“In the year 1809, I think, when I was twenty-one years old, a man in the vicinity where I resided, in Brooke co.  Va. near West Liberty, by the name of Morgan, had a little slave girl about six years old, who had a habit or rather a natural infirmity common to children of that age.  On this account her master and mistress would pinch her ears with hot tongs, and throw hot embers on her legs.  Not being able to accomplish their object by these means, they at last resorted to a method too indelicate, and too horrible to describe in detail.  Suffice it to say, it soon put an end to her life in the most excruciating manner.  If further testimony to authenticate what I have stated is necessary, I refer you to Dr. Robert Mitchel who then resided in the vicinity, but now lives at Indiana, Pennsylvania, above Pittsburgh.”

MARY COWLES.

TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM LADD, Esq., now of Minot, Maine, formerly a slaveholder in Florida.  Mr. Ladd is now the President of the American Peace Society.  In a letter dated November 29, 1838, Mr. Ladd says: 

“While I lived in Florida I knew a slaveholder whose name was Hutchinson, he had been a preacher and a member of the Senate of Georgia.  He told me that he dared not keep a gun in his house, because he was so passionate; and that he had been the death of three or four men.  I understood him to mean slaves.  One of his slaves, a girl, once came to my house.  She had run away from him at Indian river.  The cords of one of her hands were so much contracted that her hand was useless.  It was said that he had thrust her hand into the fire while he was in a fit of passion, and held it there, and this was the effect.  My wife had hid the girl, when Hutchinson came for her.  Out of compassion for the poor slave, I offered him more than she was worth, which he refused.  We afterward let the girl escape, and I do not know what became of her, but I believe he never got her again.  It was currently reported of Hutchinson, that he once knocked down a new negro (one recently from Africa) who was clearing up land, and who complained of the cold, as it was mid-winter.  The slave was stunned with the blow.  Hutchinson, supposing he had the ‘sulks,’ applied fire to the side of the slave until it was so roasted that he said the slave was not worth curing, and ordered the other slaves to pile on brush, and he was consumed.

“A murder occurred at the settlement, (Musquito) while I lived there.  An overseer from Georgia, who was employed by a Mr. Cormick, in a fit of jealousy shot a slave of Samuel Williams, the owner of the next plantation.  He was apprehended, but afterward suffered to escape.  This man told me that he had rather whip a negro than sit down to the best dinner.  This man had, near his house, a contrivance like that which is used in armies where soldiers are punished with the picket; by this the slave was drawn up from the earth, by a cord passing round his wrists, so that his feet could just touch the ground.  It somewhat resembled a New England well sweep, and was used when the slaves were flogged.