded a new trial, but he shook him off with
contempt and indignation, as though he had been a viper. In his wild fury
and reckless determination to destroy my character, he had cast a foul
stain upon his own, never to be effaced.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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