[Footnote [9]: Mr. Knapp, gives me some further verbal particulars about this affair. He says that his informant saw the negro dead the next morning, that his legs were blistered, and that the negroes affirmed that Gibbs compelled them to throw embers upon him. But Gibbs denied it, and said the blistering was the effect of frost, as the negro was much exposed to before being taken up. Mr. Bowers, a son of Mrs. Phillips by a former husband, attempted to have Gibbs brought to justice, but his mother justified Gibbs, and nothing was therefore done about it. The affair took place in Upper Elkton, Tennessee, near the Alabama line.]
The following is from Mr. Knapp's own lips, taken down a day or two since.
"Mr. Buster, with whom I boarded, in Limestone Co., Ala., related to me the following incident: 'George a slave belonging to one of the estates in my neighborhood, was lurking about my residence without a pass. We were making preparations to give him a flogging, but he escaped from us. Not long afterwards, meeting a patrol which had just taken a negro in custody without a pass, I inquired, Who have you there? on learning that it was George, well, I rejoined, there is a small matter between him and myself that needs adjustment, so give me the raw hide, which I accordingly took, and laid 60 strokes on his back, to the utmost of my strength.' I was speaking of this barbarity, afterwards, to Mr. Bradley, an overseer of the Rev. Mr. Donnell, who lives in the vicinity of Moresville, Ala., 'Oh,' replied he, 'we consider that a very light whipping here' Mr. Bradley is a professor of religion, and is esteemed in that vicinity a very pious, exemplary Christian.'"
EXTRACT OF A LETTER FROM REV. C. STEWART RENSHAW, of Quincy, Illinois, dated Jan. 1, 1839.
"I do not feel at liberty to disclose the name of the brother who has furnished the following facts. He is highly esteemed as a man of scrupulous veracity. I will confirm my own testimony by the certificate of Judge Snow and Mr. Keyes, two of the oldest and most respectable settlers in Quincy."
"Quincy, Dec. 29, 1838
"Dear Sir,—We have been long acquainted with the Christian brother who has named to you some facts that fell under his observation while a resident of slave states. He is a member of a Christian church, in good standing; and is a man of strict integrity of character.
Henry H. Snow, Willard Keyes.
Rev. C. Stewart Renshaw."
"My informant spent thirty years of his life in Kentucky and Missouri. Whilst in Kentucky he resided in Hardin co. I noted down his testimony very nearly in his own words, which will account for their evidence-like form. On the general condition of the slaves in Kentucky, through Hardin co., he said, their houses were very uncomfortable, generally without floors, other than the earth: many had puncheon floors, but he never remembers to have seen a plank floor. In regard to clothing they were very badly off. In summer they cared little for clothing; but in winter they almost froze. Their rags might hide their nakedness from the sun in summer, but would not protect them from the cold in winter. Their bed-clothes were tattered rags, thrown into a corner by day, and drawn before the fire by night. 'The only thing,' said he, 'to which I can compare them, in winter, is stock without a shelter.'
"He made the following comparison between the condition of slaves in Kentucky and Missouri. So far as he was able to compare them, he said, that in Missouri the slaves had better quarters-but are not so well clad, and are more severely punished than in Kentucky. In both states, the slaves are huddled together, without distinction of sex, into the same quarter, till it is filled, then another is built; often two or three families in a log hovel, twelve feet square.
"It is proper to state, that the sphere of my informant's observation was mainly in the region of Hardin co., Kentucky, and the eastern part of Missouri, and not through those states generally.
"Whilst at St. Louis, a number of years ago, as he was going to work with Mr. Henry Males, and another carpenter, they heard groans from a barn by the road-side: they stopped, and looking through the cracks of the barn, saw a negro bound hand and foot to a post, so that his toes just touched the ground; and his master, Captain Thorpe, was inflicting punishment; he had whipped him till exhausted,—rested himself, and returned again to the punishment. The wretched sufferer was in a most pitiable condition, and the warm blood and dry dust of the barn had formed a mortar up to his instep. Mr. Males jumped the fence, and remonstrated so effectually with Capt. Thorpe, that he ceased the punishment. It was six weeks before that slave could put on his shirt!
"John Mackey, a rich slaveholder, lived near Clarksville, Pike co., Missouri, some years since. He whipped his slave Billy, a boy fourteen years old, till he was sick and stupid; he then sent him home. Then, for his stupidity, whipped him again, and fractured his skull with an axe-helve. He buried him away in the woods; dark words were whispered, and the body was disinterred. A coroner's inquest was held, and Mr. R. Anderson, the coroner, brought in a verdict of death from fractured skull, occasioned by blows from an axe-handle, inflicted by John Mackey. The case was brought into court, but Mackey was rich, and his murdered victim was his SLAVE; after expending about $500 be walked free.
"One Mrs. Mann, living near ——, in —— co., Missouri was known to be very cruel to her slaves. She had a bench made purposely to whip them upon; and what she called her "six pound paddle," an instrument of prodigious torture, bored through with holes; this she would wield with both hands as she stood over her prostrate victim.
"She thus punished a hired slave woman named Fanny, belonging to Mr. Charles Trabue, who lives neat Palmyra, Marion co., Missouri; on the morning after the punishment Fanny was a corpse; she was silently and quickly buried, but rumor was not so easily stopped. Mr. Trabue heard of it, and commenced suit for his property. The murdered slave was disinterred, and an inquest held; her back was a mass of jellied muscle; and the coroner brought in a verdict of death by the 'six pound paddle.' Mrs. Mann fled for a few months, but returned again, and her friends found means to protract the suit.
"This same Mrs. Mann had another hired slave woman living with her, called Patterson's Fanny, she belonged to a Mr. Patterson; she had a young babe with her, just beginning to creep. One day, after washing, whilst a tub of rinsing water yet stood in the kitchen, Mrs. Mann came out in haste, and sent Fanny to do something out of doors. Fanny tried to beg off—she was afraid to leave her babe, lest it should creep to the tub and get hurt—Mrs. M. said she would watch the babe, and sent her off. She went with much reluctance, and heard the child struggle as she went out the door. Fearing lest Mrs. M. should leave the babe alone, she watched the room, and soon saw her pass out of the opposite door. Immediately Fanny hurried in, and looked around for her babe, she could not see it, she looked at the tub—there her babe was floating, a strangled corpse. The poor woman gave a dreadful scream; and Mrs. M. rushed into the room, with her hands raised, and exclaimed, 'Heavens, Fanny! have you drowned your child?' It was vain for the poor bereaved one to attempt to vindicate herself: in vain she attempted to convince them that the babe had not been alone a moment, and could not have drowned itself; and that she had not been in the house a moment, before she screamed at discovering her drowned babe. All was false! Mrs. Mann declared it was all pretence—that Fanny had drowned her own babe, and now wanted to lay the blame upon her! and Mrs. Mann was a white woman—of course her word was more valuable than the oaths of all the slaves of Missouri. No evidence but that of slaves could be obtained, or Mr. Patterson would have prosecuted for his 'loss of property.' As it was, every one believed Mrs. M. guilty, though the affair was soon hushed up."
Extract of a letter from Col. THOMAS ROGERS, a native of Kentucky, now an elder in the Presbyterian Church at New Petersburg, Highland co., Ohio.
"When a boy, in Bourbon co., Kentucky, my father lived near a slaveholder of the name of Clay, who had a large number of slaves; I remember being often at their quarters; not one of their shanties, or hovels, had any floor but the earth. Their clothing was truly neither fit for covering nor decency. We could distinctly, of a still morning, hear this man whipping his blacks, and hear their screams from my father's farm; this could be heard almost any still morning about the dawn of day. It was said to be his usual custom to repair, about the break of day, to their cabin doors, and, as the blacks passed out, to give them as many strokes of his cowskin as opportunity afforded; and he would proceed in this manner from cabin to cabin until they were all out. Occasionally some of his slaves would abscond, and upon being retaken they were punished severely; and some of them, it is believed, died in consequence of the cruelty of their usage. I saw one of this man's slaves, about seventeen years old, wearing a collar, with long iron horns extending from his shoulders far above his head.
"In the winter of 1828-29 I traveled through part of the states of Maryland and Virginia to Baltimore. At Frost Town, on the national road, I put up for the night. Soon after, there came in a slaver with his drove of slaves; among them were two young men, chained together. The bar room was assigned to them for their place of lodging—those in chains were guarded when they had to go out. I asked the 'owner' why he kept these men chained; he replied, that they were stout young fellows, and should they rebel, he and his son would not be able to manage them. I then left the room, and shortly after heard a scream, and when the landlady inquired the cause, the slaver coolly told her not to trouble herself, he was only chastising one of his women. It appeared that three days previously her child had died on the road, and been thrown into a hole or crevice in the mountain, and a few stones thrown over it; and the mother weeping for her child was chastised by her master, and told by him, she 'should have something to cry for.' The name of this man I can give if called for.
"When engaged in this journey I spent about one month with my relations in Virginia. It being shortly after new year, the time of hiring was over; but I saw the pounds, and the scaffolds which remained of the pounds, in which the slaves had been penned up"
M. GEORGE W. WESTGATE, of Quincy, Illinois, who lived in the southwestern slave states a number of years, has furnished the following statement.