CHAPTER IV.
IN THE LAND OF FREEDOM.
On Saturday morning, we bid our kind host and benevolent daughters good-by and started on our journey. On account of not being acquainted with the road, we did not reach our destination until about seven o’clock that night. Going down (what we afterwards learned to be Market Street,) we found the markets open and crowded with people. I cannot say we were surprised, but I must confess that we were wonderfully frightened at seeing so many people at one place at the same time. The like was never seen by either of us before.
We continued down Market Street until we came to the ferry boat. Not daring to look to the right or left, we walked on board supposing all the while we were walking on the street. If it had not been for the guard chain at the bow of the boat, we would have walked overboard, when the waters below would have informed us of the blunder. Soon the whistle sounded, the engine was put in motion, and in a very short time we found ourselves in a little town called Camden. Here we wandered about for a short time, but at last concluded to seek the woods for shelter. We remained in seclusion all day Sunday, not daring to go to anybody’s house for fear of being kidnapped or imprisoned. When night came, we started back by the same way we came, for we had neither money or friends. We knocked around there until the following Sunday; sometimes visiting somebody’s house, and sometimes secreting ourselves in the woods.
One day we were successful in obtaining a job in cutting wood for a farmer who very liberally paid us for our services by giving us a supper and a night’s lodging in his barn. Whether from the fear of us robbing his house, or for the welfare of our safe keeping I know not, but this I do know and well remember, that after we had gone into the barn, he locked the door and, I suppose, put the key in his pocket. By this ingenious precaution of safety, we had to remain whether we wanted to or not.
On the following Sunday during our travels, probably it would seem better to say wanderings, we met an old colored gentleman who very kindly took us to his home, a distance of about half a mile. Our feet at this time had become very much swollen and painful; and we were exceedingly tired. He proved to be “a friend in need as well as a friend indeed.” He fed us sumptuously, and took special care of us. It was our happy lot to remain under his kind hospitality until the following Sunday morning. As was his custom, he went to church and should have us accompany him to the place of worship. After the service was ended, he announced in the church that he had with him three travelers, and wanted some of the brethren to care for them. A woman by the name of Mary Jackson arose and said that her employers wanted a man, and if one of them could go home with her, she thought she could get him a place. The opportunity was too good to be lost, and there was no time to be spent in thought. There was three of us, and one place presented, and it may well be imagined I hastened to speak up quickly, and said I would go. When she got ready we started, leaving my old companions in sorrow. We had to go a distance of five miles. The week’s rest and good care, with the expectation of obtaining work afforded strength and cheer for the journey. This place proved to be Doe Run, in Chester County, and the man’s name was James Pile, a farmer. When I saw him he told me he could give me work with a compensation of four dollars a month, board, lodging and washing. I accepted his terms, and made a bargain to work for him until the first of the coming April. One of the boys (my former associate) procured a situation similar to mine, and the other went to live with a colored family to cut wood for the winter. Just two weeks from the time we started from the land of slavery for that of freedom, we were settled down, independently working for our own bread, and choosing our own employers.
I remained in the employ of James Pile for nearly three months, and then renewed the agreement for an indefinite time, for eight dollars a month. I must mention something here with regard to a daughter of Mr. Pile’s. It was a sight unseen by me in my southern home; and that was the daughter of a farmer or planter standing by the side of her father’s workmen with a hay-fork in her hand, not idly standing by to see the work done properly, or that the men did not idle away their time, but to share in the labor of spreading and stacking the hay. When the time came to take it to the barn, she could do her part in pitching it on the cart. I continued to work on this farm until September.
When I left Mr. Pile’s I went to a place called Chatham, where I hired myself to a man by the name of Sam Hooper, as a farmer; but my particular work was to thrash wheat. He agreed to pay me thirteen dollars a month with board and lodging. I did not remain in his employ very long. I worked around in different places until the month of April of the following year, sometimes thrashing wheat, sometimes quarrying stone and at other times cutting wood. On the 1st day of April, 1848, I entered into an agreement with Mr. David Chambers to work for him for eight months for ten dollars a month as a farmer. He made me his principal farm hand, and I continued in his service until the winter of 1849. On leaving this farm I went to live with a Mr. Joshua Pusey, another farmer, who agreed to give me fifty cents a day, a house to live in and two acres of planting land for my own use, six months firewood, with the use of a horse and team, and a horse to plough the ground. Perhaps some of my readers may wonder why these additions were made to my former contracts; why this house, this garden and firewood? I did not wonder at it, neither will you, dear reader, when I tell you I was making preparations to be married, and wanted a comfortable home for my bride and self. I anticipated great things. Once a slave, but now free and soon to be a married man. Yes, I was building airy castles in my imagination.
As the time advanced and I was to enter upon my new contract, my hopes grew brighter and my joys expanded. When my expectations were at their height, three slave-holders drove up from Maryland in a team and went to a neighboring house that was occupied by a colored man named Tom Mitchell, knocked the door in, took the man out and drove off with him, leaving his wife and children screaming for the loss of a fond, industrious husband and a loving father. This Tom Mitchell was like myself, a runaway slave and came from the same county as I did. That kind of work thoroughly frightened me, and I resolved that I would break the Pusey bargain and leave that region immediately.