uel lashes from the tyrants on the other. Finally
the poor little child was torn from the mother while she was
sacrificed to the highest bidder. In this way the sale was carried on
from beginning to end.
There was each speculator with his hand-cuffs to bind his victims
after the sale; and while they were doing their writings, the
Christian portion of the slaves asked permission to kneel in prayer on
the ground before they separated, which was granted. And while bathing
each other with tears of sorrow on the verge of their final
separation, their eloquent appeals in prayer to the Most High seemed
to cause an unpleasant sensation upon the ears of their tyrants, who
ordered them to rise and make ready their limbs for the caffles. And
as they happened not to bound at the first sound, they were soon
raised from their knees by the sound of the lash, and the rattle of
the chains, in which they were soon taken off by their respective
masters,--husbands from wives, and children from parents, never
expecting to meet until the judgment of the great day. Then Christ
shall say to the slaveholding professors of religion, "Inasmuch as ye
did it unto one of the least of these little ones, my brethren, ye did
it unto me."
Having thus tried to show the best side of slavery that I can conceive
of, the reader can exercise his own judgment in deciding whether a man
can be a Bible Christian, and yet hold his Christian brethren as
property, so that they may be sold at any time in market, as sheep or
oxen, to pay his debts.
During my life in slavery I have been sold by professors of religion
several times. In 1836 "Bro." Albert G. Sibley, of Bedford, Kentucky,
sold me for $850 to "Bro." John Sibley; and in the same year he sold
me to "Bro." Wm. Gatewood of Bedford, for $850. In 1839 "Bro."
Gatewood sold me to Madison Garrison, a slave trader, of Louisville,
Kentucky, with my wife and child--at a depreciated price because I was
a runaway. In the same year he sold me with my family to "Bro."
Whitfield, in the city of New Orleans, for $1200. In 1841 "Bro."
Whitfield sold me from my family to Thomas Wilson and Co., blacklegs.
In the same year they sold me to a "Bro." in the Indian Territory. I
think he was a member of the Presbyterian Church. F.E. Whitfield was a
deacon in regular standing in the Baptist Church. A. Sibley was a
Methodist exhorter of the M.E. Church in good standing. J. Sibley was
a class-leader in the same church; and Wm. G
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