Quest Biographies Bundle — Books 31–35. Rosemary Sadlier
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did not serve her term. By 1662, the concept of Partus sequitur ventrum, a legal doctrine, was applied so that any child born of an enslaved woman would be a slave. This set the tone for this type of relationship and made it possible for white men to avoid having any responsibility for the children they sired with African women. Not only was this a financial savings for the owners, it reduced the potential for scandal and relegated their promiscuity to the plantation, not “refined” society.
Because enslaved African women were subject to the confinement and control of their enslavers and their sexuality was fantasized and “available,” black women were seen as being more willing to be sexual in relation to white women, who were seen to be “pure.” Many wealthy slave owners alienated their white wives in their pursuit of and involvement with enslaved African women. The children born of these unions were sometimes treated with special care by the male owner who might not be able to bear selling them. However, should the wife remain in the picture, her treatment of the “other woman,” the enslaved African and her “mulatto” child, was not so charitable.
Having the lighter skinned slaves in the house to do the lighter work and the darker skinned slaves in the fields was due to the fact that the lighter ones were the owner’s children. It also had the effect of further colourizing class. In trying to find ways to further care for one’s own children, white plantation owners supported the establishment of the “black” universities where their offspring could be educated.
Having children bound the enslaved woman to the place where her children were. It made it more difficult for her to contemplate escape since her children might not be easy to spirit away from the home of the owner, the care of the older slave women, or the glare of the mistress of the plantation. Similarly, having the enslaved male marry was seen as means of tying him to the plantation, although it made it difficult for him to attempt to protect his wife from violent threats to her — both physically and sexually — as he could not betray his master. What did this do to his sense of self as a protector when he could not intervene in the treatment of his wife?
Part of slave resistance included enslaved people’s finding ways to worship, celebrate, or socialize with each other. Using remote locations, invited through secret communications, they could have services or “parties” that would serve as an opportunity to either practice traditional spirituality or to have some fun, dance, and sing. These brief times away allowed for some courting and friendships to be extended. It provided fleeting moments of freedom. It informed those who would be able to choose a partner.
Harriet chose free black man John Tubman to be her partner. She may have become acquainted with him as he travelled or through one of the secret meetings in the woods. After their union, it would appear that no children were born to them. It is possible that a head injury may well have affected Harriet Tubman’s ability to adequately produce the hormones necessary for reproduction. Without having children to worry about leaving behind, and with her small frame built up through hard work as well as her knowledge of how to determine directions and survive outdoors, Harriet was as well positioned to run away as any man.
3
Unearthing the Truth
During fall evenings, field slaves would work in a group to clean up the wheat and husk the corn. One fall evening in 1835, Harriet saw a slave named Jim, from the neighbouring Barret plantation, make a run for his freedom. Curious, Harriet as well as his overseer, McCracken, chased him. Jim went into the Bucktown general store and was cornered by McCracken, who demanded that Harriet tie Jim up. While Harriet refused, Jim bounded out the door and Harriet blocked the doorway. McCracken responded to this act of defiance by picking up a two pound weight and throwing it, perhaps intending to get Jim, but it got Harriet, hitting her in the forehead and nearly killing her.
For months, Rit did everything she could to help Harriet as she fell in and out of consciousness. Brodess wanted to sell her, but no one wanted the slave who had recurring bouts of sleeping attacks, sometimes as many as four per day. After she “recovered,” Harriet went back to work in the fields for her temporary master John Stewart, and continued to be hired out to Dr. Thompson. Harriet commanded fifty to sixty dollars a week, while a male slave could expect one hundred to one hundred and fifty dollars a week for the same type of work.
Harriet Tubman U.S. postage stamp, thirteen cents. First issued in 1978. Photo courtesy Milton S. Sernett, Harriet Tubman: Myth, Memory, and History (Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press), 2007.
Because Edward Brodess was not yet old enough or experienced enough to assume the responsibilities of plantation administration, John Stewart, a builder, had been brought in to take over for a time. Dr. Thompson’s father owned Benjamin Ross, Harriet’s father, and was Edward’s guardian. Harriet drove oxen, carted, and plowed when working at home, and she sometimes worked with her father, who also worked for Stewart. Stewart liked to brag about Harriet’s strength because he claimed that she could lift a barrel filled with produce, or pull a plow just like an ox could.
Benjamin Ross, though still a slave, was now a timber inspector and supervised the cutting and hauling of timber for the Baltimore shipyards. If she was working with her father, Harriet would cut wood, split rails, and haul logs, producing half a cord of wood a day. Brodess permitted Harriet to keep a small portion of her earnings, and she used the money left over after giving Brodess his share to buy a pair of oxen, worth forty dollars, to help her in her work. It was unusual for an enslaved woman to be doing a man’s strenuous job and even more unusual for a slave to buy and own anything. The Bucktown community would have been aware of this unique slave.
Harriet’s narcolepsy, or sleeping seizures, as a result of her near fatal head injury, prevented her sale to southern plantation owners who might not have been tolerant of her sleep attacks. It also kept her from being paired off to breed while an adolescent, as did her plain appearance on her five foot tall frame. Harriet is reported to have looked like she could not understand anything at all at times, and this was very helpful to her since she could assume this “dull” stance around her master or overseers, while taking in everything that was going on around her. Sometimes she even pretended to be having a sleep attack to learn more about her master’s plans. In fact, many slaves came to know the plans of their owners, as they would listen and watch them intently while seeming not to be aware at all. “One mind for the white man to see, another mind I know is me.”
Harriet was a very spiritual person. Both Ben and Rit possessed a strong faith in God which Harriet shared. They, along with other plantation slaves, worshipped at open-air services at what is now the site of the Bazel Methodist Episcopal Church in Bucktown. By the time of her head injury, Harriet began having visions which guided her or which gave her encouragement. She prayed about everything and took the meaning of her visions to be the response of God to her prayers. She combined an African spirituality with her interpretation of Christianity.
Recuperating also provided her with time to think through the impact of slavery on her life and how she could change her status. Harriet replaced her work name of Araminta with her birth name of Harriet while she was a teenager — though some researchers feel that Harriet was known as Araminta until she was married. Her surname changed when she married John Tubman. John’s surname was from his great grandparents’ bondage experience with the wealthy Tubman family of Dorchester County. John’s parents had been manumitted, freed upon the last will and testament of Justice Richard Tubman. Harriet again was unconventional in marrying a free person.
Certainly Harriet did not wait until her 1844 marriage to consider how to become free. Harriet had been interested in her own freedom for a long time. She questioned John about his freedom and how his parents were manumitted. John’s mother had been manumitted so he was free through the freedom of his mother. Only children born of slaves were seen as slaves according to the law. John’s mother was granted ownership of herself, manumitted, as a reward for a lifetime of loyalty and hard work.
Slaves could also pay for their freedom by buying their own value