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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781575678399 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Moody Publishers |
| Publication date: | 06/01/2003 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 144 |
| File size: | 778 KB |
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More Than a Slave
The Life of Katherine Ferguson
By Margaret D. Pagan
Moody Publishers
Copyright © 2003 Margaret D. PaganAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-57567-839-9
CHAPTER 1
Given to God
1779
Preaching from high in his pulpit to the white people seated in the main sanctuary, Pastor Mason lifted his voice so that it carried to the Negroes seated high in the gallery of the Scottish Presbyterian Church on Cedar Street, reaching to Hannah Williams as well. So much so, that tears rolled down her cheeks, dropped to her hands, and trickled onto her faded homespun dress, making dark splotches. Hannah's hand gripped the hand of her seven-year-old Katy, sitting beside her.
Slave traders stalked New York City daily, seeking slaveholders whose earnings had dwindled under the British military government in the Colony. Massa Bruce had been seen by a Negro servant from a prominent household pocketing money from Newton Woolridge, the slave trader within whose eyes burned the very fires of hell. Rumor said it was for an adult woman, and all the Negroes—sitting tall and still in the gallery despite the shivering cold—knew that most likely it was Hannah who was going to be sold. Whatever it was, they knew it was a herald of disaster.
When church ended, the white worshipers pulled their heavy coats and shawls around themselves and left, leaving the Negroes to linger freely in the gallery of the small, white-frame structure.
"Don't you worry, Hannah. We hopin' it ain't how it 'pears to be," said one man, holding his hat in his hand.
"We don't know what's gonna happen, Hannah, but we all gonna be prayin' fer ya," said an older man, as others nodded.
"Don't make no sense!" interrupted a flat-faced woman wearing a green dress. "Worrying 'bout whether you gonna get sold to a flesh merchant. Lord, it ain't right!" They all agreed, shaking their heads, "Ain't no right in it!"
At home that evening in their icy garret above Robert Bruce's dry goods store, Hannah, with Katy on her knees beside her, prayed a desperate prayer. "Lord, please don' let Massa tear me and my baby apart! Who gonna love her like I do? How her daddy gonna find her if she ain't wit' me? If I get sold and my baby get lef' behind, I wants to leave her in Yo' hands. She Yours, Lord, just like she mine. I'm givin' her to You."
She said to Katy in a husky voice, "Either way, if Massa Bruce sell me or if he don't, you in God's hands now. Wetchee and Sim will help you." Hannah cried,pulling her daughter to her bosom.
"Don' cry, Momma," Katy consoled.
Hannah got up and stuffed rags around the dormer window to help ward off the cold, then huddled beside her daughter on the straw-filled ticking that served as their bed. For the little one, a warming glow of colors surrounded her mother, a glow that leaped and danced and chased off the drab brown dullness of slavery. She saw her mother's love as a cozy flame and felt it whenever she was near. Sometimes she closed her eyes, allowing the glow to surround them both. Downstairs, the Bruces and their three children lay on quilts around the wood-burning stove in their store, to draw warmth from the last glowing embers.
Frost coated the windows next morning when Hannah arose. Dressing quickly, she descended to the kitchen to stoke the hearth. After serving warm porridge to the Bruces, she returned to the attic room to get her child, so they could eat what remained. Later, she stood at the kitchen sink washing dishes, while Katy played with spoons at the table nearby.
"Hannah!" called Massa from the outer room. At the sound of his voice, Katy jumped down from the chair and ran to her mother. Something in the way he called her mother's name frightened her, and she grabbed Hannah tightly around the waist while burying her head in her mother's skirts.
"No!" she screamed, holding fast to her mother. Tears welled up in their eyes.
"It's all right, baby," she said to Katy, tugging her thick braids. "We don' know."
"Hannah!" called Massa Bruce, raising his voice to its full force.
"Yes, Massa?" answered Hannah, wiping her hands on her white apron.
"No, Momma, no!" cried Katy.
In a moment, Massa Bruce's lean, gaunt frame filled the doorway. His lips lined up under a well-shaped nose, dark eyes, and a bushy, furrowed brow. His angry stare pierced Hannah's heart.
"Now!" he demanded, moving toward them as though to forcibly peel Katy's arms from around her mother's waist. Hannah pushed Katy behind her.
"Yes, Massa."
"Go up to Pearl Street," he ordered. "Search through the rubble from the fire and see what you can find. Bring back anything of value."
Several nights earlier, a fire beginning on the west side at Whitehall Slip had cut a fiery path up north along Broad Street to Broadway, reaching all the way to the college grounds. Five hundred buildings in all, almost a third of the city, lay in charred ruins, leaving distraught residents and business owners to search among the rubble for anything they could find.
Even as Mr. Bruce dispatched Hannah, he knew that Woolridge's agents lurked there waiting to seize her and drag her to the slave market for auction. But that was more palatable to him than having them take her from his shop. He never wanted a slave anyway but bought one because the missus wanted help with Ann Amelia. He went along with Missus because he knew she needed help and because he owed Dr. Marion money. The doctor needed money to leave the Colonies fast, so he had bought her.
Mr. Bruce stepped aside to let his slave pass, then blocked the doorway. Katy screamed hysterically, punched the master's thigh with her tiny fists, and ran upstairs to the attic room. From there she watched anxiously through the window, weeping and twisting her shirt. A pall hung like a dark cloud over the normally busy street. Gone were the sparrows that skittered among the leafless branches. Gone were the people; no one walked up or down the street. Not a single cart squeaked by. The last thing Katy saw through the barren trees was the red bandanna tied around her mother's head. When it disappeared, she clutched her rag doll, went to her bed, and tightly curled up there.
Out in the streets, beleaguered New Yorkers without means to flee the British-occupied city suffered through the virtual standstill of trade and services. The recent fire added to their burden as they searched throughout the once-thriving city for fuel and food.
Two days had passed and Katy still lay in the same position on her bed. Mr. Bruce called Pastor Mason from the Scottish Presbyterian Church on Cedar Street to come pray for Katy's health. The clergyman agreed and soon after was following Mr. Bruce up the narrow stairway to the garret. Pastor Mason pulled up a homemade stool and squatted on it—his knees almost touching his chin.
"I oft have prayed for such in Scotland," he mused quietly before bowing his head in a long, silent prayer for Katy. When several minutes had passed, the girl stirred and the reverend stood, bumping his head on the slanted ceiling.
Pastor Mason had seen this child and her mother sitting among the Negroes in his church, listening attentively to his sermons. He had marked them as a pair who loved the Lord. Now the mother was gone. These colonists with their slave system were sometimes more than he could bear. Like the cotters in Scotland's Highlands, he felt they had a right to be free. Soon Katy opened her eyes.
"Pastor Mason!" she cried weakly and raised herself up on her elbows.
"Let's go, Pastor!" inserted Mr. Bruce, clasping the pastor's arm and ushering him to the stairway. "I really appreciate your coming. I'll tell the neighbor's help to come look in on her now." They left, and Katy soon heard Miss Wetchee's quick, sure footsteps, followed by the daintier, more highly arched footsteps of Miss Sim, climbing the stairs to the garret. Sim held a wet cloth in her hand for Katy's forehead. An apple and a small paring knife bulged in the pocket of Wetchee's red-checkered apron. Wetchee, a pure African, had been captured as a young girl. The only thing she ever liked about New York was the apples, and she stole one whenever she could.
"Dey stole me, so I reckon I can steal a' apple o' two," she always said.
Sim knelt down, lifted Katy's head in her fair hand, and wiped Katy's face. Wetchee knelt beside them, retrieving the knife from her apron pocket and scaling small bits of apple, which she put to Katy's lips. When Katy sucked a little then took the apple in her hand, Wetchee breathed easily. Sim hummed softly as she stroked Katy's arm. A little cry broke from the girl's throat, followed by deep sobbing. "She all right now," nodded the women to each other. Sim embraced Katy as the child wept, and Wetchee, remembering her own two children who had been taken from her almost at birth, sighed.
CHAPTER 2Growing Up
1779–1781
After the selling of her mother, Katy's life seemed to hang like a millstone around her neck. Each morning her body's weight seemed to press her to the bed. When she finally could get up, her hands would feel heavy and her feet like cords of wood she could scarcely lift. Her thin shoulders sagged under the burden of her heavy heart. Sorrow rolled over her, crushing her words before they ever came out.
With breakfast over, Katy would climb on the stool at the kitchen sink, roll up her sleeves, and plunge her hands into the dishpan of greasy water. She'd clean and rinse the wooden plates, lay them on their sides, then carry the stool outside so she could stand on it to hang clothes. Next, she'd take the water buckets to the water cart at Pearl Street, fill them, and lug them home. At a penny a gallon, she dare not spill a drop. She'd sweep the house with the heavy corn-husk broom and, following lunch, deliver dry goods to Massa's customers who could not come into the store. When the day ended, if she had a free moment, she would call on Miss Wetchee or Miss Sim.
At night she'd fall into bed dead tired and remember things her mother had told her. Your momma named Hannah Williams and your daddy named Tom Williams. We was slaves in Virginie and your grandmother, Sowei, had a desire that we be free. We planned to get away on a ce'tain schooner that dock at the wharf near the Dunmore plantation. We say if one of us could not get away, the other was to go on and we would meet up in New York. When we found out I was spectin' a chile, we didn' change our plans. I got on the schooner when it came, but not Tom. In all the tears and 'citement, you borned yourself on the schooner. All I could do was lay there and holla. A white doctor named Marion help me, but he sol' me back into slavery when we got to New York. But by God's grace, Tom will find us and we will 'scape again together. If somethin' happen to me, I'm leavin' you in God's hands.
Thus Katy soothed herself with thoughts of her mother and welcomed the comfort she received from her mother's friends, Miss Wetchee, Miss Sim, and Mr. Hendricks, the Negro cart man. The load of sorrow had begun to lift when, without warning, the Pettibones— next door—moved away, taking with them the beautiful Miss Sim. Katy had always looked forward to Sunday mornings when, before church, Miss Sim would come over. She'd tuck Katy's woolly hair firmly under a castoff bonnet she'd brought, then with a clump of lard she'd draw from her apron pocket, wrapped in waxed paper, she'd lovingly rub the dryness from Katy's face and hands. Afterward she'd lace Katy's handed-down shoes, which were always too small or too large, then stand back, look at Katy, and say, "There! Now you look like a proper young lady. Go on now. Go to church; sit next to 'Liza."
Imagining that she looked as beautiful as Miss Sim, Katy would smile as she'd skip to church, climb the ladder to the gallery, and slide in beside Miss Eliza.
"How you today, Katy?" Eliza would ask, patting her hand.
"Fine, thank you," she'd say.
Now slavery's wide net had dropped over Sim, adding to the lump of pain in Katy's heart. She began to spend her Sundays walking the streets, kicking stones she pretended were slaveholders. Her mother's friend Mr. Hendricks rarely came around, and she refused to go with Miss Wetchee to the John Street Methodist Church on the other side of town.
CHAPTER 3The Fulani Girl
1782
Once Miss Wetchee insisted that Katy go with her to the Methodist church for "homecoming." They met many people, ate lots of food, and felt the bonds of kinship and experience draw them together in loving accord. Sometimes the event would reach the heights of glory when a church member or guest was reunited with a lost, sold, or runaway kin.
This year, however, ended ominously. On their way home, they spotted a girl whose tangled hair shot out like an explosion around her sullen face. Her faded clothing hung as though from a skeleton. She ran like a rogue. Her deep and troubled eyes scanned the faces of each person she saw. Katy gripped Miss Wetchee's hand as the vagabond approached them, riveting her eyes upon their faces.
"Jus' act natu'al," Miss Wetchee whispered. Katy's heart pounded like a drum as fear surged through her. She wanted to run, but Miss Wetchee tightened her grip. Then abruptly the girl darted off.
"My Lord!" breathed Katy. "Who was that?"
"The Fulani girl," Miss Wetchee replied. Katy saw a tear roll through the soft, gray hairs that powdered Miss Wetchee's face. "She roams the streets in late evenin', searchin' for her sister."
"Her sister?" Katy asked.
Miss Wetchee sighed heavily, then proceeded to tell Katy the sad story. The Fulani girl and her older sister were taken from their home in Nigeria. While chained to a beam in the bowels of a slave ship, the two were able to keep in touch. When sleep came over them, the girls would tap with their fingernails on the beam. Night after night, they tapped out a rhythm that they made up and clapped with their hands at play like they did in their home, Nigeria. All along the middle passage, this tapping was the cord they clung to each other, and to life.
"When the dark cargo came to New York, the sisters got to see each other at the Meal Slave Market. But slavery's iron chains soon pulled them apart. The sisters were sold by themselves. This made the poor Fulani girl sad and she tried to kill herself a lot of times, by jumping in the river. Everybody could see she pined for her sister and for her homeland. Eventually, the man who bought the Fulani girl sold her to a tavern owner. She still works there in the back room washing dishes and sleeps in a closet."
After that explanation, Katy and Miss Wetchee walked in silence as black ghosts loomed before Katy's eyes. A crying child—lost, alone, disconnected. No momma to love her and to fix her plate, or comb her hair, or mend her dresses. There was no momma to kiss her, hold her hand, pray with her, or take her to church. Who would wiggle her tooth when it got loose and pull it, or say, "Here, let me help you wit' dat"? Or who would say, "Fix yo'self up!" when she cried? Or say, "Stan' tall like a Mende," when she slumped. "Dat white man don' own you. He jus' got you in his grip fo' a while." "I loves you, sugar!" No one to say any of these things. Disconnected. A wayfaring stranger.
Soon, gratitude replaced Katy's fear. When they reached home, she turned to Miss Wetchee and buried her head in her comforting skirts. "I miss Momma so much," she cried. "Miss Sim too." Miss Wetchee patted her.
"Don' worry, chile. God is wit' you."
"I'm glad you wit' me too. Thank you, Miss Wetchee." The following Sunday, Katy returned to the Scottish Presbyterian Church that she had attended with her mother. Yet, her anger toward the Bruce family remained.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from More Than a Slave by Margaret D. Pagan. Copyright © 2003 Margaret D. Pagan. Excerpted by permission of Moody Publishers.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTSPrologue, September 1772
1. Given to God, 1779
2. Growing Up, 1779-1781
3. The Fulani Girl, 1782
4. The Coin, 1783
5. Catechism, 1784
6. The Chase, 1785
7. Salvation, 1786
8. A Brother in Christ, Winter 1786
9. Battery Barracks in the Fort, Spring 1787
10. Fiery Darts, Fall 1787
11. Pinkster, July 1788
12. Freedom, August 1788
13. Sister, Winter 1788
14. Cakes and Cupids, April 1789
15. Mrs. Ferguson, School Mistress, 1789-1790
14. The Wilderness Experience, 1791-1799
17. The Turn of the Century, 1800-1829
18. A Decade of Destruction, 1830s
19. The Mysterious Long, Black Schooner, 1839-1841
20. A Be-Still Bakery, 1842-1852
21. A Crown Awaits, 1853