The Underground Railroad
Arrival from Georgetown, D.C., 1858
PERRY CLEXTON, JIM BANKS AND CHARLES NOLE.
This party found no very serious obstacles in their travels, as their plans were well arranged, and as they had at least natural ability sufficient for ordinary emergencies.
Perry reported that he left “a man by the name of John M. Williams, of Georgetown, D.C., who was in the wood business, and kept a wharf.” As to treatment, he said that he had not been used very hard, but had been worked hard and allowed but few privileges. The paltry sum of twenty-five cents a week, was all that was allowed him out of his hire. With a wife and one child this might seem a small sum, but in reality it was a liberal outlay compared with what many slaves were allowed. Perry being a ready-witted article, thought that it was hardly fair that Mr. Williams should live by the sweat of his brow instead of his own; he was a large, portly man, and able to work for himself in Perry’s opinion. For a length of time, the notion of leaving and going to Canada was uppermost in his heart; probably he would have acted with more promptness but for the fact that his wife and child rested with great weight on his mind. Finally the pressure became so great that he felt that he must leave at all hazards, forsaking wife and child, master and chains. He was a young man, of about twenty-five years of age, of a dark shade, ordinary build, and full of grit. His wife was named Amelia; whether she ever afterwards heard from her husband is a question.
Jim, who accompanied Perry, brought the shoe-making art with him. He had been held a slave under John J. Richards, although he was quite as much a white man as he was black. He was a mulatto, twenty-nine years of age, well-made, and bore a grum countenance, but a brave and manly will to keep up his courage on the way. He said that he had been used very well, had no fault to find with John J. Richards, who was possibly a near relative of his. He forsook his mother, four brothers and three sisters with no hope of ever seeing them again.
Charles bore strong testimony in favor of his master, Blooker W. Hansborough, a farmer, a first-rate man to his servants, said Charles. “I was used very well, can’t complain.” “Why did you not remain then?” asked a member of the Committee. “I left,” answered C., “because I was not allowed to live with my wife. She with our six children, lived a long distance from my master’s place, and he would not hire me out where I could live near my wife, so I made up my mind that I would try and do better. I could see no enjoyment that way.” As the secret of his master’s treatment is here brought to light, it is very evident that Charles, in speaking so highly in his favor, failed to take a just view of him, as no man could really be first-rate to his servants, who would not allow a man to live with his wife and children, and who would persist in taking from another what he had no right to take. Nevertheless, as Charles thought his master “first-rate,” he shall have the benefit of the opinion, but it was suspected that Charles was not disposed to find fault with his kin, as it was very likely that the old master claimed some of the white blood in his veins.