by Harriet A Jacobs, edited and with intro by Jean Fagan Yellin (1987)
p. xxi Both its style and content are completely consistent with Jacob’s private correspondence and with her pseudonymous public letters to the newspapers – which unquestionably she wrote herself.”
p. xxvi “Like the persepctive of other slave narratives, the angle of vision of Incidents is revolutionary; and like other narrrators, Jacobs asserts her authoriship in the subtitle, uses the first person, and addresses the subject of the oppression of chattel slavery and the struggle for freedom from the viewpoitn of one who has been enslaved…. the special subject of this narrative, a woman’s struggle against her oppression in slavery as a sexual object and a mother”.
p. 8 Aged 12, her mistress dies: “She possessed but few slaves, and at her death these were distributed among her relatives. Five of them were my grandmother’s children and had shared the same milk that nourished her mother’s children. Nowithstanding my grandmother’s long and faithful service to her owners, not one of her children escaped the auction block. These God-breathing machines are no more, in the sight of their masters, than the cotton they plant, or the horses they tend.”
p. 11 “My grandmother’s mistess had always promied her that, at her death, she should be free, and it was said that in her will she made good the promise. But when the estate was settled, Dr Flint told the faithful old servant that, under existing circumstances, it was necessary she be sold.”
“At last a feeble voice said “Fifty dollars.” It came from a maiden lady, 70 years old, the sister of my hrandmother’s deceased mistress. .. her wishes were respected and no one bid above her. She could neither read nor write, and when the bill of sale was made out, she signed it with a crosss. But what consequence was that, when she had a big heart overflowing with human kindness. She gave the old servant her freedom.”
p. 12 “Mrs Flint, like many southern women, was totally deficient in energy. She had not strength to superintend her household affairs, but her nerves were so strong, that she could sit in her easy chair and see a woman whipped till the blood trickled from every stroke of the lash…. If dinner was not served at the exact time on a particular Saturday, she would station herself in the kitchen and wait till it was dished, and then spit in all the kettles and pans that had been used for cooking. She did this to prevent the cook and her children from eking out their meagre fare.”
p. 13 “When the mother was delivered into the trader’s hands, she said: “You promised to treat me well.” To which he replied, “You have let your tongue run too far, damn you!” She had forgotten it was a crime for a slave to tell who was the father of her child.”
p. 28 ” I longed for some one to condife in… But Dr Flint swore he would kill me, if I was not as silent as the grave … I was lucky that I did not live on a distant plantation but in a town … the doctor, as a professional man, deemed it prudent to keep up some outward show of decency.”
p. 80 “My children grew finely, and Dr Flint would often say to me, with an exulting smile, “These brats will bring me a handsome sum of money one of these days.
I thought to myself that, God being my helper, they should never pass into his hands… The money for the freedom of myself and my children could be obtained, but I derived no advantage from that circumstance. Dr Flint loved money, but he loved power more.”
p. 143 Aunt Nancy “had been married at 20 years of age, that is, so far as a slave can marry. She had the consent of her master and mistress, and a glergyman performed the ceremony. But it was a mere form, without any legal value. Her master or mistress could annul it any day they pleased. She had always slept on the floor in the entry, near Mrs Flint’s chamber door, that she might be within call. When she was married, she was told she might have the use of a small room in an outhouse. Her mother and her husband furnished it. He was a seafaring man, and was allowed to sleep there when he was at home. But on the wedding evening, the bride was ordered to her old post on the entry door…. She kept her station there through summer and winter, until she had given premature birth to six children. and all the while she was employed as night-nurse to Mrs Flint’s children.”
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