NOTE: Free essay sample provided on this page should be used for references or sample purposes only. The sample essay is available to anyone, so any direct quoting without mentioning the source will be considered plagiarism by schools, colleges and universities that use plagiarism detection software. To get a completely brand-new, plagiarism-free essay, please use our essay writing service.
One click instant price quote
... and they had to steal food from neighboring farms to survive. Frederick received many beatings and saw worse ones given to others. He then organized a Sunday religious service for the slaves that met in near by Saint Michaels. The services were soon stopped by a mob led by Thomas Auld. Thomas Auld had found Frederick especially difficult to control so he decided to have someone tame his unruly slave.
In January 1834, Frederick was sent to work for Edward Covey, a poor farmer who had gained a reputation around Saint Michaels for being an expert "slave breaker." Frederick was not too displeased with this arrangement because Covey fed his slaves better than Auld did. The slaves on Covey's farm worked from dawn until after nightfall, plowing, hoeing, and picking corn. Although the men were given plenty of food, they had very little time allotted to eat before they were sent back to work. Covey hid in bushes and spied on the slaves as they worked, if he caught one of them resting he would beat him with thick branches. After being on the farm for one week, Frederick was given a serious beating for letting an oxen team run wild. During the months to follow, he was continually whipped until he began to feel that he was "broken.
On one hot August afternoon, his strength failed him and he collapsed in the field. Covey kicked and beat Frederick to no avail and finally walked away in disgust. Frederick mustered the strength to get up and walk to the Auld farm, where he pleaded with his master to let him stay. Auld had little sympathy for him and sent him back to Covey. Beaten down as Frederick was, he found the strength to rebel when Covey began tying him to a post in preparation for a whipping. "At that moment - from whence came the spirit I don't know - I resolved to fight, " Frederick wrote. "I seized Covey hard by the throat, and as I did so, I rose. Covey and Frederick fought for almost two hours until Covey finally gave up telling Frederick that his beating would have been less severe had he not resisted. "The truth was, " said Frederick, "that he had not whipped me at all.
Frederick had discovered an important truth: "Men are whipped oftenest who are whipped easiest. He was lucky, legally; a slave could be killed for resisting his master. However, Covey had a reputation to protect and did not want it known that he could not control a 16 -year-old boy. After working for Covey for a year, Frederick was sent to work for a farmer named William Freeland, who was a relatively kind master. However, by now, Frederick did not care about having a kind master. All Frederick wanted was his freedom.
He started an illegal school for blacks in the area that secretly met at night and on Sundays, and with five other slaves, he began to plan his escape to the North. A year had passed since Frederick began working for William Freeland and his plan of escape had been completed. His group planned to steal a boat, row to the northern tip of Chesapeake Bay, and then flee on foot to the free state of Pennsylvania. The escape was supposed to take place just before the Easter holiday in 1836, but one of Frederick's associates had exposed the plot and a group of armed white men captured the slaves and put them in jail. Frederick was in jail for about a week. While imprisoned, he was inspected by slave traders, and he fully expected that he would be sold to "a life of living death" in the Deep South.
To his surprise, Thomas Auld came and released him. Then Frederick's master sent him back to Hugh Auld in Baltimore. The two brothers had finally settled their dispute. Frederick was now 18 years old, 6 feet tall and very strong from his work in the fields. Hugh Auld decided that Frederick should work as a caulker (a man who forced sealing matter into the seams in a boat's hull to make it watertight) to earn his keep. He was hired out to a local shipbuilder so that he could learn the trade.
While apprenticing at the shipyard, Frederick was harassed by white workers who did not want blacks, slaves, or free, competing with them for jobs. One afternoon, a group of white apprentices beat up Frederick and nearly took out one of his eyes. Hugh Auld was angry when he saw what had happened and attempted to press charges against the assailants. However, none of the white employees of the shipyard would step forward to testify about the beating. Free blacks had little hope of obtaining justice through the southern court system, which refused to accept a black person's testimony against a white person. Therefore, the case had to be dropped.
After Frederick recovered from his injuries, he began apprenticing at the shipyard where Hugh Auld worked. In Frederick's spare time he met with a group of educated free blacks and indulged in the luxury of being a student again. Some of the free blacks formed an educational association called the East Baltimore Mental Improvement Society, which Frederick had been admitted to. This is where Frederick learned his debating skills. At one of the society's meetings, Frederick met a free black woman named Anna Murray. Anna was a few years older than Frederick and was a servant for a wealthy Baltimore family.
Although Anna was a plain, uneducated woman, Frederick admired her qualities of thriftiness, industriousness, and religiousness. Anna and Frederick were soon in love and in 1838, they were engaged. Love and courtship increased Frederick's discontent with his status. After Frederick's escape attempt, Thomas Auld had promised him that if he worked hard he would be freed when he turned 25. Nevertheless, Frederick did not trust his master, and he resolved to escape. However, escaping would be very difficult due to professional slave catchers patrolling the borders between slave states and free states, and free blacks traveling by train or steamboat had to carry official papers li...
Free research essays on topics related to: thomas auld, free blacks, frederick, hugh auld, auld
Research essay sample on Hugh Auld Thomas Auld
