An Englishman's Travels In America: His Observations Of Life And Manners In The Free And Slave States - 1857 - By J. Benwell.
- Page 162 of 194 - First - Home
The Season Anterior To His Last Visit
Had Been A Very Unpropitious One, And He Was Much Dissatisfied With The
Management.
To prevent a recurrence of this loss, and, under the strong
impression that the hands were not worked as
They should be, he resolved
to inspect the plantations himself, and administer some wholesome
discipline in _propria persona;_ for this purpose, he visited one of the
plantations, intending afterwards to proceed to the others in rotation.
It so happened that he arrived when not expected; and, finding his
overseer absent, and many of the hands not as closely engaged as he
wished, he became violently enraged. Summoning the overseer, he ordered
all hands in front of the house to witness a punishment, and causing
eight or ten of those whom he pointed out to be tied up at once and well
whipped, stood by the while in uncontrollable anger to give directions.
In the midst of the scene, and while urging greater severity, he was
seized with a fit of apoplexy, which was of such a nature, that it at
once closed his career, and he died instantaneously. Directly the man
fell, the negroes collected round him and uttered cries and
lamentations, and the poor wretch who was at the moment the victim of
his brutality, on being untied, which was immediately done, joined in
it. Notwithstanding that my companion had a decided leaning towards the
extinction of slavery, (although he started various objections to its
abolition,) I was quite inclined to believe his relation, having, when
in Florida, met with a somewhat similar instance of the devotedness of
the negro race, in an old woman who was bitterly bewailing the loss of
her deceased mistress.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 162 of 194
Words from 44323 to 44608
of 53222