cross they were separated; the dogs
followed Champion, and ran him down that morning about eleven o'clock.
Champion had a gun and pistol; as the first dog ran up and opened his
mouth to take hold of him he discharged the contents of the pistol in
his mouth and killed him instantly. The rest of the dogs did not take
hold of him, but surrounded him and held him at bay until the hunter
reached the spot.

When Mr. Black rode up within gunshot, Champion aimed at him with a
loaded double barrel gun, but the caps of both barrels snapped from
being wet by running through the bushes. Mr. Black had a gun and pistol,
too; he attempted to shoot the negro, but William Turner, Col.
Singleton's overseer, who hired Mr. Black to hunt Dick, the runaway from
the colonel's plantation, would not let him do it. Mr. Black then
attempted to strike Champion with the breech of his gun, but Champion
kicked him down, and as he drew his knife to stab Mr. Black, Mr. Turner,
the overseer, struck him on the back of his head with the butt of a
loaded whip. This stunned him for a few moments, and by the time he had
regained his senses they had handcuffed him.

After the negro had been handcuffed, Mr. Black wanted to abuse him,
because he had killed the dog, and attempted to shoot him, but Mr.
Turner, the overseer, would not let him. Champion was taken to Col.
Singleton's plantation, locked up in the dungeon under the overseer's
house, and his master was notified of his capture; he was a mulatto
negro, and his master, who was his father, sent for him at Col.
Singleton's plantation; but I never learned whether Mr. Black, the
hunter, was ever paid for capturing him. Dick, the runaway negro from
Col. Singleton's place, came home himself sometime after Champion, his
companion, had been captured.

Mr. Black, the slave hunter, was very poor, and had a large family; he
had a wife, with eight or ten helpless children, whom I knew as well as
I did my fellow negroes on the colonel's plantation. But as cruel as Mr.
Black was to runaway slaves, his family was almost wholly supported by
negroes; I have known in some cases that they stole from their masters
to help this family. The negroes were so kind to Mr. Black's family that
his wife turned against him for his cruelty to runaway slaves.

I have stated that some of the masters and overseers hired the hunters,
on condition that they would capture and return the runaway slaves,
unbruised and untorn by their dogs;