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The
University
of Iowa
Libraries

E444
H17
.
 UNIVERSITY OF IOWA

3 1858 019 924 152

DATE DUE

JUN 213 2001

3

DEC032001
NOV 2007
OCT 2 7 200519 AM

JUN 202800
JUN 26 2013

Printed
in USA

HIGHSMITH # 45230
-
 25

THE LIFE OF

Samuel Hall

WASHINGTON , IOWA

A Slave For Forty -Seven Years

BORN 1818

sa
3
--
--
 COPYRIGHTED 1912
BY

SAMUEL HALL
All rights reserved

JOURNAL PRINT, WASHINGTON , IOWA

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1
 12

SAMUEL HALL .
--

-
SAMUEL HALL
he

47 YEARS A SLAVE

-O

A BRIEF STORY OF HIS

LIFE BEFORE AND
AFTER FREEDOM CAME
TO HIM .
-
 1

Introduction
T HAS been the good fortune of the writer of
these lines to become rather intimately ac
I quainted with Samuel Hall , colored, of Wash
ington , Iowa. When I was in the grocery
business Mr. Hall used to peddle vegetables
and occasionally he would unload a few
bunches of onions, radishes, early beets, new pota
toes, tomatoes, celery, etc. , at our store. On such
occasions it was always a pleasure to “ jolly ” the
old man for he was old then-a dozen years ago. He
was an old man thirty and even forty years ago,
old as boys and girls look upon age, but always he
has been young in spirit and even as a little child
in his simple, Christian faith.
But, it was by means of those little business
associations that I first got acquainted with Samuel
Hall and later that acquaintance grew deeper and
more cordial when Samuel Hall and John Wagner
used to sit by the stove in the grocery on cold
winter days and “ argue religion .” Those argu
ments used to grow quite animated at times, and
Mr. Hall was frequently much put out because he
had to stop and spit out a large quantity of Old
Kentucky juice before he could safely give vocal
expressions to his argumentative thoughts. He was
always a ready arguer, however , and he and Mr.
Wagner often made otherwise dull days quite en
durable for those who were permitted to hear their
controversies ,
 Mr. Wagner, too , was a fine old character. He
was a man who had come up from poverty into
comparative wealth by means of indefatigable in
dutry, sustained always by a goodly portion of that
too rarely distributed but ever necessary element
of success, common sense. He was a temperance
crank . He loathed strong drink in every form and
in that he and Mr. Hall were agreed , so it was fre
quently the case that this writer might by means of a
little ingenuity becalm the threatening stormy climax
of a religious controversy between these two men by
gently leading their thoughts toward the evils of
intemperance. That could generally be accomplish
ed by mentioning that some one is " drunk again ."
Mr. Wagner died a few years ago. On his bed of
sickness, however, and when he was at that
threshold across which one steps to be ushered in
to the greater eternity he did not forget his old
colored friend , Sam Hall. He said to a mutual
friend : " Tell Sam Hall that he is all right. Stand
fast ! "
And Sam Hall " still stands fast ” and he
believes that some day he will see John Wagner
again for he knows that John Wagner's heart was
right and when they do meet again Mr. Hall hopes
that it will be in a place where the cuspidors will
be so plentiful and so conveniently set about that
he will at no time be interrupted in his arguments,
for he has thought of a few " clinchers ” that he
wants to hand out to John Wagner when they meet
again . And it will not be long, now, until Sam Hall
will "pass across" too. He carries very nearly a
century of years on his shoulders. He does not
see so well as he used to see ; he is not the physi
cal terror that he was as a slave ; he walks un
steadily with a cane and his days of hard work are
past. But, his mind is alert and he entered into
the plan of setting down in black and white a brief
history of his life with youthful zeal . He fairly
haunted the office of the writer, but was ever patient
under trying interruptions and it has been a great
pleasure to me to be helpful in arranging this story
of Mr. Hall's life and in making an effort to express
for Mr. Hall the great sense of gratitude which
he feels toward the people of this community for
helping to make his years of freedom such happy
and fruitful years as they have been . He was a
slave until he was forty - seven years of age, far past
the half way point in the average " old man's life,
but he feels that God in his infinite wisdom and
mercy has seen fit to bless him with a full, free
life, even after a life of slavery.
ORVILLE ELDER .

Q more
 BIRTH OF SAMUEL HALL .

HE STORY which we are presenting here

T with is the story of the life of Samuel Hall ,

colored , of Washington, Iowa, and the story
is one which illustrates in a most striking
way the great injustice of slave life and it is
but one of many thousands of like stories
which might have been told by many colored peo
ple before they were gathered to that long home
which we are taught to believe makes no distinc
tion in color, or previous condition of servitude.
Mr. Hall is now , in the year 1912, in the 94th
year of his age. He was born in slavery, in Iredell
County , North Carolina, May 7th , 1818. He was the
son of Samuel Hennick, who was born a free man
in Liberia in the year 1756. The father at the age
of 15 years was kidnaped, with his mother, and
brought to this country, and both were sold as
slaves into a family named Vanderver in Maryland.
The mother would never work after she was sold
into slavery, but pined away, never even learning
the language of the people of this country. She
looked always and waited in vain for the coming of
her husband , her lover “ Bingo ” from the home land
of Liberia .
Samuel Hennick , Mr. Hall's father, was first
married in Maryland to a slave girl, who belonged
to a neighbor of his master. Several children were
born to this union, and then the father was sold
away from his family, the mother retaining the
children as the property of her master, and the
father was taken into North Carolina. Here the
father was married again , this time to Hannah Hall ,
who had been previously married also, and to the
latter union Samuel Hall , the subject of this sketch ,
and one brother , Abe Hall , were born. While his
father's Liberian name was Hennick , Mr. Hall took
the name of his mother's master, “ Hall,” to whom he
belonged by birth .
Samuel Hall has no way of knowing how many
half brothers and half sisters he had . His father
was married the second time at the age of sixty
and Mr. Hall was born some two years after that
date. Mr. Hennick's children by his first wife
were left in Maryland and Mr. Hall never got accur
ate information concerning them . Mr. Hall's mother
had six children by her first husband and then the
two, Samuel and Abe, by the second husband . The
father died a slave in 1844 at the age of 88 years,
in Iredell County, North Carolina . In this instance,
too, the husband and wife belonged to different
masters and Mrs. Hennick and her children were
owned by Alex Hall , the family from which they
acquired the name of Hall ,
 A PIECE OF PROPERTY.

JITH THE death of Alex Hall the more in

Wteresti ng part of Samuel Hall's life began .
Alex Hall as the owner of Saml. Hall's
slave mother and her children had kept
them together, but with his death , in the
distribution of his property, the slaves
went as hay and corn and oats and pigs and cows
go . In other words they were divided without re
gard to the wishes of the property. Samuel Hall's
mother was inherited by Robert Hall , a strict church
man, a Seceder preacher, and he gave Mrs. Hall her
freedom, taking his other slaves north with him and
freeing them and there, still in the vicinity of Xenia ,
Ohio, the descendants of those freed slaves may be
found. Mr. Hall's mother, however, did not go north
even after she was freed . She chose to stay in
North Carolina near her children .
Samuel was about twelve years of age when the
separation of the ownership of his family, as above
noted, occurred . He and his half brother, Caesar,
were inherited by Thomas Hall . Samuel Hall's full
brother, Abe, was inherited by Hugh Hall , who also
inherited Samuel Hall's half brother , Isaac. Joseph
Hall , the oldest of the sons of the father, Alex Hall ,
the original head of the family , inherited Samuel
Hall's uncle, Peter Hall . Hugh Hall , owning Abe
Hall, wanted Samuel Hall, the subject of this sketch,
in order to keep the brothers together , so he traded
Isaac Hall and wife to Tom Hall for Samuel Hall ,
and thus it was that Samuel Hall and Abe Hall ,
colored , full brothers, came into the family of Hugh
Hall, white, as slaves.
The life of Samuel Hall and his brother in the
home of Hugh Hall was a happy life. Samuel was
about 12 years of age when he became the property
of Hugh Hall and he grew to manhood in this family
and had the best of opportunities to educate him
self and improve his intellectual condition . He took
advantage of some of those opportunities and others
he ignored against the advice of his master.
This master, Hugh Hall , was a humane man . He
did not believe in slavery and he reared his Negroes
as " free niggers.” They were known far and wide
for their high degree of intelligence and their cap
acity to do work and to do it intelligently, but the
regular slave holders looked upon them as spoiled
Negroes. Samuel and his brother, Abe, were never
abused by Hugh Hall, nor would he allow others to
abuse these slaves , or any other of his slaves . He
was a champion of the black man's natural rights .
As an example of Hugh Hall's attitude toward
the rights of the Negro Samuel Hall relates that
in one instance Hugh Hall pursued a slave murderer
to the gallows, it being a capital offense at that
time for a master to kill one of his slaves .
This particular master had killed two of his
slaves , one a girl slave and the other a boy . The
circumstances in connection with the murder were
terribly brutal. The master became angry with
one of his girl slaves because she would not respond
to his every immoral whim and he stripped her naked
and tortured her by spearing her into efforts to
climb a greased pole which he erected . When her
hands slipped, in an effort to climb the pole, he
would prod her with a sharp pointed piece of iron
and in that way he tortured her to death .
A colored boy witnessed the killing and in the
fear that the boy would tell , the master bound him
and threw him into a brush heap which he set afire
and the lad was cremated . The head did not burn ,
was discovered, and the circumstances already point
ing toward the master as being guilty of murder,
Hugh Hall pressed the case until the inhuman master
was brought to the gallows and he confessed his
crime before he was executed .
Situated in such a home as the Hugh Hall home
it might appear that Samuel Hall's prospects were
bright enough, even as a slave , but there were other
conditions that conspired to eventually bring into
Mr. Hall's life some of those heart -tearing tragedies
which seem almost unbelievable in this day and age.
Hugh Hall , like his brother the Rev. Robert Hall ,
did not believe in slavery and would have freed his
slaves had he been free to do as he wished , but he
was married to a woman who believed differently .
She had been reared farther south and had quite
different ideas from those that controlled her hus
band . She too had inherited slaves and a greater
number than did her husband. When her hus
band suggested the freeing of his slaves she said
that she would free hers too, and would also
when that was done, return to her parents. Under
that threat Hugh Hall kept his Negroes in SO
called slavery but, as his wife said and as his
neighbors knew, he spoiled them as slaves .
Samuel Hall was with his master at the time
of his death . They loved each other as brothers
and when the master, Hall, died the grief of Samuel
Hall was as genuine as would have been his grief
over the demise of a dearly beloved brother. All
the slaves of Hugh Hall respected and loved him
and when he died they wept as if they had lost
their best friend, and they had .
SOLD AWAY FROM HIS FAMILY .

jITH THE death of her husband Mrs. Hugh

W Hall immediately billed a sale of the grown
slaves of the Hall estate. She claimed
that she was afraid of these Negroes who
had been reared by her husband as free
Negroes and in this sale which she made
was offered Samuel Hall, about whom we are
writing, and who is today a resident of Washing
ton, Iowa . He was sold on the block to a Missis
sippi-Tennessee plantation slave holder in the year
1855, then aged thirty-seven years. And there the
real tragedy of Mr. Hall's life first came into
evidence.
At the time of this sale he was a married man.
Ten years before he had been married to Margaret
Minerva Clark, a girl slave in the family of James
Clark, who lived a few miles from the Hall plan
tation . This young colored woman had captivated
young Hall and on the permission of their masters
they became man and wife with no other formality,
that being all that was required in that day and age.
Five children were born to this couple, Mar
garet, Ann, Augustus, Ellen and Adeline. The chil
dren were, of course, the property of the owner
of the mother and it was from this family that
Mr. Hall was to be sold. The day before the sale
he helped to lift his old , insane mother into the
wagon that carried her to the poor house. For
years this old mother had stayed around where
the children were, visiting from one to the other
and serving as a sort of a granny doctor, but with
this wholesale disruption of the family she became
insane . She was sent to the poor house and Sam
uel Hall never saw her after that.
He kissed his wife and his children good -bye
four of the children , for the fifth , Adeline, was yet
unborn—and went to the auction block and was
sold off as we would sell a beef today. The wife
and three of those children he never saw again .
Two of the children, Augustus and Adeline, came
north many years afterward when he sent for
them . Adeline died a few months after arriving
here , and Augustus is at present a prosperous citi
zen of the West Liberty, Iowa, community.
 HE BRINGS $ 1,125.00.

AMUEL HALL was a good piece of property .

He was an intelligent Negro . But he was
S one of the so - called free Negroes and they
were generally bought up by speculators
who adopted taming methods peculiar to
that day and age which very often accom
plished the aim either by bringing the slave into
subservience or killing him . All of the slaves of
fered by Mrs. Hugh Hall at her sale were sold to
speculators excepting Samuel Hall . He was
bought by a Tennessee man who wanted him for
his own plantation, but with all that he had the
reputation of being a bad man. Sam stood on a
bench and was auctioned off for $ 1,125,00, $ 125.00
more than was brought by any of the other Ne
groes.
He did not see the purchaser, did not look to
see. He was in a sullen mood , for the rearing he
had received in the home of Hugh Hall had given
him a proper conception of human rights. His
soul rebelled against such subservience to men
who called themselves masters and his temper
was aroused to such a pitch that he was like a wild
animal in a cage, conscious, in a way, of the hope
lessness of his situation but none the less tamed ,
or willing to admit that he was justly restrained .
As he stepped down off the bench from which
he had been sold, not knowing who had purchased
him, the purchaser stepped up a little too close
to Sam to suit him and he grabbed his owner and
flung him back into the crowd .
Mr. Hall knows now that that was an unnec
essary and an unwise thing to do, but he was not
at that time in a tactful humor. He was in a
mental frenzy, ready to fight to the death, to kill.
He expected that they would attempt to shackle
him then and there and he was determined in his
heart that he would die before he would submit to
such treatment.
The crowd evidently understood his mental at
titude perfectly for pacific methods were adopted.
A friend talked to him and told him that the pur
chaser was a good man . The purchaser trembling
like a leaf came around and asked Sam if he
would go with him.
" I'll go to hell with you if you want to go," was
the answer the subject of this sketch gave to this
new master.
After a while, however, he calmed down a lit
tle, agreed to go with his new master, went to his
quarters and put on his good clothes and mingled
with the crowd. He had sullenly refused to dress
up prior to the sale. Coming forth in his good
clothes, neatly attired and showing up his splen
did physical manhood in better form Mr. Hall's
new owner found that he had drawn a prize so far
as appearances went any way.
They crowded around him asking“ What will
you take for the boy ?" and the new master turned
down an offer of $ 1,500.00 then and there.
 HALF BROTHERS LOST.

IT THIS sale three half brothers, a half sis

ter and other more distant relatives of
A Samuel Hall were sold to speculators . The
half brothers were named Peter, Ben and
Caesar . Peter Hall was a well educated
Negro having taken advantage of the oppor
tunities offered him in the Hugh Hall home and
when he was put upon the block for sale he made
a speech to the assembled crowd in which he pro
tested against such treatment and against slavery.
He was sold and immediately his hands and feet
were shackled and Samuel Hall saw Peter for the
last time as that unfortunate individual, dragging
the heavy chains on his feet moved off toward the
barn on the Hugh Hall plantation .
Mr. Hall never saw, nor heard from that broth
er again and has no knowledge of what became of
him . He disappeared as completely from Samuel
Hall's sight as he would had the earth opened and
received his form into its cold embrace.
Ben Hall, too, was sold and never heard of or
seen again by Samuel Hall and the half sister,
Zavorah, met with the same fate as did numerous
of the other relatives . Caesar Hall was sold and
bought right back into the same community and
was well taken care of and lived a comparatively
-
1
happy life. He died a few years ago. Samuel Hall
learned of Caesar's fate after the sale through Aug
ustus Hall, Samuel's son, who came north when Mr.
Hall sent for him .
Sam might possibly have escaped from slavery
had he chosen to make the effort. In the Hugh
Hall home, however, the real evils of slavery were
not so apparent to him and he did not consider an
effort to escape. After the death of Hugh Hall and
prior to the date of the sale he did contemplate
escape on one or two occasions.
In one instance he and another slave had plan
ned an attempt to escape, but the other Negro took
two more slaves into the plan and Samuel Hall know
ing them to be drinking boys refused to go with them .
They got up into Illinois, got into a saloon and then
into trouble and were finally turned back to their
owners .

One of the most ingenious plans suggested to

Samuel for his escape was one proposed by a white
man named Lundee. Lundee suggested to Samuel
Hall that they run away iogether and he, Lundee,
would sell Hall and secure the necessary money to
carry them on up through the northern states into
Canada. After Lundee had sold Mr. Hall , Mr. Hall
was to run away again and join Lundee and then
they would go on.
This plan sounded all right to Mr. Hall , pro
viding he could be sure that Lundee would be hon
est with him . But, since the scheme contemplated
a dishonest act on the part of Lundee right to
start with, in selling property that didn't belong
to him, Mr. Hall questioned the good faith of the
man making the proposition . He refused to go into
that plan.
 A white girl of considerable property offered
to take Sam north as her slave and free him in
Canada, if he would run away , but there was a
terrible danger in such an attempt and it meant
more than danger to the girl who proposed the plan
and Samuel Hall refused to avail himself of that
chance which he felt was a chance in the strictest
sense of the word . And so it was that he was taken
to the block and sold .
1
 WILLIAM WALLACE'S SLAVE .

HE PURCHASER of Samuel Hall was a man

by the name of William Wallace. He was
T what was known at that time as a " pillar "
in the Presbyterian Church in his home
community which was on the Tennessee
Mississippi border line nine hundred miles
from where Samuel Hall had been sold . The trip
was made by wagon all that distance and Mr. Hall
was in this man's service for about ten years .
The story of his experience with this " saintly "
character will be told later in Mr. Hall's own words.
It was during his service for this man that he was
married a second time and this time he was again
wedded to the woman slave of a neighbor and he
had five children in slavery by this wife . That wife
and their five children were brought north by Mr.
Hall at the close of the great war which freed the
slaves.
At the very beginning of the war, at the time
of the John Brown raid, the Negroes in the commun
ity in which Mr. Hall was living became somewhat
excited over the situation and it was suspicioned by
the whites that they planned to organize an upris
ing and had chosen Mr. Hall as their captain. Dur
ing that time of excitement Mr, Hall did not know
what moment he might be led out by the whites and
hanged to a tree until he was dead . But that all
passed over and later he was gathered in with
many other reluctant slaves to help do the hard
work for the soldiers in the Southern army.
His faithful service in that way tended to make
the soldiers feel that they had in him a good rebel .
He served in the rebel army, taking care of horses
most of the time for about two years. While he
was in appearance a good rebel he was at heart
the opposite. He had a pretty good understanding
of the situation and was content to bide his time.
Meanwhile he never lost an opportunity to favor the
union army in a surreptitious way and was on sev
eral different occasions in the union lines and in
con erence with union officers. He knew better ,
however, than to run away permanently from the
south and from his master for still , by all legal
rights he was the property of William Wallace ;
therefore he remained nominally a slave.
The union army gradually crowded down into
Tennessee so threateningly that the Southerners
began to fear the loss of their slaves . Samuel Hall
was put in with a bunch of other valuable Negroes
and started south as a refugee. Mr. Hall started , not
entirely aware of the significance of the move, but
after he had traveled a day he came to himself and
getting up the next morning hitched up his team
of mules and when the man in charge of the refu
gees asked him what he was doing he said he was
getting ready to go back home.
He said : " I ain't going another damned step
south ."
He went back home and immediately William
Wallace got up a big party for Sam . All the col
ored folks of the community were invited in to make
merry at the celebration in honor of Mr. Wallace's
returned foreman . At this party Samuel Hall was
the gayest of the gay. No one would have thought,
to see him , that he had a single other thought than
thoughts of gratitude toward his dear master. He
danced and he sang and he ate as happily as one
wo'ild who was without a care and the next morn
ing he was gone. The emancipation proclamation
had been issued just two days before and Sam knew
now that he was permanently safe with the union
army and he went to it.
 A CHANCE FOR REVENGE .

T WAS but a few days after he joined the union

army that Samuel Hall had an opportunity
I for revenge over his old master that few men
would have failed to take advantage of. He
feared that his family might be taken south
as refugees, since they were still in slavery,
and he secured a band of union soldiers and went
to his old master's plantation to get his family. In
the flush of his new liberty he said things to his
old master which he admits now he should not
have said .
He showed William Wallace the scar on his
neck where Wallace had almost succeeded in mak
ing a fatal cut in Sam's throat and he delivered
himself of a few thoughts that were not calculated
to ease Wallace's peace of mind . Union soldiers
standing by told Sam to beat the man's brains out.
Mrs. Wallace in a frenzy of terror begged for
mercy for her husband and she with the restrain
ing influence of Sam prevailed upon the bunch of
union soldiers not to harm Wallace personally.
They gave Sam complete charge of the situation,
however, so that his revenge at that time was of an
undreamed of spectacular character. He required
po more of his old master, however, than that that
ex-master should hitch up his mules, load up his
wagon with hams and bacon and include in the load
Sam's wife and five children and haul them all over
into the union lines .
In a few days Mr. Hall with his family and
many other Negroes got on board a boat and moved
northward, forever away from the unhappy south ,
Mr. Hall says that as the boat pulled out into the
river the colored people sang the most beautiful
song that he has ever heard . His old master stood
by the side of the river tearfully watching the
disappearance of his $ 1,125.00 and Sam waved his
old hat in farewell to that man who was never
more to issue orders to him . Mr. Wallace had found
out that Sam was just what they had told him in
North Carolina, “ a damned good nigger, but he
knowed too much . ” Wallace had come down to the
river to beg Sam to come back onto his plantation.
He was ready to make any kind of terms with him
but Sam wouldn't listen to them . He was bound to
get clear away from the scene of the most unhappy
days of his life. He was forty-seven years of age
before he came into his own rights as a man and
after serving the full term of his enlistment in the
union army he brought his family on up into Wash
ington county, Iowa , which has been his home ever
since . The following is Mr. Hall's own story as
written in his own words, telling additional inci
dents in his own life,
IF SAMUEL HALL'S STORY.
EARLIEST RECOLLECTIONS.
WAS born May 7th, 1818, in Iredell County, N.
61 C., of slave parents, whose forefathers were
full- blooded Africans . My father could well
remember when he was shipped over. He was born
in Liberia and he and his mother were kidnaped
when he was 15 years of age and they were brought
over to this country and sold as slaves. The mother
never would work, but pined away and died . She
never learned the American language. My father
had two brothers who were never brought over.
When I was a little boy, one of the first things
that I can remember was that my uncle had a fish
trap and I went with him down to his fish trap
and when we got in sight of his fish trap a man by
the name of Will Hall had taken one fish out and
we were so close to him that he didn't have time
to get away with the fish so he jumped in the creek
and swam across and as we came back-it was in
the spring of the year and the old geese had gos
lings and in those days we boys wore nothing but
shirts and I was behind my uncle watching him when
the old gander took offense at my light clothing and
decided to whip me and succeeded in so far that my
uncle had to take him off me.
!

The next thing I can remember was when my

youngest brother walked . My brother stuck a but
cher knife in the floor and told him to walk and
he walked to it and he was so tickled to see him
walk that he grabbed him and went to sit down
on the tub where my mother was washing and in
they both went. That happened just ninty years
ago March, 1911.
A little later I can remember that the Negro
where I was raised had to have so many days out of
each week to be taught. When I got up so I could
learn the law was changed so that my people could
have no schooling. But the man that raised me be
ing opposed to the law decided that his Negroes
should read and he gave us a chance to learn and
brother Peter was the only one that took the chance
for learning. But I was taken to Sabbath school
and taught in respect to the Bible ever since I was
a small boy.
Every Sabbath we had a long bench set in the
yard and that was where we had our Sabbath school
at home, but the main Sabbath school was held in
the Academy where my master taught ; but in a
short time that was shut off, then there was no
irore Sabbath school for my people . Then the law
was passed in a short time that whoever was caught
teaching the Negro they would have to pay a big
fine.

THE NEGRO KEPT IN DARKNESS

This brings me up to about the time when I

began to learn to read . I had an old elementary
speller and my master and his children taught me
how to spell but I did not take on enough learn
 1

ing and my master would say to me : " old fellow

you will rue it,” which I have . Later my eyes
were opened and I could see the great mistake I
had made, for from the day they began to shut off
the learning from the Negro they began to bind
them tighter. If the Negro ever learned to write
and it was made known the law was that he or she
must suffer the loss of a finger to keep him from
writing .
It leads me here to impress on the people that
everything possible has been done to keep the
Negro in darkness and yet, with all the oppression
that was put upon him , to keep the Negro in dark
ness, when Christmas came and New Years, al
though some would be sold and going with their
blankets and bundles on their backs and heads ,
they were far more happy than their oppressors
and yet the people of the north would come among
my people and speak about them being so happy ,
but for all that they didn't realize what the burdens
of the race were.
Yes, they were happy during the holidays up
to New Years but at that time many of them would
be changing homes and their burdens would be
very heavy. And , oh , such heavy tasks as they
would be put to ! So heavy that some of them
could not endure them , no more than a horse with
more than he can pull and becomes balky.
The men who had wives would go to see them
twice a week , Wednesday and Saturday, and they
might stay to see them over Sabbath , some of them .
Wherever that man had a wife, the children of said
Wife belonged to the wife's master and the father
of the children had no control over his children and
-
the children were raised to tell their master what
ever was talked about during this visit.
And in those days the southern country was
patrolled by what they called patrollers. Those
men would come into our place of enjoyment and
drive and whip the husbands away from their wives
and use those same women for their own pleasure .
Then how could our women live virtuous lives with
such treatment as they had to endure. I have
known these slave holders to take and sell husband
and wife away from each other just for spite when
they would attempt to stand up for their virtue.

MY FIRST MARRIAGE.

This brings me to the time of my own marriage .

I was married to my first wife May 6th , 1844 , by
Squire Dunlap, of North Carolina . The license
then was a permit from my master and a permit
from her master. If that was agreeable, that was
all that was necessary. They gave me a big wed
ding at her master's home . He respected me and
wanted me in his family , but would not buy me
when I was sold for the reason that I had been
raised to know that I was a man and they always
called me a " free nigger."
I lived with this wife not quite twelve years.
Then my master died and his Negroes were sold be
cause our mistress was afraid to keep us so that
sale was on for all of us . I was the first one put
on the block and was bid off the block for $ 1,125.00 .
I was sold to a man by the name of William Wal
lace who lived on the line of Mississippi and Ten
nessee. I was sold away from my wife and children
and was taken nine hundred miles away from them
and never saw any of them any more, excepting
two of the children that I sent and brought north
twelve years after I came here.

TAKEN TO TENNESSEE.

After I was sold I was taken to Fayette county ,

Tennessee, and lived there ten years. With this
I began to see the awful curse of slavery. My
master said when he bought me that he was going
to take me down to Tennessee and " break me. " I
had never been broken.
He took me and I lived with him three years
before I ever attempted to get out among the
young people, then trouble began. I went to him
and asked him one Saturday evening for a pass,
and he said with an oath that he did not buy me
to run around among the girls, I was to wait on
him .
“ Now ," said I , " you sell me, for we will nev
er get along, for you can kill me but you can't
whip me.”
He said , " I'll sell you to the devil."
I said : “ You can sell me to the devil, or any
other place, but you can't whip me. I'll never ask
you for a pass again , but when I have my work done
I am going ! "
I went and put on my Sunday clothes and went
away and after I had gone he wrote a pass and said
I was " too big feelin ' " to wait and from that time
on he had it made up in his mind to whip me. I had
been foreman on his plantation all the time from
the time he bought me, but on Wednesday night I
was away and on Thursday morning he called me
up and asked me where I had been and I told him
and he swore by an oath that he was going to
have something done and I said :
" You sell me, or kill me.”
And he said : " I'll sell you to the devil."
And I said : “ I don't care who in the devil you
sell me to ."

WALLACE TRIES TO “ TAKE ME.”

My master changed my work and when he

changed my work I put the boys to ploughing and
I went up after the tools to start them to work.
When I came back with the tools he was waiting
on the fence and he said to me : “ I am going to
take you down this morning."
I said : " I guess not! ”
There were three colored boys there and he
thought he and the three boys would take me. I
dropped my tools and took up a hoe and said :
" Any man that comes to me, I'll kill him, I
don't care who it is. "!
Then he picked up a piece of rail and threw it
at ine and ran . It hit me and hurt me but I didn't
let on. The coward went home and got the gun
and came back and I was sitting on the fence.
· He said : “ Now by G- I guess you'll get
down .
I said to him : “ If you shoot that gun off shoot
to kill me , for if you shoot to scare me I'll kill
you sure.”
Then he wheeled around and ran and directly
he came back with two other men that were called
" nigger breakers." I was still sitting on the fence
but was prepared for a fight. I had got me a good
club and was sitting on the fence in such a way
that I could get over which ever way they came.
And so, here they came, himself with the two
" nigger breakers " and a doctor and he had a load
ed whip , the end of it being filled with lead about
ten inches long. He aimed at me with the whip and
the end flew out and hit one of the men on the arm
and crippled him . I was on the one side of the
fence and they on the other and I defied them to
come over but they were afraid . They worked for
about two hours begging me to just let them tie me,
but I wouldn't do it. I told them that they could
kill me right then and there but they shouldn't
tie me .

After while a friend of mine ,Billy Tomblin, a

white man , came up and asked Wallace, my master,
what the trouble was and Wallace said :
" This nigger has got the 'big' in him and I
want to take it out."
Then Billy Tomblin said : “ Wallace you have got
the best nigger in the country and he don't need
no whippin '." .
Then Wallace got mad and they both got mad
and Tomblin swore right then and there that they
should not whip me. After they had fussed a while
my master wanted me to go back to work but I
had it in my head that he must sell me , but he said
that if I would go back to work it would be set
tled and I could go on as I had before. So Billy
Tomblin persuaded me to go back to work and it
would be all right so I agreed if they were sure it
was settled.
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 TRIES TO CUT MY THROAT .

I went back to work and still my master had

that old grudge against me that he would break me
and I knew it. In just a year from that time he had
set his mind to take me again . I had been away all
day on the Sabbath and he didn't say a thing to
me about it, but on Monday he went and got two
of what they called " bully men " and they were go
ing to take me. On Tuesday when I came to my
dinner he and two other men were sitting on the
porch and I passed by them and looked at them and
they looked at me but I went on around to the kit
chen for my dinner . My mistress did not call her
men in to dinner until I passed by going to my
dinner, then she came to the kitchen window and
said :

" Sam , they are going to take you , and I wish

you were dead."
I said right there and then : " I'll soon be dead,
for they never will take me."
She said : " It will be a terrible thing . ”
I sat down and ate my dinner and then stayed
in and took my smoke as usual. We always had an
hour and a half at noon . Then I got up and went
to the barn . In the meantime one of the men had
gone out and got behind the barn .
In those days the barns were made with legs .
Then my master and the other fellow came follow
ing me to the barn and when I went into the barn
the one that was behind the barn came around and
the two of them were coming in the door and one of
them said :
 " Sam , I guess we'll have to take you down."
But there were entries made in the barn and
bars to keep the horses from backing into the en
tries. I took one bar down and dropped it and car
ried the other one with me up to the head of the
horses very unconcerned . When they said they
would have to take me, I said : " I guess not,” and
I made for them and ran them out of the barn and
started to go out of the barn myself. My master
was standing at the side of the door with a knife in
his hand and I did not see him and he tried to
cut my throat. He succeeded so far that he just
missed the jugular vein, striking me in the jaw
with the knife. Then he ran and me after them ,
the blood flying from my face and neck .
I chased them out of the barn yard and then
for forty-eight hours no one could come near me,
not even my wife who wanted to wrap up my neck.
I was crazy mad and did not care if I died . I just
let the cut in my neck and jaw go.
When I came to my senses the " nigger break
ers ” had gone and my master came to me and apol
ogized , saying that he was wrong and begging me
to go back to work , but I would not go to work for
a week or more and then I was persuaded to by
friends and finally did and never had any more
trouble with him as long as I stayed . After that he
was offered $ 1,900.00 for me and he would not take
it. That was in the spring of 1858 .

MY SECOND MARRIAGE .

I was married to my second wife in September,

1857, and we lived together fifty years and six
months. To us nine children were born , three dead
and six living. My wife and my master's wife were
full cousins. After this trouble with my master i
had made my mind to run off and go to Canada , I
and another man by the name of Mart Burnette ,
but he took in two other fellows and when he did
that I was afraid because I knew that they drank
and I was afraid to risk them . So they started and
went off and went up into Illinois and went into a
saloon and when they went into the saloon they
got into trouble and were asked for their pass and
they had none. Then they were taken to St. Louis
and put in jail and lay there for three months and
were advertised for sale, and their masters went up
and got them and brought them back and put them
in old Ed Forrest's trader yard and their masters
would go in and whip them three times a day. How
cruel ! They were kept there two weeks, or until
they found some one to buy them, and one of them
was whipped nearly to death . Mart Burnette in
about three months after he was sold down below
Vicksburg came back after me to go with him
to Canada. I was away and he couldn't see me,
but if I had been home I should have gone. I never
saw him any more for he got to Canada and wrote
back to his master and said : “ I am in Canada, now
you come and get me."

Old Ed Forrest was the General Forrest who

was in the southern army. He kept a slave trader
yard in Memphis and I knew him well. I saw him
often when I was in Memphis for my master . He
would buy up slaves and keep them in this yard
and sell them like people sell hogs today . He did
a big business and was known all over the south .
His trader yard was always filled full of slaves
for sale or trade, and the danger of the freeing of
the slaves made old Ed fear that his business was
going to be knocked out . That was the reason he
fought so hard for the south . He didn't want his
“ nigger pen " put out of business.

CRUELTIES OF SLAVERY.

I knew an old man who was whipped to death

by his master. I saw the old man after he was
whipped so hard. The master took a “ nigger"
whip and doubled it and whipped the old man
until there were splits in his side where the whip
doubled over. The old man lived several ays af
ter the whipping and one night I was out fishing
and while I was sitting on the bank in the dark
fishing I heard a voice praying and it was the old
man . He had crawled out into the brush and he
was praying for his master, that the master might
be brought to see the light. God says “Blessed are
the merciful, for they shail innerit the earth .” My
people have always been merciful . God will keep
his promise in his own good time ; in his own good
way.
I have seen slave mothers fall over in a dead
faint when their children were sold away from
them . The mothers would have to hand down
their children and when they fell over in a faint
men would pick the poor women up and carry them
away just as if they were dogs . Those mothers
loved their little children just the same as white
mother's love their little babies and some of them .
were never happy again and some went insane as
did my old mother when her children were sold
away from her .
My first wife's sister was killed by her master.
He struck her over the head with a loaded cane .
We did not know that for some time after the girl's
death for slaves feared to tell such things for fear
they would be killed for telling.
My boy, Frank , was taken by William Wallace
down into the brush and whipped and Wallace told
Frank that if he told me he would kill him . Wal
lace knew me so well that he feared to let me know
that he had whipped one of my boys. Frank never
told me about it until after we were up north , clear
away from any danger from Wallace .

THE LITTLE CHILDREN.

Now I want to speak about how the little chil

dren were treated . I have seen where these " nig
ger" traders would go and buy children from eight
years down to babies . To feed them they would
have a pan about ten or fifteen feet long and put
a row of these children on each side of it and they
would make soup of vegetables and these children
would just eat and stap and - fight like pigs over
swill . They were cared for by an old woman
whose charge it was to look after them like we do
hogs. They were raised to do just like what you
would tell a dog to do . When they would come
to ten or eleven years old they would be put on the
block and sold.
The poor mothers had to hand their children
down to those " nigger ” traders " just the same as
you would sell a calf away from a cow . No mat
ter how her heart would ache she would have to
see her little child go, and yet one- third of said
children would probably have white fathers and the
very one that was patroled out to keep the negro in
his place would often be the father to some of these
children .
Now I want to know what the reader thinks of
this inhuman treatment toward my people when
your people went into the wilds of Africa and
brought the Negroes here among enlightened people
and placed him here as a slave and kept him in
bondage nigh unto three centuries ; used them like
dogs, yes even placed them lower than a dog , used
him to his own advantage and yet they want the
Negro problem solved. Suppose they had begun
solving this years sooner and remembered that he
was flesh and blood the same as you and others of
different nationalities that they are sending the
light to by missionaries. Suppose they had begun
working on us to enlighten us instead of kicking
us lower and lower. The problem wo'ud have been
solved years ago, yes years ago .
Tell me what the Negro has done to make him
a slave . Sure, he has his bad with his good ones , so
have the white people, but there has never been
anything done that was rig but what he stood by
it as a man. Show me if you please what reproach
the Negro has ever brought on this nation. No sir,
he has been loyal to his nation . God said "blessed
are the peace makers” and this the loyal Negro be
lieves in.
But, slavery has been God's doing. God was in
it. It was a blessing to the black man and a curse
to the white man. It brought my people from sav.
agery and gave us the enlightenment of the Ameri
can people. There are black men in Africa now
who went over from here who are doing ten times
more good than a white man can for the people of
Africa know they are their own people . There was
lots of suffering for the black people in slavery
but it had its purpose . The Children of Israel
were in slavery , too . That was God's plan. Joseph
was sold up into Egypt ; we were stolen and
brought over into America . God was in all of it.
I thank you for reading my story and may God
bless you as he has blessed me with long life and
may your latter days be as happy as mine have
been .. SAMUEL HALL .
 SAMUEL HALL'S LATER LIFE.

¡HAT THEN is Samuel Hall's story as writ

ten by himself. He was rather meagre in his
T details , therefore this writer added to the
story the opening and more detailed outline
of his career . However , his life in all of its
strange vicissitudes offers abundant room
for a long, long story . But this work was for the
purpose only of putting in black and white, for
Mr. Hall's own satisfaction , a few of the incidents
of his long life, and also to express to the people of
Washington county , Iowa , Mr. Hall's appreciation
of the good treatment that he and his family has
always received from them .
The next forty -seven years of Mr. Hall's life
can be told in even fewer words . He was forty
seven years of age at the time that he was freed
from slavery and at the time of this writing he has
enjoyed just about forty- seven years more of free
life . They have been beautiful years to him , too .
He has enjoyed them all and he expects to go
right on enjoying this life and finally quietly blend
it into that grander and better life about which he
has read and thought now for over ninety years.
As a little black youngster, barely able to tod
dle about, his first master “ Alex Hall " used to gath
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-
 er the slaves about him Sunday afternoons in the
yard of his home and teach them about God and
Heaven and there it was that Samuel Hall learn
ed about God and became a thorough convert to
the principles that are the essence of real
Christianity .
In some of the more stirring experiences of
his life he had his trials, his temptations, and made
his mistakes, as all others have done. But those
little lessons that he learned in his master's Sunday
school when he was a small boy kept him steadfast
in the Christian faith and undoubtedly were the
means of preserving his life through the trying
years of his later slave life.
Immediately after the close of the civil war
Samuel Hall , his wife and his five children came to
Washington , Iowa. Mr. Hall had planned to go to
Wisconsin , but while in Memphis serving out the
time of his enlistment with the union army he fell
in with Major James Hope and Captain Allen and
he liked them and concluded to go where they went.
They came back to Washington and here Mr. Hall
came as an entire stranger, a perfectly black man ,
with a black wife and five coal black children .
It was like coming into a new world to them , but
the manner of Mr. Hall's rearing had in a way pre
pared him for the change in his conditions and he
soon adapted himself to the ways of the north .

1
 HIS LIFE IN WASHINGTON .

R. HALL moved his family into a little house

up in the east end of Washington and
M there they lived for three days. In the
meantime he had been looking for work
John Hale saw him , liked his appearance
and approached him to ask him what kind
of work he wanted to do. Sam told him that he
wanted any kind of work , so Mr. Hale hired him to
farm for him . He farmed for John Hale for four
years, managing the farm entirely and retired from
that work only to go into farming for himself.
At the very beginning of his work in the north
he had some little humiliations to endure, but they
were as nothing to what he had had to endure as a
slave so they seemed as comparatively nothing to
him . They hurt his pride a little , but in doing
that they spurred him to greater honorable effort
in order that he might show the white men that
there were some good Negroes .
One citizen of Washington prominent in that
day wondered why John Hale was "taking a lot
of damned ‘niggers' out to his place to steal ev
erything he had." Mr. Hall heard of the remark
and long after, when he had “ proved himself” and
after he had become intimately acquainted with that
" prominent citizen " he recalled the saying to the
mind of the citizen and had the satisfaction of hear
ing the old gentleman admit that he had been fool
ed in Sam Hall and his family.
Shortly after moving out onto the Hale farm
the matter of schooling for his children came up.
There was objection in the district on the part of
some of the families to permitting the Negroes to
go to school with their children . One farmer said
that Hall's children were going to be permitted
to go to school in that district his children should
stay at home. S. P. Kiefer, still a resident of this
community was one of the directors and he said
that Hall's , children “ were going to school in that
district and the other man could keep his children
at home if he wanted to ." That didn't happen , how
ever . The disgruntled farmer sent his children to
school just the same and inside of three weeks
they were the most friendly of all the children in
the school toward Mr. Hall's children .
At the close of his service with John Hale, Mr.
Hall bought a little farm of Dr. McClelland west of
town . That he farmed for a while and then he sold
it and planned to go to Kansas. Before getting
started west, however, he changed his mind and
bought teams and again went to farming for him
self. He rented from Dr. McClelland for two years ;
from Michael Hayes for five years ; from Alex
Houck for three years, and then he came into
Washington where he has since lived . He accumu
lated enough property to see him safely through
his old age and he saw all his children started
well in life so far as education could start them .
He always felt that education was the one thing
that was needed to bring his people up. The right
kind of education he says will solve the Negro
problem. It must be an education that teaches in
dustry and frugality . If the Negro will go his own
way, work, do his work well, be honest and treat
all men right, Mr. Hall insists that he will be re
spected and will not be subjected to the humilia
tions and reproaches that are heaped upon the less
worthy.
He knows there is a prejudice against the Ne
gro that is deep seated and generally very unjust.
It is a prejudice that is to a certain extent based
upon that often illustrated principle which is shown
in one's dislike for one whom he has injured . The
south injured the Negro, took unfair advantage of
him and now in his life of so - called freedom the
people of the south , pricked by an uneasy con
science, still, in many instances , strive to justify
themselves and in so doing evidence their hatred
of the Negro as a free man in this country .
Samuel Hall is an interesting old colored man .
Mental and physical strength have been happily
blended into his make-up. He is optimistic in tem
perament; well satisfied to take the events of the
day as they come, having faith in the outcome and
believing that all things are for the best to them
that " love the Lord .”
He has always been highly respected by those
who knew him and those who have known him in
timately know that he is made of the kind of stuff
that heroes are built from . In authorizing the pub
lication of this short story of his life he did it, not
because he felt that his life was entitled to any
greater publicity than the lives of thousands of
others , but because he wanted to express in some
public way the great sense of gratitude which he
feels toward the people of the community in which
he has lived his free life. He says :
" I want the people of Washington and Wash
ington county to know that I have always tried
to live like a man among them and to be in my
conduct as nearly like them as I could . I didn't
want them to see anything different about me ex
cepting my skin, and I have always claimed that
if a man is as black as coal, but behaves himself
and tends to his own business and don't shove
himself in where he ain't wanted, he'll get along all
right and will be wanted more and more places as
he grows older. You tell the people of Washing
ton county that they've always been good to me and
my family and we all thank them for it . ! owa is
the best state in the union toward the Negro and
Iowa has always tried to help me and my people."
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