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Updated: May 22, 2025
On this particular account I was very careful who I applied to. In a day or two I applied to Mr. Dansley, whose plantation was about eighteen miles from Wilson's, and who had been recommended to me as being the kind of man I was hunting for. Mr.
Dansley left the matter entirely with me; and, after trial, I found my rules were not sufficiently stringent, and that if I expected to successfully "carry on" that farm I would have to make rules with penalties attached, the men I had to deal with caring little or nothing for mild, persuasive laws. I therefore drew up the following rules, and presented them to Mr.
Dansley failed, and I was left to my exertions to get to Canada the best way I could. I was secreted during this time about Dansley's farm, and was aroused to a sense of my condition one day by reading a hand-bill which was posted on a tree on the road close to Mr. Dansley's house, of which the following is a copy: "ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS REWARD!"
They had their blood-hounds with them, and demanded permission of Dansley to search his house. The permission was granted, when the men began the search. I could see and hear all that was going on, and trembled for my safety. I put myself on the mercy of the Almighty and resigned myself entirely into his hands.
As soon as dark came I emerged from my hiding-place, and, after being supplied with what provisions I could conveniently carry, I bid good-by to Christian Dansley and his family, and started on my perilous journey to the free states and Canada. My progress was necessarily slow and wearisome, being compelled to travel altogether at night.
When the house-servants were at work in the field, they would insult and misuse them in every conceivable manner, and it was with great difficulty that Mr. Dansley could get his work done properly and in season. Knowing I had been a farm-superintendent on Wilson's plantation for a number of years, Mr.
Dansley should buy me of Wilson if he could, and that I should stay and work for him at the rate of thirty-five dollars per month until I had re-imbursed Mr. Dansley, when I should have my freedom papers. It would have required about four years for me to pay for myself at those rates, as Wilson "priced" me at sixteen hundred dollars. The negotiations for my purchase by Mr.
Dansley's, and said he had come for me to go with him to Saulsbury, Tennessee, where he was going to start a grocery, and that he wished my assistance in erecting a building therefor. He informed me, at the same time, that as soon as the building was finished, I might return to Mr. Dansley and stay with him as long as he wanted me. He had another colored man with him, and desired to go right away.
Dansley questioned me closely, and examined me as to my reasons for wanting to hire out, and why my master wished me to hire out when there was plenty of work on his own place for me to do.
He gave me a written permission to work for Mr. Dansley as long as Dansley should want me. I immediately went to Dansley's, and stayed with him nine months nine months of contented time. I found my new master every way worthy of any confidence I might repose in him. In moderate circumstances, he used prudence and diligence in his business transactions and farm operations.
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