Table of Contents
PREFACE
PART FIRST BURIED ALIVE LIFE OF WILLIAM WALKER
CHAPTER I SHARKS FED ON HUMAN FLESH — IN THE SLAVE PEN AT NEW ORLEANS
CHAPTER II DICK FALLON, THE DEVIL'S BROTHER — NANCY, THE OCTOROON GIRL — THE COTTON FIELD — THE MURDER
CHAPTER III THE ESCAPE — PURSUED BY BLOOD HOUNDS — THE CAPTURE — THE PUNISHMENT
CHAPTER IV NANCY'S DREAM — A TERRIBLE BLOW — GLOOM — BELLS TOLLING IN THE SKY
CHAPTER V A FLASH OF LIGHTNING KILLS FALLON AND WRITES HIS NAME ON STONE
CHAPTER VI IN OLD MISSOURI — THE ESCAPE — ARRIVAL IN DETROIT, MICHIGAN
CHAPTER VII FARMING — THE SHOLTZ FAMILY — THE MEETING WITH NANCY — THE QUARREL — THE MURDER
PART SECOND LIFE IN JACKSON PRISON
CHAPTER I IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT — ABOLISHMENT OF THE SOLITARIES — "FRENCH JOE"
CHAPTER II THE CONTRACT SYSTEM — ESCAPE AND CAPTURE OF TOM BARTOLES — DIED WITH HIS SHACKLES ON
CHAPTER III THE REIGN OF TERROR — DRAWN FROM HIS CELL WITH RED-HOT IRONS
CHAPTER IV A NEW ADMINISTRATION — A CHANGE FOR THE BETTER — A WOMAN PHILANTHROPIST
CHAPTER V USE OF TOBACCO PROHIBITED — THE HAUNTED ROOM — THE LIGHTNING BOLT
CHAPTER VI PRISON LIFE AT MIDNIGHT — SHAVING ON SHORT NOTICE — HORRIBLE FATALITIES
CHAPTER VII CUNNING ESCAPES — WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY BANQUET — CONVICT McLOUD KILLED
CHAPTER VIII THE STRETCHING MACHINE — RECORD OF MISCONDUCT — FATALITIES, MURDERS AND SUICIDES
CHAPTER IX WARDEN HATCH AND PRISON REFORM — THE INDETERMINATE SENTENCE ACT
CHAPTER X THE LITERARY MEETINGS AND RELIGIOUS SERVICES — THE PRISON CHAPLAIN
CHAPTER XI GUILTY AND INNOCENT — CANFIELD, THE SLAYER OF LITTLE NELLIE GRIFFIN
CHAPTER XII DIED FOR WANT OF WATER — WILLIAM WALKER'S PETITION FOR A PARDON
CHAPTER XIII PRISON LITERARY MEETINGS — ESSAYS BY EDWARD HANLAN, IRVING LATIMER AND WILLIAM BUTLER
CHAPTER XIV LOVERS OF PRISON LIFE — BEGGING TO BE RETURNED TO PRISON
CHAPTER XV SUNDAY IN PRISON — MUSICAL PRISONERS — THE DYNAMITE EXPLOSION
CHAPTER XVI DESPERATE PRISONERS — MACHINERY DEMOLISHED WITH A SLEDGE HAMMER — PRINCE MICHAEL
CHAPTER XVII CANDIDATES FOR THE HOSPITAL — CAPITAL PUNISHMENT — SINGULAR MURDERS
CHAPTER XVIII THE SUNDAY SCHOOL — PAPER READ BY IRVING LATIMER AT A SABBATH SCHOOL EXHIBITION
CHAPTER XIX EXPIRATION OF WARDEN HATCH'S ADMINISTRATION — A CHRISTMAS PRESENTATION
CHAPTER XX WARDEN DAVIS' ADMINISTRATION — EMANCIPATION DAY ADDRESS — CONCLUSION
Thomas S. Gaines

Buried Alive Behind Prison Walls

The Inside Story of Jackson State Prison from the Eyes of a Former Slave

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2017 OK Publishing
ISBN 978-80-272-2532-3

PREFACE

Table of Contents

In presenting this volume to to the public I do not intend that the convict shall pose as a martyr. And as sensationalism is almost invariably incompatible with the truth, I shall also avoid that. Far more eloquent pens than mine have exhausted the subject of contract labor, showing the world the injurious effects it had on the workingman. It is now my aim to show the misery it causes to his more unfortunate brother on the inside of the walls. I make no comments, I merely portray the facts. I am the artist. You, reader, are the critic. But in sending forth this little book, should it gain the attention of some of our public benefactors, and through them be the means of bettering the condition of those bound to these modern despots, I shall feel that I have not written in vain.

PART FIRST
BURIED ALIVE
LIFE OF WILLIAM WALKER

Table of Contents

CHAPTER I
SHARKS FED ON HUMAN FLESH — IN THE SLAVE PEN AT NEW ORLEANS

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I WAS born in Southampton County, Virginia. I do not know my age, for I was born a slave, and all of my ancestors were slaves. But as near as I can judge, I was born in the year 1819 or 1820.

I do not know either the month or the year of my birth, and it would not be an exaggeration for me to say that there is not one human being in a thousand who was born a slave who knows his exact age; and it would have been much better for me if I had never been born. The true meaning of the words "born a slave" will never be known only to those who were born and nurtured beneath its dismal shadow. Fifty or sixty years ago, slavery in America was in its zenith, and it was the most unrighteous burden ever imposed on a race of people, black or white, civilized or uncivilized. Until I was nineteen or twenty years of age I belonged to Dr. Seaman, who also owned my father and mother. In the month of August, 1841, I was taken from home and confined in the slave pen at Petersburg, Virginia, where six hundred other slaves were awaiting transportation to different Southern cotton farms. The slave pen where we were kept was a one-story shed or building about one hundred feet long and fifty feet wide, and was used as a store house for slaves.

It was a partnership building, owned by Natt Blake and General Downs, and was a dismal looking structure, its swaying roof and sunken corners, its sun-warped sides, in fact, all of its appearance seemed to be in sympathy with the echos and groans of slaves which were continually shaking it.

I have never seen or heard of my father or mother since the day I stepped inside of that slave pen. But nature has sown an imperishable germ in the hearts of all children, black or white, bond or free, and the memory of my old mother will ever be perpetuated. And to-night it is just as fresh and green as the day I was separated from her, which was more than fifty years ago; and I am well aware, as the days flash by and the older I grow, I am being drawn face to face with my father and mother who died in Old Virginia long before the war. Why, what power can equal that which confers existence and reason? and what recollections can last so long as the remembrances of mother and father?

You can rob man of his love, friendship, honor; you can deprive him of his liberty, justice; rob him of the light of the sun; rob him of the gentle zephyrs that kiss the wildest flowers and sway the forest oaks; but you cannot rob him of his parental memory.

After remaining six weeks in the slave pen at Petersburg, we were all marched on board a boat called the "Pellican," and started for our destination, New Orleans. It would be impossible for any man to draw the faintest idea of the horrible position in which we were placed while on the boat. It is indescribable.

Men, women and children were packed beneath the hatches like cattle. Think of six hundred human beings living six weeks in the hold of a vessel 180 feet long, 40 feet wide and 10 feet high. There was no air to be had, for the only means of receiving air was by three small grated windows on either side of the boat, two feet long and eight inches wide; and when sea sickness began among us it was surely one of the most horrible places ever visited by a human being. I believe it would have been dangerous for any boat to have anchored within rods of us or traveled in our wake, for the odor from that filthy boat was poisonous to breathe — — cholera and sure death. Surely the "Pellican" was a floating carcass on the sea. Thirty-one of our number died before we reached the southern coast of Florida, and the last five that died were thrown into the ocean just before we reached Florida Straits, and the sharks that were in swarms around us soon had the surrounding water red with human blood.

Six weeks from the day we left Petersburg we arrived at New Orleans, where we were again placed in another slave pen; and it will never be possible for me to speak, write or by any means adequately explain the horrible condition of that slave pen. It was worse than any cattle yard I have ever seen north of the Ohio river.

It was a sickening place! No wonder Louisiana is the hot bed of the terrible disease called yellow fever. But I suppose the black race is the only race on the globe that cannot, or will not, let their grief and adversities completely overwhelm them. They will sing and dance in the midst of famine, as well as in the midst of abundance; in chains as in liberty. Nearly the entire length of Grand street, in New Orleans, on either side, was one solid row of buildings where human beings were incarcerated waiting for a purchaser.

Some of them were singing and praying; while others were drowning their sorrows by dancing or telling funny stories. Very frequently you could see a woman sitting on one of the old rough benches, with her elbows resting on her knee, her hands supporting her chin, and her eyes staring at the floor. It was not necessary to inquire what was the subject of her meditations; for in her countenance was depicted the very thoughts of her soul; and it was visible to all that her mind was in the old log cabin way up in Old Virginia, where she left her little babe; insanity's cold glitter had already began to curdle in her eye. I believe that every supernatural cause is equally as impenetrable to man; and just as sure as the thunderbolt trails in the wake of the lightning's flash, those Southern cyclones, earthquake shocks and yellow fevers that are daily haunting Southern soil are only the re-echos of many slave groans—just retribution from on high. Man is the only sensible being who forms his reason by continued observation. His education begins with his life, and only ends with his death. His days would pass away in perpetual uncertainty, unless the impression of different objects and the various scenes and flexibility of his brain in early life gave to the impression of his memory a character not to be effaced. At that period are formed ideas and observations which may influence his whole life. Man's first affections are likewise his last. They accompany him amid all the events with which his days are checkered. They re-appear in old age and revive the recollections of his infancy with still more force than even those of mature age.

After remaining about three months in the slave pen at New Orleans, my purchaser arrived. And it seemed to me as though I knew the very minute he was coming by my feelings. I am not superstitious; but yet it seemed to me as though I could hear his voice, and was in his presence long before he arrived. The night preceding the day I was sold I had a presentiment that something was about to occur which was of a character I did not wish to meet. The dreadful feeling completely unnerved me. In twenty-four hours I became a physical wreck, and was mentally tortured until I must have been on the very verge of insanity.

Oh! how I did long to be with my father and mother in the old log cabin 'way up in old Virginia. And in my dreams I was in old Virginia, on the same old plantation, using the same old hoe.

But it was only a dream, and the last one that I ever had in New Orleans, for the shrill blast of the watchman's bugle bade us rise up; for it was five o'clock and we must get ready for our daily rations of corn-meal and bacon.

It would have been impossible for me to have tasted of the most delicious meal that was ever prepared for a king. Why, I felt as though some unseen hand was ready to grasp me; even my own shadow seemed to be breathing and watching me; my own footsteps seemed to rattle like the hoofs of the Negro driver's horse on the distant turnpike.

The uncontrollable hallucination did not deceive me; for the very hour had arrived which was to determine all the joys and sorrows of my future life. Before eight o'clock I heard the keys rattling and the door swung open, and the overseer of the slave pen called the following names: Will Clark, Henry Jones, Sarah Tompkins, Nancy Day and William Walker.

The last name was my own, and on going forward I was brought face to face with Dick Fallon, my purchaser, and the worst human being that ever drew bloody groans from a slave. The four other slaves had been bought for John Porter (an uncle of Frank Porter, now living in Detroit, Mich.)

CHAPTER II
DICK FALLON, THE DEVIL'S BROTHER — NANCY, THE OCTOROON GIRL — THE COTTON FIELD — THE MURDER

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BUT I was the property of Ed. Purgoo, and Dick Fallon was Purgoo's Negro driver. The very name of Dick Fallon was terrorizing to all the slaves from North Carolina to Texas.

He was a man (or perhaps we had better call him a demon) about thirty-five years of age, Irish by birth, sandy complexion and a short stubby mustache, small glittering eyes that seemed to sit too far back in his head and which made them glitter like the eyes of a deadly serpent. He could also boast of being the possessor of a small round, head, large neck, very broad shoulders, and he was six feet in stature.

Although he weighed one hundred and eighty pounds, yet he was as supple as a cat and possessed extraordinary strength, and always carried two big horse-pistols, with which I have often seen him, while riding horse back, shoot a crow on the wing.

If ever a fiend walked this earth in human shape, Dick Fallon was the man. I have often heard it said that the wildest animals in the jungles of Africa, when captured and caged, have been known to quail and tremble with fear when confronted with trainers of long experience. I do not know whether it is false or true; but I do know that no other name in all the Southern States was so alarming to the slaves as the name of Dick Fallon, better known before the war as Red Dick, the Negro tamer.

When we emerged from the jail we were commanded to ascend a raised platform, called the auction block, in order that we could be better inspected, which was always customary when buying slaves. We were commanded to walk up and down the platform in order for them to see if there were any defects in our limbs. We were commanded to go through a complete process of gymnastics, and after being thoroughly examined by the planter and his physician that accompanied him, I was pronounced as sound as a rock, as hearty as a buck and as strong as an ox, and nine hundred and fifty dollars in pure gold was counted and paid for me; and I was in the hands of Dick Fallon. He commanded me to come down from the auction block and asked me if I knew who he was. I replied that I did not. He said: "I am Dick Fallon, and I have just paid nine hundred and fifty dollars in hot gold for you, and g___d d___n you, if you do not skin enough cotton in three days for me to get back my money I will skin you just the same as I would any other black squirrel."

John Porter owned three thousand acres of land at a place called Monroe, situated about one hundred and twenty-five miles north of New Orleans. His plantation was stocked with five hundred Negroes; and adjoining his place was the plantation known as the Purgoo Kingdom, owned by E. D. Purgoo. Purgoo himself lived in Paris, France, and his plantation was conducted and run by Dick Fallon, and a half dozen other Negro drivers on the plantation who strictly obeyed and executed the orders of Red Dick.

The Purgoo Kingdom consisted of eleven thousand acres; six thousand five hundred acres was the cotton farm. This mammoth plantation was stocked with one thousand and fifty. Negroes and one hundred and thirteen as ferocious-looking blood-hounds as ever tracked a panting slave. John Porter had justly earned the reputation of being the most humane planter in the State of Louisiana. He would not abuse his slaves nor allow them to be ill-treated by any one else. He lived on the same plantation until the black cloud of rebellion began to settle over Southern soil, and then he sold a few slaves and liberated the rest and moved to Arkansas, where he died with yellow fever.

I did not have long to wait before I was convinced that my new master had justly earned the name of being the most cruel man in the State of Louisiana. Surely he was the most inhuman being that God ever permitted to walk the earth. I will not relate all the many acts of cruelty which I have seen performed by him, or by his command.

The world has long since seen the folly of trafficking in human bodies in America, and a quarter of a million men freely gave their lives for the extirpation of Negro slavery, which was surely the greatest curse known among men.

It would be a crime against my conscience and a sin against God for me to revive the wrongs committed fifty years ago, and not by a human being, but by a fiend in human form. But I shall be compelled to relate one or two incidents in order to connect a link to the chain of circumstances contained in this book.

During the first four or five years that I had been on the plantation I had frequently seen my fellow slaves hanging to the whipping-post — which was made in the shape of a cross — by one hand and one foot, while the other hand and foot was made fast to the ground by a chain running through a post driven into the ground. And although blood was streaming from a hundred gashes made with the lash, yet I have known them to remain hanging for hours in the heat of the burning sun in the month of July. During the summer of 1847 I saw Dick Fallon perpetrate a deed which, perhaps, for cruelty never was equalled in the State of Louisiana.

It is just as visible to my mind now as the day it was enacted, although half a century has passed; and I often wonder why the just retribution which was so swiftly pursuing him, and so close on his heels, did not overtake him before he committed that dreadful act.

One day, just before the blowing of the dinner horn, there were three hundred slaves picking cotton in the field where I was working, and the most of them were women. Women are more expert at picking cotton than men, for their fingers are naturally more supple and not so large as a man's, and their fingers will enter a cotton pod much more easily than a man's. It was customary among the women who had children to carry their nursing babies strapped to their backs, in true Indian style, while picking cotton; and when the child would begin to cry for the want of food, the mother would hasten to her work and get a few rods ahead of the rest of the gang and nurse her child. All of the cotton pickers were compelled to keep in line and side by side while at work; and if any one of them fell behind the gang, even the distance of ten feet, they would feel the keen cut of the Negro driver's lash. It often occurred that one mother who could pick faster than another one, would nurse the other mother's child. Planters were always anxious to have their slaves marry, and would compel them to marry the one of the master's choice, thereby increasing his stock of slaves. Among our number was an Octoroon woman by the name of Nancy. She was married to a Negro on the place by the name of Peter. Slaves were only called by their first names; their last name was the same as that of their masters.

Nancy was a beautiful girl, twenty years of age, always vivacious and full of fun, and made the field ring with her plantation melodies. She had been married about a year, and her child was about two months old. She was called the swiftest cotton picker on the place, but since the birth of her child it had been somewhat of a burden for her to perform her daily task. It seemed as though she had not gained her natural vigor and strength.

The day we now refer to, Nancy's child had been fretting and crying for the want of care; and, in fact, it only lacked a few minutes of the time to hear the blowing of the dinner horn, which was sure to be heard by the time we could reach the end of the row, which was only a few rods away. Nancy was doing her level best to reach the end of the row and care for her hungry child. In fact the whole gang were doing their best to reach the end of the row before the blowing of the dinner horn. Not a song was being sung; not a word spoken; not a sound could be heard, only a steady click, click, click, click of the the fingers of three hundred Negros splitting cotton pods, with the heavy tread of half a dozen Negro drivers just behind them. Nancy was a few feet in the lead of all of us, earnestly struggling to reach the end of the row and nurse her hungry child. Dick Fallon came riding by the plantation from Monroe, where he had been on one of his usual debauches since early in the morning, and on hearing the cry of Nancy's child he leaped from his horse, and came stalking across the field toward us, and the fearful glitter in his eyes and the smell of his breath was a signal that his mission was one of blood. Walking up to the Negro driver that was in the rear of the gang, just behind Nancy, he thus addressed him: "What in h — — l have you got that d — — n little nigger squalling that way for? I could hear it before I left the city;" and before the overseer could answer him he snatched the heavy bull-whip from the overseer's hand, and, approaching Nancy, said to her: "D — — n you; I will stop that brat's crying and set you to squalling in its place;" and as he spoke a blaze of fire seemed to follow the copper wire lash as the heavy whip whistled in its lightning descent upon Nancy's child. The terrible blow even severed the strap by which the child was bound to its mother's back and the infant fell to the ground, and as the mother was bending over it to raise it to her bosom, Fallon snatched the bloody corpse from the ground and threw it in her face. Yes, it was clay! it was a corpse! for the wire lash had plowed its way deep into the left side of the young child's neck and severed its jugular vein as complete as if cut with a razor. Just then the dinner bell was heard, and Fallon went stalking across the field, mounted his horse and went riding homeward to his "dinner," after shedding innocent blood. A complete murderer — — Cain and Abel. Little did he dream, or care, that in all the walks of life, "Thou God seest me." Little did he dream that Justice, the swift and sure messenger of God, was making long and rapid strides and drawing nearer and nearer.

The young mother raised the lifeless form to her breast and turned her eyes toward heaven, as if to catch one glimpse of its ascending spirit, and then she fell into the line with the three hundred other slaves that were slowly wending their way toward their cabins for an hour's rest and consume their scanty meals.

It was a complete funeral procession, silent and speechless; not a voice could be heard, not a word was spoken; there were no Negro melodies, no passing of jokes. The only voices heard were the sweet notes of the mocking birds echoing from the surrounding tree tops—for even the birds seemed to realize our sad situation and were chanting a funeral song while the spirit of the little one rose and was speeding its way to God, from whence it came. It was on the day of that terrible event and standing in the presence of that lifeless form that I swore, in silence, a righteous oath — — that I would have my liberty or die; and from that very hour I began to manufacture different plans by which to make my escape, but I was merely building castles in the air. To think of escape was merely to meditate on performing an impossibility. Little did I dream of what a tremendous task I had before me, ere I eluded the vigilance of my master's Negro drivers and human. blood-hounds. I had not calculated on what a vast tract of land there was for me to cross ere I was safely beyond the reach of Dick Fallon's grasp, and beyond the keen scent of old master's hounds. I had not calculated on the many adversities and calamities that beset the pathways of pedestrians in a free land; much less the dangers and accidents that are ever haunting an escaping slave. I did not know that since black slavery was inaugurated that not one slave in ten thousand had made their escape from Louisiana and successfully reached the land of free soil and free men, Canada, which forty years ago was the only safe place of shelter for a negro on the Western Hemisphere.

The only effectual means for a human being to foil blood hounds when being pursued by them, is to saturate your foot prints with water, thereby erasing the scent and makes it impossible for them to keep your trail. Water has the same effect on deadening the scent from foot prints on any kind of soil, as it does on erasing the smell from any kind of clothing. It is a false idea to believe that by rubbing pepper and other articles on the feet and keeping them in your stockings will make it impossible for the hounds to follow you. There is no possible way to thwart those well trained blood hounds, only by leaving water in each foot print. I have know refugees to bore small holes in the bottom of their boots or shoes and keep them well filled with water, and by so doing sprinkle their tracks and make it impossible for the hounds to follow the trail.

Escaping slaves always choose a rainy night. About three weeks after Fallon committed that horrible crime, my plans were complete by which to make my escape, and I determined to execute them at once. It was one of the darkest nights I ever beheld, and the rain was pouring down as though a river had burst its banks in the heavens and was determined to drag or wash the whole State of Louisiana into the Gulf of Mexico. Blinding flashes of lightning seemed to run along on the ground, and the ground was rolling from the effects of thunder shocks, like the water rolls on the ocean. It was a night like the beginning of Noah's deluge.

CHAPTER III
THE ESCAPE — PURSUED BY BLOOD HOUNDS — THE CAPTURE — THE PUNISHMENT

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THIS was the night I selected to start on my journey to that free land of Canada, which I knew was somewhere under the North Star. About ten o'clock at night I selected the swiftest mule on the plantation and started for Lake Providence, which is about ninety miles north-east of Monroe, and situated on the Mississippi River.

My intentions were to ride that mule until nearly day light, and then turn him loose and let him go back to the plantation as he often did when taken from home and turned loose. And then my intentions were to secrete myself in the swamp during the day, and resume my journey at night.

The mule traveled like a deer for more than four hours, and it must have been very near three o'clock in the morning, (for the roosters were crowing) when the old mule changed his mind. All at once he stopped, and I kept straight on over his head for about ten feet, and landed on my stomach in six inches of mud and water.

When I regained my footing he was standing just where I had left him when I went over his head. I again climbed on to his back and told him to go ahead, but he never moved no more than if he had been a dead mule. I patted him on the neck awhile and then again urged him to go ahead, and he turned around and looked me in the face, as if to say:

"I know just what you are doing; you are running away," and all at once he turned around in a perfect circle for about five minutes and then started like the wind.

I have often believed that mule circled around in order to make me lose my bearing, for it had been running for some time before I was aware he was carrying me back over the same road which I had come; and I never saw any living animal run as that mule was running, and all my endeavors to check his speed were of no avail; so I leaped from his back and I have never spoken to a mule since, and I do not care to have anything to do with mules again.

Dear reader, you cannot even imagine what a predicament I was in. To return to my cabin before the blowing of the horn was impossible, for I was more than thirty miles away. It was Fallon's edict that every slave that failed to form in line ten minutes after the sounding of the horn, at four o'clock, should receive one hundred lashes.

My clothing was completely saturated with mud and water, which made me look more like a big mud turtle than a human being. I was in a land where every white man was a Negro catcher, and every black man was worth his weight in gold.

But something was to be done, and at once, for the rain had ceased to fall and the clouds were scattering in every direction; and by the morning star that was slowly moving up the horizon I knew day was breaking. I left the highway and waded through mud and swamp land until I reached the dense forest, and then continued my journey for a mile or two back in the forest and climbed a cypress tree. The fringe on a cypress tree is sufficient to make it impossible to discover a man except by close observation, after he has climbed twenty-five or thirty feet from the ground.

I was not afraid of being captured that day, unless by mere accident, for I was satisfied that the rain had not only made it impossible for the hounds to follow my trail, but it had also erased my foot prints on the main highway. I selected the forks of a tree and lashed myself to the limbs with cypress bark and was soon fast asleep. In my dreams I was again with my father and mother in my log cabin 'way up in old Virginia.

During the day I remained in my hiding place and I was greatly refreshed by my day's rest, and the dry atmosphere had completely dried my clothing, and it was an easy matter for me to rid my clothing of the greater part of the mud and dirt, by pounding and shaking them, and as soon as darkness began to settle over the forest I cautiously began to look around for a sweet potato patch, or some other means to satisfy my stomach. And after having filled up on googer nuts (or peanuts) and sweet potatoes, I re-filled my water bottle and started on my journey toward the town of Lake Providence, but my progress was very slow, as well as irksome, for I was compelled to keep clear of the highway, and traveled across fields and swamps that were filled wit insects and poisonous serpents. Compelled to travel under the cover of darkness, with no guide except the Mississippi River, and no light but the North Star. I did not dare to venture near a habitation of any kind, for fear of arousing all the blood hounds in the neighborhood, and I was also aware that Dick Fallon and his man eaters were at that very hour scouring the country for my capture. You who live in palaces and sleep in a feather bed, can never imagine the hardships of the man who is traveling through mud and swamps in the dead hours of night, with no shelter but the canopy of heaven, and was startled at the rustle of every leaf, and the chirping of every cricket seemed to cry out "Stop him, there he goes!" and imagine he could hear voices whispering in the still midnight air. I knew it was useless for me to think of venturing near the public road, before I reached Lake Providence, which was the safest place for me to cross the river, and get out of the State of Louisiana. It was a beautiful starlight night, not a cloud was visible, and I traveled as rapid as possible, until the morning star arose high in the heavens. Then I again retreated to the forest, and selected the forks of a tree for my hiding place during the day. On the third night of my escape I arrived at Lake Providence about one o'clock in the morning, and securing a row boat, I safely crossed the river into the State of Mississippi, and continued my journey a few miles along the banks of the river, and then, concealed myself in the swamp.

I was unaware of the vigilance kept along the banks of the Mississippi river between Vicksburg and Memphis for the capture of runaway slaves. I was not aware that both sides of the river was being patrolled night and day by those who made their livelihood by capturing escaped slaves, and thereby securing the rewards, which were frequently as high as five hundred dollars if captured alive, and one-half that sum for their dead bodies.

I did not know that blood hounds were let loose at all the accessible places of crossing in order to scent the tracks of any one who might have crossed the river during the night unobserved. But I was soon made aware of these facts. About nine o'clock in the morning, while snugly perched in the forks of a tree, I heard the old familiar howl of hounds, and although the sound was a long distance from me, yet I was sure a human being was being pursued.

But whether it was myself or some one else I was not able to determine. Blood hounds are not fleet until within a few rods of their game. About five miles an hour is their ordinary gait when following a cold trail, or when their game is two or three miles ahead of them; but as they draw nearer they double their speed, and they never tire and are as unerring as time itself. I have known them to follow a trail for five consecutive days and win their game. The owners of them generally follow on horseback and about a mile in the rear.

About ten minutes after hearing the first echos of their howls it was repeated, but was much nearer and more distinct; and then I knew that it was myself that was being pursued, and I determined to foil them if possible. I at once left my hiding place and started for the river, which was about a mile away, and when having run about two-thirds of the distance they gave me another one of their terrible warnings that they were not more than a half mile behind me.

The thoughts of freedom and the dread of Dick Fallon renewed my energy and doubled my speed in my superhuman efforts to reach the river. It was a race against time, a run for my life. I knew that if I could reach the river it was possible to elude them by wading into the water along the bank, and then retracing a few miles of my journey. The canebrake and underbrush that grew along the banks would conceal me, and the water would cover my trail. But it was a task beyond human strength and human speed to execute, for as I neared the river the ground would not bear my weight only by slow and cautious tread. I was wading in six inches of mud and water, and the bogs and mounds were trembling and sinking beneath my feet, and another tremendous howl from a score of those pursuing man eaters made my blood run cold; for they were not more than one hundred rods behind me, while twice that distance must be traveled ere I could reach the river. It was sure death for me to be run down by that swarm of hunting tigers, for the men on horseback were perhaps a mile away, and I knew I would be torn limb from limb before they could possibly arrive.

I knew I must leave the ground, and very speedly, for as I cast one backward glance, I saw the grass swaying and splitting and the canebrake was cracking and falling, as the hounds came rushing after me, and not more than fifty rods away. A small cypress tree stood about ten rods to my left and my life depended on my ability to reach it.

Reader, picture the scene, if possible, of a man running for his life and a score of mad hounds pursuing him to drink his blood. There were no chasms, no cliffs, no places of concealment, no possible chance of escape, except by reaching that cypress tree and ascending beyond their reach ere they came sweeping down upon me. It was the crisis of my life, and although it happened nearly fifty years ago, yet it startles me, even now in my old age.

I succeeded in reaching the cypress tree, and had not a minute to spare, for before I was ten feet from the ground I was surrounded by twenty-one of the largest and most ferocious looking blood hounds I ever saw; and I was still in great danger, for the tree was not more than six inches in diameter, and I was afraid of its being uprooted or torn down before the men on horseback could arrive. They would have succeeded in doing this had I not begun to throw my clothing among them. First I threw my hat and coat, which they tore into shreds in less time than I could relate it. Then I hurled my old shoes at them, which only deterred some of them for perhaps a minute; and at last I hurled my pants among them, which they consumed as speedily as they had the rest of my clothing. And then they at once began digging and tearing at the roots of the tree. Then I began to realize that the end was near, for the tree had begun to reel and totter just as the men on horses hove in sight; and one shrill sound of the bugle was sufficient to cause those well-trained animals to cease their efforts to devour me, and it also caused them to form a complete circle at the root of the tree. It may not be generally known that well-trained blood hounds can be called from the chase by the sounding of the bugle in the hands of their owner, and the same means is also used as a signal for them to renew the chase, and they will readily obey the bugle at any distance within its sound.

When they were within a few rods of me I observed they were seven in number, and I was greatly relieved to see that Dick Fallon was not among them; but, as I have previously stated, it was a party of men that make their living by catching runaway Negroes.

They all dismounted and the one that seemed to be the leader of the party thus addressed me:

"Hello! up there, you black gorilla; what are you doing up there? Don't you know that cocoanuts don't grow on cypress trees? Come down from there, d___n quick, too."

And I immediately obeyed them.

When I had descended to the ground the following conversation passed between us:

"Where is your clothing?"

"The dogs tore them up, master."

"Yes, and you are d___d lucky they did not tear you up. Who are you anyhow? Who's nigger are you? Why, you look like Adam in the garden of Eden. Where do you hail from, and where were you heading to?"

I replied that my home was in old Virginia and I was on my way to Canada, for I did not want them to know that I belonged to Dick Fallon and I was in hopes they would send me back to old Virginia.

I was asked a great many questions concerning Virginia; all of which I was able to answer, for it was the land where I was born and nurtured; but when I was asked why I was in Mississippi if I belonged in Virginia and on my way to Canada I could not make a satisfactory reply.

It was only a matter of time for them to find my owner, for it was customary with them, when they captured a runaway slave, to advertise for the owner and also give a general description of the captured Negro, a process which made it almost impossible for the master not to know the whereabouts of his property.

Of course I was to be kept in jail during the time of the inquiry. They were somewhat puzzled in regards how to supply me with clothing suitable to convey me through the streets of Lake Providence, for the dogs had torn my clothing so fine that there was not enough left to cover the back of a good-sized rabbit, and one of the men suggested that it would be well to take enough skin off my back to make a suit of clothes for me. Finally I was supplied with a horse blanket and was commanded to wrap it around my body in true Indian style, and we all began to retrace our journey toward Lake Providence, which was perhaps some five or six miles away.

I was confined in jail at Lake Providence, with twenty-three other runaways that were held for identification by their owners and the offering of a satisfactory reward, and all of them had been captured by the same party that captured me.

There was one man held in confinement, of whom I will relate a circumstance that happened while I was in jail and of which I was an eye witness. He had escaped from a planter in the northwestern part of Louisiana by the name of Robert Johnson, and was captured while crossing the Mississippi river at Lake Providence and was jailed at that place. His master had seen the advertisement and had come after him. I had frequently heard him say that he would never be carried back alive; and surely he was justified in his declaration, for from the crown of his head to the sole of his feet it would have been impossible to have found a square inch that was not gashed with the lash, and his clothing was glued to his flesh with the exudation from running sores.

About three weeks after I had been confined in jail I was standing at the grated window talking to him. It was just before twelve o'clock noon, when we observed two men coming up the street toward the jail. One of the men was the Sheriff of the jail and the other was his old master; and the minute he saw his master a stream of a fire seemed to leap from his eyes, and he said to me: "Yonder comes Master Roberts after me and he will take his dinner in h — — l; for I shall kill him the minute he steps inside of this door;" and as he spoke he seized one of the railings of the bunk on which we slept and with the strength of a tiger he wrenched the solid scantling from its place and glided behind the door, which swung inward when opened.

The keys rattled, the heavy door swung on its rusty hinges and his master stepped inside the jail without the least suspicion of harm or that death was at hand. Why, there crouched near Robert Johnson a human lion, with the scorching thoughts of wife and babe, who had been sold only a few days before.

There was a man near him whom he had robbed of his wife and child, robbed of his freedom, robbed of his God-given rights; yes, and even robbed him of the skin that covered his back, and then had come to return him to that caldron of misery that was boiling with the white flame of despair. What comes next? Why, what do you expect to hear?

Like a lion that springs from the mountain cliff, the slave leaped from his hiding place and a trail of smoke seemed to follow his uplifted club as it came rushing down upon the head of his cruel master. It was an awful blow. I don't believe so powerful a blow was ever struck before or since by any man. The solid beam, or club, was torn into shavings, and Robert Johnson was a headless