The History of Mary Prince, a West Indian Slave
years ago, in a French vessel called the Pearl. She had lost her
reckoning, and was driven by stress of weather into the port of St. Ives,
in Cornwall. Louis and his four companions were brought to London upon a
writ of Habeas Corpus at the instance of Mr. George Stephen; and, after
some trifling opposition on the part of the master of the vessel, were
discharged by Lord Wynford. Two of his unfortunate fellow-sufferers died
of the measles at Hampstead; the other two returned to Sierra Leone; but
poor Louis, when offered the choice of going back to Africa, replied, "Me
no father, no mother now; me stay with you." And here he has ever since
remained; conducting himself in a way to gain the good will and respect of
all who know him. He is remarkably intelligent, understands our language
perfectly, and can read and write well. The last sentences of the
following narrative will seem almost too peculiar to be his own; but it is
not the first time that in conversation with Mr. George Stephen, he has
made similar remarks. On one occasion in particular, he was heard saying
to himself in the kitchen, while sitting by the fire apparently in deep
thought, "Me think,--me think----" A fellow-servant inquired what he
meant; and he added, "Me think what a good thing I came to England! Here,
I know what God is, and read my Bible; in my country they have no God, no
Bible."
How severe and just a reproof to the guilty wretches who visit his country
only with fire and sword! How deserved a censure upon the not less guilty
men, who dare to vindicate the state of slavery, on the lying pretext,
that its victims are of an inferior nature! And scarcely less deserving of
reprobation are those who have it in their power to prevent these crimes,
but who remain inactive from indifference, or are dissuaded from throwing
the shield of British power over the victim of oppression, by the
sophistry, and the clamour, and the avarice of the oppressor. It is the
reproach and the sin of England. May God avert from our country the ruin
which this national guilt deserves!
We lament to add, that the Pearl which brought these negroes to our shore,
was restored to its owners at the instance of the French Government,
instead of being condemned as a prize to Lieut. Rye, who, on his own
responsibility, detained her, with all her manacles and chains and other
detestable proofs of her piratical occupation on board. We trust it is not
yet too late to demand investigation into the reasons for restoring her.
_The Negro Boy's Narrative._
My father's name was Clashoquin; mine is Asa-Asa. He lived in a country
called Bycla, near Egie, a large town. Egie is as large as Brighton; it
was some way from the sea. I had five brothers and sisters. We all lived
together with my father and mother; he kept a horse, and was respectable,
but not one of the great men. My uncle was one of the great men at Egie:
he could make men come and work for him: his name was Otou. He had a great
deal of land and cattle. My father sometimes worked on his own land, and
used to make charcoal. I was too little to work; my eldest brother used to
work on the land; and we were all very happy.
A great many people, whom we called Adinyes, set fire to Egie in the
morning before daybreak; there were some thousands of them. They killed a
great many, and burnt all their houses. They staid two days, and then
carried away all the people whom they did not kill.
They came again every now and then for a month, as long as they could find
people to carry away. They used to tie them by the feet, except when they
were taking them off, and then they let them loose; but if they offered to
run away, they would shoot them. I lost a great many friends and relations
at Egie; about a dozen. They sold all they carried away, to be slaves. I
know this because I afterwards saw them as slaves on the other side of the
sea. They took away brothers, and sisters, and husbands, and wives; they
did not care about this. They were sold for cloth or gunpowder, sometimes
for salt or guns; sometimes they got four or five guns for a man: they
were English guns, made like my master's that I clean for his shooting.
The Adinyes burnt a great many places besides Egie. They burnt all the
country wherever they found villages; they used to shoot men, women, and
children, if they ran away.
They came to us about eleven o'clock one day, and directly they came they
set our house on fire. All of us had run away. We kept together, and went
into the woods, and stopped there two days. The Adinyes then went away,
and we returned home and found every thing burnt. We tried to build a
little shed, and were beginning to get comfortable again. We found
several of our neighbours lying about wounded; they had been shot. I saw
the bodies of four or five little children whom they had killed with blows
on the head. They had carried away their fathers and mothers, but the
children were too small for slaves, so they killed them. They had killed
several others, but these were all that I saw. I saw them lying in the
street like dead dogs.
In about a week after we got back, the Adinyes returned, and burnt all the
sheds and houses they had left standing. We all ran away again; we went to
the woods as we had done before.--They followed us the next day. We went
farther into the woods, and staid there about four days and nights; we
were half starved; we only got a few potatoes. My uncle Otou was with us.
At the end of this time, the Adinyes found us. We ran away. They called my
uncle to go to them; but he refused, and they shot him immediately: they
killed him. The rest of us ran on, and they did not get at us till the
next day. I ran up into a tree: they followed me and brought me down. They
tied my feet. I do not know if they found my father and mother, and
brothers and sisters: they had run faster than me, and were half a mile
farther when I got up into the tree: I have never seen them since.--There
was a man who ran up into the tree with me: I believe they shot him, for I
never saw him again.
They carried away about twenty besides me. They carried us to the sea.
They did not beat us: they only killed one man, who was very ill and too
weak to carry his load: they made all of us carry chickens and meat for
our food; but this poor man could not carry his load, and they ran him
through the body with a sword.--He was a neighbour of ours. When we got to
the sea they sold all of us, but not to the same person. They sold us for
money; and I was sold six times over, sometimes for money, sometimes for
cloth, and sometimes for a gun. I was about thirteen years old. It was
about half a year from the time I was taken, before I saw the white
people.
We were taken in a boat from place to place, and sold at every place we
stopped at. In about six months we got to a ship, in which we first saw
white people: they were French. They bought us. We found here a great many
other slaves; there were about eighty, including women and children. The
Frenchmen sent away all but five of us into another very large ship. We
five staid on board till we got to England, which was about five or six
months. The slaves we saw on board the ship were chained together by the
legs below deck, so close they could not move. They were flogged very
cruelly: I saw one of them flogged till he died; we could not tell what
for. They gave them enough to eat. The place they were confined in below
deck was so hot and nasty I could not bear to be in it. A great many of
the slaves were ill, but they were not attended to. They used to flog me
very bad on board the ship: the captain cut my head very bad one time.
"I am very happy to be in England, as far as I am very well;--but I have
no friend belonging to me, but God, who will take care of me as he has
done already. I am very glad I have come to England, to know who God is. I
should like much to see my friends again, but I do not now wish to go back
to them: for if I go back to my own country, I might be taken as a slave
again. I would rather stay here, where I am free, than go back to my
country to be sold. I shall stay in England as long as (please God) I
shall live. I wish the King of England could know all I have told you. I
wish it that he may see how cruelly we are used. We had no king in our
country, or he would have stopt it. I think the king of England might stop
it, and this is why I wish him to know it all. I have heard say he is
good; and if he is, he will stop it if he can. I am well off myself, for I
am well taken care of, and have good bed and good clothes; but I wish my
own people to be as comfortable."
"LOUIS ASA-ASA."
"_London, January 31, 1831_."