Chapter V: Treatment of the Sick (3)

"I do not know that any thing could be gained by particularizing the scenes of _horrible barbarity_, which fell under my observation during my _short_ residence in one of the wealthiest, most intelligent, and most moral parts of Georgia. Their _number_ and _atrocity_ are such, that I am confident they would gain credit with none but _abolitionists_. Every thing will be conveyed in the remark, that in a state of society calculated to foster the worst passions of our nature, the slave derives _no protection_ either from _law_ or _public opinion_, and that ALL the cruelties which the Russians are reported to have acted towards the Poles, after their late subjugation, ARE SCENES OF EVERY-DAY OCCURRENCE in the southern states. This statement, incredible as it may seem, falls short, very far short of the truth."

The foregoing is extracted from a letter written by Dr. Finley to Rev. Asa Mahan, his former pastor, then of Cincinnati, now President of Oberlin Seminary.

TESTIMONY OF REV. WILLIAM T. ALLAN, OF ILLINOIS, _Son of a Slaveholder, Rev. Dr. Allan of Huntsville, Ala._

"At our house it is so common to hear their (the slaves') screams, that we think nothing of it: and lest any one should think that in _general_ the slaves are well treated, let me be distinctly understood:--_cruelty_ is the _rule_, and _kindness_ the _exception_."

Extract of a letter dated July 2d, 1834, from Mr. NATHAN COLE, of St. Louis, Missouri, to Arthur Tappan, Esq. of this city:

"I am not an advocate of the immediate and unconditional emancipation of the slaves of our country, yet _no man has ever yet depicted the wretchedness of the situation of the slaves in colors as dark for the truth_.... I know that many good people _are not aware of the treatment to which slaves are usually subjected_, nor have they any just idea of the extent of the evil."

TESTIMONY OF REV. JAMES A. THOME, _A native of Kentucky--Son of Arthur Thome Esq., till recently a Slaveholder._

"Slavery is the parent of more suffering than has flowed from any one source since the date of its existence. Such sufferings too! _Sufferings inconceivable and innumerable--unmingled wretchedness_ from the ties of nature rudely broken and destroyed, the _acutest bodily tortures, groans, tears and blood_--lying forever in weariness and painfulness, in watchings, in hunger and in thirst, in cold and nakedness.

"Brethren of the North, be not deceived. _These sufferings still exist_, and despite the efforts of their cruel authors to hush them down, and confine them within the precincts of their own plantations, they will ever and anon, struggle up and reach the ear of humanity."--_Mr. Thome's Speech at New York, May,_ 1834.

TESTIMONY OF THE MARYVILLE (TENNESSEE) INTELLIGENCER, OF OCT. 4, 1835.

The Editor, in speaking of the sufferings of the slaves which are taken by the internal trade to the South West, says:

"Place yourself in imagination, for a moment, in their condition. With _heavy galling chains_, riveted upon your person; _half-naked, half-starved_; your back _lacerated_ with the 'knotted Whip;' traveling to a region where your _condition through time will be second only to the wretched creatures in Hell_.

"This depicting is not visionary. Would to God that it was."

TESTIMONY OF THE PRESBYTERIAN SYNOD OF KENTUCKY; _A large majority of whom are slaveholders._

"This system licenses and produces _great cruelty_.

"Mangling, imprisonment, starvation, every species of torture, may be inflicted upon him, (the slave,) and he has no redress.

"There are now in our whole land two millions of human beings, exposed, defenceless, to every insult, and every injury short of maiming or death, which their fellow men may choose to inflict. _They suffer all_ that can be inflicted by wanton caprice, by grasping avarice, by brutal lust, by malignant spite, and by insane anger. Their happiness is the sport of every whim, and the prey of every passion that may, occasionally, or habitually, infest the master's bosom. If we could calculate the amount of wo endured by ill-treated slaves, it would overwhelm every compassionate heart--it would move even the obdurate to sympathy. There is also a vast sum of suffering inflicted upon the slave by humane masters, as a punishment for that idleness and misconduct which slavery naturally produces.

"_Brutal stripes_ and all the varied kinds of personal indignities, are not the only species of cruelty which slavery licenses."

TESTIMONY OF THE REV. N.H. HARDING, Pastor of the Presbyterian Church, in Oxford, North Carolina, a slaveholder.

"I am greatly surprised that you should in any form have been the apologist of a system so full of deadly poison to all holiness and benevolence as slavery, the concocted essence of fraud, selfishness, and cold hearted tyranny, and the fruitful parent of unnumbered evils, both to the oppressor and the oppressed, THE ONE THOUSANDTH PART OF WHICH HAS NEVER BEEN BROUGHT TO LIGHT."

MR. ASA A. STONE, a theological student, who lived near Natchez, (Mi.,) in 1834 and 5, sent the following with other testimony, to be published under his own name, in the N.Y. Evangelist, while he was still residing there.

"Floggings for all offences, including deficiencies in work, are _frightfully common_, and _most terribly severe._

"_Rubbing with salt and red pepper is very common after a severe whipping._"

TESTIMONY OF REV. PHINEAS SMITH, Centreville, Allegany Co., N.Y. who lived four years at the South.

"They are badly clothed, badly fed, wretchedly lodged, unmercifully whipped, from month to month, from year to year, from childhood to old age."

REV. JOSEPH M. SADD, Castile, Genessee CO. N.Y. who was till recently a preacher in Missouri, says,

"It is true that barbarous cruelties are inflicted upon them, such as terrible lacerations with the whip, and excruciating tortures are sometimes experienced from the thumb screw."

Extract of a letter from SARAH M. GRIMKÉ, dated 4th Month, 2nd, 1839

"If the following extracts from letters which I have received from South Carolina, will be of any use thou art at liberty to publish them. I need not say, that the names of the writers are withheld of necessity, because such sentiments if uttered at the south would peril their lives."

EXTRACTS

--South Carolina, 4th Month, 5th, 1835. "With regard to slavery I must confess, though we had heard a great deal on the subject, we found on coming South the _half_, the _worst_ half too, had not been told us; not that we have ourselves seen much oppression, though truly we have felt its deadening influence, but the accounts we have received from every tongue that nobly dares to speak upon the subject, are indeed _deplorable_. To quote the language of a lady, who with true Southern hospitality, received us at her mansion. "The _northern_ people don't know anything of slavery at all, they think it is _perpetual bondage merely_, but of the _depth of degradation_ that that word involves, they have no conception; if they had any just idea of it, they would I am sure use every effort until an end was put to such a shocking system.'

"Another friend writing from South Carolina, and who sustains herself the legal relation of slaveholder, in a letter dated April 4th, 1838, says--'I have some time since, given you my views on the subject of slavery, which so much engrosses your attention. I would most willingly forget what I have seen and heard in my own family, with regard to the slaves. _I shudder when I think of it_, and increasingly feel that slavery is a curse since it leads to such _cruelty_.'"

PUNISHMENTS.