The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus

by American Anti-Slavery Society

These facts in connection with the preceding advertisement, are a sufficient exposition of the 'public opinion' towards slaves, prevalent in these classes of society.

The following scrap of 'public opinion' in Florida, is instructive. We take it from the Florida Herald, June 23, 1838:

Ranaway from my plantation, on Monday night, the 13th instant, a negro fellow named Ben; eighteen years of age, polite when spoken to, and speaks very good English for a negro. As I have traced him out in several places in town, I am certain he is harbored. This notice is given that I am determined, that whenever he is taken, to punish him till he informs me who has given him food and protection, and I shall apply the law of Judge Lynch to my own satisfaction, on those concerned in his concealment.

A. WATSON.

Now, who is this A. Watson, who proclaims through a newspaper, his determination to put to the torture this youth of eighteen, and to Lynch to his 'satisfaction' whoever has given a cup of cold water to the panting fugitive. Is he some low miscreant beneath public contempt? Nay, verily, he is a 'gentleman of property and standing,' one of the wealthiest planters and largest slaveholders in Florida. He resides in the vicinity of St. Augustine, and married the daughter of the late Thomas C. Morton, Esq. one of the first merchants in New York.

We may mention in this connection the well known fact, that many wealthy planters make it a rule never to employ a physician among their slaves. Hon. William Smith, Senator in Congress, from South Carolina, from 1816 to 1823, and afterwards from 1826 to 1831, is one of this number. He owns a number of large plantations in the south western states. One of these, borders upon the village of Huntsville, Alabama. The people of that village can testify that it is a part of Judge Smith's system never to employ a physician even in the most extreme cases. If the medical skill of the overseer, or of the slaves themselves, can contend successfully with the disease, they live, if not, they die. At all events, a physician is not to be called. Judge Smith was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of the United States three years since.

The reader will recall a similar fact in the testimony of Rev. W.T. Allan, son of Rev. Dr. Allan, of Huntsville, (see [p. 47],) who says that Colonel Robert H. Watkins, a wealthy planter, in Alabama, and a PRESIDENTIAL ELECTOR in 1836, who works on his plantations three hundred slaves, 'After employing a physician for some time among his negroes, he ceased to do so, alledging as the reason, that it was cheaper to lose a few negroes every year than to pay a physician.'

It is a fact perfectly notorious, that the late General Wade Hampton, of South Carolina, who was the largest slaveholder in the United States, and probably the wealthiest man south of the Potomac, was excessively cruel in the treatment of his slaves. The anecdote of him related by a clergyman, on [page 29], is perfectly characteristic.

For instances of barbarous inhumanity of various kinds, and manifested by persons BELONGING TO THE MOST RESPECTABLE CIRCLES OF SOCIETY, the reader can consult the following references:—Testimony of Rev. John Graham, [p. 25], near the bottom; of Mr. Poe, [p. 26], middle; of Rev. J. O. Choules, [p. 39], middle; of Rev. Dr. Channing, [p. 41], top; of Mr. George A. Avery, [p. 44], bottom; of Rev. W.T. Allan, [p. 47]; of Mr. John M. Nelson, [p. 51], bottom; of Dr. J.C. Finley, [p. 61], top; of Mr. Dustin, [p. 66], bottom; of Mr. John Clarke, [p. 87]; of Mr. Nathan Cole, [p. 89], middle; Rev. William Dickey, [p. 93]; Rev. Francis Hawley, [p. 97]; of Mr. Powell, [p. 100], middle; of Rev. P. Smith [p. 102].

The preceding are but a few of a large number of similar cases contained in the foregoing testimonies. The slaveholder mentioned by Mr. Ladd, [p. 86], who knocked down a slave and afterwards piled brush upon his body, and consumed it, held the hand of a female slave in the fire till it was burned so as to be useless for life, and confessed to Mr. Ladd, that he had killed four slaves, had been a member of the Senate of Georgia and a clergyman. The slaveholder who whipped a female slave to death in St. Louis, in 1837, as stated by Mr. Cole, [p. 69], was a Major in the United States Army. One of the physicians who was an abettor of the tragedy on the Brassos, in which a slave was tortured to death, and another so that he barely lived, (see Rev. Mr. Smith's testimony, [p. 102].) was Dr. Anson Jones, a native of Connecticut, who was soon after appointed minister plenipotentiary from Texas to this government, and now resides at Washington city. The slave mistress at Lexington, Ky., who, as her husband testifies, has killed six of his slaves, (see testimony of Mr. Clarke, [p. 87],) is the wife of Hon. Fielding S. Turner, late judge of the criminal court of New Orleans, and one of the wealthiest slaveholders in Kentucky. Lilburn Lewis, who deliberately chopped in pieces his slave George, with a broad-axe, (see testimony of Rev. Mr. Dickey, [p. 93]) was a wealthy slaveholder, and a nephew of President Jefferson. Rev. Francis Hawley, who was a general agent of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, confesses (see [p. 47],) that while residing in that state he once went out with his hounds and rifle, to hunt fugitive slaves. But instead of making further reference to testimony already before the reader, we will furnish additional instances of the barbarous cruelty which is tolerated and sanctioned by the 'upper classes' of society at the south; we begin with clergymen, and other officers and members of churches.