Classic Slave Narratives

7 Pages 1689 Words

In The Classic Slave Narratives, Harriet Jacobs contribution “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl”, add a spin to the slavery story that is oftentimes not thought of as much in the antebellum period. While it is true that slave men received harsh treatments and punishments, slave women were not immune to this maltreatment. In fact, through her autobiography, Jacobs lays out a story of the hardships and conditions that she had to face from the start of her birth.
Jacobs begins her story from the beginning, describing her family and how they became enslaved and sent to America. Life started out good for Jacobs. In fact, it was not until the death of her families’ mistress that her life would become more troublesome. Jacobs also lost her father and mother within the same time frame. Worse yet, Dr. Flint took over caring for the estate, and his wife and himself made life much more horrible for Jacobs than she ever realized that it could. It was during this time that Jacobs says that she first realized that she was a slave. The Flints treated Jacobs and her fellow slaves as mere property, which was not uncommon at the time, which was a stark contrast to the easier going life that they had lived just months ago. One of the few people left for Jacobs to confide in was her grandmother, and even she was not immune to Flint’s carelessness. Flint ordered that she was to be sold, however, fortunately for Jacobs’s grandmother, the small town all knew what a kind and generous slave she was, and would not stand to see her sold away. An elderly woman bought her, and set her free.
Slave life for Jacobs continued to become more difficult as time progressed. One of her brothers, Benjamin, often rebelled against the wishes of his master, and would often face punishment for it. After one fight where Ben shoved his master to the ground, Ben resolved to flee to the North. However, he was captured, and jailed for a substantial period ...