The Kidnapped And The Ransomed Part 43

"Pshaw! child, don't believe all he says."

"I believe that, for he never would have said such a thing, if it wasn't so."

The young gentleman who had them in charge was closely questioned by the Captain of the boat, and by sundry other officious persons at Waterloo--a little village on the north side of the river, nearly opposite Eastport. He was, however, allowed to go on board with them, and they were glad, for soon they had their supper--the first food they had tasted since daylight in the morning.

All went smoothly till they reached Paducah. Here they were obliged to change boats, and again was their young guardian subjected to a series of impertinent questioning, as to what he was going to do with the negroes, &c. He at length succeeded in transferring his charge to a Louisville boat; but the captain of this was exceedingly uneasy about the slaves--he having seen them when Mr. McKiernan was conveying them back to slavery--nearly four years before. This young man was evidently from the North; indeed he did not scruple to confess it; and if he should be running these n.i.g.g.e.rs off, and if his boat should bear him on in the commission of such treason against the Const.i.tution and the Union, alas! what ruin would ensue. Yet he had straight papers, and did not act in the least like an Abolitionist so after much deliberation, he concluded to let them come on board; but at the same time he resolved to watch them well, lest the fellow should play some Yankee trick.

They arrived at Louisville in safety, and lost no time in seeking a boat for Cincinnati. But lo! the valorous captain of the packet they had just left was there before them, and his sage warning procured from the commander of the Cincinnati boat a stout refusal to take them on. Their young guardian was now sorely perplexed; but fortunately he recollected that he had an acquaintance in Louisville, who was a merchant of some note. To this gentleman he hastened in his extremity, and by his influence with the cautious captain, he at length secured a pa.s.sage for himself and the four ransomed slaves to Cincinnati.

The nearer they approached the end of their long journey, the more restless and impatient grew the mother. She had learned to bear suspense and sorrow. She had waited and been patient; but this rapid and sure approach towards the fulfilment of her hopes was strange and new. She could not eat nor sleep for very joy. The attention of her children, however, was more easily diverted, by surrounding objects, and as the boys found occasional employment on the boat, the hours to them were far from wearisome.

They all suffered exceedingly from cold. Their clothes were thin and old; but what cared he who clutched in his hard grasp the avails of all their years of toil, beside the five thousand dollars for their ransom?-- what cared he if they should perish by the way? He held the gold.

It was the morning of the Sabbath--the last day of the year 1854.

Peter rose very early, and walked down to the wharf. He had been in Cincinnati for a week, waiting to greet his loved ones--how long the hours had seemed while his heart trembled between hope and fear. One hour he felt sure that he should soon clasp in his fond arms the precious forms of wife and children--the next, a hundred fears arose that all his hopes, even now, were doomed to disappointment. He had not heard from them since from the papers he had learned of their return to slavery, perhaps--Oh! how the thought now shook the fabric of his hopes-- perhaps to torture and to death. Four summers had pa.s.sed since then--four seasons where fearful sickness is wont to make its annual visits to the dark, unhealthy quarters of the slave.

But on this holy Sabbath morning, these fears no longer vexed him; for but a few hours had pa.s.sed since the telegraph had brought him tidings of the safe approach of those for whom he waited.

He stepped on board the "Northerner," and the first man he met was the agent of Mr. Hallowell. A moment more, and wife and daughter--both were clasped to his true heart, while on each side his manly sons, with grateful reverence, gazed upon their father's face.

In that embrace no toil or sorrow was remembered; their swelling hearts had only room for love and grat.i.tude, and praise to Him who had not betrayed their trust.

At the home of Levi Coffin the ransomed family were welcome; and as that good man himself received them there, his kind heart thrilled with a delicious joy, in which the angels sympathized.

Rest ye, poor hunted ones. No more shall "Christian wolves" prowl along your pathway, for the golden hand of charity hath taken from their cruel fangs the power to do you harm. Aye, ye are free! How changed from the poor trembling fugitives that so lately feared the echo of your own unequal footsteps. Rejoice! for gold hath power when justice fails. Be glad! for mercy lives, though on the fairest portion of our country's wide domain her hands are chained-- her tongue is silent.

The news of this glad re-union spread rapidly among the citizens of Cincinnati, and on two successive evening, public meetings were held for the benefit of the s.h.i.+vering strangers. Gifts of warm clothing, and of money to defray the expenses of their journey onward, were gladly offered by those who love to "clothe the naked," and who rejoice in the "setting at liberty of those who were bound." Many worthy persons also proposed to entertain the family at their houses, but being already settled at Mr. Coffin's, they deemed it wisest to remain there during their stay in town.

On the third of January they left for Pittsburg. There, also, they were received with joy; for Peter's story had found interested listeners in that city, as he had pa.s.sed to and fro between Cincinnati and Philadelphia.

While they remained at Pittsburg, a meeting was held for them in the Bethel Church, at which the whole family appeared in the clothes they wore from the plantation. The grateful joy of the father, which beamed so brightly from his smiling face, and the shrinking modesty of those who had been redeemed from bondage through his patient efforts, will be long remembered by those kind friends who there offered them the greetings of the free.

On the tenth, the travellers reached Philadelphia, but here they made no stop. Poor Vina was, by this time, quite worn out by excitement and fatigue, and all the family were suffering from colds contracted on the river. So they hastened on to Burlington, where Peter had previously made provision for their reception in the family of a colored friend.

Often, during Peter's weary wanderings here and there, while collecting money for the ransom of his family, was the momentous question asked, "What will they do when they are free?" To answer this important inquiry is all that now remains.

The first few days were spent by the re-united family in resting from the tedious journey, and in rendering themselves presentable to the new relatives and friends that longed to greet them. Then came the delightful visit to Peter's aged mother. She had heard of their arrival in Cincinnati, and had been, for some days, expecting them at her home.

We need not picture the glad meeting of the venerable woman with the wife and children of her long-lost son. The sight of their happy faces filled her heart with holy grat.i.tude; for in each form so lately released from slavery's hated chains, she saw a living witness of her Great Father's love. Year after year her heart had sorrowed for her sons, and now, like Israel to Joseph, she could say, "I had not thought to see thy face, and lo, G.o.d hath showed me also thy seed."

But even in that glad circle beat one sorrowing heart. Young Peter turned sadly from the joyful greetings of his new-found kindred, for the sound of a little voice rang in his ears. "I am not there, my father!" was the wailing cry--and the last parting gift of his dying wife seemed stretching forth its little hands to claim a place among the free. Poor baby!--G.o.d forbid that thou shouldest live--a slave "Let us trust that in His good Providence this little one may yet be brought to share the blessings of that liberty which, without his presence his young father can never half enjoy.

Early in February, Catharine went to reside with her uncle, William Still, in Philadelphia, for the purpose of attending school, and also of receiving instruction from her aunt in the practical duties of a free woman.

Young Peter has obtained an advantageous situation in the service of Mr. Richard Ely, at New Hope, Bucks county, Pa.; and Levin is perfecting his knowledge of the blacksmith's trade in Beverly, N. J.

The father and mother, during the summer (1855), have been at service in a large boarding-house in Burlington; and though they are not yet entirely settled, the arrangements are nearly completed by which, for the first time in their lives, they may enjoy the comforts of their own home.

We must not omit to mention a novel marriage that has occurred in the family since their emanc.i.p.ation. The previous relation of the parties, as well as the motives which impelled. them, may be gathered from the subjoined Certificate.

"This is to certify that Mr. Peter Still and Lavinia, his wife, having solemnly testified to their lawful union in wedlock, which took place twenty-nine years ago, the twenty-fifth of last June, while in the bonds of Southern Slavery, in the State of Alabama, having now obtained their freedom, and having no certificate of said union, being desirous of again solemnizing their union in the sacred nuptial ties, were solemnly re-united in the bonds of marriage, on the eleventh day of March, in the year of our Lord one, thousand eight hundred and fifty-five, by me, a duly authorized Minister of the Gospel.

"WAs.h.i.+NGTON BARNHURST. "Burlington, Burlington Co., N.

J.".

Our task is done. We have sought truthfully to portray the various phases of slave-life which are ill.u.s.trated in the history of the subjects of these "Recollections." The facts are from the lips of Peter and his wife; and are in all cases given substantially as narrated by them to the writer. If their record shall in any wise subserve the cause of Justice and Humanity; if the perusal of these pages shall increase the reader's hatred of slavery, or win one manly voice or vote for Freedom, our labor is not lost.

APPENDIX.

SETH CONCKLIN.

WAS born February 3, 1802, at Sandy Hill, N. Y. Previously to her marriage his mother had been a teacher in the schools of Vermont.

His father was a mechanic, who was accustomed to go South in search of employment. He died in Georgia, leaving his widow with five children, of whom Seth, then about fifteen years of age, was the oldest. He was not wholly without property, but what little he had, he left in charge of a man, who defrauded the family of every cent of it and fled to Canada. They became dependent upon the boy Seth, who took up the business of a pedlar, and so procured a livelihood for his mother and sisters. It is remembered how careful he was to save every penny for them, how he went upon long journeys, being absent for weeks at a time, how anxiously his return was watched for, how highly he was thought of, not only by the little ones of his own household, but also by the children of the neighbors; how the children, when they descried the weary young pedlar returning after a long tramp, ran to meet him and quarrelled for his hand and hung upon his coat.

After a while, Mrs. Concklin was induced by some relatives to go to Canada. There was a more promising prospect for her in that country. Seth procured a situation in a lumber yard; where his employer esteemed him so highly, that in order to keep the lad contented, he took into his family a little sister of Seth's, Eveline.

The lumber man, Mr. W--, treated him with uniform confidence.

This man was subject to violent fits of intemperance, when he would fasten up his house and keep his wife and children in the utmost terror by his wild and frenzied proceedings. At such times Seth was the only person who had any influence over him. Again and again he seized his gun and threatened to shoot Seth, whom be charged with colluding with the family against him. But the lad, as his sister well remembers, stood calm and unmoved by the threats of the madman. So fearful was Mr. W-- in his sane moments, of being forsaken by Seth, who, he knew, wished to join his mother, who had sent for him, in Canada, that he caused the little Eveline, Seth's sister, to be locked up in a chamber up stairs, so that her brother could communicate with her only by climbing a tree which stood near her window. He seized an opportunity when his master was unable to rise from his bed, to take his little sister away. He did not go without bidding farewell to Mr. W--, who paid him his wages and shed tears at parting with the youth. "I shall go to utter ruin now that Seth has left me!" the master exclaimed.

The boy and girl set out on foot for Canada. They met with much kindness. Sometimes a kind woman, a mother, would take them in, give them food and shelter, wash the little girl and comb her hair.

From others they received harsh words, and thus they trudged on.

They were observed and spoken of as "the children." For though Seth was some seventeen years of age, his appearance was very boyish. The country was then new and wild, and log houses were the princ.i.p.al habitations to be seen. In one place in the neighborhood of Watertown, a good woman living in a neat frame house, surrounded by a large farm, a Mrs. Coles, treated the young travellers with especial kindness, took a fancy to the little Eveline, wished to retain and adopt her, as her own children were all grown up and married; and made Seth promise that if he returned to the States, be would bring Eveline to her, and let her have the child. At this stage of the journey, the little girl fell sick and was worn down by fatigue, and grew fretful and cried a good deal, but Seth was anxious to reach Sackett's Harbor; and he coaxed and threatened her. She remembers how they used to sit down by the road-side to rest, and how her brother used to cry, and she thought it was because his pack was so heavy, and she wanted him to let her take it, although it was beyond her strength.

At last they reached Sackett's Harbor one afternoon. Seth found that the steamboat fare was higher than he could pay. He took his sister to a public house, bade her go to bed and sleep till he called her the next morning. The weary child slept till ten o'clock the next morning, and upon waking and not finding Seth, grew frightened and thought he had left her; but he soon came. He had engaged a man with a small sailboat (a smuggler), to take them across the Lake to Gravel Point, which they hoped to reach that same evening. It was September. The weather was cold, with flurries of snow. They had been out on the Lake hardly an hour when a rain-storm arose, and the waves grew angry and dashed into the boat, so that it required constant bailing, and there was nothing to bail with but a leaky old coffee pot, and that was soon lost overboard. The little girl was very much frightened. She screamed and took off one of her shoes to bail out the water. The boat made little or no headway till dark. They were all drenched to the skin, the water going over them all the time. Seth's sister remembers their getting round a dangerous point called Pillar Point. The opposite sh.o.r.e, which they were approaching was apparently uninhabited. But, although the others could not see it, the little girl descried a small log hut in the distance. They gained the land at last, and the man and boy set themselves immediately to gather sticks and wood to make a fire to warm and dry themselves, and keep off any wild beasts. Eveline, however, entreated them so earnestly to go in the direction in which she insisted she had seen the log hut, that at last they yielded. After walking some distance, it appeared in sight, and they found that she had not been mistaken. At the hut they found a young married couple, squatters, who had been settled there only a few months, and who received them with a hospitable welcome. The woman said she had seen their boat while it was daylight, and had watched it for some time.

This couple had their chief dependence for food upon game. The only eatable they had in the house was some wheat flour. The woman made bread for them and for their supply on the morrow.

She divided her bedclothes with them. The hut was so low that a man could hardly stand erect in it. There was no chimney; a fire was made at one end, and the smoke found its way out through the roof.

The next day they started by the lake for Gravel Point, and arrived at sunset. The weather had cleared. As they were approaching land, they saw a two-horsed wagon just starting for Kingston, some four or five miles distant. Seth was so anxious to secure a seat in the wagon for his sister, that when they got into shallow water, he bade her take off her shoes and stockings. They both jumped into the water and ran to overtake the wagon. There were a number of men with it, but they refused to let her ride, as, they said, the road was new and very bad, scarcely a road--they were carrying rails to prop and at the wagon--they doubted whether they should be able to go through. They took no notice of Seth and his sister. The mud was so deep--Seth sinking into it over his boots--that he took the little girl in his arms, who with his baggage made a heavy burthen.

She begged to be put down. At last she was allowed to walk, and tried to jump from log to log, but she fell again and again into the mud and was completely covered with it. It began to grow dark.

They got to Kingston, however, before the wagon. At the ferry a fat, good-natured old woman insisted upon taking off the child's clothes, giving her a good was.h.i.+ng, and wrapping her up in a buffalo skin.

The young travellers reached Kingston at two o'clock in the morning; and with the a.s.sistance of a watchman, found the dwelling of a Mr. Roleau, with whom their mother lodged. She received her two children with great emotion, laughing and weeping hysterically. She had been sick, but was on the recovery.

During her illness her business, keeping a small shop, had gone to ruin, and she was earning bread for her children with her needle.

Eveline was ill for three months, from the cold and fatigue of the journey. Seth took to peddling again through the approaching winter and the following summer. But the winter after that, the second in Canada, he became discouraged. One day he brought back such a pittance that he threw down his pack, and said he would never take it up again. He knew not what to do.

Occasionally he found some transient employment. He searched the newspapers diligently to seize upon what might offer. One day, in looking over a newspaper, he found something about a haunted house. "Here's a ghost story!" he said to his mother and brothers and sisters, "come, let me read it to you." It turned out to be an advertis.e.m.e.nt of a house in Sackett's Harbor which had the reputation of being haunted, and in which the owner was willing that any one should live, rent free, until the place should get a better name. Seth exclaimed: "I'll go take that house, and we shall have nothing to pay." He started instantly for Sackett's Harbor, with the consent of his mother (they had no fear of ghosts), and returned in three days, having found and engaged the house in the suburbs of the place; large and commodious, originally built for an hotel.

While the family were preparing to leave Kingston, a robbery was committed on the money-drawer of the shop, adjoining the, house where the Concklins lived. Seth was arrested and put in jail on suspicion of being the thief. The sole ground of the charge, thus brought against him by the shopkeeper, was that Seth being well acquainted with his two sons, had often been in the shop and knew where the money was kept. The family felt keenly the shame of such a charge; and some of their best friends grew cool. Seth, however, fearless in the consciousness of his integrity, was convinced that he would be acquitted, and begged his mother not to be detained by his trial, which was not to take place for some weeks; but to go immediately to their new residence in Sackett's Harbor. Accordingly she started; it was the spring of the year; the snow was all gone. But just as she had got on board the vessel with all her baggage, and with her five children, a man came running to inform her that Seth was to have a hearing, and she must return.

There was nothing to be done but to let the children (the oldest of whom was a girl of about twelve years of age), go alone with the baggage. The mother gave this child some money and every possible direction, and the strictest charges to make no fire and light no candle in the house till she came. They were to live on bread and milk. One of the children, a little boy, was sick, and had to be carried in the arms of his little sisters all the way. The party of little ones reached Sackett's Harbor in safety, attracting much curiosity and kindness on board the boat. The haunted house belonged to a Mr. Comstock, but a person by the name of Parker had care of it. Lydia left the other children in the boat and went to look after the house. In about a couple of hours she returned with the key, and a man and cart to take their baggage. As they were on the way to their new tenement, an old man met them who proved to be a quack doctor, who, struck by the youth and unprotected condition of the little group, carrying with them a sick child, stopped and questioned them, took the sick one in his arms, and went with them to the house. It soon became dark. The children had no supper. The old doctor said they must have a light. But the children would not listen to it. It would be against the express commands of their mother, who feared probably that they might catch the house or themselves on fire. The doctor expostulated, but to no purpose. Mother had forbidden it. He was, it seems, an oddity. His speeches set the children a laughing. He suspected, he said, that the house really was haunted, and that these little things were the ghosts--they were so afraid of light. He guessed they had an invisible mother.

Three times a day for ten days, till the mother joined her children (Seth having been fully acquitted), the good man visited them, bringing them soup, etc., and nursing the sick child. As soon as their mother arrived, she unpacked her trunks and furniture, and made the place a good deal more comfortable. As she was seated at her first meal with the children, in came the doctor, and stood staring at the party without saying a word. "I was wondering," he said at last to Mrs. Concklin, "whether you were a ghost or a real woman."

The mother brought to her children the cheering intelligence that Seth would be with them in three weeks. Eveline, then about eleven years of age, with her little brother George, kept watch on the sh.o.r.e of the Lake, as the time drew nigh for the coming of Seth. At last they recognized his figure, before they could see his features, on board of a vessel that was approaching, and on which he worked his pa.s.sage. At this period the family was tolerably comfortable and happy. Seth got work. They lived in "the haunted house" one year. Then, as the owner considered the good character of the place established, he required them to pay rent. It was too high for their means, and they removed.

Seth, recollecting his promise to Mrs. Coles, the good woman who had been so kind to him and taken such a liking for the little Eveline when they stopt at her house on their way to Canada, advised his mother to send Eveline to that lady. She acceded, and the child was sent by the stage, and received by Mrs. Coles with the most cordial of welcomes, and adopted as her own, and taught many things. The child was happy here and the next winter, Mr.

Coles, a worthy and elderly man, took her in a sleigh to see her mother. Upon her visit home, Eveline found Seth a soldier. Her mother was declining, and Seth, having the offer of a place as a subst.i.tute, enlisted for one year, nine months, nineteen days in Company B. By cooking for the company, Seth greatly increased his income, and was better able to a.s.sist his mother. As he was not allowed to leave the garrison, Mr. Coles took Eveline to see Seth and she recollects how the old man who was a methodist gave Seth his blessing for being such a good son and brother.

The next fall, of the eight hundred men in garrison at Sackett's Harbor, four hundred were drafted to go to St. Mary's (understood to be a thousand miles off,) and Seth being young and unmarried, among the number. He endeavored to be excused but without success. The hope was cherished that he might be induced to re-enlist when his time was out. His mother parted with him with a heavy heart. She told the children she should never see him again.

With the help of her eldest daughter, the mother was enabled to do something for the support of her children, making sun-bonnets.

Seth sent them nearly all his wages, and kept them so well supplied with money that when his mother shortly after fell sick, and after an illness of eight weeks, died, there was money enough in the house for all the frugal wants of its inmates, and for the expenses incurred by her sickness and burial. In this her last illness, she talked only of her absent son, and her dying injunction to her little ones was to obey Seth in all things.

Upon the decease of Mrs. Concklin, the unprotected state of the orphans was published in the newspapers, so that their kindred might come and take charge of them. Seth saw the papers. They gave him the first news of the death of his mother. He succeeded in obtaining a discharge. His mother died in April, but he was not able to reach home till August. He found the children in the care of an aunt. His interest had been awakened in the Shakers, and he conceived the idea of putting his brothers and sisters in the charge of a Shaker community.

With this intention he visited the Watervliet Shaker settlement not far from Albany, and was so much pleased with it, that he took the little ones, now every where known as "Seth's family," and enrolled them and himself as members of that community. The Coles, having had a daughter with five children come home to live with them, gave up Eveline who joined the Shakers also. Seth remained with the Shakers three years, the children for a longer period.

Upon leaving the Shakers, Seth went from place to place, finding employment now here, now there. He followed the business of a miller for some time in Syracuse and in Rochester and other places, never, in all his wanderings, losing sight of "his family,"

keeping always in correspondence with them. Everywhere he was accounted a singular man, eccentric, silent, "in the way of bargain, cavilling for the ninth part of a hair," and yet generous as the day.

Whenever any attempt was made to cheat him, he instantly appealed to the law, and, it is said, he never lost his suit. At the same time he would turn his pockets inside out to relieve the dest.i.tute. On one occasion his attention was arrested by a poor Irish woman with a number of children, who told him how they had been turned into the street for rent, her husband being in jail on the same account. He asked the amount, and, upon learning it, gave her what she wanted, but it was nearly all that he had. The woman immediately fell at his feet in the street and clasped his knees, and poured out, with Irish volubility, such a torrent of blessings and thanks that quite a crowd collected. Seth, much annoyed, turned to get rid of her, and at last finding he could not silence her, he shook her off, exclaiming in a way that was characteristic of him: "Get away, you d--d fool!"

From time to time, he visited his old friends the Shakers. (His youngest sister remains with them to this day.) Although, according to their rules, members who quit them, lose their members.h.i.+p, yet exceptions occur. And Seth, in consideration of his worth and eccentricity, was allowed again and again to return into full communion with the Society of Watervliet. It impressed him very strongly in favor of the Shakers that they did not recognize the distinction of color.